No reason to reimpose harmful restrictions

Oh, no! Delta variant! Case counts going way up! Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! One big Louisiana city already looks ready to hit the panic button, so should the state follow as after a subdued period the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic starts to boil higher again?

Absolutely not. By no means should the state or its subgovernments begin to reimpose restrictions that weren’t that effective anyway and probably cost more lives than they saved.

Predictably, case surges have started in areas with lower rates of vaccination. In fact, a high cluster of these exists in the center of the country running north-south from Missouri through Arkansas and swelling into Louisiana. This comes largely courtesy of the rising virus delta variant now becoming more prominent, which does appear more transmissible and does a bit better job of defeating vaccines.

Diluted UBI about to hit reeling LA hard

Louisiana’s problems will multiply as for the next 12 months the nation takes one step closer to a universal basic income.

This week, households with children can start receiving child tax credit monies courtesy of legislation rammed through Congress by its slender majority of Democrats and signed by their own Pres. Joe Biden. It provides $3,000-$3,600 in free (read: from increased taxes or debt) money to upper middle-class and below households per child, depending on age, with monthly installments available for half through the end of the year. Those invested in the idea, such as Louisiana’s Democrat Rep. Troy Carter, already shill it as great policy.

Far from it, and not because it's not a perfect universal basic income, or the idea that every citizen should receive a periodic government cash grant without strings attached. It tapers beginning at about six figures and disappears at a quarter million dollars in income, it only lasts a year with an option to receive the first half of payments in six monthly installments, and obviously the family must have a dependent child younger than 18.

Edwin Washington Edwards, 1927-2021

Two years ago, Louisiana had five ex-governors out and about; today, just one. The one of the quartet who stayed with us the longest, Prisoner #03128-095, went out in a way not inconsistently with his political career: with a wink and a nod. Last week, he entered hospice care, with him and his family saying it was for better care and that he looked forward to future birthdays. Days later ….

Known outside the big house as Democrat former Gov. Edwin Edwards, it’s perhaps difficult for many who follow Louisiana politics to understand the shadow he cast over state politics for a quarter-century starting in 1972. Obviously the center of attention when in office, he wasn’t too far away from that even when out of it during the 1980-84 and 1987-92 periods (he actually vacated the office after conceding defeat a couple of months prior to the official end of his third term in 1988). He probably really liked it that way.

I met Edwards the first time, briefly, when he attended the dedication of my employer’s new library in 1992. But where I actually had a few minutes to chat with him, the chastened version after prison, was almost a decade ago at the Louisiana Political Science Association annual meeting. From that second meeting I draw some of the impressions below.

Politics, not data, behind top cop veto wish

You might think Republican Lafourche Parish Sheriff Craig Webre, after nearly three decades in office, would have learned it is an asset in politics to know what you are talking about before you open your mouth. Only in office less than a decade, Republican Bossier Parish Sheriff Julian Whittington showed him how it’s done.

Last week, in an assemblage of a few dozen law enforcement officials that included a dozen of the state’s 64 sheriffs, Webre emerged as the most outspoken critic of efforts to overturn Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards’ veto of SB 118 by Republican state Sen. Jay Morris. The bill would remove permit requirements to carry a concealed firearm for most citizens, which currently include a fee, paperwork, and mandatory training classes.

At the made-for-media, if not Astroturf, news conference, Webre expressed several sentiments. “I don’t want to be at a Mardi Gras parade with my daughter where someone jumps up to catch a bead and that gun falls out their waistband it hits the concrete, goes off and innocent people get killed …. I don’t want to go into a department store or restaurant and wonder who might be carrying a concealed weapon.” He further alleged that the bill “not only is going to endanger the law enforcement community, it will endanger the general public as well.” And, he claimed it could embolden untrained people to act like citizen vigilantes, unnecessarily escalating minor incidents into deadly ones.

Keep Shreveport ban to empower vulnerable

Shreveport’s City Council this week faces a choice between possibly more tax dollars from more economic activity and limiting the autonomy of vulnerable citizens.

Councilors will consider passing an amended ordinance that carves out an exemption from its commercial smoking ban for establishments that have gambling. An entire ban for indoor areas except for businesses specifically catering to smoking would have gone into effect last Aug. 1 but was delayed to this Aug. 1 because of the impact of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic. Now some want to dilute the prohibition by excluding gaming areas of casinos and bars and truck stops licensed for gambling.

As has become typical as jurisdiction after jurisdiction in Louisiana where such battles play out with casinos involved – and all resulting in restricting of smoking – opponents argue casinos will take a hit with this. Smoking, like gambling, is addictive behavior, so eliminating the practice of one vice by discouraging practitioners of another disproportionately eats into casinos’ potential clientele.

