As is her wont, Gov. Kathleen Blanco defended her latest unwise increase in budgetary spending by assuming Louisiana’s citizens need to be told how to think and/or are as confused about it all as she is.
As part of her budget which threatens to undo the needed fiscal restraint imposed upon the state by the hurricane disasters of last year, Blanco wants to make new commitments of about $135 million annually for raises in educators’ salaries, as well as increases in other areas. She says she heard of “a lot of excuses about why we should proceed with caution.”
Let me see if I can replicate those “excuses”: six months ago a third of the state’s economic output was severely damaged by the hurricanes that will take years to recover, the state probably lost a tenth of its workforce permanently, it will owe the federal government hundreds of million of dollars in reconstruction bills – and ongoing problems such as coastal restoration and unfunded accrued liabilities in state pension funds continue to exist, right? (And others claim this budget produces shortfalls in other, needed areas.) Even a best-case scenario argues for a standstill budget from late 2005 with no new spending commitments unless with commensurate cuts elsewhere.
Blanco and the state did some hard work (if not optimally so) in getting Louisiana closer to living within its means with cuts late last year, but suddenly now she has decided that resources that had gone to eliminated spending either now can be returned to those purposes or for new ones, like the salary increases. Prudence dictates that no additional spending occurs until the state solidly is back on its feet.
Yet Blanco dismisses this prudent strategy and indicated she seems quite confused, as also has been her trademark, about what she should do in office. “If I am doing what one group said should be done last year, and I am doing it this year, they say ‘Oh my God, we shouldn’t be doing that.’ I am just tired of the confusing messages, signals that they send out,” Blanco has said.
Let me try to put this into terms that render even Blanco’s confusion abated. Assuming she’s talking about the raise, which mainly Republican legislators argued last year should have been granted if commensurate cuts in spending had occurred elsewhere without raising taxes, let’s remember the situation then: Louisiana had a bloated budget and Blanco wanted to hike taxes to take even more money out of the public in order to spend more (on the raises). The disasters then reduced the state’s revenue-generating capacity by at least 5 percent for the foreseeable future. Cuts were made to compensate. But now she wants to hike spending again, saying we don’t need a tax increase to do it for educators’ pay – which is what her opponents last year desired.
Ordinarily, this would have worked because the cuts of last year would represent a reallocation in this year. But these are not ordinary times because the cuts were made not for reallocation purposes, but to offset a permanent, for the time being, loss in revenues. However, Blanco doesn’t see it that way because of a raft of federal funds temporarily coming into the state and additional revenues from unstable revenues sources temporarily producing extra revenues.
The problem is, she is proposing permanent increases in spending, and no amount of chanting “you have to have a little confidence in the economy” is going to assure these temporary sources of funds will translate into long-term economic growth that allows an overnight recovery from the disasters. A fiscally prudent policy-making approach would assume the opposite and, perhaps a few years from now, the state can enjoy any excess fruits of recovery.
Still, Blanco doesn’t seem to get that, and it leads to the question why something so simple appears to elude it her. It may not: the new spending could well be a reelection tactic. In the past, the most reliable way to win elections in this state has been to promise people stuff, regardless of whether the state could afford it. Under heavy pressure with low popularity as 2007 approaches, Blanco might well be drawing on her liberal/populist roots to present this unaffordable pledge as more trinkets to throw out to the crowds to make her more popular. (And the fact she is running radio ads trying to do the impossible by insisting her nearly 10 percent overall budget increase isn’t a return to “big government” using her campaign funds lends credence to this scenario.)
If so, it’s reckless and inexcusable. If not, then she apparently fails to have the acumen to run the state at this time. If she really feels strongly about handing out raises, why not make spending more efficient in areas such as long-term health care and use savings from there? Absent that, either way, her course of action endangers the state’s economic health.
9.3.06
Fields, Jackson undermine Louisiana democracy
If the Rev. Jesse Jackson is going to carpetbag in Louisiana on the conduct of elections, it would do if he got his facts straight. Then maybe the hurricane-force blowhard winds that he produces wouldn’t spawn little tornadoes like state Sen. Cleo Fields’ lawsuit to stop the Apr. 22 elections in Orleans Parish.
Jackson asserts several inaccuracies. First, like it should make any difference, New Orleans will have a majority of black voters present on Apr. 22. The fact that Jackson mistakenly mentions that New Orleans’ population composition present now is majority white implies that he really wouldn’t think voting rights is an issue if he had known a majority black population likely will be on the ground on election day. That is, if a hurricane shattered a majority white city that left a majority of non-whites in the city on election day, we wouldn’t hear a peep out of him. It’s not voting rights he’s concerned about, it’s power for a constituency he claims to represent.
Also, when Jackson writes “Louisiana … refused to provide satellite voting places for those dispersed,” it’s obvious he paid no attention to what happened in the last special session when the state bent over backwards to set up 10 of these for the next couple of elections (he can check here for a full account). He also accuses the state of holding “an election with a secret voting roll in New Orleans.” This is patently untrue: anybody can request to see the names of registered voters in Orleans Parish at any time.
Fields takes these untruths and runs with them, claiming in a request to the U.S. Department of Justice that the state has not done enough to ensure minority voting rights. In fact, the state has complied with its own laws, in the past found adequate by the federal government, and even gone beyond them, by spending millions of dollars to directly inform displaced voters about election aspects.
Indeed, Fields shows little understanding for the basic principles of American government when he echoes claims that evacuees are unlikely to take advantage of the complicated procedures that would let them vote by mail-in absentee ballots (why are these people different from anybody else for whom these procedures have been in place for years; aren’t all people to be treated equally?) and when he makes statements like “What's the rush? There's not one vacant position. All of these positions have elected officials that are in place.” Uh, OK, but a fundamental precept of our representative democracy is that elected majoritarian branch officials serve fixed, not open-ended, terms.
In this light, the actions of Jackson and Fields represent a disregard for democratic principles, even as they insist they are allegedly trying to promote them.
