Uniquely imprinted in South with
the stamp of populism, or the belief that government primarily is to be used as
a tool for redistributing resources to favored interests from those that aren’t,
Louisiana has struggled intellectually to detach itself from this past. Even as
liberalism finds itself far more compatible ideologically to this, many who
claim to be conservatives in the state have their belief systems diluted with
the notion that place more emphasis on the need for government to use its
powers to provide some kind of subsidy or assistance to certain groups against
presumed hostile forces as a result of this legacy.
But as educational attainment
levels (with qualitative improvements within those levels) have increased, political
information has become more plentiful and less costly to access, and economic
growth has brought in conservative out-of-state immigrants whose formative
political cultures lacked it, populism has less and less effectively has served
as a mask for the violations liberalism brings upon the tenets held by
conservatives. Even two decades ago, many economic liberals infested state and
local offices, buttressing their positions by enunciating conservative social
issue preferences, and embedded themselves because of a public with lesser
cognitive capacity that discouraged being able to think ideologically and of a
paucity of information about politics generally available to it. This environment
made much more difficult understanding the internal contradictions liberalism
presented within its own philosophical and data-denied incoherence and externally
to core conservative values held by many who were becoming increasingly able to
understand cause and effect in policy.
That’s no longer the case, as the
titanic shift in partisan control of the state has demonstrated, and no politician
has ridden this wave better than Vitter. While rightfully Republican Gov. Bobby
Jindal by far has been the primary catalyst for policy change at the state
level over the past few years, Jindal always has faced limits of his
largely-pure principled conservatism that argues for right-sized government with
the primary role of removing obstruction and privilege in order to allow
individuals to succeed (with the exception of some crony capitalism in the area
of economic development, vaguely following the theory of state-sponsored development
once all the rage among less developed countries). Until his recent pivot into obstinate
opposition to Common Core State
Standards in education, Jindal never really attempted to present front and
center a populist issue preference as part of his agenda.
By contrast, Vitter has put
populist preferences onto his agenda, but selectively, while continually
propagating policy based upon core conservatism. Only last week, on the
occasion of issuance
of a report he requested, he reminded the country about legislation he
proposed a couple of years ago that would place stricter capital requirements
on larger banks in order to eliminate an advantage he asserts they have over
smaller banks. For years he
has fought to make it easier to import drugs, saying that this would lower
prices to consumers without any significant health risks. And he's not a great friend of big business in general, having most recently drawn a lukewarm rating by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. These actions tap
into that latent populism and remind voters that, while his conservative credentials
are without question given
his voting record, he has some sympathies in this area as well. And he
blends them so well that both principled and populist conservatives claim him
as their own.
Thus when, in an interview
last week and in written
remarks after, Vitter made the most definitive statement about supporting
Common Core, which goes against the populist grain, of any announced candidates for governor next year, he demonstrated again how he can
create a tent large enough to incorporate a conservatism that wins elections in
Louisiana. So far, both others – Republican Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne and Democrat state Rep. John Bel Edwards – also
have expressed support of it. But Dardenne is viewed suspiciously on
tax-and-spend issues by many conservatives, and Edwards has little hope of
attracting any of their votes by a strategy
of presenting a socially conservative face grafted onto a liberal populist body.
Vitter had no need to stake out a
populist position on this issue to attract conservative votes precisely because
his conservatism is unquestioned. Nor is it a real valence issue that could add
a significant slice of the electorate to his camp for, despite all the
controversy and rhetoric afforded it, the issue simply isn’t one that important
to many Louisiana voters – a survey
this spring by academicians at Louisiana State University Baton Rouge revealed
that only about half of respondents even knew anything of CCSS, and of those
that did they split pretty much in opinion about it. So while a candidate might
enter the race who would speak against CCSS – state Treasurer John
Kennedy, who generally is allied with more populist conservatives than
other major state Republicans, might jump in – it’s unlikely that alone would in
net peel more than a handful of votes from a Vitter who did not condemn the
standard-setting program. (And potential Democrat candidate New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu recently made, if anything, even a stronger pitch for CCSS.)
This illustrates why Vitter still
must be considered the big favorite to succeed Jindal – he best balances the
preferences of a public growing in its ability to direct its majority
conservative sentiments to voting for conservative candidates while still clinging
to its populist sentiments atavistically attained. The latter attitude continues
to erode and probably within another generation will evaporate from the
consciences of enough conservatives in Louisiana to negate the odd marriage of
populist conservatism as a political force, but until then in this atmosphere Vitter
stays extremely well-positioned as a politician to win elections.
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