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Lines blurred between Sen. Vitter’s campaign committee and new Fund for Louisiana Super PAC; Jindal to succeed Vitter?

Posted in Campaign Contributions, Congress, Governor's Office, House, Senate, PACs, Politicians on December 17, 2013| 7 Comments »

The Daily Kingfish blog http://dailykingfish.com/tag/superpac/, with an inadvertent assist from the Baton Rouge Advocate, http://theadvocate.com/columnists/6061634-55/around-washington-for-monday-may has given us an interesting angle on the new Super PAC set up on U.S. Sen. David Vitter’s behalf which conceivably could bring him some problems with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC).

LouisianaVoice also has come across an interesting bit of speculation beginning to make its way through the rumor mill that involves a possible Vitter run for governor.

It’s a tangled web that started with a demand by Washington attorney Charles Spies that the Louisiana Board of Ethics should fall in line with the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision that removed the limits that may be contributed to Super PACs.

Spies chairs the Fund for Louisiana (FFL), the Super PAC set up to help Vitter with either a run for governor in 2015 or for re-election to the Senate in 2016.

Spies, also co-founder of Restore Our Future PAC for Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, said in his filing with the Louisiana ethics board that if the U.S. Supreme Court’s opinion abolishing the contributions to Super PACs is not granted and it is later determined by the courts that the state’s $100,000 limit “impermissibly infringe on constitutional rights, Fund for Louisiana’s Future will have suffered irreparable harm” and that “FFL’s political speech—and the political speech of others like it—is being burdened and chilled.”

But The Daily Kingfish noted that while Spies is the mover and shaker behind the effort to remove the state’s contribution cap, the Louisiana address for FFL is 6048 Marshall Foch Street in the Lakeview area of New Orleans.

That’s the address at the bottom of FFL’s web page and it just happens to be the home of Bill Callihan, a director at Capital One Bank.

Okay, nothing wrong with this picture so far.

Vitter is prohibited by federal election rules from coordinating for the Super PAC and does not personally participate in fundraising activities.

Again, nothing wrong so far.

FFL has scheduled its Louisiana Bayou Weekend for Sept. 5-7, 2014 with Vitter as “special guest.” Invitees will have the opportunity to participate in Cajun cooking, an airboat swamp tour and an alligator hunt.

While Vitter can appear at the Super PAC event, he is prohibited from soliciting contributions.

And this is where the picture becomes somewhat muddled.

Courtney Guastella Callihan—Callihan’s wife—is listed on invitations as the contact person for the Bayou Weekend.

She also served as Vitter’s campaign financial director, a dual role that blurs the distinction between her function with the Super PAC and Vitter’s Senate campaign.

Citizens United legalized independent groups raising unlimited funds but it did not legalize politicians establishing dummy organizations to evade campaign finance laws.

So the question now becomes is Courtney Callihan on the payroll of both Vitter’s Senate campaign committee and FFL?

If so, that could conceivably bring real legal problems with the FEC.

Now, having said all that, here is a real zinger we came across in the rumor mill. Mind you, everything is speculation at this point, but the report appears to have a certain validity that warrants a mention here.

Even if it proves to be untrue, it’s still interesting to speculate.

It is no secret that Jindal and Vitter are not the best of friends. Jindal even refused to endorse Vitter in his re-election campaign three years ago even though Vitter, in an apparent effort to be the better man (that being a relative term), did endorse Jindal for re-election the following year.

But it is also true that politics makes for strange bedfellows and this would rate right up there with the most bizarre of them all.

Should Vitter be elected governor in 2015, he would take office in January of 2016 with still a year left on his Senate term.

He would have to vacate his Senate seat, of course, and as governor would name his successor.

Sources say that the two have buried the hatchet and talk already has Jindal moving into the Senate office for the duration of Vitter’s term, thus providing him a stepping stone, so to speak, for his anticipated longshot run for the GOP presidential nomination. (should we have bold-faced, capitalized, underlined and italicized longshot?)

Of course, if Public Service Commissioner and former Secretary of the Department of Natural Resources Scott Angelle should run, that in turn would create a dilemma for Jindal. Would he throw his Protégé under the bus for a shot at a U.S. Senate seat?

Stranger things—including outlandish political marriages—do occur in politics (see JFK/LBJ, 1960).

