I may never write a column about a journalist’s retirement again, but the point of this space is to try to get behind the headlines and in this instance I think I can offer something here to readers about a man who has had a not insignificant impact on Louisiana politics – and one who some have come to vilify – for now the chief capital correspondent of Louisiana Gannett News Service, John Hill.
Until perhaps the last decade, for reporting on Louisiana government and expressing some opinion about it, for the previous 20 or so years prior if you didn’t live south of I-12 in Louisiana John probably would have been almost your only source of information and commentary. As such, he fulfilled this need in the world of Louisiana politics for many. As part of that job, John has interviewed me on many occasions but I am fortunate enough to know him outside the two sides of an interview and can offer some additional insight into his career (perhaps other than what he’s about to tell the world over the next couple of weeks.)
John’s a great writer and in some matters he did an outstanding job of distilling complex details of stories into good, readable news copy. I’m not sure he would agree with me on this, but I think his best job was on trial coverage, especially the Prisoner #03128-095 case that landed the four-term ex-governor in jail. That was an extremely complex case but John had a knack of boiling it down into understandable prose for the typical reader.
As John has written before, perhaps his work there and subsequent conversations with and stories about Edwin Edwards may make Edwards the most identifiably-linked political person to John when all is said and done. You have to know that they make somewhat of an odd couple because John’s not been happy about political corruption in the state and Edwards has been perhaps its most proficient practitioner.
But the fact is that John is, at the end of the day, a man of the left in the political world who, as he said, “grew up in the generation hoping to make a difference. And I've always felt like we should be the citizens' representatives when we're sitting in a meeting room or covering a press conference.” In his later years, in my opinion, in his reporting one read a frustration that a different attitude than his about the purposes of government, and of the media, was taking hold in the state, and it did affect what he wrote and wrote about.
It may have been fueled by a vocal set of opponents who, through talk radio and the Internet as their reaches proliferated making available more information about Louisiana politics than provided by just John and the few traditional media outlets that had dominated state political discourse for so long, became very critical about John’s reporting. To some, he represented everything wrong with Louisiana media and its relationship to state government; unfortunately, a few in their zeal to criticize got more to attacking the messenger than in concentrating on the contents and kinds of stories published under his byline.
So, for a rather varied set of reasons, John’s contributions to Louisiana politics will be missed.
2.8.07
Veto session possibility illustrates interesting conditions
I was waiting to post looking for updates on veto session information. At this time, both chambers still are a number of votes away from cancelling the session so I can’t wait any longer.
This attempted session has come closer to succeeding than any in the past, over 30 years, for several reasons:
Term limits, to some extent, free legislators from what they perceive to be electoral consequences of gubernatorial retribution since they will not be running for reelection – the consequences being the governor using her people appointed directly or otherwise on the State Bond Commission to excise projects of legislators who don’t vote for not having the session
Gov. Kathleen Blanco’s decision not to run for reelection, making her a lame duck and unable to extend retribution for not stopping the session past the Bond Commission deliberations – in other words, legislators may call her bluff, knowing that she gets no political capital out of denying projects as a response to their not voting to stop the session.
Two of the measures vetoed, HB 505 and SB 45, are extremely high profile and were voted against by 0 and 1, respectively, of the 144 legislators – meaning legislators believe overrides on these will be received favorably by voters back home.
Whether these or any other vetoes would be overridden is another matter. With a third of the House membership voting against a session may mean there’s no chance for overrides working. Then again, maybe the opposition is in being called back in and once there they would be for overrides.
(Note, however, that the National Conference of State Legislatures annual meeting in Boston would overlap at the beginning of the session which may bring about some reluctance to attend – and attendance is needed in order to get the two-thirds majorities to override. Still, probably least likely to vote for overrides would be the attendees of the Boston conference – almost all Democrats demonstrating once again that Democrats are the party of those who think elective office is a vehicle to reap goodies regardless of the taxpayer – so override attempts may be doomed from the start.)
Regardless of what happens, what typically has been a perfunctory exercise instead has taken on meaning this year. The conditions that produced this are worth noting for the future.
