Rescuing Bobby Jindal From Media Floodwaters

As I'm sure you've heard, read, or seen by now, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal delivered a disastrous nationally televised speech in response to President Obama's first address to Congress. In what has become a media feeding frenzy, different aspects of Governor Jindal's speech have been picked apart and for additional comedic value or because it appears as though Jindal made various misleading distortions over the course of his speech. Meanwhile, Jindal's crack communications squad has reacted poorly to the various controversies by struggling to provide basic and consistent explanations to fairly fundamental media queries.

While I believe that there are more consequential lies within the speech delivered on Tuesday, the mainstream media has been particularly nosy about the story Jindal told about his presence in Sheriff Harry Lee's office during Katrina because it appears that the Governor made up the whole thing. His office basically admitted as much but has since changed their story several times since Wednesday. What could have been spun as an inconsequential exaggeration and immediately buried with little egg on the face has instead morphed into a week-long controversy that continues to undermine the governor's basic credibility as a professional.

I became extremely frustrated yesterday by the media's fixation on the Harry Lee lie, especially since I thought that his ridiculous distortion of the state of education in New Orleans, his inexplicable condemnation of volcano monitoring funds, and his hypocritical invocation of the nonexistent funding for a train from Las Vegas to Anaheim were several times more outrageous than the fibs used to embellish a largely tangential story.

But that's how it works. And besides, I've got some major news to break. I have obtained a copy of an alternative speech that Governor Jindal wrote instead of the now infamous McBreyer address. This version was ultimately rejected by Chief of Staff Timmy Teepell and Communications Director Melissa Sellers at the 11th hour. My highly trained show falcons retrieved the speech from dumpsters outside the governor's mansion in Baton Rouge. Much of the speech - congratulating Obama while highlighting his own biography - is the same. The middle part of the speech, however, is drastically different. I've provided the relevant clip from the original transcript and the rejected alternative follows below:

Republicans are ready to work with the new President to provide those solutions. Here in my state of Louisiana, we don't care what party you belong to if you have good ideas to make life better for our people. We need more of that attitude from both Democrats and Republicans in our nation's capital. All of us want our economy to recover and our nation to prosper. So where we agree, Republicans must be the President's strongest partners. And where we disagree, Republicans have a responsibility to be candid and offer better ideas for a path forward.

Today in Washington, some are promising that government will rescue us from the economic storms raging all around us.

Those of us who lived through Hurricane Katrina, we have our doubts.

Let me tell you a story.

During Katrina, I visited Sheriff Harry Lee, a Democrat and a good friend of mine. When I walked into his makeshift office I'd never seen him so angry. He was yelling into the phone: 'Well, I'm the Sheriff and if you don't like it you can come and arrest me!' I asked him: 'Sheriff, what's got you so mad?' He told me that he had put out a call for volunteers to come with their boats to rescue people who were trapped on their rooftops by the floodwaters. The boats were all lined up ready to go - when some bureaucrat showed up and told them they couldn't go out on the water unless they had proof of insurance and registration. I told him, 'Sheriff, that's ridiculous.' And before I knew it, he was yelling into the phone: 'Congressman Jindal is here, and he says you can come and arrest him too!' Harry just told the boaters to ignore the bureaucrats and start rescuing people.

There is a lesson in this experience: The strength of America is not found in our government. It is found in the compassionate hearts and enterprising spirit of our citizens. We are grateful for the support we have received from across the nation for the ongoing recovery efforts. This spirit got Louisiana through the hurricanes - and this spirit will get our nation through the storms we face today.

To solve our current problems, Washington must lead. But the way to lead is not to raise taxes and put more money and power in hands of Washington politicians. The way to lead is by empowering you - the American people. Because we believe that Americans can do anything.

And here is the alternative that got tossed just hours before the cameras went live:

Today in Washington, some are promising that government will rescue us from the economic storms raging all around us. Because of how poorly the last Republican administration went about the business of governing, Americans are intelligently looking to the Obama administration and the federal government for a different approach.

In reality, however, Americans aren't asking for that much. They're asking for a sleek, well-defined government capable of delivering basic services in an efficient, cost-conscious way. Conservatives like me believe that the best way to stimulate the economy is to streamline bloated federal bureaucracies and immediately pass the savings on to small businesses and individual Americans.

But we conservatives also understand why the Republican Party doesn't have your trust and I might have the best understanding of all.

You see, my state, Louisiana, was a tragic casualty of the last Republican administration's failed governance. I voted for the last President because I thought that he and his Congressional partners would halt self-perpetuating federal bureaucracies, cut spending, and pass the savings onto you. Instead, in attempting to untie the constraints of big government, the knot only got bigger and tighter. Instead of small government, what we got was bad government.

My fellow conservatives and I still believe in the strength of the individual and in the ideal of small government but what we must prove is that not only do we believe in effective government but we have a plan for delivering just that.

Let me tell you a story to illustrate my point.

During Hurricane Katrina, the federal government was no where to be found. Local and state bureaucracies were incapable of handling the fallout from the levee failures and the communicative disconnect between local and federal officials contributed to property loss, unnecessary suffering, and even the deaths of patriotic American citizens.

When push came to shove, it was the individual that saved the day. I look at the story of Kimberly Rivers Roberts and her family, the subjects of an academy award nominated documentary. When the flood waters were rising in her neighborhood, she looked after her neighbors as her husband Scott delivered them to high ground on nothing more than an old punching bag that was floating by. Then, she did what so many other patriots from Louisiana have done, she returned home with her family to help rebuild the community.

When you drive through New Orleans or around the areas most badly damaged by Hurricanes Katrina, Rita, Gustav, and Ike, it isn't the government that has come in to rebuild those areas. The real work has been done by individual citizens.

This underscores my commitment to conservative ideals. It is the strength of the American citizen that makes this country great not the size of our government.

