Mr. Rove, Meet Mayor Nagin

Cindy Sheehan was just the first to show that moral courage trumps spin, any day:

With attention turning to what had gone wrong, Mr. Nagin said he wanted an independent assessment of the missteps, saying he believed the matter was beyond the ability of politicians to solve. He blamed a lack of coordination, a rescue plan that was slow to be carried out and what he called a "two-step" danced by federal and state officials to determine who was in charge.

He said he welcomed any effort to criticize his own handling of the crisis. "My big question to anybody who's trying to shift the blame is, 'Where were you?' " Mr. Nagin said. "I was here. I know what happened. I walked among the people in the Superdome and in the convention center. I saw babies dying. I saw old people so tired, they said, 'Just let me lay down and die.' They can talk that, but bring it on. I'm ready for it."