It has been heart-rending to watch our fellow citizens amidst the devastation, the scope of Katrina's destruction making it much more so. In response, Americans have looked to do what we can — giving money, clothes, food for the relief effort, with hundreds of volunteers offering time, hard labor, and expertise. Many of us far away have been touched by the disaster, worried about friends and relatives. This is a human tragedy of vast proportions that has left only the heartless untouched.

Enter the politicians. For far too many obsessed with politics, the hurricane proved just another opportunity to point fingers at old enemies and score cheap political points in the never-ending jostling for power.

The Washington Post ran a 30-column-inch story on Friday in which congressional Democrats condemned the big-spending Mr. Bush as heartless and/or ignorant for not supporting every dollar that the Army Corps of Engineers requested for work on New Orleans's levees.

The Democrats all admit, according to the Post, that even at the highest levels of proposed funding, none of these projects would have been completed in time to have prevented New Orleans from being under water today. Still, the smears of Bush went blithely on. The Post's chosen headline, "Critics Say Bush Undercut New Orleans Flood Control" beat out the more accurate alternative: "No Government Plan Would Have Prevented Flood, Democrats Still Blame Bush."

Jürgen Tritton, Germany's environmental minister, argued in the Frankfurt Rundschau that Katrina was caused by "neglected climate protection" — meaning, of course, that it was brought on by Bush's opposition to international global warming agreements. Tritton wrote, "When reason finally reaches the headquarters of the climate polluters [guess where], the international community will need to be able to extend a hand with an elaborate proposal for the future of international climate protection."

An intriguing statement — and one that signals the real bankruptcy of his position. He has no plan to solve the problem about which he rants. But once we turn our fate over to the "international community," they'll be glad to come up with an "elaborate" one.

Of course, even without consulting a scientist or developing an opinion on global warming, it is a simple fact that there were hurricanes before any global warming, real or imagined, and it seems likely there will be hurricanes in the future. No matter what politicians in Berlin or Washington do or say about it.

Meanwhile, storm-ravaged people are hot, hungry and thirsty in New Orleans. And the fact that the president's critics are full of it doesn't mean his team didn't fumble the ball.

Something even the President admitted. And as the crisis worsened, Republicans began to rap the Administration. Louisiana's new Republican Senator David Vitter argued that FEMA has been "completely dysfunctional and completely overwhelmed. There was no coherent plan for dealing with this scenario."

Where has FEMA been with air drops of food? With some plan for restoring order? Why didn't they call sooner for help from the military and National Guard, parts of the federal government that actually work?

Yet, blaming the Bush Administration misses the bigger problem.

"Everybody is to blame — it transcends administration," said Michael Parker, a former GOP congressman from Mississippi, who was actually forced out of his job as assistant secretary of the Army for civil works by the Bush Administration. "It transcends party."

Parker doesn't really mean "everybody." You're probably not to blame. He means the problem permeates government at all levels. Parker argues that there is resistance throughout the federal government to investing in long-term projects. Like the levee project. Continued...