But the story also offers a lesson that conservatives around the country must learn as I have - that we must have an efficient federal government and it must effectively deliver on what little it promises.

I opposed the stimulus bill not because I don't believe that the federal government has a role to play in rescuing us from these choppy financial waters. Rather, I opposed the stimulus bill because I believe that the borrow and spend policy is not the most effective way to reinvigorate the marketplace. Instead, by prudently cutting the bloated bureaucracies that contributed to the ineffective response to Hurricane Katrina, we can cut taxes to put money back in the pockets of working families.

I know that it may take time for the Republican party to earn credibility in the eyes of the American public. I know this because my home state and my home district were victimized by our own party's inability to resist the temptations of power. Governors and young congressmen have learned this lesson the hard way. That is why the Republican party is proud to present a new generation of leadership that understands the difference between small government and ineffective government. We will work to keep the Democratic majority honest by standing up for true conservative principles. If we succeed in helping Barack Obama streamline bloated bureaucracies we will have the credibility to argue for the savings to be passed onto you, the individual, instead of spend once more on creating yet another bloated bureaucracy.

...

Wouldn't that have been a way better argument for conservative ideals? Wouldn't that have been a better way to avoid substantive issues? Wouldn't that have avoided days and days of relentless ridicule?

It still distorts history and glosses inconvenient truths but sentences that come from the mouths of Republicans tend to do that - I'm just trying to stay true to the template.

How sad is it that someone who rejects conservative principles can write a better argument in favor of them than Melissa Sellers or Timmy Teepell?


--UPDATE--

Just obtained this email from Timmy Teepell to Ben Smith of Politico:

BS (as in Ben Smith),

Teeps here. You misinterpreted previous emails and phone calls from me and my colleague, the Selldawg. Please disregard and instead check out this liberal blogger BS (as in ?) from WCBF which explains exactly what the governor meant on Tuesday.

X's and O's,

T squared

Good times...

Question

If Governor Bobby Jindal believes that New Orleans schools have been "reinvented" post-Katrina sufficiently enough that he considers federal stimulus money for education in Louisiana to be wasteful spending but Congressman Joe Cao voted against the stimulus because apparently he believed it didn't include enough for schools, then what are we supposed to believe?

Jindal distorts own record in order to offer nothing to nation

After spending the day celebrating Mardi Gras, I took a peek at Obama's address to Congress and Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's response for the GOP.

Obama's speech was incredible, especially toward the end. Weaving the 'quitters' thing in from the story about the girl from South Carolina? Just beautiful.



Jindal's speech?

Ouch. He's getting put through the paces in the media for his creepy body language and pipsqueak delivery - and rightly so. He was horrendous. Absolutely awful.

To a certain extent you have to put it in context. I mean, what's the GOP response supposed to be after a 52 minute operatic masterpiece by a popular, pro-active commander-in-chief? No Republican in the nation would have been capable of saying anything remotely inspiring in that situation. Not one. That is a function several things - the GOP personality vacuum, the deserved unpopularity of the GOP brand for their 95% culpability in fostering our current dire circumstances, and the overall GOP strategic vision of opposing every good idea of the new President while offering no alternatives - but certainly you'd expect that the great last hope of the conservative fundamentalists would be able to offer something to the American people. He didn't because he couldn't - he has nothing to offer. Nor does the rest of his party. And it must begin crystallizing for conservatives of all stripes that they're going to have to radically alter their political priorities and target coalitions if they're ever to be seen as fit for national power ever again.

Here is a video of Governor Jindal's speech:




Conservative pundit David Brooks gets this:




But let's truly evaluate the lack of substance by looking at the transcript of the speech itself. It wasn't just the meek voice with which Jindal delivered them, it was the words themselves - and what they mean in juxtaposition to Obama's ambitious plans to make America a greater nation.

Jindal's speech lasts just over 2000 words. He doesn't discuss a single substantive policy until he's about 800 words in. He spends the beginning part of the speech introducing his own personal story as the son of immigrants from India. He makes some feint acknowledgment of the need for bipartisanship. And he inexplicably highlights a generic disposition against "government" by telling the story of the time that Republican President George W. Bush's pathetic administration failed to respond to Hurricane Katrina.

All anecdotes and platitudes that rang hollow.

Then he finally gets into a real-world issue by railing against the recently passed stimulus bill - the one that promises to invest in communities, create jobs, and lower taxes in the midst of an economic crisis. Calling the President's do-something approach "irresponsible," Jindal highlights his "different approach" in Louisiana and tosses out his ideas for repairing our economy.

Since I became governor, we cut more than 250 earmarks from our state budget. And to create jobs for our citizens, we cut taxes six times - including the largest income tax cut in the history of our state. We passed those tax cuts with bipartisan majorities. Republicans and Democrats put aside their differences, and worked together to make sure our people could keep more of what they earn. If it can be done in Baton Rouge, surely it can be done in Washington, DC.

To strengthen our economy, we need urgent action to keep energy prices down. All of us remember what it felt like to pay $4 at the pump - and unless we act now, those prices will return. To stop that from happening, we need to increase conservation ... increase energy efficiency ... increase the use of alternative and renewable fuels ... increase our use of nuclear power - and increase drilling for oil and gas here at home. We believe that Americans can do anything - and if we unleash the innovative spirit of our citizens, we can achieve energy independence.

To strengthen our economy, we also need to address the crisis in health care. Republicans believe in a simple principle: No American should have to worry about losing their health coverage - period. We stand for universal access to affordable health care coverage. We oppose universal government-run health care. Health care decisions should be made by doctors and patients - not by government bureaucrats. We believe Americans can do anything - and if we put aside partisan politics and work together, we can make our system of private medicine affordable and accessible for every one of our citizens.

To strengthen our economy, we also need to make sure every child in America gets the best possible education. After Katrina, we reinvented the New Orleans school system - opening dozens of new charter schools, and creating a new scholarship program that is giving parents the chance to send their children to private or parochial schools of their choice. We believe that, with the proper education, the children of America can do anything. And it should not take a devastating storm to bring this kind of innovation to education in our country.

