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Archive for the ‘Vitter’ Category

PSC member Foster Campbell enters Senate race, Moody’s downgrades state credit as House passes Edwards sales tax

Posted in Budget, Congress, Economy, Elections, Finances, Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Politicians, Senate, Taxes, Vitter on February 25, 2016| 20 Comments »

Thursday (Feb. 25) was an unusually big day in politics, even by Louisiana standards.

The big news in Baton Rouge on Thursday was House passage of Gov. John Bel Edwards’ one-cent sales tax (minus the assessment on manufacturing) but the action was quickly overshadowed by a credit rating downgrade by Moody’s. http://theadvocate.com/news/14993547-79/moodys-downgrades-louisianas-credit-rating

The state also received a “negative outlook” from Moody’s, meaning the state could be downgraded again.

Coupled with the sales passage, which must now go to the Senate for a vote, was additional cuts of $100 million in state spending and the taking of $128 million from the rainy day fund. With the $60 million already cut by the Edwards administration, Thursday’s action will make up about $700 million of the $900 million needed by the end of the current fiscal year on June 30.

The downgrade was the first for the state since Hurricane Katrina and the lower rating means when borrowing money, the state will have to pay higher interest rates.

And just to add a touch of spice to an already politically volatile state, Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell announced on the Jim Engster Show on Thursday that he will be a candidate for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Sen. David Vitter. http://www.jimengster.com/

Campbell, an outspoken PSC member and a former state senator, is the second Democrat to enter the already crowded field of senatorial hopefuls. So far, U.S. Reps. Charles Boustany, Jr. of the state’s 3rd Congressional District and John Fleming of the 4th District, State Treasurer John Kennedy and U.S. Air Force veteran Rob Maness, all Republicans, a second Democrat, New Orleans attorney Caroline Fayard, and, of course, the former director of Louisiana Alcohol and Tobacco Control, the inimitable Troy Hebert, an Independent.

A debate between all the candidates could be reminiscent of the early debates between the 17 original candidates for the Republican president nomination—but without the charm, sparkle and depth of Ted Cruz and Donald Trump, a lot less fun.

Maness was an unsuccessful candidate for the U.S. Senate seat won by Bill Cassidy in 2014 and Fayard was defeated in a special election for lieutenant governor in 2010 by Jay Dardenne.

Campbell, something of a throwback to the populist candidates of another era, is outspoken on issues, particularly with utility companies and the oil and gas industry, and while in the State Senate, he crossed party lines to lend strong support to then-Gov. Dave Treen’s proposed Coastal Wetlands Environmental Levy (CWEL), a $450 million tax on petroleum and natural gas. Campbell today says had CWEL passed, the state would not be in the financial bind in which it now finds itself. But strong opposition by LABI and the oil and gas lobby defeated the proposal.

In a related but relative minor matter, LouisianaVoice received one of those “independent political polls” that was so obviously commissioned by Rep. Fleming that it may as well have been conducted by the good congressman himself.

The questions were prefaced by glowing stories of Fleming’s humble background and how he pulled himself by the bootstraps to not only become a doctor but to establish “numerous businesses,” one of which just happened to be a payday loan company that preys on low-income citizens, hooking them for exorbitant interest rates.

At the same time, the pollster, a woman, set up other questions about the other candidates with disparaging background stories on Boustany, Fayard and Kennedy (Maness was omitted, possibly in deference to his military service) that stopped just short of labeling them as subversives. Also omitted from the verbal flogging was Campbell, obviously only because he was not a declared candidate at the time Fleming wrote the questions for the poll.

Louisiana’s credit rating was not changed by Fitch and Standard & Poor’s, the other two major financial rating agencies.

But Moody’s move, dropping the state from Aa2 to Aa3 leaves Louisiana with better credit ratings than just two other states, New Jersey and Illinois. The downgrade will be applied to the state’s general obligation bonds and gas and fuel tax bonds. That means in turn that when the state issues bonds to finance construction projects such as roads and public buildings, it will have to pay higher interest rates on the borrowed money.

