Louisiana Voice

It was barely mentioned in passing, but House Speaker Mike Johnson, our very own congressman from Louisiana’s House District 4, played a significant role in that infamous August 26 visit to ARLINGTON NATONAL CEMETERY by Cadet Bone Spurs, aka Mrs. Putin.

That’s the one where Trump staffers roughed up a U.S. Army representative who attempted to enforce a longstanding rule against photography in Section 60 of the cemetery.

Well, it turns out that family members of servicemen buried there had experienced some degree of difficulty in arranging for FAUXTUS to visit the cemetery, according to U.S. Rep. Mike McCaul (R-Texas), who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Committee. A spokesperson for McCaul said the families had reached out to McCaul because the cemetery had been giving them “a hard time” about coordinating the ceremony with Spanky McLiarface.

The families claimed that the Army would only allow specific times which did not work into everyone’s schedule.

So naturally, McCaul reached out to the Speaker of the House and Johnson obligingly greased the skids to accommodate everyone, the rules be damned.

But it wasn’t the first time Johnson had stuck his neck out in order to curry favor with Agent Orange.

New York Magazine last March published 27 NOT-FUN FACTS ABOUT SPEAKER MIKE JOHNSON. Some of those included the following:

• He masterminded Frump’s election coup;
• He worked for the conservative legal group behind the case that ended Roe v. Wade;
• He wants to ban abortion nationwide and to sentence abortion providers to hard labor;
• In a real stretch, he managed to blame abortion for school shootings, and for Social Security and Medicare cuts;
• He also managed to blame mass shootings on the teaching of evolution;
• He not only subscribes to the creationist theory that the earth is only 6,000 years old, but fought successfully to have the state of Kentucky pony up $18 million to help underwrite construction of the Ark Encounter theme park;
• He fought to ban same-sex marriage in Louisiana, led an anti-gay campus movement, authored several homophobic op-eds, introduced a national version of Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill and that Rome fell in part because it was too gay;
• He once provided legal counsel to Exodus International, which offered counseling services to help young people “convert” from gay to straight;
• Citing queer youth and a lack of church attendance, he described America as “depraved and dark,” and once wrote the foreword to a book filled with homophobic insults – like any compassionate Christian;
• He advocated “covenant marriage,” making it more difficult to obtain a divorce;
• He was appointed dean of the Judge Paul Pressler School of Law at Louisiana College in Pineville, saying at the time that it couldn’t fail. It failed. Not a single class was ever held.
• There is no evidence he has a banking account (though, in fairness, his financial affairs could be conducted through a brokerage with home he may have some type of arrangement);
• He blamed post-Katrina looting on America’s turning away from God;
• He supported the display of the Ten Commandments in public buildings in defiance of the separation of church and state doctrine;
• He subscribes to Covenant Eyes, a brand of “accountability software” that monitors “inappropriate” computer use, like porn, raising the question of why he feels that is necessary.

Back to that foreword he wrote for Scott McKay’s book, The Revivalist Manifesto, in which Johnson wrote that the book managed “to articulate well what millions of conscientious, freedom-loving Americans are sensing.”

Really?

Let’s take a look at a couple of McKay’s more bizarre articulations:

• Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts was part of Jefrey Epstein’s sex trafficking ring;
• That the PIZZAGATE and SETH RICH conspiracies are true at least in part, despite both having been proven to be totally bogus;

“I obviously believe in the product (McKay’s book), or I wouldn’t have written the foreword, so I endorse the work,” Johnson said.

Ooookaaaay…

Meanwhile, H.R. 2955, the Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act, has been introduced in the House by U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-California). The bill calls for an end to the warehousing and the often accompanying sexual, mental and physical ABUSE OF CHILDREN in residential homes, many of which are run by church-affiliated organizations.

What’s unique about the bill is that it has 113 CO-SPONSORS, including representatives from both Democratic (64) and Republican (49) sides of the aisle.

For whatever reason, only two of Louisiana’s six representatives, Republican Julia Letlow and Democrat Troy Carter have seen the necessity of signing on as co-sponsors.

Where are Clay Higgins, Steve Scalise, Garret Graves and, most of all, that paragon of virtue and family values, Mike Johnson?

So, now Jeff Landry wants Mike the Tiger present at LSU home football games.

It’s good to know he’s so concerned about monumental issues such as having a mascot attend a football game.

• Never mind the fact that Louisiana’s violent crime rate is 65 percent higher than the national average.

Jeff Landry is insistent that LSU athletic teams be present on the sidelines or courtside for the playing of the National Anthem before games.

• Never mind that Louisiana’s preventable hospital admissions are 27 percent higher than the national average and that 40 percent of our population is considered obese.

Jeff Landry is so concerned about education that he issued an executive order banning all critical race theory (CRT) from public schools – neglecting for the moment that it isn’t even taught, never was taught, below the college graduate level.

• Never mind the fact that Louisiana ranks 48^th in education or that at one time New Orleans had the biggest slave market in the U.S.

Jeff Landry pushed for – and got – a law making the posting of the Ten Commandments mandatory in all public-school classrooms.

