Wilson, 4 Dwarves debate doesn't change race

The song remains the same as Wilson and the Four Dwarves battled among themselves futilely to keep Republican Atty. Gen. Jeff Landry from an expected eventual gubernatorial victory.

Not a band but gubernatorial aspirants Democrat former cabinet member Shawn Wilson; independent trial lawyer Hunter Lundy; and Republicans state Sen. Sharon Hewitt, Treas. John Schroder, and former gubernatorial appointee Steven Waguespack – all met in a candidate forum for the office televised by the Louisiana Public Broadcasting consortium of stations and affiliates. Noticeably absent was Landry, who the latest polls make the clear front runner, followed distantly by Wilson, with the other four unable to crack single digits of support.

For that reason, any analysis of the efforts insofar as specific answers to issues is meaningless without Landry’s responses. General impressions of each will suffice from the forum that won’t change the dynamics of the contest that will put Landry and Wilson into a runoff, with Landry the clear favorite.

As such, Wilson made the most overtures towards attacking Landry, as if aching for a head start and needing quite a one if he has any chance of achieving the dramatic improvement in fortune necessary to win. That he has a long way to go echoed from the noticeable lack of quality and effectiveness of these sorties, such as the lame assertion that Landry’s absence meant anything more meaningful than a front running strategy of playing it safe.

In the meantime, he also managed to convey, despite the polished nature of his rhetoric, his visible shortcomings as a candidate for statewide election in Louisiana. At one point, when Lundy called him an extremist liberal, he ridiculously suggested that his issue preferences on the whole weren’t really liberal, much less sharply to the left – this coming from somebody who advocated throughout the forum for much bigger government and thereby the higher taxes to fund it, for abortion on demand, for allowing government mandates to trample constitutional rights, and for allowing medical mutilation of children, and who has a history of consistently stumping for all of the above. Good luck in keeping that information from the state’s center-right voting majority.

Predictably most of the fire he got was from Lundy, the placeholder for white liberal populist Democrats who retain social conservatism. He needs to convince black voters – Wilson is black – that he has a better chance than Wilson in a runoff against Landry.

Lundy’s biggest hurdle to surmount in this long shot task is himself. The other half of the time when he’s not blaming insurance or fossil fuel companies for everything wrong in the state he comes off as a dunce. Halfway through the debate, in a discussion that brought in both his whipping boys, Hewitt and Waguespack had had enough of his act and in their replies in turn schooled him on the intricacies of insurance rate-setting and the current threat of salt water intrusion up the Mississippi River. The very few voters watching were reminded that his platform long on demagoguery and short on facts chock full of raising taxes, spending more money, and punishing his enemies – the same agenda that has put the state so far behind others in economic development.

Hewitt’s answers showed a good, and unapologetic, grasp of policy as more than the others she challenged liberal orthodoxy. Waguespack wasn’t far behind if more restrained. For his part, Schroder concentrated more on what in retrospect has become a failed strategy of trying to invoke a crusade against corruption as a central theme to his campaign that has failed to generate any excitement for his candidacy.

Just as Lundy needs to detach votes from Wilson, each of the Republicans needs to abscond with a good portion of Landry’s intended haul to vault over everybody but Landry into a runoff, and they took a minor potshot at him here and there. Their problem is they don’t differ much with him on the issues, leaving little ground on which to criticize and to the extent they need to make the runoff, and the ordnance they tried to deliver wasn’t nearly enough nor powerful enough.

Something major needs to explode on the hustings to change this election’s trajectory from a Landry win upon dispatching Wilson in the runoff. This forum wasn’t it, nor sowed any seeds to cause that.