If
you can’t win by playing by the rules, try to use undemocratic means to change
the rules, a frivolous suit aimed at reshaping Louisiana’s congressional
districts illustrates – but with an eye on the long game.
An
arm of national Democrats, the National Redistricting Foundation, recently
filed suit in Louisiana plus two other states, alleging in all three instances
the drawn congressional districts violate voting rights. In all cases, the proportion
of black residents exceeds the proportion of seats held by black Democrats in
Congress as set up by the respective districting plans.
This
leads to complaints by plaintiffs that they can’t elect the candidates they
want as their votes are “diluted,” referring to prohibitions in Section 2 of the
Voting Rights Act of 1965. Their only problem is, their position has been
litigated for over three decades and found wanting.
Once
is an accident. However, twice is not a coincidence but intentional, much to
the chagrin of Ouachita Parish.
That’s
the reality area legislators and local officials must accept regarding flood
control. Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards
vetoed – again – state money for the
River Styx pump station. The repairs would decrease the chances of flooding in
the northeastern part of the parish, near CenturyLink headquarters and
surrounding neighborhoods that suffered high water encroachment in 2016.
It’s
Democrat Gov. John
Bel Edwards vs. Republican House of Representatives majority III, a showdown
that, like some prizefights, basketball championships, etc. may prove less competitive
than its predecessors.
Edwards
called
the year’s third special session because the lower House GOP will not
accede to backing his requests to spend all outdoors. It will
grant him spending all indoors, witnessed by the fact that in the second such
session that a majority voted for reinstituting a third of a cent increase in
the sales tax due to expire, but that offer, representing 80 percent of his
desired total, his party found wanting and defeated that measure the second
time it came up (any tax increase requires a two-thirds vote in each chamber of
the Legislature).
Therefore,
back to the salt mines go legislators, as Edwards attempts a sitzkrieg strategy to wear down House
opposition (in the Senate his lapdog GOP Pres. John Alario has enough
feckless Republicans to muscle through whatever the governor wants). Yet the call
he made to do it illustrates how his position has weakened.
As
it turns out, in indirect fashion Louisianans may end up countenancing more
murders beginning next year.
Either Louisiana House of Representatives Democrats did their level best to destroy their party’s Gov. John Bel Edwards’
reelection chances, or else he has so little influence that he can’t keep his
party from melting down Louisiana government.
Last
night (just about early this morning), the 2018 Second Extraordinary
Session of the Louisiana Legislature ended in paralysis. The previous hour had
seen some productivity for better or worse.
Worse
was accepting HB 18 by
Democrat state Rep. Katrina Jackson
that expanded the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit. A dozen
Republicans who should have known better supported it, although at least
they placed a hard sunset date on it. To fund it, they raised taxes on mostly higher-income
earners. Also bad: the sunset date for this and discussed tax measures was all
the way into 2025, leaving little incentive to right-size state government.