To strengthen our economy, we must promote confidence in America by ensuring ours is the most ethical and transparent system in the world. In my home state, there used to be saying: At any given time, half of Louisiana is under water - and the other half is under indictment. No one says that anymore. Last year, we passed some of the strongest ethics laws in the nation - and today, Louisiana has turned her back on the corruption of the past. We need to bring transparency to Washington, DC - so we can rid our Capitol of corruption ... and ensure we never see the passage of another trillion dollar spending bill that Congress has not even read and the American people haven't even seen.

First, he highlights some cursory reductions in earmark spending and his deficit-fanning tax cuts. That's fine.

Then he prioritizes an interesting plan to cut energy costs. Whereas Obama wants to invest in weatherization, renewable and alternative energy, and conservation, Bobby Jindal also indicates a willingness to invest in energy independence. The difference is that Barack Obama just passed a stimulus bill - the one that Jindal vehemently opposes - that would specifically invest in renewable energy research and home weatherization programs. Jindal cites the high gas prices that no longer exist due to this crippling recession as evidence that we need to provide more giveaways to oil and gas companies for more offshore drilling.

Next, Jindal addresses healthcare accessibility. This was a big part of Obama's speech. The President has promised that healthcare reform will be a priority for this year, because access to healthcare is a human right and because the rising cost of care is kneecapping small businesses. Jindal is light on the details himself, saying only that he opposes a single-payer state system. While I believe in single-payer myself, it is seemingly certain that the Obama plan for universal healthcare will be a public-private partnership. So not much substance from the GOP here.

Then he highlights his record on education policy - I'll get to this later.

Jindal closes the policy portion of the speech by calling for ethics and transparency in Washington, which is kind of silly given the strident standards that President Obama imposed immediately upon taking office and absolutely dumbfounding given the unabashed corruption epidemic within Bush's Republican administration and the GOP Congress.

The rest of the speech is a half-assed mea culpa for the GOP in which he pledges that his party will regain the trust of the nation.

How about some actual policies and ideas?

--

Here is what Jindal said about education:

To strengthen our economy, we also need to make sure every child in America gets the best possible education. After Katrina, we reinvented the New Orleans school system - opening dozens of new charter schools, and creating a new scholarship program that is giving parents the chance to send their children to private or parochial schools of their choice. We believe that, with the proper education, the children of America can do anything. And it should not take a devastating storm to bring this kind of innovation to education in our country.

This is, simply put, a total distortion of not just of what is going on in New Orleans schools but also his own role in implementing the policies he highlights. He does this all in once sentence somehow.

"We reinvented the New Orleans school system..."

By this I believe he's referring to the effective dissolution of the Orleans Parish School Board and the creation of the state-run Recovery School District to take temporary receivership of public school management in New Orleans after Katrina. For one, the decision was made and implemented before Jindal was governor. In fact, it was former governor Kathleen Blanco who created the RSD, hired Paul Pastorek to head the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, and brought in Paul Vallas to manage the RSD itself. For two, nobody aside from the cheerleaders from within the system's administration is anywhere close to declaring any kind of victory in what is an ongoing and contentious experiment.

"...opening up dozens of new charter schools..."

It is true that the RSD has outsourced the management of many schools to charter organizations (also under Governor Blanco, not Jindal). But the sentence might be misinterpreted in indicate that the school system in New Orleans is back online. In fact, the long-term RSD plan is to shutter schools.

The reality is that school facilities in New Orleans are in horrible disrepair. While the RSD's facilities master plan will bring some new schools and renovations online within the next few years, GOP opposition to the stimulus actually killed school building money that would have accelerated school facilities construction in New Orleans in a real and measurable way.

The students at George Washington Carver High School in the 9th Ward still attend class in temporary FEMA-issued portable units behind chain-link fences in bright orange uniforms.

Meanwhile, this is the state of the Morris FX Jeff school in Mid City:



This picture is from over a year ago when neighbors organized to get this school repaired by the RSD, but I can assure you that the building looked the same or worse when I walked past it on Saturday on my way to the Endymion parade. This is precisely the type of building that could have been renovated had Jindal and other GOP "leaders" not been so petulant in reaction to a stimulus bill that promised to actually help people and communities around the country. And this wild post-disaster public education experiment is Bobby Jindal's crowning achievement in education policy?

"...new scholarship program..."

This part is true. Some local Democratic legislators sold out and capitulated on a school voucher program that diverts public resources away from needy public schools. But he can this one if he wants.

The bottom line is that I don't think Bobby Jindal wants to spend too much time touting his record on education. I haven't even mentioned his enthusiastic endorsement of teaching creationism in science classes.

--

I've noticed how the GOP stars have been aligning for Bobby Jindal's ascendancy to a roll as a national leader of the Party. But all that was predicated on their belief that he was capable of showing Americans that Republicans had some sort of practical vision, some policy ideas that could maybe resonate down the road when political conditions improve. Looks like they could be heading back to the drawing board on that one.

Cao: New Orleans Shafted!

Given how little we know about precisely how the stimulus will work around the nation, to start making job projections for individual Congressional districts seems silly, more so when one realizes that so much of that the allocation of much of each state's haul is still up for negotiation between governors and legislatures.

So I wouldn't get too indignant about the details of this article in today's Times-Picayune. The problems in New Orleans are so vast that a more direct infusion of federal attention is to be expected, and it is highly unlikely that more stimulus money would have been procured at the cost of special attention later.

Nonetheless, Joe Cao would have you believe that the real reason he voted against the stimulus package was that it didn't include enough jobs for the 2nd Congressional, which does indeed rank last on the Obama administration's estimate of jobs created or saved per district. On Monday, he unveiled this line in an op-ed penned to the Times-Picayune. Yesterday, he was flogging this talking point at a joint event held with Steve Scalise at the Port of New Orleans.