This attempted session has come closer to succeeding than any in the past, over 30 years, for several reasons:
Whether these or any other vetoes would be overridden is another matter. With a third of the House membership voting against a session may mean there’s no chance for overrides working. Then again, maybe the opposition is in being called back in and once there they would be for overrides.
(Note, however, that the National Conference of State Legislatures annual meeting in Boston would overlap at the beginning of the session which may bring about some reluctance to attend – and attendance is needed in order to get the two-thirds majorities to override. Still, probably least likely to vote for overrides would be the attendees of the Boston conference – almost all Democrats demonstrating once again that Democrats are the party of those who think elective office is a vehicle to reap goodies regardless of the taxpayer – so override attempts may be doomed from the start.)
Regardless of what happens, what typically has been a perfunctory exercise instead has taken on meaning this year. The conditions that produced this are worth noting for the future.
1.8.07
Veto session worthwhile to improve state education
Given recently-released results of state standardized testing, there should be no question at all that a veto session of the Louisiana Legislature should be called for the first time ever. Whether it will happen is another matter.
The Legislature is empowered to call itself into session to deal with gubernatorial vetoes, if more than half of the members of both chambers refuse to turn in a ballot to call off the session by a deadline, this year Aug. 2. Gov. Kathleen Blanco vetoed fewer than two dozen items from this regular session but she picked some controversial ones. The one with the largest monetary impact might be refusing to lop off a percentage of sales tax on utilities paid by business, who then passes this tax on to consumers.
But the veto with perhaps the longest-term, largest impact to the state was to prevent private school tuition payments receiving a tax credit, continuing the dual-payment system where some families have to pay public school taxes even though their children do not use them and must pay private school tuition to increase their children’s chances of receiving quality instruction. No doubt a tax break on private school tuition would encourage sending children to private schools.
And why not, given the stunning achievements of many of the schools similarly situated to private schools, charter schools, in Orleans Parish? Recent data shows many charter schools there, with often the same kind of student body as in years past when they were wholly public schools, posted extraordinary gains in student achievement on tests. While charter schools vary in some ways that they differ from public schools, two which make them like private schools are they have much greater freedom in personnel policies such as in hiring, promotions, and firings, and in pay policies such as in being able to offer merit pay.
Where typical public schools have failed in Orleans Parish charter schools have succeeded, so one small change to the state’s education landscape that would encourage education of this superior kind, the tax exemption, one would think would be embraced by those in the education profession. Wrong: perhaps the most strident opponents of the veto session because they fear the possibility of undoing the tax exemption veto are teachers unions and their allies in the public education sector.
Why would educators, seeing something that works, be so reflexively against it? Because the goal of teachers’ unions and their sycophants is not to provide the best education possible to students, but instead to transfer as much money as possible from the pockets of taxpayers into their pockets and those of their members. They know all too well that individual accountability measures helping charter schools improve education will impair their greedy impulses.
Of course, since it takes two-thirds vote to override a veto even if the session gets called that’s a tough standard to meet to get Blanco’s decision reversed. But realizing these test results shows at least the attempt through approving an override session should occur, even if for this reason alone.
The Legislature is empowered to call itself into session to deal with gubernatorial vetoes, if more than half of the members of both chambers refuse to turn in a ballot to call off the session by a deadline, this year Aug. 2. Gov. Kathleen Blanco vetoed fewer than two dozen items from this regular session but she picked some controversial ones. The one with the largest monetary impact might be refusing to lop off a percentage of sales tax on utilities paid by business, who then passes this tax on to consumers.
But the veto with perhaps the longest-term, largest impact to the state was to prevent private school tuition payments receiving a tax credit, continuing the dual-payment system where some families have to pay public school taxes even though their children do not use them and must pay private school tuition to increase their children’s chances of receiving quality instruction. No doubt a tax break on private school tuition would encourage sending children to private schools.
And why not, given the stunning achievements of many of the schools similarly situated to private schools, charter schools, in Orleans Parish? Recent data shows many charter schools there, with often the same kind of student body as in years past when they were wholly public schools, posted extraordinary gains in student achievement on tests. While charter schools vary in some ways that they differ from public schools, two which make them like private schools are they have much greater freedom in personnel policies such as in hiring, promotions, and firings, and in pay policies such as in being able to offer merit pay.
