An excellent Op-Ed piece by Alex Prud’homme in the Feb. 27 New York Times explains the nation’s critical need for infrastructure reinforcement, as seen in Hurricane Katrina and recently in a flood in Nevada. (See “Floods in Nevada?” in In the News, left column.) The U.S. is threatened by dangerously inadequate levees, he says, and Congress must allocate funds for the Corps of Engineers to do its job: “We need to reinvigorate the Army Corps of Engineers and give it a mandate to build and maintain a coherent, robust, nationwide flood protection system—as opposed to the ineffective, piecemeal measures that failed so catastrophically in New Orleans.”
Month: February 2008
Nuestro Amigo en Texas
Obama draws a crowd of 25,000 or so in Austin. They can’t get enough of the man in the black hat. The Texas Observer reports “Obama Storms Texas.”
A Reply to ‘Obama Our Infrastructure Hero’: Letter from a New Orleans engineer/blogger
In reply to “Barack, You’re Totally Our Infrastructure Hero” (below), our friend Tim Ruppert of Tim’s Nameless Blog points out that in fact the infrastructure part of Obama’s economic agenda doesn’t appear till near the end of the plan. Also, the senator doesn’t mention the words ‘Katrina,’ ‘levees,’ ‘flood,’ ‘Corps of Engineers,’ etc. (Tim Ruppert is a New Orleans–born engineer at the Corps of Engineers, N.O., and a past president of the Louisiana chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers.)
Barack, You’re Totally Our Infrastructure Hero!
At a General Motors plant in Janesville, Wisc., on Feb. 13, Barack Obama “turned it down a notch” and gave a major policy address that laid out a broad agenda for reinforcement of the American economy. The plan would restore a measure of economic balance and stability, create infrastructure and renewable-energy jobs, and many other necessary and ambitious undertakings. The speech is substantive and shows Senator Obama’s seriousness and grasp of economic reality and possibility. Optimism and realism together. We’re delighted to see at least one of the three major candidates offering serious solutions to infrastructure and environmental degradation (as John Edwards also did). See excerpts from Obama’s speech below the fold.
Louisiana Adds to ‘Obamomentum’
This is the kind of surge we like. After winning the Louisiana primary and caucuses in Washington state, Nebraska, and the Virgin Islands, Obama gave a strong, confident speech at the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Richmond, sharpening the distinctions between himself and Hillary Clinton and asserting his strengths as a general election candidate over John McCain. The so-called GOP front-runner, who seems not to have won anywhere on Saturday, was Obama’s principal target.
Geaux-’bama!
Our friend Oyster at Your Right Hand Thief sent us links to coverage of Barack Obama’s “O-vent” before a more-than-packed house at Tulane University’s Fogelman Arena on Wednesday, campaigning before the Louisiana primary on Saturday, Feb. 9.
Happy Mardi Gras 2008!
Today is both Mardi Gras and Super Tuesday. Sounds auspicious to us. May the best candidates win, and may the public have some good news to celebrate. Drink up. Tomorrow it’s all ashes.
What John Edwards Brought Us
We are voting for Senator Barack Obama in the primaries—as many times as possible. The more we see of him, the more we like. But first, we want to take a parting glance at the contributions our First Favorite, John Edwards, made to the presidential campaign of 2008.