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π-yush has the job he wants–again: absentee governor will serve as ‘leader’ of nation’s Republican governors in 2013

Posted in Budget, Campaign Contributions, Economy, Education, Governor's Office, Health Care, Legislature, Legislators, LSU, Transparency on October 15, 2012| 6 Comments »

Gov. Piyush Jindal had barely recovered from the bitter disappointment of being snubbed for a spot on Mitt Romney’s ticket than he was off and running for yet another national office—that of president.

His preference these days seems to be anything to avoid addressing the real problems that face Louisiana.

For a man who insists that he has the job he wants, he certainly seems to devote a minimal amount of time doing it.

Jindal’s travel miles this year alone have surpassed those of the James Brown extended post mortem farewell tour of a few years back.

Piyush is on the road again more than Willie Nelson.

His campaign appearances rival in number those of President Barrack Obama and Mitt Romney combined—and he’s not even an official candidate for anything. Yet.

He has the job he wants, which apparently is making more public appearances than the Harlem Globetrotters.

He’s more difficult to locate than Sasquatch.

When it comes to answering reporters’ questions, Jindal makes the late Marcel Marceau seem like a chatterbox.

So now, with the sound and fury of the vice presidential selection process behind him, he goes and gets himself picked to head up the Republican Governors Association next year—a job that will no doubt necessitate his absence from the state even more, if that’s possible.

The position is a plum in that it theoretically gives him a leg up on the Republican president nomination in 2020 (or 2016, should Romney lose in November).

He will chair the organization in 2013 and will be followed by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie the following year. The post is considered a springboard to higher office. Romney and Texas Gov. Rick Perry each served as chairman prior to launching their presidential campaigns.

The Associated Press speculated that the position could help Piyush gain momentum and support for a future White House bid, “if he’s interested.”

If he’s interested?

That’s like saying a hyena will attack a wildebeest if he’s hungry.

The same AP story notes that in five-plus years as Louisiana’s absentee governor, he has promoted his book, given campaign speeches, attended fundraisers and Republican events in 39 states and the nation’s capital. He has managed to pop up in key presidential primary or caucus states like New Hampshire and Iowa on numerous occasions—sometimes even being asked by the locals to leave. Quickly.

More than a third of his 160 or so out-of-state trips have taken place since January.

Ironically, most of his travels have been to support state candidates or Republican causes and to collect campaign contributions for Piyush Jindal.

His campaign trips on behalf of Romney, on the other hand, are merely an afterthought.

Rather like his occasional attention to matters in Louisiana—little insignificant matters like budget shortfalls, cuts to state hospitals, litigation over his education and retirement reform packages in Louisiana and growing resentment on the part of legislators over the closures of prison and health care facilities.

So basically, he believes he received a mandate in last year’s underwhelming re-election vote of 67 percent of 20 percent of the voters—against only token opposition, no less.

Piyush may want to consider the fact that 80 percent of the voters yawned their way to a state of languid indifference on the question of whether or not he should be awarded a second term.

And he’s going to try and parlay those results into becoming leader of the free world?

But he must first prove himself a leader of the nation’s Republican governors.

If his leadership of Louisiana is an indication of his capabilities, it should be fun to watch—if you like watching a delusional political wannabe.

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Notable Quotables (in their own words)

Posted in Boards, Budget, Campaign Contributions, Governor's Office, Higher Education, Legislature, Legislators, LSU, Notable Quotables on October 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »

“He seems to have little interest in strengthening its educational mission. He’s slashed its budget by an obscene amount (almost half a billion dollars in cuts for Louisiana higher education in the past three years). In that time, state appropriations as a percent of LSU’s budget have gone from 60 percent to about 35 percent. Ten percent of the faculty has left or been laid off. Courses have been cancelled. Class size has grown. Tuition has increased dramatically.”

–Bob Mann, director of the LSU School of Mass Communication’s Reilly Center for Media & Public Affairs, on Gov. Piyush Jindal’s persistent meddling in the day to day operations of the state’s flagship university, a practice Mann says can endanger the school’s accreditation.

“Perhaps the only reason he hasn’t yet started stuffing LSU with friends and washed-up legislators is that he only recently acquired a strong majority of the LSU Board of Supervisors.”

–Bob Mann, further elaborating on Jindal’s possible motives in assuming political control of LSU. (Mann, however forgot to mention that Jindal achieved that “strong majority” by appointing to the board a man who has less than a year of college education. Ya gotta love it.)

