-->

Monday, May 19, 2008

"Ahead of the game"

According to Kevin Allman, Jeremy Alford's cover story recently run in the Independent and then again in the Gambit which criticizes the "Stonewalling" Jindal administration is "way ahead of the game" in questioning PBJ's hypocritical "do as I say, not as I do" approach to ethics and transparency in government. Is it, though?

I would have thought "Ahead of the game" reporting on Jindal's obvious hypocrisy would have meant reporting on it before the election. Not so for Alford who authored the Gambit's notorious "Geek Appeal" cover profile of Jindal which along with Gambit's endorsement of Jindal put the "needed alternative" weekly squarely in the Dragonslaying corner.

In "Geek Appeal" Alford's "ahead of the game" reporting on Jindal's disputed ethics record reads,

Operatives from the Louisiana Democratic Party stayed in the shadows during the press conference, but roamed among the reporters at its conclusion and handed out "Bobby Jindal's Real Record on Ethics and Corruption." The one-page handout detailed five votes in which Jindal's position could be interpreted as hypocritical. There are two votes in particular where he supported killing ethics investigations related to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff. The Jindal campaign immediately fired off a response, arguing the votes were "ill-disguised partisan maneuvers" by the Democratic leadership that separated liberals from conservatives. Most of the bills also contained riders that changed the impact of the legislation, his campaign insists.


So in the pre-election reporting, the only questions raised about Jindal originate from "operatives" "roaming in the shadows" with a "one-paged handout" while the Jindal campaign's take is given disproportionate credence.

Prior to the election the Jindal campaign also was becoming well known for the same "Stonewalling" tactics with the press Alford criticizes in his recent piece. Unfortunately when Alford was given an "ahead of the game" opportunity to report on the paranoid tendencies of the Jindal campaign and his principal spokesperson Melissa Sellers this is about as hard-hitting as it got.

Dodging public debates also has sparked criticism of Jindal, and his various no-shows are an extension of just how scripted and guarded the campaign has become. Sellers says that Jindal is just "busy bringing his message of a fresh start to the state" and declined further comment.


In its subsequent endorsement of Jindal, the Gambit told us this election was a "once-in-a-lifetime opportunity" to elect someone whose "integrity is beyond reproach" It seems now, however, that the shine has worn off of that Dragonslaying armor more quickly than anybody could have predicted. Take, for example, this piece from Alford in the most recent Gambit in which we learn that Jindal's connections (going back at least as far as October) to a campaign contributor looking to open a landfill and to a shady 527 advocating school vouchers combined with the administration's secretive strong-arming tactics are starting to make for some raised eyebrows in Baton Rouge.

Until last October, when he was still a GOP congressman from Kenner, Bobby Jindal had no connection to Alsen. That changed with $50,000 in campaign contributions from Colorado-based Louisiana Land Systems (LLS). The money went to Jindal as the company was trying to open a landfill near Alsen. The state Department of Environmental Quality had previously rejected the company's application in 2000, but a new push was clearly afoot. Jindal's press secretary said at the time that that there was no talk of the landfill when candidate Jindal met with LLS officials.

New friends are easy to make when you're the front-runner in a governor's race. During last year's campaign, Jindal also befriended All Children Matter (ACM), a Virginia-based 527 group with a chapter in Louisiana. A 527 group is an unregulated political advocacy group not subject to state or federal campaign finance laws. As a 527 group, ACM typically promotes politicians, like Jindal, who support school vouchers. The group bankrolled part of Jindal's radio efforts in 2007 and got involved in several other races. ACM's contributors are a who's who of corporate big shots — its Louisiana arm got $100,000 from Wal-Mart tycoon Jim Walton and another $100,000 from neoconservative icon Bruce Kovnier, founder of Caxton Associates.

Although last year's campaign is over, both relationships continue to matter on the state level as all roads — at least on paper — lead to Jindal. For example, the debate over LLS's pending permit (and DEQ's anticipated decision on it) could soon rekindle interest in Jindal's connection to the company. And just last week, ACM became Jindal's attack dog when it lashed out at a New Orleans lawmaker, Rep. Karen Carter Peterson, who claims Team Jindal pulled the trigger on radio spots attacking her opposition to vouchers.

The landfill issue could be a sleeping giant. A recent public records request reveals that LLS is finishing up a new application that could soon come up for community review. According to DEQ spokesperson Jean Lockwood Kelly, there's "no set schedule," but information is currently being collected and assessed. On the surface, it's the same application that DEQ denied in 2000, citing the company's failure to show a "genuine demand" for putting back into use an underground catacomb designed to house waste from Superfund sites.


What explains the sudden turnaround in the handling of Jindal? Perhaps more than a few formerly enthusiastic reporters and editors are now feeling a bit burned at this point by the increasingly arrogant and paranoid stance the administration takes toward the political press. Alford's cover story, in fact, can be read as a collective exercise in access-starved reporters ganging up to feel sorry for themselves. Maybe such reporters and editors could have saved themselves this trouble if they had only been a little further "ahead of the game".

No comments: