Louisiana, The Media, and the Katrina Blame Game

It's interesting who the people of Louisiana - those who actually suffered through Katrina - blame for the hurricane's aftermath:

There was an historic election in Louisiana yesterday. My home state got a new Republican governor. Yes, in the state of Katrina, which the liberal media has falsified into a "Bush-caused catastrophe," the state went Republican--and not just Republican, but with a highly conservative, pro-life Republican. Let it be clear: many of those from Louisiana knew right off the bat that the Katrina disaster was the product of years of insitutionalized Democratic mismanagement and corruption in New Orleans and Louisiana politics. Yet, the liberal media, oblivious to the facts, boldly projected their anti-Bush obsession onto the disaster and gave the nation a false picture of the cause of the disaster...
~ Oswald Sobrino writing at Catholics in the Public Square


Democrats have used Hurricane Katrina to beat up on George Bush for the past two years, but that didn't fool Louisiana voters. They saw the difference between the rescue and repair efforts in Mississippi and Louisiana, and knew the difference was the state and local government responses. The Democrats have run the state as corrupt incompetents, but their poor leadership didn't cost lives until 2005. The voters have begun cleaning house in Louisiana.
~ Ed Morrissey at Captain's Quarters

Regarding the future of newly elected Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Morrissey continues:

Now Jindal takes his place in an important executive position at a critical time for Louisiana. New Orleans needs leadership and action, sorely missing from local and state government since Katrina hit. The state itself still suffers from the endemic corruption left behind by the Democrats who still dominate the state bureaucracies. If he can clean up Louisiana and return New Orleans to health and safety, Jindal may get a lot more attention in eight years as a Republican candidate for the White House -- and at 44, he could electrify conservative politics in 2015.

The stage is set. If Jindal performs, this could be the start of a long run.

And the liberal media knows this, which is why there's been next-to-no national coverage of Jindal's election victory (unlike the extensive media coverage that is always the case whenever a Democrat takes a seat formerly held by a Republican).

And which is why the Democrats and their cohorts in the liberal media won't sit on their hands for long before going on the offensive against Jindal. They already tried to torpedo his gubernatorial campaign by engaging in anti-Catholic smears. There's no way the left is going to sit by passively and allow a young, attractive, well-educated ethnic minority to rise to prominence as a future star of the GOP without doing all they can to bring him down.

Expect beaucoup scandal-mongering from the press in an effort to taint Jindal in the near future (especially the sort of coverage that will try to paint Jindal as a "hypocrite") - I doubt there'll be anything with which to taint him, but that won't stop the liberals and their media cohorts from trying. Expect every misstep by Jindal to be magnified and every accomplishment to be either ignored or minimized. It's going to happen, but Jindal and the GOP just need to be ready to fire back.

Any bets as to who the media will blame the next time a devastating hurricane hits Louisiana?


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Bobby Jindal - Catholic Convert and Son of Indian Immigrants - Wins Louisiana Governor's Race

Michael Denton's First Newspaper Column

A Strange Way to Woo Religious Voters

Louisiana Democrat "Know-Nothings" Attack Jindal

Dems Go After Jindal's Catholicism & Ethnicity