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Like the proverbial frog in the water, π-yush may not yet feel the heat being turned up over his blatant coup d’etat at LSU

Posted in Boards, Budget, Campaign Contributions, Ethics, Governor's Office, Higher Education, Legislature, Legislators, LSU, Politicians, Teague on October 4, 2012| 1 Comment »

Much like the proverbial frog in the pot, the heat is being turned up on Gov. Piyush Jindal and he may not even realize it until the water starts boiling.

First, two national publications, and now a Baton Rouge blogger have taken dead aim of the political mauling of the state’s flagship university at the hands of Jindal and his hand-picked Board of Supervisors and an outfit calling itself Louisiana’s Flagship Coalition.

That blogger just happens to be none other than Robert Mann who holds the Manship Chair at the Manship School of Mass Communication at LSU and who is director of the school’s Reilly Center for Media & Public Affairs. He has written several critically acclaimed political histories of the U.S. civil rights movement, the Vietnam War, and American wartime dissent. His most recent book, Daisy Petals and Mushroom Clouds: LBJ, Barry Goldwater and the Ad that Changed American Politics, was named by the Washington Post as one of the best political books of 2011.

He has worked for three U.S. senators (John Breaux, Bennett Johnston and Russell Long) and a Louisiana governor (Kathleen Blanco).

That said, when Mann takes on the governor, he is not to be taken lightly.

Given the fact that Jindal is in full control of his rubber stamp LSU Board of Supervisors and equally compliant university Interim President William Jenkins, Mann’s recent blog post raised more than a few eyebrows in and around Baton Rouge.

Jindal, after all, has already teagued former President John Lombardi, health system head Dr. Fred Cerise, Interim LDU Public Hospital CEO Dr. Roxanne Townsend and LSU System General Counsel Ray Lamonica.

And that’s just at LSU. Jindal has fired subordinates and demoted legislators for the simple act of disagreeing with him or thinking independently so one has to wonder if Mann’s scathing column is enough to provoke the little dictator into firing Mann, one of the most esteemed members of the Louisiana Fourth Estate.

Just the title of his post was provocative enough: So, Gov. Bobby Jindal is running LSU. Why should we care? In the column itself, Mann said, “Jindal doesn’t care much about putting LSU on stronger financial footing and he has made no effort to explain his cuts to students or faculty. Here is the link to Mann’s post:

http://bobmannblog.com/2012/09/18/so-gov-bobby-jindal-is-running-lsu-why-should-we-care/

“What he may care about is the LSU jobs available to his friends and campaign donors. His history of favoritism in other state departments (not to mention his intolerance of dissent) is well-known. Perhaps the only reason he hasn’t yet started stuffing LSU with friends and washed-up legislators is that he only recently acquired a strong majority of the LSU Board of Supervisors.”

It should be noted that one of the board members recently appointed by Jindal is campaign contributor Lee Mallett of Iowa, who attended less than a year of college at McNeese State University in Lake Charles. So, a member of the governing board of the state’s flagship university serves sans degree. Nice.

“With Just a few years left in office, it’s time to start finding well-paying jobs for his friends and campaign contributors. Jindal’s ‘Jobs Plan for Friends’ plan, however, assumes there’s a viable accredited university still in existence,” Mann said.

Accreditation was the thrust of Mann’s column. “Losing accreditation—or being deemed non-compliant in a major category—would be very harmful or even deadly for LSU and its budget,” he said. “If it lost federal student aid, the university would not survive.”

One of the major criteria for accreditation by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) is governance and administration of institutions “free of undue political influence,” Mann said.

He cited Section 3.2.4 under Governance and Administration in the SACS Principles of Accreditation which requires that “The governing board is free from undue influence from political, religious, or other external bodies and protects the institution from such (external) influence.”

“Can anyone say with a straight face that LSU is in compliance with this standard?” he asked—perhaps rhetorically and perhaps not.

Mann provided internet links to two separate publications that address the problems of governors attempting to run state universities. One of those specifically cited the present political atmosphere at LSU.

The Pew Center on the States in August published a report entitled How Governors govern Higher Ed. While that report never mentioned LSU or Jindal, it did name Florida Gov. Rick Scott and Texas Gov. Rick Perry, two of Jindal’s closest allies, for their interference in the affairs of Florida A&M and Texas A&M, respectively.

