JUNE 22, 2009 POLITICS / JOHN MAGINNIS
Congressman Charlie Melancon has confirmed that he is actively considering challenging U.S. Sen. David Vitter for re-election next year. According to a statement from a campaign aide, the Democrat from Napoleonville is talking it all over with his wife and kids and plans to make an announcement in a few weeks.
Several political sources say he has been more definite with national Democratic campaign officials, telling them he plans to run.
While Melancon earlier this year seemed to have ruled out a Senate challenge, a renewed press by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, armed with a poll showing Vitter's vulnerability, got the three-term congressman to reconsider.
Besides conferring with the family, a final piece of unfinished business for Melancon would be a sit-down with businessman and fellow Democrat Jim Bernhard, who also has considered running. A friend of the Shaw Group chairman said he has been at his North Carolina retreat for two weeks making his own final decision on the race.
Yet Bernhard has been mulling this over for a year or more, to the impatience of state and national Democrats seeking a formidable challenger. Melancon fills that bill as an experienced lawmaker, a strong fundraiser and a proven natural campaigner.
Another factor driving Melancon's final decision is the alternative: he faces a tough re-election in 2010 in a House district that might not exist after the 2011 reapportionment.
Rep. Nickie Monica, R-LaPlace, is expected to announce his campaign for Congress in the 3rd District some time after the Legislature adjourns this week. Monica says he's been getting encouragement from business people and conservatives unhappy with the congressman's votes for the federal stimulus package and President Obama's first budget.
Beyond that, with the state likely to lose a congressional district after the next census, the 3rd, in the bayou region, could be cut up among other south Louisiana districts. Even if the 3rd remains intact, it stands to lose many of its African-American voters in the river parishes--Melancon's base--in order to maintain a minority district based in New Orleans.
Even if polls show Vitter, recovering from his sex scandal, having electability problems, a Democrat running for the Senate in the South in 2010 would have his own. Vitter has emerged as the principled opponent of nearly every Obama administration policy so far. He would try to tie Melancon to national Democrats' quest for a filibuster-proof 60-seat Senate majority.
A leader of the moderate Blue Dog caucus in the House, Melancon would need to create some separation between himself and the liberal Democratic leadership. But he has left his flank exposed on an issue crucial to business interests. He will have to answer for his sponsorship of the Employee Free Choice Act, also known as card check, which would allow labor unions to organize workplaces through signed petitions instead of secret-ballot elections.
Vitter already is highlighting his virulent opposition to the legislation. National business groups plan to spend millions hammering away at the issue. By when they're through, card check will sound worse than adultery.
Republicans want to make this an election about national issues instead of a personal referendum on Vitter. Rather than a Blue Dog, critics already paint Melancon as a lapdog for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The GOP will warn that Melancon, if elected, will fall in behind the president and Senate Democrats on sweeping energy and healthcare legislation.
Which is why some local Democrats are hesitant to push Bernhard aside. His profile as a civic-minded, successful entrepreneur and his lack of a voting record would make him appealing to voters across the board and a moving target for GOP attacks. That independent streak, however, is problematic for Senate leaders not interested in dealing with a Democrat in name only.
Until the two Democratic heavyweights meet and emerge with one holding the other's fist up high, this race is not yet set.
Nor is it on the Republican side. Though Vitter is working to close party ranks, an attractive primary challenger to the incumbent could turn this election upside down, upsetting best-laid plans all around.
Should that come to pass, what an irony and a bummer it would be for Democrats to agree on the candidate they want, only to lose the opponent they need.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Roemers Challenge Jindal to Lead
JUNE 15, 2009 POLITICS / JOHN MAGINNIS
By now, Gov. Bobby Jindal has about had his fill of the Roemer clan. The governor's past week started and ended with members of that political family challenging his leadership on education, high school and higher.
The big event, of course, was the extraordinary news conference at which Buddy Roemer and three other former governors--Dave Treen, Mike Foster and Kathleen Blanco--urged the sitting governor to restore funding cuts to higher education. It was an awkward if not excruciating moment for Jindal, but it beat the alternative. According to a source knowledgeable with the events, the governor's predecessors almost went public without him, which would have been a very serious rebuke.