The move came as a surprise as most observers, including Kennedy, though Moody’s would wait until the Legislature completed the current special session, which is scheduled to end March 9.

Kennedy used the downgrade to take shots at both Bobby Jindal and Gov. Edwards. “You can’t spend more taxpayer money than you take in for seven years in a row and not expect a downgrade to your credit rating,” Kennedy said. “You also can’t make public statements about suspending TOPS, ending LSU football, closing Nicholls State University and closing five prisons without scaring the daylights out of the credit rating agencies that grade our debt and the institutional investors that buy our debt. What we tell our children is true: Acts have consequences.” http://theadvocate.com/news/14993547-79/moodys-downgrades-louisianas-credit-rating#comments

Edwards, meanwhile, blamed the downgrade on the seven years of patchwork budgeting by the Jindal administration, calling it “a disappointing development, particularly since we believed that Moody’s would wait until the conclusion of the special session to make any decision on our rating. Unfortunately, the downgrade confirms what we’ve been saying about the structural imbalance of our budget. The overuse and abuses of one-time money and fund sweeps by the Jindal Administration were a major factor in this decision.”

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To show we can accentuate the positive, LouisianaVoice is launching its first-ever election for LA’s ‘Beacon of Light’

Posted in BESE, Boards, Budget, DOA, Elections, Ethics, Governor's Office, Higher Education, Lawsuits, Legislature, Legislators, LSU, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, PACs, Politicians, State Agencies, Teague, Vitter on December 12, 2015| 48 Comments »

Just as there are many deserving nominees for Boob of the Year, so are there those who deserve to be recognized for their work to bring the actions of those boobs to public light. Their efforts have helped to expose corruption in lieu of an ineffective State Ethics Board that Jindal gutted as his first action upon becoming governor.

And for those who think we’re too negative, here is our chance to put some positive spin on state politics. Unlike our Boob of the Year nominees, few of our nominees for the John Copes Beacon of Light award are public officials, though it would be unfair to say that no elected official is worthy.

Copes, a Louisiana Tech graduate, was one of the very first political bloggers in Louisiana, launching his website The Deduct Box in 1999. A resident of Mandeville, he died in October of 2006 at a time when his blog was getting about 10,000 hits per day.

Because any such list is subjective, some deserving candidates will be left out by oversight as occurred with our Boob of the Year nominees. Accordingly, you are free to make your own nominations.

So, with that in mind, here we go:

