Louisiana Voice

“The political Witch Hunt by the Radical Left Democrats, with New York now taking over the assignment, continues. It is dividing our Country like never before!”

—The former guy, responding in (yawn) the same old tired way to indictments handed down against his company this week.

“He’s a decrepit, sick, vile old man. I hope he burns in the hottest place in hell.”

—Janice Baker-Kinney, a Bill Cosby accuser who says he raped her in 1982.

“The act of throwing tortillas at a predominately Latino team is unacceptable and warrants sanctions.”

—California Interscholastic Federation news release in announcing that a high school basketball team was being stripped of its regional title after members of the mostly white team threw tortillas at a predominantly Latino opposing team following their game two weeks ago. (Just an extension of the Stephen Miller mentality, folks, and what of the coach who allowed this kind of behavior to take place?)

“Bill Cosby’s release is exactly why rape survivors don’t come forward.”

—Moira Donegan, writing for The Guardian.

“These joint projects of church and state were hotspots for child abuse and sexual assault carried out by priests and school administrators, most of whom have escaped justice for their crimes. Canada was built on genocide.”

—Mumilaaq Qaqqaq, member of Canadian Parliament, reflecting on the genocide of the Inuit of Nunavut Territory, as Canada Day is observed. (So soon after the graves of more than 700 Cowessess First Nation children were discovered at a Catholic Church-run school site.

“The governor told everybody to go fly a kite and see you in the veto session. I think it is probably already going to happen.”

—Repugnantcan House Speaker Pro-Tem Tanner Magee of Houma, on the likelihood of Louisiana’s first veto override session. (And of course, one of the key issues would be for the right of every John Wayne wannabe to be able to pack heat without proper training requirements to obtain a concealed handgun permit. Just what we need: more weapons on the street when Baton Rouge already has one of the highest homicide rates in the country.)

Whether you support Donald Trump or hate him, please watch this 40- minute documentary produced by The New York Times. Please watch it all the way through to the end:

Day of Rage: An In-Depth Look at How a Mob Stormed the Capitol – The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Your personal opinion of Trump or The New York Times is inconsequential.

Set aside your personal feelings about illegal immigration, abortion, foreign relations, jobs and the environment and concentrate on the scene that unfolds in this video.

What matters is that you take a candid, objective look at this presentation, absorb the visual content, try to comprehend the mentality of the participants and then ask yourself the following questions:

• Do you agree with Rep. Andrew Clyde who equated the events of Jan. 6 to a “normal tour visit”?
• Do you agree with Sen. Ron Johnson who said he never felt threatened during this event?
• Do you really think this was no more serious than the Black Lives Matter demonstrations in Portland?
• Do you actually believe that these people were patriots trying to save democracy?
• Do you believe in your heart of hearts that Donald Trump’s rhetoric did not contribute to this event?
• Do you believe this is an accurate portrayal of support for police?
• Superimpose yourself into this crowd and ask yourself: “Would I be proud for my grandchildren to see me there?”
• Do you seriously believe that this was a proper way to display love for one’s country?
• Do you subscribe to the position that Donald Trump does not owe the country an apology?

If you answered in the affirmative to even one of these questions, then you are part of the problem.

Period.

“I am deeply troubled that some of our student-athlete parents were subjected to racist slurs during last night’s game. This is absolutely unacceptable and disgraceful behavior, and such hateful language has no place anywhere in our society.”

—Vanderbilt Athletic Director Storey Lee, on the behavior of redneck white trash at the College World Series Monday night. (Vanderbilt was playing Mississippi State, so go figure.)

“You know the system is broken when Republicans only needed 51 votes to cut taxes for the rich, but we need 60 votes to defend the fundamental right to vote.”

—US Sen. Alex Padilla (D-California)

“Trump sent the National Guard to the border, denied them to the nation’s Capitol when it was under attack (by him), and tried to invoke the Insurrection Act to put tanks on the streets against Americans. That’s what coups looks like.”

—Anonymous tweet

The political fallout over the beating death of Ronald Greene at the hands of Louisiana State Police (LSP) continues with the reassignment of the state’s top law enforcement agency’s legal counsel, as reported last week by Baton Rouge TV station WBRZ’s investigative reporter Chris Nakamoto.

The removal of FAYE MORRISON from her appointive unclassified position to that of a classified civil servant follows a shakeup in Troop F in Monroe where Greene was tased, dragged and beaten in May 2019 was the latest attempt by the LSP high command at mitigating legal liability in his death. To date, three troopers have been FIRED and two resignations at the command level have taken place pursuant to Greene’s death with one of the three fired troopers DYING of an apparent suicide in the days following his termination. The problem with that termination last September was that it did not take place until last September – 16 months after Greene was killed.

Kevin Reeves, who was LSP superintendent at the time of Greene’s death, RETIRED  on Oct. 1 just as the long-delayed investigation of Greene’s death was heating up and his second in command, Chief of Staff Col. MIKE NOEL, also chose retirement rather than subject himself to expected intense questioning in his confirmation hearing as Gov. John Bel Edwards’ appointee as chairman of the Louisiana Gaming Control Board.

But Morrison’s demotion is of particular interest. Like the attempt by Bobby Jindal to make former director of the Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control MURPHY PAINTER a scapegoat years earlier, these types of events rarely occur in a vacuum. There’s always a back story.

Morrison may have given legal advice but ultimately, she took her orders from the LSP brass and those top two administrators (Reeves and Noel) are already gone, leaving only one outside of Troop F – or perhaps more appropriately, F-Troop – who may have known the details of the attempted cover-up in Greene’s death.

Rather than termination, Morrison was given something of a soft landing – if a 36.5 percent pay cut can be considered soft. An Attorney 3 classified employee from August 2010 until July 2017, when she was promoted to the unclassified appointive position of Assistant Secretary, she went from making $93,500 a year to $150,000 before getting a salary bump to $156,000 last July. With her reassignment back to Attorney 3, her pay was slashed to $99,000.

If her performance as the LSP legal counsel was so abysmal, why not fire her like the three troopers involved or force her into retirement a-la Reeves and Noel?

Without appearing too conspiratorial, it could just be that she knows too much about the machinations of the attempted spin control over Greene’s death and the beating and tasing of ANTONIO HARRIS, another African American man by some of the same F-Troopers a year after Greene’s death.

Of course, certain information would be protected under attorney-client privilege but there could well be other information outside that protective realm that Morrison is aware of that LSP would be embarrassed over or perhaps even find itself exposed to further legal liability should it be revealed.

As Lyndon Johnson once said in explaining why he wouldn’t fire FBI director J. Edgar Hoover: “It’s probably better to have him inside the tent pissing out, than outside the tent pissing in.”