Two excerpts from Paul Krugman’s column in today’s New York Times:
… By all accounts Ronald Reagan, who declared in his Inaugural Address that “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem,” wasn’t personally racist. But he repeatedly used a bogus tale about a Cadillac-driving Chicago “welfare queen” to bash big government. And he launched his 1980 campaign with a pro-states’-rights speech in Philadelphia, Miss., a small town whose only claim to fame was the 1964 murder of three civil rights workers.
Under George W. Bush – who, like Mr. Reagan, isn’t personally racist but relies on the support of racists – the anti-government right has reached a new pinnacle of power. And the incompetent response to Katrina was the direct result of his political philosophy. When an administration doesn’t believe in an agency’s mission, the agency quickly loses its ability to perform that mission.
…Consider this: in the United States, unlike any other advanced country, many people fail to receive basic health care because they can’t afford it. Lack of health insurance kills many more Americans each year than Katrina and 9/11 combined.