Jackson asserts several inaccuracies. First, like it should make any difference, New Orleans will have a majority of black voters present on Apr. 22. The fact that Jackson mistakenly mentions that New Orleans’ population composition present now is majority white implies that he really wouldn’t think voting rights is an issue if he had known a majority black population likely will be on the ground on election day. That is, if a hurricane shattered a majority white city that left a majority of non-whites in the city on election day, we wouldn’t hear a peep out of him. It’s not voting rights he’s concerned about, it’s power for a constituency he claims to represent.
Also, when Jackson writes “Louisiana … refused to provide satellite voting places for those dispersed,” it’s obvious he paid no attention to what happened in the last special session when the state bent over backwards to set up 10 of these for the next couple of elections (he can check here for a full account). He also accuses the state of holding “an election with a secret voting roll in New Orleans.” This is patently untrue: anybody can request to see the names of registered voters in Orleans Parish at any time.
Fields takes these untruths and runs with them, claiming in a request to the U.S. Department of Justice that the state has not done enough to ensure minority voting rights. In fact, the state has complied with its own laws, in the past found adequate by the federal government, and even gone beyond them, by spending millions of dollars to directly inform displaced voters about election aspects.
Indeed, Fields shows little understanding for the basic principles of American government when he echoes claims that evacuees are unlikely to take advantage of the complicated procedures that would let them vote by mail-in absentee ballots (why are these people different from anybody else for whom these procedures have been in place for years; aren’t all people to be treated equally?) and when he makes statements like “What's the rush? There's not one vacant position. All of these positions have elected officials that are in place.” Uh, OK, but a fundamental precept of our representative democracy is that elected majoritarian branch officials serve fixed, not open-ended, terms.
In this light, the actions of Jackson and Fields represent a disregard for democratic principles, even as they insist they are allegedly trying to promote them.
8.3.06
Blanco's risky budget fails to promote real fiscal reform
Be prepared for a budgetary two-step coming from the administration of Gov. Kathleen Blanco: she’s going to claim it represents fundamental reform and a decrease in spending when it really doesn’t, and when all is said and done, it will continue to perpetuate past inefficient practices and priorities that have become less affordable than ever in this era of budgetary uncertainty.
Comparing the budget placed into law by the Legislature at the end of the 2005 regular session, there is a noticeable hike in expenditures over twice the rate of inflation. But get ready to hear that this budget not only doesn’t create a big increase, you’ll hear it actually represents a decrease – because Blanco will argue that it is less than the budget approved after the special sessions and executive orders she issued which incorporated a huge influx of federal funds put there in response to the hurricane disasters of 2005.
In other words, the proposed budget ($20.294 billion) is considerably higher than the one that went into effect on 7/1/05 ($18.427 billion). But it is actually slightly lower than the one that went into effect 12/1/05 ($20.787 billion). (A difference which, at first, left some legislators scratching their heads.) Guess which difference will be harped upon in the next three months by the Blanco Administration?
Actually, when all is said and done, that’s the only real difference between last year’s and this year’s budget – federal funds. When you subtract out the extra amount of it that added in, there’s little difference between the two.
Which, if you take a glass half-full approach, isn’t a bad deal. You could argue that an essentially standstill budget is a good thing in a state with a history of living beyond its means. But that would be, unfortunately, the wrong way to look at it.
Besides the influx of federal funds (which will go away when the aftermath of the disasters becomes ameliorated), three other substantial changes occurred within the past eight months. One, the Blanco Administration and Legislature cut about $615 million in spending; two, the Budget Stabilization Fund was raided to the tune of nearly $154 million, and three, in the current budget additional revenues of $410 million have been recognized. In essence, around $1.1 billion of a combination of restored cuts and new spending wiped away gains from cuts and use of new revenues (mainly revenues, as some lawmakers have pointed, which really should be treated as nonrecurring where Blanco foresees them as being used for continuing items such as educator salary increases and health spending – the administration’s excuse: Blanco’s not doing anything not done in previous budgets).
Admittedly, a few items do point to a half-hearted attempt to restructure state spending. The urban and rural funds were not resurrected, and a few hundred employees did drop from the state government rolls (whether they were needed in light of cuts to provision of social services and education, resulting from reduced population from the disasters, is another matter.) Blanco also wants to marginally increase spending on more efficient community-based long-term health care, by way of another example.
However, her budget lacks major structural reforms. One example here is in monies spent on the wasteful institutional bias present in long-term health care; the budget seems to reflect no attempt to realize roughly $100 million a year in savings from changing reimbursement policies to nursing homes. In short, some expenditures got moved around to make the state a marginally more efficient enterprise, some mostly lower-priority, previously-cut items along with some big ticket new spending got added, and the state drew down on its “rainy day” fund and upon revenues uncertain to continue in order to compensate.
To pull all of this off, Blanco is betting that projections don’t materially change and that Louisiana experiences a “hurricane dividend:” that people displaced from the state disproportionately were less productive to the state in terms of revenues they brought to it but bigger drains on health and human services they claimed from the state. Only time will tell, and it may tell very badly if neither of these come to pass.
So, do not be fooled if Blanco proclaims that her budget not only does not promote “big government,” but that it represents real reform. It does not: real reform would have entailed keeping most of the cuts enacted in the past few months, extending them further into areas based on priority, shifting expenditures to deal with bigger but more obscure problems (such as unfunded accrued liabilities in Louisiana’s pension funds, estimated to grow by about another $237 million this year), demanding more efficiency out of the bureaucracy, and utilizing far more conservatively additionally recognized revenues from the state’s own and the federal government’s resources. The glass is half-empty, and until reform beyond what Blanco seems willing to offer occurs, Louisiana always will risk fiscal difficulties.
Comparing the budget placed into law by the Legislature at the end of the 2005 regular session, there is a noticeable hike in expenditures over twice the rate of inflation. But get ready to hear that this budget not only doesn’t create a big increase, you’ll hear it actually represents a decrease – because Blanco will argue that it is less than the budget approved after the special sessions and executive orders she issued which incorporated a huge influx of federal funds put there in response to the hurricane disasters of 2005.
In other words, the proposed budget ($20.294 billion) is considerably higher than the one that went into effect on 7/1/05 ($18.427 billion). But it is actually slightly lower than the one that went into effect 12/1/05 ($20.787 billion). (A difference which, at first, left some legislators scratching their heads.) Guess which difference will be harped upon in the next three months by the Blanco Administration?
