Jim Beam
Jim Beam

In a speech on Friday (story here) New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin blamed racism and the LA state and Federal governments for New Orleans’s woes a year after Katrina and the Corps of Engineers struck it.

Here are some excerpts from Jim Beam’s reaction in his column (here) in Sunday’s Lake Charles newspaper:

New Orleans officials have failed their poor, but they are quick to blame racism or the state and federal governments for their shortcomings. Blacks have been running New Orleans city government and education for a long time now, and blamlng racism for the city’s troubles is a cop-out.

The state had to take over its failing schools, and Katrina unmasked a horrible poverty problem. Texas is doing what New Orleans city government should have been doing for its poor for decades. For nearly a year, they have taken in the less-fortunate, fed them, cared for their medical needs and found them housing.

Now, they are trying to help them plan their future. Instead of blaming someone else for their failures, New Orleans officials could learn something from our neighbors to the west.

You also have to wonder what happened to those billions of dollars the state spends every year on social services. Louisiana’s people are still some of the poorest in the country.

Beam, though very courageous will likely be blasted for being politically-incorrect, but it is what it is.

C.B.