Several weeks ago, the Times Picayune had three front page stories that I just could not believe:

- Nagin Endorses Bill Jefferson for Congress

- City Signs New Waste Disposal Contract at 3x the Current Price

- Grand Jury Fails to Indict Kimberly Williamson Butler for Malfeasance in Office

That's in just one day.

Then, I got a $700 bill from the Sewerage & Water Board for a house I'm not living in, which only used to cost $100/month when I was living there. So I call to complain, and they cut my water off. Then I have to take a few hours off work to sit around an empty house and wait for someone to re-connect my water, even though everything he does is out on the street and there is absolutely no reason for me to be there. The next month, we get a $200 bill -- which we pay -- and yet, of course, a few days later, they cut off our water off again.

That's in addition to my $400 Entergy bill, for a house I'm not living in. Plus double the premiums I paid last year on my Homeowner's Insurance, including the mandatory full contents coverage - despite no "contents" in the home.

Then, a few days later, I am driving to work down St. Charles. Everyone who drives down St. Charles every day knows, (either consciously or implicitly as a matter of habit), that there is no stop sign when you get to Lee Circle. But there are two cops there, with two squad cars, pulling people over. The cop says I ran a stop sign. "What stop sign?" - "It's right there." - "Where?" - "There." - And finally I see, on a little mounted tripod, about two feet high, behind a huge construction sign, the back of what I presume to be a stop sign, which no one else is stopping at, and which the cop admits was only put up they day before.

Now, I understand the City needs money and everything. But, when we have a huge crime problem, don't waste cops' time giving out b.s. tickets. It's bad enough to waste their time giving out legitimate tickets; but to have them set up traps, it's unbelievable.

And not only that, I have to waste my time going down to Traffic Court to take care of it.

If you need my money, send me a bill. Add it to my property taxes or something. I'll send you a check.

But don't waste my time pulling me over, and then make me miss work to go pay the ticket, and then, when every insurance company is looking for an excuse to cancel New Orleans policyholders, give them the excuse they are looking for.

You need me, New Orleans.

You need me and people like me a hell of a lot more than we need you.

I know Nagin wants to "send me a postcard", but F* him.

This is my postcard to Nagin: You should be bending over backwards to try to make it as easy as possible for people to live and work in this city.

But for God sakes, don't make it any harder.

What the hell is Bill Jefferson doing running for Congressman? If he is re-elected, not only are we going to be a laughing-stock around the country, (again), but what is the point? As soon as this election is over, he is going to get indicted. And then, if he wins, his own supporters, and Karen Carter's supporters, and the taxpayers, and everyone else are going to have to finance and hold another election.

So what's the point? Why is he doing such a disservice to his own supporters and the rest of his constituency? - So he can raise money to pay for his legal defense.

Come on. You talk about the opposite of good government. First he's got $90,000 in his freezer. Then he commandeers a National Guard Unit during Katrina so he can check on his house. But this takes the cake.

And who is Jefferson's former law partner? Our esteemed District Attorney, Eddie Jordan. Who was appointed U.S. Attorney why? you might ask. By whom? you might inquire. Was the U.S. Attorney's Office investigating Jefferson while Eddie Jordan was in charge over there? I doubt it.

This guy is a disgrace.

His office was in shambles before Katrina. Then he allows the Clerk of Court to lose the Evidence Room. Then, after a year and a half, he still can't give the judges a census of the pending cases. They have prisoners who have been in the system for months that they can't even locate, much less charge or release. He's clearly playing politics with the Tenet Memorial Hospital and the Danzinger Bridge indictments, or non-indictments. Crime is running rampant. And all Jordan can do is point a bunch of fingers, raise a bunch of excuses, and blame it on everyone but himself.

"Our goal is to get convictions."

(Jordan says, walking off the Nightline set.)

Actually, that's not supposed to be the goal of the District Attorney's Office.

But if that is his goal, he's doing a pretty poor job of it.

