| Yesterday, when you were carrying the Jindal Administration's water on HB 1100, which seeks to limit the open records exceptions claimed by the Governor, you dropped a condescending little history lesson:
"Our forefathers wrote the Constitution in secret."
The difference between our forefathers and Governor Jindal, Mr. Kostelka, is that while our forefathers came together to write the Constitution of the United States in Philadelphia's Independence Hall, and did so in secret, they had to have a supermajority of the state legislatures of the country at the time ratify the Constitution. Governor Jindal merely needs a majority of the legislators in each chamber to ratify his proposals. And Governor Jindal has the advantage of procedural mechanisms, such as outright bribery, that our forefathers could only dream of.
The men that convened in Philadelphia had to undertake a public information campaign that you may not be aware of ... called the Federalist Papers, where they sought to explain to the American people why they came to the compromises and solutions they did when they wrote the Constitution. Indeed, the subject of ratifying or not ratifying the Constitution became the one of the first media sagas of our nation's history, debated from rural countryside to the cities, from Boston to Charleston, and in every single state legislature before packed galleries.
I've been to the Legislature recently, and I have not seen one packed gallery hinging on the every word of a single legislator. Indeed, you'll usually find lobbyists paying more attention to the people's business that the people themselves.
Explaining in full detail the actions that they have undertaken and why they have done so is not something that Governor Jindal's Administration has ONCE done, preferring instead to shut the door on the Louisiana media time and again.
Governor Jindal campaigned on a vague promise to strengthen our ethics laws to a "gold standard." The people of Louisiana, desperate for change, any change, stampeded toward the mirage erected by Governor Jindal.
It is only now that we see that the Jindal Administration, aided by YOU, is seeking to make it harder for the Ethics Board to conduct its' business of holding our public officials accountable to the people, and easier for politicians to break the law. After all, you've been fighting to make the burden of proof on the Ethics Board almost impossible to meet.
It is only now that we see that the Jindal Administration, aided by YOU, is fighting to shield the public's records from our view. After all, you just cast the tie-breaking vote to allow the Governor to continue shielding wide swaths of public records from public view.
I must ask ... would you be carrying the water of the Jindal Administration, if say, it was not the Jindal Administration, but the Landrieu Administration? Somehow, I doubt it. |
