Bobby Jindal's Downside (Jindal as POTUS? Take a closer look at his record as Louisiana governor)

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal is busy promoting his new tome Leadership and Crisis with book tour stops all over the country. This latest tour comes on top of his previous speaking tours to raise campaign cash for himself and various Republican candidates around the country. The only place Governor Jindal has trouble visiting is his home state of Louisiana. The joke in Louisiana is that Bobby is known as a governor in 49 states.

Governor Jindal is intelligent and very well-educated, and he manages to look like a creditable leader during a crisis. In this he learned well from former Governor Kathleen Blanco's disastrous handling of the Hurricane Katrina aftermath. He can spout numerous statistics off the top of his head and make complicated situations understandable.

However, as we've learned from the current occupant of the White House, command of statistics and the ability to explain the complicated do not necessarily indicate that one is destined to be a great leader.

Louisiana's last budget was balanced with numerous accounting tricks, one-time funding sources, and massive cuts to health and higher education. Jindal has been criticized for pushing hard decisions down the road to avoid offending anyone in preparation for a presidential bid, and it is well-known in Louisiana that Jindal is preparing to run and campaigning across the country on trips funded by Louisiana taxpayers.

Louisiana is a populist state that tends to overspend in flush times and flail in lean times. In Louisiana, health and higher education are not constitutionally protected from budget cuts and are routinely savaged when the economy dives. To be fair, there is a great deal of waste in higher education that needs to be eliminated, and LSU professors are not helping their cause by threatening to unionize in a state where unions are not looked on favorably. Also, LSU System President Dr. John Lombardi, Louisiana's highest-paid state employee, recently refused to trim his salary for the good of the school and further exposed the hypocrisy in Louisiana higher education.

During Jindal's administration, Louisiana has added over 3,100 new employees, and its budget has increased from $12 billion in 2008 to $24 billion in 2010. The governor seems to think this surge in state government will somehow conquer the budget in the long run.

When it comes to cutting spending, the governor can't cut even his own travel budget. One of Governor Jindal's favorite Louisiana campaign tactics is local church attendance by helicopter in rural areas rarely visited by any governor.

Jindal's celebrated ethics legislation promoting transparency in Louisiana government has backfired (see also here): it has been revealed that enforcement powers were stripped from the Ethics Board, resulting in several resignations in protest, and Jindal has zealously guarded the records of the governor's office from the light of day. The law's most notable accomplishment has been to drive worthy citizens away from serving on state boards by requiring draconian disclosures of every conceivable financial detail and close association in a futile effort to prevent political corruption. Are you kidding? This is Louisiana!

Governor Jindal devotes a sizable portion of Leadership and Crisis to detailing Louisiana's natural beauty, recounting political anecdotes, and listing boilerplate conservative talking points without ever mentioning his plans to deal with the state's looming $1.5-billion budget shortfall or the numerous challenges faced by Louisiana as its graduates flee in search of opportunities the state can't provide.

Jindal doesn't seem to understand is that status quo governing is currently not in vogue. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is talked about as presidential material precisely because of his willingness to shake up New Jersey's insular political culture without thought of higher office. Christie is willing to take on the special interests and make the hard choices New Jersey needs to survive, while Jindal is doing his best not to offend any powerful interests in Louisiana. This type of timid leadership is exactly what the Tea Parties are railing against.

Those promoting or considering Bobby Jindal as presidential material need to take a much closer look at his record as Louisiana governor. Jindal talks the talk, but he doesn't walk the walk.

Hat tip: C.B. Forgotston

Tom Roberson is an independent conservative holding finance and engineering degrees and doing his small part to save his country.

Flintsilver7 is correct. I’ve been complaining about Jindal ever since he was elected and proceeded to turn into a Big Government Republican, contrary to his campaign promises.

In the spring of ‘08 the very first thing he did in a special legislative session was to bust the constitutionally-mandated spending cap and piss away an extra $1 billion in state spending. Recall this was when oil prices were skyrocketing, which resulted in Louisiana’s state government to be flush with money from the oil/gas severance taxes.

He then proceeded to hand out raises to every government deadhead in the state.

Next he backed a bill tripling the pay of state legislators. We had enough by that time.

Moon Griffon, a state-wide talk radio host (who I am very proud to claim as a personal friend of mine) led the charge to stop the pay raise. I and a bunch of other conservatives also helped, and we managed to put enough heat on Jindal to veto it.

This is all documented if anyone cared to look it up before they post and make fools of themselves by claiming that Jindal is a “true conservative.”

He’s no such thing.

So it really doesn’t bother me what other out-of-state folks claim to know about Jindal. I’ve known the man for fifteen years and followed his political career ever since.

But I do feel I owe my fellow conservatives here at FRee Republic the truth of the matter when it comes to Jindal and his conservative bona fides, or lack thereof.

I’ve been doing my own political newsblog for a year and a half now, and have had my share of dealing with local and state politicians, including Jindal’s people.

I was born here in Louisiana. I live here and work here.

Jindal AIN’T a movement conservative.

Actually I think the real problem is we split our conservative vote between too many candidates, and the establishment RINO then wins by a plurality.

It happens every election cycle; we all get fired up about different conservatives, and then start bickering back and forth about who is “more’ conservative, strengthening our resolve to ‘not compromise’ our ‘principles’.

All the while the establishment candidate is racking up delegates and moving toward the nomination.

See: Nixon, Ford, Bush, Dole, Bush, McCain, and now Romney.

I am sick of the RINO parade and would really like a real conservative this time.

I honestly think we need to come together early behind a single conservative and keep our conservative base strong and united.

This will be very hard to do with the various factions of conservatives.

To me that candidate is Sarah Palin, but if we split our votes and dilute our power, we will hand the nomination to the establishment RINO, just as we did in 2008.

I’m thinking a vote in the primaries for anyone but Sarah is a defacto vote for Romney.

"...we’re left with a sad sack like McCain with no chance of winning."

It was McCain's turn. The Republicans have a long history of nominating "the next guy in line". Nixon, Ford, GHW Bush, Dole and McCain are all examples. The Republican establishment doesn't want a Conservative at the top. The only real stand out in the past 40 years is Ronald Reagan. The country clubbers couldn't stop him, but they sure tried, didn't they?

What do you think of my idea that we as conservatives need to come together as a large voting block behind a SINGLE conservative early on.

It's my contention we always split our vote among several conservative candidates and that allows the establishment RINO a path to victory with a plurality of the vote.

I have been trying to analyze how we can finally get a conservative nominee, as time after time the establishment RINO seems to win.

The only problem is (as evidenced here on FR) how can we get everyone to agree early on one candidate? Everyone sees their vote as a personal statement of their values and no one is interested in any type of pragmatism.

I think as conservatives, we are very strong in our beliefs and rightly see compromise as a bad thing.

But seriously, wouldn't Sarah, or Barbour, or Pence, or some other conservative(although perhaps NOT your favorite of the group) be better than Mittens?

I believe our only hope this time is Sarah Palin. I know there are some on here who feel otherwise. And that's the problem. How do we come together?

RE: she will not be looking to “reach out” across the aisle in a “show of bipartisanship”.

One thing this woman has shown inspite of some other shortcomings, is her TOUGHNESS.

All that crap thrown at her and family by the media and she’s still standing.

This character trait is what we need in a dangerous world where we have to face the likes of Al Qaeda, Terrorists, Kim Jong Il and Latin American dictators.

And we’ll need toughness too to confront the likes of Pelosi and Reid ( who will be with us for another 6 years, with Pelosi having her seat for as long as she wants it ).

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