Which is why we’re here…

It’s great to be back in New Orleans, and an honor to be back at Xavier University. I’m inspired to spend time with folks who have demonstrated what it means to persevere in the face of tragedy – and rebuild in the face of ruin. Thank you, Jade, for your introduction – and congratulations on being crowned Miss Xavier.

As Jade said, she was a junior at Ben Franklin High School five years ago when the storm came. After Katrina, Ben Franklin High was terribly damaged by wind and water. Millions of dollars were needed to rebuild the school. Many feared it would take years to reopen – if it could reopen at all. But then something remarkable happened. Parents and teachers, students and volunteers got to work making repairs. Donations came in from across New Orleans and around the world. And soon, silent, darkened corridors were bright and filled with the sounds of young men and women, including Jade, heading to class again. Jade then committed to Xavier, a University that likewise refused to succumb to despair. So Jade, like so many students here, embodies hope – and that sense of hope in difficult times is what I came to talk about today.

It has been five years since Katrina ravaged the Gulf Coast. There is no need to dwell on what you experienced and what the world witnessed: water pouring through broken levees; mothers holding their children above the waterline; people stranded on rooftops begging for help; bodies lying in the streets of a great American city. It was a natural disaster but also a manmade catastrophe; a shameful breakdown in government that left countless men, women, and children abandoned and alone. Shortly after the storm, I came down to Houston to spend time with some of the folks who took shelter there. I’ll never forget what one woman told me. “We had nothing before the hurricane,” she said. “Now we got less than nothing.”

Obama’s statement that those who chose not to evacuate from New Orleans after being ordered to by local authorities were “abandoned and alone” is a bald-faced lie. Precisely when were these people “abandoned and alone?” Was it immediately after the storm passed and the levees broke, when Coast Guard helicopters and citizens in boats rescued tens of thousands of people from their homes? Was it 72 hours later, when the National Guard arrived in deuce-and-a-half trucks loaded with supplies to help evacuate the Superdome and the Convention Center?

There was a shameful breakdown, all right. The fact that tens of thousands of New Orleanians were conditioned to believe that government, rather than they themselves, were responsible for taking control of their own safety indicates a breakdown on a major scale. And Obama’s policies seek to compound this problem for political gain.

 In the years that followed, New Orleans could have remained a symbol of destruction and decay; of a storm that came and the inadequate response that followed. It was not hard to imagine a day when we’d tell our children of a once vibrant and wonderful city laid low by indifference and neglect. But that is not what happened. It’s not what happened at Ben Franklin. It’s not what happened at Xavier. And that’s not what happened across New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. It is true that this city has become a symbol. But it’s a symbol of resilience, of community, of the fundamental responsibility we have for one another.

He’s got the first two right. New Orleans has proven its resilience, though the Saints winning the Super Bowl, which had almost nothing to do with government (the state took steps to induce Tom Benson not to pull the team out of the city, but no government official signed Drew Brees, drafted Marcus Colston or found Pierre Thomas), did more to create community than any billion-dollar federal program ever could. As for “the fundamental responsibility we have for one another,” the lesson of Katrina is that fundamentally you’ve got to take responsibility for yourself, and not burden others, during an emergency like that storm.

We see that at Xavier. Less than a month after the storm struck, amidst debris and flood-damaged buildings, President Francis promised that this university would reopen in a matter of months. Some said he was crazy. But they didn’t count on what would happen when one force of nature met another. By January – four months later – class was in session. Less than a year after the storm, I had the privilege of delivering a commencement address to the largest graduating class in Xavier’s history.

Xavier’s post-Katrina recovery is a terrific story. It’s also a private sector story.

We see that in the efforts of Joycelyn Heintz, who is here today. Katrina left her house under 14 feet of water. But after volunteers helped her rebuild, she joined AmeriCorps to serve the community herself – part of a wave of AmeriCorps members who have been critical to the rebirth of this city and the rebuilding of this region. Today, she manages a local center for mental health and wellness.

Maybe I’m out of touch, and I certainly don’t mean to diminish anyone’s role in the city’s recovery, but in five years I’ve heard nothing about AmeriCorps being critical to New Orleans’ rebirth. Guess you learn something new every day.

We see the symbol that this city has become in the St. Bernard Project, whose co-founder Liz McCartney is with us. This endeavor has drawn volunteers from across the country to rebuild hundreds of homes throughout St. Bernard Parish and the Lower Ninth Ward.

I saw the sense of purpose people felt after the storm when I visited Musicians’ Village in the Ninth Ward back in 2006. Volunteers were not only constructing houses; they were coming to together to preserve the culture of music and art that is part of the soul of this city – and the soul of this country. Today, more than 70 homes are complete, and construction is underway on the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music.