However, we know very well that the jobs per district number is misleading. More useful would be a calculation of jobs per capita or per 100,000 residents. The 2nd Congressional district lost a huge percentage of its population as a result of, well, you know.

But that's not really the important point.

The questions I have are:

Where the hell was Joseph Cao when the stimulus bill was being written?

Was he on the phone daily between the Regional Planning Commission, the Regional Transit Authority, the City of New Orleans, the Recovery School District, the State Department of Transportation and Development, and the Port of New Orleans?

Was he talking to traditional friends of New Orleans in Congress like Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, Judicial Committee Charmian John Conyers, Committee on Education and Labor Chair George Miller, or Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus Barbara Lee?

Was he working with other fiscally conservative moderates who were working on maximizing returns for Louisiana and New Orleans like Rep. Charlie Melancon or Senator Mary Landrieu?

Did he try to leverage his highly coveted vote as a Republicam moderate to try to win extra spending on projects important to his district? The Democrats were bending over backward to try to get some GOP support. Did Joseph Cao try to use that?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Cao went the other way. He didn't put the pressure on Democrats to tailor the bill to help his residents.

He got pressured by conservative wing nut Republicans. He's alternatively had Newt Gingrich, Steve Scalise, Eric Cantor, and others whispering into his ears while stepping on his feet.

Take this revelation from the Politico:

He told reporters an hour or two before the vote that he was strongly considering a vote in favor of the stimulus measure after rejecting an earlier version – “At this point, I’m leaning ‘yes,’ but I’m not absolutely certain.” He reasoned that his heavily Democratic district could use the money with many of his constituents still struggling to rebound from Hurricane Katrina.

Beforehand, Cao acknowledged that Republican leaders had put “pressure” on him to oppose the package, and the party’s chief deputy whip, California Rep. Kevin O. McCarthy, stood near Cao during the entire vote.

“They encouraged me to vote ‘no,’ but they understand the needs of my district,” Cao said.

Does Joseph Cao understand the needs of this district?

Something tells me that the deregulation/kill government/fundamentals are strong/let'em drown crowd doesn't understand the needs of this district AT ALL. Nobody representing the leadership of the Republican Party has any credibility to talk about the needs of New Orleans.

So Joe Cao better decide quickly who precisely he's representing.

Seeking, Buffering: GOP strategy @ 48.8 bps

Some interesting leaks this weekend regarding GOP strategy as it relates to stimulus, Obama, and Congressional Democrats.

1. Elana Schor documents GOP triangulation against Pelosi and Reid.

But don't tell Republicans that it's Obama's stimulus plan they're rejecting. GOPers are subtly aiming to capitalize on two very different numbers: the Democratic Congress' sub-30% approval rating and Obama's impressive 64% approval.

"The problem lies squarely with congressional Democrats," House Republican Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) told reporters after the vote. "My conversation with the president was clear; he said, 'it's the Speaker [Pelosi] and the Leader [Reid] running these chambers, they have the ability to control this process.'"

2. Rep. Cantor is the real leader of the House Republicans these days. He's been considered a rising star for some time and his name was bandied about when John McCain was looking at potential running mates this past summer. Now, as head whip, he's really started to realize his influence on GOP politics. He's BFF with Newt Gingrich and they talk on the phone several times a week about the latest sitcoms and dramas.

You can start to see a new generation of leadership crystallizing around some of the organizing and messaging principles laid out by Newt Gingrich since 2006ish. I've tracked this on and off since the election but it's worth bringing full-circle. Gingrich and Bobby Jindal are clearly cozy and the two employ a very similar rhetoric about "solutions." Gingrich also not-so-quietly supported Michael Steele's campaign for the GOP Chairmanship. And now the Gingrich protege Eric Cantor represents the 'anointed one' in Congress.

Watch those four names very closely: Cantor, Gingrich, Jindal, and Steele. I'm curious to see who else is looking to do business with master Newt.

3. Getting back to point 1, Josh Marshall interprets Elana's digging:

In fact, it even goes deeper than this. As Elana noted yesterday, the plan of the congressional GOP -- to the degree they have one -- is to faux cozy up to Obama and say that they both face a common foe in the Democratic Congress. The idea being that since "Congress" is really unpopular they can run against Congress.

But there's a very big problem with this strategy above and beyond the absurdity of the argument. "Congress" may be really unpopular. And the Democrats now control Congress. But politics is a zero sum game. At the end of the day, in almost every case, you've got to pick a Republican or a Democrat when you vote. And if you look at the numbers, congressional Democrats are pretty popular. And congressional Republicans are extremely unpopular. If you look at the number, the Dems are at about 50% or higher in most recent polls, while the GOP is down in the 30s.

From my armless chair, I trace a lot of this weekend's recalibration as it relates to interpreting GOP strategy to Andrew Sullivan's reaction to overall GOP tactics related to the stimulus vote and the Gregg withdrawal.

Their clear and open intent is to do all they can, however they can, to sabotage the new administration (and the economy to boot). They want failure. Even now. Even after the last eight years. Even in a recession as steeply dangerous as this one.

I think an abundance of disbelief related to Andrew's dark assessment has caused a lot of pundits to convince themselves of a contrived GOP triangulation against Congressional Democrats.

The GOP is really just kind of using a stumble upon strategy, reevaluating their position at the end of every tactically-contrived media cycle.

Maybe they have indeed come up with a medium-term plan to work against Pelosi and Reid in lieu of Obama. But this is most certainly NOT something that the wingnut base is going to endorse.

4. And for all the stories about the death of bipartisanship and the unpatriotic GOP war of insurgency, there's this from Arlen Spector:

"When I came back to the cloak room after coming to the agreement a week ago today," said Specter, "one of my colleagues said, 'Arlen, I'm proud of you.' My Republican colleague said, 'Arlen, I'm proud of you.' I said, 'Are you going to vote with me?' And he said, 'No, I might have a primary.' And I said, 'Well, you know very well I'm going to have a primary.'"

