There was so much insane gobbledygook that came out of Gov. Bobby Jindal's mouth last night that I could keep wring for days about it. I couldn't believe my ears when Bobby Jindal used the utter failures of the Bush administration over their "Brownie" handling of the Hurricane Katrina disaster to attack the role of the federal government in our lives. Especially when the state of Louisiana has received billions of dollars from the federal government to help them recover.
The federal government has devoted more than $175 billion to the region since Katrina. It's unclear how much more money will be needed to fix the leftover damage. But nearly everyone agrees the federal government should continue investing heavily to strengthen the region's levees and make other flood control improvements to prevent a repeat of Katrina's devastation.
I'm sorry, but the federal government is a necessary player to help Americans in times of any kind of natural disasters. Even from Volcanoes. What was up with this Sheriff Lee that he praised? Oh, that's right, he's a race profiler who fits in perfectly in the GOP's world.
In the wake of Katrina, Lee grabbed national headlines by suggesting his deputies could randomly stop blacks to combat a rise in drug crimes caused by the displacement of low-income New Orleans residents.
He later abandoned the idea -- but never apologized.
In an earlier incident, Lee sparked a firestorm by ordering his force to arbitrarily stop “young blacks in rinky-dink cars” driving in white neighborhoods, according to The Associated Press. He backed off that plan, calling it a mistake after the NAACP called on him to resign.
Shortly before his death, Lee stoked controversy again, telling a TV reporter: "We know the crime is in the black community. Why should I waste time in the white community?"
And he completely ignores the fact that President Bush and all the Republicans voted to increase the federal deficit more than any other time in our history.
Bush ran up more debt for this country than all previous presidents combined.
Jack Cafferty asked the right question today: Are the Republicans in any position to lecture President Obama on fiscal responsibility? Being lectured by the Jindal's of the GOP is irresponsible and ridiculous. And it was creepy. I call him the Exorcist for a reason:
...in an essay Jindal wrote in 1994 for the New Oxford Review, a serious right-wing Catholic journal, Jindal narrated a bizarre story of a personal encounter with a demon, in which he participated in an exorcism with a group of college friends. And not only did they cast out the supernatural spirit that had possessed his friend, Jindal wrote that he believes that their ritual may well have cured her cancer.
Reading the article leaves no doubt that Jindal -- who graduated from Brown University in 1991, was a Rhodes Scholar, and had been accepted at Yale Law School and Harvard Medical School when he wrote the essay -- was completely serious about the encounter. He even said the experience "reaffirmed" his faith.
I don't think the media dared to mention this fact to America and it certainly wasn't part of Michael Gerson's wonderful Villager profile on Jindal. But he's the future of the Republican party as their party leader Rush Limbuagh warns them.
Joan Walsh astutely points out that there's also a deeply noxious racial stench to the governors like Jindal who are refusing these funds.
Even the wingnut base was shocked at his performance.
Townhall's Amanda Carpenter has always struck me a young lady of simple All-American tastes, who would be dazzled by a fistful of carnations and the early bird special at Applebees. Tonight:
Well, I don't feel as good about the Jindal response as I did earlier today.
There was a cheesy, salesman-like quality to the response that I don't think connected with the Rick Santelli-inspired anger so many Republicans are feeling right now. And, I'm pretty sure he's going to be SNL's next target. His speech tempo was just, so weird.
Enough complaning from me. He didn't pass the primetime test and it makes me sad. I don't want to dwell.
Oh dear. One can almost see an evening spent on the couch beneath a Snugglie, a pitcher of Twisted Devils at hand and a Gretchen Wilson CD blasting away on the stereo until the police show up and pound on the door.
Speaking for the more or less Y chromosome side of the aisle, Ol' Bacon 'n Playdoh hisself:
Awful. He walked out like an earnest dork and has a weird inflection, trying to sound upbeat and sunny when it's clearly not his natural metier. It sounds false, and he looks false.
I don't care how much of a star Jindal is, America doesn't elect somewhat-off dorks as president.
That's Ace.
Calling someone else a "dork".
He almost killed off his chances in 2012. Here's the transcript of what he said.
During Katrina, I visited Sheriff Harry Lee, a Democrat and a good friend of mine. When I walked into his makeshift office I'd never seen him so angry. He was yelling into the phone: 'Well, I'm the Sheriff and if you don't like it you can come and arrest me!' I asked him: 'Sheriff, what's got you so mad?' He told me that he had put out a call for volunteers to come with their boats to rescue people who were trapped on their rooftops by the floodwaters. The boats were all lined up ready to go - when some bureaucrat showed up and told them they couldn't go out on the water unless they had proof of insurance and registration.
I told him, 'Sheriff, that's ridiculous.' And before I knew it, he was yelling into the phone: 'Congressman Jindal is here, and he says you can come and arrest him too!' Harry just told the boaters to ignore the bureaucrats and start rescuing people. There is a lesson in this experience: The strength of America is not found in our government.
It is found in the compassionate hearts and enterprising spirit of our citizens. We are grateful for the support we have received from across the nation for the ongoing recovery efforts. This spirit got Louisiana through the hurricanes -- and this spirit will get our nation through the storms we face today