Actually, when all is said and done, that’s the only real difference between last year’s and this year’s budget – federal funds. When you subtract out the extra amount of it that added in, there’s little difference between the two.
Which, if you take a glass half-full approach, isn’t a bad deal. You could argue that an essentially standstill budget is a good thing in a state with a history of living beyond its means. But that would be, unfortunately, the wrong way to look at it.
Besides the influx of federal funds (which will go away when the aftermath of the disasters becomes ameliorated), three other substantial changes occurred within the past eight months. One, the Blanco Administration and Legislature cut about $615 million in spending; two, the Budget Stabilization Fund was raided to the tune of nearly $154 million, and three, in the current budget additional revenues of $410 million have been recognized. In essence, around $1.1 billion of a combination of restored cuts and new spending wiped away gains from cuts and use of new revenues (mainly revenues, as some lawmakers have pointed, which really should be treated as nonrecurring where Blanco foresees them as being used for continuing items such as educator salary increases and health spending – the administration’s excuse: Blanco’s not doing anything not done in previous budgets).
Admittedly, a few items do point to a half-hearted attempt to restructure state spending. The urban and rural funds were not resurrected, and a few hundred employees did drop from the state government rolls (whether they were needed in light of cuts to provision of social services and education, resulting from reduced population from the disasters, is another matter.) Blanco also wants to marginally increase spending on more efficient community-based long-term health care, by way of another example.
However, her budget lacks major structural reforms. One example here is in monies spent on the wasteful institutional bias present in long-term health care; the budget seems to reflect no attempt to realize roughly $100 million a year in savings from changing reimbursement policies to nursing homes. In short, some expenditures got moved around to make the state a marginally more efficient enterprise, some mostly lower-priority, previously-cut items along with some big ticket new spending got added, and the state drew down on its “rainy day” fund and upon revenues uncertain to continue in order to compensate.
To pull all of this off, Blanco is betting that projections don’t materially change and that Louisiana experiences a “hurricane dividend:” that people displaced from the state disproportionately were less productive to the state in terms of revenues they brought to it but bigger drains on health and human services they claimed from the state. Only time will tell, and it may tell very badly if neither of these come to pass.
So, do not be fooled if Blanco proclaims that her budget not only does not promote “big government,” but that it represents real reform. It does not: real reform would have entailed keeping most of the cuts enacted in the past few months, extending them further into areas based on priority, shifting expenditures to deal with bigger but more obscure problems (such as unfunded accrued liabilities in Louisiana’s pension funds, estimated to grow by about another $237 million this year), demanding more efficiency out of the bureaucracy, and utilizing far more conservatively additionally recognized revenues from the state’s own and the federal government’s resources. The glass is half-empty, and until reform beyond what Blanco seems willing to offer occurs, Louisiana always will risk fiscal difficulties.
7.3.06
What hurricanes? Blanco budget promises business as usual
Let me get this straight, six months ago the sky was falling in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, with Rita soon on her way to add insult to injury (relatively speaking). But instead, if you are to take Gov. Kathleen Blanco’s 2006-07 budget at its word, not only is the sky not falling, it’s raining money onto the fair state of Louisiana.
Sure, a good 350,000-plus still are displaced, probably most never to return, thousands of revenue-producing businesses with them, and damage estimates topping (when counting insurance claims and government assistance) over $100 billion, but Blanco decided on the back of better-than-expected revenues to propose the largest budget, by far, in the history of the state.
Optimists like myself, in the aftermath of the disasters, comforted ourselves by thinking a streamlining and prioritizing of government would serve as the silver lining to the dark cloud. As if a business undergoing tough economic times, state government would reorganize itself to become more efficient and to shed itself of functions which provided little real benefits compared to great costs. Money, I figured, would go to where it was really needed.
Silly me. Personally, I might like a raise, but let’s see how some other things first work out (which probably do not include raises for secondary school teachers because they continue to get overpaid for what they produce – although with Orleans Parish and its union-driven high-pay, low-performance system largely defeated, maybe in the rest of the state results have caught up to compensation). There is still a multitude of spending time bombs which should have first priority over any restored cuts or new spending, such as the $12 billion unfunded accrued liability of state retirement systems.
Note that the $20.3 billion price tag on this produces an annual increase of 8.56 percent, more than doubling the current rate of inflation. And this is after factoring out state job and spending cuts that resulted from the disasters. Plus, who knows how high it would have gone without this being an odd-numbered year session, when taxes can’t be raised ordinarily, blunting Blanco’s proclivity to hike them.
Details of the budget are forthcoming soon, but with the broad numbers coming out as they are it seems unlikely any real push towards efficiency and priorities will appear in it. So (even as the federal government watches and ponders whether to give more recovery money to a state with a spendthrift reputation), Louisiana looks to rip even the silver lining off the cloud and waste it like it has done so often in the past?
Sure, a good 350,000-plus still are displaced, probably most never to return, thousands of revenue-producing businesses with them, and damage estimates topping (when counting insurance claims and government assistance) over $100 billion, but Blanco decided on the back of better-than-expected revenues to propose the largest budget, by far, in the history of the state.
Optimists like myself, in the aftermath of the disasters, comforted ourselves by thinking a streamlining and prioritizing of government would serve as the silver lining to the dark cloud. As if a business undergoing tough economic times, state government would reorganize itself to become more efficient and to shed itself of functions which provided little real benefits compared to great costs. Money, I figured, would go to where it was really needed.
Silly me. Personally, I might like a raise, but let’s see how some other things first work out (which probably do not include raises for secondary school teachers because they continue to get overpaid for what they produce – although with Orleans Parish and its union-driven high-pay, low-performance system largely defeated, maybe in the rest of the state results have caught up to compensation). There is still a multitude of spending time bombs which should have first priority over any restored cuts or new spending, such as the $12 billion unfunded accrued liability of state retirement systems.
