Transcripts

"Commentary"- An Idea For Rebuilding New Orleans

GHARIB: Tonight's commentator is looking at Louisiana in the wake of hurricane Katrina. Here's Daniel Henninger, Deputy Editor of the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal.

DANIEL HENNINGER, DEPUTY EDITOR, EDITORIAL PAGE, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: New Orleans is going to be rebuilt. It may not be the same Big Easy that preceded Katrina but this most southern of cities will rise again. The problem is too many people want to lay hands on the patient. Planners, politicians and profiteers all have ideas on how to revive this famous American city. Well, this past weekend marked the anniversary of September 11, and the people gathered at ground zero saw what happens when the politicians and planners gain control of a major rebuilding project: the space once occupied by the World Trade Center towers is still nothing but a hole in the ground.

Maybe there's a better way than politics as usual to rebuild devastated New Orleans: let the market decide. By that I mean the real market of creative, tireless and determined individuals, the kind of people who created some of our greatest cities in the 19th century: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New York. These cities flourished when they became centers of commerce and new economic activity. To do that now we should turn New Orleans and perhaps all of Louisiana into a vast enterprise zone. Liberate Louisiana for 10 years from federal capital gains taxes, corporate taxes and even workers payroll taxes. Anything that gets in the way of reviving New Orleans' economy should be set aside for the next 10 years. The politicians and planners won't like this idea, which is why we should give it a try. I'm Dan Henninger.