  • Former State Sen. Butch Gautreaux: All he did was to bust a gut in trying to save the Office of Group Benefits from certain corruption and mismanagement. He failed, of course, because Bobby Jindal wanted to privatize the agency and indirectly raid OGB’s reserve fund. Now the fund has been depleted, premiums have risen and benefits have been cut and Sen. Gautreaux has been proven correct.
  • State Sen. Dan Claitor: Claitor filed a lawsuit to nullify the illegal retirement increase of some $50,000 for State Police Superintendent Mike Edmonson. He won that suit and then filed a bill to make certain there were no more backdoor deals for Edmonson. He also objected to the administration’s less than ethical ruse to delay payment of Medicaid claims by two months, thus kicking the final two months’ problems into the next fiscal year—long after Jindal and his fraudulent cohorts will be gone. Sadly, Claitor’s objections to the move were ignored by the administration—and his fellow legislators who once again, allowed Jindal to have his way with them.
  • Lame duck BESE members Carolyn Hill and Lottie Beebe: Both stood up to State Superintendent of Education John White and both paid the price. Out of state money poured in for their opponents and both Hill and Beebe were defeated for re-election.
  • John Bel Edwards: It may be too early to call him a Beacon of Light. That will depend on what he does as governor. But he did fight Bobby Jindal for eight years and overcame mind boggling odds against a Democrat with little name recognition outside Tangipahoa Parish upsetting powerful (as in $10 million worth of power) U.S. Sen. David Vitter. While Jindal held onto his congressional salary right up to the time he took the oath as governor, Edwards has resigned from the Louisiana Legislature.
  • Tommy and Melody Teague: She was fired from her job (but won it back on appeal) for daring to testify before Jindal’s governmental streamlining committee; he for the audacity of taking over an agency (OGB) with a deficit of some $200 million and take it to a surplus of $500 million and then not falling all over himself to support Jindal’s proposed privatization of OGB. Jindal prevailed of course, and the surplus (reserve fund) was depleted, premiums increased, benefits reduced and many retirees now living out of state have lost their medical benefits altogether. At least Tommy Teague saw the danger way before the smartest man in the room.
  • Murphy Painter: As director of the Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control (ATC), he refused to allow FOB (friends of Bobby) short circuit the regulations for an alcohol permit for Champion’s Square across from the Superdome. For insisting that the applicant comply with ATC regulations, he was fired and indicted on made up criminal charges. Rather than bene over and grease up, he fought back, was acquitted at trial and stuck the state with his legal bills of nearly $300,000.
  • Whistleblower Jeff Mercer: The Mangham, Louisiana contractor was harassed, coerced and intimidated when he refused to comply with a DOTD inspector’s demand that he give the inspector money and/or equipment (a generator). When he complained about the extortion attempt, more pressure was applied in the form of harsh inspections, delayed and denied payments for work performed. He went bankrupt as a result of the DOTD actions but determined to fight back, he sued and won a $20 million judgment from the state. A pity since the governor’s office was made aware of the inspector’s actions but chose to do nothing to avert the eventual courtroom battle.
  • Whistleblower Dan Collins: The Baton Rouge professional landman complained about things he observed in the Atchafalaya Basin Program and promptly got frozen out of future state contracts. Undaunted, he and his one attorney went up against the Department of Natural Resources and its four corporate attorneys and on Friday (Dec. 11, 2015) won treble damages totaling $750,000—all after complaints to the governor’s office had been ignored, leaving us with the unavoidable conclusion that the Jindalites would rather pay hefty lawsuit judgments than correct obvious problems early on. To paraphrase the title of Hilary Clinton’s book, sometimes It Takes a Pissed off Citizen….
  • Lamar White: This Alexandria native, along with Bob Mann, has been a persistent thorn in the side of our absentee governor, a couple of congressmen, and anyone else he sees tampering with governmental ethics. But more than merely badgering, Lamar thoroughly documents everything he writes. If any official has anything to hide, he will be outed by Lamar. He is the one who dug up the story about U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise’s close connections to David Duke. That story, said Baton Rouge Advocate reporter Billy Gunn, “exemplifies the power of the pen and its ability to challenge the mighty.” High praise for someone another blogger once ridiculed for his cerebral palsy affliction which makes it difficult for him to walk. “But there’s nothing wrong with his mind,” Gunn said. “He writes on subjects ranging from the rights of the disabled to racial inequity.” Walter Pierce, editor of the Lafayette news site The Ind.com, said, “He has a sort of selfless bravery.”
  • Bob Mann: Journalist/author/political historian Bob Mann holds the Manship Chair in journalism at LSU and has unflinchingly taken on the powers that be, including his bosses on the LSU Board of Supervisors. Mann, who writes a column for Nola.com and Salon.com, has become such an irritant that one LSU Board member, Rolfe McCollister, has even advocated Mann’s firing for his saying that the LSU Board was more loyal to Jindal than to the students at LSU. This is the same Rolfe McCollister, by the way, who publishes the Baton Rouge Business Report. So much for his defense of the First Amendment. McCollister quoted a “former seasoned journalist” as saying “Every good journalist knows that you cannot ethically cover the institution that pays your salary and the people who supervise the work you do for that salary.” So much for his defense of the First Amendment. But Rolfe, how about “ethically” serving higher education that your boss has tried to starve to death with repeated budgetary cuts that resulted in higher and higher tuition for students? How is that you’re able to “ethically” look out for the interests of students and faculty of LSU while giving $17,000 to Jindal’s campaign, serving as treasurer of his campaign, and treasurer of Believe Again, the Super PAC created to promote Jindal’s presidential campaign. I guess the question really comes down to who has the higher ethical standard, you or Bob Mann. We go with the Mann. Every time.
  • C.B. Forgotston: What can we say about this former legal counsel for the Louisiana House? C.B. has a political blog but he doesn’t post often. And when he does post, the dispatches are usually short. But what he lacks in verbiage, he more than makes up with impact. He is terse, to the point, and quite often vicious in his critique of anyone he sees in office who he believes is wasting time or state dollars. Most people who know him would rather be on the receiving end of volumes of criticism from Jindal and his minions than a single sentence of disapproval from C.B.
  • Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne: for having the courage to cross party lines and endorse Democrat John Bel Edwards over Diaper Boy Dave Vitter. Dardenne took a lot of heat for that but who could blame him after Vitter’s carpet bombing of him and fellow Republican Scott Angelle in the first primary? Some will say his appointment as incoming Commissioner of Administration was the payoff. Perhaps so, but if anyone can come up with a better person for the job, we’re listening.
  • State Treasurer John Kennedy: His ill-advised endorsement of Vitter aside, Kennedy has been tenacious in his guarding of the state treasury, taking on Jindal and Commissioner of Administration Kristy Kreme Nichols time after time when they tried to play funny with the money. He would have easily walked in as Attorney General after the first primary had he chosen to run for that seat, which we encouraged him to do. Instead, he has chosen to remain as Treasurer—at least for the time being. Remember there is Vitter’s U.S. Senate seat that opens up next year and Kennedy would like that job. Whatever his motives for endorsing Vitter (many speculate had Vitter won, he would have appointed Kennedy to fill the remaining year, thus giving him the advantage of incumbency), no one can deny that he has been a splendid foil for the Jindalites for eight years.
  • Louisiana Trooper Underground: This unknown author or authors undoubtedly has/have reliable links deep within the upper echelons of the Louisiana State Police command in Baton Rouge. A relatively new entry into social media, this a Facebook page that posts the latest developments in the unfolding saga involving various troop commands and LSP headquarters itself.
  • Finally, all the others who have been Teagued: Tommy and Melody were the inspiration for the term but they are in good company with a long list of those who attempted to do the right thing and were either fired or demoted by a vengeful Jindal. Despite the obvious reprisals that lay ahead, each of them stood up for what was right and paid the price. They’re the silent heroes.