Note that the $20.3 billion price tag on this produces an annual increase of 8.56 percent, more than doubling the current rate of inflation. And this is after factoring out state job and spending cuts that resulted from the disasters. Plus, who knows how high it would have gone without this being an odd-numbered year session, when taxes can’t be raised ordinarily, blunting Blanco’s proclivity to hike them.
Details of the budget are forthcoming soon, but with the broad numbers coming out as they are it seems unlikely any real push towards efficiency and priorities will appear in it. So (even as the federal government watches and ponders whether to give more recovery money to a state with a spendthrift reputation), Louisiana looks to rip even the silver lining off the cloud and waste it like it has done so often in the past?
6.3.06
Black majority present in Orleans, aiding Nagin
For awhile after Hurricane Katrina, conventional wisdom was that Republicans and white candidates electorally would be advantaged in Orleans Parish. Congressional Research Service data indicated that blacks disproportionately fled the city and such relatively few numbers were left that non-blacks actually held a majority in New Orleans by Oct., 2005.
But it’s not going to happen. I presented a paper last week at the Louisiana Political Science Association 2006 annual meeting that estimates that while Orleans Parish will have regained less than half of its pre-storm population by city elections Apr. 22, it will have a black majority, using a model based upon estimated population and actual voter registration statistics both before and after Hurricane Katrina struck the greater New Orleans area in late Aug., 2005.
Taking a voting model based upon past elections shows, with so many blacks registered as Democrats and historically voting for such candidates that Democrat candidates should have little trouble in winning city/parish elections. We have to remember that New Orleans was 68 percent black in population prior to Katrina, with over 165,000 more blacks than all other racial group numbers combined. About half of all registered voters were black Democrats. Even if blacks are not returning to the city in the proportion, 73 percent, that comprised the evacuees, it appears a majority, about 57 percent, of the returnees are black.
As the city continues to repopulate, blacks have regained their numerical dominance, a trend that will continue until New Orleans reaches its “carrying capacity” of just over 300,000 around the end of the year. Then the city will grow slowly if at all for some time. But there will be an estimated 115,242 blacks present in New Orleans by Apr. 22, as opposed to about 103,000 non-blacks.
We also can use historical data to figure out the numbers of black Democrats, white Democrats, and white Republicans projected to be present, to create a voting model. The statistics don’t look good for Republicans at all. 53,803 black Democrats are predicted to be in New Orleans on election day, compared to less than 18,000 white Republicans. And even if, unrealistically, one theorized that every single white Democrat voted for a Republican, those predicted there only comprise about 26,000. The black and Democrat advantage will continue to grow by the general election runoff on May 20.
Adjusting by registration and historical voting patterns doesn’t change this relationship. Blacks expected to vote still will outnumber non-blacks by several hundred. And this does not include absentee/early voting totals which are heavily weighed to blacks.
These numbers tell us that if the likes of Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu want to wrest the mayor’s job from Ray Nagin, they’re going to have to do it the old-fashioned way: a bi-racial coalition. Being the only major black candidate in the race, unless one of the major white candidates can snare a non-trivial portion of the black vote, Nagin will win even with all the bad publicity he has garnered (and he realizes this as his campaigning emphasizes his ethnicity.)
To win the office of New Orleans mayor in 2006, you’re almost certainly going to have to run as a Democrat. And if you base your strategy of the mistaken belief that whites will comprise a majority of voters, you guarantee yourself defeat. (P.S. if readers would like a copy of the paper, write me.)
But it’s not going to happen. I presented a paper last week at the Louisiana Political Science Association 2006 annual meeting that estimates that while Orleans Parish will have regained less than half of its pre-storm population by city elections Apr. 22, it will have a black majority, using a model based upon estimated population and actual voter registration statistics both before and after Hurricane Katrina struck the greater New Orleans area in late Aug., 2005.
Taking a voting model based upon past elections shows, with so many blacks registered as Democrats and historically voting for such candidates that Democrat candidates should have little trouble in winning city/parish elections. We have to remember that New Orleans was 68 percent black in population prior to Katrina, with over 165,000 more blacks than all other racial group numbers combined. About half of all registered voters were black Democrats. Even if blacks are not returning to the city in the proportion, 73 percent, that comprised the evacuees, it appears a majority, about 57 percent, of the returnees are black.
As the city continues to repopulate, blacks have regained their numerical dominance, a trend that will continue until New Orleans reaches its “carrying capacity” of just over 300,000 around the end of the year. Then the city will grow slowly if at all for some time. But there will be an estimated 115,242 blacks present in New Orleans by Apr. 22, as opposed to about 103,000 non-blacks.
We also can use historical data to figure out the numbers of black Democrats, white Democrats, and white Republicans projected to be present, to create a voting model. The statistics don’t look good for Republicans at all. 53,803 black Democrats are predicted to be in New Orleans on election day, compared to less than 18,000 white Republicans. And even if, unrealistically, one theorized that every single white Democrat voted for a Republican, those predicted there only comprise about 26,000. The black and Democrat advantage will continue to grow by the general election runoff on May 20.
Adjusting by registration and historical voting patterns doesn’t change this relationship. Blacks expected to vote still will outnumber non-blacks by several hundred. And this does not include absentee/early voting totals which are heavily weighed to blacks.
These numbers tell us that if the likes of Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu want to wrest the mayor’s job from Ray Nagin, they’re going to have to do it the old-fashioned way: a bi-racial coalition. Being the only major black candidate in the race, unless one of the major white candidates can snare a non-trivial portion of the black vote, Nagin will win even with all the bad publicity he has garnered (and he realizes this as his campaigning emphasizes his ethnicity.)
To win the office of New Orleans mayor in 2006, you’re almost certainly going to have to run as a Democrat. And if you base your strategy of the mistaken belief that whites will comprise a majority of voters, you guarantee yourself defeat. (P.S. if readers would like a copy of the paper, write me.)
4.3.06
Lawsuit provides Landrieu opportunity against Nagin
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has more than reelection to worry about, having become the target of a lawsuit by the National Rifle Association. Nagin ordered police officials to seize privately-held, legal firearms in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and a temporary restraining order issued Sep. 23, 2005 enjoined him to cease the practice. Apparently, confiscated weapons have yet to be returned.