Even before the storm, fewer than half of the cases referred to Jordan's Office resulted in convictions. According to one report released in May of 2005, only 8% of arrests resulted in convictions, with staff morale in the office low. Just before the storm, a second study, conducted by the Metropolitan Crime Commission, found that, while violent crime was rampant, they only accounted for 5% of the convictions. Rather than focusing on the murders and robberies, the Office flooded the courts with what Chief Judge Calvin Johnson referred to as "nickel and dime" cases. According to the Metropolitan Crime Commission Report, only 12% of those arrested for homicide resulted in convictions. His excuse? Apparently he told Brinkley that he "had to drop cases because the arresting officer simply refused to be a witness." Come on. My wife tried 100 cases with the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office, and I don't ever remember her complaining that the investigating officer refused to testify. Sure, there are scheduling conflicts, and things have to be continued. But refuse to testify? In a murder trial? Even if that happened in a handful of cases, it's the DA's job to make sure the arresting officer testifies. Issue a subpoena, get the judge to hold him in contempt, and cross him from his report. If it comes to that. But come on.

Now, a year and a half after the storm, we are on the cover of USA Today, as "Crimes Takes Hold of New Orleans." Even with the presence of the National Guard, which returned last summer to help prevent looting, the murder rate is currently 73.5 per 100,000, markedly higher than Compton, which led the nation with 67 murders per 100,000 in 2005.

Forgetting the DA's Office for a minute, you've got FEMA declaring some church as "historically significant", bringing a $23 million rebuilding project to a screeching halt. "Here is a shining star of a project that the whole community of Gentilly is behind" says the presiding councilwoman, Cynthia Hedge-Morrell. "Their neighborhood, as devastated as it was, is picked as the site of the Holy Cross School, whose brothers say they are committed to this city and want to rebuild. And every time we think we are picking ourselves up by our bootstraps, we turn out to be victims again, of FEMA."

And the City has absolutely no plan. It's been a year and a half, and the City has no plan. The Commission the Mayor appointed can't do anything because the City Attorney's Office hasn't processed the paperwork? Then they finally appoint some type of Recovery Czar. Today?

Give me a map and a few magic markers and about two hours and I'll com up with a plan.

Come on.

Around 30 of the 80,000 LRA Claims have been processed.

Travelers is not writing any more commercial policies in the City.

One-third of the City (including people in Jefferson) are likely to consider laving in the next two years.

What the hell is going on?





[See, e.g., Krupa, "Council Seeking Details of Garbage Contracts" Times Picayune, Nov. 30, 2006, p.A1; Donza, "City Hall Tardy, Board Accuses" Times Picayune, Dec. 2, 2006, p.B1; Schleifstein, "Church is Designated as Historic by FEMA" Times Picayune, Nov. 21, 2006, p.A1; Douglas Brinkley, The Great Deluge, pp.48-49; "Crime Takes Hold of New New Orleans" USA Today, Dec. 1, 2006, p.1A; Gill, "Another Official Gets Huffy with the Press" Times Picayune, Sept. 1, 2006, p.B7; Grace, "Meltdown Comes at a Bad Time" Times Picayune, Aug. 31, 2006, p.B9.]

[Note - The views expressed on this political blog / New Orleans blog / blawg relating to New Orleans politics, Hurricane Katrina, Eddie Jordan and Congressman Bill Jefferson, and other issues are the personal observations of Steve Herman and are not intended to represent the views of Herman Herman Katz & Cotlar, Herman Mathis, LTLA, LAJ, ATLA, AAJ, Public Justice, TLPJ, Loyola Law School, the Civil Justice Foundation, or any other organization.]

Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee attacks Bill Jefferson's opponent, Karen Carter, who, when interviewed by Spike Lee in his documentary, sensibly commented that it was inappropriate, unlawful, and un-American, for Jefferson Parish Deputies to form an armed barricade on the Mississippi River Bridge in order to prevent people who were trapped at the New Orleans Convention Center from seeking higher ground in J.P. The "good news" is that even Lee would not go so far as to formally endorse Jefferson.

Some voters are apparently willing to look beyond the $90,000 Jefferson had in his freezer. Dwight Garrett, an insurance broker and adjuster, was apparently "shocked" to learn about the freezer full of marked bills, but, according to the Times Picayune, has decided to stick with Jefferson anyway, as the government's case "apparently isn't very strong or they would have indicted him by now." Plus, Garrett suggests, Jefferson wouldn't be the first African-American politician wrongly tainted with false charges.

