Can there can be any question now that U.S. Rep. Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia, intends to challenge Congressman Charles Boustany this fall? A reception scheduled for May 23 at the garish, nouveau-riche River Ranch home of oil patch magnate Mike Moreno bills itself as “a reception benefitting the re-election of Congressman Jeff Landry, Louisiana, 3rd District.” Couples will pay $250 to attend, $1,000 to host and the handsome sum of $2,500 to serve as sponsors. Twenty-seven individuals and/or couples are signed on as sponsors while 18 are listed as hosts, meaning the fête has already netted Landry more than $85,000. (See an image of the invitation below.)
Problem is, after 2012 there will be no 3rd Congressional District to which Landry could be re-elected; the district was effectively eliminated during the 2011 redistricting session in the Legislature — absorbed into districts to the east and west including Republican Boustany’s 7th Congressional District, which will expand eastward to take in New Iberia where Landry lives.
The new district for which Boustany will essentially be the incumbent will be called the 3rd Congressional District effective Jan. 1, 2013. But don’t tell the Landry camp that. On the congressman’s website, LandryForLouisiana.com, there is a page devoted to the 3rd Congressional District but the congressman uses an image of the new 3rd, which doesn’t yet exist (see the screen grab below). The combined effect of the May 23 fundraiser in Lafayette and the deceptive image on Landry’s website is that Landry is seeking re-election to Rep. Boustany’s district. Weird, we know. Landry seems to be inventing a new reality: He's the incumbent in southwest Louisiana and he's seeking re-election.
Landry hasn’t yet announced his intention to run against Boustany this fall, but if he doesn’t he’ll be out of a job in elected politics, at least for the time being.
He and Boustany have already begun sniping at each other in press releases. There will be a contest between the two. It will get ugly.
Read more on Landry and his attempts to generate name recognition in Boustany’s turf here.
| The Landry campaign has already netted more than $85,000 for its campaign coffer with the May 23 reception, based on the invitation above. Meanwhile, on his LandryForLouisiana website (detail below), Landry is using an image of the 3rd Congressional District that will go into effect Jan. 1, 2013, suggesting he is already the incumbent for southwest Louisiana. | |
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JUNE 19 Former Saint Steve Gleason, who is paralyzed by ALS, released a statement Tuesday in response to the Atlanta radio station's skit making fun of him and the disease, this Picayune post reports. What did he say? He said he'd accepted the apology of the DJs who did it, notes that at least the incident has got people talking about ALS, and asks anyone who is burning to take action about it to do so -- by helping him fight ALS.
JUNE 19 Blogger Ian McGibboney takes a look at the Gleason incident in this post. He makes a good argument about the difference between having free speech and being free from consequences for your speech (which none of us is). He also admits that many of us got upset before we listened to the skit -- but lets us know that the reality is far worse than we can imagine. It was the incredibly bad judgment, even more than the actual speech, that probably got those DJs fired, he opines.
JUNE 19 Washington Post blogger Aaron Blake writes about Sen. Guillory's switch to the GOP in this post. He writes what most political watchers in Louisiana know: Guillory was a Republican before he decided to run for the senate seat in a mostly-D St. Landry district, and has switched back now that he plans to run for Lt. Gov. in a mostly-R state. But how come Blake missed Guillory's appearance on a TLC pageant show? Now that is a video we'd like to see. (Again).
JUNE 19 Here's another Washington Post blog post about a Louisiana politician, and it's just plain scathing. Ezra Klein says Jindal's Politico post was "insulting" to the intelligence of voters, and adds that Jindal is personifying the "stupid" he's railed against, by being an "elite" who convinces GOP activists of "things that aren't true." Me-ow.
JUNE 19 Here's Gov. Jindal's post in Politico, in which he asks the GOP to get over losing to Obama (again) and stop "the bedwetting." (Uh, what?) He gives his Republican buddies what is probably a nerd's idea of a coach's motivational talk, which starts with a list of accomplishments that they can't seem to exploit and ending with an absurd description of liberals that sounds like a character treatment for a Fox "News" movie scripted by Gordon Liddy. Sure, he's preaching to the choir, but even the choir's not this gullible.
JUNE 19 Lamar Parmentel read Gov. Jindal's post on Politico, but thinks it was so dumb it probably was published in the wrong paper. This post by Lamar on the Daily Kingfish opines that possibly Jindal's post was destined for the Onion -- because the governor couldn't possibly be serious here. If you listen closely, you can hear the staff of the Kingfish giggling.
JUNE 19 Blogger Robert Mann posts from Turkey, a country he has visited several times in the past few years. Mann gives an interesting overview of the current political and societal climate of the country, which -- if you're living under a rock and don't know -- is experiencing protests and turmoil these days. Mann promises to post as much as he can during his trip, which should be fascinating reading.
JUNE 19 Blogger CB Forgotston says the legislature is keeping the vicious cycle going with its funding of new buildings for the community college/technical college system. Universities across the state need maintenance and improvement on existing buildings, and the solution is to build new buildings at other schools? By the time the bonds are paid off, those buildings will be falling down, too, CB says.
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