Louisiana Voice

Political ads normally don’t generate much excitement among voters because for the most part, they are disingenuous at best and packed with blatant lies and half-truths at worst.

But there was a series of ads in Kentucky that can be found by connecting to the links below. In the first two ads, Republican challenger Mitch McConnell attempts to “find” the missing incumbent Democrat U.S. Sen. Walter Huddleston whom McConnell paints as AWOL on several key votes. Huddleston, it seems, is too busy making speeches to tend to the more mundane matters of Senate votes.

A team of bloodhounds is employed in futile attempts to locate the missing Huddleston in such places as Los Angeles hotels and on the beaches of Puerto Rico, places where Huddleston allegedly received generous speaking fees. That was in 1984 and McConnell defeated Huddleston.

Now fast forward to 2008 and Democrat Bruce Lunsford reprises the bloodhound ads and uses them against McConnell in an unsuccessful bid to unseat the four-term Republican.

Here are the links:

Perhaps this same tactic could be employed to find our own AWOL governor.

LSU student body President J. Ryan Hudson, he of the timely letter to the missing Gov. Jindal, could lead a team of bloodhounds out of the front gates of the university as he calls out, “Piyush, Piyush, where are you? Please come home.”

As a determined Hudson trudges through swamps and across Louisiana’s prairies, he encounters military veterans with recently-awarded medals given them by Jindal, but no Jindal. “He came through here, pinned this medal on me, said something really fast, and disappeared,” the veterans say, shaking their heads and adding, “That boy sure talks fast. Couldn’t understand half of what he said.”

Hudson labors on, going from church to church in north Louisiana only to find over and over that, “Yes, the governor was here. He popped in during our services, passed out some checks, and left.”

The bloodhounds pick up the governor’s scent at helicopter pads located near the governor’s mansion in Baton Rouge, but now he’s off to Florida, New Hampshire, New York, Missouri, Georgia, California, Ohio, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and Iowa where he delivers staccato endorsements of fellow Republicans while condemning the federal stimulation money that he accepted anyway and then heads off to another fundraiser in yet another state.

Hudson, realizing the dogs are exhausted and in grave peril of suffering the same fate as the bloodhound in the classic movie “Cool Hand Luke,” finally gives up in the realization that Jindal may have the job he wants, but without a Hurricane Gustav or a major oil spill, he becomes bored rather quickly and must seek other venues to get valuable face time with the television cameras.

Reluctantly, he takes the bloodhounds home and returns to LSU to witness, along with the combined student bodies, administrators, and professors at all of Louisiana’s universities, the dismantling of Louisiana higher education in the interest of transparency. Meanwhile, Piyush can be heard from somewhere far away, as if through the fog of a bad dream, telling us to stop whining.