From Rush Limbaugh:
All right, people say, "Rush, what do you mean media scandal?" Let me put scandal in quotes. The simplest way, I think, to clue you in as to my thinking is to give you the -- well, before I do that -- how many people did you expect after two weeks of news coverage to be in body bags? Ten to 20,000, right? We had 25,000 body bags, and the death toll was constantly predicted at 10,000, the mayor down there, thousands upon thousands, the figure grew and grew until finally someone put a number to it, 10,000 was the number I saw most frequently. And, of course, that figure was constantly bandied about as graphics on television screens over the destruction of New Orleans, or shots of poor people in New Orleans trying to leave. And of course the impression -- we're a nation of pictures -- the impression was left that some of these people we're looking at are not going to make it, they're going to die because nobody is getting there soon enough because nobody cares about them -- why? -- because they're black. And, of course, the local government and the state government in Louisiana, of course always exempted from any criticism or concern here because it was a fast route to George W. Bush who, as a Republican, automatically is a racist. And so we were expecting huge numbers. And it was so bad -- but the federal government wasn't concerned, they didn't get down there soon enough afterwards, they didn't try to get people -- you know the drill. Here is the death toll as of this morning; 197 dead in Louisiana (story), 211 dead in Mississippi, where you still have a tough time finding a news camera, 7 people dead in Florida.
So the death toll now is a little more than 400, and don't misunderstand, I am not suggesting that that's acceptable or okay. I'm simply saying it ain't 10,000, it isn't 25,000 body bags. It's not total destruction, it doesn't even rank as we speak today in the top ten deadliest natural disasters in the country, not even close.
