Louisiana Voice

Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry is taking the correct action in launching an investigation into who was responsible for the decision to move 843 patients from seven nursing homes into a warehouse in Tangipahoa Parish during Hurricane Ida.

Landry told the Baton Rouge Advocate that his office’s goal was “to determine who decided to move these patients to this apparently unsafe and potentially inappropriate facility.”

That’s all well and good, but he could have a problem that we’ll examine later.

The warehousing of the patients in conditions of squalor from piled-up trash, overflowing toilets and non-working air conditioning has been linked to at least seven deaths. Dozens more were subsequently hospitalized.

While sprinkling his statement with such legally-cautious terms as “apparently,” “potentially” and “inappropriate,” Landry nevertheless indicated a willingness to conduct a real investigation. “We wish to determine who authorized that these patients be moved to that facility, who oversaw the movement, who later turned away career staff members of the Louisiana Department of Health when they attempted to look into this situation,” the AG said.

The patients came from River Palms Nursing and Rehab and Maison Orleans Healthcare Center in Orleans Parish, South Lafourche Nursing and Rehab in Lafourche Parish, Park Place Healthcare Nursing Home, West Jefferson Health Care Center and Maison DeVille Nursing Home in Jefferson Parish, and Maison DeVille Nursing Home in Terrebonne Parish.

All seven facilities are owned by Baton Rouge businessman Bob Dean, as is the warehouse, Waterbury Companies, where the patients were taken.

Dean is listed as an officer, director or manager of more than 100 corporate entities, according to Louisiana Secretary of State corporate records. At least 20 of those are related to the medical field, including at least a dozen nursing homes a hospice facility, a dialysis facility, and rehab and therapy facilities and an assisted living facility.

Since the warehousing debacle, the state has shut down the seven nursing homes involved but has done nothing about the other facilities owned by Dean.

The warehousing incident isn’t Dean’s first rodeo.

In 2009, OSHA FINED Louisiana Health Care Consultants, LLC, Dean Building Holdings and Bob Dean Enterprises, Inc. $112,000 for three willful and 10 serious federal health and safety regulation violations for failure to follow federal standards for asbestos-related projects in the construction industry.

The Baton Rouge Advocate’s Gordon Russell reported on Thursday that state regulators have repeatedly hit his nursing homes for inferior and occasional “shocking conditions,” including one resident drowning and another who was found covered in fire ants.

Even the warehousing incident in the wake of Hurricane Ida wasn’t an isolated case. In 1998, as Hurricane Georges approached, residents of three of his New Orleans-area nursing homes were similarly evacuated to a Baton Rouge warehouse – transported in a bus that lacked air conditioning. Two of the evacuees died either during or immediately following the trek.

In that case, Dean was found to have failed to file required documents with the state Department of Health or with Jefferson Parish officials spelling out his evacuation plan. The warehouse where they were taken, the Lyceum Dean in downtown Baton Rouge was in violation of the fire code, city officials said. The building lacked various safety systems, including a sprinkler system, fire alarms or emergency lights.

Dean received a hand-slap after Baton Rouge EMTs were called out to the building on seven different occasions in response to heat-related health issues for residents. He was fined $1500 for the botched Georges evacuation who said the lack of a disaster plan contributed to the death of an 86-year-old who died of a heart attack during the evacuation.

He appealed even that token fine and a state administrative judge reduced it to $1,000, explaining somewhat incredulously that Dean Enterprises was not responsible for the patient’s death but saying that a plan should have been filed.

In the most recent evacuation, Louisiana Department of Hospitals inspectors were barred from the warehouse when they attempted to conduct an inspection on Aug. 31.

For his part, Dean thinks he did a good job. “We only had five deaths within the six days,” he sniffed. “Normally, with 850 people, you’ll have a couple a day. So, we really did good on taking care of people.”

One LouisianaVoice reader said it seems to him that state oversight of nursing homes is a tad “shady.”