Specter, along with centrist Maine Republican Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, joined with Democrats last week to move the stimulus bill forward. Specter said he doubted there would be any more Republican votes than those three Friday night.

"I think there are a lot of people in the Republican caucus who are glad to see this action taken without their fingerprints, without their participation," he said.

Specter was asked, How many of your colleagues?

"I think a sizable number," he said. "I think a good part of the caucus agrees with the person I quoted, but I wouldn't want to begin to speculate on numbers."

Now Arlen has a certain way of making a tactical lie seem like refreshing candor but it's worth taking note. I wonder how this changed the printout coming from the Marshall and Sullivan Megapolitics3000 supercomputer.

---

So basically I think that Obama needs to continue doing exactly what he's been doing as far as political strategy is concerned. It's amazing how often I'll read thousands of words from people freaking out left, right, and center and ultimately conclude that Barack Obama's game plan is generally the right way to proceed. Pick the issue, reach out to skeptical parties, make a couple of changes, pass the law.

Late to the party (Cowing to the Party Update)

Update: Uh-oh! Flip-Flop! Cao says no to jobs, schools, roads, and levies for his own district. So much for yesterday's playful explanation of his intention to vote yea on stimulus:

"The GOP leadership, they fully understand my situation and the needs of my district, " [Cao] said.

Scalise, the assistant Republican whip, laughed when asked whether it was his responsibility to keep Cao in line, adding that a few Republican defections are to be expected.

Joked Cao, "Steve Scalise doesn't know kung fu. I know kung fu. He can't whip me."

So just how did Congressman Scalise 'whip' the rookie Cao into dis-understanding the needs of his district?

Does this mean Joseph Cao's honeymoon is over now?

---

Original post

Congressman Cao's noble pledge to vote for the stimulus bill on his second-go-round with the legislation is like sneaking your name onto someone else's gift at an office birthday party after the present has already been opened.

Not an office guy myself, but I'm confident in the analogy.

"I'm voting along what my conscience dictates and the needs of the 2nd Congressional District dictate, even if I were to be the only member of the GOP to vote for the stimulus package, " he said.

"Even though it is going to be a humongous bill, even though we will be in debt for years, I believe that more likely than not, I will vote for it because the 2nd Congressional District needs a stimulus package."

The Times-Picayune's Jonathan Tilove certainly doesn't get in the way of Cao's self-congratulation.

In fact, Cao was totally MIA when this bill was being crafted. He did absolutely nothing to articulate the needs of the district and was not properly engaged with the detailed plans of various municipal and state agencies. He did not leverage his vote to try and get money for schools, roads, public transit, or energy infrastructure. He voted 'no' when it counted, when his vote would have meant something in terms of the structure of the bill. Then, he was in lock-step with his obstructionist, do-nothing, Hooverite brethren.

And it cost the city of New Orleans.

I've been doing a lot of heavy examination behind the scenes of how various state and municipal agencies collaborated with our Congressional delegation, national organizations, and with the Obama transition team. I'm trying to work it all into one big picture but there are many layers. I promise results soon.

Suffice it to say, we could have used some real representation in the House. I'm not sure Bill Jefferson would have been appreciably better but he at least would have tried.

I'm glad to see Cao is voting for the stimulus now but the Congressman from the most devastated city in the nation needs to bring more to work than a lunch box and a 'yea' vote. Legislate, my good man. Legislate.

More of this please

TPM highlighted this speech as especially good.

If you've been as bummed out by the media's handling of the stimulus debate as I've been, then you'll appreciate the pick me up.

Is this like that bully pulpit I've heard so much about?

Links Purge

1. James Gill takes no prisoners in commentary on the Pope and Archbishop Hughes.

2. Interesting passage from David Hammer's article on the Road Home:

The LRA has begun lobbying Congress for the right to move leftover Road Home money into other projects, rather than having to pay it back to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. LRA board members have expressed interest in using the surplus to help finance Louisiana State University's proposed hospital near downtown New Orleans.

Hmm. Which LRA board member(s) might have floated that ridiculous trial balloon? And why?

3. I've continued to conduct research into the various strategies employed by different state and municipal agencies to get money for Louisiana and New Orleans from the big federal stimulus bill. A few weeks ago I highlighted this article about what lobbyists were doing to get spending approved for their clients to contrast Bobby Jindal's early intention to submit a very bare-bones ask for Louisiana. Following up on that, read this from TPM about an earmark for the "clean" coal lobby.

The stuff I've been hearing and reading about Louisiana strategy has been absolutely fascinating, IMO. I can't wait to distill it down for you. Give it time.

What Is Bill Cassidy Saying?

The House version of the stimulus bill passed yesterday and included something in the order of $5 billion for the state of Louisiana. Big chunks of that are going to go toward state highway projects and existing Army Corps projects.

I'm also happy to report that Louisiana schools will see a big infusion of funding.

There will be some help for our public transit system, but nothing in the order of what the RPC and the City proposed. This is regrettable given the needs here but considering how little advance planning officials did in anticipation of this stimulus money, Louisiana came away with a respectable haul with perhaps the least amount of Congressional support out of any state in the country. Besides Charlie Melancon and Mary Landrieu, the Louisiana Congressional delegation has tried to obstruct the flow of money to our state. Not one Louisiana House Republican crossed over to support the bill and Vitter has positioned himself as the most belligerent and reactionary member of the Senate.

Congressman Bill Cassidy of the 6th Congressional District had an interesting rationale for his nay vote yesterday. Try to wrap your mind around this.

Cassidy voted against a massive stimulus bill that would send checks to working families, build infrastructure, and cut business taxes because...

A better bill, Cassidy said, "would focus on providing tax relief for working families and small businesses and strengthening our infrastructure."

