Last Call For Louisiana Blues For The Blue Team

Democrats have done pretty well in 2023's special elections, but as we're now only a few weeks away from Election Day, political gravity is reasserting itself in a painful way in red states like Louisiana.

 

Attorney General Jeff Landry, a Republican backed by former President Donald Trump, has won the Louisiana governor’s race, holding off a crowded field of candidates.

The win is a major victory for the GOP as they reclaim the governor’s mansion for the first time in eight years. Landry will replace current Gov. John Bel Edwards, who was unable to seek reelection due to consecutive term limits. Edwards is the only Democratic governor in the Deep South.

“Today’s election says that our state is united,” Landry said during his victory speech Saturday night. “It’s a wake up call and it’s a message that everyone should hear loud and clear, that we the people in this state are going to expect more out of our government from here on out.”

By garnering more than half of the votes, Landry avoided an expected runoff under the state’s “jungle primary” system. The last time there wasn’t a gubernatorial runoff in Louisiana was in 2011 and 2007, when Bobby Jindal, a Republican, won the state’s top position.

The governor-elect, who celebrated with supporters during a watch party in Broussard, Louisiana, described the election as “historic.”

Landry, 52, has raised the profile of attorney general since taking office in 2016. He has used his office to champion conservative policy positions. More recently, Landry has been in the spotlight over his involvement and staunch support of Louisiana laws that have drawn much debate, including banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender youths, the state’s near-total abortion ban that doesn’t have exceptions for cases of rape and incest, and a law restricting youths’ access to “sexually explicit material” in libraries, which opponents fear will target LGBTQ+ books.

Landry has repeatedly clashed with Edwards over matters in the state, including LGBTQ rights, state finances and the death penalty. However the Republican has also repeatedly put Louisiana in national fights, including over President Joe Biden’s policies that limit oil and gas production and COVID-19 vaccine mandates.

 

People forget that while Bobby Jindal is now a national punchline and the ultimate has-been who never was in Republican politics, the guy did outright win the state's jungle primary for governor twice, and he won easily. 

Current Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards has been the only thing stopping Louisiana from becoming as red as a boiled crawfish, and that's going to be a painful experience for the poorer parts of the state in the years ahead, especially in NOLA and Baton Rouge.

Hopefully we'll have a better outcome here in Kentucky next month.

Poll Positioning In Louisiana

Two new polls out this week show Democrat John Bel Edwards with a massive lead over Sen. David Vitter to succeed Bobby Jindal in the Louisiana gubernatorial race. Market Research has Edwards up by 14, 52-38%, and a University of New Orleans poll has Edwards up by an even larger 18-point margin, 54-36%.

Here's the question though: considering the polls in Kentucky were universally off by 14 points, where a 5-point Conway lead turned into a substantial 9-point Bevin victory, are these two polls anywhere near being close to correct?

I think there's considerable doubt in an off-year, low-turnout runoff that's not even being held on Election Day, that a Democrat is winning in Louisiana in 2015 by 14 to 18 points.  The people who actually vote aren't the people who are being polled, and that shift towards Vitter will only be magnified by the low turnout.

Do not be surprised if Vitter makes this a nailbiter, or if he manages to pull out a win.  Polling across the board in 2015 has been rotten.

Last Call For Diaper Dave's Downfall

Louisiana Democrat John Bel Edwards is going for the jugular against GOP Sen. David Vitter for the governor's runoff on the 21st to replace term-limited (and reality-limited) Bobby Jindal.

“The choice for governor couldn’t be more clear,” the ad states. “John Bel Edwards, who answered his country’s call and served as a ranger in the 82nd Airborne Division, or David Vitter, who answered a prostitute’s call minutes after he skipped a vote honoring 28 soldiers who gave their lives in defense of our freedom. David Vitter chose prostitutes over patriots. Now, the choice is yours.”

According to the Monroe Daily Star, the commercial references a February 2001 vote the senator missed honoring US troops killed during Operation Desert Storm in February 1991. Vitter has admitted to being a patron of the “D.C. madam,” Deborah Jeane Palfrey in 2007.

Edwards’ campaign also released a list of phone calls allegedly made by Palfrey, including one to Vitter on the day of the vote — though not during the vote.

The ad is slated to debut around the state on Saturday.

That is a hell of a broadside, and even Republicans in Louisiana are endorsing Edwards here.  The polls also show Edwards with a hefty lead.

Of course, the same was true in Kentucky earlier this week too, wasn't it?

