Unfortunate outcome has electoral ripples

Sadly, for the third time in its history Louisiana has had someone duly elected to Congress die before taking office for the first time, with this regrettable occurrence reverberating outside of the state that could trigger distasteful Democrat calculations.

The unpredictable Wuhan coronavirus struck down Republican Luke Letlow mere days before he would have been sworn in to serve the state’s Fifth Congressional District. In 1872 and then in 1882 it had happened, although in both instances just after the election and well before the next Congress would meet.

His new House neighbor GOP Rep. Mike Johnson, a few years older than Letlow’s relatively youthful 41, earlier this month weathered a bout of the virus with little difficulty, and Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, a couple of decades older, did the same earlier this year. Unfortunately, you never know with this virus, and at this difficult time Louisianans should offer up prayers for him and his family.

Unlike Newsom, Edwards unworried about recall

Each state has a botched Wuhan coronavirus pandemic response by its Democrat governor, who also turns out to be a hypocrite on the issue. As a consequence, each state suffers economically. Yet only one stands a good chance of enduring a recall election, telling us about the state’s politics and culture

California Gov. Gavin Newsom faces increasingly rough waters over this discontent. Actually, in terms of his initial response, things started out about as well as they could given the pandemic’s circumstances. Newsom acted swiftly in its early days with a flexible strategy of restrictions that allowed for much of the economy to stay open while California rang up a comparatively low number of cases and deaths despite being on the shore of the virus’ origin, the People’s Republic of China.

But eventually cases and deaths began a steady march upwards while Newsom, although with some temporary retreats, steadily clamped down harder and more widely on the economy. The fallout triggered depopulation to the point likely now the state will lose a seat in the House of Representatives in the upcoming reapportionment and a cascade of significant employers decamping to low-tax states.

Confused conservatives impede LA evolution

For fundamental change to occur in Louisiana politics – more specifically, evolution away from a state government-centric, primarily redistributive, and populist system – conservatives have to understand why things are as they are before they can act to make things different. Including when they are their own worst enemies.

A couple of examples surfaced last week illuminating how some conservatives don’t get it; one from the world of electoral politics and the other from the milieu that provides the intellectual ammunition for conservative ideas to triumph. In the aftermath of state central committee elections earlier this month, former Republican gubernatorial candidate Eddie Rispone announced his intentions to lead the state party.

Prior to his run for governor, where he almost knocked off Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards, Rispone had worked behind the scenes to elect conservatives. During the latest round of governance elections, he backed several candidates. In a sense, this desire for the GOP’s chairmanship merely extends his history of building an infrastructure to elect conservatives.

Pandemic tale of two states not good for LA

Accelerated by the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic, the “end of cities” isn’t confined to Louisiana’s urban areas as an indictment of the state’s direction the last five years under Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards.

Up to the production of 2020 population estimates – which in a couple of weeks the actual Apr. 1, 2020 census numbers will supersede – analysts ruminated about the hollowing out seen in a number of American cities, and about others that have see a surge in new residents over the year. Relatively heavy outflows came from New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Washington, DC, while the likes of Austin, Phoenix, Nashville, Tampa, Jacksonville, Las Vegas, Charlotte, Dallas, Charleston, Denver, Tulsa, Louisville, Burlington, Knoxville, Syracuse, and Little Rock appear to have picked up significant numbers of new residents.

Notice something? Losing cities were in states (and DC) with Democrat control of government, while among winning cities only Denver, Syracuse, and Las Vegas were the same, with every other city (except Burlington) located in a state with complete Republican control (Vermont has a Democrat-led Legislature). More anecdotal evidence confirms flight from overtaxed, overregulated leftist states towards friendlier conservative ones.

Christmas Day, 2020

This column publishes every Monday through Friday 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 Easter, 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 Memorial Day and Veterans' Day.

With Friday, Dec. 25 being Christmas Day, I invite you to explore this link.

Edwards virus policy shows rot of liberalism

This week, again letting politics take precedence over science, Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards continued until Jan. 13 an unproductive and intrusive set of government restrictions on public behavior to address the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic. To understand why he and many on the political left persist in promoting and imposing this erroneous policy, an understanding of their ideology illuminates their mistaken actions.

Because the data show they clearly are mistaken. After many months, data have accumulated about the consequences of economic and behavioral restrictions, to the point from a public policy perspective we can draw certain conclusions: (1) degree of restrictiveness doesn’t vary with deaths caused by the virus (established through quasi-experimental methods), (2) as a corollary, excess deaths not attributed to the virus rose more the more restrictions existed (3) the relative ineffectiveness of wearing face coverings makes their mandatory use effective only in environments where inside recommended physical distancing for longer lengths of time cannot be established or for high-risk medical facilities, (4) in this pandemic hospital system capacity has not been significantly more strained compared to recent influenza seasons and the last (2009 swine flu) pandemic, and (5) deaths and hospitalizations for those under age 20 are almost nonexistent and extremely few occur among adults under 65 who don’t have some underlying co-morbidity factor.