• Never mind the fact that Landry could not see the need to feed hungry school children when he can feed them scripture.

Jeff Landry wanted – and got – elimination of a requirement that certain employment requirements be met before a corporate entity could qualify for generous tax exemptions.

• Never mind the fact that Louisiana factories release more than three times (3,134 pounds) the amount of industrial toxins per square mile compared to the national average (937 pounds).

Jeff Landry insisted on – and got – new legislation that made it practically impossible for a wrongfully convicted individual to petition for a new trial.

• Never mind the fact that there are more than 100 persons wrongfully incarcerated for crimes they did not commit who have been exonerated and that state payments and awards from lawsuits by those falsely imprisoned – some for decades – total in the tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars. And never mind that Louisiana has the highest incarceration rate in the civilized world.

Jeff Landry, like so many like-minded Republicans, wants to control women’s bodies.

• Never mind the fact that in Louisiana, a 12-year-old who is impregnated by rape by a relative will be forced to carry the pregnancy to term.

Louisiana ranked No. 21 in healthcare access (but not in healthcare itself), thanks largely to the Medicaid expansion with only 10.3% of the population uninsured compared to the national average of 11.3%.

About one in five Louisianians live in poverty.

The WalletHub study ranked Louisiana 50th among states and the District of Columbia as best places for women, ahead of only Oklahoma.

Last spring Louisiana ranked as the worst state in America for working mothers, with moms coming up shortchanged on everything from pay to childcare.

And last year Louisiana 49th for child well-being.

Utah was ranked as the top state. Texas was No. 29 as Louisiana’s highest-ranking contiguous neighbor, while Mississippi ranked No. 48 and Arkansas No. 47.

The U.S. News report ranked Louisiana 50^th in crime/corrections, 49^th in economy, 47^th in education and fiscal stability, 46^th in healthcare, 49^th in infrastructure and natural environment, and 44^th in opportunity.

But Jeff Landry wants Mike the Tiger present and accounted for at LSU football games.

You may recall, those of you with no short-term memory issues (a trait that I’m coming more and more familiar with in up-close personal experience), that yesterday’s LouisianaVoice post questioned the necessity of and the reasons for the secrecy of CONFIDENTIALITY CLAUSES in lawsuit settlements.

That essay came on the heels of one the longest posts in the 13-year history of LouisianaVoice that suggested that attorney-legislators might be abusing a thing called LEGISLATIVE CONTINUANCES which give them carte blanche in delaying legal proceedings virtually indefinitely.

A legal challenge to the practice is being taken up by the Louisiana State Supreme Court as I write this.

But back to those confidentiality clauses. In yesterday’s post, I theorized that the sole purpose of their inclusion in settlements of litigation was to shield defendants from revealing – and plaintiffs from learning – the value of any similar claims that might be lurking out there in the real workaday world in which the rest of us exist.

That begs the question: If you are seeking damages from someone or some corporate entity who has harmed you, why would you want to protect them from further liability if they’ve done the same thing to others? Why would you shield them with a confidentiality agreement – and most likely, also allow them to skate with a “no admission of guilt”?

Well, that post was barely up when I got a call from an attorney friend who is a regular reader of this blog. He shed additional light on the issue that, should it become common knowledge, might make any plaintiff a little skittish about agreeing to any conditions of confidentiality.

Before I go any further, I should offer this additional bit of advice: The defendant’s attorney isn’t about to reveal the peril of such a deal and your own attorney, unless he is diligent in keeping abreast of the latest legal developments, won’t even know about it.

Anyway, as President Biden might say, here’s the deal.

Go to this link to conduct your own research in the federal case of AMOS v. COMMISSIONER, No. 13391-01 | Casetext Search + Citator. It’s scary.

In case you’re too busy to read the entire case, here’s the gist:

Eugene Amos was employed as a TV cameraman and was covering an NBA game between the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Chicago Bulls. During the course of the game, Bulls player Dennis Rodman fell into a group of photojournalists that included Amos and twisted his ankle. He then kicked the photographers, striking Amos in that most tender and vulnerable of spots on a man’s anatomy, causing intense pain (ya think?), leaving him limping (I bet) and probably (and I’m guessing here) singing soprano for a while.

Long story short, Amos sued and Rodman settled. The settlement was for $200,000 but at the time of the settlement (1997) a confidentiality clause was agreed to by Amos whereby terms of the settlement were to be kept confidential forevermore.

Well, forevermore turned out to be a little shorter time than anticipated by either side. Turns out that settlements in personal injury cases are tax-exempt. Confidentiality agreements, on the other hand, are considered payments for one’s silence and thus taxable, according to the IRS.

Here’s the applicable bureaucratic language that applies:

Petitioner concedes the determinations in the notice of deficiency (notice) issued to petitioner with respect to 1997 to disallow $6,755 of deductions claimed by petitioner in Schedule A, Itemized Deductions, and $7,178 of deductions claimed by petitioner in Schedule C, Profit or Loss From Business. There are other determinations in the notice that are computational in that resolution of the issues relating to such determinations flows automatically from our resolution of the issue addressed herein.