The Money Game

In the post-Citizens United world of campaign finance, whoever runs out of money first loses the race. Rick Perry and Scott Walker ran out of cash and closed shop, and with third quarter campaign fundraising figures now out, the candidates who have raised tens of millions will go on. It's the candidates who have raised only chump change in comparison who are on the way out, and top of that list of losers running out of money is Bobby Jindal.

Thursday could mark the beginning of the end for Bobby Jindal’s increasingly slim presidential hopes.

The Louisiana governor’s campaign reported having just $260,000 to spend at the end of September after raising a little over half a million dollars and spending significantly more than that in the third quarter. It’s a paltry sum compared to his rivals, and if Jindal can’t jumpstart his White House bid soon, he could be headed the way of Rick Perry and Scott Walker, who ended their campaigns when their coffers ran dry.

Jindal’s haul—or lack thereof—was the most ominous signal that came from the quarterly FEC filing deadline on Thursday, which showed that the top two Democrats, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, each raised more money between June and September than any of the 15 Republicans still in the race. (Donald Trump, of course, has access to more money than any of them through his own personal wealth.) Clinton raised $28 million and Sanders raised $26 million. Ben Carson’s rise to a close second in the polls was reflected in his fund-raising, as he led the GOP field by taking in $20 million in the third quarter. 

Perry ran out of cash, Walker is a million in debt now, and Jindal will soon join them. And it says the world that Ben Carson has gotten $20 million dollars from people. Fool and his money are soon parted, I guess.

Last Call For Soulless Lumps Of Basalt

Whenever I think to myself "Boy, Republican politicians really can't get any worse" invariably somebody proves me wrong within minutes. Charles Johnson:

Republican presidential candidates are competing to see who can say the most heartless, reprehensible things today about the gun massacre at Oregon’s Umpqua Community College. 

First, Ben Carson blamed the victims for not defending themselves. 

Yeah, Ben Carson is a bit of a douchebag.

He'd also be your next President if America voted today, too.  Keep that in mind.  Meanwhile, Bobby Jindal is on the rise from 0% in the polls too.

And now, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal (a creationist like Ben Carson), has issued a statement at his website that actually goes a step further into awfulness: We Fill Our Culture With Garbage, and We Reap the Result.

And Jindal just goes off the rails and careens into the wall here.

Now, let’s get really politically incorrect here and talk specifically about this horror in Oregon. This killer’s father is now lecturing us on the need for gun control and he says he has no idea how or where his son got the guns. 

Of course he doesn’t know. You know why he doesn’t know? Because he is not, and has never been in his son’s life. He’s a complete failure as a father, he should be embarrassed to even show his face in public. He’s the problem here. 

He brags that he has never held a gun in his life and that he had no idea that his son had any guns. Why didn’t he know? Because he failed to raise his son. He should be ashamed of himself, and he owes us all an apology.

Now however you feel about the killer in Oregon, the fact of the matter remains is a father has outlived his son, one of the great tragedies that can occur, and yes, the son murdered nine people and then took his own life.  But for Jindal, a man running for President, to say something so heartlessly callous just for the shock value of scoring publicity while his presidential and political aspects wither like his soul?

I've thought some terrible things about Republicans, but never that they were just unfit to be in human society.

Jindal needs to resign from this planet, let alone the office of Governor of Louisiana.

Last Call For Investigations Are For Losers

You may recall that one of the first reactions by the GOP over this Planned Parenthood video nonsense was Louisiana GOP Gov. Bobby Jindal trying to revive his moribund 2016 presidential run by immediately calling for an investigation into the organization's clinics in the state.

Well, seeing as how he only until tomorrow to get his terrible numbers high enough to get into the FOX debate in Cleveland this week, he's now no longer waiting for the results of the investigation.

Today, the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals informed Planned Parenthood it is exercising its right to terminate Planned Parenthood’s Medicaid provider agreement. In recent weeks, multiple videos have surfaced showing Planned Parenthood Federation of America senior personnel and other employees describing how they actively engage in illegal partial birth abortion procedures and conduct these abortions in a manner that leaves body parts intact so that they can later be sold on the open market. Since these videos have surfaced, Governor Jindal has directed DHH to investigate Planned Parenthood’s activities in Louisiana and also sent a letter to both the Louisiana Inspector General and the F.B.I. asking them to assist in the investigation. 

According to the Medicaid provider contract between DHH and Planned Parenthood, along with relevant Louisiana law, either party can choose to cancel the contract at will after providing written notice. Governor Jindal and DHH decided to give the required 30-day notice to terminate the Planned Parenthood Medicaid provider contract because Planned Parenthood does not represent the values of the State of Louisiana in regards to respecting human life. Pending the ongoing investigation, DHH reserves the right to amend the cancellation notice and terminate the provider agreement immediately should cause be determined.

