Louisiana Voice

So, Jeff Landry and sock puppet Liz Murrill believe that posting the Ten Commandments in every single classroom in every single Louisiana school is critical to producing cookie-cutter model citizens?

Landry even went on record as expressing his belief that if they had been posted in the classrooms of would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks, the man who attempted to shoot Donald Trump, he might not have felt the compulsion to do what he did.

Really?

Well, maybe if a few other Bible verses were posted in classrooms, the carnage might be even greater in terms of mass shootings, adultery, and various other sins of the flesh and spirit. They’re most likely verses you won’t hear your minister say much about in his Sunday sermons. Let’s take a look (you may wish to read the boldface passages more than once to get the full implications):

Leviticus 25:44-46: If in spite of this you still do not listen to me but continue to be hostile toward me, then in my anger I will be hostile toward you, and I myself will punish you for your sins seven times over. You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters.

2 Kings 5:28-29: But the king asked, “What is the matter?” She replied, “This woman said to me, ‘Come, let’s eat your son today, then we will eat my son tomorrow.’ Then the next day I said to her, ‘Kill your son so we can eat him,’ but she had hidden her son.”

1 Samuel 15:3: Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.

Isaiah 13:15-18: “Whoever is captured will be thrust through; all who are caught will fall by the sword. Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses will be looted and their wives violated.”

Psalm 137:9: Blessed [is] the one who seizes your children and smashes them against the rock; the children represent the future generations, and so must be destroyed if the enemy is truly to be eradicated.

Joshua 6:21: “They devoted the city to the Lord and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it—men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys.”

Numbers 31:17-18: Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves.

Judges 19:22-29: While they were enjoying themselves, some of the wicked men of the city surrounded the house. Pounding on the door, they shouted to the old man who owned the house, “Bring out the man who came to your house so we can have sex with him.” The owner of the house went outside and said to them, “No, my friends, don’t be so vile. Since this man is my guest, don’t do this outrageous thing. Look, here is my virgin daughter, and [my] concubine. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But as for this man, don’t do such an outrageous thing.” But the men would not listen to him. So, the man took his concubine and sent her outside to them, and they raped her and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go. At daybreak the woman went back to the house where her master was staying, fell down at the door and lay there until daylight. When her master got up in the morning and opened the door of the house and stepped out to continue on his way, there lay his concubine, fallen in the doorway of the house, with her hands on the threshold. He said to her, “Get up; let’s go.” But there was no answer. Then the man put her on his donkey and set out for home. When he reached home, he took a knife and cut up his concubine, limb by limb, into twelve parts and sent them into all the areas of Israel.

Ezekiel 15:17: But you trusted in your beauty and used your fame to become a prostitute. You lavished your favors on anyone who passed by and your beauty became his. You took some of your garments to make gaudy high places, where you carried on your prostitution. You went to him, and he possessed your beauty. You also took the fine jewelry I gave you, the jewelry made of my gold and silver, and you made for yourself male idols and engaged in prostitution with them. (WHAT?!!)

1 Samuel 18:25: Saul replied, “Say to David, ‘The king wants no other price for the bride than a hundred Philistine foreskins, to take revenge on his enemies.’

Genesis 19:31-36: One day the older daughter said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is no man around here to give us children—as is the custom all over the earth. Let’s get our father to drink wine and then sleep with him and preserve our family line through our father.” That night they got their father to drink wine, and the older daughter went in and slept with him. He was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up. The next day the older daughter said to the younger, “Last night I slept with my father. Let’s get him to drink wine again tonight, and you go in and sleep with him so we can preserve our family line through our father.” So, they got their father to drink wine that night also, and the younger daughter went in and slept with him. Again, he was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up. So, both of Lot’s daughters became pregnant by their father.

2 Kings 2:23-24: From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

Exodus 21:20-21: Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result, but they are not to be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two, since the slave is their property.

Ephesians 6:5: Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.

Deuteronomy 25:11-12: If two men are fighting and the wife of one of them comes to rescue her husband from his assailant, and she reaches out and seizes him by his private parts, you shall cut off her hand. Show her no pity.

1 Corinthians 14:34-35: Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.

1 Timothy 2:11-12: A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.

Ezekiel 23:19-21: Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a prostitute in Egypt. There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.

And the Republicans have their panties in a wad over the content found in our libraries. (Sigh).

What’s that, you say? Each of the aforementioned examples are found in the Old Testament and Old Testament laws taught us that we were sinners who needed a sacrifice, but Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice that freed us from the laws that no one followed perfectly? Really?

But…but…the Ten Commandments were handed down to Moses in the Book of Exodus, the second book of… the Old Testament. Are you saying that Jesus’s ultimate sacrifice freed us from the Ten Commandments? Just asking.

I await an answer from Jeff Landry and sock puppet Liz Murrill.

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If you know how to game the system, it can pay handsomely to be a former Louisiana legislator with friends in high and not-so-high places. Just ask former State Sen./Rep. Mike Walsworth, a West Monroe Republican.

Former senator and representative because, like several others who got used to a life of influence in Baton Rouge, he served in both chambers, moving from one when hitting the three-term limit to the other for another 12 years, thus rendering Louisiana’s term limits statute meaningless as a deterrent to legislators hanging around too long.

