In the four years of our existence, LouisianaVoice has poked fun at, criticized, questioned and challenged Gov. Bobby Jindal on a number of issues and finally, it has come down to the harsh reality that forces us to say what we have refrained, out of respect for the office, from saying thus far:
Bobby Jindal is a fool.
Of course we’re going to get some push back for making such a disrespectful comment about the man elected—twice—to be the chief executive officer for the State of Louisiana. Yes, we’ve called him silly and an embarrassment in the past, but his performance in London goes far beyond embarrassing.
His little tantrum at the National Governors’ Conference luncheon a year ago was an embarrassment to Louisiana; his performance in London yesterday evoked memories of Wisconsin Republican Sen. Joe McCarthy’s claim in Wheeling, West Virginia on Feb. 9, 1950, that he had a list with the names of more than 200 “known communists” employed by the State Department. http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/mccarthy-says-communists-are-in-state-department
Jindal seems hell-bent on out-cruzing Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz with his outlandish claim in his speech to the Henry Jackson Society (HJS), named ironically enough, for the late U.S. Sen. Henry Jackson, a Washington Democrat.
A little background on the Henry Jackson Society is in order here.
Created in 2005, HJS purported to offer a forum for those who believed that any form of totalitarianism required a hardline response—either diplomatic or military.
The HJS Associate Director is a man named Douglas Murray, who also is a columnist for The Spectator and Standpoint. The Spectator, a conservative magazine is Britain’s oldest continuous publication, dating back to 1828 and owned by David and Frederick Barclay. The lesser-known Standpoint was founded in 2008.
Much like their Republican counterparts in the colonies, the Barclay brothers, who also own the London Telegraph, have been accused of avoiding taxes by placing their assets under the ownership of offshore companies and controlled through trusts.
But back to HJS Director Murray, who in March of 2013 wrote an article in Standpoint in which he lamented the fact that “white Britons” were in the minority in 23 of London’s 33 boroughs (this is starting to sound eerily familiar). http://standpointmag.co.uk/node/4868/ful
Concern over the growing divisiveness of the strident organization was such that two months later, the Guardian editorialized that Britain’s Labour Party should cut ties with HJS. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/may/20/labour-cut-ties-henry-jackson-society
Fast forward to January of 2015 and Louisiana’s governor, who has problems back home sufficient to keep him in Baton Rouge, i.e. a budget deficit that grows daily, deep cuts pending for health care and higher education, controversy over the proposed open burning of 15 tons of munitions in Minden, crumbling state infrastructure, looming $180 million bill from Medicaid/Medicare over his hospital privatization deal, and a fast-approaching legislative session at which hard decisions will have to be made. Instead, he chooses to traipse off to London to give an inflammatory speech chock full of inaccuracies and misconceptions.
Ostensibly on a state-sponsored economic development trip (meaning taxpayers pick up the tab for his travel, lodging and meals as well as his support staff and state police security detail), he nevertheless manages to squeeze in an address meant to appeal to his rabid right wing supporters back home as he continues his quest to at least show up in David Letterman’s Top Ten List of Why Bobby Jindal Never Shows Up in the Top Ten List of GOP Presidential Hopefuls. The sad truth (for Jindal, that is) is that he doesn’t even rate a mention in any such Letterman list.
So, what, exactly, did he say that registered an 11.2 on the 10-point Richter scale of Political Absurdities?
Only that there were areas in Europe where non-Muslims are not allowed and radical Islamic law is allowed to override local law. He calls them “no-go zones.”
But when he said, “Non-assimilationist Muslims establish enclaves and carry out as much of Sharia law as they can without regard for the laws of the democratic countries which provided them a new home,” Jindal got it all wrong. When he added, “It is startling to think that any country would allow, even unofficially, for a so- called ‘no-go zone,” he got it all wrong.
“I’ve heard from folks here that there are neighborhoods where women don’t feel comfortable going in without veils. That’s wrong. We all know that there are neighborhoods where police are less likely to go into,” Jindal told CNN. “I think that the radical left absolutely wants to pretend like this problem is not here. Pretending it’s not here won’t make it go away.”
He got that all wrong, too.
That’s all wrong as in Joe McCarthy’s outrageous—and unsubstantiated—claims that ultimately hastened his political demise.
When challenged by CNN, Jindal was undaunted: “I think your viewers know absolutely there are places where the police are less likely to go. They absolutely know there are neighborhoods where they wouldn’t feel comfortable.”