We see the dedication to the community in the efforts of Xavier graduate Dr. Regina Benjamin, who mortgaged her home and maxed out her credit cards so she could reopen her Bayou la Batre clinic to care for victims of the storm – and who is now our nation’s Surgeon General.

Thanks for depriving New Orleans of one of its top physicians, Mr. President.

And we see that resilience – that hope – exemplified by students at Carver High School. They’ve helped raise more than a million dollars to build a new community track and football field – their “Field of Dreams” – for the Ninth Ward.

Because of you – all the advocates and organizers here today, folks who are leading the way toward a better future for this city with innovative approaches to fight poverty, improve health care, reduce crime, and create opportunities for young people – because of you, New Orleans is coming back.

Five years ago, many questioned whether people could ever return to this city. Today, New Orleans is one of the fastest growing cities in America, with a big surge in new small businesses. Five years ago, the Saints had to play every game on the road because of the damage to the Superdome. Well, two weeks ago, we welcomed the Saints to the White House as Super Bowl champions. We marked the occasion with a 30-foot po’boy made with shrimp and oysters from the Gulf. There were no leftovers.

There’s a big surge in small businesses partially because your predecessor got the government out of the way and gave favorable tax treatment to the place, Mr. President.

Of course, I don’t have to tell you that there are still too many vacant and overgrown lots. There are still too many students attending classes in trailers. There are still too many people unable to find work. And there are still too many New Orleanians who have not been able to come home. So while an incredible amount of progress has been made, on this fifth anniversary, I wanted to come here and tell the people of this city directly: my administration is going to stand with you – and fight alongside you – until the job is done.

He’s not fighting alongside us. He’s behind us with a garrotte. This president had an estimate of 23,000 lost jobs in hand when he allowed his Interior Secretary to impose a ban on offshore drilling in the Gulf and it didn’t bother him in the least. If this is his idea of fighting alongside us, we’re better off abandoned and alone.

When I took office, I directed my cabinet to redouble our efforts, to put an end to the turf wars between agencies, to cut the red tape and the bureaucracy. I wanted to make sure that the federal government was a partner – instead of an obstacle – to the recovery of the Gulf Coast. And members of my cabinet – including my EPA administrator, Lisa Jackson, who grew up in Pontchartrain Park – have come down here dozens of times. This wasn’t just to make appearances – to just be in a few photos putting up dry wall. This was so that they could listen, learn, and make real changes so that government was actually working for you.

Virtually every visit by a member of Obama’s cabinet, at least during the saga of the BP oil spill, has been followed by a policy change bordering on insanity. As for Jackson, she’s directly responsible for 540 miles of oiled shoreline for having insisted on the adherence to a nonsensical 15-parts-per-million marine discharge standard which rendered skimming operations ineffective for two months. She’s also working on a host of extralegal government intrusions which will serve to damage Louisiana industries and destroy local jobs. Ask around, Mr. President – Miz Jackson isn’t considered a local favorite in these parts.

For example, efforts to rebuild schools and hospitals, to repair damaged roads and bridges, and to get people back into their homes, were tied up for years in a tangle of disagreements and byzantine rules. So when I took office, working with Senator Mary Landrieu, we put in place a new way of resolving disputes, so that funds set aside for rebuilding efforts actually went toward rebuilding efforts. As a result, more than 170 projects are getting underway, including work on firehouses, police stations, roads, sewer systems, health clinics, libraries, and universities.

We’re tackling the corruption and inefficiency that has long plagued the New Orleans Housing Authority. We’re helping homeowners rebuild and making it easier for renters to find affordable options. And we’re helping people to move out of temporary homes. When I took office, more than three years after the storm, tens of thousands of families were still stuck in disaster housing – with many living in small trailers provided by FEMA. We were spending huge sums of money on temporary shelter when we knew it would be better for families, and less costly for taxpayers, to help people get into affordable, stable, and more permanent housing. So we’ve helped make it possible for people to find those homes, dramatically reducing the number of families in emergency housing.

In other words, most of the recovery work had already been done and Obama is now taking credit for things which were put in motion long before he took office.

On the health care front, as a candidate for President, I pledged to make sure we were helping New Orleans recruit doctors and nurses, and rebuild medical facilities – including a new veterans hospital. Well, we’ve resolved a long-standing dispute – one that tied up hundreds of millions of dollars – to fund the replacement for Charity Hospital. And in June, Veterans Secretary Ric Shinseki came to New Orleans for the groundbreaking of that new VA hospital.

This one is breathtaking. An arbitration panel ruled against the Obama administration in January and in favor of state officials on the Charity Hospital issue, and yet the President is going to take credit for building the facility? Wow. That’s a little like the Japanese taking credit for ending World War II.