As near as I can tell, the figures I can find have about 30% of the state on Medicaid.  You figure half are women (if not more) and with 4.65 million people in the state, that's roughly 700,000 women on Medicaid for Louisiana.

That's a lot of women who are no longer able to go to a Planned Parenthood clinic for basic services, because of a questionable video.

But what does Jindal care?

Bobbying For Crapples

So on Tuesday, a heavily edited hit video was posted to YouTube, purported to show a Planned Parenthood employee discuss using late-term abortions to harvest baby parts.  Which is kind of odd, since 1) Planned Parenthood doesn't do late-term abortions (only 4 clinics in the US do period) and 2) the video is a screaming fake from the James O'Keefe School Of Complete Horsecrap.

But that's not stopping Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal from using the fake video as an excuse to harass Planned Parenthood and score cheap points.

Gov. Bobby Jindal on Tuesday announced he's directed the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals to investigate Planned Parenthood activities in the state after a video surfaced that claims the organization is selling fetal body parts. 

The video, which was posted to YouTube by the Center for Medical Progress, shows a woman discussing the harvest of fetal organs and body parts from partial-birth abortions. The Center for Medical Progress identifies the woman as Dr. Deborah Nucatola, who is Planned Parenthood Federation of America's national medical director. 

There was no indication that the video or the activities described in it had ties to Louisiana. But Jindal said he was ordering an investigation in part because Planned Parenthood is planning to open a clinic in New Orleans.

But here's the kicker (and the real reason why Jindal is pretending to believe this nonsense):

The investigation means the $4 million clinic planned for New Orleans will not be able to open because Jindal's order includes suspending the issuance of new licenses by DHH.

So yes, Jindal is a manipulative slimy bastard.  Oh, and where is he getting the money to investigate Planned Parenthood when the state is running a $1.6 billion deficit under his budget?

And he's running for President!?!?

My guess is he won't be for much longer when this blows up in his face.

Last Call For Bobby Jin-Dull

Well, we have our winner for the dumbest reaction by and idiot Republican 2016 candidate to today's historic Supreme Court decision affirming marriage equality, and no surprise it's from Bobby Jindal.

Louisiana Gov, Bobby Jindal (R) on Friday suggested doing away with the Supreme Court during a speech in Iowa that followed the court's historic ruling on same-sex marriage.

"The Supreme Court is completely out of control, making laws on their own, and has become a public opinion poll instead of a judicial body," he told the crowd, as quoted by The Advocate newspaper. "If we want to save some money lets just get rid of the court."

"Yesterday, Justice Scalia noted that in the Obamacare ruling 'words have no meaning,'" Jindal added, according to The Advocate. "Today, Chief Justice Roberts admitted that the gay marriage ruling had nothing to do with the Constitution. Marriage between a man and a woman was established by God, and no earthly court can alter that."

Amazing.  All the screaming and accusations of "Obama the Tyrant" and here we have Republican presidential candidates actually advocating for the dissolution of the Supreme Court when it does not agree with them.

I considered Jindal to be a meathead before, playing down his obvious intelligence and experience in order to fit in with the Republican Party that openly despises intelligence and scholarship, but now I consider to him to be a dangerous ideologue who has no place as an elected official.

The most chilling part is that Jindal is far from the only 2016 hopeful calling for open defiance to this ruling. And these fools are running for President?

One of them will still get 45% of the vote, minimum.

Cause One's Got A Weasel And The Other's Got A Flag

One's one the pole, shove them all in a bag.

South Carolina senator and Republican presidential candidate Lindsey Graham was asked by CNN’s Alisyn Camerota this morning why the American and South Carolina state flags were flying at half-mast today, but the Confederate flag was not.

As he didn’t seem inclined to answer, Camerota shifted to a more general question, asking the senator whether it’s “time to stop flying the Confederate flag.”

Graham said that it would be “fine” by him if South Carolinians wanted to “revisit that decision,” but insisted that “this is part of who we are. The flag represents — to some people — the Civil War, and that was the symbol of one side.”

He acknowledged, though, that “to others, it’s a racist symbol, and it’s been used by people in a racist way.” But, he added, “the problems we’re having in South Carolina and around the world aren’t because of a symbol, but because of what’s in people’s hearts.”

It's not like Huckleberry here had a real shot at the GOP nomination, but this "real leadership" response on the flag issue shows the world just what kind of joke the guy is.  If you can't take a stand against a racist symbol in 2015 being flown in the capital of your own home state when you admit that the Confederate flag is a racist symbol, you've kind of lost the race for the White House.

