CAUTION -- "OPPORTUNITY" ZONE AHEAD

Progress Report:

Yesterday, President Bush addressed the nation in a prime time speech about Katrina. You won't find many details on the president's proposals in today's papers, "which is understandable, since the president didn't offer any details." But read between the lines and the president's strategy is clear. Though Americans have stood aghast at the bungled federal response to Hurricane Katrina and the pervasive poverty the hurricane's aftermath exposed, President Bush has chosen to push ahead with the same ideological agenda that helped produce those problems.

CAUTION -- "OPPORTUNITY" ZONE AHEAD: Last night, President Bush proposed the creation of a "Gulf Opportunity Zone" to encompass "the region of the disaster in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama." You won't find specifics in Bush's speech, but you can find them on the Heritage Foundation's website, since it proposed the idea in its "manifesto on post-Katrina policy" last week. According to Heritage's plan, the "opportunity" in the zones is actually for the wealthy few and for special interests seeking to strip away government protections and regulations. Heritage calls for a panel of government and private sector officials to target "regulations at all levels" to be "eliminated or simplified," for capital gains taxes and the estate tax for the ultra-weathy to be repealed, and for waivers on environmental rules.

'HIGHER AND BETTER,' OR HIGHER BUILDINGS FOR THE BETTER-OFF?: President Bush described his "vision of the future, in this city and beyond: we will not just rebuild, we will build higher and better." But the policies he is proposing for the hurricane-battered areas will not achieve this goal. Already, watchdog groups, "including two in New York that have monitored the post-9/11 reconstruction of Lower Manhattan," are warning Gulf Coast leaders to "closely monitor the design of Hurricane Katrina aid packages so that low- and moderate-income people, unemployed workers, and small businesses are treated fairly." They pointed out that after 9/11, "rules that normally restrict federal economic funding to primarily benefit low- and moderate-income communities were stripped out," as is being suggested now. As a result, the groups says, "much of the $20 billion allocated for economic development has benefited real estate developers and wealthy neighborhoods."

Factual links at original