What was particularly lamentable is that Nagin had absolutely no authority under either the U.S. Constitution or the Louisiana Constitution to do so. Louisiana statutory law does allow some restrictions on firearms during extraordinary conditions, but does not allow for out-and-out confiscation.
The publicity generated by this suit (probably not accidentally) comes at the launch of the sprint to the mayor’s election Apr. 22 and it only can hurt Nagin’s already tough chances. Four years ago, Nagin got into the general election by capturing a good chunk of the dwindling white vote, where he used it to defeat another black Democrat. However, no serious Republican or white candidate ran in 2002.
The white vote will be even more important this time out because Nagin has three whites, one Republican, running, Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu, civic leader and Audubon Institute director Ron Forman and former city councilor Peggy Wilson. But, at the same time, he is the only prominent, credible black candidate in the race.
It is likely that most whites will desert Nagin, and whites will comprise a larger portion of the electorate than they did in 2002. At the same time, without a major black opponent (even if Democrat Landrieu will have some crossover appeal), Nagin could win if he monopolizes the black vote.
Here’s where his controversial confiscation action and the reminder the lawsuit serves of it potentially causes him problems. Security is an issue that cuts across partisan and racial lines. Blacks and whites, Republicans and Democrats, and all others equally needed firearms to protect themselves against looters in the chaotic environment right after Katrina. Indeed, violence may have been higher in neighborhoods that had higher proportions of black residents.
If Landrieu in particular can remind people that Nagin grabbed guns instead of allowing their use to prevent looting and demonstrates a strong Second Amendment through past deed and current words, this could facilitate his crossover appeal to black voters. Wilson and Forman can do so, too, but Landrieu would be the biggest beneficiary because Landrieu probably would be the next port of call for black voters disgruntled with Nagin created by negative campaigning against Nagin.
Landrieu has nothing to lose by emphasizing this, and probably could pick up some white votes as well. It’s a vulnerability Nagin will wish he didn’t have.
What was particularly lamentable is that Nagin had absolutely no authority under either the U.S. Constitution or the Louisiana Constitution to do so. Louisiana statutory law does allow some restrictions on firearms during extraordinary conditions, but does not allow for out-and-out confiscation.
The publicity generated by this suit (probably not accidentally) comes at the launch of the sprint to the mayor’s election Apr. 22 and it only can hurt Nagin’s already tough chances. Four years ago, Nagin got into the general election by capturing a good chunk of the dwindling white vote, where he used it to defeat another black Democrat. However, no serious Republican or white candidate ran in 2002.
The white vote will be even more important this time out because Nagin has three whites, one Republican, running, Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu, civic leader and Audubon Institute director Ron Forman and former city councilor Peggy Wilson. But, at the same time, he is the only prominent, credible black candidate in the race.
It is likely that most whites will desert Nagin, and whites will comprise a larger portion of the electorate than they did in 2002. At the same time, without a major black opponent (even if Democrat Landrieu will have some crossover appeal), Nagin could win if he monopolizes the black vote.
Here’s where his controversial confiscation action and the reminder the lawsuit serves of it potentially causes him problems. Security is an issue that cuts across partisan and racial lines. Blacks and whites, Republicans and Democrats, and all others equally needed firearms to protect themselves against looters in the chaotic environment right after Katrina. Indeed, violence may have been higher in neighborhoods that had higher proportions of black residents.
If Landrieu in particular can remind people that Nagin grabbed guns instead of allowing their use to prevent looting and demonstrates a strong Second Amendment through past deed and current words, this could facilitate his crossover appeal to black voters. Wilson and Forman can do so, too, but Landrieu would be the biggest beneficiary because Landrieu probably would be the next port of call for black voters disgruntled with Nagin created by negative campaigning against Nagin.
Landrieu has nothing to lose by emphasizing this, and probably could pick up some white votes as well. It’s a vulnerability Nagin will wish he didn’t have.
1.3.06
Katrina response used to advocate border insecurity
Apparently Sen. Mary Landrieu isn’t the only one wanting to pile on the American Red Cross and government organizations for political gain. Enter the National Council of La Raza, an anti-American group (motto: “For the Race, Everything; Outside the Race, Nothing”) which promotes unfettered illegal immigration into the U.S. regardless of national security concerns, and pursues a predictably redistributive agenda focused on taking wealthy and power from others and transferring it to those of Hispanic origins. It’s upset about the “response” of nonprofits and government to “Hispanics” regarding the 2005 hurricane disasters.
A lot of the sheer idiocy of its agenda is visible right off the top. The group claims government agencies didn’t provide emergency directions in languages other than English which cost Peruvians and Brazilian working along the Gulf Coast their lives. So we’re supposed to have a bunch of evacuation signs posted in Spanish and Portuguese because of a few immigrants who were irresponsible enough not to be have some knowledge of English? When you come to America to work legally, you need to know some basics of the country’s official language. You adapt to America; it doesn’t adapt to you. It’s your own fault when you fail to do so, not this country’s obligation to bend over backwards for you. I’ve been to 50 countries worldwide and I sure didn’t expect there to be signs in English alongside those in Arabic or Bulgarian (for example); even if I’m a visitor it’s my responsibility to figure out to get around and my fault alone if I can’t.
Also, the group in the report whines about how storm victims got deported because they showed up seeking aid. Well, a little common sense tells us that if they were in the country illegally to begin with, they needed to be deported after receiving assistance. (And, of course, had they not illegally entered the country, they wouldn’t have needed help in the first place.)
While labor abuses did occur, the report illogically tries to tie that to the wise suspension of the Davis-Bacon Act that serves to restrain trade and infringes on individual rights. There’s nothing about artificially inflating wages in order to satisfy union greed that would stop illegal labor practices.
The report gets downright contradictory when it faults the Red Cross on the one hand for requiring diversity training of its workers, which slowed response, yet at the same time criticized the organization for not having enough Hispanic volunteers. So what was the ARC to do, break down doors to Hispanic household and impress volunteers? Does La Raza even understand the meaning of the word “volunteer?” And if the ARC declined help from other Hispanic groups as the report alleges, do these other groups need the ARC’s permission to launch their own efforts? (Perhaps another word with which La Raza is unfamiliar is “ingrate.”)