Even Jeb Bush, after dicking around again for two days, finally admitted that he was the Florida governor that removed the Confederate flag from his state's capitol in Tallahassee and put it in a museum where it belongs.  Mitt Romney reiterated his 2008 call to take that flag down, but Ted Cruz punted too and so did Marco Rubio and Bobby Jindal, referring to the issue (ironically enough) as a states' matter.

Rubio is supposed to be the conservative savior of the GOP, but he can't come up with a coherent position on the friggin' Confederate flag, the flag of traitors to the country?

Good luck in 2016, assholes.

Last Call For Bigotry Today, Bigotry Tomorrow, Bigotry Forevah!

GOP Gov. Bobby Jindal takes to the pages of the NY Times to write an opinion piece on how Louisiana will never, ever, ever, ever, ever allow same-sex marriage, and shame on you for trying to make them accept it, you awful intolerant hatemongers in the corporate wing of the GOP!

THE debate over religious liberty in America presents conservatives and business leaders with a crucial choice. 

In Indiana and Arkansas, large corporations recently joined left-wing activists to bully elected officials into backing away from strong protections for religious liberty. It was disappointing to see conservative leaders so hastily retreat on legislation that would simply allow for an individual or business to claim a right to free exercise of religion in a court of law. 

Our country was founded on the principle of religious liberty, enshrined in the Bill of Rights. Why shouldn’t an individual or business have the right to cite, in a court proceeding, religious liberty as a reason for not participating in a same-sex marriage ceremony that violates a sincerely held religious belief? 

That is what Indiana and Arkansas sought to do. That political leaders in both states quickly cowered amid the shrieks of big business and the radical left should alarm us all. 

As the fight for religious liberty moves to Louisiana, I have a clear message for any corporation that contemplates bullying our state: Save your breath.

Louisianans will have the God-given right to hate some gay people, Goddammit.

I hold the view that has been the consensus in our country for over two centuries: that marriage is between one man and one woman. Polls indicate that the American consensus is changing — but like many other believers, I will not change my faith-driven view on this matter, even if it becomes a minority opinion.

A pluralistic and diverse society like ours can exist only if we all tolerate people who disagree with us. That’s why religious freedom laws matter — and why it is critical for conservatives and business leaders to unite in this debate.

Sure, we all have to tolerate people who disagree with us, except I'm the governor of this effing state and I'm going to sign this bill that makes my minority opinion into law. Tolerance, you see, is you dealing with discrimination and accepting it.

Right?

Bobby Who? Whatsit Jindal? Never Heard Of Him.

NY Times columnist Charles Blow laments the black hole that is Bobby Jindal's presidential hopes (and the Louisiana state budget gap).

In the latest CNN/ORC poll of Republicans and independents who lean Republican, only 1 percent said that he was the candidate they would most likely support for the Republican nomination. Even “none/no one” got 6 percent. 

And in a desperate attempt at relevancy — and press — he has lately been sliding further into Islamic hysteria. 

In January, he caused a controversy by claiming that parts of Europe were “no-go zones” because of Muslim extremists. Jindal said that there were cities “where non-Muslims simply don’t go in,” like Birmingham in Britain. Prime Minister David Cameron said in response: “When I heard this, frankly, I choked on my porridge and I thought it must be April Fools’ Day. This guy is clearly a complete idiot.” 

That hasn’t stopped Jindal. Last week on Fox News, he set about defending his statement that America “shouldn’t tolerate those who want to come and try to impose some variant, or some version, of Shariah law.” But he went so far as to say of prospective immigrants:
“In America we want people who want to be Americans. We want people who want to come here. We don’t say, ‘You have to adopt our creed, or any particular creed,’ but we do say, ‘If you come here, you need to believe in American exceptionalism.’ ” 

What? Where is that written? I can’t find this “need to believe in American exceptionalism” anywhere in the Immigration and Nationality Act. Isn’t American exceptionalism itself a creed? 

The smart-on-paper Jindal increasingly comes across as nuttier than a piece of praline.

On the contrary, Jindal has all but glowingly accomplished his job: driving Democrats out of what was a reliably blue state.  Blanche Lincoln and Mary Landrieu and friends are ancient history, and the state's vaunted Democratic machinery is in utter ruin.  The state's race to the bottom has been breathtaking.

Now it faces a more than $1.6 billion budget hole, and it's going to be filled with the bones of the state's universities, libraries, and public schools. And when Bobby Jindal leaves office, the state will be a shell of itself, hollowed out in order to give the wealthiest even more money to hoard.

By that criteria, Bobby Jindal has always been the man that he promised to be.