Okay. But I would imagine that the reason why Jefferson hasn't been indicted yet is because the Republicans are in charge of the investigation, and they were, and are, happy to (a) hold up Jefferson as the poster child for corruption by Democrats, in a vain attempt to off-set the Republican Abramoffs, Foleys, Hasterts, Cunninghams, and DeLays, and (b) let the Democrats drain their coffers on a meaningless election which, if Jefferson wins, will have to be conducted again. In addition, not even Jefferson himself contends that he was targeted because of his race, or even that he was framed; he simply suggests that he has some secret and mysterious "honorable" explanation. Yet the real bottom line is that even if Jefferson is completely innocent and neve gets indicted, he is tained, has been stripped of power within the House Committee structue, and cannot effectively do the job. Particularly when you have highly intelligent, competent, ethical, industrious, effective, well-spoken, experienced (and African-American, if that matters to you) alernative in Karen Cater, any continued suppot of Jefferson is disheartening, to say the very least.

In other important news, and on the heels of the Travelers-St. Paul's announcement that it is pulling out of the New Orleans market, a new report issued by California-based Risk Management Solutions shows New Orleans will have increasing risk of flooding caused by land issues, hurricanes and rising sea levels from global warming. Although the risk model is flawed, in that it does not factor in the improvements to the levees and flood protection being completed at this time, this report will likely have a detrimental effect upon convincing insurance companies to continue to do business in Louisiana.

And finally, the Government Accountability Office reports that one year after Hurricane Katrina, FEMA is still squandering millions in wasted disaster aid, including $17 million in bogus rent paid to persons who had already received free trailers and apartments. The GAO found that FEMA paid $20 million to thousands of people who claimed the same property damage in hurricanes Katrina and Rita. At least $3 million was paid to more than 500 ineligible foreign students.

“How can people want what is so obviously wrong?

"Democracy must be flawed to produce an electorate so badly mistaken.

"No one forces me to believe what I believe. I believe it because reason has told me that it is right. Reason is equally available to every citizen. If self-interest cut the other way, that would be one thing. But the self-interest of most citizens coincides with what I believe, or so it seems to me. So in a fair fight, my side should win. If my side doesn’t win, that proves the fight is not fair. So the other side must be cheating....

"After all, apart from cheating, there are only two possibilities: either you are wrong, or the voters are wrong.

"It is unattractive to say or think the voters are wrong.

"But if reason has lead you to a certain set of political beliefs, the fact that others disagree perhaps should give you pause, but it should not automatically change your mind, no matter how many others there are.”


- Michael Kinsley, “Election Day” New York Times Book Review, Nov. 5, 2006.

While not directed to Eddie Jordan, the following quote from defense attorney Joe Cheshire seems an appropriate response to Jordan’s statement that it is his job to “get convictions”:

"It is the ethical duty of a district attorney not to win a case, not to prosecute all cases, but to see that justice is done.”


- Lewis, et al, “Rape Charges Dropped in Duke Lacrosse Case” WRAL.com (Dec. 22, 2006).

John Scott is renowned as a sculptor.

But I know him as the artist responsible for my favorite Jazz Fest Poster.

A few weeks ago, I heard that there was still a big problem with looters going around the neighborhoods with a lot of flood damage and stripping out the copper gutters and pipes.

Apparently, some of these thieves broke into Scott's warehouse, and dismantled dozens of heavy bronze sculptures with a hammer and hack saw, presumably to be sold for scrap.

Normally commanding thousands of dollars for each piece, the scrap metal will probably bring in a few hundred bucks, collectively.

I don't know what's worse: The criminals knowing what they were doing; or not.

Two armed men - one carrying a gun, the other a knife - held up Parasol's bar and po-boy shop Tuesday night, marking the second time since Hurricane Katrina that the popular Irish Channel establishment has been hit by robbers. While police said the holdups are not part of an uptick in armed robberies in the area in recent weeks, an employee said he could not recall Parasol's being robbed in the six years he has worked there before the two recent holdups.

- L. Maggi, "Parasol's Robbed Again; It's Second Time This Year" Times Picayune, Dec. 28, 2006.

It seems obvious that a tragic mistake was made on the Danzinger Bridge. I have nothing but sympathy for the innocent victims and their families. And there could be (or, if not, arguably should be) a civil action for damages against the Police Department or perhaps even some of the officers involved.

But when you are talking about a criminal prosecution, for first-degree murder:

One wonders, perhaps, why, if the case against the police officers were so compelling, Eddie Jordan would, without objection, allow the defendant officers to be released on bail, which is apparently contrary to law - except where there is a finding by the court that the evidence is particularly weak.

Perhaps there are, in the post-Katrina Tent City of a jail, inadequate facilities to protect the officers from the rest of the inmates(?)