Roemer, distressed by Jindal's proposed budget cuts, had enlisted his three colleagues in making a joint statement of concern. Jindal got wind of the cabal and quickly arranged a meeting, and also invited the Fosters for dinner at the Mansion the night before.
After the five met Thursday morning, Jindal opened the press conference by stressing their points of agreement. He committed to reducing state support for higher education by no more than 10 percent, not the 15 percent in his original budget.
The governor then introduced Roemer, who grasped the lectern and promptly took over the tour de force. He related how the former governors "got anxious over this past year about the priority given to higher education" and began trading ideas for a joint statement. "It was so much fun," he said.
Not for Jindal, standing by and politely enduring Roemer's remarks, now rolling off that silver tongue. "Scrub, not slash," he admonished Jindal. "What we need is leadership."
Roemer then introduced his colleagues, noting their singular contributions to higher ed, especially Foster's: "When Mike Foster talks about education, I listen." Hint.
Foster acknowledged that spending cuts must come, but that the governors counseled "slowing down the train a bit."
Lone Democrat Blanco was not as conciliatory. "You can't do more with less," she lectured, "You do less with less," warning against a "drive to mediocrity."
This may have been a Buddy Roemer production, but Foster's presence made the foursome and also forced Jindal's hand. Their new relationship got off to a bad start at the inauguration when Jindal, with his former boss seated behind him, lamented "decades of failure in government" and "leaders who were unconcerned with the future."
Now it was Jindal being taken to task by his elders for his stewardship of higher education, the state's future. In the end, though, Foster gave Jindal cover when he spoke up to say they were "all on the same page" backing Jindal's commitment to only cut higher ed by 10 percent.
Actually, Jindal conceded nothing more than his recently expressed willingness to restore about $70 million to university budgets, amounting to a 10 percent reduction.
Yet, the past governors' broader concerns seemed to be for Jindal's leadership. His idea for a long-term plan has been to badger university leaders to come up with one. After a week of that, Jindal should have put forward his own proposal. Instead, Speaker of the House Jim Tucker did, getting the Legislature to form a commission, including out-of-state experts, to report back next year on how to reorganize the university system.
But back to the show. Roemer, relishing his gubernatorial moment, concluded by honoring the better half of his tag team.
"I want to thank my son Chas," he said, recalling how the young man recently challenged him to "spend less time making money and to give something back."
Jindal must have curdled inside, reminded that a few days earlier Chas Roemer, a member of the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, released a blistering statement that criticized the governor for supporting the alternative high school diploma legislation, which he said would give false hope to struggling students.
Young Roemer charged that politics is keeping Jindal from tackling fundamental education problems that are holding the state back. "To take on issues that matter would mean to risk some political capital--something this administration seems unwilling to do," he said.
Old governors will tell you that the chief executive who fails to demonstrate strong leadership on an issue will be challenged for it. A brash young Buddy Roemer thrived on calling out the political leadership of his day, a course the next generation seems destined to follow.
By now, Gov. Bobby Jindal has about had his fill of the Roemer clan. The governor's past week started and ended with members of that political family challenging his leadership on education, high school and higher.
The big event, of course, was the extraordinary news conference at which Buddy Roemer and three other former governors--Dave Treen, Mike Foster and Kathleen Blanco--urged the sitting governor to restore funding cuts to higher education. It was an awkward if not excruciating moment for Jindal, but it beat the alternative. According to a source knowledgeable with the events, the governor's predecessors almost went public without him, which would have been a very serious rebuke.
Roemer, distressed by Jindal's proposed budget cuts, had enlisted his three colleagues in making a joint statement of concern. Jindal got wind of the cabal and quickly arranged a meeting, and also invited the Fosters for dinner at the Mansion the night before.
After the five met Thursday morning, Jindal opened the press conference by stressing their points of agreement. He committed to reducing state support for higher education by no more than 10 percent, not the 15 percent in his original budget.
