LOUISIANA SENATE PRESIDENT CONSIDERS ANOTHER PARTY SWITCH

Politics1 ^ | 11/25/2003 | Politics1

[Abram]

LOUISIANA SENATE PRESIDENT CONSIDERS ANOTHER PARTY SWITCH. Louisiana State Senate President John Hainkel (R) enjoys his leadership job and wants to have a good working relationship with incoming Governor Kathleen Blanco (D). Blanco -- who is replacing a term-limited GOP incumbent -- let it be known she'd like the next House Speaker and Senate President to be Democrats, according to CQ Politics Today. Hainkel told the New Orleans Times-Picayune that the most important thing to him is retaining his leadership post: "Maybe I’ll be [a] Democrat ... If that is the biggest freakin’ thing ... to [Blanco], I’d change my party affiliation. It doesn’t make any difference to me. I could be an independent or a Libertarian or a Tory." Hainkel, a conservative, served as House Speaker as a Democrat in the late 1980s, before switching to the GOP in the 1990s when the tide shifted in his state. Hainkel also briefly flirted with making a GOP run for Governor earlier this year.

[Abram]

Interesting...Thanks for the lesson, but what about ballot box stuffing, absentee ballots? In Washington, Cantwell won because of "special ballots" in King County that gave her the very narrow edge. I understand Jindal was on the slide in the end...but he must have slide quite a bit to lose by such a margin. On paper, he seemed like a "dream" candidate...maybe his inexperience got the best of him.