In this week's edition of Harold Evans' BBC Radio 4 broadcast, Tina Brown's love monkey directs his passion, yet again, to the glory of the American spirit. Naturally, Evans reflects on the goverment's response (or lack thereof) in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and predicts the disaster to have a similar political impact as that of the Great Depression. Why you care: Evans somehow comes to this conclusion via a metaphor about a log floating in water, which sounds a lot like borderline potty humor to us. After the jump, Henry the Intern's weekly report.

Every weekend BBC Radio 4 airs "A Point of View" with Harold Evans. A more apt title would be "Harold Evans Takes a Big Bite of the American Spirit and Likes How It Tastes." In this week's installment, Sir Evans ominously explains why "there will be hell to pay for Katrina."

Hurricane Katrina is "likely to have as traumatic an impact on American political life as the Great Depression of the 1930s," predicts our favorite historian. "That catastrophe ushered in two decades of Democratic presidents, but even more, it reversed America's entrenched dedication to laissez faire Social Darwinism, a philosophy embraced by both major parties for 150 years." Even the liberal media couldn't usher in two decades of Josiah Bartlet.

Harry tells us about philosophers, old Yale polemicists, Andrew Carnegie, President Grover Cleveland, and "the romantic ideals of Jeffersonian individualism" to prove he knows his stuff. Then, he stretches for a literary device. Try following the log through the waves of American politics:

"So Social Darwinism has remained in the American psyche, sometimes submerged in the current, sometimes coming to the surface like a log in a fast-flowing river. [President Cleveland's] sentiments might have popped up any time in the eighties on Ronald Reagan's teleprompter. His remark that 'government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem' was an echo of Cleveland and many presidencies thereafter. The log came clearly into view again when turbulence in the wake of 9/11 led to the re-election of George W. Bush. . . My judgment is that the log of Social Darwinism will disappear again under the toxic flood waters of New Orleans."

Americans, Harry believes, are so "kindly a people" that we will "look once again for vigor and compassion in government, even at the price of higher taxes." (Perhaps we can use a lock-box!)

Harry continues, informing listeners that after the great Mississippi flood of 1927, "Republican President Calvin Coolidge refused even to recall Congress to vote emergency money." Luckily, Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover saved the day, and subsequently became president. Hoover's heroism did not last, Harry says, because he "had a tin ear" to the Great Depression, "rather like George Bush."

"When G.W." —yes, Harry called him G.W.— "belatedly visited the flooded region, he reminisced about his good-time days in New Orleans" and comforted Trent Lott. Asked Harry, "Brother, can you spare a dime?"

Harry revisits the log in his conclusion: "Back in the 30s, clinging to the log of Social Darwinism did not save Hoover. He was swept away by a riptide of anger and fear like that which may threaten the Republican ascendancy today." Indeed, the Great Depression allowed President Franklin Roosevelt to create the New Deal, "a ringing reaffirmation of America's commitment to huddled masses yearning to share in the great American Dream."

See, history comes full circle. And in Harry's world, history comes in a neat narrative about a log floating through the American experience.