There’s a reason for that. The nursing home industry has long been an untouchable industry as far as the Louisiana Legislature is concerned, and the AG’s office could be part and parcel to that atmosphere.

All one has to do is check the campaign contributions of nursing home owners to see why the legislature (a) beats back efforts each year to fund in-home care of elderly patients (nursing homes are funded by Medicaid/Medicare on the basis of occupied beds – ergo, they must keep the beds occupied to keep the funds flowing and (b) the more money nursing homes make, the more in campaign contributions flow to the legislators who keep the nursing home operators happy, who in turn, keep the legislators happy, who in turn…well, you get the drift.

Dean, for example, has a history of supporting political campaigns with generous contributions:

• John Kennedy and his PAC: $30,000;
• Gov. Mike Foster: $2500;
• Former Attorney General Richard Ieyoub: $20,000;
• Gov. John Bel Edwards: $42,500;
• Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff Daniel Edwards (Gov. Edwards’ brother): $6500

Gov. Edwards received more than $165,000 from all nursing home sources, including those from Dean, over the past decade. Others who received significant contributions from nursing homes included:

• Former Gov. Kathleen Blanco: $33,000;
• Former Gov. Bobby Jindal: $80,600;
• Former Attorney General Charles Foti: $7500;
• Former Attorney General Buddy Caldwell: $28,500;
• Former U.S. Sen. David Vitter: $4,750;
• U.S. Sen. John N. Kennedy: $8,750;
• Louisiana Republican Party: $7,250;
• Louisiana Democratic Party: $52,000;

While I would love nothing better than to list all the legislators who have fed at the nursing home teat, the list I downloaded is simply too voluminous to make such a list practical. But rest assured, it shows that the nursing home industry is a major player in what goes on in that 24-story edifice that stands on the banks of Capitol Lake in Baton Rouge.

And though he received no contributions from Dean or any of his entities, Landry’s investigation could be tainted by the fact that he has been the recipient of more than $12,000 from seven nursing homes in Louisiana and a Mississippi company that operates at least 18 nursing homes in Louisiana – which only serves to reinforce my long-held conviction that no political candidate should be allowed to accept contributions from an industry he might regulate or have occasion to investigate.

Let’s hope that Landry doesn’t stumble over the bags of money from the nursing homes during his investigation.

LouisianaVoice is working at a decided disadvantage in its September fundraiser.

• I don’t have Newt Gingrich or Lindsey Graham prostituting themselves on behalf of our fundraising efforts.
• I don’t have MAGA caps or T-shirts with cute slogans on them to offer donors.
• I can’t give donors false hopes of entering some lottery to meet me at some rally (as if anyone would ever stand in line to meet me, anyway).
• I can’t offer to quadruple the impact of your contribution through some smoke-and-mirrors scam.
• I don’t claim to have won an election that I actually lost by 7 million votes.
• I don’t have some fake plaque to which I can promise to affix your name in exchange for a contribution.
• I don’t even have cheesy “official” cards to give you in exchange for your donation.
• I won’t furtively force your one-time contribution into a monthly donation unbeknownst to you.

But what I can offer is continued coverage of issues that mean something to our readers – issues like the posturing by members of Congress who pretend to want to help with social security benefits but who in reality have to intention of bringing an important resolution to a vote despite having more than enough co-sponsors to move the issue to a vote.

I can keep you abreast of what state agencies such as Louisiana State Police are doing or not doing that affect your lives.

I can work to uncover fraud, malfeasance, and theft in public offices that are supposed to be working on your behalf.

I am currently looking into organized crime connections to a state official and into the manner in which a state agency can inadvertently encourage child trafficking.

These are major projects and they take time and money. Please do what you can to assist LouisianaVoice in its efforts by either clicking on the yellow DONATE button to the right of this post and contributing by credit card or by sending a check to:

LouisianaVoice, P.O. Box 922, Denham Springs, Louisiana 70727.

Your support, no matter how large or how small, is deeply appreciated.

