Jindal is Bad

On Monday I wrote the following about Clancy's Gen-X icon,

Jindal isn't running against his opponents. He won't even debate them. In fact, it's hard to say he's even running for Governor of Louisiana since he talks so little about the unique problems Louisiana faces with regard to insurance, or storm protection, or coastal restoration, or our crushing poverty.

In this post, David elaborates on Jindal's lack of any there there, after a visit to "Geek Appeal"'s website.

For somebody who's supposed to be just about the brightest sumbitch in the whole entire gad dang state, Jindal doesn't seem to be very clear on the concept. If you tell people that can read your detailed paln on your website, they expect to be able to read the plan, not that you have a plan. Of course, Jindal's just using an increasingly common political ploy -- be as vague as possible, while saying that details are available on your website. It generally works, because most people, including most journalists, don't bother going to the website. Four years ago, he wasn't a politician, now he's using the newest, oldest politician's trick in the book.

Update: Oyster (even if he is a whiny baby) observes this fun bit of anti-NOLA race baiting in the "News" section of Jindal's site.

In the "News" section of the web site, Bobby links to a supportive letter by John "fan belt" Cooksey, printed in the Ouachita Citizen. The letter celebrates the displacement of New Orleanians from their home state after the largest disaster in U.S. history. I repeat: the letter celebrates the displacement of New Orleanians from their home state after the largest disaster in U.S. history.

"Fortunately, not all of the state's electorate is from Orleans Parish. Fortunately, many of the people who once composed a great deal of the electorate in Orleans no longer lives in Louisiana. Thus, they are not taking part in the patronage system which has existed in New Orleans for at least 150 years and is the source of so much corruption."

Notice the way the Jindal people execute a slick declension from "corruption" to "New Orleans" to "the people who once composed a great deal of the electorate in Orleans". Jindal's "Slay-the-Dragon" campaign has deftly substituted the word "corruption" for whatever bogeyman the target electorate can imagine. In this case, Jindal's war on a word targets the not-so-subtly-racist anti-NOLA vote. Plus Jindal's campaign is more or less openly stating that the slow recovery of New Orleans post-flood is somehow a good thing. Is this the kind of advocacy New Orleans needs in the Governor's office for the next four years?