Governor Transparency

If you're thinking that joke is old, obvious, and not funny anymore, you are correct.

(AP) — Top officials in Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration used personal email accounts to craft a media strategy for imposing hundreds of millions of dollars in Medicaid cuts — a method of communication that can make it more difficult to track under public records laws despite Jindal’s pledge to bring more transparency to state government.

Emails reviewed by The Associated Press reveal that non-state government email addresses were used dozens of times by state officials to communicate last summer about a public relations offensive for making $523 million in health care cuts. Those documents weren’t provided to AP in response to a public records request.

Jindal, now in his second term, has become a leading voice among Republican governors and is considered a potential presidential candidate. His administration’s emails fold into a national debate over the use of personal email accounts by government officials to discuss official business.

The issue was a prominent one during the administration of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

 The Palin punchline there is a bit fresher, though.  Maybe we should keep that one going.