Posted on 05/31/2013 12:55:54 PM PDT by TheBigB
If anything, my condemnation will help him out.
State Sen. Elbert Guillory, now a Republican, says Democratic Party chair remarks helped spur his switch
http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/05/elbert_guillory_republican_lou.html
http://www.google.com/search?q=elbert+Guillory+voting+record
His voting record is very conservative: http://votesmart.org/candidate/key-votes/75837/elbert-guillory
Let’s keep an eye on him; he might be going places.
At this point, it may be political suicide for him to run for reelection in that district as a Republican. It might be a better option for him to run for the wide open Lt Governors office (with Jay Dardenne exiting it as the now leading candidate to succeed Jindal) as it currently has no potential candidates. Of course, if Jindal runs for the Senate and wins, Dardenne will be elevated a year early and will get to choose a Lt Governor appointee.
Other than that, if Rodney Alexander retires in the 5th, he could run in that seat (Guillory’s hometown of Opelousas being in the SW corner).
All of St. Landry Parrish lies in the LA-07, held by backstabbing Congressman Boustany. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:LA-districts-109-07.gif
Maybe Guillory can take him on in the jungle primary—the CD is like 25% black, and majority Catholic, so if Guillory and Boustany make the run-off, a black, Catholic, conservative Republican such as Guillory would have a real chance of beating the Protestant Boustany.
You’re forgetting that LA lost that 7th seat and all the districts were augmented. The Opelousas part of St. Landry is now in Alexander’s 5th.
http://www.ourcampaigns.com/ContainerDetail.html?ContainerID=456
Boy, is my face red. I mean, not only did I not trust what you said, I went by what Wikipedia said, forgetting that there is no such thing as a LA-07 anymore. With St. Landry split between two North Louisiana CDs, I don’t think that Guillory will be able to run for Congress; and reelection will be very difficult in his heavily Dem state senate district. Maybe he can run for Lt. Gov. as you mentioned.
If he’s been voting conservative and even endorsed David Vitter then it sounds like he was only pretending to be a democrat in order to win a rat seat. Democrats do that all the time (hello Mayor Bloomberg).
Back when Illinois had plural voting (each state house district had 3 members and you could pool all 3 of your votes for one candidate so you could elect 1 of 3 members in a district dominated by the other party) you had democrats run as fake Republicans in Chicago, including the first Mayor Daley who was elected as a “Republican” member in 1936.
Whether Guillory always intended to “switch” back or just couldn’t go on with the charade anymore I don’t know.
I salute him for taking up a rat seat as a “rat”, it kind of conflicts with the agenda of growing the party in enemy territory but could be a highly effective tactic to elect conservatives in places where the letter D is the only thing voters look at. Double agents, misdirection, it’s part of war and this is war. Personally though I’d bite my arm off before I’d vote in a rat primary.
I wonder what now, obviously he won’t hold the seat and will be replaced by a real rat. I’m guessing he has his eye on higher office or else he would have continued pretending to be a democrat to stay in the legislature (or he just couldn’t do it anymore, could you pretend to be a democrat? Not everyone is cut out to be a secret agent).
I suppose he could try to hold the seat but I doubt he’d be successful. Worth a shot though if that’s his aim.
Of course, in LA, there’s no such thing as a RAT primary, so you wouldn’t havevto vote in one; there’s a jungle primary on general election day, with all candidates on the same ballot, and if no one gets 50%+1 there’s a run-off between the top two a few weeks later.
Right, would be no problem there.
But here, I wouldn’t want to not be able to vote in the GOP primary.
I’m reminded of the now-illegal “blanket primary” setup they had in Cali.
California changed it to something very similar to the LA jungle primary, the only difference being that the CA jungle primary takes place on primary day, with the top two finishers going on to Election Day even if one got a majority, while in LA the junge primary is on Election Day and, if no one gets a majority, the top two go to a runoff in early December. The courts have upheld jungle-primary systems, but I would strike them down as violative of the First Amendment rights of citizens who form political parties to petition the government for redress of their grievances and who are denied by such law of the ability to select their party’s standardbearer for the election.
You may recall I was waaaaaay against the new system in Cali (and LA switching back to the jungle primary) but I hate it less now. Our candidates were helped by not having votes lost to 3rd parties and I really like the mathematic simplicity of the results. Plus it saved Gary Miller’s A$$, got rid of Pete Stark and almost saw Waxman lose his seat to an independent.
It’s still unconstitutional though and could easily screw us in the future.
Yeah, it seems to have backfired on the RATs in the short term. I loved when Stark lost to another commie RAT he had been redistricted in with. If it wasn't for Obama winning re-election in 2012 and lousy GOP candidates, we might have actually gained more congressional seats in California under the new system.
I wish the RATs were foolish enough to have their Orwellian "Popular Vote Compact" go into effect whenever an individual state ratifies it, instead of a majority of states (which would put California "in play" for us during Presidential elections, since they voted to cast their electoral votes for whoever wins the popular vote nationally), but fortunately for the RATs they're not that stupid.
Have you heard Illinois has changed its system of electing Governors/Lt. Governors? It seems to be another change for the worse that nobody talked about until after it passed. Under the new system, the Governor & Lt. Governor candidates will run together as tickets in the primaries so you have to choose your Governor candidate's choice for Lt. Governor. I liked the old system better where voters could pick whoever they wanted for Lt. Governor in the primary, whether or not he supports the person they want for Governor. The change limits voters choices, IMO. Also, some foolish Republican state legislators want to abolish the Lt. Governor's office alltogether saying it "costs too much money" (why they don't abolish dozens of other cushy appointed jobs in Illinois government that cost taxpayers $$$ but serve NO purpose is beyond me.... it would be like saying let's get rid of the Vice Presidency but keep all of Obama's unelected Czars)
I did not hear that. I’m surprised it wasn’t done after the 1986 LaRoushie fiasco.
