That's what happens when Democrats forget who they are and who they represent and buy into the conceit that they can get elected if they run as 'Republican-lite' candidates. Ultimately, they are not Democrats and their votes show it. Today, Jindal's DHH Secretary Alan Levine dropped the first of what will be many shoes. According to The Advocate, he announced another round of Medicaid budget cuts made necessary because of rising enrollments in the program and the inability of the department to implement cuts fast enough. Poverty is up in Louisiana. Unemployment is up. The number of companies offering health insurance coverage is falling through the floor. So, Levine, working within Jindal's "No Taxes for Any Reason" straight jacket, is ordering more cuts. This is, of course, a result of issues in the current fiscal year. This isn't even related to the even bigger cuts that will be needed next year. Senator Harry Reid handed Louisiana Democrats a gift today by including the Public Option in the bill that the U.S. Senate will debate and vote on in a couple of weeks. Word is that the bill will include an "opt out" clause for states to leave the public option. Is there any doubt as to which way the Jindal administration and Louisiana Republicans will lurch on this? Levine has been taking part in Louisiana Republican Party workshops talking against healthcare reform. Jindal's path to the national Republican stage requires he follow the party's rejectionist strategy, so he will clearly push to have the state opt out of the public option. But, here's where it gets interesting. Depending on the year, anywhere between 17 and 25 percent of working age Louisiana adults are uninsured. In July, the Baton Rouge Business Report quoted a spokesman for BlueCross/BlueShield of Louisiana who said that only 30 percent of Louisiana small businesses offer health insurance to their employees and that the number is falling due to skyrocketing rates. While no one will speak up for Medicaid patients, surely someone will speak up for the rights of the working uninsured and fight the Jindal administration's expected push to, in fact, opt out of the public option — the path to provide affordable coverage to those working age residents without coverage. The 2011 statewide elections will be the battle ground where this fight takes place. Jindal, if he follows his current course, will have cut higher education by three-quarters of a billion dollars. He will have cut a billion in healthcare spending, eliminating services, shutting institutions, impacting the families of the disabled, the sick and the infirm. This election will take place on a re-districted state Legislative map. Every district will be redrawn, and it will be pretty radically different due to post-2005/2008 storm induced population shifts. Democrats should be easy to distinguish from Republicans. The Republicans will be the ones saying they are sorry for the pain, injury and even deaths their cuts inflicted, but that they had no choice. Democrats will be the candidates motivated by outrage at the callous, depraved disregard for the health and well-being of their fellow citizens. Jindal will be vulnerable in 2011. He will have revealed that everything said about him in 2003 was true — that his knowledge of numbers is matched only by his inability to see the people behind the numbers in state budgets and programs. The healthcare ads that Kathleen Blanco ran against him in 2003 — those credited with sealing her victory then — will ring prophetic. This man is devoid of compassion and is blinded by his ambition. Our state is paying — and will pay — a fearful price for his limitations. But, elections are about changing course. Harry Reid has just set up Louisiana Democrats to take our state back, to walk it back from the brink. It will be a hard fight — beating incumbents always is. The Louisiana Committee for a Republican Majority (David Vitter's homage to Tom DeLay) did not quite succeed in taking over either house of the Legislature, but they succeeded just enough to give Jindal the ability to defeat tax increases that could stave off some of these cuts. They will also work to ensure that the re-districting process is skewed to favor Republicans. They, too, are setting him up for defeat — and the members of the House and Senate they sent there to do their ideologically driven work. The world has shifted. They have not changed. The opportunity to oust them is ripening. |
