Louisiana Voice

Folks, there’s less than a week left in LouisianaVoice‘s March fundraiser and we’re still a couple thousand dollars short of our goal.

It’s fun being retired and able to write about official corruption and misbehaving on the part of those we put in place to look out for our interests. It’s rewarding to be able to shine a light into those dark corners of questionable expenditures, illegal transactions, and downright corruption.

But as a retiree, I’m doing so on a fixed income. I’ve already cut my cable TV to keep costs down but everything else keeps going up.

I’m in the middle of obtaining my tax-exempt 501C(3) status which costs money and I’m also preparing to file two public records lawsuits, one of which will probably require a trip to Shreveport for a court trial.

Bottom line, LouisianaVoice needs your help. Please click HERE or on the yellow DONATE button (below, in column at right). Or you may mail your check to: LouisianaVoice, P.O. Box 922, Denham Springs, Louisiana 70727.

And as always, thanks so much for your continued support of honest, transparent government.

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No one ever assigned me to create LouisianaVoice or to post stories of political corruption, ethics violations, and back room deals.

I do it because I have a passion for good, honest government. I know it’s a pipe dream, that we will never have completely transparent representation from our elected and appointed officials because they have their agendas and they act many times out of interest for their own career advancement and not for the good of Louisiana citizens.

And even though it’s a goal that is beyond our reach, I will never cease, as long as I have the ability to string two or more coherent thoughts together, to strive for that end because I have an unquenchable belief in the good of the people of this country and this state. I believe we can overcome the petty politics of self-interest if we are united in our demand for the standards of decency.

And that’s why I ask for your support. It takes time, effort, and financial resources to continue in this endeavor. I was forced into retirement from my state employment eight years ago because of this blog and what it stands for, but that’s a consequence I readily accepted with no regrets and no hard feelings toward those who made that decision for me.

If you can and if you have the inclination to do so, I humbly and gratefully ask that you contribute to my efforts by clicking HERE or on the yellow DONATE button to the right of this post and give what you can. Or you can send your check to: LouisianaVoice, P.O. Box 922, Denham Springs, Louisiana 70727.

As always, your help is greatly appreciated.

Tom Aswell, Publisher

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He was a small-time celebrity as a street hustler, but Ricco Bastardo wanted more in life. He desperately craved respectability and recognition. And more than anything, he wanted his name in the Social Register.

His only success in life had come thanks to a huge grubstake from his father, owner of a chain of seedy bars, strip clubs and cheap motels. He had parlayed that into a chain of lucrative storefront predator loan companies that he turned into a mega fortune, made on the backs of the poor.

There were the persistent rumors of mob connections. People who knew him swore Ricco was tied into the mob and that his payday loan operations were merely fronts for a massive money-laundering operation. There was no way, they said, that he could have amassed such a large fortune legitimately.

It was impossible to prove, of course, because his tax records were a tightly-held secret.

He took not one, not two, but three trophy wives over the years in his desperate—but vain—attempt to climb the ladder to join society’s elite upper crust.

But now he saw his opportunity and he was determined to seize the day. The presidency of Hope and Change University was being vacated and he announced his desire for the appointment.

No one gave him a ghost of a chance. He had zero experience running a university and, in fact, his own academic achievements had been called into question but they, like his tax returns, were locked away from prying eyes. The only thing anyone knew for sure about his scholastic pursuits was that he was admitted to the prestigious school up east only after his father bestowed a generous endowment upon the institution.

But he refused to allow that to discourage him from his dream of social acceptance and the adulation for which he yearned. He pushed his way to the front of the line by insulting the other applicants, hurling personal attacks at them to the point of outright libel, disparaging their families, and embellishing his own dubious, even nonexistent achievements.

There were rumors, as yet unproven, of outside help from rival university presidents who saw an opportunity to gain advantage over Hope and Change with Ricco’s appointment. Coincidentally, confidential emails, embarrassing to his leading rival, were released only days before the selection committee was scheduled to vote on a new president which only served to further fuel the persistent rumors.

