Then I heard eyewitness testimony about what's going on at the Convention Center that made me wonder if I was hearing right. Police & NGs standing around outside, refusing to get involved with any of the victims. No food. No water. People are dying and being laid to rest in corners of the building. Others breaking into nearby stores for food, forced to eat candy bars and all the junk food you find in such places. then the man says men were roaming packs, raping young girls.

Just exactly what are the police and the National Guard supposed to be doing there?

What is going is going on there? I am so disgusted, I could scream. And then I learn that at least some of America is blaming the people stuck there because they didn't leave!!!

It must be nice to live in a world where it's so easy to blame the victim. Makes it easier not to feel, I guess.

But Wolf Blitzer, for once, was pointing out that it wasn't because they wanted to ride out the storm. They read letters from viewers outraged at the treatment the people, mostly blacd, were getting and were saying it was because they were black.

One person wrote to say that if these were white upper class, Congress would've reconvened on Tuesday and they'd have removed by Tuesday night (or something along those lines).

I confess I've been stunned at CNN's openess at telling the truth, even if some of their guests are spinning like crazy. It's one tiny silver lining in a huge, dark, ugly cloud.

I learned that Nancy Pelosi insisted that Congress return early so they could vote on a $10 billion emergency fund for FEMA - as a starter - to clean up this mess. Go, Nancy!!! And also learned that the House Majority Leader thought it was a terrible idea and didn't want to do it. (There's no surprise. Guess he saw no political gain in this.) But she fought back and finally got at least some of them to return to DC. The vote is to be either tonight or tomorrow morning.

The kicker is - all the Army Corp of Engineers needed to protect NO protected from a Cat 5 hurricane, to keep the levees from breaking was, I believe, less than $2 billion. Once again, an ounce of prevention....

Mostly, I am even more stunned that the rescue of the people is taking so long, whatever the reasons or excuses. I know there's shooting but there's always the air drops. Hard to believe this is America. I  don't care what the excuses are; this is bad.

We didn't lose our innocence on September 11, 2001. We lost it this week. For anyone who's been clinging to that vision of the good ol' USA that we were taught in public school and is now willing to watch with open eyes and listen with open ears, we've become adults. This is US: this is what we're really like, behind the smiles, behind the makeup, behind the television cameras: Bigoted. Heartless. Every person for him- or herself. The wicked witch complete with warts and green skin and flying monkeys for companions.

Why were not only the Corp of Engineers protections put into place up and down the coast, but why weren't there evacuation plans? Why weren't there buses and even trains for those who couldn't afford to leave? Why weren't there emergency facilites waiting on the other end? Hurricanes are not exactly surprises.

There will be hell to pay for this. Hell to pay.

I want to see people doing jail time and pay huge fines. I want justice, but there is no justice for what these people are doing.