One would hope, during a crippling crime wave, including the murder of at least seven people in just the last week, that the indictment of these officers, which is sure to put a dent in the already shaken morale of a trimmed down and overburdened police force, is founded upon solid evidence of criminal wrongdoing, and not merely a response to inflammatory cries by people with various agendas, from near and far.

I don't know the answer to that.

But I think Lisa Jordan (no relation)'s comments in the Times Picayune the other day are worthy of some consideration:

"District Attorney Eddie Jordan should apologize for shamelessly exploiting a hot media topic to boost his soiled reputation. Charging police officers with first-degree murder in a situation where they were indisputably on the job is a horrific perversion of criminal law.

"Eddie Jordan says his indictments show that police officers are not beyond the law. No, his indictments show that he subjects police officers to a standard not suffered by others. In Jordan's world, police officers acting in the course and scope of their duties, who make a mistake that costs someone his life, are guilty of first-degree murder and subject to the death penalty. No one else is subject to the death penalty for a mistake.

"Of course, what happened on the Danzinger Bridge will not be determined until the trial. However, there has never been any dispute that the police officers arrived at the Danzinger Bridge in response to reports of shots having been fired.

"These were not rogue cops; they were police officers trying to maintain order in the worst of circumstances: a chaotic, lawless environment so frightening and nerve-wracking that even National Guardsmen were quoted as saying they would rather be in Iraq.

"I'm sure the indicted officers now feel the same."



- Lisa Jordan, "Punish Accidents with Death?" The Times-Picayune, Jan. 3, 2007, p.B-4.

“Let’s say some punk went out in New Orleans one night last year, bought a Powerball ticket and then shot a passer-by dead in the street. Which is more likely to have happened since? A) He won the jackpot. B) He was convicted of murder. The lottery odds are 146 million to one, so he is most unlikely to be rolling in dough right now. But the correct answer is B. There is no chance whatsoever he was found guilty of murder because, although 162 stiffs showed up in the city last year, nobody has been. Of the 162 homicides, 94 still have the cops baffled. They have closed the book in 21 cases, declaring that the killers have either died or taken it on the lam. Arrests were made in 47 cases, and DA Eddie Jordan has filed charges in 17.... If the mayor must be held responsible for the failures of his police chief, the district attorney is his own man. But we didn’t elect Jordan to whine about the difficulties of finding staff when the pay is so low. For whatever reason, his staff is clearly not up to the job, and someone - Nagin springs to mind - could surely persuade him to get help.... What are the chances our current leaders will finally rise to the occasion? 146 million to one? Say it ain't so.”

- James Gill, “Killer Odds: Criminals Play a Lethal Lottery, and We're the Losers” Times Picayune, Feb. 11, 2007.

“The accusation that Eddie Jordan has routinely given more consideration to politics than the pursuit of justice began with his curious decision as U.S. Attorney not to prosecute Cleo Fields, a politician caught on camera trying to force-fit a wad of cash into his jeans pocket. Maybe winning a conviction would have been harder than people assume, but the easy conclusion was that Jordan, who has long been advised by Congressman William Jefferson, held off on Fields so as not to burn his political bridges. When Jordan became district attorney of Orleans Parish and allowed a Jefferson lieutenant to come to Tulane and Broad and fire dozens of white employees, that was prima facie evidence that politics was playing an inordinate role in the management of the district attorney’s office.... On Aug. 30, 2005, four men who police say were illegally going in and out of an Algiers gas station were accosted by a New Orleans police officer. The men didn't heed Officer Kevin Thomas’ orders to stop and instead exchanged gunfire with him. A bullet through the head almost killed Thomas, and his partner Clarence Mitchell was wounded.... The police officers accused of citizens on the Danziger bridge were indicted in December. The citizens accused of trying to kill officers in Algiers were charged at the beginning of February. If the order of charges reflects the district attorney’s priorities, then it suggests that Jordan gets more excited at the prospect of prosecuting cops who fire at citizens than vice versa. I, for one, will always be more disturbed by wolves in sheep's clothing than wolves themselves. Even if Jordan feels the same way, his decision to focus on the cops-as-criminals case at the expense of the cops-as-victims case may leave police officers to assume he just hates cops. Or that he’s trying to court the votes of those who do.... It would have been better for Jordan politically if he had pursued the cases in chronological order. Police groups would have applauded (or at the very least supported) his decision to go after those accused of shooting at cops, and when Jordan later went after cops accused of shooting unarmed civilians, those groups would have had less justification to insult the district attorney. At the same time, Jordan would have come off looking stern, but fair, a district attorney who will prosecute accused criminals, whether they had badges on their chests or not. But the truth is, he has aggressively pursued the cops on the Danziger Bridge while making the case against the violent looters an afterthought.”