There are our nominees. You are free to write in your own favorite’s name. It is our sincere hope that the response to this will be as gratifying as that of the Boob of the Year.

Go.

Vote.

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LouisianaVoice holding first ever ‘Boob of the Year’ contest

Posted in Attorney General, Boards, Broadband, Internet, Budget, Campaign Contributions, Charters, Contract, Contracts, Corruption, Courts, DOA, Education, Ethics, Governor's Office, Grant, Grants, Health Care, Higher Education, Lawsuits, Legislature, Legislators, Office of Group Benefits, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, PACs, Politicians, Privatization, Retirement, State Police, Taxes, Vitter, Vouchers on December 11, 2015| 61 Comments »

As we face the end of eight years of ineptitude, deceit, and whoopee cushion governance, LouisianaVoice is proud to announce our first ever election of John Martin Hays Memorial Boob of the Year.

There are no prizes, just a poll of our readership as to whom the honor should go in our debut survey.

Hays was publisher of a weekly publication called appropriately enough, the Morning Paper in Ruston until his death last year. He relished nothing more than feasting on the carcasses of bloated egos. He single-handedly exposed a major Ponzi scheme in North Louisiana, sending the operator to prison. That got him some major ink in the Atlanta Constitution and the New York Times.

The problem of course, is trying to narrow the field to make the final selection manageable.

The obvious choice for most would be Bobby Jindal, but there are so many other deserving candidates that we caution readers not to make hasty decisions. After all, we wouldn’t want to slight anyone who has worked so hard for the honor.

So, without further ado, here are the nominees, along with a brief synopsis of their accomplishments.