The governor then introduced Roemer, who grasped the lectern and promptly took over the tour de force. He related how the former governors "got anxious over this past year about the priority given to higher education" and began trading ideas for a joint statement. "It was so much fun," he said.
Not for Jindal, standing by and politely enduring Roemer's remarks, now rolling off that silver tongue. "Scrub, not slash," he admonished Jindal. "What we need is leadership."
Roemer then introduced his colleagues, noting their singular contributions to higher ed, especially Foster's: "When Mike Foster talks about education, I listen." Hint.
Foster acknowledged that spending cuts must come, but that the governors counseled "slowing down the train a bit."
Lone Democrat Blanco was not as conciliatory. "You can't do more with less," she lectured, "You do less with less," warning against a "drive to mediocrity."
This may have been a Buddy Roemer production, but Foster's presence made the foursome and also forced Jindal's hand. Their new relationship got off to a bad start at the inauguration when Jindal, with his former boss seated behind him, lamented "decades of failure in government" and "leaders who were unconcerned with the future."
Now it was Jindal being taken to task by his elders for his stewardship of higher education, the state's future. In the end, though, Foster gave Jindal cover when he spoke up to say they were "all on the same page" backing Jindal's commitment to only cut higher ed by 10 percent.
Actually, Jindal conceded nothing more than his recently expressed willingness to restore about $70 million to university budgets, amounting to a 10 percent reduction.
Yet, the past governors' broader concerns seemed to be for Jindal's leadership. His idea for a long-term plan has been to badger university leaders to come up with one. After a week of that, Jindal should have put forward his own proposal. Instead, Speaker of the House Jim Tucker did, getting the Legislature to form a commission, including out-of-state experts, to report back next year on how to reorganize the university system.
But back to the show. Roemer, relishing his gubernatorial moment, concluded by honoring the better half of his tag team.
"I want to thank my son Chas," he said, recalling how the young man recently challenged him to "spend less time making money and to give something back."
Jindal must have curdled inside, reminded that a few days earlier Chas Roemer, a member of the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, released a blistering statement that criticized the governor for supporting the alternative high school diploma legislation, which he said would give false hope to struggling students.
Young Roemer charged that politics is keeping Jindal from tackling fundamental education problems that are holding the state back. "To take on issues that matter would mean to risk some political capital--something this administration seems unwilling to do," he said.
Old governors will tell you that the chief executive who fails to demonstrate strong leadership on an issue will be challenged for it. A brash young Buddy Roemer thrived on calling out the political leadership of his day, a course the next generation seems destined to follow.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
LSU Struggles with Hospital Power Plays
JUNE 8, 2009 POLITICS / JOHN MAGINNIS
Providing tickets for legislators to purchase for the national collegiate baseball tournament series at LSU last weekend was the least that school officials could do, given how much tumult, hostility and fear the university's issues have caused at the Capitol this spring.
The flagship's budget woes, leading those of all higher education, have been a source of rancor and tension between lawmakers and the administration. On top of that, an intense power struggle over the size, site and control of LSU's proposed teaching hospital and medical center in New Orleans has landed in the middle of the legislative session. With it comes the renewed bitter rivalry between LSU and Tulane, marked by some condescending statements about the city from the LSU president, veiled threats that the medical school might pull up stakes and an old-fashioned hallway shouting match between the state treasurer and a school official.
The controversy might be worth the unpleasantness if it had something to do with shaping the future of public healthcare and hospitals in Louisiana, but the state overall seems headed in the opposite direction from what it's trying to do in New Orleans. Yet, at $1.2 billion, the fate of the project commands the interest of legislators statewide.
LSU's proposal to build alongside a planned Veterans Administration hospital on a 70-block tract in the middle of the city is opposed by preservationists, some doctors and community groups that want it to rebuild the old hospital, which they argue is the faster, cheaper alternative for restoring a vital health asset. Supportive of their cause is Tulane University, whose medical center would be left isolated downtown if LSU and the VA relocated across elevated Interstate 10.
