Gregory L. Giroux reports of CQ Weekly that some are lobbying both parties to consider the possibility of holding their political conventions in New Orleans in 2008.

As the Gulf Coast region struggles to recover from the catastrophe inflicted by Hurricane Katrina, a campaign is under way to persuade both parties to hold their 2008 presidential nominating conventions in the now-devastated city of New Orleans — and to announce the decision jointly as a powerful display of comfort and support for the battered region.

”It would help the city and area both symbolically and substantively,” said Ron Faucheux, a prominent political analyst and former Louisiana officeholder who is promoting the idea with state party chairmen and executive directors, as well as national party officials.

”National conventions bring a lot of attention and a lot of money to a local economy, and it is also an opportunity to have a bipartisan show of support for the city and the area — which is needed, given the partisan sniping that’s been going on,” said Faucheux, the former editor-in-chief of Campaigns and Elections magazine, once owned by Congressional Quarterly.

The two parties typically choose and announce their convention sites independently. But there is precedent for both gatherings to be held in the same city, as they were in 1972 when Miami Beach played host to both party gatherings.

This sounds like a great political move for either political party -- or both.