When asked by CNN if that was because of crime and not because of a concentration of Muslims, our governor said, “This isn’t a question.” He stuck to his guns, saying the left “wants to make this into an attack on religion and that’s not what this is. It’s absolutely an issue for the UK, absolutely is an issue for America and other European and Western nations.”
He “absolutely” repeated his “no-go zone” claims, throwing in a few more absolutelies in the process, later in the day during an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEjlHY2caIs#t=48
Jindal even managed to evoke the “American exceptionalism” claim in the Blitzer interview—while standing on a busy street corner….in London, no less. The only thing absolutely missing was a court jester’s hat for Jindal to wear for the CNN interview.
The problem is he got his information from Faux News which later issued corrections that there was “no credible information” that such “no-go zones” exist in France or Europe.
Lest one think his London speech was not “political,” Jindal even managed to slip in attacks on Hillary Clinton, apparently on the supposition that she will be his Democratic opponent in next year’s presidential election (insert chuckles, chortles and guffaws here).
The Democratic National Committee (DNC), fully cognizant of his budget problems back home in Louisiana, was quick to criticize Jindal, saying he was “just embarrassing himself now” and that he is “very interested” in being president but not so much in governing.
But we disagree with the DNC; he long ago transcended embarrassment. He embarrassed himself many years ago when he insisted on dropping his Indian first name (Piyush which, by the way is still his legal name, calling into question the legality of all documents signed as “Bobby”) in favor of adopting the name of a character on The Brady Bunch sitcom. (We still say it was his good luck that he wasn’t a fan of The Beverly Hillbillies: We just don’t believe Jethro Jindal would’ve caught on.)
He embarrassed himself when he wrote an essay for the New Oxford Review entitled “Beating a Demon: Physical Dimensions of Spiritual Warfare” about his supposed exorcism of a female classmate at Brown University.
He embarrassed himself when he gave that awful response to President Obama’s State of the Union address in 2009.
He embarrassed himself when he insisted against all expert engineering advice to the contrary on building those $250 million sand berms in the Gulf of Mexico in an unsuccessful attempt to stem the flow from the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill onto the Louisiana coast—unsuccessful because the berms washed away in a matter of days, sinking tens of thousands of dollars of cranes and bulldozers with them.
He embarrassed himself when he, a Roman Catholic, went to all those Protestant churches in north Louisiana during his first term to speak about his “born again” conversion to Christianity—while aides were passing around forms for congregation members to complete with their names, addresses, phone numbers and email addresses for future political contribution solicitations (it’s illegal to solicit campaign contributions in the church itself).
No, he didn’t embarrass himself this time. Oh, that he had only limited the damage to embarrassment.
Instead, he showed himself to the world to be the fool he really is and in the process, made the citizens of this state who twice elected him, appear as hysterical, hate-mongering David Duke and Joe McCarthy disciples of demagoguery.
And for that, we should all be embarrassed—or worse, humiliated.
Louisiana Voice 
Jindal’s new campaign slogan: “Je suis Stupide!”
..or, as he obviously believes, “Vous êtes tous stupides”
George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are both Methodists. I haven’t heard anyone calling on the Methodist Church to renounce the actions by these two for the slaughter of well over 100,000 persons under false pretenses.
And for an aspiring presidential candidate to go to Great Britain and for all intents and purposes tell the country’s Prime Minister that he doesn’t know what he is talking about when he says there are not any “no-go” areas in one of its major metropolitan centers should in and of itself disqualify him for further consideration by any sane person. But that still leaves the Republicans eligible.
Yes, Jindal is a fool and an embarrassment not just to Louisiana but to the United States.
I refuse to be embarrassed by Jindal’s outrageous behavior. I did not vote for him. His foolishness is all on himself and the third rate operatives he surrounds himself with. They got him elected but they can’t make him a leader, teach him to govern or imbue him with a sense of humanity. At this point, I no longer even recognize this person as governor. He does not even make a pretense of doing the job he was elected and is being paid to do. If our legislators had any sense at all, they would stop the blatant payroll fraud and impeach him. We’ve had enough. It’s time for Louisiana officials to be for Louisianaians.
A credible source says Jindal has a photographic memory. This enabled him to do well in school and establish a reputation for being smart.
To me, smart means being to assemble facts related to an issue and to be able to figure out how to fix it. A photographic memory will not help you with that.
