Heckuva Job...

Howie says that as soon as Bush takes a pro-active position regarding the Gulf States' clean-up, his poll numbers will be just fine again. So, how's he been doing? Let's see.

He has started off by taking better care of his friends than of the citizens of Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Bush has guaranteed the greatest profits for those contractors who will be rebuilding New Orleans by allowing them to pay below the prevailing wage. The poor gulf staters who are doing the work will be getting very low wages.

From Money.cnn.com:

In a notice to Congress, Bush said the hurricane had caused "a national emergency" that permits him to take such action under the 1931 Davis-Bacon Act in ravaged areas of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi.

The Davis-Bacon law requires federal contractors to pay workers at least the prevailing wages in the area where the work is conducted. It applies to federally funded construction projects such as highways and bridges.

Even red staters are uncomfortable about this, albeit for all the wrong reasons. From Red State:

The Bush administration has suspended the Davis-Bacon Act for an indefinite period. Under that Act, federal contractors must pay the prevailing wage, which in the Gulf Coast is from around $9 to $20 an hour. This will make it easier for illegal aliens to underbid U.S. citizens. For 45 days, employers won't be fined for hiring anyone who doesn't have documentation. Illegal aliens are currently doing cleanup and roofing jobs in Biloxi. Not only are they not being pursued by the DHS, some of them now want work visas. Day laborers from Conroe TX have been picked up to work in the cleanup. Vicente Fox was practically giddy at the chance to provide reconstruction workers. Phyllis Schlafly says we should give jobs currently going to illegal aliens to Katrina victims. Jesse Jackson says much the same thing. Even those at the DemocraticUnderground tend to agree. The Washington Post points out that evacuees in Houston face job competition from illegal aliens. It probably won't be too long before various conspiracy theories arise as to why Bush would seemingly want to move blacks out of the Gulf Coast and move Hispanics in.

So, just who is getting the no-bid contracts, sweetheart deals (now that the prevailing wage has been tossed aside), to rebuild New Orleans? How about the same old friends of Bush and Cheney that have gotten no-bid contracts in Iraq? How about Halliburton, Bechtel, The Shaw Group, and others?

Meanwhile GOP Senators blocked a move by Sen. Hillary Clinton (D., NY) to appoint an independent panel to investigate Federal Government screw-ups in the immediate aftermath of the disaster.

And one more note from the "compassionate conservative" response to Katrina. From Think Progress:

"SEPARATE BUT EQUAL" EDUCATION: The Wall Street Journal reports that Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings will ask Congress to waive a federal law that bans educational segregation for homeless children. The Bush administration is arguing, along with states like Utah and Texas, that providing schooling for evacuees (who, in this case, are likened to homeless children) will be disruptive to public school systems, so they want to have sound legal backing for creating separate educational facilities for the 372,000 schoolchildren displaced by Hurricane Katrina. The State of Mississippi is opposed to waiving the Act because they argue the law helps evacuees enroll in schools without red tape.

All I can say is, "You're doing a heckuva job, Bushie."