LSU officials are adamant it will not re-occupy the old building as long as it is responsible for public healthcare in New Orleans. That could change with passage of legislation by Speaker of the House Jim Tucker, R-Algiers, which would remove LSU from control of the medical complex and turn that over to an independent board of community stakeholders, including all local universities involved in medical education.
Tucker says he is not opposed to the new hospital complex, but wants LSU to stick to running its medical education program. He gets quiet support on that score from within the LSU community, where there are those who believe its healthcare responsibilities detract from its higher education mission.
Gov. Bobby Jindal supports the medical complex, but says he would sign Tucker's bill if it passes. What the governor really wants, he says, is for LSU to agree to have Tulane and other schools represented on the board of the non-profit governing corporation still to be formed. LSU, at first strongly opposed to power-sharing with Tulane, is becoming more amenable under pressure. If the two schools reach some accord, even at the point of the governor's shotgun, the larger challenge would be reaching a hurricane damage settlement on the old building with FEMA and selling Wall Street on its financial plan--some very big ifs.
That might leave the preservationists feeling jilted, but state and school officials agree that the iconic 1939 structure will be saved and put to new use.
The plan for the new medical complex, given its broad economic development potential, might sound like the future of public healthcare in Louisiana, but it more likely will be the last hospital the state ever builds. LSU has given up on erecting a new hospital in Baton Rouge and instead is forging a partnership with Our Lady of the Lake to train doctors and provide indigent care. The Jindal administration envisions gradually doing the same in other parts of the state. Except in Shreveport, where the high-quality University Medical Center is the model that LSU hopes to emulate in New Orleans.
The state's most forward-looking public hospital--which is ironic, given its original name, Confederate Memorial--trains LSU doctors, treats both private-pay patients and the uninsured, and turns a profit. It also is to its city what LSU had better learn to be in New Orleans, a responsive and respected member of the community.
Providing tickets for legislators to purchase for the national collegiate baseball tournament series at LSU last weekend was the least that school officials could do, given how much tumult, hostility and fear the university's issues have caused at the Capitol this spring.
The flagship's budget woes, leading those of all higher education, have been a source of rancor and tension between lawmakers and the administration. On top of that, an intense power struggle over the size, site and control of LSU's proposed teaching hospital and medical center in New Orleans has landed in the middle of the legislative session. With it comes the renewed bitter rivalry between LSU and Tulane, marked by some condescending statements about the city from the LSU president, veiled threats that the medical school might pull up stakes and an old-fashioned hallway shouting match between the state treasurer and a school official.
The controversy might be worth the unpleasantness if it had something to do with shaping the future of public healthcare and hospitals in Louisiana, but the state overall seems headed in the opposite direction from what it's trying to do in New Orleans. Yet, at $1.2 billion, the fate of the project commands the interest of legislators statewide.
LSU's proposal to build alongside a planned Veterans Administration hospital on a 70-block tract in the middle of the city is opposed by preservationists, some doctors and community groups that want it to rebuild the old hospital, which they argue is the faster, cheaper alternative for restoring a vital health asset. Supportive of their cause is Tulane University, whose medical center would be left isolated downtown if LSU and the VA relocated across elevated Interstate 10.
LSU officials are adamant it will not re-occupy the old building as long as it is responsible for public healthcare in New Orleans. That could change with passage of legislation by Speaker of the House Jim Tucker, R-Algiers, which would remove LSU from control of the medical complex and turn that over to an independent board of community stakeholders, including all local universities involved in medical education.
Tucker says he is not opposed to the new hospital complex, but wants LSU to stick to running its medical education program. He gets quiet support on that score from within the LSU community, where there are those who believe its healthcare responsibilities detract from its higher education mission.