Wow, what a stickler for progressive principles! I agree, this bill should have had more infrastructure spending and more tax relief for working class families. Who said Don Cazayoux would have been a better Congressman?

House Passes Stimulus

Not one Republican crossed over to support the bill. Nice to see the GOP coming out 100% against job creation, tax cuts, and infrastructure improvements. That's right the caucus voted against tax cuts.

Louisiana tally:

Yeas: Melancon

Nays: Cao, Boustany, Cassidy, Alexander, Fleming, and Scalise

Stimulus: Crossing Our Fingers

I've tried to stay on top of the New Orleans implications of the big federal stimulus bill being negotiated in Congress. When I last broached the topic, I discussed the competing asks coming from the state and municipal levels.

Under a directive from Governor Bobby Jindal, the Department of Transportation and Development released an approximately $1.4 billion plan that is almost entirely comprised of major highway expansion projects outside of Orleans Parish. DOTD Secretary Ankner is on the record saying that the state is really only expecting to receive something in the ballpark of $400 million from the feds.

That's not very much money at all, and almost none of it would go to New Orleans, you know, the place with the most crippling infrastructure needs in the United States of America.

But as it turns out, New Orleans has come up with it's own ask. I alluded to the competing plan by the Regional Planning Commission, Regional Transit Authority, and the City of New Orleans.

Here are some more details:

Total ask: $6.3 billion
Estimated "shovel ready" spending for 2009: just under $1 billion.

First up is public transportation, where we request a total of half a billion dollars,

This portion of the draft document proposes seven streetcar projects, including:

-extending the Carrolton ave. line to connect to the Canal st. line
-extending the riverfront line to Jackson Avenue, building a new line north along Jackson Ave to St. Charles
-extending the riverfront line to Poland Avenue, building a new line along Poland from the river to St. Claude
-building new line to link union passenger terminal to Canal
-new line from Canal to Elysian Fields along N. Rampart and then from N. Rampart to the river along Elysian Fields
-a new line along convention center boulevard
-a new line connecting Canal all the way to Poland Ave, perhaps extending the proposed line along N. Rampart all the way down St. Claude

Also there is several tens of millions of dollars in spending proposed to build Bus Rapid Transit lines from the CBD to N.O. East and Algiers as well as for shelters, new buses, kiosk technology, etc. etc.

Then there's what is known as 'infrastructure resilience' spending, which actually comprises close to half of the city's total request. This includes an ask of $2.5 billion to supplement efforts to replace our sewer lines and pipes and half a billion to bury electrical and telephone wires.

Another section details our requests for regional rail spending, about $1.2 billion. There's a 450,000,000 request for a light rail line from downtown New Orleans to the airport. The city also proposes high speed rail connections to Baton Rouge, Mobile, Lafayette, Lake Charles, Hattiesburg, and Meridian.

Then there's just over a billion dollars proposed for "pedestrian enhancements" like new sidewalks, curbs, gutters improved drainage systems, street lights, trees, crosswalks, etc.

What else?

$120,000,000 for airport improvements
$240,000,000 for road repaving in Orleans Parish
$65,000,000 for bicycle infrastructure

Of course, all amounts are approximated and project details are heavily annotated.

But after a quick browse, it's a pretty solid package. I'm not sure what's "shovel ready" for 2009 but it's not hard to imagine how helpful these projects would be for our short, medium, and long term regional health.

Just think if all we got funded out of this was half of the proposed streetcar lines and half of the proposed sewer replacements. Even that would be an extremely significant, if not a game-changing investment.

I'd been wondering why it was that the city of New Orleans and the RPC were putting out a plan that would compete with the state plan, why the DOTD plan didn't just include our region's requests.

It turns out that this was by design - as a result of lobbying by the Mayor - to counteract what might happen if states were not given strict guidelines on how to allocate federal money. This was something discussed within the US Conference of Mayors, so I don't mean to insinuate that Nagin just invented the strategy out of thin air.

In fact, it would appear that the USCM thinks that a lot of the infrastructure money in the stimulus bill can and will be funnelled directly to cities and regional planning organizations through existing programs like CDBG.

--

I have also heard from a couple of different sources that, to a significant extent, the amount of stimulus money allocated for New Orleans depends on the lobbying efforts of folks like Karen Carter Peterson and Desiree Glapion Rogers instead of the Louisiana Congressional Delegation.

My question now is why our Congressional Delegation isn't up to bat for us. Is it just because New Orleans doesn't have political clout within our state delegation? Or is it because Congress in general isn't actually doing much "earmarking" of the package?

I have some theories but I'd like to know what you guys think...

Lobbyists Get the Memo

No "pork" in the stimulus bill means no "pork" in the stimulus bill.

"Somebody's going to earmark it somewhere,"

Something for New Orleans to keep in mind.

That's Right, Butter Him Up

New Orleans making its case for a fair share of the stimulus.

Infratructure and You: City v. State

Following up from earlier...

Bobby Jindal was early proponent of a possible infrastructure stimulus package. Here's what he had in mind in December:

At a news conference before leaving for the Philadelphia meeting, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said he would like to see more federal investment in coastal restoration projects, barrier island recovery efforts and the project to close the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet. He also listed hurricane protection and levee projects in Jean Lafitte and the restoration of a Charity Hospital medical complex in New Orleans as priorities.

"There are literally billions of dollars that can be pushed through the pipeline that have already been allocated by Congress that have yet to come to our communities, that have yet to come to our state, " Jindal said, before leaving for the summit with Obama.

"I think it's unprecedented for a newly elected president to sit down with Democratic and Republican governors, " Jindal said. "We're going to have the opportunity to share with him what's going on in our states and make some recommendations to his administration so they can hit the ground running."

The Times-Picayune made it seem as if Jindal would be making hurricane protection and coastal restoration the centerpiece of Louisiana's ask. We also know that the funding shortfall for the LSU/VA hospital development is a big priority.

