Some Followups

I asked early this week if New Orleans should be rebuilt. Seems Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert caused a stink by asking the same questions. You can read about it, from a Left-Democratic perspective here.

The Pesky Fly wonders if people thought the same thing about Chicago, after the Great Fire. Good point. What about San Francisco after the Great Earthquake? It's on an earthquake fault, after all. That might be a better point to make than Chicago. San Francisco's problem was a site located on a geographical danger zone. New Orleans' is being below sea level and in a hurricane alley.

Len over at Dark Bilious Vapors has a post looking at the question from a great, historical perspective. Remember kids: Studying the past helps us know the present and guides us into the future!

Mr. Roboto, at Thursday Night Fever, reminds us of the Law of Unintended Consequences. Congress, you may recall, passed draconian new bankruptcy laws earlier this year that are widely expected to cause a lot of difficulties for many Americans. In the wake of Katrina, Roboto asks, will this new law turn around and bite bankers in the ass? Huge new numbers of people will be trying to file, having been brutalised by the hurricane and the flood. When they find out how hard and unfriendly it now is, there's going to be some serious, serious anger developing. A lot of Congresscritters will find themselves seeking new jobs.