The mayor of New Orleans recently blasted emergency crews for using helicopters to rescue people rather than plug up the breached levees. I'll admit, it's a tough choice, but if they could stop the water flowing in, they could begin pumping and fewer people would need rescuing. Plus the cleanup would go faster--the mayor claimed the delay would add at least four weeks to the time needed to drain the city.

Some of those people couldn't have gotten out earlier (I read one account of a man on a respirator who died when he ran out of oxygen) but if all the ones who could've had, imagine what a difference it would've made.