In education, we’ve made strides as well. As you know, schools in New Orleans were falling behind long before Katrina. But in the years since the storm, a lot of public schools opened themselves up to innovation and reform. As a result, we’re actually seeing rising achievement and New Orleans is fast becoming a model for the nation. This is yet another sign that you’re not only rebuilding; you’re rebuilding stronger than before. Just this Friday, my administration announced a final agreement on $1. 8 billion dollars for Orleans Parish schools – money that had been locked up for years – so folks here could determine how best to restore the school system.

Riiiiight. New Orleans is benefiting from charter schools and a state scholarship program which operates a lot like a voucher program. In fact, it operates just like the voucher program in Washington, DC that Obama strangled to death as soon as he took office. Another breathtaker.

And in a city that has known too much violence and too much despair – that has seen too many young people lost to drugs and criminal activity – we’ve got a Department of Justice committed to working with New Orleans to fight the scourge of violent crime, to weed out corruption in the police force, and to ensure the criminal justice system works for everyone here. And I want to thank Mitch Landrieu, your new mayor, for his commitment to that partnership.

No mention of thanks to Sen. David Vitter, who had to hold up judicial appointments in Louisiana for the better part of a year so Jim Letten – the primary DoJ representative in New Orleans – could keep his job when Obama clearly had an eye on replacing the former George W. Bush appointee. Letten is widely regarded as the single most important force in the New Orleans area for fighting crime and corruption.

And let’s not get started on the “partnership” between Landrieu and Eric Holder. That’s a column, or several, all to itself. 

Even as we continue our recovery efforts, we’re also focusing on preparing for future threats – so that there is never another disaster like Katrina ever again. The largest civil works project in American history is underway to build a fortified levee system. And as I pledged as a candidate, we’re going to finish this system by next year, so that this city is protected against a 100-year storm. Because we should not be playing Russian roulette every Hurricane season. We’re also working to restore protective wetlands and natural barriers that were not only damaged by Katrina but had been rapidly disappearing for decades.

The levee system was already in the works before Obama got elected, so for him to take credit for it is another fraud. As for coastal restoration, has the President been instrumental in any progress on that front?

In Washington, we are restoring competence and accountability. I’m proud that my FEMA Director, Craig Fugate, has 25 years of experience in disaster management in Florida, a state that has known its share of hurricanes. We’ve put together a group led by Secretary Donovan and Secretary Napolitano to look at disaster recovery across the country. We’re improving coordination on the ground, modernizing emergency communications, and helping families plan for a crisis. And we’re putting in place reforms so that never again in America is someone left behind in a disaster because they’re living with a disability or they’re elderly or infirmed.

Lord help us.

Finally, even as you’ve been buffeted by Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita, as well as the broader recession that has devastated communities across the country, in recent months the Gulf Coast has seen new hardship as a result of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. And just as we have sought to ensure that we are doing what it takes to recover from Katrina, my administration has worked hard to match our efforts on the spill to what you need on the ground.

From the start, I promised you two things. One is that we would see to it that the leak was stopped. And it has been. But the second promise I made was that we would stick with our efforts, and stay on BP, until the damage to the Gulf and to the lives of the people in this region was reversed. And this, too, is a promise we will keep.

I can’t respond to this without profanity. Moratorium, anyone?

That is why we rapidly launched the largest response to an environmental disaster in American history. This has included 47,000 people on the ground and 5,700 vessels on the water to contain and clean up the oil. When I heard that BP was not moving fast enough on claims, we told BP to set aside $20 billion in a fund – managed by an independent third party – to help all those whose lives have been turned upside down by the spill. And we will continue to rely on sound science – carefully monitoring waters and coastlines as well as the health of people along the Gulf – to deal with any long-term effects of the oil spill. We are going to stand with you until the oil is cleaned up, the environment is restored, polluters are held accountable, communities are made whole, and this region is back on its feet.

Mr. President, your independent third party, who actually works for you, seems to be doing a heck of a lot more to deny claims than pay them. You also wasted 60 days in standing that third party up, and the $20 billion fund you extracted from BP allowed them to write off $10 billion in taxes this year – which essentially put the paying of claims on the back of the U.S. taxpayer, in total contravention of your representations. The idea that Obama is standing with us isn’t one shared by most of the people of South Louisiana, for these and other reasons. 

So that is how we are helping this city, this state, and this region to recover from the worst natural disaster in our nation’s history. We are cutting through the tangle of red tape that has impeded rebuilding efforts for years. We are making government work better and smarter – in coordination with one of the most expansive non-profit efforts in American history. And we are helping state and local leaders to address serious problems that had been neglected for decades – problems that existed long before storm came, and have continued after the waters receded – from the levee system to the justice system, from the health care system to the education system.

