This and more available in the latest issue of Policy Options...
http://www.irpp.org/po/


"After the storm: pathologies of decision-making in New Orleans" by Ray
Taras
A Canadian professor of political science at Tulane University in New
Orleans, Ray Taras had an opportunity to observe decision-making from
within the disaster zone after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Big Easy.
His assessment: “Post traumatic stress syndrome suffered by usually
competent leaders on the ground, combined with the obliviousness and usual
incompetence of Bush administration officials, led to hundreds of needless
deaths, tens of thousands of lives changed forever, and billions of dollars
of property damage.” The re-building of New Orleans is a conversation with
strong overtones of the racial inequalities that are always present there,
and observable by even the most casual visitor to the city.