[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 14]
[House]
[Page 19555]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           HURRICANE KATRINA

  (Mr. MORAN of Virginia asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. MORAN of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, our Nation failed its people last 
week. There was a violation of the trust that the American people have 
a right to vest in their government. The importance of that trust 
cannot be overstated. It is why we let our sons and daughters go to 
foreign lands to fight wars. It is why we pay our taxes. It is why we 
obey official laws and orders.
  But last week this trust was breached. Whether it is because we are 
not used to seeing poverty so visible or the results of institutional 
racism so stark or because of just pure incompetence, it was criminal 
to abandon thousands and thousands of men and women, mothers and 
children and grandparents to rot in the squalor of complete government 
neglect. There has to be an immediate, rigorous and harsh determination 
of accountability for this criminal neglect.
  But there must also be a response worthy of a great and prosperous 
and noble Nation. A person of the caliber of a Colin Powell, perhaps, 
must be given singular authority and responsibility to resettle when 
necessary, to rebuild where possible, and to return eventually New 
Orleans to its status as one of America's great cities. The people of 
New Orleans are asking for no more and the American people should 
demand no less.

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