The strongest indictment of Jindal, however, was contained in Lombardi’s Firing at LSU Puts Spotlight on Governor’s Reach into University Affairs, a report published by the Chronicle of Higher Education.

That report accuses Jindal staff members into trying to “strong-arm Mr. Lombardi into firing people” and further describes the governor’s office as “intent on inserting itself into the day-to-day management of the university system, often in alignment with a group called the LSU Flagship Coalition.”

In alignment with LFC? Really?

LFC describes itself as “a group of business leaders and citizens from across the state supportive of maintaining and enhancing LSU as a flagship university. The Coalition’s focus is on a top-tier research university that continues to improve its performance through admission standards, faculty research and productivity and higher retention and graduation rates. We believe LSU should be a driving force in the state’s workforce objectives, economic development strategies and innovation opportunities.”

Sounds noble enough. But let’s take a closer look at the LFC makeup.

Of its 57 members 33 combined to contribute nearly half-a-million dollars ($496,000) to Jindal political campaigns.

That’s in addition to the nine members of the LSU Board of Supervisors who chipped in another $162,000 and seven members of the University Medical Center Management Corp. Board who gave an additional $203,800. Because a couple of contributors serve on more than one of the boards, we have to be fair and say the total comes to something in excess of $800,000 (not the $861,000 at first glance) for the privilege of a handful of political cronies to run the state’s flagship university.

The desire by Jindal to have Lombardi fire Mike Gargano, chief of staff and vice president for students and academic support, Lamonica and Charles Zewe, vice president of communications and external affairs was “reinforced” by Jindal staff members during two separate meetings with Lombardi.

Jindal wanted them gone because he considered them insufficiently responsive to directives from the governor’s office. When Lombardi refused, LFC member Sean Reilly called Alvin Kimble, then a member of the LSU Board of Supervisors. “Sean called me and said we need to get rid of John Lombardi,” Kimble said.

Lombardi was fired in April of this year and Lamonica was “reassigned” last month.

While the LFC touts its agenda as aimed at turning the Baton Rouge campus into a “top tier” research university, there are those who have their doubts.
Kevin Cope, chairperson of the LSU Faculty Senate, said there has not been “a single example of work-force development that is aimed at basic research or advanced research.”

Cope said he also is concerned about apparent conflicts of interest between the LSU provost and a company run by an LFC member.

Provost John Maxwell Hamilton is a member of the board of directors of Lamar Advertising where LFC member Sean Riley is chief executive.

Hamilton has averaged $130,856 per year as his annual compensation from Lamar, including cash and stock, according to the company’s proxy statements.

Hamilton said his board membership at Lamar presents no conflict of interest.

Here are the contributions to Jindal’s campaigns by LFC members, their family members, their businesses and business associates:

• Hank Anderson: $20,000;

• Brent Bankston: $1,000;

• Boysie Bollinger: $58,850;

• David Bondy: $24,000;

• Jeff Brooks: $21,150;

• Terrell Brown: $2,000 (Brown was head of United Companies in Baton Rouge when the company went bankrupt);

• Ron Cambre: $25,000;

• Jay Campbell: $1,500;

• Jim Flores: $5,000;

• Todd Graves: $31,000;

• Lane Grigsby: $33,000;

• Frank Harrison, Jr.: $5,000;

• Brian Haymon: $1,000;

• Gary Laborde: $6,000;

• Richard Lipsey: $28,000;

• Roy O. Martin: $24,000;

• James Maurin: $11,000 (Maurin and Roger Ogden were both officers with Stirling Properties which contributed $5,000. Stirling’s contribution is included with Maurin but not Ogden.);

• Henson Moore: $6,000;

• Ron Neal: $500;

• Jake Netterville: $7,000;

• Roger Ogden: $5,000;

• Will Pecue: $34,500 ($15,000 of that from Taylor Energy, which has been leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico for more than eight years);

• Michael Polito: $38,400;

• Sean Reilly: $11,000;

• William “Billy” Rucks, IV: $17,500;

• Rob Stuart: $16,000;

• Richard Sturlese: $3,500;

• Carol Suggs: $2,300;

• Cyril Vetter: $2,500;

• Charles Weems: $5,000;

• Michael Worley: $15,000;

• Gary Young: $16,000;

• Richard Zuschlag: $17,384.