Gov. Bobby Jindal supports the medical complex, but says he would sign Tucker's bill if it passes. What the governor really wants, he says, is for LSU to agree to have Tulane and other schools represented on the board of the non-profit governing corporation still to be formed. LSU, at first strongly opposed to power-sharing with Tulane, is becoming more amenable under pressure. If the two schools reach some accord, even at the point of the governor's shotgun, the larger challenge would be reaching a hurricane damage settlement on the old building with FEMA and selling Wall Street on its financial plan--some very big ifs.
That might leave the preservationists feeling jilted, but state and school officials agree that the iconic 1939 structure will be saved and put to new use.
The plan for the new medical complex, given its broad economic development potential, might sound like the future of public healthcare in Louisiana, but it more likely will be the last hospital the state ever builds. LSU has given up on erecting a new hospital in Baton Rouge and instead is forging a partnership with Our Lady of the Lake to train doctors and provide indigent care. The Jindal administration envisions gradually doing the same in other parts of the state. Except in Shreveport, where the high-quality University Medical Center is the model that LSU hopes to emulate in New Orleans.
The state's most forward-looking public hospital--which is ironic, given its original name, Confederate Memorial--trains LSU doctors, treats both private-pay patients and the uninsured, and turns a profit. It also is to its city what LSU had better learn to be in New Orleans, a responsive and respected member of the community.
Vitter Haunts Dardenne's Election Bill
JUNE 1, 2009 POLITICS / JOHN MAGINNIS
Call him paranoid, but Sen. David Vitter is taking no chances with any change in the law that could threaten his re-election next year--that is, more than he already has threatened it by his past association with an escort service in Washington, D.C.
The junior senator's acute sense of survival drew his attention to a seemingly harmless legislative bill concerning minor political parties that was offered by Secretary of State Jay Dardenne. While the bill, on its surface, had no effect on his candidacy, Vitter and Republican supporters approached it like it was the first skirmish of next year's election. For those keeping score, he won.
Dardenne was trying to avert an unforeseen consequence of the state's return to party primaries in congressional elections. His office crafted a bill that, in effect, would require the state to conduct primary elections for only the two major parties and not for the three other officially recognized but minor parties: Libertarian, Green and Reform. Combined they have about 5,000 members statewide.
Say, for example, a power struggle breaks out in the Libertarian Party, and two of its members decide to run for the U.S. Senate. Assuming multiple Democrats and Republicans ran, the ballot would list candidates under three separate party primaries. Trouble is, the state has invested in new computerized voting machines that only display two sets of primaries. Dardenne estimates it would cost $38 million to reprogram all the voting machines and to train voting commissioners on the lockout procedures, which, even as they now stand, proved to be confusing to voters and commissioners in last fall's elections.
Rather than go through all that, under the proposed law, if two minor party rivals could not settle their differences beforehand, both their names would appear on the general election ballot in November.
Enter Sen. Vitter, who cares not a whit about Secretary Dardenne's software concerns but seemed leery of his ulterior motives. Dardenne has said he is considering challenging Vitter in next year's Republican primary. According to the bill's sponsor, Rep. Wayne Waddell, R-Shreveport, Vitter called him a half dozen times to express concern that Dardenne would later try to have the bill amended to allow independents to vote in either party's primary. That would not suit the senator at all.
When the Legislature reinstated party primaries for congressional elections, it let the parties’ governing bodies determine which voters could participate in each. The Democrats opened their primary to independent voters, those unaffiliated with either party, while Republicans closed theirs to members only.
Vitter much prefers a closed GOP primary, because that would not give pesky independents the opportunity to vote against him should Dardenne or some other Republican challenge him.
Rep. Waddell wasn't the only one Vitter called. After the author and Dardenne explained the bill to the House & Governmental Affairs Committee and pledged to entertain no amendments, Rep. Noble Ellington, D-Winnsboro, said he had received phone calls from individuals he did not name who were still concerned about the legislation.
That got a rise from assistant secretary Tom Schedler, who said no one contacted him or Dardenne about the bill. "We cannot respond to a ghost," said Schedler. "Let the ghost call me."
Ellington said he was satisfied with Dardenne's explanation, but asked to delay voting on the bill, saying, "It would give me some time to talk to the ghost. . . . It's a big ghost."