- Jarvis DeBerry, “Poor Timing Makes DA Look Even Worse” Times Picayune, Feb. 11, 2007.

While charges were finally brought in connection with the Algiers shooting earlier this month, the accused gunmen had already (apparently unbeknownst to the DA’s Office) been released, due to the fact that the DA’s Office failed to bring charges within 60 days.

You can say what you want about Harry Connick, but when he was DA, I think an Article 701 release, particularly in a violent case, was probably rare - and likely grounds for immediate termination.

Yet, apparently, even in the eight months before Hurricane Katrina, Jordan’s Office released 187 people without bringing charges timely, including eight murder suspects. In 2006, the number of releases soared to about 3,000. And last month alone, 580 people escaped legal custody of either jail or a bond obligation only because prosecutors couldn’t pull together a case ahead of the deadline imposed by law. Charges against the 580 included 457 felony charges. Of the felony lot, 220 people physically walked out of jail, while the rest were out on bond.

As reported by Gwen Filosa: “The day after Hurricane Katrina, police officer Kevin Thomas drew a line in the sand with some suspected looters outside an Algiers gas station store. ‘Man, we’ve been going into this store all day, and we’re going in again,’ one of the four men reportedly told Thomas, an 18-year veteran whose 4th District force was fending off looters as the West Bank bled into lawless abandon. That led to an exchange of gunfire, putting a bullet through a cop’s head and creating a court case that produced no charges until days ago. The suspects walked July 2, having been held first at an out-of-town lockup, and their release was never documented on an Orleans Parish court docket. Despite having a police report and witnesses, and having the three suspects in custody, prosecutors didn't bring attempted murder charges against anyone booked with the crime until Friday....

“On recent FBI wiretaps, agents can hear criminal suspects muttering about ‘misdemeanor murders,’ code for doing hardly any time at all for the worst crime on the books. On street corners and in the grungy holding tanks at parish prison, they have another name for it: ‘701,’ shorthand for Article 701 of the Louisiana Code of Criminal Procedure. It states that no one can be held longer than 60 days on a felony arrest without an indictment. Sometimes a 701 release merely eliminates a bond posted by a suspect in order to remain at liberty pending a trial. But in other cases, the 701 springs a murder suspect from jail because prosecutors have failed to meet the 60-day deadline, and that's been happening with astonishing frequency - a tenfold increase - in the widely criticized New Orleans criminal justice system since Hurricane Katrina. The 701 list for 2005 includes Dquane Morgan, 20, booked with the second-degree murder of Ryan Crooks, 17, shot down in a hallway at the St. Bernard public housing complex June 2, 2005. Three days later, Morgan was arrested. Sixty days after that, he walked free on a 701 release, leaving the case cold and now closed.”


See Gwen Filosa, “Crime Thrives Under 60-Day Rule: Blown Deadline Frees Hundreds of Suspects” Times Picayune, Feb. 12, 2007; Gwen Filosa, “Charges Filed in Katrina Shooting: Cop Was Nearly Killed; Suspects Were Let Go” Times Picayune, Feb. 7, 2007.

"President Bush is visiting New Orleans to mark the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, as are Democratic presidential candidates Barack Obama, John Edwards and Hillary Clinton, and Republican candidates Mike Huckabee and Duncan Hunter. The White House will probably release a fact sheet detailing how many billions of dollars the government has spent on Gulf Coast recovery. The Democrats, no doubt, will call for more money and action. Here's hoping at least one political visitor will be brave enough to say the truth: that while many New Orleans residents are courageously taking the initiative to rebuild their homes, they cannot build an effective police and prosecutorial force on their own.

"To understand how New Orleans is doing two years later, consider a few recent stories. This past weekend, seven family members and friends were enjoying a quiet evening outside their home in a tranquil neighborhood on the city's east side, which was badly flooded by Katrina. Then, according to New Orleans police, gunmen forced them into their house, robbed them, and shot them all, killing two. It was the neighborhood's second such crime in two weeks. Previously, gunmen had murdered a couple, Anjelique Vu and Luong Nguyen, leaving their infant and toddler unharmed.