Don't forget these bills in override session

Perhaps overshadowed by the spotlights on other bills, several less-publicized ones deserve veto overrides that the Louisiana Legislature seems poised to cue up later this month.

The driving force behind a historic such session comes from legislator distaste at Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards’ vetoes of SB 156, which prevents discrimination by sex in scholastic and collegiate sports, and SB 118, which removes requirements for carrying concealed firearms found unnecessary in almost half the states. As well, his vetoes of several other measures that would shore up weaknesses in the state’s electoral system integrity have drawn legislators’ ire.

However, other vetoed bills also merit attention, beginning with a few that address vaccinations for the Wuhan coronavirus. Already noted is the necessity of HB 498 by Republican state Rep. Kathy Edmonston that prevents government-mandated vaccinations to gain citizens to access ordinary services until such vaccinations receive formal and final Food and Drug Administration approval. Given the vaccines now are known to cause certain rare maladies particularly in youths, such a mandate would cause a terrible choice between enduring legalized discrimination preventing reception of government services or risking state-sanctioned murder as in the case of abortion.

Council clowns' tantrum makes BC look unserious

Describing the antics of the Bossier City Council might draw such words as “amateur hour”, “clown show”, and “laughingstock” – except it’s no laughing matter when its elected officials provide such a stark reminder to the world that by their behavior they oversee America’s biggest small town.

If the majority cabal at present running council affairs wanted to impress upon observers just how unprofessional, inept, and petty Bossier City government is, they couldn’t have done better with the circus of a meeting they put on earlier this week. After witnessing what happened, any business wanting to set up shop in northwest Louisiana would cross the city off its list, correctly deducing that its parochial, secretive and dysfunctional government would create a toxic business environment held hostage by a few egotists and not worth the trouble to invest in.

The gory details are here, and a special meeting later this week would appear at least to iron out the appointment by Republican and new Mayor Tommy Chandler of 26^th Judicial District Judge Charles Jacobs as city attorney and therefore 26th District assistant district attorney Richard Ray as assistant. But that doesn’t erase how handling this became a manufactured controversy ending with a self-inflicted wound.

Edwards bill massacre signals go big or home

The Thursday night massacre of 2021 Louisiana Legislature regular session bills shows Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards want to go big or go home.

Last week, on the final day of this decision-making, Edwards vetoed a slew of bills concerning hot-button issues. In essence, by doing so including some issued earlier this year he authorized less transparency in government, insufficient checks on gubernatorial emergency powers, coerced government diversion of part of paychecks to special interests, elections less secure from fraud and special interest interference, potential forcible injections of vaccines labeled by the federal government as carrying elevated risks for youths, an invitation to waste taxpayer dollars on invalid public records searches, encouragement of state bond underwriters to engage in discriminatory lending practices, needless requirements to carry a concealed firearm, and discrimination against female youths in athletic pursuits.

Never had a governor vetoed so many high-profile non-fiscal bills, because never has a governor faced as rebellious of a Legislature. Until a quarter-century ago, economic liberal populists with socially conservative tendencies, almost all Democrats, ruled the legislative roost with views sympathetic mostly with those of governors. A vast influx of full-spectrum conservatives has infiltrated the Legislature since, while Edwards mirrors the old-school liberal populists of the past but with more socially-liberal views than almost all of his predecessors.

Another LA Democrat strategically drops label

Cosmetic and political more than significant describe no party state Rep. Malinda White’s dropping of her Democrat label.

Last week, White announced she would leave the party. She claimed frustration with a partisan atmosphere at the Capitol and asserted her constituents felt more like she should speak for issues and ideas. Former state party executive director Stephen Handwerk speculated intraparty friction might have soured her, which he conjectured came from the increasingly far left tilt of the organization’s leadership (that mimics the trend seen at the national level). Of course, Handwerk himself appears to have been a casualty of this when he exited his former role as a new central committee gained election with extreme leftists and/or blacks becoming more prominent a portion in the party’s base and leadership, so he may be imprinting this experience onto his interpretation.

Reviewing this legislative session her votes on 16 pieces of key legislation – all vetoed by the state’s most prominent Democrat whose behavior increasing aligns with this violent movement to the left, Gov. John Bel Edwards – White voted for six, opposed five, and didn’t vote on five. As an absence essentially counts as a negative vote, insofar as Republicans and conservatives were concerned, she only voted the right way 37.5 percent of the time on these controversial non-fiscal issues.

Independence Day, 2021

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