Mary Landrieu Blocks Army Corps Nominee

It's hard to believe that nearly two years after Hurricane Katrina devastated the U.S. gulf coast, the national conversation is still centered on total mismanagement by the Bush regime.

Recently, reports have have surfaced that the Army Corps of Engineers installed defective flood control pumps in the New Orleans levee system last year. While this incident didn't generate a whole lot of outrage, it's just another example of the complete lack of attention being paid to reconstruction by the overseers in the Bush administration. It seems almost axiomatic that after many such displays of incompetence in the federal response to the disaster, someone with a level of access equivalent to a cabinet official should have been appointed to coordinate the federal efforts. Again, there is no responsibility being assumed, butts kicked, or names named.

What else is new?

Anyway, Senator Mary Landrieu (D-La) is mad - so mad that she's put a hold on the Bush regime's nominee to head the Army Corps of Engineers:

To protest what she called mismanagement of the New Orleans levee system, Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., has placed a hold on the nomination of Lt. Gen. Robert Van Antwerp to head the Army Corps of Engineers.

Landrieu made the announcement Tuesday at a news conference near the 17th Street Canal levee in New Orleans that was breached after Hurricane Katrina.

"We cannot protect our communities without effective leadership and competent management," Landrieu said...

While it's easy to applaud Sen. Landrieu's move, it's also important to remember her own moves during and after Katrina. While thousands were suffering in the SuperDome and New Orleans Convention Center, she was apologizing for the Bush regime's incompetence on national television. While the French Quarter of New Orleans is once again alive, large sections of the city remain uninhabitable. While there is some semblance of law and order, the criminal justice system in New Orleans is so broken that a judge recently ruled that he'll no longer hear cases for defendants who are represented by public defenders.

Perhaps I'm being a bit harsh, but Mary Landrieu's protest seems a little too little, a little too late.