Okay, I don’t understand all that gibberish, either but basically, what the IRS said was that it was impossible to determine how much of the $200,000 was for bodily injury and how much was a payment for Amos’s silence. So, typical of IRS thinking, it treated the entire amount as silence-purchasing and taxed Amos accordingly, to the tune of $61,668. And that’s what this case is all about.

But lawyers are waking up to the dangers of confidentiality provisions in legal settlements. Here are a few links from several different attorneys offering words of warning:

Sorrels.pdf (hbtlj.org)

Confidentiality Provisions – Settlement Law Firm – Orlando Attorneys (specialneedsfirm.com)Daily Journal

Avoiding the confidentiality tax bite: the proceeds of your client’s settlement for physical injury are free from income tax, right? Not necessarily, if the settlement contains a confidentiality provision. Enter into such settlements carefully and be aware of potential tax consequences. – Free Online Library (thefreelibrary.com)

Confidentiality: But At What Cost? – Thompson, Coe, Cousins & Irons, LLP (thompsoncoe.com)

Here’s the best one (or at least the best headline):

Amos v. Commissioner: The Ambiguous and Ever-Changing Definition of What Constitutes a Person Physical Injury under Internal Revenue Code Section 104(A)(2) (umt.edu)

Okay, you’ve been told. There’s an old Latin adage that applies here: Praemonitus, praemunitus (translated: Forewarned is forearmed).

Proceed accordingly.

Remember in yesterday’s LOUISIANA VOICE POST, I briefly touched on CONFIDENTIALITY CLAUSES in lawsuit settlements?

Well, while that passing observation was in reference to an entirely separate legal issue, the matter of confidentiality clauses coincidentally surfaced today in a Bloomberg Tax story by writer Michael Bologna (no baloney).

Bloomberg Tax, like its sister service Bloomberg News, has a paywall and I’m not a subscriber so I’m unable to access the full article but essentially it says that the Louisiana Department of Revenue has “confidentially settled” a major tax lawsuit against ConocoPhillips Co. that could have meant a $700 million windfall to the state in the form of back taxes, penalties and interest due the state.

The Revenue Department refused to say if Conoco paid even one red cent in the settlement.

“Could have.” But apparently, we’ll never know because of that confidentiality clause that shields Louisiana’s taxpayers from ever knowing how much the state will receive in funds to meet a looming fiscal cliff that seems to pop up with increasing frequency these days.

Folks, don’tcha think that we, as taxpaying citizens of Louisiana, deserve to know (a) how much the state receives from these lawsuits and (b) how much the state has to pay in litigation costs assessed against it? I mean, after all, it is our money that’s being tossed around here. There should be some accountability, I would think. But hey, that’s just me.

Well, it isn’t just me. Jan Moller, executive director of the non-partisan fiscal policy think tank Invest in Louisiana, had this to say about the settlement:

“The administration should explain to the public why it walked away from a potential $700 million lawsuit. This is money Louisiana desperately needs. If the state is going to ask ordinary citizens to pay taxes, then certainly the wealthiest corporations should also pay what they owe.”

 Steven Procopio, president of the Public Affairs Research Council of Louisiana, added that the department should explain why it withdrew from the lawsuit. “[C]itizens will be left to speculate why potentially $390 million to $700 million was left on the table,” he said.

But hey, it ain’t our first rodeo with this song and dance.

Last December, the state and Cameron Parish agreed to a confidentiality settlement with BP, Hilcorp and Shell in a coastal damage lawsuit potentially worth up to $7 billion in damages to the state. But again, we don’t know the real value because (ahem) that little bit of information remains protected.

A joint motion filed last Dec. 8, (that was on a Friday, the day of the week most often chosen by politicians to ensure the least news coverage as both reporters and readers gear up for the weekend) by attorneys for all litigants – the three oil companies and the parish and state – created individual agreements between each of the companies and the parish and state that resolved all claims outlined in a 2016 coastal damages lawsuit. It said the protective order is needed to shield actions by both parish plaintiffs and oil company defendants in 41 other pending coastal damage lawsuits.

There you have it. The confidentiality of the agreement was need “to shield” actions in other coastal damage litigation.

It just seems to me that the interests of the state and its 4.6 million taxpaying citizens should have taken precedent over the interests of multi-billion-dollar oil and gas conglomerates. But again, that’s just me.

Again, it’s me thinking that the residents of Southwest Louisiana, where this litigation was concentrated, certainly deserved better.

It’s been four years, after all, since the area was visited on August 27, 2020, by HURRICANE LAURA with torrential winds that fell just shy of making her a Category 5 storm, but still the most severe storm to hit the state in a century and the 10^th worst in the U.S. As if that were not enough, six weeks later, Hurricane Delta, a Category 2 but still an ugly storm cut a near-identical swath through the same area hit earlier by Laura.

Recovery, even after four years, remains agonizingly slow. Damaged roofs remain covered by the infamous blue tarps, now frayed from four years’ exposure to the elements. Other houses were simply abandoned, rotting where what’s left of their skeletal remains stand.

I’m pretty sure the area could’ve used some of that potential $7 billion in damages. But again, that’s just me thinking out loud.