Walsworth was last elected to his third Senate term in 2015 and left office in January 2020. But he didn’t exactly go away. He signed a six-month, $30,000 contract to perform “consulting” services for Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser’s office.

No sooner did that contract expire than he signed a renewal – for a full year this time, from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2024 – for $60,000, never missing his $5,000 per month payments for keeping a pulse on legislative issues in north Louisiana for Nungesser and making “oral” reports To the lieutenant governor. No information was available on whether or not he has had his contract renewed again.

Those oral reports apparently were channeled through a Sarasota, Florida, public relations firm called Miles Partnership, which also was used to route an additional $25,000 for each of three separate six-month contracts – from July 1, 2021 to De. 31, 2021, from Jan. 1, 2022, to June 30, 2022 and from July 1, 2022 to Dec. 31, 2022, to Walsworth.

All that is certainly interesting enough, but the real story here is found in a parcel of land designated as the site for Louisiana Delta Community College (DcC) in Farmerville, Walsworth’s connection to Mayor John T. Crow and a glaring failure to inform the Farmerville Town Council of that connection which would appear to create an obvious conflict of interests and a major ethics breach.

Farmerville attorney and real estate developer Johnny Dollar owns a company called Deloutre (for the non-initiated, that’s pronounced “d’Looter”, after an area bayou) Property Rentals. He previously donated land for the Union Parish Law Enforcement District (sheriff’s office), for a local church and developed land on which a Walmart store, a strip shopping center, two banks, two convenience stories and a Natural Resources Conservation Service office are located.

Dollar offered to donate a “shovel ready” site for DCC, utilities and access already in place. His offer was rejected in favor of a 100-acre tract of raw wooded land that has no public infrastructure at a cost of $1.2 million – on the advice of a consulting firm and….Mike Walsworth.

Walsworth was retained by the town as a “consultant” at a rate of $1,000 per month and to date has been paid more than $40,000. The extent of his “consulting,” however, is somewhat vague.

The problem with all that, besides the spurning of an offer of free land in favor of coughing up $1.2 million of state taxpayer money, is that his honor the mayor (John Crow) and Walsworth are business partners in a little outfit called C and W Louisiana Properties, LLC, according to records on file with the LOUISIANA SECRETARY OF STATE, which might be construed by the discriminating observer as something of a conflict of interest – and probably a violation of even Louisiana’s otherwise toothless ethics code for public and elected officials. Dollar said that a woman named Angie Robert was a former assistant to Walsworth and is a “current associate of both Walsworth and Crow, receiving mail for C and W Louisiana Properties at her place of work in the Monroe office of U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy.

The history of the tract selected has an interesting history in itself:

Feb. 13, 2015 – it was sold to William Caskey Terral for $306,978.

Nov. 11, 2022 – Terral sold one-half interest in the land to Mayor Towns and a man named Jared Ramsey for $1,356,450, quadrupling his initial investment while retaining half-interest in the tract.

Nov. 16, 2022 – Terral, Towns and Ramsey transferred what was now called the TTR tract to TTR, LLC, a limited liability corporation formed on Nov. 11, 2022. The division was designated as 50 percent to Terral and 25 percent each to Towns and Ramsey.

On Nov. 14, 2022 (two days before the aforementioned transfer took place) – Deloutre Property Rentals (DPR) protested a requirement that the DDC campus be locate within half-a-mile of LA. 15 (a state highway leading into and out of Farmerville). Dollar in filing his protest for DPR, said the requirement was a “transparent” attempt to control the site selection for the benefit of the TTR tract, partially owned by Mayor Crow. Dollar claimed the requirement raised the question of “improper collusive conduct in connection with public funding.” Walsworth, who you might remember was/is being paid $1,000 per month at the insistence of his business partner, the mayor, in a text exchange with Dollar, denied the existence of any such collusion.

January – March 2023 – DPR became aware that DCC had selected a consultant of its own, a company called CSRS, to advise it on site selection. CSRS is a Baton Rouge consulting firm and in September 2019, contributed $1,000 to Walworth’s political campaign even he was term-limited and slated to leave office in four months.

Jan. 27, 2023 – Mayor Crow sold his 25 percent interest in the 120-acre site (30 acres) to an outfit called TFR (Towns Family Rental) for $1.2 million, nearly doubling his investment.

Ignored by the Louisiana’s daily newspapers, it has played prominently on the front pages of the tiny Farmerville Gazette, which, on the surface would raise eyebrows; it’s rare that a local weekly would take on the local political power structure.

But The Gazette was purchased some time ago by the Ruston Daily Leader which in turn sold it to former NBA basketball star Karl Malone…and Johnny Dollar. Dollar subsequently purchased full control from Malone. And it’s Dollar who’s kicking up sand, probably from Folly Beach at nearby D’Arbonne Lake, over the shenanigans of Mayor Crow and Walsworth. If you own the paper, you can speak truth to power as much as you please. There was a time when that pretty much defined authentic journalism and bold publishers, but sadly, those days are pretty much gone. Maybe real reporting by The Gazette will arouse a sleeping daily in nearby Monroe – but it’s doubtful that a Gannett paper investigates anything other than its own bottom line and shareholder profits.

There will be more to this saga in the coming days, a story of a boat ramp and the town’s paying for the demolition of a deserted motel but for now, this is plenty to chew on. But if you insist on a more detailed narrative, read this installment from The Gazette:

and here:

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