Rita, unfortunately, acted just like her bigger cousin Katrina in wiping structures along miles of coastline along her eastern side, where the storm surge is the greatest. The target this time was Louisiana’s Bayou region.

At its worst, Rita behaved like a viciously effective bulldozer, scraping away everything it met, scraping away places such as Holly Beach. The full scope of the storm’s brutality can be comprehended only from the air, and from the air the images are heartbreaking: 200 miles of Louisiana coastal life broken apart or left to steep in the brownest, dankest water imaginable.

The scope of devastation between these two storms is truly stunning.

On the political side, Dan Balz and the Washington Post shows their liberal colors as they desparately look forward to the never coming filibuster showdown:

Filibuster Showdown Looms In Senate
Democrats Prepare For Next Court Pick

By Dan Balz and Amy Goldstein

Well, it is not going to happen. The Gang of 14 and The Coalition of The Chillin’ have been vindicated time and time again since the agreement was reached to avoid the filibuster/constitutional option showdown. Only partisans who want to see a political win want gridlock and high emotion in the Senate. I think everyone would prefer a more professional, statesman-like conduct after the pathetic blame game going on with Katrina.

The upcoming battle over a successor to Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor threatens to plunge the Senate into another bitter confrontation over filibusters and the “nuclear option,” with Democrats already threatening to use any means possible to thwart President Bush if he nominates someone they regard as too conservative.

Obviously, democrats have never heard of the story about the boy who cried “Wolf!”.

He [Howard Dean] cited appellate court judges Priscilla R. Owen and Janice Rogers Brown as two who would be likely to trigger such opposition.

That crazy Dean! He’s as bad as McCauliffe was in predicting coming successes for the democrats.

The Post also discusses one of the first interesting cases the Roberts Court will be deciding in the upcoming term – campaign finance law:

The first case is a challenge to provisions of the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign law that prevent corporations or labor unions from buying ads with unregulated money about a specified candidate in the weeks just before an election.

Wisconsin antiabortion activists say their particular proposed ads are genuine efforts to express their views on an issue, not attacks on candidates disguised as issue ads — or “sham” issue ads the law was meant to regulate.

Sounds like a good test case.

Michael Brown’s testimony yesterday was meant to sink him – it didn’t. Brown is collecting some defenders who are tired of the simplicistic claims he was the problem in Katrina. A simple test shows that is not the case. If the storm had ravaged Texas or Florida, places prepared, would Katrina’s aftermath been so abysmal? Most likely not (since FEMA worked through four major hurricanes last year). So if the variable between success and failure is the state partner, FEMA is not the source of the problems.

And we come full circle today with another demonstration of liberal socialism rampant in the media-formally-known-as-mainstream:

Don’t Let Industry Win With Disaster Bailouts

By Steven Pearlstein

You don’t get more socialist than this. Don’t let US companies win work to rebuild and offset the strain on our economy? Don’t let US companies hire people to rebuild? Don’t let locals in devastated areas get real jobs with US companies? Don’t let entrepreneurs in to recreate a vibrant economy????

Hold on to your wallets, Mr. and Mrs. America. Congress is in session, Katrina relief is on the agenda and special interests are drumming up schemes to help themselves under the guise of helping others.

Yeah right. And socialists are ready to make those of you who lost your homes and jobs all wards of the state so you can be forever in their debt. The money to rebuild has to come from somewhere – there is little option that it is from the government. But how it is used is totally controllable. The socialists in DC want to control how Mississippi and Alabama will be rebuilt. If I was from those states, facing this kind of thinking, I would say the interest being demanded on the money from DC is too high a price to pay.