The American Spectator

Reader Mail

(Page 2 of 4)

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"New Orleans still needs help. We cannot afford to let it die." Really?

Mr. Hillyer seems to have illusions that New Orleans was some sort of a cultural Mecca. But no, the facts are: New Orleans is one of, if not the most, corrupt city in the nation. The police were quasi-criminals; the schools were out-and-out failures; the city government, when it was not run by thieves, was always incompetent; crime was rampant.

By any objective measure, New Orleans was (and is) a city that cannot govern itself. As for the culture of New Orleans, it was that of a sewer. Although he doesn't explicitly say it, you can just sense that a big part of the city's charm for Mr. Hillyer is its blatant corruption.

Even now, so much of the money -- both private and from the government -- that is being funneled down there is stolen and/or squandered. But all that money is not enough. It never will be. But why pour billions, maybe even a trillion plus dollars, into New Orleans, especially given the fact that the city itself is below sea level and is still sinking deeper?

p>If anything, the New Orleans recovery money should go to protect the area's port facilities and oil refineries which serve a national purpose, not to rebuild ghettos and reestablish its "culture." br> -- Peter Skurkiss br> Stow, Ohio /p>

While I sympathize with Louisiana, Quin Hillyer, I truly don't understand how we can rebuild New Orleans. When people with houses on Long Beach, North Carolina, were not allowed to rebuild after a hurricane a few years back, I thought it sad, but the risk they took for living so close to the sea.

When you have a city that resides in a bowl below sea level, it seems a rather risky proposition to rebuild it. Apparently no one wanted to spend the money there over the years to maintain those improperly built levies. What makes you think that money will be spent wisely this time in a corrupt city in a corrupt state?

Don't get me wrong. I agree that New Orleans has been a treasure, and if I could be assured that that city of murder and mayhem could actually be resurrected from the mud and controlled by some adults rather than those fun-loving, irresponsible, money-grubbers that have run New Orleans (also known as: "colorful eccentrics"), then I'd be first to grab a hammer and send some money.

p>Someone needs to take charge of that, but I don't see anyone stepping up. Maybe Bobby Jindal if he can get past the corruption of the state that houses that doomed city. br> --

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