LFC Executive Board members include Bollinger, Flores, Grigsby, Haymon, Martin, Maurin, Ogden, Reilly and Young.

Those nine combined to contribute more than $166,200, or an average of $18,470 each.

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The π-yush nullification whirlwind tour: is Florida next on his judicial revenge itinerary? LouisianaVoice will follow

Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, Campaign Contributions, Governor's Office, Legislature, Legislators, Lobbyist, Politicians on September 27, 2012| 7 Comments »

Piyush Jindal is still on his whirlwind tour of New Hampshire to attend a Republican breakfast and Iowa to campaign against a state supreme court judge who had the audacity to help make unanimous a ruling that the state’s one man-one woman marriage law was unconstitutional but now Jindal may already be planning another jaunt—this time to Florida to take on three more state supreme court judges.

Apparently there are simply no more problems in Louisiana that demand his attention so he is free to look elsewhere. Nice to know everything is under control here.

Though nothing official has come from Jindal’s office, the atmosphere appears favorable for him to charge into the state on his noble steed in concert with David Koch to rescue the state and Gov. Rick Scott from the evil judges who were part of a 5-2 majority that blocked an unconstitutional ballot initiative seeking to nullify the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare).

The Tea Party group Americans for Prosperity, chaired by David Koch of Koch Industries, the driving force behind the American Legislative Exchange Council, joined the Florida Republican Party’s effort to remove the three judges, which would give Gov. Scott, a Tea Party member, control over nearly half the court.

“Many states, like Ohio, gave their citizens the right to vote against the Affordable Care Act,” sniffed the Americans for Prosperity, sounding like a true victim, “but not Florida. Our own supreme court denied our right to choose for ourselves. Shouldn’t our courts protect our rights to choose?”

First of all, the Florida Supreme Court’s decision had nothing to do with denying anyone’s “right to choose.” The decision was to remove the unconstitutional ballot initiative after the initiative’s own defenders admitted that the ballot language was misleading so the court’s decision simply said that voters should be able to understand what they are voting for before they cast ballots.

Even more important, however, is that the Koch group, by supporting the ballot initiative, is also endorsing a questionable constitutional theory known as “nullification.” Because the Constitution provides that duly enacted federal laws “shall be the supreme law of the land,” states do not have the authority to block or supersede an Act of Congress such as the Affordable Care Act, whether through a ballot initiative or otherwise.

Nullification was last in vogue with the nineteenth century slaveholders and Civil Rights era segregationists. But the Tea Partiers have revived the concept and the Florida judges apparently hurt their feelings.

Tea Party self-appointed historian Tom Woods has published a book defending nullification. Of course he also once published an article describing the Confederacy as “Christendom’s Last Stand.”

So now Americans for Prosperity and Koch desire to punish three judges for putting the law above conservative ideology. They are hellbent on turning over Florida’s highest court to the Tea Party governor. If successful, this campaign will send a chilling message to every elected judge in the country (Louisiana’s judges are elected) that they can adhere to the Constitution at their own peril.

Sounds like a perfect opportunity for Piyush. After all, his most recent trips just happen to be in the states where the nation’s first presidential primary and first presidential caucuses are held. And Florida is almost certain to be a swing state in future elections.

Too bad Piyush doesn’t realize that his political fortunes are sinking faster than that big hole in Assumption Parish.

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Guest columnist explains why he feels ‘sense of urgency’ in legislative defeat of the punitive π-yush privatization push

Posted in BESE, Campaign Contributions, Charters, Ethics, Governor's Office, Higher Education, House, Senate, Layoffs, Legislature, Legislators, LSU, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, ORM, Office of Risk Management, Privatization, State Agencies, Transparency on September 18, 2012| 2 Comments »

By JOHN SACHS

Periodically I am asked why I’m screaming about what is taking place in our state government. It is suggested that I speak with more deference and respect to and about elected and appointed officials. I am reminded of the adage that one catches more flies with sugar than with salt. I listen to that advice and then I counter with the following explanation for my approach and call to action:

When you as an individual or through your business or when a government entity wants to make a change in service providers such as a pest control service, a janitorial service, or a building maintenance and repair service, it does not involve the lives and livelihood of employees or the ownership of the entity’s physical assets such as buildings. One simply contacts several competing service providers and after evaluating them, makes a decision as to which vendor will provide the specific service for a specific time period.