  • Bobby Jindal: Mismanaged the state budget for an unprecedented eight consecutive years. At least there’s something to be said for consistency. In his eight-year reign of error (mostly spent in states other than Louisiana) he managed to cut higher education more than any other state; he robbed public education to reward for-profit charter schools and virtual schools; he gave away the state’s Charity Hospital system (he awarded a contract to the new operators—a contract with 50 blank pages which is now the subject of what is expected to be a prolonged legal battle; he appointed political donors to prestigious boards and commissions, including the LSU Board of Supervisors which, under his direction, fired two distinguished doctors, the school’s president and its legal counsel; He trumped up bogus charges against the director of the State Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control (ATC) to appease mega-donor Tom Benson and to appoint the husband of his children’s pediatrician to head up the agency; he forced state offices to pay higher rent in order to again accommodate Benson by signing a costly lease agreement with Benson Towers; rather than consider alternative ideas, he simply fired, or teagued, anyone who disagreed with him on any point; he refused Medicaid expansion, thus depriving anywhere from 250,000 to 400,000 low-income citizens needed medical care; he tried unsuccessfully to ram through pension reform that would have been devastating to state employees; he insisted on handing out contract after contract to attorney Jimmy Faircloth who is still searching for his first courtroom victory after receiving well more than $1 million in legal fees; he spurned a major federal grant that would have brought high-speed broadband internet to Louisiana’s rural parishes; he stole $4 million from the developmentally disadvantaged citizens so he could give it to the owner of a $75 million Indianapolis-type race track—a family member of another major donor and one of the richest families in the state; he abandoned his duties as governor to seek the Republican presidential nomination, a quest recognized by everyone but him as a fantasy; he ran up millions of dollars in costs of State Police security in such out-of-state locations as Iowa, New Hampshire, Ohio, and South Carolina; he had the State Police helicopter give rides to his children, and the list goes on.
  • Attorney General Buddy Caldwell: All he did was completely botch the entire CNSI contract mess which today languishes in state district court in Baton Rouge; He consistently turned a blind eye to corruption and violations of various state laws while ringing up what he thought was an impressive record of going after consumer fraud (Hey, Buddy, those credit care scam artists are still calling my phone multiple times a day!); and his concession speech on election night was one for the books—a total and unconditional embarrassment of monumental proportions.
  • Kristy Nichols: What can we say? This is the commissioner of administration who managed to delay complying to our legal public records request for three entire months but managed to comply to an identical request by a friendly legislator within 10 days; We sued her and won and she has chosen to spend more state money (your dollars, by the way) in appealing a meager $800 (plus court costs and legal fees) judgment in our favor; it was her office that came down hard on good and decent employees of the State Land Office who she thought were leaking information to LouisianaVoice (they weren’t); she first reduced premiums for state employee health coverage in order to free up money to help plug a state budget deficit all the while whittling away at a $500 million reserve fund to practically nothing which in turn produced draconian premium increases and coverage cuts for employees and retirees (and during legislative hearings on the fiasco, she ducked out to take her daughter to a boy-band concert in New Orleans where she was allowed to occupy the governor’s private Superdome suite.
  • Troy Hebert: appointed by Jindal to head up ATC which quickly turned in a mass exodus of qualified, dedicated agents; he used state funds to purchase a synthetic drug sniffing dog (hint: there is no such thing as a synthetic drug sniffing dog because synthetic ingredients constantly change; this was just another dog, albeit an expensive one); he launched a racist campaign to rid his agency of black agents; while still a legislator, he was a partner in a firm that negotiated contracts with the state for hurricane debris cleanup.
  • Mike Edmonson: Oh, where do we start? Well, of course there is that retirement pay increase bill amendment back in 2014; there is the complete breakdown of morale, particularly in Troop D; then, there was the promotion of Tommy Lewis to Troop F Commander three years after he sneaked an underage woman into a casino in Vicksburg (he was subsequently fined $600 by the Mississippi Gaming Commission but only after first identifying himself as the executive officer of Troop F and asking if something “could be worked out.”); allowing Deputy Undersecretary Jill Boudreaux to take advantage of a lucrative buyout incentive for early retirement (which, in her case, came to $46,000, plus another $13,000 of unused annual leave) only to retire for one day and return the next—at a promotion to Undersecretary. She was subsequently ordered to repay the $56,000 but thanks to friends in high places, the money has never been repaid (maybe incoming Commissioner of Administration Jay Dardenne would like to revisit that matter); consistent inconsistency in administering discipline to officers who stray—such as attempting unsuccessfully to fire one trooper for assaulting a suspect (even though the suspect never made such a claim) while doing practically nothing to another state trooper who twice had sex with a woman while on duty—once in the back seat of his patrol car.
  • David Vitter: what can we say? The odds-on favorite to walk into the governor’s office, he blew $10 million—and the election. His dalliance with prostitutes, his amateurish spying on a John Bel Edwards supporter, an auto accident with a campaign worker who also headed up the Super PAC that first savaged his Republican opponents in the primary, turning Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne and Public Service Commissioner Scott Angelle irreversibly against him and driving their supporters to Edwards’s camp. In short, he could write the manual on blowing an election.
  • The entire State Legislature: for passing that idiotic (and most likely illegal) budget on the last day of the session but only after Grover Norquist was consulted about the acceptability of a little tax deception; for allowing Jindal to run roughshod over them on such matters as education reform, hospital privatization, pension reform and financing recurring expenses with one-time money; for being generally spineless in all matters legislative and deferring to an absentee governor with a personal agenda.

