Posted on 05/20/2006 9:22:20 PM PDT by My Favorite Headache
NEW ORLEANS - Mayor Ray Nagin, whose shoot-from-the-hip style was both praised and scorned after Hurricane Katrina, narrowly won re-election over Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu on Saturday in the race to oversee one of the biggest rebuilding projects in U.S. history.
"We are ready to take off. We have citizens around the country who want to come back to the city of New Orleans, and we're going to get them all back," Nagin said in a joyful victory speech that took on the tone of Sunday sermon.
"If we are unified there is nothing we cannot do," he said. "It's time for us to stop the bickering. It's time for us to stop measuring things in black and white and yellow and Asian. It's time for us to be one New Orleans."
With all 442 precincts reporting, Nagin won with 52.3 percent, or 59,460 votes, to Landrieu's 47.7 percent, or 54,131 votes. Results showed he got black votes he needed from scattered residents across the country who voted by fax and absentee ballots, and got a sizable crossover vote from white districts.
Nagin, a former cable television executive first elected to public office in 2002, had argued the city could ill-afford to change course just as rebuilding gathered steam.
His second term begins a day before the June 1 start of the next hurricane season in a city where streets are still strewn with rusting, mud-covered cars and entire neighborhoods consist of homes that are empty shells.
With little disagreement on the major issues — the right of residents to rebuild in all areas and the urgent need for federal aid for recovery and top-notch levees — the race came down to a referendum on leadership styles.
Nagin, a janitor's son from a black, working-class neighborhood, is known for his improvisational, some say impulsive, rhetoric. After Katrina plunged his city into chaos, Nagin was both scorned and praised for a tearful plea for the federal government to "get off their (behinds) and do something" and his now-famous remark that God intended New Orleans to be a "chocolate" city.
In his victory speech, Nagin reached out to President Bush, thanking him for keeping his commitment to bring billions of dollars for levees, housing and incentives to the city.
And as for Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco, with whom he feuded as his city descended into chaos, Nagin thanked her "for what she's getting ready to do."
" It's time for a real partnership," he said. "It's time for us to get together and rebuild this city."
Landrieu, who served 16 years in the state House before being elected to his current post of lieutenant governor two years ago, is the scion of a political dynasty known as Louisiana's version of the Kennedys. He's the brother of Sen. Mary Landrieu (news, bio, voting record) and had hoped to be the first white mayor in a generation, since his father, Moon Landrieu, left office in 1978.
In conceded the race, Landrieu echoed the theme of his campaign — a call for unity.
"One thing is for sure — that we as a people have got to come together so we can speak with one voice and one purpose," he said. "Join with me in supporting Mayor Nagin."
Fewer than half of New Orleans' 455,000 pre-Katrina residents are living in the city, and a large number of blacks scattered by the storm have yet to return.
Evacuees arrived by bus from as far as Atlanta and Houston to vote. More than 25,000 ballots were cast early by mail or fax or at satellite polling places set up around Louisiana earlier in the month — 5,000 more than were cast early in the primary.
Turnout appeared to be on-par with the April 22 primary, when about 37 percent of eligible voters cast ballots.
Nagin, who had widespread support from white voters four years ago, lost much of that support in the primary but got a much stronger showing this time.
Results from Louisiana's Secretary of State's Office showed Nagin carrying majority black precincts and Landrieu winning in majority white ones. But Nagin pulled a significant crossover vote in some heavily populated predominantly white precincts in Uptown New Orleans.
Voter Elliot Pernell was philosophical about his vote for Nagin.
"He's been through the experience already," he said, "and won't make the same mistakes."
Among the first to vote was 61-year-old Alice Howard, who was rescued after three days on her roof following Katrina and evacuated to Houston.
"I want the city to come back," she said. "This is my city. This is home to me. ... I want to make sure the correct person takes care of home."
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Who says that dead men don't vote?
"He's been through the experience already," he said, "and won't make the same mistakes."
ROFLMAO
Every population deserves its government, as a wise man once said. Serves them right.
HL Mencken?
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
H. L. Mencken
Gluttons for punishment...
"Cokkit fo evvybuddy!" /Buckwheat voice
Ashamed to admit that I do not remember the attribution. But it sounds like him.
Damn, I love Mencken. I gotta break some out. I collected old hard cover Mencken books for a while. Fun hobby.
