Liberty and Justice for All!

An article on nola.com says that Jindal returned to his former congressional district, giving a speech at the Airport Hilton in Kenner.

Problem. The Airport Hilton in Kenner is located in the second congressional district.

No wonder why I couldn’t get fair reporting when I ran for Congress in 2004. The T-P cannot even be bothered to check simple facts like this (and that I was actually a Democrat when I ran even though they reported that I was a Republican twice on their printed ballots).

Today the T-P had an interesting editorial from James Gill. It asked “When will voters see through Jindal?”.

Here is my response that I emailed him immediately after reading the article:

I have been wondering since 2004 when the media would start to see through Jindal. It is the fault of the media for failing to do its job that Jindal is able to get away with all he has gotten away with. Had the media done fact checking, they would have known that Jindal is a fraud, a hypocrite, and absolutely insincere when it came to ideas like “ethics reform” (or anything else for that matter)

Before blaming the voters, perhaps the Times Picayune should do some introspection and look back at the past reporting done on Jindal over the years. Many of the news articles written about him sound either like fluff peices or like campaign press releases. Your newspaper allowed Bobby Jindal to waltz into the Governors office without a hint of criticism or questioning.

I suggest you read this blog post I made after your paper endorsed Jindal for Governor.

http://www.jindalisbad.com/times-picayune-a-failure-in-fact-checking/

He lied about saving the healthcare system in Louisiana. He lied about bringing us our fair share of oil revenues. He lied about being supportive of ethics. And you guys not only let him do all those things, you published his lies as fact. And you wonder why the voters are not seeing through Jindal? The reason is because you helped create the monster in the first place! So before anyone on the Times Picayune blames the voters, they need to look inward and start blaming themselves first.

T-P ran an article about how Florida’s current healthcare plan is being criticized. Florida moved from a “fee for service” to a “fee for patient” plan and this is what Jindal and Levine (formerly in charge of Florida’s healthcare system and currently in charge of ours) wants for Louisiana. Criticisms of Florida’s healthcare plan is that it has caused a reduction of access to healthcare.

So on  February 15th, 2009, the T-P ran this article. On January 9th, 2008, I ran an article about how Bobby Jindal had set the bar low for Louisiana’s healthcare by picking Levine. I said then how people in Flordia lost access to healthcare because of what Levine did. Should there be any surprise that Levine was brought in to do similar changes to the Louisiana Health Care system? Why did it take the T-P over a year to come to the same conclusion?

And we should not forget that back when Jindal ran the Louisiana Department of Health, that one of the main reasons we dropped to dead last in national health rankings was because Jindal removed access to healthcare as well.

We should also not forget that under Jindal and Levine, that Louisiana has yet again dropped to being the state with the worst healthcare system.

The paper that endorsed Bush in 2000, made no endorsement in 2004, and has been a solid supporter of ultra-conservative Bobby Jindal has decided to endorse Barack Obama for President.

There are very few undecided voters in Louisiana. I am not sure what percentage of those voters based their decision on who the T-P endorses. So I doubt this will help Obama win Louisiana.

However, if anything, you should read the comments afterwards. Interesting to say the least.

It is time that the Times Picayune gave credit where credit is due. In it’s recent article (Demos vow to erase state share of levee cost) the Times Picayune reported that Bobby Jindal sponsored the legislation that allowed Louisiana to collect offshore oil royalties. This is factually incorrect. Bobby Jindal did sponsor legislation to get us a share of oil revenues and that bill passed the House. However, the Domenici-Landrieu bill was passed in the Senate, emerged from the conference committee unchanged, was passed by the House (in lieu of Jindal’s legislation) and was signed by the President. It was Mary Landrieu, and not Bobby Jindal, who got us a fairer share of oil revenues.

Their endorsement is laughable.

He spent three terms in the Louisiana House of Representatives and was elected to the state Senate last fall.

Yeah, why did he run for that again? Oh yeah, that’s right. He wanted to follow in Jindal’s footsteps by running for a job he had no intention of keeping, but being able to collect a paycheck from out tax dollars to run for office. So much for fiscal conservatism.