Bobby Jindal, Moderate Republican(?)

When pundits look back on the 2016 GOP race, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal will hold a special place as a man who not only turned his back on his constituents for political expediency, but also shredded his degree in biology for the same reason.

Planned Parenthood began construction here last year on a clinic that would perform abortions and provide other medical services for women. “High-Quality, Affordable Health Care for New Orleans,” a sign promised. “Seeing Patients Early 2015.”

That sign is now crumpled on the ground behind a chain-link fence at the project’s abandoned construction site, victim of efforts by Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) and other abortion opponents to block the clinic.

The push against the project began last year, when the Catholic archbishop of New Orleans wrote a public letter threatening to blacklist contractors on the clinic from any of the church’s numerous real estate projects. That led to several subcontractors walking away from the project, delaying work on the facility. An inspector for the State Licensing Board for Contractors also began making weekly visits, which one of the major contractors said was unprecedented.

Then last month Jindal’s administration denied Planned Parenthood an operating license, stating that the group failed to show the need for the clinic. Work has stopped at the site on a busy thoroughfare west of downtown, at least for now, while Planned Parenthood vows to appeal.

There's nothing moderate about Jindal anymore.  He knows his road to the nomination in Cleveland in July 2016 goes through Tea Party central, and he's trying to prove he's the guy who can punish his constituents the most.

In 2010, Louisiana had the sixth-highest rate of unintended pregnancies, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

Before opening its $4 million clinic, Planned Parenthood had to undergo a “Facility Need Review” under a 2012 rule created by Jindal’s Department of Health and Hospitals. In its 74-page application, Planned Parenthood used statistical analysis to estimate that its entrance into the market would allow another 2,844 women to get abortions per year. In its rejection, the state agency’s top official said Planned Parenthood had failed to establish the need for another abortion facility.

Of the five that exist in Louisiana, one is in New Orleans and another is in the suburban city of Metairie.

“The safety and protection of women is not an issue of economic debate,” the governor’s press secretary, Mike Reed, said in an e-mail.

So yeah, Jindal has gone full Tea Party these days.  He had before, but now it's official.

Last Call For The Great Beturbaned Horde

I think of all the Republican politicians I dislike the most, Bobby Jindal has to be at the top of the list simply because he's smarter than a great percentage of them and chooses to spout ignorance like this anyway.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) expressed fears of an extremist Muslim “invasion” of America in an interview on Monday, outlining a strict vision for how Muslims should assimilate into the United States and doubling down on his recent controversial comments about Muslim “no-go zones” in Europe. 

According to Buzzfeed, Jindal spoke at length about Muslim immigration during an interview on the Washington Watch radio show, hosted by Family Research Council president Tony Perkins. Jindal began the segment by defending remarks he made earlier this month about so-called “no-go zones,” or areas in England and France that some American conservatives have erroneously claimed are so dominated by extremist Muslims that police forces simply do not enter.

“If we’re not careful the same no-go zones you’re seeing now in Europe will come to America,” Jindal said. “What is not acceptable and what you’ve seen in Europe and this is a very serious particular threat, you’ve got those that do want to try to impose a form of sharia law. And sharia law is antithetical, mutually exclusive of freedom, in treating women as first-class citizens, it is antithetical to the values we hold dear. And you see, third, fourth generation immigrants in the U.K., France, in other places in Europe that don’t consider themselves part of those societies and that’s very dangerous.”

No-go zones are a complete lie, but Jindal understands that being an Islamophobic Republican as well as a man of Indian descent allows him to make a contrast as "one of the good immigrants" in this country.  He's lowering the discourse on purpose to further his own political ambitions. It's a form of self-hatred and loathing that's been practiced here for centuries, but it's just as tiring now as it was in the days of blaming the Irish, Italian, Greeks and Catholics coming into the country to join America.

Jindal should frankly know better about a lot of things.  But he's lying to his base for a reason.

Last Call For Dumb As An Iceberg

A CNN poll on global warming finds that after 7 years of asking the question, America's views on the subject haven't really changed much over the years.











Considering those numbers were 54%/20%/22%/4% in May 2007, it seems like we're stuck in a long-term rut of ignorance.  It explains why Republicans are quick to refer to global warming as "the Left's religion" so often.

President Obama—in his rush to embrace the Left’s climate change religion—wants to stand in the way of jobs. http://t.co/kUHmKda1os
— Gov. Bobby Jindal (@BobbyJindal) January 15, 2015

First of all, Bobby Jindal is a man with a biology degree and should know better, but he chooses not to.  Second, comparing belief in science to religious faith just serves to piss liberals off (ever the point of 90% of what Republicans do or say.)  Third, it puts religion on par with science in a way that equates them in validity, as modern Christian conservatives can be very good at dismissing other "religions" quite handily in order to feel more superior about their own beliefs.