I’m seeing conflicting info. Did they change it to run together in the primary (like Kentucky) or the Governor nominee appoints the running mate after winning (like Colorado)? I’m ok with former but don’t like the latter. The US Vice Presidential nominees are defacto appointed however they are technically nominated separately and the convention could chose to defy the nominee as is their right (think if McCain had picked Liarman).
If it is indeed a change to the Colorado system then it will be the only statewide office the voters don’t nominate themselves. That’s just wrong.
You absolutely can’t abolish the office even if the guy doesn’t have much to do, NJ’s recent past is case in point of why one is needed. It’s salary and office budget as you say is a drop in the stinking bucket, these people are such hypocrites.
Unlike NJ we have other statewide elected officials in the line of succession whereas all those offices are appointed in NJ and the job fell to the Senate President. However the guy next in line could be from a different party, worked for us in Arizona where Sec of State Brewer took over for Butch but I don’t like that.
We need an amendment to be able to fill the office when it’s vacant as that is currently not possible because the state constitution doesn’t mention it. NY was in the same boat but a court let Patterson fill the office anyway.
In MA it seems they also have no provision to fill the office of LT Governor. What a weird oversight in these state constitutions.
Here’s the article on the proposal by the IL House to abolish the office of Lt. Governor (ironically being sponsored by a foolish conservative Republican who would rather abolish that than NUMEROUS unnecessarily appointed government jobs). They want to make it a ballot referendum for voters to approve. I’d vote NO for the reasons you mentioned when NJ had no Lt. Governor position and it caused numerous problems. Not to mention I do NOT want the Attorney General (currently little Lisa) as “next in line”
http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20130411/news/704119808/
And here’s the article about them changing the way Lt. Governor’s are chosen in Illinois. This article was written before it passed, but I read in an email two days ago that it’s already been enacted and will go into effect in 2014, so there’s speculation on who the gubernatorial candidates (Rutherford, Dillard, Brady, etc.) would pick as their running mate:
http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20130528/BLOGS02/130529808
I thought they were going with the Kentucky system, but from that article it looks like the Colorado system. Definitely a move that takes away power from Illinois citizens and puts it in the hands of politicians to decide behind closed doors (a terrible idea no matter how many freepers live in their fantasy world that state governments are smarter and know whats best for us). I’m surprised there’s virtually no news coverage about this in Illinois. Voters should rightfully be outraged about the change.
They’ve probably changing it because of what happened when Quinn got paired with that scumbag criminal after the primary and had to force him out so he could appoint Shelia Simon. He wants to be able to automatically do that in the future and take it out of voters hands completely.
IMO, they should keep the current system (voters choose whoever they want for Lt. Governor in the primary), but amend the duties of the Lt. Governor so it’s not a powerless office, and make it similar to the duties of the Vice President (casts the tie-breaking vote in the IL Senate, becomes acting Governor automatically if the Governor is incapacitated, etc.) Of course, that would require common sense, which we don’t have in Illinois.
Under the previous constitution the LT Governor was President of the Senate. That changed with the 1970 constitution.
Our Senate is odd numbered so it has no need for a tie breaking vote. The House though since they reduced it in 1982 is even numbered.
According to constitution the Sec of State convenes the House so they can elect a Speaker and the Governor himself convenes the Senate so they can elect a President, with the LT having no role whatsoever.
It’s a minor role but you could have the LT convene both Houses and break ties in the House. Combined with the various bureaucratic duties delegated to the office by statute or by the Governor and that’s enough to justify an office that has that 1 vital function.
Two more black officeholders have switched to the GOP on the heels of Senator Guillory’s announcement: Mayor Pro-Tempore Ralph Washington of Central (in East Baton Rouge Parish) and former Baton Rouge Metro Councilman Darrell Glasper. And apparently additional party switches are coming. http://thehayride.com/2013/06/now-that-ralph-washington-has-switched-lets-talk-about-lord-bob/
Speaking of black Republicans, Northwest Florida Tea Party President Mike Hill won a special election to the state House of Representatives from a 35%-black Pensacola district yesterday, making him the only black Republican currently in elected office in Florida. http://www.sunshinestatenews.com/story/mike-hill-wins-florida-hd-2-race-becoming-legislatures-only-black-republican
In regard to the colored people, there is always more that is benevolent, I perceive, than just, manifested towards us. What I ask for the negro is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, but simply justice. The American people have always been anxious to know what they shall do with us… I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played the mischief with us. Do nothing with us! If the apples will not remain on the tree of their own strength, if they are worm-eaten at the core, if they are early ripe and disposed to fall, let them fall! … And if the negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is, give him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone! If you see him on his way to school, let him alone, don’t disturb him! If you see him going to the dinner table at a hotel, let him go! If you see him going to the ballot box, let him alone, don’t disturb him! If you see him going into a work-shop, just let him alone, — your interference is doing him positive injury.
January 26, 1865-Frederick Douglass, abolitionist and Republican
Amen. Blacks should succeed or fail based on their merits, just like everyone else. But if showcasing those that succeed on their own helps us to convince black voters to listen to their conservative hearts and minds and vote Republican despite the lies that they’ve heard through the years, then I’m all for that.
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