Its recommendations turn out predictably leftist with a heavy emphasis on embracing victimhood and irresponsibility: force government to spend money to support additional languages other than the national language of English, refuse to enforce immigration laws in times of turmoil, shower benefits on illegal aliens, compel the ARC to become more diverse, etc. Much of what it proposes would degrade border security. In short, the whole thing is a waste of resources and intellectual energy, just an excuse to promote an agenda not designed to assimilate to and celebrate the concept of America, but instead to divide and weaken it.
A lot of the sheer idiocy of its agenda is visible right off the top. The group claims government agencies didn’t provide emergency directions in languages other than English which cost Peruvians and Brazilian working along the Gulf Coast their lives. So we’re supposed to have a bunch of evacuation signs posted in Spanish and Portuguese because of a few immigrants who were irresponsible enough not to be have some knowledge of English? When you come to America to work legally, you need to know some basics of the country’s official language. You adapt to America; it doesn’t adapt to you. It’s your own fault when you fail to do so, not this country’s obligation to bend over backwards for you. I’ve been to 50 countries worldwide and I sure didn’t expect there to be signs in English alongside those in Arabic or Bulgarian (for example); even if I’m a visitor it’s my responsibility to figure out to get around and my fault alone if I can’t.
Also, the group in the report whines about how storm victims got deported because they showed up seeking aid. Well, a little common sense tells us that if they were in the country illegally to begin with, they needed to be deported after receiving assistance. (And, of course, had they not illegally entered the country, they wouldn’t have needed help in the first place.)
While labor abuses did occur, the report illogically tries to tie that to the wise suspension of the Davis-Bacon Act that serves to restrain trade and infringes on individual rights. There’s nothing about artificially inflating wages in order to satisfy union greed that would stop illegal labor practices.
The report gets downright contradictory when it faults the Red Cross on the one hand for requiring diversity training of its workers, which slowed response, yet at the same time criticized the organization for not having enough Hispanic volunteers. So what was the ARC to do, break down doors to Hispanic household and impress volunteers? Does La Raza even understand the meaning of the word “volunteer?” And if the ARC declined help from other Hispanic groups as the report alleges, do these other groups need the ARC’s permission to launch their own efforts? (Perhaps another word with which La Raza is unfamiliar is “ingrate.”)
Its recommendations turn out predictably leftist with a heavy emphasis on embracing victimhood and irresponsibility: force government to spend money to support additional languages other than the national language of English, refuse to enforce immigration laws in times of turmoil, shower benefits on illegal aliens, compel the ARC to become more diverse, etc. Much of what it proposes would degrade border security. In short, the whole thing is a waste of resources and intellectual energy, just an excuse to promote an agenda not designed to assimilate to and celebrate the concept of America, but instead to divide and weaken it.
28.2.06
Second, Sixth Districts unlikley to have partisan change
On an earlier occasion I warned that superficial analysis and over-reliance on conjecture would create problems in understanding the political changes wrought by the 2005 hurricanes in Louisiana. Another example has presented itself.
An organization headed by 1980 independent presidential candidate John Anderson, FairVote, recently argued that the impact of the hurricanes could create competitive Second (around New Orleans) and Sixth (around Baton Rouge) District Congressional elections. But this analysis only incorporated subjective conjectures and superficial data. A look at more specific and rigorous data demonstrates this scenario to be rather far-fetched.
As concerns the Second, the simple fact of the matter is with almost half of the district comprised of black Democrats before Katrina, some extreme dislocations would have to occur for it to become competitive. This seems unlikely. Understand that prior to the storm the district had about 250,000 black registrants out of 405,000.
Two-thirds of the district is comprised of part of New Orleans. The city now estimates it has 156,140 people, and the work I’m doing for a paper presented later this week shows the majority of them are black (yes, I will summarize it all for a future posting). It’s not the 68 percent prior to the storm, but when this is broken down into voter registration totals of those present in Orleans that puts a bare minority as black Democrats who almost always vote Democrat.
Keep in mind the election is eight months away, people are still flowing into Orleans the majority of who are black, and that some whites will vote for a Democrat. In short, it is highly unlikely that a Democrat will not win there in the fall, and likely that this person will be black.
There’s only a marginally better chance that the Sixth District, represented by Republican Rep. Richard Baker for almost 20 years, could flip Democrat. The Greater New Orleans Community Data Center’s population estimates show this to be unlikely, reporting state population down about 385,000 in January. The population estimation data only shows an increase of 57,820 total individuals in the Sixth District. Using historical data and assuming they all are black Democrats from Orleans Parish, and further assuming all stay and change their registrations from Orleans, the 56.79 percent who would be registered would comprise 32,836 voters, adding to all black voters in the Sixth District would make the district only 38 percent black.
Further assuming that 82.21 percent of all blacks in the district would be black Democrats, adding to that the 28 percent who are white Democrats, and assuming everybody votes at the same rate their partisanship and other parties registrants split theirs, a Democrat could eke out a victory by about 5 percent of the vote. But historically, white Democrats are as likely to vote for a Republican candidate as they are to stay loyal to their party in the Sixth District’s contest, making a Democrat win, all other things held equal, an unlikely scenario – especially with the election ten months away from the date of this data and continued predicted movement from the Sixth District back to the Second.
I like to think that the intentions of FairVote on this issue were genuine. Its purpose is to suggest changes to electoral codes and systems to better reflect popular will in elections. However, they use their conclusions to support changes suggested by their conclusions, opening the possibility of why they were a bit too lax in their research methods was because such conclusions could assist their agenda. In any event, careless research will do nothing to increase our understanding of Louisiana’s post-hurricanes political geography.
An organization headed by 1980 independent presidential candidate John Anderson, FairVote, recently argued that the impact of the hurricanes could create competitive Second (around New Orleans) and Sixth (around Baton Rouge) District Congressional elections. But this analysis only incorporated subjective conjectures and superficial data. A look at more specific and rigorous data demonstrates this scenario to be rather far-fetched.