""The slayings . . . were the latest in a series of armed home invasions and robberies in eastern New Orleans," wrote the New Orleans Times-Picayune. "Several crews of gunmen . , . have robbed and shot workers . . . and homeowners in the area, where many residents are rebuilding their flood-damaged homes." Also last week, gunmen lined up six laborers and shot three, killing El Salvadoran Julio Benitez-Cruz. (New Orleans has experienced a post-Katrina influx of Hispanic laborers, both legal and illegal, who are tempting targets for criminals because they carry so much cash from contracting jobs.)

"In fact, since Katrina, New Orleans's murder rate has been higher than that of any First World city. Depending on fluctuating estimates of the city's returning population, it's perhaps 40% higher than before Katrina and twice as high as the rate in other dangerous cities like Detroit, Newark and Washington. Families trying to make a home in this environment live in fear, even while many have taken to rebuilding their homes with their bare hands. As the Rev. Nguyen The Vien, pastor of one of eastern New Orleans's churches, told me earlier this year, "We're here and we're rebuilding" - with or without federal assistance. Indeed, Mr. Nguyen and his parishioners seemed to treat the subject of government help almost as an afterthought: it may help pay the bills if it ever arrives, but it's not expected. After Katrina, neighbors fixed up Mr. Nguyen's church under his direction so that they would have a "home base" for eating, sleeping and showering. Then they set to work rebuilding houses, one by one. Residents of many other neighborhoods - white, black, and Asian - have done the same. As New Orleanians have found out the hard way, the work is backbreaking, but not impossible.

"What individual New Orleanians can't do by themselves is fix the city's long-broken attitude toward criminal justice. Over and over again during my February trip to New Orleans, I heard how demoralized residents feel when they buy and install new appliances, pipes and furniture for their flooded-out houses, leave for a day or two, often to temporary homes - and return to find their hard-earned new handiwork ripped out and stolen.

"For generations now - and this is the city's deepest problem - New Orleans has hobbled along without a real law-and-order presence. Criminals graduate from petty crimes to burglary to drug-dealing to carrying illegal weapons to gang robberies to murder, and face few consequences at any stage. The police, and especially the prosecutors, are ineffectual. Since Katrina, things have gotten much worse, in part because criminals, finding life difficult in cities that enforce the law, have returned to the Big Easy in numbers disproportionate to those of law-abiding citizens. Mayor Ray Nagin doesn't try to fix things, perhaps because, as he often says, he believes crime is a social problem, rooted in a lack of opportunity for poor youth.

"The Bush administration has deployed extra federal law-enforcement agents to try to get the worst criminals off the street. The state of Louisiana, meanwhile, has sent the National Guard to patrol half-empty neighborhoods. But just as the U.S. military can only do so much in Iraq when Baghdad's local government is ineffective, the federal government can't do much in New Orleans until the city's local government changes its attitude and behavior. Residents have no reason to think that criminal behavior has predictable negative consequences, because Mr. Nagin and District Attorney Eddie Jordan have failed to make clear that people who commit crimes in New Orleans will be prosecuted.

"But President Bush can use federal dollars to try to convince them to do it. In his speech in New Orleans today, Mr. Bush should announce that he's ready to ask Congress for $500 million over two years to overhaul New Orleans's police and prosecutorial forces. But he also should say that the money is contingent on a pledge from Messrs. Nagin and Jordan that their city's No. 1 priority will be law enforcement. Mr. Bush should also tie the federal money to measurable results: rational arrests (from quality-of-life crimes all the way up to homicide), effective prosecutions and, ultimately, fewer crimes. It's an enduring mystery why Mr. Bush hasn't used the Katrina disaster to show the world that America can rebuild a major city using a bedrock conservative principle: law and order first. Democrats are welcome to propose the same idea, of course. Mr. Obama, Mr. Edwards and Mrs. Clinton have all mentioned New Orleans's crime problem in their recent speeches.

"But they often tie it to a lack of staff and equipment in the city after Katrina - as if it's a question of rebuilding something that was lost, instead of building from scratch the most essential component of any city's success. Until politicians understand that basic difference, spending more money - or bragging about past billions spent - while tolerating intolerable conditions in a first-world city is nothing short of disgraceful."


- Nicole Gelinas, "The Most Dangerous City: Two years after Katrina, New Orleans desperately needs law and order" Wall Street Journal, Aug. 29, 2007.