Blocked Out  Here's one way to sound the alarm about the
impending death of a federal program that tens of millions
beneﬁt from and almost no one has heard of: Accuse President
Bush of copycatting al-Qaeda. At a February meeting of the U.S.
Conference of Mayors, National League of Cities, and National
Association of Counties, Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley invoked
the September 11 attacks on “our metropolitan cores,” then went
on to say: “Years later, we are given a budget proposal by our
commander in chief, the president of the United States, and with
a budget axe, he is attacking America's cities. He is attacking
our metropolitan core.”  O'Malley's incendiary words got the
Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program, which provides
nearly $5 billion yearly in aid to cities and counties, what was
no doubt its ﬁrst segment on Paula Zahn Now.  O'Malley waxed
apocalyptic for a reason: The Bush administration's budget
proposes to eliminate the CDBG and related programs run by the
Department of Housing and