Can anyone explain this controversy over the use of the term “refugees” to refer to people whom Hurricane Katrina drove from their homes, often with the loss of everything they owned? How did that perfectly apt word — far more telling of the problems at hand than the bland “evacuee,” which leaves the implication of going home in a couple of days, or the even less meaningful “victim” or “survivor” — become another flash point in this nation’s on-again, off-again confrontation with racial issues? If refugee is a derogatory term, what does it say when those of us who are white refer to our New Orleans relatives as refugees? With the possibility of thousands of corpses scattered around New Orleans, how can anyone think this is a semantic debate worth having? In any case, we highly recommend Glenn Craven’s column in today’s Daily Dispatch. And let us add that if Glenn is a racist, we’re anti-Semites (something that should make synagogue services awkward tonight). Now that we have that off our chests, the floor is yours.