Landry win over woke EPA perhaps his biggest

The way Louisiana Republican Atty. Gen. Jeff Landry keeps racking up wins, you almost wish he would say “no thanks” to running for governor and attempt to stay on in his present job, especially after posting his biggest W to date.

Several times in his present term Landry, in conjunction with any of another to over a dozen other state attorneys general have won key cases against federal government overreach (as well as picking up some corporate settlements). Last week he and Missouri’s put another notch in their belts by having a federal district court rule that several federal government agencies and officials had to desist collaborating, if not pressuring, social media companies over constitutionally protected speech.

Their lawsuit argues that the federal government overstepped in its efforts to convince social media companies to respond to or deemphasize, if not block, postings containing information about vaccinations for the Wuhan coronavirus or that could affect elections. Evidence continues to mount that agencies and officials coordinated with several social media companies to influence news content or sources that likely affected the outcome of the 2020 presidential election and suppressed validated information critical about government policy concerning the pandemic.

Board wants to buck Court, waste taxpayer bucks

From clown show to freak show, perhaps only the Cypress Black Bayou Recreation and Water Conservation District Board of Commissioners could pull off such ignominy in a span of just over a week.

The regular Jun. 21 meeting featured comedy, doubtlessly unintentional on the part of those who provided it, that for most viewers in Bossier Parish turned surreal upon realization this was their tax dollars at work. It occurred a couple of months after the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled that lower courts had to judge whether Executive Director Robert Berry, who also serves as the appointee of the Bossier Parish Police Jury to the Board, was in violation of dual officeholding law by having both posts – with the majority opinion issuing stern instructions that made clear any lower court would have to rule that he was.

That meeting demonstrated several things:

Independence Day, 2023

This column publishes every Sunday through Thursday around noon U.S. Central Time (maybe even after sundown on busy days, or maybe before noon if things work out, or even sometimes on the weekend if there's big news) except whenever a significant national holiday falls on the Monday through Friday associated with the otherwise-usual publication on the previous day (unless it is Thanksgiving Day, Independence Day, Christmas, or New Year's Day when it is the day on which the holiday is observed by the U.S. government). In my opinion, in addition to these are also Easter Sunday, Memorial Day and Veterans' Day.

With Tuesday, Jul. 4 being Independence Day, I invite you to explore the links connected to this page.

Edwards salutes LA with middle digit once more

As a parting gift to Louisianans, Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards gave them the middle-fingered salute that forever cements his reputation as Gov. Nyet.

It’s not so much the volume of vetoes, contrasted to his predecessor Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal who in his first term vetoed 74 regular session non-appropriations bills and 50 in his second term, while Edwards vetoed just 29 in his first term and wrapped up with 78 in his second. In part, it’s because Edwards cast nearly half his vetoes in just the past two years while Jindal cast only a few in his last quarter of service.

But mostly it’s because Jindal’s vetoes only rarely struck anything but low-profile measures while Edwards’ have gone against some subjects of considerable popular and newsworthy concern. So much so that Edwards looks to have triggered a third veto session in an annual row, where these meetings to overturn vetoes had been unprecedented prior to his time in office, and where one override became the first to succeed.

Prevent subversion of admissions by race ban

As expected, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down race-conscious criteria for admissions into universities. Now it’s up to Louisiana to ensure it actually gets done in the state.

The Court issued a ruling in two cases today that using race as a general classification to make admissions decisions violated the Constitution. It granted more leeway to military institutions and said that colleges still can consider “an applicant's discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise,” but that evaluation of experiences must occur “as an individual – not on the basis of race.”

Given Louisiana’s structure to higher education, in effect only a few state schools are affected that much. Community colleges are open admission, and the two lowest levels, regional and HBCU, have such low entrance requirements that (20 on the ACT or SAT equivalent, which is barely above the average nationally although Louisiana’s average was just 18.1, of which a large proportion of those below the 19.8 national mean won’t ever pursue tertiary study) that enrollment proportions by race in the aggregate probably won’t differ by much with those in the population, even though ACT data also show that only five percent of black and 11 percent of Hispanic test-takers are by its definition “college ready” according to their scores, while 29 percent of whites and 51 percent of Asians are.

