Gustav turns into political stunt

Thankfully, Gustav has turned out to not be another Katrina for the Mississippi Coast. Our thoughts are most definitely with the folks in Louisiana who took the direct hit. The last I heard is that some levees were breaking in parishes outside of New Orleans, but the president of the parish was cut off by Wolf Blitzer because First Lady Laura Bush was beginning her speech at the RNC convention. 

I digress...

However successful Mississippi may have been in it's coordination of the evacuation, and hopefully, rebuilding, our Governor still managed to turn it in to a political stunt. 

From the Clarion-Ledger:

McCain's campaign said the senator, wife Cindy and Palin visited out of concern for the region devastated by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita three years ago.

Gov. Haley Barbour invited McCain and Palin to Mississippi to see the planning efforts as the storm spirals toward the coast of central Louisiana. Barbour assured the GOP candidates that the state has done extensive planning, such as initiating contraflow on two interstates Sunday and opening dozens of shelters statewide.

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, who does not plan to travel to the Gulf Coast before the storm hits, said he respects McCain's decision to travel to Mississippi but worries about the resources that are expended, such as the use of Secret Service agents and local police officers and firefighters.

"The thing that I always am concerned about in the middle of the storm is whether we are drawing resources away from folks on the ground," Obama said Sunday in a statement. "We are going to try to stay clear of the area until things have settled down, and then we will probably try to figure out how we can be as helpful as possible."

Though commentators have said McCain was very critical of the Bush administration's handling of Katrina, I'm not sure how him coming down here yesterday helped anyone.