Reactions to the Gulf oil spill have, I suppose, been predictable. Sure enough, a substantial part of the right quickly jumped on the thought that since it seems to validate environmental concerns, it must be a dastardly plot by environmentalists. Meanwhile, much of the press floated the idea that this was “Obama’s Katrina” — despite the fact that the administration responded as quickly as anyone could reasonably have expected, and anyway there wasn’t much it could do.

What I didn’t quite expect, however, was the extent of revisionism I’m seeing about Katrina itself. Again and again, I’m seeing people claiming that tales of Bush administration failure were just a falsehood spread by the liberal media, that those left-wing crazies were blaming Bush for an act of God.

I mean, people, we all watched it as it was happening. Here’s a timeline if your memory needs jogging. Bush wasn’t blamed for the hurricane; he was blamed for the fact that thousands of American citizens were suffering in squalor — with reporters on the scene! — while receiving no help, and with administration officials cheerfully praising themselves for the heckuva job they were doing. (I somehow forgot that the Brownie line was delivered on Friday, four days into the nightmare).

Bush was also blamed for the incredible degradation revealed at FEMA, which literally had no idea how to do its job.

So how can people be trying to claim that Bush did nothing wrong? I guess it’s a question of what to believe, the party line or your own lying eyes — and for a lot of people, the eyes don’t have it.