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Sen. Dorsey got campaign contribution from future husband just months before his foundation got $300,000 state grant

Posted in Campaign Contributions, Ethics, Finances, Grant, Grants, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, NGOs, Politicians, Public Records, Transparency on November 24, 2013| 11 Comments »

From time to time at LouisianaVoice, someone will ask us how we get the information we use for our stories.

The answer is quite simple, really.

Instead of listening to what elected officials, political appointees and attorneys are saying, we listen to what they’re not saying.

And then we find out where the appropriate public records are and we go get them, sometimes finding it necessary to take legal action to obtain what rightfully belongs to the citizens of Louisiana. Our driving obsession is that public records are not the exclusive domain of whomever happens to be holding office at any given time.

The public’s right to know should be uppermost in any government—unless that government or a particular politician or bureaucrat has something to hide and we feel that having something to hide is the only reason for not releasing public records, deliberative process be damned.

And so, we choose to ask one more question. We know the politicians, bureaucrats and lawyers are going to put the best possible spin on any issue, so we must ask one more question and if we’re not satisfied with the answer, there are always the public records.

That’s the beautiful thing about a democracy; there’s always a paper trail when the politicians and their lawyers quit talking—or when they talk and we hear what they don’t say loud and clear.

And so it was when Baton Rouge attorney Mary Olive Pierson fired off that six-page letter to State Treasurer John Kennedy in which she chose to attack Kennedy for his political aspirations as much as to defend her client, State Sen. Yvonne Dorsey (D-Baton Rouge), that we listened.

Dorsey, in 2007, pushed through the legislature a $300,000 appropriation for the Colomb Foundation in Lafayette which Kennedy in July of this year listed as one of three dozen non-government organizations (NGOs) that owed the state some $4.5 million for non-compliance in reporting on how their grant money was spent.

The Colomb Foundation received its funding to design and build a community center in Lafayette Parish.

The Colomb Foundation is run by Sterling Colomb who is married to Sen. Dorsey.

Pierson, however, went for Kennedy’s jugular when she dropped her bombshell in her letter: Dorsey and Colomb were not married until 2010, three years after the issuance of the grant, she said.

It was one of those “aha” moments that attorneys love. A “gotcha,” as it were, the implication being that there could be no conflict if Dorsey was not married to Colomb at the time.

Advantage, Dorsey.

But wait.

There was something in Pierson’s declaration about their marriage date that was not said—like how long had they known each other or how long had they been in a relationship? Could Dorsey have used her position to funnel $300,000 in state funds to her future husband?

We listened but all we could hear was crickets chirping. So, we embarked on a little paper chase that took only a few minutes and a couple of clicks of a computer mouse. And what do you suppose we found?

On Jan. 5, 2007, one Sterling Colomb contributed $1,000 to the campaign of Sen. Yvonne Dorsey, according to records obtained from the Louisiana Ethics Commission. And while the $300,000 grant to the Colomb Foundation was indeed approved three years before their marriage, the campaign contribution from her future husband came approximately four months before the opening of the 2007 legislative session during which the grant to his foundation was approved—a little more than three years prior to their marriage.

Aha.

Your move, counsellor.

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Riser campaign finance report good example of ‘Legislators Gone Wild’: fast and loose with OPM (other people’s money)

Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, Campaign Contributions, Ethics, Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Politicians, Public Records on November 12, 2013| 9 Comments »

When last we left Ray Griffin, that Republican State Central Committee member who purportedly doubles as a political pundit, he was lamenting the fact that 5th Congressional District candidate Vance McAllister, a “wealthy, self-funding political novice,” was (gasp) using his own money to bankroll his campaign against Bobby Jindal-anointed State Sen. Neil Riser.

That’s right. McAllister’s biggest sin, according to Griffin, was using his own money for political campaign purposes.

Strangely enough, Griffin, whom we still question as the real author of that post on The Hayride, managed to skirt entirely the issue of using political campaign funds for personal uses.

Well, call us nitpickers, but we at LouisianaVoice choose not to look the other way on such matters. In our perverted, warped minds, we look upon private use of campaign funds as a bit more egregious than spending one’s personal funds for political campaigns.

And apparently state campaign finance laws agree with us.

Louisiana Revised Statute 18:1505.2 (I) says it quite succinctly: “Campaign funds may not be used for any personal use unrelated to a political campaign or the holding of public office.”