Where typical public schools have failed in Orleans Parish charter schools have succeeded, so one small change to the state’s education landscape that would encourage education of this superior kind, the tax exemption, one would think would be embraced by those in the education profession. Wrong: perhaps the most strident opponents of the veto session because they fear the possibility of undoing the tax exemption veto are teachers unions and their allies in the public education sector.
Why would educators, seeing something that works, be so reflexively against it? Because the goal of teachers’ unions and their sycophants is not to provide the best education possible to students, but instead to transfer as much money as possible from the pockets of taxpayers into their pockets and those of their members. They know all too well that individual accountability measures helping charter schools improve education will impair their greedy impulses.
Of course, since it takes two-thirds vote to override a veto even if the session gets called that’s a tough standard to meet to get Blanco’s decision reversed. But realizing these test results shows at least the attempt through approving an override session should occur, even if for this reason alone.
31.7.07
Politics aside, maybe Kennedy wants to be atty. gen.?
This space is called “Between the Lines” because it seeks to go beyond headlines and the surface presentation that the media provide (whether that be as a matter of course or by design to obscure larger issues) about political news in Louisiana, to get at the real story behind it all. But cocnerning news that Democrat state Treasurer John Kennedy is now thinking of running for attorney general, that’s a gambit I have trouble figuring out.
It’s well known that Kennedy would like to run for the Senate next year, perhaps switching parties to facilitate his chances at victory, and clearly holding a current state office and running a statewide campaign this year can only boost his chances of winning a statewide contest next year, Yet it doesn’t seem to make sense that launching such a bid as a rookie (with one year in) attorney general instead of a treasurer in his third term would be more advantageous.
There appear to be many reasons why, if the Senate is his ultimate goal, that an attempted lateral move like this has more disadvantages than advantages:
Kennedy would have no meaningful competition in a run for another term as treasurer. With over $2 million in campaign coffers, he could spend a good portion of this money in a campaign designed to blend easily into a Senate campaign, rather than have to parcel it out designed primarily to secure another statewide office.
A run for attorney general would be no cakewalk, by contrast. While politically wounded, the Democrat apparatus and good-old-boys in the state still would rally around incumbent Atty. Gen. Charles Foti – not just given his incumbency, but that Kennedy has been too reform-minded for their liking. Additionally, other challengers remain particularly a strong one from Republican attorney Royal Alexander. Kennedy could win, but it would not be easy and he very well could lose – a potential loss not the kind of impression he wants to have hanging over him as he immediately would turn around and begin a Senate run.
His current spot has provided a great platform for Kennedy to become the leading voice of reform from Louisiana’s executive branch. Frankly, the attorney general does little that captures headlines (unless, as has happened to Foti, he launches an ill-advised investigation which backfired politically) so if it’s publicity Kennedy would find helpful, even a successful outcome to the lateral move would be less likely to provide it.
It’s possible that other interests that could be helpful to his future campaigning are encouraging this move in conjunction with the party switch, because they think he could be the best Republican candidate against Foti, or, for their own reasons, they’d rather see him launch a Senate bid from this office than the treasury. However, again compared to where he is there just doesn’t seem to be a lot of potential upside here.
Considering all of this, there seems just one reason why Kennedy would go in this direction – maybe he (who has a law degree) simply wants to be attorney general. If so, it would make little sense to take all sorts of electoral risks to get there, especially if he possibly could abandon it after a year. Even with a Senate attempt on his mind, perhaps he would see the attorney general job as one, should he fail next year, as the most desirable consolation prize. Appropriate to Occam’s Razor, it could be that simple.
It’s well known that Kennedy would like to run for the Senate next year, perhaps switching parties to facilitate his chances at victory, and clearly holding a current state office and running a statewide campaign this year can only boost his chances of winning a statewide contest next year, Yet it doesn’t seem to make sense that launching such a bid as a rookie (with one year in) attorney general instead of a treasurer in his third term would be more advantageous.
