LA-01 needs someone who is going to work full-time for their needs, one that will stand UP and FIGHT for her people in Congress on a full-time basis, not look to abandon the seat for "bigger and better things" like the U.S. Senate or the Governor's mansion, as former Congresscritters Sinator David Vitter and Governor PBJ did. That person is Gilda Reed.
For those of you who have never met me, I have a bilateral hearing loss. I have a cochlear implant in my left ear, and wear a hearing aid in my right ear. And when I met Gilda for the first time last year at the Yearly Kos Convention in Chicago, I knew that this was a woman who just doesn't give up.
I say that because she hasn't let polio, which she contracted after swimming at Pontchartrain Beach in 1949, when she was but two years of age, slow her down. She had to learn how to sit up and walk again, and dealt with 17 surgeries along the way. Yet, she has never stopped - raising 7 children with her husband, a Navy veteran and a retired electrical inspector for Shell; earning her B.A., Masters and Ph.D. in 1991, 1994 and 1996 from the University of New Orleans; and teaching at UNO starting in 1994, and serving on the School Board of her Church Parish, despite the fact that all of her children attended public schools.
When I met her, and I saw how she interacted with people at Yearly Kos, I knew that we needed to get her elected. She's a Wellstone, people. You'll always know where she stands, because she's not afraid to speak her mind.
The ascendance of "Bobby" Jindal and David Vitter to the national political stage remains an unwritten chapter in the history of Louisiana politics. While David Vitter clawed his way up the political hierarchy from the snake pit known as the Louisiana House of Representatives, "Bobby" Jindal, a fellow Rhodes Scholar, was arbitrarily christened a political force by former Governor Mike Foster. Although both were groomed by neoconservative professors planted within the Ivy League universities they respectively attended, one had to earn his reputation, while the other simply inherited the designation despite his horrible performance as Secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health & Hospitals.
Their collaboration most probably started in 1999, when Vitter ran for the open Congressional seat abandoned by the adulterous Bob Livingston and "Bobby" was appointed President of the University of Louisiana System. Occupying a reliably Republican US House seat, Vitter never had to fret over his job security. "Bobby," on the other hand, always had to rely on others in order to secure gainful employment.
Having had secured all the requisite neoconservative connections by 2001, "Bobby" was appointed Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for Planning and Evaluation by George W. Bush, a sinecure that could serve as a springboard for political office in Louisiana. Jindal took that plunge in 2003, launching a gubernatorial bid he and Vitter had been orchestrating after Vitter declined the opportunity as a result of his strained relations with his wife Wendy. Jindal would have to serve as Vitter's surrogate. Having had failed in that effort, Vitter and Jindal, hoping to keep Jindal visible for the next four years before they would take another stab at the Governor's mansion in 2007, parlayed their political capitol with local Republicans by forcing them to allow Jindal to carpetbag into Kenner for the sole purpose of occupying the safe Congressional seat Vitter vacated in order to run for the US Senate. Augmenting his resume of sinecures with yet another position he did not earn, Jindal sat idly in Vitter's former seat, planning a rematch against Kathleen Blanco, who was forced to abandon her reelection campaign in 2007 as a result of a political smear Jindal and Vitter coordinated with Karl Rove and George W. Bush in the wake of Hurricanes Rita and Katrina.
"Bobby" Jindal's reported expenditures in his campaign finance report for the period covering 14 April 2007 through 12 July 2007 are incredibly vague for a candidate who is waging what he calls a "war against corruption." Only the most general categories are used to describe each expenditure, a clear attempt to conceal the operations of his campaign. But within all this opaque darkness is a slight glimmer that casts a glow on at least one of special interests deeply embedded within Jindal's inscrutable machine: the oil and energy lobbies.