So yes, it's a calculated strike, and an effective one.  We're effectively destroying science education in this country, and education in general.  A stupid, ignorant populace that can't think for thmeselves is easy to control.

Very easy.  You just need a cable news network.

Not Even Common Core-tesy

Louisiana GOP governor and perennial punchline Bobby Jindal has decided that the state's failing educational standards have to be Obama's fault, so he's suing the federal government.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday accusing the U.S. Department of Education of illegally coercing states to adopt the Common Core academic standards by requiring states that want to compete for federal grants to embrace the national standards. 

Jindal, a potential candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, was once a strong supporter of the Common Core standards, but he has become increasingly critical as opposition to the standards has grown, particularly among conservative Republicans and tea party groups. 

Jindal has tried unsuccessfully to remove the Common Core from Louisiana but has been stymied by the state legislature, the state board of education and Jindal’s own state superintendent of education — all supporters of the Common Core. 

“The federal government has hijacked and destroyed the Common Core initiative,” Jindal said in a statement. “Common Core is the latest effort by big government disciples to strip away state rights and put Washington, D.C. in control of everything.” 

Before filing the lawsuit Wednesday, Jindal also tried unsuccessfully to sue his state board of education over the Common Core standards.

What makes this all laughable is that for the last two decades, Republicans have been screaming about how schools were not being held accountable, how there weren't national standards of performance, and how teachers and educators weren't graded on performance like their students were.  Common Core actually does all that and offers incentives to states for participating, and suddenly it's "we have to sue the government for this coercive federal overreach!"

What makes this all pathetically depressing is that Jindal is trying to dodge responsibility for Louisiana's educational disaster by blaming the President.  After all, Jindal's the one who wanted to make massive cuts to public schools by privatizing them through religious organizations and slashed spending so harshly that libraries closed across the state and the resulting plummet in the polls can't be his own fault, you know.

Jindal has been the worst governor in the state's history, and yet he's still making plays like he has some sort of chance in 2016.

Coming at the expense of state taxpayer, no less.  Typical.

Last Call For Bobby Jindal's War On Women

And as expected, Louisiana GOP Gov. Bobby Jindal has signed into law an abortion clinic bill so awful, it will probably close the state's remaining clinics in both Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

Gov. Bobby Jindal signed legislation Thursday that is all but guaranteed to close the only abortion clinics in New Orleans and Baton Rouge.

His office issued a release after the bill signing ceremony Thursday (June 12) at the First Baptist Church in West Monroe, where the governor signed two pieces of "pro-life legislation." Sponsors of the bills are from Monroe and West Monroe.

House Bill 388, sponsored by Rep. Katrina Jackson, D-Monroe, proposes a new law adding requirements of abortion doctors that clinic administrators say will force them out of business because of the unlikeliness they will be able to comply. Supporters have dubbed it the Unsafe Abortion Protection Act.

House Bill 305, sponsored by Rep. Frank Hoffman, R-West Monroe, would prohibit abortion providers or their affiliates, including Planned Parenthood, to instruct or distribute information on health related issues, such as sex eduction, at public or charter schools.

"I am proud to sign these bills because they will help us continue to protect women and the life of the unborn in our state," Jindal said in a statement issued after the signing. "These new laws will give women the health and safety protections they deserve and continue to make Louisiana a state that values individual human life."

A lawyer for the clinics has indicated administrators will likely file a joint suit challenging the new law after House Bill 388. It's unclear if the court would grant the clinics an injunction, allowing them to keep their doors open, while litigation pends.

The bill would leave a grand total of one abortion clinic in the entire state, if that much, for 4.6 million people.  But remember, there's no war on women, Republicans aren't trying to eliminate clinics through regulations designed to close them, and women without resources totally aren't going to turn to unsafe abortion methods as a result, risk their lives.

And we certainly wouldn't see a national version of this law the minute Republicans controil Congress and the White House again, so you should probably stay home and not vote because Obama disappointed you personally.

Last Call For Bobby's World

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal made a national embarrassment out of himself yet again at the National Governor's Association meeting at the White House today.  At a bipartisan meeting of the nation's governors, Jindal threw all pretense of giving a damn about protocol out the window and displayed his Obama Derangement Syndrome, full force.

A group of governors emerged midday Monday from a meeting with President Barack Obama that stressed bipartisan cooperation — but that sentiment didn’t last as far as the White House driveway, as a Republican who’s had bigger political aspirations offered a tough assessment of what he’d heard.