There appear to be many reasons why, if the Senate is his ultimate goal, that an attempted lateral move like this has more disadvantages than advantages:
Considering all of this, there seems just one reason why Kennedy would go in this direction – maybe he (who has a law degree) simply wants to be attorney general. If so, it would make little sense to take all sorts of electoral risks to get there, especially if he possibly could abandon it after a year. Even with a Senate attempt on his mind, perhaps he would see the attorney general job as one, should he fail next year, as the most desirable consolation prize. Appropriate to Occam’s Razor, it could be that simple.
30.7.07
NW LA delegation provides good, bad, ugly 2007 work
Northwest Louisiana got a comprehensive taste of the good, bad, and the ugly from its delegation in the 2007 regular session of the Louisiana Legislature. Let’s review these:
THE GOOD: Rep. Mike Powell’s HB 113 turned out the best of a thin lineup of superior legislation coming from the delegation. This new law creates the crime of organized retail theft and will make it easier to prosecute and thus deter a crime, one where petty thieves are organized to sell to a fence, that has been growing rapidly.
THE BAD: It’s curious to find someone who tried hard to get passed good bills like SB 313, which would give tax exemptions to those buying vehicles converted for handicapped use, and SB 365, which would have brought some semblance of order to the capital outlay budgeting process, yet who at the same time whiffed so badly on other bills to the detriment of Louisiana, as did Sen. Robert Adley.
THE GOOD: Rep. Mike Powell’s HB 113 turned out the best of a thin lineup of superior legislation coming from the delegation. This new law creates the crime of organized retail theft and will make it easier to prosecute and thus deter a crime, one where petty thieves are organized to sell to a fence, that has been growing rapidly.
THE BAD: It’s curious to find someone who tried hard to get passed good bills like SB 313, which would give tax exemptions to those buying vehicles converted for handicapped use, and SB 365, which would have brought some semblance of order to the capital outlay budgeting process, yet who at the same time whiffed so badly on other bills to the detriment of Louisiana, as did Sen. Robert Adley.
29.7.07
NAACP protests distract from pursuing real solutions
Further demonstrating its irrelevancy to any serious discussion of public policy, the Louisiana National Association for the Advancement of Colored People protested for a second time in Baton Rouge that the promotional tests for fourth and eighth graders in Louisiana were “unlawful” and “unconstitutional.” This distractive rhetoric in part explains why black children disproportionately do poorly on these exams and serves as an impediment to improving the education of all children.
It’s a sign that a protester strives to prick at emotion rather than make a good-faith effort to solve a problem when words like “unlawful” and “unconstitutional” are tossed about without any sensible explanation of them to the matter at hand or even any connection to reality as in this instance. There’s nothing unlawful or unconstitutional about taking a test to demonstrate enough learning has occurred in order to proceed to the next level of mastery; nothing legally or constitutionally prohibits this. Indeed, the tests serve as an accountability measure to show how good of a job both students and schools are doing.
Although it does not have the audacity to explicitly clarify this, what the NAACP really objects to in terms of the tests is that disproportionately black children do poorly on them so many who “pass” their coursework cannot pass the exams. Thus, the protest is a thinly veiled assertion that somehow the tests are unfair, one potential explanation for gap in curriculum passage but test failure.
But if the exams are at fault, then we ought to see similar situations among all students. But non-black students are less likely to pass the classes and fail the tests, so it’s not a problem of instrumentation or the testing process. Rather, the other possible explanation for the gap, lack of rigor and quality in instruction in some schools, must be valid.
As it is, the majority of black students in Louisiana are taught in majority black schools whose staffs typically are plurality if not majority black in terms of both teachers and administrators. Apparently, this is where the problem lies so the NAACP needs to be criticizing in the main the very people it claims to represent.
Rather than blame some inanimate concept like testing, the NAACP needs to stop shooting the messenger and instead address the underlying cause. Only higher expectations of students, increased intellectual and pedagogical capacity of teachers, and expanded rigor will make for better educated students; they won’t become better by offhandedly declaring a measurement of their abilities is invalid and patting them on the back as they fulfill lower standards. State education officials are right to continue to employ testing to help continue improvement in Louisiana’s education; the NAACP’s actions prevent it this realization.