Royal Alexander, writing for The Hayride, recently penned an article in which he attacked the “gargantuan debt expenditure” contained in Sen. Bernie Sanders’ $3.5 trillion bill which Alexander claims “would remake our form of government and way of life.”

To bolster his argument, Alexander falls back on the old reliable law of supply and demand which he somehow equates to economic utopia. That would be the same law of supply and demand that has seen the costs of life-saving prescription drugs, for example, soar into the stratosphere and out of reach of those who desperately need them.

Alexander manages to claim, somewhat incredulously, that that law of supply and demand “has lifted millions out of poverty,” while ignoring the contributions of America’s labor unions on this, the eve of Labor Day.

And yes, there has been widespread documented corruption within many unions, but thanks to their clout in the days before Right to Work laws lifted the yoke of responsibility and compassion off management, those same unions gave Americans a decent wage, shorter hours, paid vacations, pension plans, sick leave, group health and life insurance plans and safer work places – all while eliminating child labor and exploitation of female workers in sweatshops.

Alexander says that Sanders advocates “exorbitant, permanent taxes including on the middle class…” He also says Sanders points to countries like Sweden, Norway, Finland and Denmark when talking up socialist programs while ignoring countries like Venezuela. I would argue instead that Alexander, in his haste to condemn socialism, points to Venezuela, which is more authoritarian than socialist, while ignoring the Scandinavian countries, consistently described as homes to the happiest people on earth.

And while he attacks socialism on principle, Alexander never reveals whether or not he rejected on that same principle any of those $1400 stimulus checks doled out by that socialist Trump administration in response to the coronavirus pandemic – or whether or not big corporations should have rejected those corporate welfare tax breaks enacted by the socialist Republican Congress.

Somewhat disingenuously, Alexander attacks Sanders’ arguments against “wealth inequality” by pointing out that the median household income grew by 9.2 percent between 2016-2019 while conveniently ignoring that fact that the rate of inflation was 13.75 percent – meaning the average wage earner actually lost ground.

Working 40 hours per week, 52 weeks per year over a work-life of 50 years, it would take the average American worker 13 lifetimes to earn the 2019 single year’s income ($21.3 million) of the average CEO of America’s top 350 US firms – and that’s assuming a minimum wage of $15 per hour.

As Alexander wrings his hands at the prospect of Benie’s $3.5 trillion bill, let’s consider how those numbers stack up when compared to other costs:

The estimated costs of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, including benefits still to be paid out for health care of the war veterans through 2050: $8 trillion. By comparison:

• It would take $1.7 trillion to pay off all outstanding US student loans;
• It would cost $1.4 trillion to provide universal, high-quality early care and education for all US children for 10 years;
• The cost of the war is nearly twice as much as the combined costs of the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill and Sanders’ $3.5 trillion bill.
• The cost of the war is roughly 12 times Jeff Bezos’s net worth of $190 billion.

Finally, it’s worth going over some facts and figures from the Congressional Budget Office.

The $5.6 trillion cumulative surplus that existed in January 2001 as George W. Bush assumed the presidency morphed into a $6.1 trillion cumulative deficit by 2011, an unfavorable “turnaround” of an eye-popping $11.7 trillion – largely the result of the cost of the Iraq/Afghanistan war and tax cuts enacted by Bush.

But it goes back even further. Public debt rose during the administration of Ronald Reagan, who cut tax rates and increased military spending – an unhealthy combination. While the debt fell during the Bill Clinton years when military spending was decreased and taxes were increased, it rose again sharply in the wake of the Iraq/Afghanistan war and the 2007-2008 financial crisis that came at the end of George W. Bush’s presidency.

NATIONAL DEBT INCREASES*

Ronald Reagan: Added $1.86 trillion, a 186% increase, almost doubling the $997.8 billion debt at the end of Carter’s last budget.

George H.W. Bush: Added $1.554 trillion to the $2.857 trillion debt at the end of Reagan’s last budget, a 54% increase.

