Bush Library at SMU to Take Out a La Madeleine

For reasons that eternally escape me, Texas’ Southern Methodist University wants to be the host of the George W. Bush Presidential Library. They have gone to some trouble to attract the Bush people, despite the fact that George Bush never attended the school, sticking to the Eastern Establishment’s prep and Ivy League schools.

Why not Yale, then? Heck George and Barbara paid enough money to get the boy through with a degree after all. Why not give him a library there?

Ah.

Not only has Yale been a big educator of great and not-so-great presidents, they actually have 19 presidential libraries in that they house the presidential papers of 19 presidents between George Washington and Woodrow Wilson.

Only since the presidency of that unforgettable president, Calvin Coolidge, have we built edifices just to house a single president’s presidential stuff.

There was even an early competition to get Dubya’s stuff on other campuses. Bayor thought they had it in the bag, being so close to Crawford, Texas. But alas, despite the fact that Baylor has acres after empty acres of university grounds on the banks of the Brazos River upon which to build a library, it was not to be. The Bush people wanted the library in a big city it seems, and SMU found itself alone in the bidding as an urban campus. The Bush people figured nobody would visit it if it were out in the country. Good point.

And therein lies the rub. SMU has no open acreage. The entire area is built up. Don’t believe me? Here is a Google Earth shot of the campus (click on it, it gets a little bigger). See that area in the lower right corner? That little strip next to the stadium? That area and the student housing behind it will be the future home of The George Dubya Bush Presidential Library.

Hey, maybe they’ll put a Starbucks on the corner – should be a killer location.

Unfortunately, all of those shops in that strip mall have got to go. They’re all built on university property anyway, so line up those bulldozers.

But wait, isn’t one of those establishments one of those cute boutique cafes called La Madeleine? Building Bush’s library is going to take out a La Madeleine? The infamy!

Local residents, upon hearing the news, are chiming in, in protest. From the Dallas Morning News:

“ ‘I'll be totally sick if I lose my cleaners, my La Madeleine, my drugstore, Horchow [Finale], even the bookstore,’ Highland Park resident Lori Collins, 57, said this week. ‘I love this strip.’ ”

This comes 4 years too late, you know. I wonder how many middle-aged white women would have withheld their vote for George Bush in 2004 had they known that he would be responsible for the obliteration of a La Madeleine café boutique?

It’s really still not too late. There is still another major city in the South (because you know the North will have nothing to do with this guy) where he can build his library. Ironically enough, the city I have in mind has lots and lots of open space, and has continued to have it, precisely because of George W. Bush. And I hear that land there, riverfront land no less, can still be had on the cheap.

My vote for the location of the George Dubya Bush Presidential “Liberry”? How about the 9th Ward of New Orleans, Louisiana?

LSU can sponsor it.

Geaux Tigers!

New Orleans, It Was Nice Knowin’ Ya

Say goodbye to the Big Easy. The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, which ironically is physically located in New Orleans, just sided with the insurance industry in overturning a case, Vanderbrook et al. v. Unitrin Preferred Insurance Company et al.

The 5th Circuit Court overturned a ruling by U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval Jr., who last November sided with policyholders who argued that language in the policies that excluded water damage from their insurance policies was ambiguous.

The plaintiffs argued that while the word “flood” was an ambiguous term in that it is generally meant to include rise in water due to rain, tide or overflowing of a levee. This was not the case in the events that came in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Water invaded the homes and businesses of 80% of New Orleans because of breaches in man-made levees. Breaches caused by human error, not an act of God.

The Appeals Court, however, sided with the insurers, who can all sigh a collective $1 billion sigh of relief. This decision is most certainly going to weigh in on those who were thinking of rebuilding in the flooded areas. There is no money coming from the insurance companies, and there is, in all likelihood, a grand chance that no money will ever come in the future should New Orleans face another hurricane.

Whatever you think about this decision, whether the plaintiffs had a case or not, this decision is going to have a huge impact on development of coastal areas along the Gulf Coast and Eastern Seaboard.

And quite an impact on whether New Orleans will be able to survive as a viable city.