Jindal has remained in control of the state's stimulus strategy. He held a press conference announcing the state's priorities last weekend. The article only briefly summarizes what might be in Louisiana's request but there are some interesting things to infer. For one, many of the things that Jindal has put on the table are not actual infrastructure projects. In no order, some examples of that from the article include:

- aid to farmers who experiences losses from Hurricanes Gustav and Ike

- "removal of red tape for local governments negotiating with [FEMA]"

- "changes to the Medicaid financing formula for states affected by disasters"

For flood protection, the article alludes to the Governor's desire to address the issue but the only concrete measure that gets fleshed out is the long-requested rule change that would mandate the Army Corps to use materials collected from dredging for existing coastal restoration projects.

-

So what is actually concrete?

Highways. We can build highways.

"I'll make the case that projects like I-49 north should be a priority for his administration.

I will personally be advocating to President-elect Obama that this project be included in the stimulus package that the federal government is hoping to get done by Jan. 20 at the latest next year."

In fact, the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development has been hard at work in anticipation of a federal infrastructure bill since summer.

DOTD started compiling a list in August - three months before the presidential election - because "I assumed that whoever was elected president was going to have to do something like this," Ankner said. "But I didn't think it was going to be this big."

Because of DOTD's planning, it was one of the first states to submit a proposal and one of only three states that included a separate plan for improving ports and airports, too.

The list of projects comes out to a price tag of $1.314 billion. But Secretary Ankner is setting lower expectations:

“I think $400 million is a good number for us to think about,” Ankner said.

We know that finishing the I-49 project around Shreveport and renovating I-12 and I-10 around Baton Rouge are major state priorities. In the metro area, we know that there are projects already underway on I-10 in Jefferson Parish that have made it on the list. What's going to be left over for New Orleans?

If you browse the actual DODT list, next to nothing. Though measures improving highways in Jefferson Parish will have a direct impact on Orleans Parish, the absence of money for New Orleans is striking. There's $7 million proposed for improving an access road at Louis Armstrong International and $10 million proposed for improving the Crescent City Connection ferry terminals. The DOTD also proposes spending $30 million to help the RTA do "preventative maintenance."

Part of the issue, I suppose, is that only a small percentage of the projects in the city are "shovel-ready." The Obama administration apparently favors projects where construction can begin immediately and be completed within the next 2-3 years. This, they say, will maximize the extent to which federal spending stimulates economic growth over the short term.

I've argued that those strings shouldn't be attached when it comes to allocating resources to New Orleans because of the last administration's broken promises and our city's sobering list of imminent needs. Given the political opportunity, it makes sense to approach the infrastructure stimulus as an opportunity to secure money that might not be available at any other time. Whatever limits the Congress or the President want to attach to how that money is allocated by local officials are more than fine with me. The important thing is getting the money through Congress, especially since it isn't at all clear when or if New Orleans might get its own turn at the top of the docket or if there will be any political will to allocate resources when or if that time comes.

In fact, I have recently learned that New Orleans, the Regional Planning Commission, and the RTA are indeed drafting their own list of smart-growth transportation infrastructure projects totalling a very large number. It will be very interesting to see how the Louisiana Congressional delegation reconciles competing lists.

Other state agencies will be submitting their own recommendations for stimulus dollars. We should be careful to monitor those also.

I don't like this process at all. There is very little information in the public domain and it doesn't seem like the local professional media is particularly curious.

Am I overstating the local implications of the stimulus? Why isn't all of this a much bigger deal in the papers?

Infratructure and You: Stimulating Strategies

I've been interested in the Louisiana implications of the mega economic stimulus package currently being negotiated in Congress. I think it's a very very big deal and believe it's something to which we need to be paying better attention.

When was the last time the federal government sunk so much money into infrastructure projects?

Louisiana and especially New Orleans have incredible infrastructure needs that directly impact the basic premise of 'recovery.' If this state doesn't quickly reimagine it's transportation and hurricane protection blueprint, arguments for rebuilding hinging on long and medium term economic viability go completely out the window. SE Louisiana simply will not remain a sustainable place in which to invest (whether we're talking about starting a business or purchasing a home) unless some of our major infrastructure flaws are fixed. The case for levees is indisputable. To a certain extent, even our social needs (housing, literacy, health care, education, criminal justice reform) are more easily understood. Less often articulated are our needs related to sewerage, the power grid, regional rail, and municipal transit - other areas in which SE Louisiana remains far behind other metropolitan competitors.

It has been many years since these types of projects have been on the table in Washington. This is a rare opportunity. It is not obvious to me that Louisiana will have many other chances to come away with globs of money as sizable as what might be possible right now. Barack Obama made some campaign promises on Gulf Coast Recovery but I'm not sensing much Congressional urgency in terms of allocating additional resources this way. The President has said that there will be no pork projects in this stimulus bill. But if there's a little extra money sprinkled into Louisiana for projects critical to issues of hurricane recovery and basic regional sustainability (and therefore, national security), well I don't see why we have to call that pork. It's not as if Congressman Cao and Senator Vitter are negotiating an extra $2 million allocation for the New Orleans Madam Museum. We're the poorest city in the poorest state in the poorest region and then we got hit with a bunch hurricanes and a federal flood. We need and deserve a little extra attention. That's how progressive values work.

So what is Louisiana's strategy for shaking loose that extra coin?

More later.

New Orleans and the Obama Administration: We Won't Receive What We Don't Ask For

Deon Roberts of the City Business blog tossed out an interesting concept for a blog post recently where he examined who was to blame for the slow pace of New Orleans' recovery.

(I've never met Deon Roberts, I've heard that he's a great guy and was a decent reporter when he stayed on beat, but his blog leaves a lot to be desired. He never seems to actually analyze or interpret, he just pastes quotes from articles and summarizes.)

Anyway, in his two part post, Roberts introduces quotes from different local and federal officials blaming each other for the slow pace of recovery.