Those are our nominees but only after some serious paring down the list.

Go to our comments section to cast your vote in 25 words or less. The deadline is Friday, Dec. 18.

As much as you might like, you are allowed to vote only once.

 

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Duck Dynasty political kingmakers demanded kings’ ransom for personal appearance at St. Charles Parish Catfish Festival

Posted in Exemptions, Incentives, Finances, Governor's Office, Higher Education, Politicians, Taxes, Vitter on November 26, 2015| 12 Comments »

Those Duck Dynasty folks up in West Monroe are riding their gravy train for all it’s worth, scoring a $415,000 tax break every time one of their sappy episodes airs, lavishing the kiss of death (disguised as endorsements) on unsuspecting politicians hoping to capitalize off their name, bashing anyone who happens to think or act differently, licensing merchandise, and demanding exorbitant fees for personal appearances.

Take Vance McAllister, the notorious kissing congressman endorsed by the Duck Dynasty’s Robertson family in his initial run against State Sen. Neil Riser. He won that race but was out a year later, disgraced by that grainy video of him swapping chewing gum with a female staffer who happened not to be his wife.

Then there was the entire Robertson family making nice with Bobby Jindal during the latter’s disastrous term as part-time governor and presidential nominee wannabe.

More recently, Willie Robertson made that painful but hilarious video with U.S. Sen. Dave Vitter in which Robertson tried to convince us (a) that the two had been traipsing about in the woods together (Vitter was in a camo top but was also wearing pressed slacks and a dress belt—not really conducive to stalking wildlife but apparently suitable for a cheesy video) and (b) to be sure and vote for Vitter who Willie said had made mistakes “but who hasn’t?”

McAllister first lost his re-election bid for a full term in Congress last year and this year lost in his attempt to unseat State Sen. Mike Walsworth in the Oct. 24 primary election. Meanwhile,  Jindal and Vitter last week tanked just days apart, underscoring the value of a Duck Dynasty endorsement.

By my count, that puts the Duck commanders at 0-3, which pretty much tracks Phil Robertson’s career as the Louisiana Tech quarterback back in the late ‘60s. I know. I was sports editor of the Ruston Daily Leader at the time and had the unenviable task of trying to write something positive about that Shreveport Thanksgiving Day game in 1966 when Phil completed more passes to Southern Mississippi defensive backs than to Tech receivers.

But now it’s been learned—if it wasn’t known already—that the Duck boys are mercenary money grubbers on top of everything else.

Recently, I accompanied my grandson to Louisiana Tech to tour the campus where he intends to enroll next year. We were paired with a couple from St. Charles Parish whose daughter also plans on joining the computer engineering program there. Her dad and I struck up a conversation during the tour and the talk soon turned to sports and politics as it generally does with men. An executive in the offshore oil industry, he made it clear he was a fan of neither Jindal nor Vitter.

