Message: How could we have known

In the weeks since Katrina submerged New Orleans in water, poverty and racial relations have emerged from a seeming absence in past years. However, it is not a surprise that the people most vulnerable to the hurricane would be the poor, and given the distribution of wealth in the U.S., a disproportionate number of the poor, especially the urban poor are likely to be black. It was, as President Clinton pointed out yesterday on George Stephanopolous', stunningly simple to see that the poor will bear the brunt of the destruction after five years of policies that have expanded the ranks of the poor in the country. Bush's policies have given the wealthy huge tax cuts while sending the poor off to Iraq to die for a lie and the attempt to impose the doctrine of pre-emption on the world. In addition, there have been reports that Jeff Sessions of Alabama is trying to find people whose relatives died in the storm and who are subject to the estate tax that affects a small business or a family farm. It is more evidence of the Republican's craven view of legislating. They won't find an example either. Indeed, despite the Republicans search for examples, they have not found a single one. That is at the lower limits currently, not the higher limits the Democrats offered as a compromise. It was very clear that much of the catastrophe of the hurricane could have been foreseen if not prevented.