While the storm tropical Ernesto if announcement, America today commemorates the first anniversary of the passage of Hurricane Katrina. A cyclone force 4 on a scale of 5 that caused the deaths in Louisiana and Mississippi of about 1,500 people mostly poor and black devastated an area of 235.000 km2, almost half of the area of the France, and overwhelmed 80 New Orleans where as many as 200,000 homes have been destroyed or damaged. This humanitarian disaster was also a policy this time, George w. Bush and his administration, whose clumsy and slow reaction dealt a serious blow to the popularity of the American President.
Its rating collapsed in the polls without ever since, back the slope. According to a survey conducted this month for Associated Press-Ipsos, 67 of the interviewees still disapprove of how the Bush team has managed the aid to the victims of the hurricane. According to another survey "New York Times" - CBS, 44 of them do not have confidence in the ability and the jurisdiction of the Government to better respond to a new disaster of the same type. A skepticism of course very widespread in the democratic ranks, but also found in the ranks of Republicans. Very bad omen for a few weeks of mid-term legislative elections.

Yet, the host of the White House has not spared efforts to correct shooting, getting the vote in the Congress for a budget of some $ 110 billion, of which 44 billion already spent. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), whose management was strongly criticised in the passage of Hurricane Katrina, in allocated 6 billion to temporarily relocate nearly 950,000 victims.
George w. Bush, who ruled this August 29 is national remembrance day since then, yesterday, on hand for the first anniversary.
Pessimism and anger
He recognized, last weekend, the errors of the Federal and local authorities, as well as their bad preparation for such a disaster, and admitted that Katrina "revealed deep-rooted poverty, which has deprived people of opportunities offered by our country (...)". "We see many signs encouraging reconstruction and renewal and many reminders also remains difficult to accomplish work", he said.
But, on the spot, sometimes the pessimism and anger prevailing. At New Orleans, French Quarter located in the historic heart of the city or the very chic Garden District have certainly found their usual animation and await with hope the return of the tourists. But they contrast with poor neighbourhoods, such as the Lower Ninth Ward, still in ruins. The reconstruction is stagnating, the reign of the débrouille and violence. More than half of the 500,000 people who inhabited the city before Katrina are still scattered to the four corners of the country. According to Susan Powell, Professor of political science at the University of the New - Orleans, the municipality has not really reconstruction project and the gap between rich and poor is widening further.
Louisiana, Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu, said that a year after, "the reconstruction process is just beginning", doubting that the nation is ready to deal with major disasters". And suspects President Bush to be more captured by war in Iraq and in the Middle East by the reconstruction in the Gulf of the Mexico.