Though the quotes apply to specific recovery-related programs, it's worthwhile to consider them in the context of the big picture because I think we can create some pretty interesting hypotheses to explain the different layers of our recovery's slowness.

On one hand, you have Doug O'Dell, the Federal Recovery Czar. The AP summarized his view of things: (emphasis mine)

The Bush administration says more than $126 billion has been earmarked for Gulf Coast rebuilding following the 2005 hurricanes. Retired Maj. Gen. Doug O'Dell, who began in the job earlier this year, said he never believed the pace of recovery was about lack of resources and he said Thursday he couldn't identify any need for additional federal funds immediately.

Mayor Nagin, on the other hand, recently ordered FEMA officials out of his office: (emphasis mine)

"I had FEMA in my office yesterday and almost, kind of, threw them out," the mayor said. "They're just not aggressively helping us."

Mayor Nagin is correct that FEMA has routinely shortchanged the city for different recovery-related reimbursements. But let's also recall how our local state and municipal governments have tended to prioritize economic development over recovery. (Using CDBG money on the LSU/VA project and Reinventing the Crescent instead of for affordable housing or main street redevelopment, for instance.)

But let's see if we can zoom out a little bit.

The quotes are indicative of the long-standing disconnect between local and federal officials dating back to the storm itself. Our local officials have tended to blame the slow pace of recovery on federal red tape. Federal officials, in turn, put it back on the laps of local officials, claiming that funds have been approved and are ready to be spent.

Our local officials complain about FEMA shortchanging reimbursements for things like the rehabilitation of Charity and for slowing down the blight removal process, etc. Federal officials point the mirror back at state officials for the failure to do things like build Katrina Cottages or quickly distribute money through the Road Home program.

I'm sure one could parse out who's right and who's wrong about reimbursements and existing aid programs, etc. But would solving these typical complaints about the programs that were designed to address short term rebuilding do anything for our long term recovery?

Even if local and federal officials were working harmoniously to make these programs hum, would New Orleans' long term prospects be appreciably less pessimistic?

I'm not so sure. It would seem to me that if FEMA capitulated to all of Mayor Nagin's reimbursement requests, the only things that would be different would be the estimate for Charity and the speed with which FEMA agrees to repay for other demolitions. That would give us half of a hospital that local officials don't want to rebuild anyway and a bunch more empty lots.

Let's also go back to O'Dell's apparent inability to identify the need for any more immediate additional federal funds. One could take a look at his statement and think that he must be disengaged and unaware of our community's needs. However, I don't think that's the case. Recall his poignant criticism of the leadership of Mayor Nagin and Ed Blakely from last August. His position has been consistent - that until the city and state can intelligently spend what has already been allocated, then the federal government will not distribute additional funds.

(You may disagree with the Bush administration's decision to take a hands-off approach to local recovery failures, but that policy has been remarkably consistent. Replacing Blanco with Jindal did not appreciably alter federal policy, for instance.)

The problem seems to be that our local officials don't know what kind of help to ask for.

The argument that the federal government is failing Louisiana would be a lot more credible if local officials had a long list of things that the federal government was refusing to fund. The squabbles over FEMA reimbursement amounts are small potatoes compared to the overall needs of the region.

--

Consider that Obama is pledging an unprecedented trillion dollar stimulus package for infrastructure projects. Yet, if you read this AP article, it would seem that Louisiana is woefully unprepared to request a game-changing share:

Louisiana's post-Katrina wish list for the next Congress and incoming Obama administration, lengthened by 2008 hurricanes Gustav and Ike, boiled down in a transition brief to one essential message: Don't forget us.

While progress has been made since Katrina and Rita lashed Louisiana in 2005, "our state still suffers an extreme housing crisis with affordable rental property hard to come by and billions of housing and infrastructure repairs yet to be completed," the Louisiana Recovery Authority said in the brief dated Dec. 8 and which the LRA provided a copy of last week.

The state's wish list for the Katrina and Rita aftermath include an extension of federal disaster housing assistance, including rental subsidies, set to expire March 1.

It also includes a call to push back by two years, to December 2012, a deadline to finish housing projects benefiting from tax credits due to the sour national economy. And there's also a call for establishment of a "blight removal fund" to help speed cleanup of thousands of derelict properties that are seen as stalling reinvestment in some devastated communities.

Louisiana also may seek a congressional appropriation if it can't come to more favorable terms with the Federal Emergency Management Agency on the level of Katrina damage to New Orleans' former public hospital for the poor, Charity. The state believes it's due $492 million; FEMA's offered $150 million.

A few things about this. First of all, the LRA's insistence that the federal government help the state address the massive affordable housing crisis is straight-up laughable given all of the state and municipal policies put in place since the storm that have directly limited the construction of affordable housing. The other things on the LRA wish list are deadline extensions and a better reimbursement figure from FEMA for Charity. That's just not a very ambitious target for the nation's neediest state.

It might explain why the AP encapsulated the Louisiana pitch to the Obama administration as a helpless and flailing "don't forget us."

Have we not drawn up even preliminary plans for any of the following?

Replacing the energy grid

Rail service along the coast

Category Five levees, sea walls, wetlands restoration

Comprehensive metro streetcar system

Granted, the first phase of any Obama stimulus package would fund projects that are immediately ready for construction. But there simply aren't a trillion dollars worth of projects around the country that are "shovel-ready." So I wonder why we haven't put forth targets for the second, third, and forth phases of the stimulus.

Obama transition officials are already reaching out to states and municipalities so that a stimulus bill is submitted to Congress immediately after he takes office. I'd be willing to wager that when they sat down with the numbers from New Orleans and Louisiana, they called back our local officials and whoever else in the planning community and stated somewhat incredulously something along the lines of: "you guys aren't asking for nearly enough."

It will be quite interesting to see how our officials scramble for New Orleans' share of the stimulus pie over the next several months.