They've Come a (Huey) Long Way

Some interesting news came out of my birth state of Louisiana on Saturday where U.S. Rep. Bobby Jindal is poised to become the nation's youngest governor and the first nonwhite to hold the post in Louisiana since Reconstruction.

The 36-year-old Republican took 53% of the vote in a twelve way race. (More than any candidate took in our state in a 3 way race btw.)

But while the rest of the country might focus on Jindal's age or ethnicity, Illinoisans may be drawn to this aspect of his candidacy:

He pledged to fight corruption and rid the state of those "feeding at the public trough," revisiting a campaign theme.

"They can either go quietly or they can go loudly, but either way, they will go," he said, adding that he would call the Legislature into special session to address ethics reform. (emphasis added)

Now that's why you call a special session - to actually get something substantive accomplished. I'm going to predict that he'll even have legislation ready for the legislators to debate when they get called into session. (Maybe I'll send his transition team a copy of HB1 to review.)

So let's see, for quite some time now, we've had the dubious honor of trailing the entire country when it comes to the gap in per-pupil education spending.

Now Louisiana is going to give us a lesson in ethics and campaign reform.

Does anybody else see a problem here?

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