Nearly A Billion Dollars in Katrina Aid Thrown Away by Bush Officials

I told co-workers a week after Katrina that it was going to be just another Bush money pit - like Iraq but not as big as Iraq. Now if they had taken this offered aid just think of all the poor Halliburton officials who'd suffer for lack of federal corporate welfare. I still remember Cuba offering nearly a hundred medical teams with supplies for aid and rescue which was turned down. That I can kind of understand, our government would rather it's citizens die horribly than get help from the great satan Castro, but the humanitarian offers from our allies?
Form the Washington Post:

Most Katrina Aid From Overseas Went Unclaimed

"..Allies offered $854 million in cash and in oil that was to be sold for cash. But only $40 million has been used so far for disaster victims or reconstruction, according to U.S. officials and contractors. Most of the aid went uncollected, including $400 million worth of oil. Some offers were withdrawn or redirected to private groups such as the Red Cross. The rest has been delayed by red tape and bureaucratic limits on how it can be spent.
In addition, valuable supplies and services -- such as cellphone systems, medicine and cruise ships -- were delayed or declined because the government could not handle them. In some cases, supplies were wasted.
The struggle to apply foreign aid in the aftermath of the hurricane, which has cost U.S. taxpayers more than $125 billion so far, is another reminder of the federal government's difficulty leading the recovery. Reports of government waste and delays or denials of assistance have surfaced repeatedly since hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck in 2005."

More also at AmericaBlog:

And meanwhile from NYT and OW we learn that 7 out of 8 hugely expensive building projects in Iraq are failures. Was Halliburton and the rest of the gangs involved?