Obama develops plan for Gulf Coast restoration
WASHINGTON -- On the cusp of the two-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Senator Barack Obama, Democrat of Illinois, will present a plan today aimed at hastening the rebuilding of New Orleans and restructuring how the federal government responds to future catastrophes in America.
The Gulf Coast restoration, said Obama, a candidate in the Democratic presidential primary, has been weighed down by red tape that has kept billions of dollars from reaching Louisiana communities. As president, he said, he would streamline the bureaucracy, strengthen law enforcement to curb a rise in crime, and immediately close the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet to restore wetlands to protect against storms.
Obama also said that he would seek to lessen the influence of politics in the Federal Emergency Management Agency by giving its director a fixed term, similar to the structure of the FBI. Under Obama's plan, the FEMA director would serve a six-year term and report directly to the president.
Obama and several presidential hopefuls are scheduled to arrive in Louisiana this week to highlight how New Orleans has -- and has not -- recovered from Hurricane Katrina. Democrats have sought to use the city as an example of what they believe was among the Bush administration's greatest domestic failures.
John Edwards, the former North Carolina senator who announced his presidential candidacy in the city's devastated Lower 9th Ward, is set to return to New Orleans tomorrow and to appear with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York at a summit dedicated to rebuilding the Gulf Coast. For Democrats and Republicans alike, a plan for New Orleans is a new element of the 2008 campaign.
The former New York City mayor said he would lower taxes, make permanent President Bush's tax cuts, and eliminate inheritance taxes.
"The Democrats believe in government when they have a choice. Republicans believe in people when we have a choice. . . . The Republican Party is the party of the people. The Democratic Party is the party of the government," Giuliani said at a town hall meeting. He appeared with former presidential candidate Steve Forbes, who is a campaign adviser, and former Massachusetts governor Paul Cellucci.
Democrats took issue with Giuliani's approach.
"Rudy Giuliani and the rest of the Republican candidates seem to be the last people in America who think the voters are looking for more of the same failed Bush agenda," said Damien LaVera, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee.
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As temperatures hit the upper 90s, the former senator wondered jokingly whether he actually was in his home state of North Carolina before turning serious.
"The question that has been asked as we negotiate our international trade deals has been: 'Is this good for the profits of big multinational corporations?' That's the wrong question," he said outside an elementary school. "The question should be: 'Is this trade agreement good for working middle-class Americans?' "
Edwards said he will insist that the nation's trade partners meet strict labor and environmental standards and will enact regulations barring other countries from manipulating their currencies.
"And we're going to close down these tax loopholes that actually give incentives to take jobs and go overseas. This is crazy," he said.
In response to an audience question later, Edwards said those measures would help reduce the nation's debt to China. He said he also would push to enforce existing laws that require goods to be labeled with their country of origin, encourage people to buy locally and give the government more authority to inspect products and food from elsewhere.
Three days into a four-day bus trip of the state, Edwards has been framing his campaign as a fight against the lobbyists and other "Washington insiders" he argues stand between Americans and change. After his brief remarks on trade policy, he took questions, often bringing the subject back to his universal health care policy.
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