new orleans will rise again, just not above sea level

President Bush last night revealed a bold plan to rebuild New Orleans. In Washington, “bold” is typically used as a synonym for “expensive.” Often, you will overhear hill staffers using the words interchangeably. “Have you seen how bold gas has gotten?” Or, “We need to use some really expensive colors if we want this graph to stand out.”

The President’s proposal takes an imaginative, multifaceted approach to addressing the many problems facing New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. For instance, to encourage businesses to return, the president proposes spending money. He would also institute a new program that would spend money to increase home ownership. In fact it is believed the bags used by the Army Corps of Engineers to plug the levee breaches were in fact sacks of cash oil company executives had donated because frankly they were running out of room and their wives were tired of having to clean up around them.

Democrats were caught off guard. Democratic Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid asked for a response said, “He wants to spend how much? Are you freaking kidding me? I mean, not in our wildest dreams. Next thing you’re going to tell me is he wants to give control over the spending to the Democrats in Louisiana, ha ha. What? Why are you all looking at me like that?”

Excited local officials have announced some preliminary plans. Mayor Ray Nagin has proposed an underground parking garage to store all the city’s municipal busses, the new Orleans Levee Board has suggested building a new meeting room carved from a solid block of gold, the city council wants to establish a jobs program for the very neediest of their first and second cousins while Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco is still trying to decide what to wear this morning.

White House officials stress that this really isn’t spending, it’s “investment.” How can you tell the difference? It’s spending when the other guy does it.

J.