So I was listening to Bush’s speech about Katrina.

It started off boring — a laundry list of things that happened as a result of Katrina (we know what happened, George; we were paying attention), and a laundry list of things that are happening now in terms of recovery.

Yawn.

Then he started going into rebuilding efforts.  I thought parts of it were nice, and a few of the ideas were good.  Of course, it sounds like much of the federal help is going to go to "entrepreneurs", rather than actual people.  I can understand helping out businesses through tough times, but construction businesses in New Orleans are NOT going to be hurting in the next several months and years.  Why do they need federal aid?

And where is all this money going to come from?  How are fiscal conservatives going to respond to Bush’s spending?  

The most awkward moment was when Bush openly admitted that there are a lot of poor black people in this country.  If he had an ounce of shame, he would be embarassed that it took a hurricane for him to sit up and actually DO something about it.

And for all his talk about revitilizing the area, let’s remember that Bush’s first directive for the post-Katrina rebuilding was to enact deep wage cuts for the people who will do the actual reconstruction.

As for taking blame, and figuring out what went wrong — well, I’m glad he’s interested in learning from his mistakes, but if he’s TRULY interested in that, he’ll allow for an independent commission.   

He outright lied when he said that one of the lessons of Katrina was that the federal government should have more authority.  The federal government always had that authority.  They just bungled it.

Anyway . . .

Bush then said something that made me shoot up in my seat:

For example, the private fundraising effort led by former Presidents Bush and Clinton has already received pledges of more than 100 million dollars. Some of that money is going to governors, to be used for immediate needs within their states. A portion will also be sent to local houses of worship, to help reimburse them for the expense of helping others.

What the fuck?!?

You mean money from private fundraising is going to help reimburse churches for their charitable efforts?   Is that how charity works these days?  It’s not charity if you get reminbursed by others.   It’s called robbing Peter to pay Paul.

I hope people follow up on this.  I want to know which churches are insisting that they get reimbursed for helping people.