The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers manages the lower Mississippi to keep the river as open as possible for shipping, and to prevent its natural tendency to shift around. The Corps also maintains a system of flood-control levees around New Orleans. The net result is that, despite being famously muddy, the river now delivers little sediment to its mouth, and much of what it does deliver is quickly dredged out. As a result, the wetlands around the river’s mouth—which act as a buffer against storms—have been afflicted with severe erosion, increasingly exposing New Orleans directly to the Gulf.

It is possible to have open shipping lanes and an adequate system of flood protection, while stemming and even reversing the wetland loss. Measures to do so have been proposed for years, but none have been implemented.

Gordon Fox
Tampa, Florida  
 
Shoot to kill
The more I hear about the case of the London police shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes the more I dislike it. The police officers who killed him, and everyone involved in an attempted cover-up, should be fired and/or imprisoned. This is what happens when you have a shoot-to-kill policy.

Chuck Mann
Greensboro, North Carolina  
 
 
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