Cruising for bruising?
Why, in his overconfidence and arrogance, Jeff Landry might be headed for a scandal sooner than most Louisiana governors
Have you noticed that Louisiana governors usually have their worst scandals in the second term?
I’ll explain why I think Gov. Jeff Landry will be the exception to that rule. But, first, the rule:
John McKeithen and (unproven) allegations of ties to the New Orleans mafia.
Edwin Edwards and Koreagate.
Mike Foster and the mailing list he bought from David Duke.
Bobby Jindal and allegations about questionable contributions to his wife’s foundation, and a federal investigation into suspected Medicaid contract fraud in his Department of Health.
John Bel Edwards and Louisiana State Police’s killing of Ronald Greene and corruption in his Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.
All that and more in their second terms (or in Foster’s case, in his second campaign).
These scandals happened because governors, their staffs, and department secretaries read the reelection results differently than the results of their first election. The first time around, they had something to prove. They were finding their way. These governors usually took better care in selecting their staff and department secretaries.
But the second term is often different.
Governors and their staffs often see in the re-election results public support that’s not there. They often see re-election as evidence of a non-existent mandate. It’s also that many of their best staff have burned out and moved on, and those who replace them aren’t as knowledgeable, wise, or skilled.
But mainly, I think it’s that second-term scandals are the product of overconfidence. It’s a feeling that “I won reelection. The public loves me. The legislature is afraid of me. I can do anything I want.”
And that’s where governors get in trouble. It’s the dangerous trap of overconfidence. And to some degree, every two-term governor since Louisiana started allowing governors to run for a second consecutive term has fallen into it.
Judging by his behavior since taking office four short months ago, Jeff Landry is about to take the plunge. He’s already showing us all the arrogance, overconfidence, and misjudgment that will most certainly result in scandal — maybe a big scandal — early in this term.
Proverbs says, “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” Or as another wise person has observed, “Overconfidence precedes carelessness.”
And in politics, carelessness breeds scandal.
With his easy election victory last October and his supermajorities in both houses, Landry hasn’t faced much opposition so far. Senate President Cameron Henry has emerged as the chief speedbump in the Legislature, but Henry has acceded to almost everything Landry has wanted. Landry’s sweeping plan to transform our election system into closed primaries and his proposal for a constitutional convention are the two most prominent exceptions.
But Landry has gotten his way at almost every turn. He and his allies have bulldozed the House, and often the Senate, achieving exactly what they wanted in almost every instance.
And I assure you, Landry is surrounded by a coterie of staff and others who give him whatever he wants and tell him whatever he wants to hear.
How do I know this?
On Wednesday, we saw an illuminating example of Landry’s arrogance and the bubble he lives in.
Did you see how Landry responded to a simple question from a New Orleans TV reporter, Chris Joseph of WVUE, about his efforts to gut the state’s public records law? Here’s the exchange:
Joseph: “Do taxpayers have the right to know how those government decisions are made?”
Landry: “That’s a great question. Do they?
“They elect us with full confidence that we’re gonna go out there and solve those problems. When we make that decision, those decisions are public. It becomes the policy of the state.
“But all of the pre-decisions, you don’t go into--I’ll give you a great example: Let me ask you, when you go to a restaurant, you go there and watch the cook make everything he serves you? No, you just walk into a restaurant—those restaurants that you think serve a great meal—and you order a great meal. You don’t want to know how—what the cook put in there, where he got the ingredients, how many people were involved cooking it. All you care about is a good meal.
“That’s what the people are looking for. They’re looking for elected officials to go out there to solve their problems. This bill helps us to do so is that.”
What Landry cooked up there ranks high in the annuls of ridiculous, half-baked answers to legitimate questions. (Note to self: If he ever invites me to dinner, never let Jeff pick the restaurant.)
Do we really need to review the question of rigorous government restaurant inspection, why it’s necessary, and why the public wants more, not less scrutiny of dining establishments? Maybe Landry doesn’t mind if the chef at his local eatery doesn’t wash his hands after a trip to the toilet, but I think most people do.
I ask you, what’s more likely:
A: This is the rhetoric of a seasoned politician with a competent staff, giving him good, sound arguments to sell a questionable proposal.
B: These are the words of a supremely overconfident but underprepared, arrogant man who doesn’t think it’s worth his time to offer you a reasonable argument before he robs you of the right to know what your government is doing.
The correct answer is B.
This governor is already untethered from reality, disconnected from the people he is supposed to represent, and brimming with a false sense of his brilliance and powers of persuasion.
In other words, this is a governor rushing headlong into scandal.
Will it come next month or next year? Who knows, but Landry is conducting himself as if he has a mandate he does not have. He fancies himself as a clever rhetorician. But in the rhetoric department, he’s more like Bobby Boucher than Bobby Kennedy.
Voters gave Landry not a mandate but a chance to prove that he is up to the job and that he has what it takes to serve them ably and with integrity.
What he’s showing us, instead, is that his overconfident overreaching might produce the kind of scandal — or scandals — that will ensure he never sees a second term.
Perhaps the best response to Landry’s arrogant, half-baked explanation of his decimation of our public records law came from New Orleans activist Jack Reno "BIG OKRA" Sweeney:
Another new category for Louisiana to be worst in - Worst Governor in the country
I'm keeping the two billion dollar state budget surplus that was handed to Jeff Landry at the end of John Bel Edwards' second term as a marker in time. I'm virtually certain that we'll be seeing a deficit of at least one billion dollars by the time Jeff Landry's governorship is done; not to mention increased child poverty, declined healthcare services and outcomes for hundreds of thousands, an exploding prison population of mostly Black and Brown folks (plus LBGTQ" folks imprisoned, injured, or killed for alleged sodomy, public obscenity, and 'child grooming') and rampant gun violence with the out-of-control proliferation of concealed carry weapons in our public places. I'm also sure Democrats will be blamed for all of these things if and when these things happen.