Jindal Fudged Katrina Story

Bobby Jindal's reps are scrambling to explain the heroic Katrina tale he slipped into his big speech on Tuesday night. The Louisiana governor said he was in New Orleans "during Katrina" and backed a sheriff's push to send out rescue boats despite "bureaucrats" who fretted over insurance. A Daily Kos diarist dug up evidence to the contrary, and Jindal's office buckled—at first.

"It was days later" when Jindal showed up and learned about the boats, a rep told Politico, but the governor "didn't imply" that the event "took place during the heat of a fight to release rescue boats." Unsatisfied, Jindal's people kept retelling the story, and Politico kept updating and even deleting parts of it. Finally Jindal's chief of staff told it this way: "This is liberal blogger BS. The story is clear." (More Hurricane Katrina stories.)