Frankly, we’d be better off neglected than to endure much more “better and smarter” government from the likes of this president. Reforms in the judicial and education systems in New Orleans have come from local people acting to reform them – not Washington.

Together, we are helping to make New Orleans a place that stands for what we can do in America – not just for what we can’t do. And ultimately, that must be the legacy of Katrina: not one of neglect, but of action; not one of indifference, but of empathy; not of abandonment, but of a community working together to meet shared challenges.

The truth is, there are some wounds that do not heal. There are some losses that cannot be repaid. And for many who lived through those harrowing days five years ago, there is a searing memory that time will not erase. But even amid so much tragedy, we saw the stirrings of a brighter day. We saw men and women risking their own safety to save strangers. We saw nurses staying behind to care for the sick and injured. We saw families coming home to clean up and rebuild – not just their own homes, but their neighbors’ as well. We saw music and Mardi Gras and the vibrancy of this town undiminished. And we have seen many return to their beloved city with a newfound sense of obligation to this community.

When I came here four years ago, one thing that I found striking was all the greenery that had begun to come back. I was reminded of a passage from the book of Job. “There is hope for a tree if it be cut down that it will sprout again, and that its tender branch will not cease.” The work ahead will not be easy. There will be setbacks. There will be challenges along the way. But today, thanks to you and the people of this great city, New Orleans is blossoming once more.

Thank you.

Yeah, thanks. Thanks for nothing. Lift the moratorium before you show back up in Louisiana, Mr. President, if you want to have any credibility in claiming to be helping us.

The numbers on the poll tell a pretty amazing story:

• Men heavily favor Vitter 68% to 26%, while women prefer the Republican by 11 points, 49% to 38%.
• Twenty-nine percent (29%) of Louisiana voters now hold a very favorable opinion of the senator, up four points over the past month. Eleven percent (11%) now hold a very unfavorably opinion of Vitter, his lowest negative rating in recent polling on the race.
• As for Melancon, just 11% view the Democrat very favorably, up just one point from January. One-in-five voters (20%) share a very unfavorable opinion of the Democrat.
• Thirty-seven percent (37%) of Louisiana voters now approve of President Obama’s job performance, while 63% disapprove. These numbers include 26% who strongly approve of the job he is doing and 53% who strongly disapprove. This is a higher rate of disapproval than is found nationally in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll.
• Like most of the country, most Louisiana voters (66%) say cutting taxes is a better way to create jobs than increasing government spending. Just 13% take the opposite view.
• Most voters (55%) in the state also favor an income tax cut for all Americans, but 26% oppose the idea.
• Fifty-seven (57%) of Louisiana voters believe it is possible to balance the federal budget without raising taxes, while 22% disagree.
• Seventy percent (70%) of Louisiana voters approve of Republican Governor Bobby Jindal’s performance, while only 28% disapprove.

The Louisiana polling isn’t a colossal surprise, as Vitter has been polling between 18 and 20 percent ahead of Melancon prior to three moves or developments in the last two weeks which have helped boost his stock with the locals.

First, Vitter’s handling of the Who Dat controversy, in which he printed t-shirts mocking the NFL and dared the league to sue him along with the mom-and-pop merchants they had fired off cease-and-desist letters to, was perfect – he shamed the NFL into backing off their position by making public arguments backed up with actions. Vitter didn’t ask the state attorney general to sue the NFL and he didn’t go to Congress with a bill threatening to revoke the NFL’s antitrust exemption if they continued to attack the purveyors of Who Dat shirts, which are the typical/Democrat reactions to everything politicians don’t like.

The Who Dat controversy followed on the heels of Vitter’s holding the president’s feet to the fire on Jim Letten’s reappointment as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana, which ultimately came to fruition a couple of weeks ago. Vitter had put holds on the blue slips for a host of Democrat judicial appointments throughout the state in an effort to secure a formal reappointment for Letten, who is perhaps the most popular public official in the New Orleans area, and stuck to his guns despite a withering set of attacks by the state’s Democrat Party and Vitter’s Senate counterpart Mary Landrieu. His persistence paid off, and Letten was officially retained. That the battle turned out not to be an enormously difficult one, as the Obama administration had said Letten was keeping his job even without a formal reappointment, was immaterial; it was politics well-played and it was appreciated by the people of the Crescent City and the rest of the state who don’t trust Obama on matters like Letten’s reappointment.

And the third item Vitter benefited from was a controversy he had little to do with. When James O’Keefe was arrested outside Landrieu’s offices for purportedly trying to bug her phones, a media-reported falsehood based on what looks like a trumped-up charge which might be negotiated down to something relatively minor in comparison, the state’s Democrat leadership went out of their way to pin the O’Keefe issue on Vitter. This gambit backfired completely, as even the state’s media saw the attacks as unhinged and ridiculous, and Vitter wisely kept his mouth shut other than to assure the public that Letten’s office was perfectly capable of handling the issue in a proper manner. He came off looking statesmanlike, while Melancon’s stock was hardly helped by his friends at party headquarters and their loopy suggestions that Vitter had something to do with O’Keefe’s stunt.

