From The Hill:
President Obama should use the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina to inject new energy into the unfinished task of repairing New Orleans, according to officials from the region.
Obama will deliver a speech here Sunday to mark five years to the day that Katrina made landfall, devastating the city and tarnishing the presidency of George W. Bush.
Showcasing the progress in New Orleans under his administration could also help boost the president’s sagging approval ratings, and with it the fortunes of his party in November. His speech, officials say, should offer a way to find balance between further oil exploration and protecting the region’s sensitive coastline.
“We’re also going to impress upon him how difficult this recovery is going to be,” Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) told The Hill. “We’re going to remind him about the importance of coastal restoration and accelerating revenue sharing.”
But more importantly, Louisiana’s congressional delegation – Democrats and Republicans – want the president to lift the moratorium on offshore oil drilling his administration imposed in the wake of the BP spill.
“We’re also going to mention to him that this moratorium that is in place – this blanket moratorium is causing severe economic damage to small businesses as well as to the oil and gas companies, large and small, independent, as well,” she said. “So this is a lot of what he’s going to hear when he’s here.”
Obama is now saddled with helping the region recover from both disasters — a responsibility fraught with political risk.
As a presidential candidate, Obama gained traction by criticizing his predecessor for his response to the disaster and for failing to instill a sense of urgency in the recovery effort in the wake of the storm.
“There is not a sense of urgency in this administration to get this done,” Obama said of the recovery effort in January 2007. “You get a sense that will has been lacking in the last several months.”
But two years into his administration, New Orleans is still being rebuilt. The city’s population is now about 100,000 less than it was before the storm, according to some estimates. And hard-hit areas like the Lower Ninth Ward are still dotted with hundreds of vacant, decaying buildings.
Read the whole thing here. So much to say here. In a span of 5 years, we’ve had two disasters in the Gulf. One was subject of wall-to-wall media coverage and used to vilify a President. The other, well, wasn’t. If there were ever a debate about media bias, it ends here.
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