Further down, in R.S. 18:1505.2 (J) 1(1), the law says it again, in a slightly different way: “…contributions received by a candidate or a political committee may be expended for any lawful purpose, but such funds shall not be used, loaned, or pledged by any person for any personal use unrelated to a political campaign, the holding of a public office, or party position (emphasis ours).

That should be clear enough.

But wait. Apparently it was not quite so clear for Riser.

From January through December of 2012, Riser made 12 monthly payments of $678.20 to Ford Credit in Dallas. The notation on the expenditure was “Truck Note.”

That represents a total of $8,138.84 he spent from his campaign funds in 2012 on his personal vehicle.

And it would be quite a stretch to claim he was using the vehicle for campaign purposes. The most recent election was in October of 2011—and he was unopposed for re-election.

Perhaps he was campaigning already for Congress. If he was, it would make him, Jindal and Rodney Alexander all liars; they claim there was no collusion in Alexander’s sudden “retirement” in favor of a $130,000-a-year job as head of the Louisiana Office of Veterans’ Affairs—a development that conveniently opened the door for Riser.

There were some other questionable “campaign” expenditures as well.

During 2012, Riser made 11 payments to T.A. Roberts Oil in Grayson for “fuel for campaign.” Those 11 fuel purchases totaled $6,656.86, or $605.17 per payment. Either he has a huge gas tank on that truck, or he was running a tab at Roberts Oil.

Riser also made two payments of $502.86 each ($1,005.72 total) on June 1 and Dec. 5 to Farm Bureau Insurance for insurance coverage on his truck

So, in 2012, Riser spent a grand total of $15,801.42 from his campaign funds on his personal vehicle.

But, hey, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

Riser, who like his mentor Jindal, actively courts the religious right as the beacon of all things pure and righteous (he made numerous $25 contributions to protestant churches all over his district), is apparently almost as generous with OPM (other people’s money) when it comes to hiring staff members.

During 2012, he paid $13,550 to Annette McGuffee of Columbia ($5,250), Mason Dupree of Baton Rouge ($6,000), and Nicholas Walts of Columbia ($2,300) for “campaign work” even though there was no campaign in 2012 and Riser had won re-election unopposed the year before.

So now, we’re up to $29,351.42 in questionable expenditures from Riser’s campaign funds—in 2012 alone. And yes, there’s more.

How many of us would love to have a slush fund to dip into to pay for roof repairs? Well, Riser did so on two occasions in 2012. In March, he paid Home Hardware in Columbia $72.45 and in August he paid David Wilson Construction of Columbia $250. Both expenditures ($322.45 total) were listed as “Roof Repair.”

How about a couple of meals in the House Dining Hall totaling $538.46?

And $100 for membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC);

Of course, we can’t overlook those purchases from the Louisiana Senate: Shirts ($49.18), Windbreaker ($36.16), Umbrella ($26), Shirts ($47.60), T-shirt and lanyard ($15.09), lapel pins ($31.05), and $34 to the Louisiana Capital Foundation for “Ornaments”—all purchases ostensibly for “campaign purposes.”

Grand total: $30,551.41.

Now, let’s hit the high spots for the years 2009-2011:

  • Kwik Mart, Columbia—20 payments totaling $3,228.95 for fuel;
  • Mason Dupree—seven payments totaling $3,500 for “Campaign Work.” (Remember, he was unopposed in 2011.);
  • LSU Ticket Office—$2,000 for athletic tickets;
  • Riser & Son Funeral Home (Riser’s business) in Columbia—$1,013.67 reimbursement for purchase of an I-Pad (WHAT?!!);
  • William R. Hulsey, CPA, of Monroe—$370 for professional fees (probably trying to figure a way to take a business deduction on that I-Pad);
  • White Ford Co., Winnsboro—$678.20 for lease on vehicle;
  • Farm Bureau Insurance Co.—$670.10 for vehicle insurance;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$646.50 for Senate plates;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$183.33 for Senate china;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$187 for luncheon;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$337.14 for flags;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$147.60 for shirts and parade throws;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$101.90 for shirts;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$62.24 for a Senate jacket;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$108.10 for flags;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$26.32 for Senate pad folios;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$25.45 for shirts;
  • Louisiana State Senate—$18.50 for a watch;
  • Louisiana House Dining Hall—$91.41 for meal;
  • National Rifle Association—$125 for membership dues;
  • American Legislative Exchange Council—$100 for membership dues;
  • T.A. Roberts Oil, Grayson—three payments totaling $1,140.38 for fuel;
  • State of Louisiana—three payments totaling $740 for rent of Pentagon Barracks Apartment;
  • Ruston Flying Service—$100 for trip (we didn’t know you could taxi down the runway for $100);
  • Wal-Mart—$76.62 for a router;
  • Johnny’s Pizza—$30.72 donation (donation?);