To put it in public policy terms, nearly universal restrictions reaching far that match what Edwards has promulgated have produced essentially no additional societal benefits than policies with much less restrictiveness. As a point of departure, these restrictions include a statewide mask mandate when in public indoor and some outdoor locations; restaurants, gyms, salons, casinos, malls and other nonessential businesses must limit customer numbers to 50 percent of their occupancy rate; churches are restricted to 75 percent of occupancy; and venues like outdoor sports stadiums are set at 50 percent; bars are limited to takeout, delivery and outside seating, if parishes don’t meet the low percentages of coronavirus tests returning positive required to allow indoor drinking at bars; and indoor gatherings for weddings and events are restricted to 75 people or a maximum of 25 percent occupancy, whichever is less.

Medicaid waste inflating LA budget woes

As red ink prepares to wash over Louisiana as a result of Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards’ Wuhan coronavirus restrictions, the low-hanging fruit to help ameliorate that would be reversal of Medicaid expansion, but at the very least establishment of realistic protocols to vet the waste-ridden program.

Louisiana’s taxpayers now pay (according to the latest fiscal year 2019 data) an extra $312 million annually to foot the bill for expansion, where roughly a third to half of these recipients used to pay their own way. Worse, a fair amount of it involves dollars wasted through inept government administration if not paying outright fraudulent premiums and claims.

Since 2014, nationally the improper payment rate to Medicaid clients has soared from just under 7 to nearly 22 percent. Analysis of the difference in large part attributes this to expansion, particularly in the vetting of initial applicants and periodic review. In a report, Louisiana was singled out as one of the more egregious violators in this regard.

Pandemic politics may finish off I-Bowl

After all its efforts to survive, Shreveport’s Radiance Technologies Independence Bowl may have received its death knell at the hands of a microscopic organism doing its things and the politics and vanities of the humans it lives in.

This week, game officials announced that, after a run of 44 years, the contest would not occur this year. Initially scheduled just after Christmas, the cancellation came when the Pac 12 football conference declared it “couldn’t” fulfill its obligation to produce a bowl-eligible team to face off against Army. For the next few years, the bowl follows a schedule where in alternating years where Army (if eligible) faces a Pac 12 team or independent Brigham Young University (if eligible) squares off against a Conference USA squad (that has several schools within 400 miles including Louisiana Tech just down the road).

In reality, this is one of the poorest potential sets of matchups in the existing bowl system, but despite this being the case throughout most of its history, the I-Bowl has a remarkable record of longevity. Except for the six most prominent bowls that alternate as sites for the College Football Playoff, only four other games have lasted longer.

Conservative pox on nascent LA CD2 hopefuls

Because they will determine the next Louisiana Second Congressional District representative with the resignation of Democrat Rep. Cedric Richmond, conservatives must choose carefully – if they have any real choice at all.

In that district that spans from Baton Rouge to New Orleans, demographics work against any conservative from winning, barring unusual circumstances. Those actually arose in 2008, when GOP former Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao defeated the indicted incumbent Democrat former Rep. Bill Jefferson, but the district then confined itself to the general New Orleans area. At present, its voter base is 63 percent Democrat and 61 percent black, practically meaning that a liberal black Democrat likely will emerge as the winner.

Maybe. Already two black New Orleans-based Democrat state senators, Troy Carter and Karen Peterson, have said they’ll run. Probable to jump in as well are Democrat New Orleans City Council member Helena Moreno, who’s Hispanic, and far-left black activist Gary Chambers from Baton Rouge. No Republican has indicated a willingness to throw his hat into the ring.

No matter where, pork shouldn't prevail

It depends on which side of the Red River you live whether it’s legal. But, regardless of whether a river runs through it, it’s unethical.

Tomorrow, the Shreveport City Council will try to find a way to evade the city’s charter. Prompted by Democrat Mayor Adrian Perkins – no stranger to trying to sidestep the law in various ways such as spending city tax dollars on his inauguration, double-billing on his automobile usage, and city appointments – the Council had budgeted in 2021 to give each of its seven members authority to direct $250,000 for road work in their districts. Sec. 4.32 flat out prohibits this, which begs the question whether the Perkins Administration or councilors and staff even bothered to read the charter.

With plenty of winks and nods, Republican Councilor James Flurry will try to salvage the deal by shuttling funds to the city’s Office of Community Development – which has authority over workforce development, business development, affordable housing and improvements, homelessness, public services, public facilities, and program funding for federal grants but not roads – and have him and his colleagues “pick up the phone and [ask] ‘Say can you do this? Can you help us on this? I have a need.’ And they come up with the funds. But this time we'll have our own funds there.”