Last Thursday’s speech by President Bush in New Orleans’ Jackson Square kicked off the administrations’ cynical campaign to snatch political victory from the jaws of defeat in the wake of its disastrous Katrina response. Karl Rove’s strategy for the coming 2006 mid-term elections will modeled on his 2002 GOP success with the Department of Homeland Security. With the Gulf States devastated, hundreds dead and thousands displaced, President Bush and the GOP will lace a popular recovery program featuring massive federal spending with a laundry list of conservative initiatives damned by the left and previously rejected by the American people. Putting politics before the people of the Gulf Coast, President Bush will then dare the Democrats to block them.

Before digging into Bush’s poison pill plan for Katrina, a look back at 2002 is instructive. In the wake of the September 11 attacks, the Bush administration opposed both the creation of an independent 9/11 commission and the establishment of a new Department of Homeland Security. Succumbing to overwhelming popular support for both, the Rove White House turned its initial opposition into opportunity. President Bush appropriated the DHS bill originally offered by Connecticut Democrat Joe Lieberman, but added the liberal trip wire new federal civil service rules that would allow the administration broad latitude in hiring and firing in the new department.

The rest, as they say, is history. A majority of Democrats and their labor allies took the bait and opposed the tainted DHS bill. Rove and the Republican leadership then tarred the Democrats as weak on national security and swept to victory in the 2002 mid-term elections. The strategy in its crudest and most disgusting form came in Georgia, where Vietnam draft-dodger Saxby Chambliss defeated Max Cleland, a Vietnam war hero who lost three limbs in battle, after running ads comparing the Democrat to Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

Fast forward three years and circumstances have once again conspired to provide President Bush and his conservative amen corner a poison pill opportunity. Not unlike 9/11, the United States has suffered devastation and destruction with Katrina, and the American people are demanding action and resources. As he made clear in New Orleans, President Bush will not be shy in opening the federal purse in response. But what was left unsaid is that relief and recovery will come at the expense of the American social contract.

A look at some of the proposals already being touted by the Republicans and their think-tank allies provide a taste of things to come:

• Curtail Prevailing Wages. In the immediate aftermath of Katrina, the Bush White House on September 8th authorized the waiving of prevailing wage laws enacted into law by the Davis-Bacon Act of 1935. Heartily endorsed by ideologues of the right, this move allows federal contractors in the disaster area to pay wages below market rates. As Don Kaniewski, political director for the Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA), put it, "I think this is a mean-spirited attack on the labor movement. The right wing has never been able to touch us in the legislative arena on Davis-Bacon. They saw an opportunity and took it."
• Enact School Vouchers. School vouchers, a long-time favorite of conservative think tanks for undermining public education, have resurfaced after Katrina as well. Back in 2001, vouchers were dead on arrival on Capitol Hill and President Bush immediately dropped them from the No Child Left Behind legislation. But now, Katrina offers President Bush the double benefit of a stealth opportunity to introduce federal support for vouchers while reaching out to African-Americans, the one Democratic constituency that supports them. Unlike the Democratic "Marshall Plan" proposal offering $2500 per student grants directly to Gulf State school districts taking in Katrina’s children, President Bush wants to give vouchers directly to parents that can be spent at private and parochial schools.
• Repeal the Estate Tax. While some Republicans are squeamish about the prospect of massive tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans during the time of Katrina and unending budget deficits, advocates of ending the estate tax are undeterred. Arizona Senator John Kyl plans to press on with his repeal legislation in October regardless. And if his Republican colleague Chuck Grassley thought that was "unseemly", one can only wonder what he must think of GOP Senator Jeff Sessions from Alabama, who said "Jon Kyl and I were talking about the estate tax. If we knew anybody that owned a business that lost life in the storm, that would be something we could push back with."
• Pursue Social Security Privatization. Despite a full court press by the White House and its conservative fellow travelers, the Bush Social Security privatization plan has gone nowhere. The American people’s overwhelming rejection of the Bush budget-busting scheme is apparently no barrier in the time of Katrina. As Congress Daily reported, White House spokesman Trent Duffy "asserted that the vast spending that would be required to address the hurricane's impact adds to the need to change Social Security, which threatens to strain the budget in coming years." So much for discretion –or the truth – being the better part of valor.
• Bless Cronyism and Profiteering. With the Katrina recovery program, the Bush administration has stayed true to form in giving favors for its political friends. Halliburton and firms represented by former FEMA head Joe Allbaugh have already received no-bid contracts. And Bush friends from the oil industry, beneficiaries of billions in tax giveaways in the 2005 energy bill, are going back to the well (so to speak) after Katrina. Their congressional allies, including Majority Leader Tom Delay, are already looking into new energy legislation for them.

These pet policies of the radical rights are just a few of the dangers that lie within the Trojan horse that is the Bush Katrina recovery plan. Some, like enterprise zones and limits on lawsuits, may not be as contentious. Others, like waiving environmental rules are pure conservative opportunism.

It’s no wonder that conservative ideologues see America’s Katrina disaster as their greatest opportunity to entrench the so-called Ownership Society. Heritage Foundation vice president Michael Franc crowed, "This is one of those pivotal moments in our history. This could be the dawn of a great era of conservative governance." Supply-side devotee Jack Kemp concurred, adding, "We have an enormous opportunity… transform America in the first decade of the 21st century."

In any event, Karl Rove and President Bush are pressing ahead with plan to reprise their 2002 success at undermining Democrats using the bait of the Department of Homeland Security. Isn’t it ironic that the Bush strategy after Katrina mirrors the creation of the very agency that failed Gulf State Americans so completely in the wake of the hurricane?

For Democrats wanting to avoid a repeat of 2002, the time to stop this nonsense is now.