If you look at his legislative initiatives, they all came from ALEC. If you look at what he has said, he has proven himself to be a politically stupid fool again and again. My favorite was after Romney lost and Jindal said “We gotta stop being stupid”, which was a stupid criticism of the GOP leadership who control his destiny as a presidential nomination candidate.
I was watching a Fox News analysis over the weekend wherein the discussion focused on the impact Romney entering the race would have. Everyone concurred his entry would harm Christie and Bush the most. They also focused on the fact Romney was able to stand out in 2012 due to the fact many of his opponents didn’t hold office. Then they said would not be the case today and they put the pictures of 8 candidates for the Republican nomination, and they stressed they were only putting up the photos of ones with a “serious, realistic” shot at obtaining the nomination. Four were in the U. S. Congress (Sen. Paul, Sen. Rubio, Sen. Cruz, and somebody I can’t remember). Then they put up four current/recent Governors who may win the GOP nomination, excluding Romney sice he’s just mulling it over: Christie, Walker, Perry, and Bush. I froze the frame to ensure Jindal wasn’t posted. He wasn’t, and this was Fox!! What was that song Merideth used to hum on Monday Night Football when the winning team became apparent?: “Turn out the lights. The party’s over.” Need us to collectively hum it out for you, Gov. Jindal? Trust me. You’ve got tons of folk who would be only too ready to hone their vocal chords to bid you farewell!
I saw a similar story and graphics on CNN Sunday.
Cokie and Steven Roberts’ nationally-syndicated column yesterday, in an analysis of who might make the best POTUS, talked about how governors are held more accountable for governing than legislators. Governor Jindal was never mentioned. I wondered whether this was because they don’t consider him a serious contender, or they didn’t want to go into his record. I sent them an e-mail, but don’t expect an answer.
http://uexpress.com/cokie-and-steven-roberts/2015/1/14/why-governors-are-different
Hi Stephen. Just read the article and I see Jindal isn’t even referenced. I did make one error on my list of Governors that Fox listed. The fourth Governor they had on the list was not Rick Perry but John Kasich of Ohio. It’s ironic that Kasich has expressed no desire whatsoever to run (that I’ve heard of, at least), any yet he makes the list of four considered viable. Meanwhile, Jindal runs all over the U. S. and now world trying desperately to be taken seriously as a viable candidate, yet no news source does (not even Fox!). Juan Williams said the reality is that it will take $1 billion to win the Presidency, and only the candidates they listed could raise that kind of money. One of the panelists said a candidate could survive the first few primaries with (and I’m quoting), “only $100 million or so.”
You KNOW Jindal’s folk (and hopefully Jindal himself) watched it. Jindal was re-elected SOLELY because no viable candidate felt he or she could contend with his $10 million war chest that he began 2011 with. I wonder how Team Jindal feels to be squeezed out of the race due to what news analysts obviously deem inadequate fund raising ability.
To paraphrase something from the first days of Saturday Night Live, lil booby is certainly one of the “Not Ready for Prime Time players”.
Earthmother has said it well, and she should be repeated:
“His foolishness is all on himself and the third rate operative he surrounds himself with.”
“They got him elected but they can’t make him a leader, teach him to govern or imbue his with a sense of humanity.”
“At this point, I no longer even recognized this person as governor. He does not even make a pretense of doing the job he wass elected and is being paid to do.”
Amen.
Another excellent post, Tom. Thank goodness we have you to speak the truth that the mainstream media ignores. I echo earthmother’s sentiments, “I refuse to be embarrassed by Jindal’s outrageous behavior. I did not vote for him. His foolishness is all on himself and the third rate operatives he surrounds himself with. “
Jindal worships T.T.’s( #1) as in Timmy not Taylor’s advice. Home schooled (read lack of critical thinking and socialization skills with un- like minded people) and believes he bible thumped his way to Governor. Some folks can’t help but look like backwoods snake oil salesmen. I agree and concluded long ago Jindal (despite the endorsement of well know Nobel laureate Mike foster), is an incompetent unconscionable self promoter. And those idiots that carry out his slash and burn agenda should never sleep wheel again. Elected folks, appointees and administrative workers should just stall his agenda until the clouds lift and this blight named Piyush is only a painful memory of how bad it can get.
Go to the comments section of the Yahoo! News story:
http://news.yahoo.com/jindal-muslim-establish-no-zones-outside-civic-control-220735997.html
There are over 4,500 comments there already and this is the top story on Yahoo! this morning. Read a sample of them.