His experience in Baton Rouge would allow him to make a swift transition in Congress, which is particularly important as this area continues to recover from disaster.

Um, is the T-P writing from some alternate universe where the Republicans control congress? See, in my world the Democrats control Congress and the chances of Scalise being successful in getting legislation passed is slim to none. His “transition” will be slow and ineffective. Gilda Reed, on the other hand, would be able to work with members of her own party to get legislation passed for Southeast Louisiana. But I guess  I shouldn’t be surprised that the T-P endorsement panel, who have been fooled by previous candidates seeking their endorsement, have been fooled again.

He promises to fight for federal funding of so-called Category 5 hurricane protection and a fair share of offshore oil revenues for Louisiana, both of which are vital to the state.

Gilda Reed promises to do this, and would be MUCH more effective in doing so. If Category 5 hurricane protection and getting more of a fair share of our offshore oil revenues are both “vital”, then it makes more sense to elect the person who is more likely to get that legislation passed. That person is NOT Steve Scalise. That person is Gilda Reed. Period.

I also notice that T-P did not mention anything about Scalise and his anti-homosexual legislation. I wonder how likely Washington Democrats will be willing to work with the Gay Hating Embryo Lover Scalise. Actually, no I don’t wonder at all.

The T-P endorsement process is a pathetic joke and they seem to care more about not risking access to the people they think will win instead of actually supporting the right candidate who will do the better job.

Sound familiar? It should!

Update 1: And here is the fluff peice from the T-P. Oyster should love this quote from Jindal:

“We have literally passed the nation’s gold standard.”

Update 2: More media fluff. The New York Times, The Daily Advertiser, Sify, and again, the T-P are drinking the kool aid and praising Jindal for passing comprehensive ethics reform, something he did not do. Let’s look at T-P:

Gov. Bobby Jindal and the Legislature dealt the infamous Louisiana Way a substantial blow with the historic reforms coming out of the special session on ethics.

Really? So lets say a lobbyist wanted to spend $200 to wine and dine a legislator. This just means he has to go to 4 luches with him/her and not just 1. Is that a huge stride? I don’t think so. These are mostly “feel good” but “do nothing” laws that have no bite since we are not seeing how they will be enforced. And when your governor balks at increased transparency on his administration because he feels that investors should be able to meet with the governor in private (ahem.. back room deals… ahem), I fail to see how Louisiana is not operating under business as usual.

I don’t understand why so called “political experts” are shocked at the success that Barack Obama is having in southern states. He won South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama. It also looks like he will also win Louisiana. In a T-P article (announcing that he will be at Tulane on Thursday) they state:

Obama has shown unexpected strength in the South.

Let’s look at the numbers, shall we?

According to CNN exit polls in Georgia, a majority of the Democratic voters yesterday were black (52%), and a super-majority of those black voters (87.4%) voted for Barack Obama. (Only 2% of the voters in the Republican primary were black)

Compare that to the 2004 Georgia exit polls in the general election where only 25% of the overall vote in Georgia was from black voters.

Barack Obama winning Georgia in the 2008 general election? That would absolutely be unexpected. The southern strategy of Nixon and Reagan is alive and well. They know that there are a lot of racists in the south who do not like that the Democratic Party is actually… *gasp*… willing to treat black people as equals (the horror!). They target the old school “southern democrats” who split from the Democratic party after the Democrats pushed for civil rights.

However, Barack Obama getting success among current southern Democrats is hardly shocking at all. A large percentage of those voters are black voters who are likely to identify with Obama and who are excited at the potential to get the first black president. To suggest that Barack Obama’s success among current southern Democrats is “unexpected” shows a complete ignorance of the political landscape of the south.

Well, today is the first day of a long four years. Bobby Jindal will be inaugurated in what will most likely be a celebration of pipe dreams and hopes based on false praise of Jindal’s past “successes”.

