Obama chats with Culver about calamity of flooding

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama talked with reporters on his press plane today about the flooding in Iowa.  Here is a transcript of Obama’s remarks: "Yes I actually had a conversation with Chet Culver, uh, right after our college education event and I think it’s important for us to understand the size and the magnitude of this disaster. It was a slow rolling disaster, it didn’t have the drama of a major hurricane but, and thank goodness that we didn’t see significant casualties, but in terms of the economic losses in that state and the prospects of rebuilding, it is mind boggling. You’ve got the second largest city in Iowa that is gonna be under water for at least another 4, 5 days. You have 3 million acres of corn that are effectively destroyed, losses are going to be in the tens of billions of dollars potentially and, we’re not done. Part of the reason that I wanted to contact Gov. Culver is because we’re gonna be seeing problems spill over as the Mississippi rises, it’s about to crest. I was in Quincy, I think you joined me this weekend, to fill some sand bags and get an assessment of what’s going on there. Burlington along the Mississippi River, some of the river towns in Missouri are all gonna be impacted by this and so I just wanted to assure Gov. Culver that we’re gonna do everything we can to get aid there rapidly. I’m glad to hear that the president is gonna be going there on Thursday but we’re gonna make sure that the resources are there in a sustained way to rebuild and to help the families that have been displaced.

Bush spoke about the flooding earlier today.  A transcript of Bush’s remarks is at the bottom of this Radio Iowa story.  Here’s the key, closing paragraph from Bush: "This Thursday I’m going to take our team down there to meet with the folks in Iowa. And I, unfortunately, have been to too many disasters as President. But one thing I’ve always learned is that the American citizen can overcome these disasters. And life, while it may seem dim at this point in time, can always be better because of the resiliency and care of our citizens."