McKeithen's injury also continues a strange thread of trials and tribulations that has followed the key figures involved in the 1987 governor's race in Louisiana.
The 58-year-old Republican from Columbia was only 17 when his father, John Julian McKeithen, became governor in 1964. By 1987, the former governor was encouraging his son to run for the state's highest office as a first-term state House member. Big John was so demonstrative that he forced Russell Long out of the race by intimating that the retired senator would be peppered with questions about the origins of his family's oil wealth.
At qualifying time in the summer of '87, Fox opted to seek the Secretary of State's opening created by the departure of fellow gubernatorial hopeful Jim Brown. The governor's race that year was a watershed event in Louisiana politics: the best and brightest of a generation conspired to unseat the Cajun Prince.
The election was decided on primary night, Oct. 24. Congressman Buddy Roemer collected 33 percent of the votes and won the governor's prize when runner-up Edwin Edwards withdrew in the early morning hours at New Orleans' Monteleone hotel.
EWE was the second place finisher in '87 with 28 percent of the votes. He regained the office four years later, but at 77, he is serving time in federal prison for criminal acts committed in his final term. Unless he receives a presidential pardon or his sentence is reversed, Edwards will be nearly 84 years old when he leaves the gates of the federal lock-up at Oakdale.
The third place finisher was Congressman Bob Livingston. The Metairie Republican garnered 19 percent support and returned to the U.S. House where he rose to the position of Appropriations Committee chairman. But Livingston was forced to resign from the House in disgrace on Dec. 19, 1998, when pornographer Larry Flynt outed him as a serial adulterer. The resignation came days before Livingston was to ascend to the perch of Speaker of the House.
In fourth place in the '87 gubernatorial field was Congressman Billy Tauzin, who became the major force on broadcast issues on Capitol Hill. Tauzin never forgave Edwards for purportedly reneging on a promise not to run that year. The Chackbay Democrat received 10 percent of the votes and went back to Congress, eventually changing his party affiliation to the GOP. Tauzin has battled a rare form of cancer and recently drew criticism for accepting a multi-million dollar lobbying job with the pharmaceutical industry.
Just behind Tauzin in fifth place was Jim Brown with 9 percent of the votes. Brown would be elected statewide three more times as insurance commissioner. Two years ago, he served six months in prison after being convicted of lying to an FBI agent during the Edwards investigation. (The 64-year-old Brown retains the survival instincts of a successful politician ' he writes and talks to audiences about his trial, conviction and comeback.)
The winning campaign in '87 was tagged as the Roemer Revolution. The victor talked of "slaying the dragon." For a brief, shining moment, it appeared a new day had arrived. "We're gonna make the world stop laughing at Louisiana and begin listening," Roemer promised in his north Louisiana twang after Edwards endured his only defeat at the polls. At 44, Roemer seemed on a par with his Arkansas counterpart, Bill Clinton.
But the man from Bossier City saw his second marriage crumble during his term and was sent packing from the mansion four years later. He never won another race. (Roemer received a ticket to political oblivion when David Duke nudged him out of a runoff in 1991.) A year later, Clinton was elected president and Roemer was teaching at Harvard.
The goal of beating Edwards was completed, but not one of the major players has remained unscathed in its wake.
Jim Engster is the general manager of WRKF 89.3 FM. He hosts The Jim Engster Show, which airs weekdays at 9 a.m.
MAY 24 Blogger Robert Mann posts this entry about the Baton Rouge Chamber's recent report on Louisiana's higher education system. It's critical to economic development, and yet our system is facing a "funding crisis" with no way to resolve it, the report says. The Chamber says control of tuition and fees must be returned to the higher ed governing boards.
MAY 24 Here's a NBC33 story about Tyrann Mathieu. He has signed with the Arizona Cardinals, inking a $3 million, four-year deal. He gets a signing bonus of $265K, but gets another, larger bonus if he doesn't get cut from the team for doing drugs. The deal reportedly includes mandatory tests and meetings for the player.
MAY 24 Jarvis DeBerry posts here about the redonkulus rhetoric that would have us believe NOLA is a safe city with a murder problem. Maybe the city's crime stats don't compare with its murder stats because you can't manipulate a murder, he says: a dead body's a dead body. It just doesn't make sense, he says, and his readers agree: a poll asks if they believe the city is safe, and more than 90 percent say no.
MAY 24 Jindal administration officials announced Thursday that the privatization of public health care is going to cost a lot more than they budgeted for, the Advocate reports here. "I'm so surprised," said no one. Anywhere. The cost they're projecting now is more than $1 billion - a lot more than the $626 million budgeted for it. And, it's more than it cost the state to operate those hospitals. So why are we doing this again?
MAY 24 Blogger CB Forgotston ridicules the recent PR campaign by the state GOP in the wake of a legislative auditor's request to both major parties. The GOP (apparently unaware that the Dems got the same request) started yammering about being targeted because it had "killed" a tax increase. CB finds that laughable, but it's also pretty funny that the GOP was comparing this episode to the IRS scandal (Because the President has so much to do with our state auditor. Right?).
MAY 24 Politico details some recent fund-raising efforts by Sen. David Vitter, which have raised the question of his future political plans. This time, it is a $5,000 per head "bayou weekend" that includes "Cajun cooking" and an all-caps "alligator hunt," the story reports. Funds raised go to a super PAC that can spend money to support Vitter in federal or state races, the story points out.
MAY 24 The pink building on Royal in the quarter was sold at a sheriff's sale Thursday, this Picayune story reports. An injunction that would have halted the sale wasn't enforced because the family failed to post a $150,000 bond, the story reports. So the owner of the mortgages on the building bought it, for nearly $7 million. Now the feuding family will have to negotiate with that company to get a lease on the building that has housed their business for close to 60 years.
MAY 23 This post in Louisiana Voice tells us about a bill by a Winnsboro lege that would require all public high school students to take at least one Course Choice online class in order to graduate. (What?) Blogger Tom Aswell says it's a monument to "waste and corruption," especially in light of the problems he's exposed with the program in recent weeks. Idaho had a similar program, but voters removed it by a 2-1 margin, Aswell says.
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