At this point the race is going almost too well for the Republican Party nationally, which would prefer to see the Democrats pour money into an effort to prop up Melancon’s chances. That’s unlikely to happen in a 24-point race, which means the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee will likely be shifting resources to more competitive candidates like Robin Carnahan in Missouri, Alexi Giannoulias in Illinois or Barbara Boxer in California.

Maybe Vitter ought to throw out a few controversial statements here and there to reel in that lead and keep Melancon close enough to get the DSCC to waste some money on the race. Call it “taking one for the team.” After all, with a 24-point lead and a gigantic fundraising advantage, he’s pretty close to Edwin Edwards’ “dead girl/live boy” territory.

As WWL reports:

… U.S. Attorney Jim Letten said the message is clear.

“The message is that if you violate the public trust, if you violate the law, especially if you violate federal law, there will be a severe price to be paid,” Letten said.

Letten said the public corruption cases already prosecuted or now underway are encouraging people to report what they see.

“The key to it all, not just that they call, but at the end of the day, they see results from their call,” said FBI Special Agent In Charge David Welker.

“There’ll never be an end to corruption, but we believe that we are beginning to turn an important corner here, just beginning,” Letten said.

Shepherd got involved in the phony construction bond scheme he eventually pled guilty to facilitating as a result of a connection with former congressman William “Dollar Bill” Jefferson (giant surprise there), who put him in touch with a scam artist named Gwendolyn Moyo, who was sentenced in April to 20 years for 41 counts of fraud and money laundering.

Letten’s crusade against public corruption in New Orleans continues, and in fact seems to be intensifying.

That’s been a good thing. But along with the kudos and good feelings have come an aggravating, and, frankly, insulting, patronization of New Orleans and Louisiana. President Barack Obama personified the attitude perfectly last week when, asked by ABC News’ Diane Sawyer what his Super Bowl pick was, he said:

I guess I’m rooting a little bit for the Saints as the underdog partly just because when I think of what’s happened in New Orleans over the last several years and how much that team means to them. You know, I’m pretty sympathetic.

This, along with a Public Policy Polling survey out last week that had Democrats rooting for the Saints by a 36-21 margin while Republicans were split evenly, is pretty telling stuff.

New Orleans has been the poster child for lefty pity and paternalism for a long time, and particularly since Katrina since the hurricane created the Left’s somewhat-accurate narrative of Bush administration incompetence. The storm, and the failure of the federally-built levees to hold back floodwaters that would destroy vast swaths of the city in its wake, became a political mother lode for the Democrat Party – and it still is.

Otherwise, when notorious liar, former ambulance chaser and abusive cad John Edwards announced his ill-fated candidacy for president in 2008, he wouldn’t have used the city’s Ninth Ward as his backdrop.

Otherwise, Democrats wouldn’t have brought up Katrina ad nauseam every time the war in Iraq came up in discussion – like, for example, during the 2008 debate over Bush’s $162 billion war appropriation when it didn’t include Katrina recovery funds (those voices fell silent a year later when the Obama stimulus package contained no dedicated funding for Katrina recovery; instead, it was argued that the federal funding pipeline was full and red tape, rather than cash, was the problem).

But while Katrina fed into Democrat memes about poverty, rapacious corporate greed and racial victimization, idiotic statements by Republican congressional leaders like Larry Craig and Denny Hastert to the effect that rebuilding New Orleans was a waste of money and that the city’s politicians and people in general would only steal what swag came their way helped move a narrative along that the GOP was happy to kill the city out of racial animus. Scores of billions of GOP-appropriated federal Katrina recovery dollars couldn’t wash away the perception that white Republicans were trying to use inaction to gentrify the city, and when the Bush administration frowned on Rep. Richard Baker’s idea for a quasi-public corporation to buy out destroyed properties from upside-down mortgagees in the city and restore them to commerce by getting developers involved an even stronger case was made. For a time it got so bad that in 2006 a Republican candidate for then-Congressman Bill Jefferson’s seat ran on a “Make Levees, Not War” slogan.

Thus was the hook set nationally for New Orleans as America’s permanent sob sister. Here you had a racially-divided city where the black community was seen by one side as the victim of white racism and poverty resulting from discrimination, while the other side saw the city as beset by a litany of failed left-wing policies and the dependency class they perpetuated.

But both sides failed to see the obvious – namely, that New Orleans’ story was about people, not policies. And while the city certainly absorbed a lot of federal dollars, and while certainly there was theft and fraud involved in the recovery, local actors have driven the comeback that the Saints’ success have shone a light on in the past few months.

