Thousands

Not all had to die.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Thousands more bedraggled refugees were bused and airlifted to salvation Saturday, leaving the heart of New Orleans to the dead and dying, the elderly and frail stranded too many days without food, water or medical care.
No one knows how many were killed by Hurricane Katrina's floods and how many more succumbed waiting to be rescued.
But the bodies are everywhere: hidden in attics, floating among the ruined city, crumpled on wheelchairs, abandoned on highways.
And the dying goes on - at the convention center and an airport triage center, where bodies were kept in a refrigerated truck.
Gov. Kathleen Blanco said Saturday that she expected the death toll to reach the thousands.

Josh Marshall, stirred from his August doldrums, is doing a good job of rounding up evidence of GOP cronyism and the lethal incompetence of the people who could have lessened the carnage, namely W, Chertoff and "Brownie," the latter two of whom should expect to be held accountable in the form of a Presidential Medal of Freedom.