Witness the following expenditures to a certain Stephen Waguespack of 1306 Massachusetts Ave. SE, Washington, DC, 20003:
Stephen Waguespack
$3,004.12
16 April 2007
Salary
Stephen Waguespack
$3,004.12
30 April 2007
Salary
Stephen Waguespack
$3,004.12
15 May 2007
Salary
Stephen Waguespack
$130.79
17 May 2007
Office Supplies
Stephen Waguespack
$3,004.12
31 May 2007
Salary
Stephen Waguespack
$3,004.12
15 June 2007
Salary
Stephen Waguespack
$3,004.12
30 June 2007
Salary
Although Stephen Waguespack is the only salaried employee of the Jindal campaign who does not reside in Louisiana, he receives a salary of $72,098.48 per annum, the highest of any of Jindal's staffers excepting Jindal's campaign manager, Tim Teepel. His job description must be elaborate, and the services he provides must be viewed as crucial to the campaign. But what role can he possibly play when he is a registered lobbyist with The Alpine Group, a "consulting firm dedicated to providing our clients with individualized lobbying assistance on tax, trade, agricultural, environmental, energy and several other issues," and a law student at the Columbus School of Law at Catholic University? Or is he remunerated at the annual rate of $72, 098.48 as a result of his current status as lobbyist for the industries with whom he engaged quite regularly while serving as a staff member for former House Energy Committee Chairman Joe Barton (R-TX)?
David Vitter's Political Action Committee, the Louisiana Committee for a Republican Majority, or the LCRM, netted a whopping $1,323,152 as of 4 June 2007, the date of the last campaign finance report the organization filed with the Secretary of State. It is an embarrassment of riches, especially when one considers that the money this organization will raise will be invested in races for approximately 30 state legislative seats this fall. This amounts to $44,000 per legislative race or $4.89 per vote. And the LCRM still has 4 months of fundraising to report before votes are cast in October.
But the LCRM is an embarrassment of riches for another reason: only 20 Louisiana businessmen and businesswoman and one Texan real estate tycoon can account for $1,240,900, or 94%, of the LCRM's warchest.
And even worse, the 21 people who plan to purchase a Republican majority in the state legislature through the program Wendy Vitter calls "Operation Clean House" mainly earned their fortunes in two industries: the petrochemical industry and real estate. "Cleaning House," according to Wendy Vitter, entails the mobilization of of funds from a group of highly localized special interests, not from a group of ordinary, "concerned citizens" as she leads her readers to believe in the 4 December 2006 letter posted on the main page of the LCRM's website.
An analysis of the structure and chronology of this LCRM's fundraising apparatus illustrates this horrifying but all too true reality of corrupt and unethical Republican machine politics in operation. Join me after the jump for what will be a long but edifying ride.
LA-01 needs someone who is going to work full-time for their needs, one that will stand UP and FIGHT for her people in Congress on a full-time basis, not look to abandon the seat for "bigger and better things" like the U.S. Senate or the Governor's mansion, as former Congresscritters Sinator David Vitter and Governor PBJ did. That person is 
I say that because she hasn't let polio, which she contracted after swimming at Pontchartrain Beach in 1949, when she was but two years of age, slow her down. She had to learn how to sit up and walk again, and dealt with 17 surgeries along the way. Yet, she has never stopped - raising 7 children with her husband, a Navy veteran and a retired electrical inspector for Shell; earning her B.A., Masters and Ph.D. in 1991, 1994 and 1996 from the University of New Orleans; and teaching at UNO starting in 1994, and serving on the School Board of her Church Parish, despite the fact that all of her children attended public schools. 
The ascendance of "Bobby" Jindal and David Vitter to the national political stage remains an unwritten chapter in the history of Louisiana politics. While David Vitter clawed his way up the political hierarchy from the snake pit known as the Louisiana House of Representatives, "Bobby" Jindal, a fellow Rhodes Scholar, was arbitrarily christened a political force by former Governor Mike Foster. Although both were groomed by neoconservative professors planted within the Ivy League universities they respectively attended, one had to earn his reputation, while the other simply inherited the designation despite his 
David Vitter's Political Action Committee, the Louisiana Committee for a Republican Majority, or the LCRM, netted a whopping $1,323,152 as of 4 June 2007, 