Wright Thompson’s sensational piece for ESPN.com in December brilliantly captured the character of New Orleans, circa 2010. The city is battered and bruised, sure – but more than that it’s defiant, resurgent and more optimistic now than ever in recent memory. A new class of entrepreneurs has taken up residence in New Orleans, young businesses dot the landscape, Hollywood celebrities and others routinely turn up in the city’s restaurants and on the property tax rolls, the restructured public schools in Orleans Parish operate mostly on a charter model which has infused the city’s educational system with a spirit of innovation and rather than the old mentality of government programs to fix the world’s problems the attitude now reflects a severe distrust and ridicule of politicians and a spirit of self-reliance.

It was expected that the beleagured and incompetent Ray Nagin would personify New Orleans. Nagin does not. To the extent a government official in the city holds that title, it’s U.S. Attorney Jim Letten for his crusade of taking down crooks who steal recovery dollars and the tax revenues of the city and its suburban parishes. The local reaction to Sen. Mary Landrieu’s Louisiana Purchase affair surrounding the Obama health care bill was a harsh one; rather than a grasping, corrupt caricature presented nationally of New Orleans and Louisiana the reality of the city’s people is commonly one of disgust with the slimy deal-making they’re rejecting locally anywhere they see it.

After all, “Dollar Bill” Jefferson’s congressional district is now represented by a Republican, Joseph Cao, who was improbably elected in a big Democratic year in 2008 as the city’s voters rejected the theft and fraud of the long-time corruptocrat – and Letten has put away the majority of his crooked family. In suburban Jefferson and St. Tammany Parishes, Letten’s investigations have succeeded in removing old-time sleazeballs like Mandeville mayor Eddie Price (a Republican) and Jefferson Parish president Aaron Broussard (a Democrat). The old machines are being dismantled, and the public is glad to see it.

The Saints themselves and their relationship with the city and the state have been transformed; in the recent past owner Tom Benson was cast, not unfairly, as a money-grubbing corporate welfare recipient in constant shakedown mode, current governor Bobby Jindal managed to put a longstanding threat of the team’s relocation to rest by making Benson and the team a partner in the resurgence of downtown New Orleans. In the relatively near future the area around the Superdome will be brought back as a theme-park of sorts with Benson as the proprietor; if ever there were questions about his loyalty to the city those have been put to rest. His granddaughter, Rita Benson LeBlanc, who has the operational control of the team, has proven an attractive and vibrant ambassador as any city could hope for.

This is not to say it’s a totally new day in the city. Today is Election Day in New Orleans, and by all accounts the city’s electorate remains majority black. And while that electorate seems likely to choose as its mayor a white candidate in Mitch Landrieu, the first non-African American mayor since Landrieu’s father Moon held City Hall in 1970′s, Republican dreams – if ever they truly existed – of “taking over” in the Crescent City have proven unfounded. A Landrieu administration is likely to produce much of the same left-wing policies and government paternalism which prevailed during New Orleans’ pre-Katrina decline.

But if so, the new mayor will do so at his political peril. This is no longer a city or a region tolerant of the failure and incompetence of the past. And while a full recovery from the hurricane is still a few years away and its effects aren’t going to be forgotten soon, New Orleans is no longer a city in decline – it has a pulse, pride and a direction again.

While the Saints spent the majority of their first 40 years in existence flirting with the cellar, and personified a city happy and comfortable in decline, the franchise’s current team also personifies New Orleans. It’s a team with great talent but, often, humble beginnings. Drew Brees, pound for pound the NFL’s best quarterback, was cast aside as a casualty of injury in San Diego despite blossoming into an elite passer there; he’s flourished in New Orleans. Darren Sharper fights back age as the league’s most prolific thief. Johnathan Vilma was considered damaged goods as a Jets linebacker; he’s in the Pro Bowl now. Jeremy Shockey was considered a flake and a cancer with the Giants; he might be the heart and soul of the Saints. Pierre Thomas (undrafted free agent) and Marcus Colston (7th-round pick) were nobodies before getting a chance in the Black and Gold. And so on.

And the oddsmakers might have the Saints as an underdog, but the smarmy sentiment surrounding the club’s entry in the sweepstakes down in Miami is something of an insult. After all, this team won 13 straight games before a swoon at season’s end due to injuries; the Saints had home-field advantage throughout the NFC playoffs because they earned it. This was no wild-card team who barely made the playoffs; they completely dominated most of their opponents this season.

So if the nation wants to pull for the Saints tomorrow night, that’s fine. But win or lose, the team’s accomplishment in getting to the Super Bowl – as a metaphor for the overall upward direction of the city – should put to bed this narrative of the team and the town as a lovable basket-case upon which politicians and media pundits can project their pathologies and philosophical fetishes.