“This president and the White House seems to be waving the white flag of surrender” by focusing on a limited set of executive actions, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal told reporters outside the White House, breaking from the comity of the first dozen minutes of a press conference led by National Governors Association chair Mary Fallin (R-Okla.) and vice-chair John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) — and from typically more innocuous readouts describing nearly all meetings as “productive.”

The president spoke repeatedly about raising the minimum wage during his meetings with more than 40 of the nation’s governors, Jindal said — but, argued the Louisiana governor, that’s the wrong place for the White House to be focusing its energies. “The Obama economy is now the minimum wage economy. I think we can do better than that, I think America can do better than that,” said the potential 2016 presidential candidate, suggesting that the president approve the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, rein in regulations and expand drilling on federal lands to boost economic growth.

Of course Jindal has his own problems, as the guys at Public Policy Polling can attest to.

Bobby Jindal continues to be one of the most unpopular Governors in the country, with only 35% of voters approving of him to 53% who disapprove. Even among Republican primary voters in his home state only 37% want him to run for President, compared to 51%  who think he should sit it out. Mike Huckabee is the top choice of GOP primary voters in the state at 20% to 13% for Jindal, 12% for Ted Cruz, 10% for Rand Paul, 9% for Jeb Bush, 8% each for Chris Christie and Paul Ryan, 7% for Marco Rubio, and 2% for Scott Walker.

Gosh, that 35% approval rating would put him, you know, in a worse spot than President Obama.  Even Rasmussen has the President above the 50% mark here for several days in February 2014.

Perhaps Jindal should keep his mouth shut, since he's no longer relevant by his own logic.

Last Call For The Red Stick

The latest example of the post-Katrina permanent minority underclass in Bobby Jindal's Louisiana?  The rich, white area of Baton Rouge is proposing seceding and taking the city's tax base with it to form a new city.

The predominantly white and wealthy residents of the southern area of Baton Rouge have proposed seceding from the city proper and incorporating into a new one to be called “St. George.” 

The movement began as an effort to create a new school district, but after the state legislature repeatedly mothballed its proposals — claiming that they could not approve an independent school district that was unaffiliated with a city — organizers shifted their energies to the creation of “St. George.” 

The new city would be the fifth largest in the state, with over 107,000 residents, and would include two of the largest tax revenue bases in the state: Perkins Rowe and the Mall of Louisiana. A study by the Baton Rouge Area Chamber concluded that Baton Rouge residents “will be disproportionately paying taxes to the proposed municipality,” given city governance’s reliance on sales tax revenues. 

If the succession were successful, the study claimed, it “could entail the dissolution of the present system of governance.”

But this is exactly what Jindal's plan to cut property taxes and raise sales taxes was intended to do:  shift the tax burden from the wealthy (with their wealth in property, stocks, and savings) and shift it to the poor (who have to pay sales taxes on everyday consumption).  The proposed St. George municipality would mean that Baton Rouge residents would be paying sales taxes at the shopping district in St. George, and all of the benefit would go to the resident of St. George.

But nobody dares call it "wealth redistribution" or anything.  And if Jindal has his way, all the state's income and corporate taxes would be replaced by sales taxes.  The plan backfired only because Republicans realized voters would have revolted if they went along with the plan.

The problem with St. George goes deeper than taxes, however.

The demographic shift the incorporation of “St. George” would create is almost as troubling as the economic difficulties. According to recent study on the demographic impact of Hurricane Katrina, the city of Baton Rouge accepted over 200,000 displaced New Orleans residents, the majority of whom were black and settled in the northern, urban parts of the city. 

The “St. George” proposal would create a poor, black, and urban Baton Rouge and a wealthy, white, and suburban “St. George.” Supporters of the new city brush off such complaints. “Typically, the only comments you hear are those that try to create fear,” one of the leaders of the movement, Norman Browning said. “They never support it with any documentation to make those claims.” 

He did not address any of the specifics of the Baton Rouge Area Chamber’s study.

Taxpayer money went to create the improvements in southern Baton Rouge for everyone in the region.  Now they want to take those improvements and tell "those people" to get the hell out.  That's the way it's worked in America for 400 years.

Last Call For The Jindal Solution

So remember after the 2012 elections when Louisiana GOP Gov. Bobby Jindal decided he was going to make himself a frontrunner for 2016 by pretending to be the "moderate voice of reason" that would lead the GOP out of the wilderness?  Among his seven suggestions last November for fixing the GOP:

Stop being the stupid party. It's time for a new Republican party that talks like adults. It's time for us to articulate our plans and visions for America in real terms. We had a number of Republicans damage the brand this year with offensive and bizarre comments. Enough of that.

