In spite of all the chaff in the coverage of what another NOLA local, Paul from Wizbang, has called The Great Flood of New Orleans, media consumers finally get some wheat. New Orleans firefighters actually got video of the 17th Street Canal levee break as it occurred. That video, and their statements, were suppressed by Congress until the investigation was completed. WWL News covered the story tonight, and a National Geographic special will air on Wednesday with more from these firefighters and on why the levees broke.

Two things come to mind when watching the video. First, that New Orleans firefighters are every bit the heroes that the NYFD were during 9/11. They stayed, they served, and they saved lives. And even now, they grieve that they couldn't do more. Second, Paul from Wizbang has been spot-on in his coverage of the levee breaks. His October 3 article, "The Story Behind The Katrina Story" asked "How did a "State of the Art" floodwall become a 200 billion dollar engineering failure?" The Corps of Engineers finally, grudgingly, had to admit that the levee broke. It was not overtopped. They knew all along what happened, because this video was available to the government. But they spent months prevaricating, stalling, and trying to find a way to explain why they failed. When they finally admitted it, however painfully, Paul wrote

Greater than a million people have suffered enormous losses because of the Corps' failures. You in the rest of America can't come close to understanding. (largely I blame of the media for that)

The Great Flood of New Orleans makes 9/11 look like child's play.

Today's report doesn't undo any of that. It can't, as the philosophers say, un-ring the bell.

The best it may possibly do is convince the remaining holdouts in Congress that since the federal government flooded us, they hold the ultimate responsibility for making many people here at least partially whole. So I guess some will say this is a "victory" for the people of New Orleans. At this point, you'll pardon us if we don't cheer.

My church was about a half mile away from the break in the video. To see a video of some of the damage, click here. You can view a photo album here, or here are a few snapshots:

Multiply that by tens of thousands of homes and businesses and you might begin to get an idea of what the Corps wrought. As I've written before, other groups, for example the Orleans Levee District, or as they're known locally, the Levee Board, certainly did nothing to prevent this. However, the group most responsible is the Corps of Engineers. And this video is the smoking gun.