It’s a sign that a protester strives to prick at emotion rather than make a good-faith effort to solve a problem when words like “unlawful” and “unconstitutional” are tossed about without any sensible explanation of them to the matter at hand or even any connection to reality as in this instance. There’s nothing unlawful or unconstitutional about taking a test to demonstrate enough learning has occurred in order to proceed to the next level of mastery; nothing legally or constitutionally prohibits this. Indeed, the tests serve as an accountability measure to show how good of a job both students and schools are doing.
Although it does not have the audacity to explicitly clarify this, what the NAACP really objects to in terms of the tests is that disproportionately black children do poorly on them so many who “pass” their coursework cannot pass the exams. Thus, the protest is a thinly veiled assertion that somehow the tests are unfair, one potential explanation for gap in curriculum passage but test failure.
But if the exams are at fault, then we ought to see similar situations among all students. But non-black students are less likely to pass the classes and fail the tests, so it’s not a problem of instrumentation or the testing process. Rather, the other possible explanation for the gap, lack of rigor and quality in instruction in some schools, must be valid.
As it is, the majority of black students in Louisiana are taught in majority black schools whose staffs typically are plurality if not majority black in terms of both teachers and administrators. Apparently, this is where the problem lies so the NAACP needs to be criticizing in the main the very people it claims to represent.
Rather than blame some inanimate concept like testing, the NAACP needs to stop shooting the messenger and instead address the underlying cause. Only higher expectations of students, increased intellectual and pedagogical capacity of teachers, and expanded rigor will make for better educated students; they won’t become better by offhandedly declaring a measurement of their abilities is invalid and patting them on the back as they fulfill lower standards. State education officials are right to continue to employ testing to help continue improvement in Louisiana’s education; the NAACP’s actions prevent it this realization.
26.7.07
While correct, prayer ruling delays final showdown
Score one for common sense as the entire 5th Circuit Court of Appeals narrowly reversed a decision made by a smaller panel of it that ruled nonsectarian prayer at Tangipahoa Parish School Board meetings violated the first amendment. While it does not settle the matter by any means, the buildup to this decision and its content reveal once again the lengths to which anti-religion advocates are willing to go to erase religion from the public sphere.
By 8-7, the Court ruled the plaintiffs that sued the Board for violation of the conjured “wall of separation” between church and state that argues government should not support the concept of religion in any way even to the point out promoting secularism (contrary to the intent of the Framers of the Constitution) did not have standing to do so because they could not prove harm. Its Chief Judge Edith Jones (frequently mentioned as a candidate for the U.S. Supreme Court) in the majority opinion said a lower court would have to visit that question, which it did not do so when District Court Judge Ginger Berrigan (a former president of the Louisiana chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, the organization which brought the suit on behalf of plaintiffs) ruled against the board.
It’s bad enough that a judge ideologically predisposed against the board made the initial ruling, but worse was the attitude displayed in the minority opinion written by Circuit Judge Rhesa Barksdale, who wrote the opinion of the three-judge panel earlier, calling the decision “a most grievous and unpardonable judicial sin of exalting form over substance.” Translation: “since the rules dictated that the outcome go against my ideological agenda, we need to break the rules.”
Essentially, the previous decisions were vacated, but expect a renewed ACLU challenge this time doing its best to demonstrate standing. In the meantime, Alliance Defense Fund counsel Mike Johnson (who defended the board at no cost to taxpayers) has developed a set of guidelines he thinks will pass constitutional muster that would anticipate forestalling another suit. It won’t given the blind ambition of the ACLU and its fellow travelers on this issue. This won’t go away and may well go all the way to the Supreme Court and maybe there a favorable outcome will protect expression of religious belief from anti-religion forces using government to try to squelch this right.
By 8-7, the Court ruled the plaintiffs that sued the Board for violation of the conjured “wall of separation” between church and state that argues government should not support the concept of religion in any way even to the point out promoting secularism (contrary to the intent of the Framers of the Constitution) did not have standing to do so because they could not prove harm. Its Chief Judge Edith Jones (frequently mentioned as a candidate for the U.S. Supreme Court) in the majority opinion said a lower court would have to visit that question, which it did not do so when District Court Judge Ginger Berrigan (a former president of the Louisiana chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, the organization which brought the suit on behalf of plaintiffs) ruled against the board.
