WP: Bush to Request More Aid Funding

[Pirate Smile]

Bush to Request More Aid Funding
Analysts Warn of Spending's Impact

By Jonathan Weisman and Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, September 15, 2005; Page A01

President Bush will call tonight for an unprecedented federal commitment to rebuild New Orleans and other areas obliterated by Hurricane Katrina, putting the United States on pace to spend more in the next year on the storm's aftermath than it has over three years on the Iraq war, according to White House and congressional officials.

With the federal tab for Katrina already nearly quadruple the cost of the country's previous most expensive natural disaster cleanup, Bush plans to offer federal assistance to help flood victims find jobs, get housing and health care, and attend school, according to White House aides.

In a speech from the flood zone, Bush will commit the federal government to what many predict will become the largest reconstruction effort ever on U.S. soil.

The president will call on Washington to resist spending money unwisely, but some in his own party are already starting to recoil at a price tag expected to exceed $200 billion -- about the cost of the Iraq war and reconstruction efforts. As emergency expenditures soar -- with new commitments as high as $2 billion a day -- some budget analysts and conservative groups are warning that the Katrina spending has combined with earlier fiscal decisions in ways that will wreak havoc on the government's finances for years to come.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/14/AR2005091402654.html

[Charlie Brown]

1. This is damage control, but

I do believe this is the right thing to do. I don't think NO will ever be as it was, but we should support federal aid to rebuild it.

[Erika]

2. Great new society...again

as I suggested W has to do something for a positive legacy after how he has wrecked this country. IMHO, we'll see.

[aquart]

3. Uh huh. How does he plan to pay for it?

And which of his friends will get those lucrative contracts?

[Sydnie]

5. Why, with more tax cuts and all of them will get a slice! n/t

[Cobalt Violet]

4. Funny when we need to spend on rebuilding one of our own cities...

All of a sudden the conservatives come out of the woodwork worried about the deficit.

I never heard them so concerned about all the money squandered in Iraq. They weren't worried about the deficit when it came to tax cuts for the rich.

But hell if someone wants to spend any money at all helping the people who actually pay the damb taxes........errrrrrrrrrrr
:grr: :grr::grr:

[FSogol]

6. Funnel more $$$ to Halliburton! nt

[merwin]

7. 60 billion will last a while. First, find out where that 60 billion went..

then set aside more money

[Oerdin]

8. Bush to Request More Aid Funding

Bush is going to call for a $200 billion dollar aid package to help rebuild New Orleans. Basically, he's taken a big hit for cutting 67% of the funding for the NOLA levee system since he took office plus the majority of the public now believes he didn't/doesn't care about poor black people so he's going to throw a massive spending bill their way in order to show he cares (or at least is willing to buy some votes). $200 billion is about 2/3 of the total cost of three years of war in Iraq so that shows just how massive this spending request is and it should about double this years budget deficit.


Bush to Request More Aid Funding
Analysts Warn of Spending's Impact

By Jonathan Weisman and Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, September 15, 2005; Page A01

President Bush will call tonight for an unprecedented federal commitment to rebuild New Orleans and other areas obliterated by Hurricane Katrina, putting the United States on pace to spend more in the next year on the storm's aftermath than it has over three years on the Iraq war, according to White House and congressional officials.

With the federal tab for Katrina already nearly quadruple the cost of the country's previous most expensive natural disaster cleanup, Bush plans to offer federal assistance to help flood victims find jobs, get housing and health care, and attend school, according to White House aides.


more...


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/14/AR2005091402654.html

[OneBlueSky]

9. um . . . George . . . I hate to be the one to tell you, but . . .

THERE IS NO MORE MONEY!!!!

[Oerdin]

11. It is funny.

That Bush claimed it was just to expensive to pay the extra $250 million over five years to modernize and maintain the levee system yet suddenly he says we can afford $200 billion one year for reconstruction. Wouldn't it have been financially smarter to just spend the money the engineers said it would have taken to prevent the city from flooding in the first place?

I guess it was just more important to see multimillionaires get a tax cut so they could buy their third Mercedes then it was to prevent the destruction of an American city. What happened to an once of prevention being worth a pound of cure? Not to long again taking required action to prevent easily avoidable disasters was known as good governance.

[ReadTomPaine]

10. Cash only, in unmarked bills and in a brown sack.

"Leave it in the 3rd stall of the Whitehouse washroom, behind the hot water pipes"