Huey Long Lives!: Gov. JBE discussion thread

[Miles]

With the election behind us, I'm creating a thread to track Governor Edwards' tenure.  

[Miles]

One thing that's looking good is Medicaid expansion:

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[Miles]

^ Most in the business community are for it, so odds are looking very good.

[Miles]

^ MungBeans actually came up with that line, and I think it fits.

Why? The blacks were very loyal to the Longs. Huey, and Earl, didn't use the racially-charged politics most southern pols did back then. The Longs' whole paradigm was uniting the lower class vs the elites, as opposed to exploiting racial divisions.

[Miles]

^ Nope. In fact, he was often critricized for being too progressive on race relations.

His home parish, Winn, actually voted against secession and Long's relatives at the time of the war were pro-Union.

[Miles]

JBE names more cabinet appointments.

The most notable is ex-Rep. Charlie Melancon, who'll lead Wildlife and Fisheries. Like JBE, Ol' Charlie ran against Vitter in 2010, but came out on the other end - good to see him back.

[Miles]

JBE wants to remove the work requirement for food stamps.

David Duke won't be happy about this...

[Miles]

^ Again, no, and I think his stance of segregation is beside the point anyway in this context.

In the 1934 legislative session, for example, Long was pushing for a bill to enfranchise most blacks and poor whites. His opponents killed it, IIRC, but shows you where his intentions were.

Even before this year, Edwin Edwards, campaigned as an obvious heir to the Longs and perhaps did the most of any Governor to get blacks involved in the political process.

[Miles]

As expected, JBE and Dardenne will have their work cut out for them in fixing Jindal's mess:

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[Miles]

Edwards, being the high energy badass he is, kicked off the new year duck hunting with his son:



A great way to remind us that he's much better than this fraud:

[Miles]

Have to give my approval to a pro-life, pro-medicaid expansion Governor, even if I never got the appeal of hunting

There's a reason Louisiana is known as the Sportman's Paradise, as even most license plates there say. Yet another way that JBE is a perfect fit for the state.

My grandpa ran a gun club in Jefferson Parish for years and some of JBE's brothers would shoot there. Its a huge part of the culture.

[Miles]

#Can'tQuellTheBel:

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[Miles]

JBE is dealt something if a blow on his first day, as his choice for Speaker, Walt Leger, will stay as Speaker Pro Temp instead. Taylor Barras (R) will be Speaker.

[Miles]

Republicans have nothing to gloat - if neccessary JBE can always use veto pen. And it will always be sustained. In addition - Vitter's camp, that wanted Henry, was defeated much more convincingly then Edwards, and Barras, as former conservative Democrat and now "moderate" (by Louisiana standards) Republican, is acceptable to him. But he could do better offering as his candidate for speaker somewhat more conservative and more rural Democrat. Gisclair, Hill, Thibaut and Danahay come to mind immediately...

Yep.

[Miles]

JBE has a press conference tomorrow, and I suspect it will be about this:

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[Miles]

Maps of how the Speaker's vote broke down.

Looking at the first ballot, most Republicans who sit in JBE districts went for Barras over Henry. There was a clear regional breakdown with the Republicans, too, as Barras only carried one northern seat.

I'm proud of my uncle, Rep. Chris Hazel, for being one of the handful of Republicans to support Leger on both ballots.

[Miles]

^ Great points, smolty. I think most serious posters would agree with you.

[Miles]

And here we go!

Major FF move by JBE, who enacts his campaign promise of expanding Medicaid:

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[Miles]

This was another big day for JBE, as he hosts the President in Baton Rouge:

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[Miles]

Also, the Senate committees were announced.

Most notably for Democrats, they'll chair two major committees -  Finance (LaFleur) and Revenue (Morrell).

[Miles]

Unlike the Senate, the situation in the House looks very bad for the people of Louisiana.

Speaker Barras is off to a very HP-ish start, as he gave critical committee slots to Edwards' enemies, and generally shortchanged Democrats.

Among Barras' most nefarious choices: Cameron Henry (R) will chair Appropriations and known traitor Neil Abramson (D) gets rewarded for his treachery with the Ways and Means chairmanship.

Full committees member list.

[Miles]

If I were Barras, I'd be mad that Cameron Henry will still be essentially running the House. I'm not sure how JBE will pull the state out the mess its in if he's working with these fools:

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[Miles]

I have to take strong exception to Rep Gene Reynolds claim that, "anything coming out of the Appropriations Committee will be no more than a rubber stamp of GOP talking points."

You sound a bit more optimistic than I'd be, but I really hope you're right. Despite the committee being woefully stacked in favor of the people's enemies, hopefully they'll put their talking points and partisanship aside.

Great observation!

[Miles]

^ Yeah, I see where you're going with that.

Its hard not to blame Barras for this mess. He stacked the committee with legislators that he knew would either have to do the people's work and support JBE or go back on their campaign promises. Its a really unfortunate and unfair situation to them, but I guess that what happens when you have hacks like Barras and Henry calling the shots. They should have respected JBE's agency more.

Its seems that our best hope, given that everything, is that the partisan Republicans on the committee end up being insincere when it comes to their Norquistian campaign promises.

Oh, its "Leger," by the way, not "Legier."

[Miles]

^ Well, perhaps you need to do a better job of explaining all these abstract points you bring up out of nowhere. But yeah, again, I'm with you, buddy. I hope Reynolds is wrong, too. I don't see why you need to keep spinning your wheels.

 At this point, we can just hope that the people's enemies on the Appropriations committee use their agency to go back on their campaign promises. Its not like the state can afford any more budget cuts, so even in doing nothing, those legislators would still be precipitating more cuts and thus subverting the interests of the state, and really their constituents.