So now we’re looking at a minimum of $46,000 in expenditures from Neil Riser’s campaign funds from 2009 through 2012—mostly in 2012, well after he was returned to office in 2011 with no opposition—that probably warrant a closer look by the Louisiana Board of Ethics.

Discounting the payments he made for “campaign work” to various individuals, there remains some $25,600 which should be counted as income. That amount includes truck payments, insurance, fuel, the router, roof repairs, LSU football tickets and of course, that I-Pad.

We have to wonder if Riser 1) claimed mileage on his income taxes and 2) if he reported the $25,600 as income. If the answers are yes to the first and no to the second, the IRS might suddenly take an interest and request a conference to go over his return.

And Neil Riser is asking voters in the 5th District to send him to Washington this Saturday so that he can join all the other Tea partiers in reining in all that wasteful governmental spending.

Wonder why Ray Griffin didn’t mention this in his column about campaign finance?

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With 5th District Congressional Election a Week Away, Some Random Observations

Posted in Campaign Contributions, Governor's Office, Politicians on November 8, 2013| 12 Comments »

While we don’t normally offer negative comments on other blot posts, there was a guest post on The Hayride Wednesday (Nov. 6) written—or ghostwritten, would be my guess—by one Ray Griffin, a member of the Republican State Central Committee from the 105th District, which encompasses all or parts of the parishes of Jefferson, St. Charles and Plaquemines.

His post on The Hayride consisted almost entirely of ridiculing Riser’s opponent in the Nov. 16 runoff for the 5th District congressional seat, Vance McAllister. He first sniped at McAllister as a “wealthy, self-funding political novice.”

Actually, we find it somewhat refreshing that a candidate is willing to sink his own money in a run for office as opposed to sucking up donations from special interests who will own the candidate after his election. PACs and fat cat donors seem to be at the root of the nation’s political dilemma today.

http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/11/some_of_gov_bobby_jindals_dona.html=

http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/11/bobby_jindals_political_appoin.html#incart_maj-story-2

http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/11/louisianas_top_campaign_donors.html#incart_maj-story-2=

Griffin also snorted his derision at McAllister’s self-proclaimed aspirations to parlay his hoped-for congressional seat into the presidency. While McAllister may be a bit premature in getting the cart way out in front of the horse, his disarming candor is certainly refreshing in light of Jindal’s continued ridiculous contention that he already has the job he wants when everyone who has not been in a coma for six years knows the presidency is Jindal’s own burning obsession.

Griffin, of Lafitte, in Jefferson Parish, is listed as an agent and officer of Cochiara Corp. in Lafitte on the Secretary of State’s web page but is designated as not in good standing for failure to file an annual report. The last annual report filed was on May 24, 2012, records show.

He is also an officer and director of Ray Griffin, Inc., an active corporation about which there were no details furnished.

Griffin also worked as an intern in Gov. Bobby Jindal’s 2004 congressional campaign, drawing a total of $1,654 in intern fees and travel reimbursements.

So now we have a campaign flunky turned entrepreneur turned political pundit.

Of course, there’s nothing wrong that—if he did indeed pen the article. But even if he allowed his name to be used for an author written by, say, someone like Kyle Plotkin, it still would not be nearly as egregious as Sen. Rand Paul’s experiment in plagiarism; at least Griffin, if he did use a ghostwriter, was a party to the ruse.

So, just to put things in perspective, here are three images of Griffin, the Riser shill:

image001

image002

image003

Hey, boys just want to have fun, right?

What continues to disturb us even more, however, besides the obvious contrivance of Jindal’s orchestrating the retirement of Rodney Alexander by offering him a lucrative state position so that Riser could inherit the office (the election being only a pesky formality), is Riser’s continued association with two former board members of New Bethany Home for Boys and Girls in Arcadia.