In yesterday’s T-P, they continued their inability to find facts when it comes to their beloved Bobby Jindal. They cannot seem to help themselves. The first sentence starts off the spin:

Bobby Jindal, the immigrants’ son whose exemplary public service made him the wunderkind of Louisiana politics

Exemplary? I was unaware that not doing your job and collecting a paycheck is exemplary. See Bobby Jindal has missed many votes in Congress, going over a month between votes at times. Yet, he collected a paycheck. I was also unaware that cutting healthcare to the needy is also “exemplary”. The reason Bobby Jindal is the wunderkind of Louisiana politics is because hack newspaper editors, instead of grasping their duty to inform, decide to sell the garbage that Jindal and his campaign has distributed to them. If the T-P had a nose, it would be brown.

He will be Louisiana’s first non-white chief executive since post-Civil War Reconstruction and the first Indian-American to govern a U.S. state. 

Again, more failures of fact checking. Kris Kolluri served as Governor for a very short time. Jindal is the first elected Governor.

A former head of the Department of Health and Hospitals, Gov.-elect Jindal also can appreciate the importance of rebuilding a medical school in New Orleans to anchor a biomedical research park.

Why should Jindal appreciate anything about healthcare? He did not appreciate the fact that by closing clinics and removing access to medical services to those who need them that the state’s health ranking would drop. But hey, I have long since given up on the T-P and their ability to give something called the truth.

The state’s future will be shortchanged, however, if we fail to reverse our corrupt reputation. Gov.-elect Jindal plans to deliver on a campaign promise by strengthening the state’s weak ethics laws during a special session expected next month.

Of course he hasn’t shared the legislation he will push. He also has never mentioned that he will bring campaign finance reform and eliminate corporate contributions. Without closing that loophole, you won’t have true ethics reform. Of course, considering Bobby Jindal benefits from the loophole, I will not hold my breath.

Im sure there will be many cheers by the die hard supporters as Bobby “the wunderkind” Jindal and his wife “Suburban Supermom” Supriya stand there smiling for the cameras. But for some reason I keep expecting to hear Dark Helmet  exclaiming “fooled you“.

Cross posted at jindalisbad.com

Update 1: The January 17th T-P continues the lies about Bobby Jindal. Either that or they are doing some really good drugs.

Then-Rep. Jindal was instrumental in securing a share of federal offshore oil and gas revenues.

Wrong. Bobby Jindal fought for his bill to pass until he won the 2006 election. In doing so he fought against the Domenici-Landrieu bill (the actual bill that got signed by the President). Mary Landrieu, not Bobby Jindal, was instrumental in securing a share of federal offshore oil and gas revenues. Bobby Jindal only changed his mind once his 2006 race was over and there could be no risk of an opponent using his flawed bill against him.

In a recent letter to the editor, David Goldberg expounds on how wonderful America is for looking beyond race and embracing change. He uses the election of Bobby Jindal and the win in Iowa by Barack Obama. This is just laughable. Does anybody actualy believe that the kind of people who voted for Barack Obama are the same kind of people who voted for Bobby Jindal?

Ignoring my conspiracy theory I put up on YRHT that conservative independent voters could have came to the Obama camp to try and get the Democrat who is less likely to win the election the votes… people who would support Obama have no issue voting for a black person. The same cannot be said about  some of the people who would vote for Bobby Jindal.

The most amazingly ignorant comment made in this letter was this:

The theme is clear — a new generation does not look at color, race or even political ideology.

This cannot be further from the truth. First of all, if Bobby Jindal wasn’t an extremist woman hating social conservative, he would not have been embraced by the Republican party as much as he was. And had Bobby Jindal not lied about being a “born again Christian”, perhaps people in the north would not have voted for the Catholic Jindal.

What really ruins the quote is this story that I constantly tell because I am just shocked it actually happened. When I was campaigning for David Gereighty in the 2006 Congressional election (you know, the election that Bobby Jindal campaign for Governor in), we spoke to people in St. Tammany parish. Those wonderfully open minded people who David Goldberg feels are “leading our nation and our state into a different, and I hope better, direction”, told us that they would never vote for a Democrat because Democrats are a bunch of “N***ER LOVERS”. So you will forgive me if I lack the optimism David Goldberg has about voting trends in Louisiana and in our country as a whole.

It seems like David also thinks that Bobby Jindal is a breth of fresh air. How dirty is the air he is breathing now?