Did New Orleans Catastrophe Have to Happen?

From Editor and Publisher, a very disturbing article alleging that, due to lack of federal funding, projects started to protect New Orleans from floods and hurricanes were never finished and thus contributed to the devastation of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina.

However, buried in the article was that protection from a category 4 or 5 hurricane was not there, and that a study for that situation wouldn't be completed for 4 years.

The main questions are:

1) Would the projects not completed because of lack of federal funds have protected the city? (Would they have even been completed on time?)

2) What were the contributions of the state and local governments in relation to the federal government?

3) Was there a causal relationship between spending on protecting New Orleans and the Iraq war budget? (The article mentions that there was, but offers no direct proof)

Regardless of the answers, I suspect that if this information is publicized, it will do serious damage to President Bush and may well lead to the defeat of the Republican party in the 2006 elections.

I'm extremely unhappy that a major city that is prone to severe weather was left vulnerable for so many years.