As concerns the Second, the simple fact of the matter is with almost half of the district comprised of black Democrats before Katrina, some extreme dislocations would have to occur for it to become competitive. This seems unlikely. Understand that prior to the storm the district had about 250,000 black registrants out of 405,000.
Two-thirds of the district is comprised of part of New Orleans. The city now estimates it has 156,140 people, and the work I’m doing for a paper presented later this week shows the majority of them are black (yes, I will summarize it all for a future posting). It’s not the 68 percent prior to the storm, but when this is broken down into voter registration totals of those present in Orleans that puts a bare minority as black Democrats who almost always vote Democrat.
Keep in mind the election is eight months away, people are still flowing into Orleans the majority of who are black, and that some whites will vote for a Democrat. In short, it is highly unlikely that a Democrat will not win there in the fall, and likely that this person will be black.
There’s only a marginally better chance that the Sixth District, represented by Republican Rep. Richard Baker for almost 20 years, could flip Democrat. The Greater New Orleans Community Data Center’s population estimates show this to be unlikely, reporting state population down about 385,000 in January. The population estimation data only shows an increase of 57,820 total individuals in the Sixth District. Using historical data and assuming they all are black Democrats from Orleans Parish, and further assuming all stay and change their registrations from Orleans, the 56.79 percent who would be registered would comprise 32,836 voters, adding to all black voters in the Sixth District would make the district only 38 percent black.
Further assuming that 82.21 percent of all blacks in the district would be black Democrats, adding to that the 28 percent who are white Democrats, and assuming everybody votes at the same rate their partisanship and other parties registrants split theirs, a Democrat could eke out a victory by about 5 percent of the vote. But historically, white Democrats are as likely to vote for a Republican candidate as they are to stay loyal to their party in the Sixth District’s contest, making a Democrat win, all other things held equal, an unlikely scenario – especially with the election ten months away from the date of this data and continued predicted movement from the Sixth District back to the Second.
I like to think that the intentions of FairVote on this issue were genuine. Its purpose is to suggest changes to electoral codes and systems to better reflect popular will in elections. However, they use their conclusions to support changes suggested by their conclusions, opening the possibility of why they were a bit too lax in their research methods was because such conclusions could assist their agenda. In any event, careless research will do nothing to increase our understanding of Louisiana’s post-hurricanes political geography.
27.2.06
Make correct, not expedient, changes in higher education
As is proper, Louisiana is reviewing the provision of higher education in the state in the light of the 2005 hurricane disasters. The luxury of too many baccalaureate degree-granting campuses no longer can be sustained in light of the new fiscal realities.
The main reason why Louisiana has gotten into the position where it has 14 such institutions is because politics, rather than educational or financial considerations, have played the main role in determining what gets taught where. There’s little real reason to have in smaller cities a Northwestern State, Southeastern, Nicholls State, Louisiana Tech, or Grambling when they all are within a hour’s drive of major metropolitan areas with their own (often more than one) major state universities. It also makes little sense to have a Southern University right down the street from the University of New Orleans, and another Southern University up the road from Louisiana State University Baton Rouge.
But you just can’t pick up whole campuses and transport them so the state is looking into some kinds of consolidations. Obviously, the move making the most sense would be to end the Southern University system and combine them into the appropriate LSU schools (including associate degree-granting Southern University Shreveport with Bossier Parish Community College) and to combine Grambling and Louisiana Tech, institutions that grant undergraduate and graduate degrees just miles apart from each other in an area of population about 30,000.
Of course, that will never happen because the schools to be merged into others will themselves and have their alumni (a few of whom roam the state Legislature) complain about the end of tradition and will claim each school has a unique, distinct mission – if any of that is true, it certainly pales in comparison to the hundreds of millions of dollars the state would save each year by this rearrangement. In the end politics, rather than efficient delivery of higher education, will win out.
More limited reforms could occur concerning the campuses in small cities near large ones, where they are more than several miles apart and could not easily consolidate resources. But it cannot occur for trivial reasons. As consultants recently have observed, there must be some synergy of functions, or nothing meaningful gets accomplished.
Fortunately, a synergistic-based strategic plan already exists – the Board of Regents of the State of Louisiana’s 2001 Master Plan. I’ll use my employer, whose views I may or may not represent on this issue, Louisiana State University Shreveport, as an example on how this can work.
LSUS is designated in the plan as the comprehensive university in Northwest Louisiana – that is, it should be the primary institution in serving educational needs in this part of the state. Historically, it has not been. NSU has been allowed to poach students through Shreveport-based programs such as its nursing programs. Tech has been allowed to offer graduate coursework at its Barksdale Air Force Base satellite campus. And graduate medical education, of course, is taken care of by the LSU Health Sciences Center Shreveport.
Given the disparate locations and roles of the programs involved, a merger really would not work. Instead, shifting of programs makes much more sense. Something like this should occur:
NSU’s School of Nursing should be transferred into LSUHSC (which should not, given LSUHSC’s current scope and facilities, not result in the loss of accreditation)
Tech should be made more purely into an engineering school, with transfers of functions such as offering degree in the Liberal Arts to LSUS
Any Tech graduate programs currently offered in Shreveport should be transferred to LSUHSC or LSUS, wherever appropriate
Some serious thought should be made to transferring NSU’s educational instruction to LSUS, even though NSU has a long history in this area (it started as a teachers’ college) because, quite simply, there’s a whole lot more demand for teachers in the 350,000-person Bossier and Caddo Parishes than there is in 25,000-person Natchitoches Parish.
Obviously, politics will intrude on these suggestions, too. NSU and Tech will scream about losing these functions. But these are the kinds of things consultants need to be considering because they will save the state tens of millions of dollars (my best guess; it could be much higher) a year and will bring more rationality to higher education in the state. Whether common sense will prevail on this matter is another matter entirely.
The main reason why Louisiana has gotten into the position where it has 14 such institutions is because politics, rather than educational or financial considerations, have played the main role in determining what gets taught where. There’s little real reason to have in smaller cities a Northwestern State, Southeastern, Nicholls State, Louisiana Tech, or Grambling when they all are within a hour’s drive of major metropolitan areas with their own (often more than one) major state universities. It also makes little sense to have a Southern University right down the street from the University of New Orleans, and another Southern University up the road from Louisiana State University Baton Rouge.