Against all odds and in defiance of all logic, he was chosen and he set about immediately putting his stamp on the university, dismantling the legacy of Hope and Change in the process.

His first priority was to shut down the school infirmary, depriving thousands of students of medical care. Just as important was his insistence on constructing an ivy-covered wall around the school to keep out the riffraff. The university was his domain and low-income residents from the city where it was located were suddenly unwelcome. Education was strictly for the select few and strictly off-limits to all others.

As for the school’s heretofore powerhouse football team, the Fighting Scapegoats, Ricco Bastardo proclaimed that he was far more knowledgeable than the scouting reports compiled on upcoming opponents. Moreover, he insisted he knew more about football than the coaches. And he continued to hold himself blameless as the team went down to a humiliating string of defeats.

He decided the entire administrative structure of the university needed a change to shake off perceived (by him) doldrums. He announced four key appointments and a string of controversial changes:

• Viziato Bastardo, his oldest son, was named Dean of Student Life;
• Son-in-law Ignorante Opportunista, Dean of Arts and Sciences;
• Daughter Splendido Opportunista (wife of Ignorante) Administrative Vice President;
• Unemployed Uber driver Rancido Mungere, was named school band director. His first move was to abolish racial quotas by removing all the black keys from the orchestra piano.
• Cooperative programs with other universities were promptly abolished by Ricco, who said they were not in Hope and Change’s best interests. He then entered into new cooperative agreements between Hope and Change’s advanced computer technology programs and a local animal husbandry school’s goat farm.
• He converted the university’s power and heating systems to coal-fired furnaces and put the dining hall on an all-fried fast-food menu.
• Even as he vocally lamented the “invasion of third-world students” enrolled at Hope and Change, he employed undocumented workers for Buildings and Grounds maintenance.

Both the Economics and Earth Sciences departments lost their accreditation within the first year of Ricco’s administration.

Finally, when Hope and Change University’s newspaper published an editorial critical of the loss of important research grants under his administration, Ricco abolished the publication, calling it the “enemy of the students.”

And whenever he was criticized for any of his actions, which was often, he invariably responded not with diplomatic, tactful explanations—ways in which he could defend his actions in a concise, orderly, structured manner, but with 280-character tweets, a practice that his peers felt was demeaning and beneath the dignity of a university president.

But those out in the countryside who had never been to college, some of whom never finished high school, were greatly pleased.

He was communicating on their level.

And members of the Board of Regents, terrified at incurring his twitter wrath, became his enablers by simply doing nothing.

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Stories like the one below won’t be found in your daily newspaper or your local television newscast (the latter of which seems to exist only to keep the lawyer ads from bumping together).

I don’t prowl the halls of the legislature and I don’t attend too many legislative committee meetings. The deals that are detrimental to the interests of Louisiana taxpayers are not made in those meetings. Oh, sure, the official votes are taken in open for all to see but too often, decisions are made long before the actual votes.

I try to explain not that these things happen—we all know they do—but why they happen.

I’ve attempted in the nine years of LouisianaVoice’s existence to illustrate that power does in fact corrupt. I’ve tried to point out cases of mismanagement, misappropriations, malfeasance, and betrayals of the public trust. I’ve not made a lot of friends within the power structure, but that’s okay. I didn’t start this blog as a vehicle to popularity.

I started LouisianaVoice as an effort to show Louisiana’s citizens that their interests, their concerns, have been left at the door of state offices, commissions and boards while those with the checkbooks have been welcomed into the inner chambers of power and influence.

If you like what I do here, please help me continue those efforts by clicking HERE (you will be asked to verify that you’re not a robot) or on the yellow DONATE button to the right and making your contribution by credit card or by mailing your check to:

LouisianaVoice

P.O. Box 922

Denham Springs, Louisiana 70727

And as always, thank you so much for your continued support.

