[Ninong]

As everyone knows, you must have homeowner's insurance to get a mortgage to finance your new home or to rebuild your damaged home. That's a major Catch 22 down here in areas ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. Many insurance companies either refuse to write new business or they offer new policies at much higher rates with all sorts of new exclusions to limit their exposure to claims.

It was bad enough that the insurance companies all charged extra premiums for wind damage if you lived near the coast (Hurricane Zone 1) and then refused to pay claims for wind damage caused by Hurricane Katrina but now the largest insurer, State Farm, has just announced that they will no longer write new commercial or homeowner's policies in the entire state of Mississippi. A few months ago several insurance companies stopped writing new commercial policies in the New Orleans area, making it almost impossible for companies to even consider rebuilding.

State Farm came right out and said that it was payback for all those greedy homeowners who have filed lawsuits against the company for its criminal activities down here.

We went through the same thing with these crooks following Hurricane Betsy in September 1965. It's deja-vu all over again. They're still the same crooks they have always been and that applies to just about all of the insurance companies and to all lines of coverage -- property and casualty as well as life and disability. You would be amazed at the lengths these companies will go to to deny a claim.