Louisiana Voice

LouisianaVoice is going to be devoting considerable attention to campaign money in the coming months.

Your help is needed so that we can continue to give you stories like on waste, mismanagement, malfeasance, misappropriations, harassment, sweetheart contracts, backroom deals, preferential treatment in the awarding of contracts by circumventing bid laws, power plays by boards and commissions, appointments to those boards and commissions on the basis not of qualifications but of campaign contributions, investigative audits, and like the story below this post on our lieutenant governor attempting to corral members of Louisiana’s various retirement systems to retain the services of a specified private law firm in a mass mailing on state letterhead.

Please contribute by clicking on the yellow DONATE button to the right of this post and give by credit card or by mailing your check to LouisianaVoice, P.O. Box 922, Denham Springs, LA. 70727.

This site has consistently focused on money in politics but it’s more important than ever in 2019 because there’s a statewide election this year. Voters will choose not only a governor, but lieutenant governor, secretary of state, attorney general, insurance commissioner, agriculture commissioner, sheriffs, police jurors and parish commissioners, district attorneys, and 144 state legislators–105 representatives and 39 senators.

And those 144 legislators will have the responsibility redrawing congressional district lines to comply with the 2020 census. If you take a good look at the gerrymandering done by the legislature for the 2010 census, you’ll get a feel for just how important the legislative elections are.

While in the world would Rep. Ralph Abraham (green on the above map), for instance, represent a district that abuts the state’s northeast boundary with southeast Arkansas all the way down to the Felicianas and Tangipahoa, Washington and St. Tammany parishes’ northern borders with southwest Mississippi? Neither does it make sense for Rep. Mike Johnson (yellow) to represent a district that runs from the state’s northwest boundary with southwest Arkansas all the way down the western part of Louisiana into Cajun country. I mean, north Louisiana has about as much in common with Cajun country as Hank Williams does with Tupac.

And as much as it defies logic for Rep. Steve Scalise (brown) to represent a district split in half by Rep. Cedric Richmond (red), it’s no less illogical for Richmond’s district to run all the way from New Orleans to Baton Rouge where Rep. Garret Graves’ (blue) district looks as though it’s trying to swallow Richmond’s like some sort of Pac-Man caricature.

The only Louisiana congressional district where some semblance of sanity seems to have prevailed is that of Rep. Clay Higgins (gold), in southwest Louisiana (the term sanity being applied only to the district lines in this case).

It would have made far more sense for Districts 4 (Johnson) and 5 (Abraham) to have been divided with one district extended across north Louisiana from the Mississippi River to the Texas border and the other to be comprised of central Louisiana. The districts represented by Graves, Richmond and Scalise could also be re-drawn to more representative of their respective geographic areas.

Of course, money is poured into political campaigns for one reason and one reason only: to buy influence. If you believe for one nano-second that contributions are made in the interest of civic-minded responsibility, you’re only fooling yourself. When contributions are made by financial institutions, big business, labor, oil and gas, chemicals, prisons, pharmaceutical companies, nursing homes, health institutions, transportation, or any other special interest, it’s for the purpose of influencing votes.

One might think it’s never occurred to these donors that their money, directed toward education, infrastructure, and health care could do so much more good than buying a legislator. That’s not it. It’s just that they’d rather lock down legislative votes in order to continue to shore up their own bottom line than use the money for greater good.

To call attention to that sorry state of affairs is the reason—the only reason—for LouisianaVoice and it’s the reason I’m asking for—and sincerely appreciate—your continued help.