That lasted, let's see, eight months.  Apparently Bobby's crash landed back in the badlands again with these offensive and bizarre comments.

Let’s stop defeating ourselves, get on offense, and go kick the other guys around. If you’ve followed the news over the past month, they are certainly asking for it. We are the conservative party in America — deal with it. We have a lot of dissenting voices. So what? Deal with it. The American public waxes and wanes. Fine. It will wax again soon enough. Deal with it, and start fighting for our principles instead of against them, so we can be in position to create the next wave.

At some point, the American public is going to revolt against the nanny state and the leftward march of this president. I don’t know when the tipping point will come, but I believe it will come soon.

Sure, because that worked so well for you in 2012, threatening to kick the other guys around.  And then we kicked your ass up and down the block, Roberto.

Because the left wants: The government to explode; to pay everyone; to hire everyone; they believe that money grows on trees; the earth is flat; the industrial age, factory-style government is a cool new thing; debts don’t have to be repaid; people of faith are ignorant and uneducated; unborn babies don’t matter; pornography is fine; traditional marriage is discriminatory; 32 oz. sodas are evil; red meat should be rationed; rich people are evil unless they are from Hollywood or are liberal Democrats; the Israelis are unreasonable; trans-fat must be stopped; kids trapped in failing schools should be patient; wild weather is a new thing; moral standards are passé; government run health care is high quality; the IRS should violate our constitutional rights; reporters should be spied on; Benghazi was handled well; the Second Amendment is outdated; and the First one has some problems too.

What we actually believe is that government can be a force for good, and it must be prevented from being a force for evil, but your small-minded worldview is exactly why most of us don't have very high opinions of the anti-science, anti-secular, Christian Taliban party.  See how this works?

Oh, and Josh Barro lays it out for you.

This is a big reason the Republican party can't change. So many of its members have a warped vision of what liberalism is. They think it's something so mind-bendingly awful that they cannot fathom how voters could willingly choose it. It must be some mistake. And sooner or later, mistakes get fixed.

And if those mistakes don't get fixed through voting means, well, maybe it's time to resort to other, more permanent, more violent measures.  It's always 1861 in someone's mind....

Bobby's World Is Falling Apart

No state was willing to go the route of full-blown GOP austerity for the 99% like Bobby Jindal's Louisiana.  His tax plan was the logical endpoint of Grover Norquist's wet dreams: the elimination of the state's income and corporate taxes, replaced by a massive hike in the state's sales tax.  And that would of course mean huge additional budget cuts in a state that had already made deep and damaging cuts to education through a voucher scheme to privatize schools and even shutting down a number of parish libraries.

But the people of Louisiana have finally had enough.  His tax plan to put the burden of the state's revenues on the poorest souls in a scheme that would almost certainly require even steeper sales tax hikes or more likely, massive new health care and education cuts in a state where both have been slashed by hundreds of millions of dollars already, all to give the state's richest a $25,000 tax cut each?

Dead on arrival.

Governor Bobby Jindal (R-LA), considered a leading presidential contender in 2016, is suffering a political meltdown in his home state. His approval rating plummeted to 38 percent in a poll last week by the non-partisan Southern Media Opinion & Research, down from 60 percent just a year ago. In an ominous sign for national Republicans, the immediate cause is a sweeping economic agenda with strong parallels to the House GOP’s latest budget.

On Monday, Jindal scrapped his own proposal to eliminate the state’s income and corporate taxes and replace them with a statewide tax on sales and business services. His retreat was a concession to the reality that the proposal was headed towards a humiliating defeat — and taking Jindal down with it along the way. Jindal said in a speech to lawmakers that the backlash against his plan “certainly wasn’t the reaction I was hoping to hear,” but that he would respect the public’s wishes and start again. 

Those ideas are now opposed by a majority of  Louisiana Republicans, because the math is brutal.  Jacking up the state sales tax from 4 to 7% on everything, including "business services" was going to take a huge chunk out of the hides of small businesses, and big corporations didn't have loopholes to hide behind anymore.  Meanwhile, the poorest Louisianans would have seen their taxes jump by hundreds of dollars, and the middle-class would have seen an even bigger tax hike.  Meanwhile, the richest state citizens could simply avoid paying any state taxes altogether by buying over the border in Texas, Arkansas, or Mississippi.  The resulting tax gap would have left the state short by billions, meaning more cuts or more hikes.

The left, right, and middle have revolted as a result, and Bobby Jindal's political career is, for the moment, as dead as his tax scam.