Louisiana Voice

It turns out that the Ayn Rand Foundation and Grover Norquist aren’t the only ones who preach self-reliance while trashing the so-called “welfare queens” who would have the temerity to accept largesse from the “guvmint.”

This is a contradiction I have addressed here in the past but the target of my criticism has generally been those who employ an army of tax lawyers and accountants to take advantage of America’s voluminous tax code to dance around their obligations while the rest of us poor wretches carry the burden of wasteful deficit spending on our backs.

But now the coronavirus pandemic has opened up all kinds of doors for others to join in the fun of reaping federal tax dollars while publicly posturing as pillars of self-sufficient capitalism.

Take good ol’ slow-talking Dr. Phil McGraw who’s so adept at telling the rest of us how we should live our lives in his down-home, folksy way. He runs two production companies: State 29 Productions and Peteski Productions—and you can bet your $1200 stimulus check he got in line for a considerably bigger reward.

While you were getting your one-time $1200 check from the “guvmint,” Stage 29 was approved for a PPP “loan” of between $1 million and $2 million and Peteski got the green light on another “loan” of between $2 million and $5 million.

While you may have been furloughed from your job, leaving you wondering how you were going to be able to meet payments for your mortgage, utilities, food, auto, tuition, etc., Dr. Phil’s son, wannabe rock star JORDAN, was plopping down $10 million for a 6,500-square-foot home in the hoity Trousdale Estates section of Beverly Hills.

I place the word “loan” in quotation marks because it’s actually a forgivable SBA “loan,” meaning the recipients won’t have to pay their “loans” back. Meanwhile, thousands of recipients of real SBA loans as a result of the 2016 floods in Louisiana damned sure have to pay their loans back—even those elderly retirees like yours truly who will never live long enough to pay their loans back.

But let’s bring the examples a little closer to home.

At the top of the list are two sister firms from my home town of Ruston.

Hunt Forest Products and Hunt-Guillot each got between $5 million and $10 million from the Paycheck Protection Program. But Hunt-Guillot has a $10 million contract with the state to inspect homes through the Restore Louisiana Program and that money is 100 percent Federal HUD money, so did Hunt-Guillot actually suffer any financial hardship?

And then there are the churches. It’s the evangelicals, after all, who are so flippin’ judgmental when it comes to insisting on doing things their way without interference from the “guvmint.” Separation of church and state, in other words.

But wait. There’s Family Worship Center, aka Jimmy Swaggart Ministries in Baton Rouge, approved for a payout of $2 million to $5 million.

But wait. There’s more:

• Bethany Church of Baton Rouge: $1 million to $2 million;
• Healing Place Church of Baton Rouge: $1 million to $2 million;
• Temple Baptist Church of Ruston: $350,000 to $1 million;
• Calvary Baptist Church of Shreveport: $350,000 to $1 million;
• Live Oak United Methodist Church of Denham Springs: $150,000 to $350,000 (full disclosure: I’m a member of Live Oak United Methodist Church);

There wee hundreds of other churches in Louisiana, not to mention the U.S. ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH which was approved for up to $3.5 billion (with a “B”), which was the biggest winner in the U.S. “guvmint” sweepstakes, with many millions of that being doled out to dioceses which have either paid settlements or sought bankruptcy protection in the church’s sexual abuse cover-ups.

But there were others recipients that also raised eyebrows:

I’ve always contended the only purpose of local TV newscasts is to keep lawyer ads and car ads from bumping together.

So, it should come as no surprise that TV stations like WBRZ in Baton Rouge and KTBS in Shreveport were each approved for “loans” of $1 million to $2 million.

And then there were the kings of the (regional if not statewide) TV ads: Morris Bart and (Get) Gordon McKernan, who each got “loans” of $2 million to $5 million. I guess there just weren’t enough auto accidents to keep them afloat during the shutdown.

Not to be outdone, the Baton Rouge law firm of Taylor, Porter, Brooks & Phillips, which has no fewer than nine active contracts with the state (one for $2 million), was also approved for $2 million to $5 million.

And I would never neglect those other big TV local newscast advertisers. Price LeBlanc (Toyota and Nissan) was approved for $2 million to $5 million, while a cluster of All-Star automotive dealerships in the Baton Rouge area was approved for six separate “loans” of $350,000 to $1 million.

In New Orleans Benson Motor Company, which was founded by the late Tom Benson, once listed as one of Louisiana’s richest people, got $1 million to $2 million. Benson Motor Co. is part of the conglomerate that owns the Saints, the Pelicans and which is a politically-connected landlord for a group of state offices.

Capital City Press, which operates the New Orleans Advocate, got $2 million to $5 million while the LSU Foundation, which has zero to do with teaching classes or producing doctors, chemists, and business leaders (it’s strictly a fund-raising arm of the university) got $1 million to $2 million.

Whew. I’m exhausted. The list is nearly 200 pages long and I’m going to have to stop for now. Maybe I’ll follow up with a later story of other recipients.

It’ll make for good reading while you’re waiting in line to sign up for unemployment or to get tested for COVID-19.

But wherever you are when you read this, don’t forget to wear your mask.

It helps to stem the gag reflex.