When I mentioned the common affiliation the two had with the Robertsons, he grunted and related a story about how he was charged with obtaining a celebrity guest for the St. Charles Parish Catfish Festival a couple of years ago.

With the Robertsons riding the crest of their popularity, the choice was a natural one. He called them to obtain the particulars of booking one or more Robertson family members for the event.

“They wanted $100,000 as their fee, plus luxury hotel accommodations and luxury transportation to the Monroe airport and from Louis Armstrong Airport in New Orleans to the festival,” he said, adding, “We don’t even have a luxury hotel in St. Charles.”

I opined that the fee they were demanding told me one of two things: They are either full of themselves or they just didn’t want to participate.

“I think they were full of themselves,” he replied, “but if they didn’t want to do it, they sure got their way. I fell out with Phil Robertson right then and there.”

Apparently a tax break of up to $415,000 per show even as state colleges took repeated budget cuts just isn’t enough. http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-05-04/-duck-dynasty-keeps-tax-break-as-jindal-cuts-louisiana-colleges

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Dumbing down the governor’s election David Vitter and Duck Dynasty style; will Jindal divorce the Robertsons?

Posted in Governor's Office, Vitter on November 12, 2015| 18 Comments »

Lying, Spying, extorting the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in exchange for campaign contributions (see story below), frequenting prostitutes, suborning perjury, blurring the lines between campaign and Super PAC….

It’s all there and just when you think the David Vitter campaign can’t get any weirder, it does. It always does.

Just when you think nothing else can happen with Vitter’s campaign to make you roll your eyes and mutter, “OMG,” something does. It always does.

Simply put, the Vitter campaign is like a recurring bad dream; it just won’t go away. It won’t. It just won’t. It never does.

And now we’re treated to one of the most bizarre events of the campaign, one that conjures up images of that laughable online video of Bobby Jindal breaking the news of his presidential quest to his children or which Bob Mann is reminded of: that photo of Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis posing in the Abrams tank during his ill-fated 1988 presidential campaign against eventual winner George Bush the First.

DUKAKIS(CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE)

Online Politico Magazine described him as the “diminutive Massachusetts governor pretending to be something he wasn’t and, in the process, making a fool of himself…”

Fast forward to November of 2015 and take a look at our “awkwardly goofy senior senator pretending to be something he isn’t and, in the process, making a fool of himself.”

http://www.davidvitter.com/david_and_willie?utm_campaign=duck2&utm_medium=email&utm_source=davidvitterd

Even though David Vitter is so easy to loathe, this 30-second video should make you cringe in pained embarrassment or break up in hysterics—perhaps both…at the same time.

Willie Robertson of Duck Dynasty fame has endorsed Vitter, putting Robertson right up there with the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry and Vitter right down there with Dukakis.

It’s enough of a stretch to observe Vitter in camo standing next to Willie as the latter first tries to convince us that “David and I have been out in the woods today” and then explains that “I know he’s made some mistakes but who hasn’t?”

One mistake that Robertson and Vitter apparently overlooked was Robertson’s unconvincing claim that they had been “out in the woods.” Why, one must ask after viewing the video, would Vitter wear a freshly pressed cammo shirt, Docker slacks and a dress belt? Perhaps he wanted to cause the ducks to laugh themselves to death.

And if you watch Vitter closely at the 10-second point of the video, you will notice his head wobbling up and down like a bobble head doll. Considering he’s in the company of a member of the Duck Dynasty, it’s interesting that he looks less like a duck than the turkey that he is.

Not only was the 30-second spot humiliating, but it also raises a burning question: now that the Duckers have embraced Vitter, will Jindal, long the darling of the Duck Commanders, now seek a divorce? Jindal, after all, hates Vitter who has to be considered the political equivalent of “the other woman” in Jindal’s eyes—which, all things considered, makes this infidelity metaphor drip with irony.

Eight days to go, folks. Any predictions on what new voyeuristic surprises may be in store for us between now and election day?

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