MoveOn.org steps into the Bush-deranged circus, via e-mailer Andy Bryant and U.S. Newswire (check out the advice to the MSM at the end of the release about “excellent visuals;” the NYTimes has already set aside space on its Friday front page):

To: Assignment Desk, Daybook Editor

Contact: Trevor Fitzgibbon, Kawana Lloyd or Alex Howe, 202-822-5200, all for Moveon.Org Political Action

News Advisory:

– Katrina Evacuees to Tell President Bush His Administration Let Them Down
– Request Meeting with President to Demand Accountability
– Why Was Federal Funding Cut For Levee Maintenance?

Hurricane Katrina evacuees flew into the nation’s capital to tell President Bush to stop blaming local officials for his mistakes and acknowledge that budget cuts and indifference by his administration led to the disaster in New Orleans and along the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

They intend to ask him why he diverted over 40 percent of federal funding between 2001-2005 away from New Orleans. Hundreds are expected to rally in front of the White House at 1 p.m. EDT on Thursday.

“The President of the United States and his appointees let us down,” said Christine Mayfield, a New Orleans public school teacher and mother of three who was dislocated and now is staying in North Carolina.

The evacuees are also seeking a meeting with Rep. Henry Waxman, the ranking Democrat on the Government Oversight Committee.

According to Rep. Waxman, “the budget of the Corps of Engineers for construction projects in New Orleans district was cut by over 40 percent between 2001 and 2005, apparently to free up funds for the war in Iraq and homeland security projects. In 2004, for the first time in 37 years, the Corps halted all work on the New Orleans levee system.”

New Orleans native Michelle Augillard, one of the evacuees, was working toward her Masters degree at the University of New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina hit. Now, she is staying with a friend in Houston, trying to pick up the pieces of her life, along with her family. Both Michelle and Christine will appear at the rally.

“It is inhumane to have treated citizens of the United States like we were treated,” she said. ”

Members of MoveOn.org Political Action are scheduled to hand- deliver thousands of petition signatures to the White House after the rally. The petition says, “President Bush should stop blaming the victims of Hurricane Katrina and get to work helping them.”

WHO: Katrina Evacuees and MoveOn members
WHAT: Protest outside the White House in support of Hurricane Victims
WHEN: Thursday, September 8th at 1 p.m.
WHERE: Pennsylvania Avenue NW. In front of the White House. (Metro: Red Line: Farragut North. Blue-Orange Line: Farragut West or McPherson Square)

EDITOR’S NOTE: Excellent Visuals — Signs reading “Shame” and “Help Hurricane Victims”

“Shame?” Try this. (Video here.)

“Help Hurricane Victims?” See here and here and here.

And regarding levee funding, see here.

***
Update: Tim Graham at The Corner notes some facts reported in the WaPo that will not be on any of the “excellent visuals” at the MoveOn.org BashBushfest:

In Katrina’s wake, Louisiana politicians and other critics have complained about paltry funding for the Army Corps in general and Louisiana projects in particular. But over the five years of President Bush’s administration, Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state, about $1.9 billion; California was a distant second with less than $1.4 billion, even though its population is more than seven times as large. Much of that Louisiana money was spent to try to keep low-lying New Orleans dry. But hundreds of millions of dollars have gone to unrelated water projects demanded by the state’s congressional delegation and approved by the Corps, often after economic analyses that turned out to be inaccurate.

See also John Berlau on Greens vs. Levees (hat tip: reader Mike M.):

…The national Sierra Club was one of several environmental groups who sued the Army Corps of Engineers to stop a 1996 plan to raise and fortify Mississippi River levees.

The Army Corps was planning to upgrade 303 miles of levees along the river in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arkansas. This was needed, a Corps spokesman told the Baton Rouge, La., newspaper The Advocate, because “a failure could wreak catastrophic consequences on Louisiana and Mississippi which the states would be decades in overcoming, if they overcame them at all.”

But a suit filed by environmental groups at the U.S. District Court in New Orleans claimed the Corps had not looked at “the impact on bottomland hardwood wetlands.” The lawsuit stated, “Bottomland hardwood forests must be protected and restored if the Louisiana black bear is to survive as a species, and if we are to ensure continued support for source population of all birds breeding in the lower Mississippi River valley.” In addition to the Sierra Club, other parties to the suit were the group American Rivers, the Mississippi River Basin Alliance, and the Louisiana, Arkansas and Mississippi Wildlife Federations.

…In 2000, American Rivers’ Mississippi River Regional Representative Jeffrey Stein complained in a congressional hearing that the river’s “levees that temporarily protect floodplain farms have reduced the frequency, extent and magnitude of high flows, robbing the river of its ability … to sustain itself.”

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