Either the far right fringe uses Yahoo! as its major news source and sounding board, or the fringe is no longer the fringe – This last is apparently what Governor Jindal believes and it is frightening to see evidence he may be right.
I forgot to add a question: If Bobby Jindal knows exactly what he is doing, who really are the fools?
The majority of the voters in Louisiana are fools for electing Jindal twice to plunder the state.
It is indeed shocking to see the ignorant posts on Yahoo from people who are primed to fall for Jindal’s BS. I just signed up and commented to help offset the deluge of pro-Jindal comments.
I don’t think Jindal did himself any favors yesterday, especially in that interview outside of Parliament. Even the visuals were not favorable. Jindal looked small and on the defensive as the interviewer pressed him on specifics, which Jindal was “absolutely” unable to provide. It was like Michelle Bachman’s stupid performance when she claimed that a vaccine caused autism because she heard it from a mother right before the interview. The only thing Jindal accomplished was a bump in name recognition, but maybe not the kind he wanted. Now he can be known not only statewide, not only nationally, but now internationally as a world-class fool, like you said in your excellent post.
Jindal and his well oiled propaganda team are starting to spin out in reality land. He has no record to stand on, just buzz words and catchy phrases. Just like Obama. Now Tom, “Much like their Republican counterparts in the colonies, the Barclay brothers…have been accused of avoiding taxes by placing their assets under the ownership of offshore companies and controlled through trusts”, why throw out the cursory attack on republicans? Do you honestly feel that democrats are not avoiding taxes? Soros, Geithner, Pelosi, Rangel et al. Honest tax paying folks? And really, throwing out the McCarthy claims. If you check history it was the House committee that did a lot more than McCarthy.
You are correct. Perhaps I should have said, “Much like their corporate counterparts in the colonies…”
But I stand by my McCarthy claims although the HUAC did inflict a lot of damage on a lot of innocent people. McCarthy was the catalyst for that sad era.
If you ever get a chance, read M. Stanton Evans “Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and His Fight Against America’s Enemies” very interesting reading for open minded folks.
Reblogged this on The Daily Kingfish and commented:
There you go.
Bobby Jindal knows exactly what he is doing. His speech was nothing more than a dog whistle to his “base” at home.
Thank you Barbara. Jindal ain’t no fool. The Republican base was happy to believe Obama was born in Kenya to Saul Alinsky and Angela Davis, and that kind of stuff steered them to many a Palin style candidate. Catering to Barnum’s fool-born-every-minute may seem crazy to us, but then again, we are readers of Tom Aswell columns, not of the Drudge news.
Now, according to a CNN report I just saw, he is trying to back away from this. Saying it in the first place was a bad move, trying to explain it away may get him in deeper. To paraphrase a famous cry, “Remember the Scalise.”
http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2015/01/19/bobby-jindal-sets-the-bar-for-addressing-radical-islam/
Fortunately, not everyone agrees with you.
http://www.breitbart.com/big-journalism/2015/01/20/jindal-nontroversy-cnn-caught-lying-about-muslim-no-go-zones/
Waiting on that retraction. I won’t hold my breath…
I’d say it wouldn’t be wise to hold your breath for sure because there’s nothing to retract! Tom, I, nor any of the other posters would claim to be so naive as to fail to have a realization that “not everyone agrees with you.” This blog serves to provide a “voice” (hence the name) on political assessments of situations or episodes. Freedom is enjoyed to agree, disagree, or be indifferent about these posts on a post-by-post basis. That’s what Tom provides.
A retraction is appropriate when something is reported that is factually in error. An inadvertent misquote or attributing a quote to a wrong source are examples. I find it interesting there are negative comments on the link you supplied. I guess a LA Voice reader could go to your link, supply a link to Tom’s post and suggest a “retraction” is in order based on some folk not agreeing and assessing Jindal as a fool, Doing so, however would expose a fundamental lack of knowledge of journalism and especially of editorial content therein, so I wouldn’t hold your breath for a LA voice reader to do that either.
Your apparent belief that a retraction is called for (under the assumption you’re being serious) is about like asking MSNBC to issue a retraction for the fact Fox News exists.
