Anyone wanna dis on Governor Blanco at this point? (2 Viewers)

[TPS]

>>Still can't stand her

Jeff,

What value does this add to the discussion. Seriously. I didn't vote for her, but I'm watching and seeing a hell of a lot more than Edwards, Roemer or Foster did for economic development (while our kids migrated out to places with opportunities). I think the term the mods are using these days is "drive-by posts" where someone sprays a thread with something inane compared to the quality of the thread (not saying this is a high quality thread, but "I still can't stand her" says a lot more about you than it does about her if you know what I'm saying. If you don't, then it says even more j/k).

J,

She brought in the guy from Mississippi that headed their Economic Development under psycho-governor Fordice. And Governor Fordice, despite his obnoxiousness, was still able to land plants and such. You've got to start somewhere, and anywhere was better than Murphy J. "Mike" Foster and his 80% support who during 8 years never even set up any kind of competitiveness task force and was one of the worst governors in the history of Louisiana because of it. A lot of the blame for out-migration of the state (black and white people) is on his shoulders because he did nothing. Now, we've got projects in the works. We're not going to get all of them, but at least we're in the running. If a kid has an alternative to dealing crack in the hood with say going to vo tech with the promise of a $35-40k job in an area without any other opporutnities than Walmart or McDonald's, I'm thinking we're on the right track. We can and should do better. But just the same, how many states are actually getting a net increase in manufacturing jobs? I'd bet fewer than 5. The midwest is reeling right now due to job losses in the hundreds of thousands. So far, we've got a train-car plant and an enhanced shipping plant (Bollinger in New Orleans) with the net + of about 6,000 jobs (and whatever else I can't even remember).

The future is as bright as it has been since 1986 IMHO.

TPS

 

[MLU]

The whole knock on KBB (including me) was that she had all these great ideas, but her answer on how to accomplish anything was either to "form a committee" or to "study it". Across the stage you have Bobby Jindal who comes off as a know-it-all to some, but had specific answers to specific questions and could undoubtedly articulate his vision much better than KBB.

Blanco had unprecedented tourism numbers to back her up and was well-known as a saleswoman for the state. Jindal had the state health system balanced and working like it was supposed to (even if he did step on some toes with his cuts) and was the GOP's golden boy, advancing up to Washington to further the conservative cause.

I feel now as I did then: Ewing was better than both, but any of them was an improvement over the last three decades of governors...

 

[City Champ]

she earned my respect when she stood up to the feds and big oil with regards to the mineral leases off of our coast...

 

[TPS]

Btw, here's her 'e-postcard' from Taipei.

http://www.gov.state.la.us/index.cfm?md=pagebuilder&tmp=home&cpid=147

 

[johnnyd]

She isn't a great public speaker but she seems to be a master of the boardroom table. She is really good one on one. When I met her (waiting in line for the restroom at her nephews wedding) I found her very composed and astute. We got to talking about Democratic politics. I remember she made a sly remark about Gore and how he shouldn't have been the Democratic nominee in 2000. I got the impression she voted for GW.

If the old girl pulls it off it will be one of the greatest comebacks in American politics and Louisiana can do nothing but benefit with her successes.

 

[SaintJ]

SaintJ - you make a good point. But it is too easy to comapre Blanco to what Louisiana has had in the past - and by that measure she is doing a whole lot more. That doesn;t mean we can't do better. But do you compare her to recent Louisana governors, or to recent Alabama/Mississippi/Arkansas/Texas governors?

I measure her against the standard of what needs to be done.

Getting $35k-$40k manufacturing jobs is certainly a good thing; and it's the kind of economic news that makes people in the region feel good today. I'm not knocking it. But the means of production are still owned by, and the profits and capital return flow out to, owners and management teams living outside the state.

Leadership (1) to reduce the size of government and the number of regulations, thereby shrinking the state's tradition of brib..., umm, bahksheesh.., umm, the need to hire significant local consultants to assist one through complicated local processes, (2) to undertake substantial tax reform across the board to encourage local entrepreneurship (if the homeowners don't pay, and the multinationals who can come in and cut a deal don't pay, just who DOES pay the taxes in Louisiana?) and (3) to improve the quality of primary, secondary and college education (just why DOES Louisiana need three different university systems? to maintain a proven track record of education-for-the-dollar superiority over other states?), are all critical to re-establish capital in the state, not just jobs, ownership, not just jobs, and entrepreneurship, not just jobs. Otherwise, you're a northern version of Oaxaca or Chihuahua. You might start with tort reform, property tax reform and business tax reform on a grand scale. If you eliminated all the unnecessary government jobs at the state and local level, you could probably afford all those tax cuts without utterly destroying money available for Medicaid, education and safety-net services.

Leaders in Pennsylvania, even Philadelphia for crissakes, have tried to focus on downtown revitalizations, getting the smart people to stay home and start businesses, invent things, create companies and free enterprise. They are, if slowly, even trying to cut taxes statewide, in various ways, especially those that affect businesses. There's only so much government can do, but Louisiana's sad Huey Long-populist heritage has it about 20 years behind the curve.

In Louisiana, claiming victory (or even improvement) by comparing current leaders to former leaders is like bragging that you've got the taller midget. And beating Mississippi and Alabama? Feh. The measuring stick needs to be the big Sun Belt growth states like Florida, Georgia, and Arizona.

 

[threexcharm]

She has to pay back her boys at the Shaw Group.

She is gonna need more campaign contributions.

Joe

 

[St. Widge]

If she lands the Toyota plant in Richland Parish and the Kuwaiti Refinery, not only will I vote for her, I will actively campaign for her.

