Louisiana Voice

The Livingston Parish Library controversy continues to fester, thanks to the influence of outsiders who apparently consider the local folks too dense to grasp an issue as basic as the First Amendment and so feel they must do our thinking for us.

And apparently, there are certain Livingston Parish leaders who willingly and eagerly drink that Kool-Aid, even to the point of attacking a good and decent person like Amanda Jones whose one sin was to speak up against censorship and book banning.

All that aside, the Livingston Parish Council, in a 5-4 vote on Thursday removed every member of the parish library board, though two of the members were promptly reappointed.

The latest brouhaha arose after the now former library board gutted the parish library BUDGET, cutting or reducing several key programs, even down to slicing funds for building maintenance.

One of the most puzzling comments to come out of Thursday’s three-hour meeting was uttered by council member Erin Sandefur who said with a straight face, “In no way was the budget cut to defund or harm the library in any way.”

Funny she should say that when the original library board shakeup did not occur until one Michael Lundsford of Lafayette and his organization, Citizens for a New Louisiana, stuck their noses into the machinations of the local library and deemed all things inappropriate.

That would seem to indicate that there is an element of leadership that doesn’t lead at all, but merely parrots the platitudes and banalities of others so often that we get an echo chamber of “witch hunts,” “fake news,” “stop the steal,” “drain the swamp” and of course, “MAGA.”

Show me just one of the catch-phrases being bandied around that wasn’t first spoon-fed to the masses.

But Sandefur went a step farther, saying, “There’s been propaganda and untruth stated in public that is the radical left way…”

Wait. What? Radical left?

Lady, let me give you a quick history lesson about the “radical left.”

The “radical left,” as you call it, pulled this country out of an awful depression after a Republican president put us there in the first place.

The “radical left” is responsible for the 40-hour work week.

The “radical left” is responsible for paid vacation for workers.

The “radical left,” largely through the efforts of organized labor, is responsible for your having medical and retirement benefits.

The “radical left” is responsible for our being able to count on Social Security and Medicare in our golden years.

The “radical left” is responsible for the implementation of workplace safety regulations.

The “radical left” is responsible for worker’s compensation to help you survive if you’re injured on the job.

The “radical left” is responsible for the inspection of food to ensure you won’t be serving spoiled or diseased meat to your family.

And Ms. Sandefur, if you remember nothing else, remember this: the “radical left” is responsible for women’s suffrage, which gave women the right to vote which in turn led directly to your being able to seek and win the seat on the Livingston Parish Council which you now hold.

So, what can we thank the “right” for?

Basically, we can thank the “right” for continuing to lavish tax breaks on the corporations and the very rich individuals so that the middle class can bear the burden of taxation and so that we can continue to complain about “welfare queens.”

We can thank the “right” for elimination of the Fairness Doctrine, which opened the doors to idiots like Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson.

We can thank the “right” for wave after wave of deregulation which led directly to the 2008 collapse of several major Wall Street banks, subprime mortgages, predatory lending, etc.

We can thank the “right” for the ever-increasing income disparity between the very wealthy and those who actually produce that wealth, the workers.

Worst of all, we will most probably one day be able to thank the “right” for the complete erosion of rights and benefits that will be systematically yanked from our grasp, leaving a “right” ruling oligarchy.

And, if we study our history, perhaps one day we’ll look back and ask, “Did all this really start over a library?”

(Full disclosure: To put my rant into proper perspective, it might be useful to know that I spent more than 40 years as a Republican, voting for such candidates as Goldwater, Nixon, Reagan, Ford and the first Bush. It was a governor named Jindal and a clown named Limbaugh who pushed me away from the “radical right.”)