New Orleans has had enough of that, just like it has had enough of the bad football and worse leadership it was known for prior to the hurricane. Let the Saints be judged on their accomplishments – and let New Orleans be judged the same way.

First order of business for former congressman and state legislator Claude “Buddy” Leach should be to bring in the men in white coats.

No, Leach has not landed with some group that plans to wait on a hilltop for the end of the world next Saturday, say. But it is almost that bad. He has just been elected chairman of the Louisiana Democratic Party.

Democrats, in their desperate quest to oust U.S. Sen. David Vitter, have grown delusional. Thus, Vitter is variously cast as a criminal mastermind operating in the shadows, and the timid victim of blackmail.

Gill launches into a description of the second theory, one which has lingered in the breeze like burnt trash for the last 4-5 years. It goes like this – when U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana Jim Letten took down the Canal Street Madam a few years ago, he got the goods on Vitter as a customer. And in return for Vitter getting let off the hook, Letten found himself a political benefactor who would keep him in his current position come hell, high water or a Democrat president (please, no cracks about how there isn’t much difference between the three).

The theory is a slur against virtually everyone involved, obviously, and it argues for the existence of Vitter Derangement Syndrome – a phenomenon we’ve equated to Republican mania surrounding Edwin Edwards and Democrat unhingery about George W. Bush. That Letten and Vitter should both be Republicans is likely reason enough for Letten to have donated $300 to Vitter’s campaign, and that Letten does a singularly good job busting up corrupt politicians – most of them Democrats – and ingratiating himself to the populace is plenty enough reason why Vitter should treat him as a prize.

Gill puts it quite succintly:

When Vitter wants a Republican U.S. attorney to remain in place, no tortured explanation is required.

Which brings us to the other major issue involving Vitter, Letten and feverish Democrat apparatchiks – namely, James O’Keefe. Gill isn’t impressed with the goofy accusations made by the state’s Dems that Vitter somehow was involved with O’Keefe’s caper in Sen. Mary Landrieu’s New Orleans office. When we addressed that one on The Hayride, we said:

The answer, in all likelihood, is psychological. Establishment Louisiana Democrats and other lefties hate Vitter with a fervor and fanaticism not dissimilar to that which Republicans in the state hated former governor Edwin Edwards. The state’s Democrats first hated Vitter because he’s an unapologetic, activist conservative, and when he admitted involvement in untoward behavior surrounding a scandal involving a D.C. prostitution ring in 2007 it was merely fuel for the fire. Three years later, when it seems patently obvious that Vitter will get re-elected by a state electorate (he leads Charlie Melancon by anywhere between 18 and 20 points in recent polling) willing to forgive his sins precisely because of the unabashed conservatism Democrats hated him for in the first place, it’s enough to have them completely unhinged.

Of course, for Vitter to have been involved in the O’Keefe play it would certainly have had to involve a lot more than just an attempt to embarrass Landrieu for not answering her constituents’ phone calls; O’Keefe, of ACORN exposure fame, wouldn’t have needed Vitter to put him up to such a stunt and even his most ardent left-wing detractors have to admit Vitter is a lot smarter than to jeopardize a 20-point lead over Charlie Melancon’s moribund campaign on a salvo against Landrieu when he’s not running against her. Since O’Keefe has publicly stated what his intentions were, Vitter’s involvement seems impossibly implausible.

And furthermore, O’Keefe’s caper wasn’t exactly without unwanted consequences on the conservative side. The fact that he gave a seminar on “citizen journalism” the Thursday before his exploits at Landrieu’s offices to invitees of the free-market think tank The Pelican Institute in New Orleans has brought the wrath of lefty media shops down on that organization, and you can only imagine the effect a well-intentioned policy shop with no interest in or taste for the kind of controversy the Landrieu situation has caused the folks there.

One can hardly blame the state’s Democrats for pining for a game-changing scandal that will reverse their dreadful fortunes and offset their lack of political talent, so the current wild conspiracy theories and goofy statements they’re slinging aren’t much of a surprise. Those aren’t much of a substitute for ideas, however, and the problem the Dems have is they’re running a bit short of those these days.

First, Letten was finally given the official go-ahead from Attorney General Eric Holder as a reappointed U.S. Attorney. The move, which was telegraphed last week following Holder’s conference with Louisiana Sen. David Vitter, opens the door for a number of Obama administration judicial appointments in Louisiana to sail through after Vitter had blocked their “blue slips” while demanding clarification of Letten’s status.

“This prestigious appointment makes it crystal clear that Jim isn’t going anywhere except on regular trips to Washington to personally advise the attorney general,” said Vitter. “The attorney general and I specifically discussed this in our meeting last Thursday, and I’m really excited it got done.