We've come a long way to just be considered for those projects. To actually land them would be a coup. It would be like firing Sean Payton after leading the Saints to a Superbowl.

Insane...

What I worry about is that it's more like firing Jim Haslett after his first year. He seemed to have done a good job then, how would could we know that it was all going to fall apart?

I see that with Blanco. These are exactly the types of things she was doing before Katrina. She was doing a good job, then she failed miserably with Katrina and the LRA is still failing miserably under her watch. I can't shake the memory of her blank stares and lack of State Government response to Katrina.

Can she turn that around? Sure. Could she still earn my vote? Sure. But, I'm not sure that landing a few manufacturing plants will do it. As SaintJ suggested I expect more from our Governor than someone who is using tactics that other governors have been doing for years while Mike Foster was busy hunting and taking classes at Southern. To paraphrase a line from The Godfather, we need a war time Governor and I'm not sure Blanco is a war time Governor.

Honestly whether she gets my vote or not will depend on how I see the State Government through the LRA acts in rebuilding SELA. It will also depend on who runs against her.

 

[Hoyasaint]

That's a very big IF.

I will be very pleased if any one of these projects ever sees the light of day. I am not holding my breath.

There you have it. Lots of people had things 'lined up' and 'in the works'. If this happens I will be pleased, but I'll wait until then to hand out kudos.

 

[MLU]

Widge, I won't get into Katrina because 1) I think the worst thing that she did was manage her publicity poorly and not handle the spin better and 2) I'm from North LA so my opinion holds little weight with people whose homes were destroyed by the man-made disaster.

I don't think that there was one single Governor in this country that would have done a significantly better job had they been in her situation, but again I remind myself of my geographical proximity and how difficult it is for me to really place myself in someone else's shoes that still remain in dried mud along with many priceless items that cannot be replaced. I understand if people affected by the disaster would never want to vote for her (or very likely anyone who happened to have been Governor then). There are plenty of threads in which I posted my thoughts on that subject at http://srarchives.com that aren't really worth repeating.

I fact, I have already said too much...

She has to pay back her boys at the Shaw Group.

She is gonna need more campaign contributions.

Joe

Quite possibly the lamest reason to not vote for someone since Dick Cheney "cashed in" his Haliburton options. Tell me: What politician that has run for office has not been bought and sold and/or helped his buddies when elected to political office?

I help my friends out all the time. If you know me, I'll try my best to hook you up with cheap airfare, waive fees when possible and look the other way when you want to check another piece of luggage or it weighs too much. If I don't know you, you're out of luck.

Why is that? Is it because I am crooked and self-serving or because I enjoy helping people when I can knowing that one day they might return the favor?

Get over yourself. I hope Shaw makes a ton of money because it puts cash back into Louisiana and creates more jobs building the actual buildings as well as filling them with workers after it's completed. You might have a point worth bringing up is Shaw was in the business of drowning puppies or creating mutant mosquitoes.

Every President, Governor, Senator, Representative, City Councilman, Police Juror, Clerk at Wal-Mart, guy at Jiffy Lube, etc. helps out his bud by tossing them a bone from time to time.

 

[killah]

The road home thing is a joke. Tat money should have been doled out months ago. I blame her for this. The money has been given from the Feds almost a year ago.

 

[MLU]

Got a link for the Road Home thing? I don't want to comment until I know more. I hear it a lot, but I am still kinda ignorant.

 

[killah]

Got a link for the Road Home thing? I don't want to comment until I know more. I hear it a lot, but I am still kinda ignorant.

I was just watching the news and they said that a grand total of 26 people have their money. The money was put in I think last Dec. that is just wrong.

 

[Mr. Sparkle]

EDITORIAL: Clear the roadway





Monday, November 13, 2006


If things don't speed up significantly, the state may have to call its housing grant program the Long and Winding Road Home.
Beleaguered homeowners who need help to rebuild their flooded homes or who want to sell out and start over elsewhere are stuck waiting for long-promised federal grant money. Just figuring out how to apply for assistance has been a headache. And some applicants who have been lucky enough to get an appointment with a grant counselor were given incorrect or misleading information.
To its credit, the Louisiana Recovery Authority is pushing to speed up the process and to correct confusing and conflicting information. The success of those efforts, though, ultimately depends on the contractor hired by the LRA to administer the housing program.

<SCRIPT language=JavaScript><!--if (parseFloat(navigator.appVersion) == 0) {document.write('<IFRAME WIDTH=468 HEIGHT=60 MARGINWIDTH=0 MARGINHEIGHT=0 HSPACE=0 VSPACE=0 FRAMEBORDER=0 SCROLLING=no BORDERCOLOR="#000000" SRC="http://ads.nola.com/RealMedia/ads/adstream_sx.ads/www.nola.com/xml/story/N/NOED/@StoryAd"></IFRAME>');}--></SCRIPT>ICF International is being paid $756 million to manage the grant payouts, and it ought to provide stellar service for that kind of money. So far, the work has not been entirely impressive.
Even making allowances for the complexity of the situation, more South Louisiana residents should have money in hand by now. As of Monday, program officials say they had calculated 1,721 grants totaling $110.3 million in benefits. Calculating a grant and cutting a check are not the same thing, though. And the program has a backlog of roughly 79,000 applications. Since the application rate is lower than expected, that number almost certainly will grow.
http://www.nola.com/search/index.ssf?/base/news-3/1163399916214170.xml?NOED&coll=1

 

[Three Monkeys]

For a good read on Road Home from John Maginnis:

http://www.businessreport.com/newsDetail.cfm?aid=9826

Mr. Maginnis seems to disagree with the perception of Louisiana's program.