Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans?

As symbol of what's gone wrong in this country over past seven years, you don't even have to go to Baghdad to see devastation, disappointment and disenfranchisement.  Just go to New Orleans. The nation's spotlight has been on it several times since August 2005 ... for football games... the upcoming NBA All-Star Game ... and all these images make the city look like nothing ever happened.  Sportscasters make opaque references to the city being well on its way to recovery. 

None of the political candidates have used the city as one of President Bush's great failures.  Sure there have been occasion references by Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton.  And certainly none of the Republican candidates have made a big deal about what they would do to rejuvenate The Crescent City.  In fact, in all the debates, I've watched - Democratic or Republican - the city is rarely, if ever, mentioned.

So, let me offer my five point plan to the candidates... maybe somebody's listening...

Spend the night in a FEMA trailer in the Ninth Ward.

• Clean up the housing fraud and create a well-managed program to loan and/or grant money to deserving homeowners to rebuild.
• Provide tax credits for homebuilders, retailers and manufacturers to invest in the city so that there will be jobs for those who are there and perhaps attract the tens of thousands who relocated.
• Invest in the HBCUs there to complete their repairs from Hurricane Katrina damage.
• Invite all the city's mayors to New Orleans to sit face-to-face to make sure every city has a disaster preparedness plan that is a ‘living document' and not full of pipedreams.

So, I ask, as Louie Armstrong sang:

Do you know what it means to Miss New Orleans
When that's where you left your heart
And there's one thing more...I miss the one I care for
More.....more than I miss.......New Orleans