Tim Johnson, son-in-law of New Bethany administrator/owner/minister Mack Ford, and his son Jonathan Johnson have both been active in the Riser campaign. Their motivation is obvious: for the past decade, Jonathan Johnson worked as State Director for Alexander. He is working in the Riser campaign in the fervent hope that he will continue in that same capacity once upon Riser’s coronation…er, election. And Tim just wants what is best for Junior.

Ford, the patriarch of New Bethany, has been accused by several former female residents, of beatings and rapes, dating back to the mid-1970s and continuing until the early 1990s.

No formal charges have been filed because (a) the Bienville Parish Sheriff’s Office denies that any of the victims ever appeared at his office to file a complaint and (b) because an assistant district attorney claims that the district attorney’s office cannot initiate an investigation.

Determined to see justice done, several of the former residents have indicated to LouisianaVoice that they will be appearing in person in the near future to file formal charges against Ford.

Even though the home has been closed down for more than 20 years, Ford still receives monetary support from various Independent Fundamental Baptist (IFB) churches from around the country. Several former IFB ministers are currently serving prison sentences for sexually abusing church members, mostly women.

Oddly enough, because of the IFB philosophy that women must be totally subservient to men and because the ministers instill the belief among their congregations that they are anointed by God and thus, infallible, whenever sexual abuse of women is exposed, it is the women—and often young girls—who are required to stand before the congregation and apologize for their sins of tempting men just as Eve tempted Adam into original sin.

Even more disturbing is a book by IFB members Michael and Debi Pearl. The book, To Train Up A Child, is nothing more than a manual for child abuse, i.e. beatings.

The Pearls were not the first, however. Ministers Bill Gothard and Richard Fugate were two of the first IFB leaders to preach “breaking the will” of children. The two wrote What the Bible Says about Child Training, a book used by Bob Jones University (BJU) in its child psychology classes. One of Mack Ford’s daughters attended BJU.

Among other things, Fugate recommends a balloon stick, a willow or peach tree branch, or a blackboard pointer of one-eighth-inch wooden dowel for toddlers up to 15 months in age. After that, the instruments only get thicker—up to one-half inch in diameter.

For nursing mothers, Pearl recommends pulling infants’ hair when they bite. “An alternative has to be sought for bald-headed babies,” he wrote.

Fugate writes that babies should not be spanked through a thick diaper, but bare-bottomed. A child who is strong-willed “will require more frequent and more intense whippings,” he said. “Such a child is likely to require enough strokes to receive stripes or even welts. Parents should not be overly concerned if such minor injuries do result from their chastisement as it is perfectly normal.”

Child beatings (and some IFB children have died at the hands of their “disciplinarians,” by the way) and total dominance over women are not the only characteristics of IFB. Among other things, IFB ministers teach that the word “sex” is hidden in the animated twinkling stars of The Lion King and that Azrael, the cat on The Smurfs cartoon, got its name from one of Satan’s top demons of the same name, and anyone who brought a Smurf doll into his/her home was inviting demonic possession.

One more thing: Thursday (Nov. 7) was the 95th birthday of the Rev. Billy Graham.

How is that relevant, you ask?

Well, before his rise to prominence, Graham spent a semester at Bob Jones College in Tennessee (before it relocated to its present location in Greenville, S.C.) and Jones was his mentor.

But Graham, who rejected the Doctrine of Separation, began to distance himself from Jones, who believed if conservative and liberal Christians joined forces it would compromise the word of God. The rift grew to such an extent that in 1995, Bob Jones III told 1,000 employees that, “Billy Graham has done more damage to Christianity than any other person in the 20th century.”

BJU, which teaches its students that accreditation is not important “because Harvard University is not accredited” (it is, of course), rejects any governmental interference while at the same time accepting federal student aid and enjoying tax exempt status.

These are examples of the beliefs of those to whom Jindal, Superintendent of Education John White and Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) President Chas Roemer wish to turn over the education of our children through vouchers and charter schools.

And Neil Riser is Jindal’s boy.

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Gov. Jindal completely out of touch with approval of $2 million appropriation to construct shrine to Mike Foster

Posted in Budget, Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Politicians, Public Records on October 24, 2013| 36 Comments »

Bobby Jindal has completely lost touch with reality.

To be perfectly blunt, he is an imbecilic moron. (For those of you who think I should apologize for that characterization: okay, I’m sorry he’s an imbecilic moron.)