BC Council hiring oversight legal and desirable

Once again displaying his talent for being blindsided, Republican Bossier City Mayor Tommy Chandler squawked as usual ineffectively as the city debated budget control and employee hiring.

At present, the city has Ordinance 76 of 2019 on the books, which (after recent amendment) mandates that except for public safety personnel the City Council give approval to anyone receiving any compensation from the city for employment or contracting. It’s the offspring of a series of ordinances dating back to 2010 that attempts to exert budgetary control to maximize the chances that overspending or spending on unauthorized positions doesn’t occur.

But after the recent exception made for public safety, Chandler wanted more, and apparently in the runup to the meeting went on an offensive to have the Council discard the restriction completely. So, he was flummoxed when councilors shuffled to its scheduled Aug. 15 powwow an agenda item for this week’s (postponed a week) meeting to do precisely this.

LA congressional map change not soon, if ever

Against all odds – and jurisprudential good sense – Louisiana finds itself having to revisit congressional reapportionment, although unlikely with any changes until after 2024, if even then.

Over a year ago, the chances of the state having to follow the dictates of special interest groups in drawing two majority-minority congressional districts rather than maintaining its one were about as likely as a football team succeeding with a Hail Mary pass at a game’s end. Yet with a Supreme Court decision since on an Alabama reapportionment case, it seems the ball actually got hurled with enough strength to reach the goal line and offensive players in position to catch it.

But the offense has to come down with it. Whether it does begins with the Court also declining to hear the state’s appeal of a district court decision a year ago that set the stage for drawing the two M/M map after the state legislated a one M/M map not too different from that of the present.

Liberalism promotes ideology over kids' welfare

What is it about liberalism that makes its adherents go to the mattresses to preserve the infrastructure that allows minors to have irreversible medical interventions performed on them that many children later will regret, an attitude in sharp contrast with medical practice worldwide outside the U.S.?

Currently, the fate of HB 648 from the recently-concluded Louisiana Legislature regular session hangs in the balance. The bill would disallow prescribing of drugs or surgery designed to alter the physical sex of a minor.

The state of science at present on the issue notes that of the small but growing proportion of all children who begin medical interventions to alter their sex about 30 percent within a few years want to stop, if not reverse, it. Unfortunately, the effects are irreversible, causing major psychological trauma for those who want to stop the transition and major physical trauma even for those who don’t that has significant psychological impacts as well.

Ideologues put fakery ahead of protecting kids

Known more for being behind the curve, it’s refreshing to see something showing Louisiana ahead of it, providing a lesson on how to deal with current controversies.

That happened earlier this week as a result of hearings on Capitol Hill. The Senate Judiciary Committee, controlled by Democrats, decided to hold a hearing entitled “Protecting Pride: Defending the Civil Rights of LGBTQ+ Americans,” which promoted giving privileged position to a small minority at the expense generally of women and children.

It backfired when it came to a discussion about the relative physical capabilities of biological males who assert they are “female” or who have made a medical transition through drugs and/or surgery to take on some female biological aspects, relative to natal females in sports competitions. Republican Sen. John Kennedy had an interest group leader, clearly in over her head, claim that perhaps the greatest, perhaps aside from her sister Venus, female tennis player of all time Serena Williams routinely could defeat typical male professionals.

Plenty of good options to keep $100 million cut

All the fretting about a $100 million last-minute reduction that only increases Louisiana Department of Health spending by $146 million for next fiscal year, as Republican state Sen. Sharon Hewitt suggests, is unwarranted and no corrective should be in the offing.

This week, a couple of Senate panels met unanticipatedly in the aftermath of the regular session’s close to sort out the line item in the general appropriations bill HB 1 triggering this, an insertion which caught by surprise legislators and Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards. The latter warbled about how he would do everything he could, including casting a line item veto on it, to prevent the roughly half-percent decrease it pared, while a number of state senators listened with furrowed brows as allegedly how, when considering leveraged federal funds involved, this really meant an over $700 million loss in budget authority.

Of course, that figure was scare tactics reminiscent of what Edwards threatened would happen in 2016 when trying to muscle through a sales tax increase still haunting the state, that without taking more from the citizenry people with disabilities would be left to beg on street corners, grandparents would be kicked out of nursing homes, and, by the way, college football would cease. Unfortunately, many, including Republicans who should have known better, bought it hook, line, and sinker, then and now.