The delay was granted, but the damage was done. Spooked Republicans may have trusted Dardenne, but they have seen enough slippery maneuvers in this session--"rookiedoos," in legislative parlance--to be wary of what could happen to the bill once it left the committee.
Democrats on the committee, perhaps delighting in the GOP squabble, seized the opportunity to defend the voting rights of the minor parties. The following week, the bill was deferred and is presumed dead.
Vitter and the status quo prevailed. Dardenne didn't exactly lose, but now that he has drawn attention to the possibility of a minor party primary, it is ever more likely he will have to conduct one next year.
Call him paranoid, but Sen. David Vitter is taking no chances with any change in the law that could threaten his re-election next year--that is, more than he already has threatened it by his past association with an escort service in Washington, D.C.
The junior senator's acute sense of survival drew his attention to a seemingly harmless legislative bill concerning minor political parties that was offered by Secretary of State Jay Dardenne. While the bill, on its surface, had no effect on his candidacy, Vitter and Republican supporters approached it like it was the first skirmish of next year's election. For those keeping score, he won.
Dardenne was trying to avert an unforeseen consequence of the state's return to party primaries in congressional elections. His office crafted a bill that, in effect, would require the state to conduct primary elections for only the two major parties and not for the three other officially recognized but minor parties: Libertarian, Green and Reform. Combined they have about 5,000 members statewide.
Say, for example, a power struggle breaks out in the Libertarian Party, and two of its members decide to run for the U.S. Senate. Assuming multiple Democrats and Republicans ran, the ballot would list candidates under three separate party primaries. Trouble is, the state has invested in new computerized voting machines that only display two sets of primaries. Dardenne estimates it would cost $38 million to reprogram all the voting machines and to train voting commissioners on the lockout procedures, which, even as they now stand, proved to be confusing to voters and commissioners in last fall's elections.
Rather than go through all that, under the proposed law, if two minor party rivals could not settle their differences beforehand, both their names would appear on the general election ballot in November.
Enter Sen. Vitter, who cares not a whit about Secretary Dardenne's software concerns but seemed leery of his ulterior motives. Dardenne has said he is considering challenging Vitter in next year's Republican primary. According to the bill's sponsor, Rep. Wayne Waddell, R-Shreveport, Vitter called him a half dozen times to express concern that Dardenne would later try to have the bill amended to allow independents to vote in either party's primary. That would not suit the senator at all.
When the Legislature reinstated party primaries for congressional elections, it let the parties’ governing bodies determine which voters could participate in each. The Democrats opened their primary to independent voters, those unaffiliated with either party, while Republicans closed theirs to members only.
Vitter much prefers a closed GOP primary, because that would not give pesky independents the opportunity to vote against him should Dardenne or some other Republican challenge him.
Rep. Waddell wasn't the only one Vitter called. After the author and Dardenne explained the bill to the House & Governmental Affairs Committee and pledged to entertain no amendments, Rep. Noble Ellington, D-Winnsboro, said he had received phone calls from individuals he did not name who were still concerned about the legislation.
That got a rise from assistant secretary Tom Schedler, who said no one contacted him or Dardenne about the bill. "We cannot respond to a ghost," said Schedler. "Let the ghost call me."
Ellington said he was satisfied with Dardenne's explanation, but asked to delay voting on the bill, saying, "It would give me some time to talk to the ghost. . . . It's a big ghost."
The delay was granted, but the damage was done. Spooked Republicans may have trusted Dardenne, but they have seen enough slippery maneuvers in this session--"rookiedoos," in legislative parlance--to be wary of what could happen to the bill once it left the committee.
Democrats on the committee, perhaps delighting in the GOP squabble, seized the opportunity to defend the voting rights of the minor parties. The following week, the bill was deferred and is presumed dead.
Vitter and the status quo prevailed. Dardenne didn't exactly lose, but now that he has drawn attention to the possibility of a minor party primary, it is ever more likely he will have to conduct one next year.
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