What is it exactly that should be retracted? That Piyush Jindal was abroad and (by his own admission) intentionally making controversial remarks and effectively making a fool of himself? That there’s a very serious budget problem in the state that demands his immediate attention? That he was elected to do and is being paid by the taxpayers to do the job of serving the state as governor? Listen…maybe all of these crazy phenomena actually are happening. But that’s missing the point. You’re the governor of a state, Piyush Jindal. This is something out of your league. It’s for the national security people and for the applicable foreign governments to handle, not for you. Your job is in the state capitol dealing with state business. Time for you to do your job, Piyush Jindal.
Good thing, because you’d turn a deep shade of blue. Jindal has been caught in so many lies already and his trying to play the expert on European affairs is the most nauseating of all. The man is simply in way over his head and if you want to defend him, you’d be wise to cite a more reliable source than Breitbart.com.
While Breitbart. com did break the ACORN story by having one of its reporters pose as a prostitute and then heavily edit the video (an ethically questionable method of obtaining a story but admittedly effective—as a means of achieving instant fame but subsequent egg on one’s face), the blog has a less than stellar record on other “exclusives,” i.e. the story of Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and his alleged speech to the non-existent “Friends of Hamas,” the inaccurate story of the bankruptcy of Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman (Breitbart removed the post with explanation after the story was debunked), or the erroneous story that Obama’s attorney general nominee Loretta Lynch had defended Bill Clinton in the Whitewater scandal (it was a different Lynch. Oops).
So you go right ahead with your use of Breitbart.com as your defense of Jindal. I’ll go with CNN.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breitbart_(website)
…and you will certainly want to ask The ADVOCATE to retract its op-ed piece this morning [“Our Views: No facts on the no-go”] and, in particular, this statement:
“The rhetorical irresponsibility that he has demonstrated in this episode is old hat in the State Capitol in Baton Rouge. With a presidential campaign in view, Jindaldata can now reach a wider public.”
Yeah, keep on believing Breitbart.
I saw Jindal as a flim-flam man when he was still in the US House, and when he ran for governor I begged everyone possible not to vote for him, but few paid attention. He is an embarrassment to me, but I refuse to take responsibility for his election, because I tried my best to warn Louisianians against voting for him.
I heard him in person spiel “facts and figures” which would lead me to believe he has a photographic memory, as onestateworker has already said, but it’s what you do with facts and figures, which is a matter of judgement and common sense, neither of which Jindal seems to possess. He does possess overweening ambition, which colors everything he does and says, It’s always, always all about Jindal, and to hell with the people in Louisiana.
The proof that Jindal is utterly desperate lies in the question, “With whom should this message resonate?” Iowa? Hardly. They are going to care much more about Jindal’s proposal to phase out ethanol. You hit folk in the pocketbook, they care (just ask Louisiana State employees regarding OBG changes). You reference some vague Muslim laws and “no-go areas,” and the interest level plummets. He is so utterly desperate for name recognition that he will do or say anything with reckless disregard.
To use a sports analogy, it’s late in the 4th quarter, and Jindal is quarterbacking his team which is down 28-6 with five minutes to go. Well, everybody in the stadium, at home watching, and the whole world realizes you’re not about to run the ball, so Jindal’s opponents (Christie, Bush, etc.) can just blitz and force Jindal to scramble for his life. If Jindal is dumb enough to enter the race (and he seems determined to do so), he is going to get knocked out of this game with a concussion that will leave his head throbbing for weeks.
The biggest problem I see, however, is Jindal is NOT a team player by any stretch of the imagination. Consequently, he has a right to enter the field, and I think he is going to drag ALL of the candidates down if he’s put on stage to debate with other others.
The reality is that, when Jindal won in 2007, the next day (long before Jindal was sworn into office), his parents were quoted as saying, “If he can do this, he can become President.” Jindal entered the Governor’s Office saying in his mind, “Big deal. I’m ready to set about accomplishing my parents’ dream.” He thought he could survive for years by merely ousting anyone who even slightly made him appear in a negative light by exposing corruption of his appointees and other questionable policy initiatives he sought to implement (constitutional or not). Now, he’s just desperately trying to complete a pass, but his opponents can have a field day sending the safeties and maybe even a cornerback to blitz him because he has NEVER had a decent offensive line with folk like Teepell, Plotkin, Sellars, Nichols, etc. doing the blocking for him!!
I’m willing to bet he’s furious with some staffers for (apparently) failing to alert him to the Fox News retractions (i.e. failing to see that defensive end approaching Jindal’s blind side before Jindal was leveled and the ball popped up four feet in the air and was caught by said defensive end!!).