Conservative pundits have been hammering the idea that there were “2000 school buses” that New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin could have commandeered to get the poor people of the city evacuated. According to Media Matters, this falsehood has been repeated over and over again.
In fact, the city of New Orleans has 364 school buses, of which 70 were in the shop for repairs and were not driveable. There were not drivers available for the remaining school buses to take people out of town, or personnel to gas them up, etc. Or a way to round up residents and get them to a single meeting point. The logistics of it would have been impossible.