Bill Clinton: Added $1.396 trillion to the $4.4 trillion debt at the end of George H.W. Bush’s last budget, a 31.6% increase.

George W. Bush: Added $5.849 trillion to the $5.8 trillion debt at the end of Clinton’s last budget, FY 2001, a 101% increase.

Barack Obama: Added $8.588 trillion to the $11.657 trillion debt at the end of Bush’s last budget in 2009, a 73.6% increase.

Donald Trump: As of the end of FY 2020, the debt was $26.9 trillion. Trump added $6.7 trillion to the debt since Obama’s last budget, a 33.1% increase due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic

DEFICIT INCREASES*

Ronald Reagan: Total = $1.412 trillion, a 142% increase

George H.W. Bush: Total = $1.036 trillion, a 36% increase

Bill Clinton: Total = $63 billion surplus, a 1% decrease

George W. Bush: Total = $3.293 trillion, a 57% increase

Barack Obama: Total = $6.781 trillion, a 58% increase

Donald Trump: Total Actual plus Budgeted = $6.612 trillion, a 33% increase

* (Trump and George H.W. Bush served only four years each. Each of the others were in office for eight years.)

So, in retrospect, it would seem that while Republicans love to lay claim to being the party of fiscal responsibility, neither party can stake out that claim with any degree of credibility. For the proponent of either party to attack the other for a “socialist agenda” or “fiscal irresponsibility” is intellectually dishonest.

I keep reminding myself that when I got married back in 1968, gasoline was 30 cents a gallon and my first home, a three-bedroom brick house on an acre lot, cost less than $15,000. But my full-time job that same year paid a whopping $6,500 per year, so, everything’s relative

Mr. Alexander needs to come down off his high horse and stop posturing in the guise of “good government.” The underlying cause of the runaway inflation is greed – pure and simple greed. And greed knows no party labels.

Someone told me back in 2015 that when Bobby Jindal left office, I’d have nothing to write about.

Time and events have certainly disproven that assumption.

Not even the departure of Mike Edmonson could bring a halt to stories about the sorry state of the Louisiana State Police, particularly in Troop F where apparently it is a major offense to drive while black.

The political climate in Louisiana is certainly fertile soil for investigative reporting and LouisianaVoice has endeavored to maintain the hectic pace of keeping up with events which seems to outpace any effort to stay ahead of the news cycle.

LouisianaVoice was recently recognized as one of the TOP 15 BLOGS in Louisiana (though I must question the omission of both Bayou Brief – the premier political blog as far as I am concerned – and The Lens). Still, I am both honored and humbled to be included in that list.

But doing this takes time and money. That is why I come hat in hand twice a year – in April and September – to ask that you contribute what you feel you can afford in order to support investigative journalism and your right to know what’s going on in your state.

Thomas Jefferson said that given the choice of government without a free press or free press without a government, he would not hesitate to choose the latter. So, please, either click on the yellow DONATE button to the right of this post to give by credit card or mail your check to:

LouisianaVoice, P.O. Box 922, Denham Springs, Louisiana 70727.

As always, your generous support is deeply appreciated.

Call it the gift that keeps on giving.

Just as we as a nation are beginning to emerge from the four-year train wreck that was the Donald Trump presidency, we’re greeted with the stark reminder of yet another failed Repugnantcan administration.

Even better, the two are now uniting under the double yoke of irrelevancy and incompetence.

It was in September 2015, when his own doomed presidential aspirations were still in the embryonic stage (from which they never emerged) that Bobby Jindal called Donald Trump “shallow” and an “unstable narcissist” while warning that a Trump nomination would torpedo the Repugnantcans’ chances of capturing the White House.

“Like all narcissists, Donald Trump is insecure and weak, and afraid of being exposed,” Jindal said back then. “And that’s why he is constantly telling us how big and how rich and how great he is, and how insignificant everyone else is. We’ve all met people like Trump, and we know that only a very weak and small person needs to constantly tell us how strong and powerful he is. Donald Trump believes that he is the answer to every question.”