There, we’ve said it. We’ve tried to take the high road in our criticism of his actions and policies in the past but when he chooses to spend $2 million that the state does not have to build a monument that it does not need to his mentor who isn’t particularly memorable other than for the fact that he imposed and inflicted Bobby Jindal on the state, we can only throw up our hands in abject exasperation.

Our college and university physical plants are in desperate need of repairs and renovations—but there’s no money for that.

Most state employees have gone four years without pay raises because there’s no money.

The various state retirement plans have gigantic unfunded liabilities mostly because the state does not live up to its obligation to pay its share into those funds.

Higher education has been cut to the bone by this administration but there’s money to house the archives of former Gov. Mike Foster.

Our roads and highways are in deplorable condition—and there’s no money fix them. But we can erect a shrine to a former governor for the first time in the state’s history.

The administration has been conducting a fire sale of state property in order to raise one-time money to meet recurring expenses in an effort to plug a gaping deficit in the state budget but somehow we seem to need a museum for a governor who likes to ride a motorcycle without a helmet (and Lyndon Johnson once said that Gerald Ford played “too much football without a helmet.”)

Nearly a half-million people are without health care but Medicaid benefits have been cut.

What the hell?

Has anyone taken a look at some Jindal’s veto messages?

  • He killed a $190,000 appropriation for support services to the elderly;
  • He slashed $500,000 for the arts;
  • Appropriations for individuals with development disabilities in Jefferson Parish ($50,000), the Florida Parishes ($200,000), Capital Area ($200,000), the Metropolitan Human Services District ($50,000), the Northeast Delta ($50,000), Acadiana ($200,000), Calcasieu ($50,000), Central Louisiana ($50,000), Northwest Louisiana ($50,000): all vetoed because of a reduction to Medicaid utilization;
  • Continued operation of the Children’s Special Health Services Clinics across the state ($794,000);
  • Prevention and Intervention Services Program for the Family Violence Program ($1.17 million);
  • A $2 million reduction in the value of state contracts;

Yes, we are aware that these vetoes were from Act 1, the General Appropriations Budget and the $2 million appropriation for the Mike Foster Shrine comes from Act 2, the Capital Outlay Budget and yes, we know these are two different buckets. We know that, but waste is waste and payback is payback and this is both.

The state is spending the money to renovate the third floor of an old elementary school in Franklin (Foster’s home town) to house the archives of Jindal’s benefactor who served as governor from 1996 to 2004.

The first two floors of the former school building presently serve as the Franklin City Hall.

There are three very good reasons why the state should not be paying for this. One we’ve already mentioned: the state is broke, as in destitute—mostly because of Jindal’s penchant for giving away the store in the form of tax incentives, tax breaks and tax exemptions to business and industry and for the Louisiana Department of Economic Development’s designation of enterprise zones to businesses and industries, which awards more tax incentives even though the designation does not always translate to jobs.

The other two reasons are:

  • Mike Foster is a very wealthy man. If he wants to immortalize himself with a trophy room, let him pay for it.
  • Bobby Jindal should pay for it personally because he owes everything he has attained in his political life to the glaring blunder of Foster back in 1996: appointing Jindal head of the Department of Health and Hospitals at the tender age of 24 when he knew even less than he knows now about how things work.

The most absurd utterance of this entire sordid affair came from Foster himself when, in saying that the project came as a surprise to him, added, “I never liked to be the center of attention.” That ranks right up there with Jindal’s “I have the job I want.”

State Sen. Bret Allain (R-Jeanerette) said he included the project in the Capital Outlay Bill because he did not want Foster’s papers to be buried among a university’s collection, whatever that meant. Maybe he wants Foster to make him a governor the way he did Jindal.

No governor in Louisiana’s history has had his own library, museum or archives building. That’s what makes Jindal’s approval of Allain’s project so absurd—and outrageous and irresponsible.

Most Louisiana governors simply turn their papers over to the Secretary of State’s office where they are stored in the State Archives but Foster sent only those records involving state boards and commissions. Supposedly, everything else was taken to Franklin in a U-Haul towed by Foster on a Harley-Davidson 1450 cc V-twin (yeah, we had to Google that).

Of course with Jindal’s obsession with secrecy and the “deliberative process,” there won’t be a need for a museum or a library; any papers and records that he leaves behind can probably be stored in a cabinet beneath the bathroom sink—with room to spare.

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