Americans Have the Vigour and Energy to Recover from Katrina

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Byline: NEVILL BOYD MAUNSELL

First look on the bleak side. President Bush says New Orleans and the neighbouring Mississippi coast has been devastated more than New York was by the terrorist attacks of September 2001. Seeing the fearsome aerial photos, one fears the human tragedy may be greater.

So may the economic consequences. New York's financial community got back to business almost as usual with an extraordinary display of human resilience - and astonishingly effective contingency planning. The financial markets were shaken, but far from shattered.

In the wake of Katrina, the issue is the oil industry. On Wednesday, 91 per cent of the Gulf's crude …