While he could well have been holding a mirror up to his own reign of error, Jindal went on to say that Trump “has no understanding of policy. He’s full of bluster but has no substance. He lacks the intellectual curiosity to even learn.

“You may have recently seen that after Trump said the Bible is his favorite book, he couldn’t name a single Bible verse or passage that meant something to him,” Jindal continued, calling Trump’s claim “just a show.” Jindal said at the time, “And he hasn’t ever read the Bible. But you know why he hasn’t read the Bible? Because he’s not in it.”

Well, guess what? Jindal was correct (for a change).

Trump, for his part, DISMISSED JINDAL as one would flick a stray dust speck off his sleeve, quipping, “I only respond to people that register more than 1% in the polls.”

Jindal did what Trump could not accomplish: he got reelected to a second term but it was even more disastrous than the first. “After inheriting a $1 billion budget surplus, Jindal agreed to an INCOME TAX CUT that the state couldn’t afford,” said BLOOMBERG NEWS. “He cut spending where he could, particularly on health care and higher education, and reduced the state workforce. But balancing the books required relying on one-shot revenue windfalls and resorting to other fiscal sleights of hand that have left the state’s cupboard bare.”

He also engineered what Bloomberg called “a comically dishonest tax credit that even his fellow party members referred to as ‘money laundering.’ Washington has enough of this kind of budget gimmickry already.

“Jindal joined most other Republican governors in rejecting the expansion of Medicaid. And after Indiana found itself at the center of a national controversy over a religious freedom law that allowed discrimination against gay couples, Jindal pushed for a similar law in his state,” Bloomberg said. 

But fast forward to Aug. 24, 2021, and we have the announcement that Jindal will join the America First think tank to head up its healthcare arm, the Center for a Healthy America.

America First, of course is joined at the hip with Trump and he is using the so-called think tank as just another means of extracting contributions from the faithful who must be somewhat disappointed by now that he was not reinstated as president by that Aug. 13 deadline.

If there ever were two star-struck schmucks destined to join hands in a common march into oblivion, it would be Bobby Jindal and Donald Trump – poles apart in their spiritual beliefs, but oh-so-similar in their misplaced sense of self-importance.

Trump has this unquenchable appetite for attention. He must remain in the spotlight. Jindal was as spot-on in calling him an “unable narcissist” as Trump was infinitely off-target in his self-analysis that he was a “very stable genius.” (One wag ventured that when Trump was asked what his middle initial “J” stood for, he responded, “Jenius.”)

Jindal, on the other hand, has been casting about since he left office in January 2016 for some means to keep his political vital signs alive. Those efforts, which include the occasional writing op-eds for the Wall Street Journal and getting appointed to a couple of corporate boards, have done little to resuscitate what is essentially a moribund public career.

This union reminds me of a wonderful Tom T. Hall song, The Little Lady Preacher. The song is about a 19-year-old female preacher who was “developed to a fault” and who preached each Sunday morning on the local radio. She would punctuate the Bible with a movement of her hips and when she breathed into the microphone, she’d “send us all to hell.”

In the song, Hall said he played the “doghouse bass” and she had a guitar picker named Luther Short who drank and smoked but never drew a rebuke from her though “she said a prayer for me. I told her in a way, I’d been praying for her, too.”

The upshot of the song was that the little lady preacher and Luther Short had “a callin’,” and ran away together, leaving Hall to face the “heartbreak, unemployment and all.”

“I don’t know where they’ve gone and I ain’t seen them people since.

 Lord, if I judge ‘em, let me give ‘em lots of room

I know ol’ Luther Short and he’s a hard ol’ boy to change.

And I’ve often sat and wondered who it was converted whom.”

So, as Jindal and Trump embark on their common journey to political extinction, they can take some solace (or discomfort – the jury’s still out on this one) in the knowledge that the road doesn’t fork.