It’s bad enough that a judge ideologically predisposed against the board made the initial ruling, but worse was the attitude displayed in the minority opinion written by Circuit Judge Rhesa Barksdale, who wrote the opinion of the three-judge panel earlier, calling the decision “a most grievous and unpardonable judicial sin of exalting form over substance.” Translation: “since the rules dictated that the outcome go against my ideological agenda, we need to break the rules.”
Essentially, the previous decisions were vacated, but expect a renewed ACLU challenge this time doing its best to demonstrate standing. In the meantime, Alliance Defense Fund counsel Mike Johnson (who defended the board at no cost to taxpayers) has developed a set of guidelines he thinks will pass constitutional muster that would anticipate forestalling another suit. It won’t given the blind ambition of the ACLU and its fellow travelers on this issue. This won’t go away and may well go all the way to the Supreme Court and maybe there a favorable outcome will protect expression of religious belief from anti-religion forces using government to try to squelch this right.
25.7.07
Odom again intends to use taxpayer funds unwisely
Louisiana Agriculture Commissioner Bob Odom is up to his old tricks again, proposing taxpayer funding of ventures likely to fail. Previously having sought to sink money into sugar mill sinkholes, he now wants the state to take possession of a livestock and rodeo arena, plus adjacent land.
Currently, the privately-owned Lamar-Dixon Expo Center is run under a lease-buy agreement with Ascension Parish. Built for $54 million and never having turned a profit, the agreement says the parish may buy in July, 2009 for $7.5 million; Odom has a securitized stream of money he says can support an $8 million price tag upon sale of bonds to accomplish that purpose. He accomplished this because the law dedicating money to boll weevil eradication has a loophole that allows excess funds from it to go to any purpose seen fit by the Louisiana Agricultural Finance Authority – a body controlled by Odom which approved this plan.
It may be that the state actually would not take large losses at this price. But the real question is whether the state’s taxpayers ought to be paying up for an arena that will benefit very few. Even more to the point, is this something government at any level should be involved with at all?
Currently, the privately-owned Lamar-Dixon Expo Center is run under a lease-buy agreement with Ascension Parish. Built for $54 million and never having turned a profit, the agreement says the parish may buy in July, 2009 for $7.5 million; Odom has a securitized stream of money he says can support an $8 million price tag upon sale of bonds to accomplish that purpose. He accomplished this because the law dedicating money to boll weevil eradication has a loophole that allows excess funds from it to go to any purpose seen fit by the Louisiana Agricultural Finance Authority – a body controlled by Odom which approved this plan.
It may be that the state actually would not take large losses at this price. But the real question is whether the state’s taxpayers ought to be paying up for an arena that will benefit very few. Even more to the point, is this something government at any level should be involved with at all?
24.7.07
Reports confirm Jindal loses only if he beats himself
Despite one opponent’s wallet being a little fatter than his, when Rep. Bobby Jindal swings his it’s going to hurt a lot worse relevant to the governor’s race in Louisiana this fall than anybody else’s.
Campaign finance reports that are out show Republican Jindal raised the most dollars over the most recent reporting period, topping other reporting candidates Democrats state Sen. Walter Boasso and Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell and Republican businessman John Georges. However, courtesy of his own money, Georges has a slightly higher total of cash on hand than Jindal’s $5.7 million, both dwarfing the amounts available to Boasso (although he has pledged to throw more than the $1.4 million he already has put in as well) and to Campbell (who already loaned himself $400,000).
The real story, however, is that Jindal collected his sum from a broad base of donors that makes the other three candidates’ look puny. In other words, compared to Jindal Campbell is hardly getting any money from any body, while Boasso and Georges would be in the same boat if they weren’t throwing in so much of their own personal funds.
It’s an indicator that not a lot of people are betting on anybody but Jindal winning. Donors are rational individuals: unless they feel very ideologically committed to a certain candidate and his ideas, there’s no sense in giving money to somebody they really don’t has a chance of winning because money buys access to elected politicians. But there’s no access if they guy can’t get elected, so why waste your money? (Really telling is that, to this point, no Democrat party organization has given to Campbell or Boasso.)