He'll make new ones.
they deserve him
Wait...make that "Chotlit"
Unbelievable -- any fraud involved?
I bet they loved his speech!
Read through the thread. See for yourself. :)
You beat me to it. In this case, the old proverb is indisputably correct.
Haiti, America.
Those "displaced voters" bussed into the city today are not coming back. Nagin not only played the race card, he dealt it from the bottom of the deck.
When asked if he was surprised that the out-of-town vote was in his favor, he said something to the effect of "not in the least" with a cocky, s^@$-eating grin on his face. What a gentleman.
100 percent agree.. They deserve JUST what they get . A stoned out , illiterate freak .
Does this mewan that the POS is going to re=re-locate himself from Texas back to Lower Alabama? /sarc
Some people just vote for the name that is most-familiar to them. They've seen "Nagin" before, so the knuckleheads just pull that lever...
~ Blue Jays ~
I'm actually glad Nagin won, he's mostly harmless. The Landrieus on the other hand, are pure evil.
Exactly, he's the "Devil You Know."
I wouldn't call him harmless. I'm sure a fe wpeople died because of his moronic handling of Katrina.
Well, I don't think anybody deserves Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, etc.
But the point is, New Orleanians had a choice, and they chose...Ray Nagin. Yes, they absolutely deserve him.
Heartbreaking.
Hopefully, his first duty as mayor will be to get all the New Orleans refugees including the New Orleans criminals back from Houston so New Orleans can be "back to normal."
His shoot from the hip style? The man cowered under his desk without so much as firing a shot!
"If yo feel dat pain, yo must retain!"
There's something that posters need to remember. This was not a referendum on Mayor Nagin himself, but a choice between him and Mitch Landrieu. And Landrieu is no prize, either.
Nagin was able to win more white votes than had been expected, and that's what put him over the top. I suspect that many of those voters didn't want the Landrieu family taking over the state.
Proof that no money should go into New Orleans. If they're so stupid to reeltect the man who wouldn't order an evacuation, then got out of dodge himself, they deserve what they got, and if they want to rebuild, let them do it themselves.
Mark
My heartfelt sympathies.
My point is, New Orleanians had a CHOICE. They freely chose Nagin. Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, etc. were not elected.
Geeze. We're all friends here. Thucking chill out.
Then the motto for this election should have been, "Vote for the stoned out, illiterate freak -- it's important". Because the alternative was Mitch Landrieu, which would have been 10x worse.
First of all, the Rockies are kicking your butt.
Secondly, if you knew ANYTHING about Louisiana politics, anything at all, and I do not claim to be an expert -- you'd know the most well-known name on the ballot was Landrieu, Lt Gov. Mitch Landrieu, son of former Mayor Moon Landrieu, brother of Sen. Mary Landrieu, hard core crooks every last one of them.
Election does not matter a thing here. What matters is the adequacy of the leader to those who propel and sustain him/her in the leadership. How they do it is a technicality. The leader of a rat pack cannot be a lion. The leader of the rat pack has to be a rat.
I want my money back. This State should not get one more tax payer dollar while this man? is mayor.
Ironic that Nagin could bus in people to vote, but could not bus them out to save their lives before Katrina.
Wonder if the MSM will overlook that little irony.
Wrong. Democracy, especially U.S.-style Democracy, is different, superior even, to other forms of government.
And after 4 years of Clintoon, the nation cried "More! We want more!"
Stupid is as stupid does. Another tragedy strikes New Orleans don't expect any help from my family. Nagin showed hiimself to be the most inept Mayor in the country and blamed it all on Bush. Citizens there reelected him and you got what you asked for.
I'm with you. I would rather Nagin won, if the alternative was Landrieu.
This completely exhausts any sympathy I might have for NOLA. This peacock was shown to be less than useful when the chips were down. It's on you now, NO.
One should look beyond the form [of government or of anything else] and into the substance. And the substance at hand is Nagin. And if one looks a bit deeper, then one could see that Landrieu or no Landrieu, but whoever would become a mayor of NO has to be a pretty unpleasant type. It comes with territory, and more especially with NO [and LA] electorate. It would be so even if the NO mayoralty was an appointive position in the gift of LA governor or legislature.
I blame Blank-0 more than Nagin.
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