Now take the case of lease and rentals of buildings and equipment. This is a more complex transaction and generally extends over a longer period of time than a service contract. Except in the case of a rent/lease-to-own transaction, ownership of the assets remains unchanged. Thus, at the end of the lease the parties can agree to terminate the agreement and go their separate ways or to enter into a new contract. Ownership of the asset being rented or leased, however, remains with the original owner.

Finally, there are the types of transactions that are of a permanent nature with lasting consequences, and the ones that the Jindal administration is entering into that will for all intent and purposes change our system of government, alter the delivery of essential services, and transfer ownership of state physical assets forever. What Gov. Bobby Jindal is doing now will be felt for decades to come if not forever. And forever is a mighty long time for the state to suffer after Jindal leaves office for greener pastures (which I find myself occasionally hoping will have a name such as “Serenity Gardens.”)

The first of these “Forever” changes involves privatizing essential government services. When these services are privatized, the state employees almost to a man/woman lose their jobs, their retirement and their benefits. Moreover, their years of experience and expertise are lost to the state almost always forever. The state’s records generally become those of a private company accessible only by the state agency responsible for their administration.

And even that access can become iffy. Take the Office of Risk Management, for example. In less than a year after being privatized at a cost of $75 million to the state, the contract was transferred to a second and then a third company—in open defiance of the state contract requiring written authority for the contract to be transferred. Today, two years after the privatization, nothing has been done about the contract violation.

Records that should be open and public disappear behind a cloak of protection from prying eyes not afforded public agencies. Consequently, monitoring by state and even federal investigators charged with oversight of the function becomes difficult. And to the press, the fourth estate charged with keeping everyone honest and accountable, access to once public records becomes all but impossible. When one adds in the profit motive of a private enterprise and tax liabilities that are not a cost factor to a state operating department, the cost to administer an essential and rightfully state service escalates significantly to the detriment of the state.

The second “Forever” change is the most troublesome and is the one that makes me scream the loudest. That is when physical assets owned by the state and its citizens are sold to private individuals, companies, and corporations. When assets such as hospitals, prisons, schools, etc., are sold, ownership of those assets by the state is lost FOREVER. Let me say that again. When physical assets of the state are sold, ownership of them by the state is lost FOREVER.

We will never again own them. If we need those physical assets to deliver essential state services and programs, we have to enter into negotiations with the new owners to rent or lease those same facilities that we previously owned. And since we in almost every case have no alternative site from which to provide the service, we are held captive by the private owner of the former state facility paid for with taxpayer dollars.

If the new owner knows that he has no competition, is it reasonable to expect him to give us a fair, reasonable, competitive rent/lease term? Chances of that happening are so slight as to be incalculable. The only protection is the initial agreement. After that, it’s every man for himself.

And remember, these new owners will most likely be the contributors to Jindal’s political campaigns, his political slush fund, Believe in Louisiana, or his wife’s “charitable” foundation. They will be the ALEC-supported “One-Percenters” who feel that they are, by divine right, entitled to the spoils of political patronage. It is the finality of the “FOREVER” consequences of the sale of physical assets that makes me scream the loudest and that must be stopped before it ever happens.

Jindal has three years left to do his dastardly deeds. Everyone knows he has higher political aspirations (goals that he will never attain) and that he is a pathological liar who will say anything to portray himself as a caring and responsible keeper of the sacred trust placed in him by the Louisiana electorate. And our generally brain-dead media will drink his poisoned Kool-Aid, ask no intelligent and probing questions, and print verbatim his press releases.

Meanwhile, the Super Pacs will reward him for his unconscionable acts of greed on behalf of the One-Percenters.

So how can Jindal be stopped? There is only one way. Our legislators must muster the required two-thirds (2/3) vote to take back powers to act that in the past have been ceded to the governor and his appointees. That is the only way. And that must happen within the next year and certainly before the end of his term in office. Otherwise, Jindal will have sold ALL of the most marketable physical assets that the state must have in order to deliver essential services mandated by state and federal law and the state will be forced to contract with the new owners for these assets use at exorbitant rates and for terms favorable to the new owners.

That is why I’m screaming and you’d better scream too. Legislators, you’d better muster whatever it takes to act as a body politic united to preserve our state’s assets or your term in office will be forever tainted as a do-nothing, hear, see and speak no evil hand-maiden to the most corrupt governor in our state’s history. That’s a legacy that I would not want to bear.

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