But you just can’t pick up whole campuses and transport them so the state is looking into some kinds of consolidations. Obviously, the move making the most sense would be to end the Southern University system and combine them into the appropriate LSU schools (including associate degree-granting Southern University Shreveport with Bossier Parish Community College) and to combine Grambling and Louisiana Tech, institutions that grant undergraduate and graduate degrees just miles apart from each other in an area of population about 30,000.
Of course, that will never happen because the schools to be merged into others will themselves and have their alumni (a few of whom roam the state Legislature) complain about the end of tradition and will claim each school has a unique, distinct mission – if any of that is true, it certainly pales in comparison to the hundreds of millions of dollars the state would save each year by this rearrangement. In the end politics, rather than efficient delivery of higher education, will win out.
More limited reforms could occur concerning the campuses in small cities near large ones, where they are more than several miles apart and could not easily consolidate resources. But it cannot occur for trivial reasons. As consultants recently have observed, there must be some synergy of functions, or nothing meaningful gets accomplished.
Fortunately, a synergistic-based strategic plan already exists – the Board of Regents of the State of Louisiana’s 2001 Master Plan. I’ll use my employer, whose views I may or may not represent on this issue, Louisiana State University Shreveport, as an example on how this can work.
LSUS is designated in the plan as the comprehensive university in Northwest Louisiana – that is, it should be the primary institution in serving educational needs in this part of the state. Historically, it has not been. NSU has been allowed to poach students through Shreveport-based programs such as its nursing programs. Tech has been allowed to offer graduate coursework at its Barksdale Air Force Base satellite campus. And graduate medical education, of course, is taken care of by the LSU Health Sciences Center Shreveport.
Given the disparate locations and roles of the programs involved, a merger really would not work. Instead, shifting of programs makes much more sense. Something like this should occur:
Obviously, politics will intrude on these suggestions, too. NSU and Tech will scream about losing these functions. But these are the kinds of things consultants need to be considering because they will save the state tens of millions of dollars (my best guess; it could be much higher) a year and will bring more rationality to higher education in the state. Whether common sense will prevail on this matter is another matter entirely.
26.2.06
Landrieu mayoral win creates intriguing statewide scenarios
Last week, Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu revealed one of the worst kept secrets around recent New Orleans that he will run for mayor in April. As interesting as this might be concerning politics in the Crescent City, it makes for even more interesting ramifications statewide.
Were Landrieu, as currently he is favored, to win the top job in New Orleans, he no longer could ascend to the state’s top job of Governor as Lt. Governor. What makes this more than an academic point is that a concerted recall effort is taking place aimed at Gov. Kathleen Blanco.
Legally, a petition must meet the one-third registered voter mark within 180 days, and then officials would have 20 days to certify it. Given this time frame (with any general election for mayor, as expected, to occur May 22), the next election date that could be scheduled for the recall would be the Sep. 30 contest to fill two other statewide offices.
This would give Blanco plenty of time (the Constitution gives no specifics) to choose Landrieu’s successor who would face confirmation by the Legislature (convenient, since it would be in session at the time if she’s quick about it). In essence, she might be picking her own successor if things don’t go well for her.
(This month or so would be an interesting time in the state. Should the governor’s office become prematurely vacant at this time, there would be no Lt. Governor to assume the job. Neither would there be an “elected” Secretary of State that would be next in line – the current holder of that office Al Ater was not elected. That would put Atty. Gen. Charles Foti – whose family is married into the Landrieu clan – in the Governor’s Mansion. How about that for a Landrieu anaconda wrapping itself around the state?)
This duty presents quite a choice for Blanco. She must be relieved that a potential gubernatorial rival now is out, and she would want to pick somebody that would not become a political rival to her; indeed, she would want an ally on the chance she does get recalled successfully and/or to assist her in reelection efforts. Is this a backdoor way for Jim Bernhard to finally get the political power he has craved?
And it’s something she needs to start working on immediately. With Landrieu looking like he well could be out of the picture for a succession, this can only encourage people to sign the recall petition who otherwise would not want to see two Landrieus in three of the most powerful statewide elected offices in Louisiana.
Nothing can happen unless Landrieu wins, but if he does, the situation will conjure up some political intrigue exciting even by Louisiana’s inflated standards.
Were Landrieu, as currently he is favored, to win the top job in New Orleans, he no longer could ascend to the state’s top job of Governor as Lt. Governor. What makes this more than an academic point is that a concerted recall effort is taking place aimed at Gov. Kathleen Blanco.
Legally, a petition must meet the one-third registered voter mark within 180 days, and then officials would have 20 days to certify it. Given this time frame (with any general election for mayor, as expected, to occur May 22), the next election date that could be scheduled for the recall would be the Sep. 30 contest to fill two other statewide offices.
This would give Blanco plenty of time (the Constitution gives no specifics) to choose Landrieu’s successor who would face confirmation by the Legislature (convenient, since it would be in session at the time if she’s quick about it). In essence, she might be picking her own successor if things don’t go well for her.
(This month or so would be an interesting time in the state. Should the governor’s office become prematurely vacant at this time, there would be no Lt. Governor to assume the job. Neither would there be an “elected” Secretary of State that would be next in line – the current holder of that office Al Ater was not elected. That would put Atty. Gen. Charles Foti – whose family is married into the Landrieu clan – in the Governor’s Mansion. How about that for a Landrieu anaconda wrapping itself around the state?)
This duty presents quite a choice for Blanco. She must be relieved that a potential gubernatorial rival now is out, and she would want to pick somebody that would not become a political rival to her; indeed, she would want an ally on the chance she does get recalled successfully and/or to assist her in reelection efforts. Is this a backdoor way for Jim Bernhard to finally get the political power he has craved?
And it’s something she needs to start working on immediately. With Landrieu looking like he well could be out of the picture for a succession, this can only encourage people to sign the recall petition who otherwise would not want to see two Landrieus in three of the most powerful statewide elected offices in Louisiana.
Nothing can happen unless Landrieu wins, but if he does, the situation will conjure up some political intrigue exciting even by Louisiana’s inflated standards.
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