It's going to be the heart, the pulse of the relief effort, ... We've got a vested interest in getting back there and getting things running. That's where our homes are, that's where our families are.

O, it sets my heart a-clickin' like the tickin' of a clock, when the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock

What I wanted from them is what I got. I wanted the effort to win and if you give the effort, that?s all you can do. No one expected a team that?s 9-11 to come out and beat a team that?s 19-1. Nobody. If we could have done just a little bit better job in execution and had some more continuity on the offensive end, I thought we could have played with them.

The effort to effectively restore the hurricane protection system that was so badly damaged by hurricanes Katrina and Rita last year is one of the largest and most ambitious civil works projects ever undertaken in the United States.

We're seeing a lot of things that indicate to us an erosion of the public interest. It's an increased effort, like a final gasp of desperation.

We had a lack of offense. We had a lack of effort. We had a lack of heart in the first half.