“I have come to the conclusion that politics is too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.”
- Aesop
A killer tornado in Iowa slammed into a Boy Scout leadership training camp last week, bringing out the best in a group of teenage boys who put their rescue and first aid training skills to work in the twister’s aftermath.
Four scouts died and 48 people were injured when the tornado struck. One building where a group of scouts took shelter was reduced to concrete blocks and bricks from a chimney. From the rubble, surviving scouts uncovered and aided the injured. They did not stop working when they came across their dead comrades.
A scout executive said the rescue efforts organized by the surviving scouts made the day both his saddest and proudest as a scout.
After the twister, nature blasted Iowa with floodwaters that inundated Cedar Rapids, the state’s second largest city. Aerial photographs revealed a city in a state of flooding eerily reminiscent of New Orleans after Katrina. Luckily, the loss of life has been very low, though 83 of Iowa’s 99 counties are already declared disaster areas.
The tornado and astonishing amounts of rainfall brought many of the same Iowans who responded as volunteers again and again for the people New Orleans and South Louisiana after Katrina and Rita to their knees. Hopefully, Louisiana remembers and will respond to the needs of those in the Iowa flood. Everyone realize individuals and families and towns in Louisiana just beginning to bounce back are in no position to contribute to Iowa’s well being in the way that Iowan’s contributed to the downtrodden hurricane survivors of this state.
But there is a way to help Iowa in a meaningful way. It would also restore decency and honor to a Louisiana Legislature whose members have embarked on a hoggish frenzy to raise their salaries against the wishes of those who elected them.
Our poor, pitiful state, which ranks last in child well-being, and which looked as recently as last year like it would disappear from the continental US map without massive federal relief, now has so much money the legislature wants to double or triple member salaries - even though legislators are already grossly overpaid, especially when current salaries are considered with retirement benefits and years of free lobbyist-in-training activities.
Instead of giving legislators a raise, when we know many of them will step out of office into lucrative lobbying jobs, the money that would go to the pay raise should be set aside in an emergency relief fund to pay back friends like the Iowans, and help our own people when the next flood, hurricane, out of control pipeline explosion or crippling recession strikes.
Does anyone doubt that a hurricane will hit Louisiana again - at least anyone other than legislators who are stupidly voting themselves an exorbitant pay raise that would take effect immediately?
If legislators get away with the pay raise hijacking, they will deserve full credit for reviving Louisiana’s long-standing reputation as laughingstock of America and most pitiful state in the union.
Gov. Bobby Jindal of Jay Leno Tonight Show fame says he will not veto a legislator pay raise. How could he after orchestrating Economic Development Director Stephen Moret’s unprecedented and exorbitant salary increase? Moret may be a good economics player, but he probably has more lobbyist-in-training opportunities at his disposal in his new job than the greedy elected legislators that Jindal does not want to offend because they might derail his ethics reform bill.
If the pay raise goes though, Jindal should sign on with John McCain, for his usefulness to Louisiana will be over, dwarfed by the aura of hypocrisy over his head. His career in the Gret Stet won’t be worth a pair of last year’s Hannah Montana tickets.
What is it about elective office in Louisiana that makes common politicians think they are entitled to roll off with wheelbarrow loads of public money? Are they sucking different crawfish heads than the rest of us?
They sure are sucking the honor out of elective office in this state.