The reports, by way of listed expenditures, give some insight into their strategies. Being in the most enviable situation of having both high name recognition and intended vote percentage, Jindal has not had to spend much to this point since he hasn’t had to create both of these conditions. No doubt the day after the reporting period Jindal went out and made major expenditures revealing what his campaign will do – but opponents will have to wait weeks before finding out what they are on the next report, if the products of those buys haven’t already hit the airwaves, phone lines, etc. by then.
One must wonder what kind of advice Georges has been getting. For a guy with almost zero name recognition and getting about a percent of the vote in polls, he can’t start spending big too soon, especially with so much of the Jindal mountain to have to detonate. Yet outside of some print ads there’s hardly any indicator that he’s running for this office; waiting until after Labor Day and thinking money can buy him parity or better with Jindal is foolhardly (remember this guy?). Campbell’s campaign soon will suffocate for lack of funds, while only Boasso’s campaign is doing what it has to do to have a chance to beat Jindal.
The reports only reaffirm that at this point the only guy that can beat Jindal in this contest is Jindal himself.
Campaign finance reports that are out show Republican Jindal raised the most dollars over the most recent reporting period, topping other reporting candidates Democrats state Sen. Walter Boasso and Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell and Republican businessman John Georges. However, courtesy of his own money, Georges has a slightly higher total of cash on hand than Jindal’s $5.7 million, both dwarfing the amounts available to Boasso (although he has pledged to throw more than the $1.4 million he already has put in as well) and to Campbell (who already loaned himself $400,000).
The real story, however, is that Jindal collected his sum from a broad base of donors that makes the other three candidates’ look puny. In other words, compared to Jindal Campbell is hardly getting any money from any body, while Boasso and Georges would be in the same boat if they weren’t throwing in so much of their own personal funds.
It’s an indicator that not a lot of people are betting on anybody but Jindal winning. Donors are rational individuals: unless they feel very ideologically committed to a certain candidate and his ideas, there’s no sense in giving money to somebody they really don’t has a chance of winning because money buys access to elected politicians. But there’s no access if they guy can’t get elected, so why waste your money? (Really telling is that, to this point, no Democrat party organization has given to Campbell or Boasso.)
The reports, by way of listed expenditures, give some insight into their strategies. Being in the most enviable situation of having both high name recognition and intended vote percentage, Jindal has not had to spend much to this point since he hasn’t had to create both of these conditions. No doubt the day after the reporting period Jindal went out and made major expenditures revealing what his campaign will do – but opponents will have to wait weeks before finding out what they are on the next report, if the products of those buys haven’t already hit the airwaves, phone lines, etc. by then.
One must wonder what kind of advice Georges has been getting. For a guy with almost zero name recognition and getting about a percent of the vote in polls, he can’t start spending big too soon, especially with so much of the Jindal mountain to have to detonate. Yet outside of some print ads there’s hardly any indicator that he’s running for this office; waiting until after Labor Day and thinking money can buy him parity or better with Jindal is foolhardly (remember this guy?). Campbell’s campaign soon will suffocate for lack of funds, while only Boasso’s campaign is doing what it has to do to have a chance to beat Jindal.
The reports only reaffirm that at this point the only guy that can beat Jindal in this contest is Jindal himself.
23.7.07
Landrieu endorses govt censorship of political views
Lost last week in the continuing efforts to force from office Republican Sen. David Vitter, the Louisiana media have ignored the actions of Louisiana’s Democrat senator that threaten its very freedom.
Sen. Mary Landrieu along with every other Democrat senator save one, voted to prevent language that would bar the Federal Communications Commission from reinstituting the misnamed “Fairness Doctrine” applying to broadcasting. Two decades ago the rule lapsed as electronic media outlets began to proliferate. Originally, with just over-the-air sources of electronic media available, government wanted to ensure that the few broadcasting oligopolies (local and national) then existing could not force one viewpoint down people’s throats and so decreed controversial viewpoints broadcast by a station had to allow time for opposing views.
But the advent of cable and now satellite radio with Internet components to the media have more than mooted this concern. However, also in the interim, political opinion broadcasting mostly on radio has exploded – but to the great consternation of liberals like Landrieu, almost totally favoring the conservative side of the spectrum.
