theSouthernDem

Katrina has hastened the inevitable - New Orleans will wither on the vine faster than it was doing before due to Katrina.

"The new doubts, surprisingly, are largely not based on the widespread damage caused by the flood. Rather, crippling problems that existed long before Hurricane Katrina are mostly being blamed for the city’s failure to thrive.

In this view, the storm was merely a grim exclamation point to conditions decades in the making. Before the storm, some economists say, New Orleans may have had more people than its economy could support, and the stalled repopulation is merely reflecting that."

The scapegoats will certainly not be NO itself - this will be laid at the feet of the federal government and whites in general.

The Iraqi government has voted to let the process of dividing up Iraq continue with some political cover, i.e., acknowldeging reality. Why not? The Kurds are already mostly autonomous - they fly Kurdish flags over government buildings and, more importantly, control oil revenues. Now the Shia want the same in the south. Who can be surprised or blame them? Malaiki's government is on political life support and the administrations defenses of the democracy building experiment gone awry remind me of the ROTC guard at the end of Animal House who shouts repeatedly "All is well! All is Well!"

It's great to hear that the Iraqi Interior Minister has Maliki's backing to address Shia militias by reshuffling some forces, but he can only do as much as Moqtada al-Sadr will let him.