[%] You haven't heard enough about Katrina yet

Not until you have read this article about a lost pet, this one about "why" Katrina happened, this one in which a police official says something about people who won't leave that the Huffington Post will not, this one which demonstrates that Rudy Giuliani, inspite of being a morally-flawed man, was a greater leader under fire than all the elected officials in Louisiana rolled up into one, and of course this one in which Sean Penn lectures the world on what a criminal President Bush is, but all his examples of negligence or callousness are from local officials.

The last thing you should read, just to keep your mind sharp, is this article about "who's fault" this was. As you read, I'd like you to think about this: these are the vital economic stats of New Orleans prior to the disaster. In 2004, visitor (read: tourist) spending in that city was $4.9 Billion, and contributed over $156 million to LA tax coffers. Quick math: that's a 3.2% tax on tourism trade. If the city of New Orleans needed $11 million last year to shore up the levees, and the Federal government came up with $5.5 million, an increase in tourism taxes of 0.25% (that's 25 cents on every $10,000) would have created an additional $12.2 million to overfund the project the Army Corps of Engineers said it needed.

Would it really have been too much to ask that New Orleans -- which would be the only beneficiary of the levees -- pay half on the project when they have an ample source of tax revenue to draw from?