Understanding liberalism and conservatism explains the dominance of the latter easily. If you are well-informed about history and current events, you are a logical thinker, and you don’t let emotion cloud your arguments, only if you are intellectually dishonest with yourself can you think liberalism is a valid, coherent ideology. Because radio doesn’t have accompanying images that play much more to the basis of today’s liberalism, unreasoned emotion, it demands much more critical thinking on the part of its broadcasters and listeners when explicating ideas, accentuating the vastly superior quality of reasoning and fact presentation of conservatism.
Thus, talk radio has been the great equalizer to the liberal bent of other broadcast media. This makes liberals mad and explains the move to reopen the possibility of the rule’s promulgation in the future because they cannot stand the thought that, in the marketplace of ideas, conservatism trounces liberalism, endangering their political power. The idea would be, with the rule back in place to scare broadcasters away from presenting any opinion as conservatism resonates with the audience, to enable every single utterance to have liberal rebuttals that would cost so much time, money, and create such chaos that broadcasters would be discouraged from giving conservative arguments demanded by the public.
It won’t happen immediately give the alignment of political forces but it could in the future were liberals to get much healthier majorities in the U.S. government’s majoritarian branches. Thus moves were made to write into law a prohibition on the doctrine, which last month passed in the House.
The same was tried in the Senate attaching it to an unrelated bill. Perhaps the Democrat with the most to gain from this was Landrieu, whose seat is the most at peril among Democrats in 2008 and with a compliant print media in Louisiana, only talk radio has been able to present consistently to the public aspects about her record that demonstrate why she is a poor choice to represent the state. With her help, the amendment failed.
Make no mistake, Landrieu wants to use government to censor opinions she doesn’t like, to silence those who speak truth to power – itself another indicator of her unfitness for office.
Sen. Mary Landrieu along with every other Democrat senator save one, voted to prevent language that would bar the Federal Communications Commission from reinstituting the misnamed “Fairness Doctrine” applying to broadcasting. Two decades ago the rule lapsed as electronic media outlets began to proliferate. Originally, with just over-the-air sources of electronic media available, government wanted to ensure that the few broadcasting oligopolies (local and national) then existing could not force one viewpoint down people’s throats and so decreed controversial viewpoints broadcast by a station had to allow time for opposing views.
But the advent of cable and now satellite radio with Internet components to the media have more than mooted this concern. However, also in the interim, political opinion broadcasting mostly on radio has exploded – but to the great consternation of liberals like Landrieu, almost totally favoring the conservative side of the spectrum.
Understanding liberalism and conservatism explains the dominance of the latter easily. If you are well-informed about history and current events, you are a logical thinker, and you don’t let emotion cloud your arguments, only if you are intellectually dishonest with yourself can you think liberalism is a valid, coherent ideology. Because radio doesn’t have accompanying images that play much more to the basis of today’s liberalism, unreasoned emotion, it demands much more critical thinking on the part of its broadcasters and listeners when explicating ideas, accentuating the vastly superior quality of reasoning and fact presentation of conservatism.
Thus, talk radio has been the great equalizer to the liberal bent of other broadcast media. This makes liberals mad and explains the move to reopen the possibility of the rule’s promulgation in the future because they cannot stand the thought that, in the marketplace of ideas, conservatism trounces liberalism, endangering their political power. The idea would be, with the rule back in place to scare broadcasters away from presenting any opinion as conservatism resonates with the audience, to enable every single utterance to have liberal rebuttals that would cost so much time, money, and create such chaos that broadcasters would be discouraged from giving conservative arguments demanded by the public.
It won’t happen immediately give the alignment of political forces but it could in the future were liberals to get much healthier majorities in the U.S. government’s majoritarian branches. Thus moves were made to write into law a prohibition on the doctrine, which last month passed in the House.
The same was tried in the Senate attaching it to an unrelated bill. Perhaps the Democrat with the most to gain from this was Landrieu, whose seat is the most at peril among Democrats in 2008 and with a compliant print media in Louisiana, only talk radio has been able to present consistently to the public aspects about her record that demonstrate why she is a poor choice to represent the state. With her help, the amendment failed.
Make no mistake, Landrieu wants to use government to censor opinions she doesn’t like, to silence those who speak truth to power – itself another indicator of her unfitness for office.
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