I know the White House press and the press secretary are busy with other subjects, like nukes in North Korea, and the Foley Follies. And as Walter Lippmann observed, the press too often can shine its light on only one thing at a time.

But as someone who attended many a White House and State Department briefing, there was always an opportunity to remind the briefer and the rest of the press about a story, some horror that continues to haunt policymakers.

For example, suppose someone asked Press Secretary Tony Snow, every day, “Have we caught Osama yet? And why not?” Or as I used to ask at the State Department about Bosnia, “Have we stopped the killing yet?”

Similar questions should be asked about Iraq, especially in light of a report concluding that 650,000 people have died–2.5 percent of the Iraqi population–who wouldn’t have died except for the U.S. invasion and war. But as Bertolt Brecht observed, when the casualties are almost numberless, we not only lose count; we lose the sense of the story, that dying is going on even as we sit in the briefing room.

So I propose that someone in the press corps should check the daily toll of American, allied and Iraqi deaths — then ask, at every briefing or presidential press conference, “The current toll is…. Are we closer to the day the killing will stop?”