The Levees -- some numbers

Steve H. at Hog on Ice has some good numbers on the cost to upgrade New Orleans to withstand a Cat 5 Hurricane:

Where Was Supernanny This Week?
Asleep at the Switch

I�m really disgusted by people trying to blame the New Orleans tragedy on George Bush.

Would you like to know who is really responsible? I�ll tell you. The people of Louisiana caused this tragedy.

Go ahead and yell at me, but the facts are on my side. The Bush-haters say the Army Corps of Engineers couldn�t build the levees and flood walls they wanted to put up, because Congress (which as we all know is totally controlled by George Bush) didn�t get the money it asked for.

Bullshit.

The figure quoted is about a hundred million dollars. That�s supposedly the magic sum that the Corps needed to protect New Orleans from flooding. They actually got about forty million.

Let�s all remember our fourth-grade math now.

Louisiana has a population of around four and a half million people. They needed roughly sixty million dollars. So for about thirteen dollars per person, they could have had better levees. I don�t care HOW poor Louisiana is. They could have raised thirteen dollars per person.

Someone please tell me why the federal government was supposed to come up with the money. Tell me why the state of Louisiana, which is full of profitable businesses and prosperous individuals, couldn�t come up with sixty million dollars.

Right, exactly. They could have. They chose not to. Congress didn�t give them the money, there was no reason they couldn�t come up with it themselves, and they simply decided not to pay.

And your question was?