Two years on: No, it's worse than that

From an essay by Associated Press writer Brian Schwaner:

New Orleans is my hometown. And it's dying. Despite billions of dollars in aid, recovery programs with catchy names and an outpouring of volunteer effort, New Orleans is not recovering from Hurricane Katrina.

Beyond the happy mayhem of the French Quarter, entire neighborhoods are in ruins and the business district sags from the shattered economy. Thousands of people are homeless and squatting in vacant and storm-damaged properties, some just a few blocks from City Hall.

More than 160,000 residents never returned. For those who did dare to come back home, little resembles normalcy.

For the people with the power to save it, New Orleans is a forgotten place.

It's a national disgrace. People should pay attention. The next time, it could be your town.

NO, NO, NO, you don't understand. It's far more sinister than that.

The feds, and the American public, are kind of like Michael Vick. They brutalize the dog because they can, because it's in their culture now, because they think they can get away with it.

New Orleans is the dog. The battered, bloodied, chewed-up dog that's not worth much to anybody anymore. Trouble is, it was pretty much that way before Katrina.

What's happening -- or, rather, not happening -- there is just "Michael Vick" putting you down after the dogfight's done and the accounts settled. And I'm not talking insults.