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Dr. Arnold Feldman may be perplexed as to why House Health and Welfare Committee Chairman Rep. Frank Hoffman and other committee members have been unresponsive to his email inquiries, but I can give him 377,000 reasons, or in Hoffman’s individual case, 34,000 reasons.

Last April 10, the Senate voted 36-0, with three members absent, to approve Senate Bill 286, the so-called Physicians’ Bill of Rights.

But on May 2, Hoffman’s Committee, on the motion of Rep. Dustin Miller (D-Opelousas), involuntarily deferred the bill, thus killing it before it could reach the House floor.

Rep. J. Rogers Pope (R-Denham Springs) offered a motion that the committee move forward (meaning that the committee would vote to approve the bill) but when Miller made his substitute motion to involuntarily defer, there were no objections.

The BILL, by Sen. John Milkovich (D-Shreveport), would have provided a number of protections to physicians subjected to complaints to the Louisiana State Board of Medical Examiners.

That’s because the board of medical examiners, like the Louisiana State Board of Dentistry, has been shown to be autocratic and more than willing to abuse its broad investigative and regulatory powers to shakedown physicians of exorbitant fines for sometimes minor or even non-existent infractions.

Both the dentistry and medical examiners boards’ autocratic practices—Dr. Feldman recently received a letter from the medical examiners informing him of a fine of nearly half-a-million dollars—have been called into question by legislators.

Not only do the boards slap doctors and dentists with enormous fines—the sole source of income for both boards—but there also appears to be a less-known arrangement with the PHYSICIANS HEALTH FOUNDATION for the referral of penalized doctors to rehabilitation facilities at even more budget-busting costs to the physicians.

Meanwhile, Dr. Feldman is unable to get an answer from Hoffman or any other members whom he has contacted.

Last week, Feldman sent the following email to Hoffman (R-West Monroe):

From: Arnold Feldman MD
Sent: Thursday, March 14, 2019 8:23 AM
To: hoffmannf@legis.la.gov
Subject: Medical Board

Dear Representative Hoffman,

As you may recall I testified at a May 2 2018, Louisiana Health and welfare committee that you Chaired. My testimony was 100 percent accurate and truthful. 

Despite this Senator Milkovich, who spoke truthfully had his bill involuntarily deferred, yet it passed the Senate almost unanimously.

I have written to you and other members multiple times but I have received no response.

What can be Done? The Medical Board is corrupt and operates as a racketeering enterprise. Responsibility for physician suicide was heard. The culprit Cecilia Mouton was demoted but given a 220,000 dollar job for no work. Action is necessary.

I deserve at least a response.

Justice delayed is Justice denied.

It’s really not difficult to understand the breakdown in communications—$377,000 has a way of doing that.

That’s how much Hoffman and the other 12 committee members received in campaign contributions from the medical community over the past five years.

Rep. Julie Stokes led the way with $84,000, but to be fair, she recently ran a campaign for Secretary of State, a statewide campaign in which the maximum allowable contributions was $5,000, twice that for legislative offices.

But Rep. Katrina Jackson (D-Monroe) had no statewide race but still raked in $70,000 from medical interests.

Others included, in order of amount received:

• Rep. Dodie Horton (R-Haughton): $43,600;
• Pope: $36,150;
• Hoffman: $34,000;
• Rep. Robert Johnson (D-Marksville): $22,350;
• Rep. Joseph Stagni (R-Kenner) and Rep. Miller: $17,500 each;
• Rep. Larry Bagley (R-Stonewall): $17,000;
• Rep. H. Bernard LeBas (D-Ville Platte): $15,400;
• Rep. Charles R. Chaney (R-Rayville): $12,600;
• Rep. Kenny R. Cox (D-Natchitoches): $5,000;
• Rep. Jerome “Dee” Richard (I-Thibodaux): $2,000.

So now maybe Dr. Feldman understands that $377,000 can buy a lot of silence.

But if you’re one of those ponying up some of that $377,000, it’s a good bet you’d get an immediate response to your inquiry. Can I get any takers on that bet?

I can almost hear the crickets chirping.

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