“Now Jim can continue his vital work, including battling corruption, and I can sign the blue slips this week for the president’s other Louisiana choices.”

Following the reappointment, Letten’s first public act was to back out of the prosecution of conservative activist filmmaker James O’Keefe, whose arrest at Sen. Mary Landrieu’s New Orleans offices amid an effort to document a refusal to take constituents’ phone calls was something of a sensation last week.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jan Mann will handle the case.

One Hayride source explained Letten’s pullout as coming from two bases. First, the O’Keefe case is small potatoes for a federal prosecutor with a bevy of well-known skulls on his belt and with the bountiful investigations going on within the ranks of the Jefferson Parish government at present he may be a little busy in the coming weeks.

Secondly, the case is, as the source says, “a dog with fleas.” While O’Keefe might well be guilty of something, the federal charge of entering a federal building under false pretenses for the purpose of committing a felony – namely that O’Keefe was engaged in trying to bug Landrieu’s phones – is not going to stick. The feds don’t have wiretapping equipment in evidence, because O’Keefe and his gang didn’t bring any. O’Keefe and Robert Flanagan both recorded the entire foray into Landrieu’s offices with cameras, and the government has the video in evidence. The idea that one would record oneself committing a felony in the open is a laughable one.

And because the case is flea-bitten, there is a relatively good possibility the whole matter may be dropped. As Letten is seen as a Republican, having originally been appointed to his position by President George W. Bush, his being the prosecutor on the O’Keefe case is a loser of an idea – if he drops the charges it looks like he’s condoning criminal behavior by Republicans out of political motives and if he tries the case and gets beat it looks like he’s mailing it in. Better to leave it in someone else’s hands and let the air out of the matter.

Regardless of what the ultimate disposition of the case might be, as more information comes to light about it “Louisiana Watergate,” as the state Democrat Party and several left-wing media outlets made it out to be, seems a rather inappropriate moniker.

In a release late this afternoon, acting state party head Michael McHale said the following…

“This is a Louisiana Watergate. Louisiana families are shocked and outraged that these men would break the law to carry out their political agenda with this Watergate-like break-in and attempted wiretapping. Given his ties to some of the players involved, Sen. Vitter should immediately denounce the actions of these four men and anyone who may have instigated, supported or assisted them.”

“We call on U.S Attorney Jim Letten to conduct a thorough investigation and to prosecute any wrongdoers to the fullest extent of the law.”

McHale’s statement comes following a relatively more sane communique by the state’s Democratic senator Mary Landrieu…

“This is a very unusual situation and somewhat unsettling for me and my staff. The individuals responsible have been charged with entering federal property under false pretenses for the purposes of committing a felony. I am as interested as everyone else about their motives and purpose, which I hope will become clear as the investigation moves forward.”

(Hat tip: BayouBuzz.com.)

A number of things spring to life here. First, Landrieu is to be credited for her restraint – particularly in light of reports that she wigged out and publicly castigated Vitter at a D.C. Mardi Gras breakfast event over the weekend using language that would make a sailor blush. That she was able to craft a totally reasonable statement for public consumption here is commendable.

Second, we now know why McHale is only the acting state Democrat party director, since he clearly lacks the communications skills to hold down that job. Since he may be aware of the potential penalties for slandering Vitter, he didn’t come out and offer any specifics on why it is that Vitter needs to denounce O’Keefe and his gang, like for example how Vitter is somehow connected to them. Presumably McHale didn’t offer any of that, rather than just to smear Vitter by innuendo in a rather shabby fashion, because he has no such information.

One wonders why McHale would choose Vitter as his target rather than U.S. Rep. Joseph Cao, the Republican Congressman who represents the New Orleans district in which these events occurred, or U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, the Republican Congressman who represents the adjacent district, given that Scalise and Cao are just as up for re-election as Vitter is this fall. Or perhaps McHale would choose Gov. Bobby Jindal as his target; after all, Jindal governs the state in which “Louisiana’s Watergate” took place.

The answer, in all likelihood, is psychological. Establishment Louisiana Democrats and other lefties hate Vitter with a fervor and fanaticism not dissimilar to that which Republicans in the state hated former governor Edwin Edwards. The state’s Democrats first hated Vitter because he’s an unapologetic, activist conservative, and when he admitted involvement in untoward behavior surrounding a scandal involving a D.C. prostitution ring in 2007 it was merely fuel for the fire. Three years later, when it seems patently obvious that Vitter will get re-elected by a state electorate (he leads Charlie Melancon by anywhere between 18 and 20 points in recent polling) willing to forgive his sins precisely because of the unabashed conservatism Democrats hated him for in the first place, it’s enough to have them completely unhinged.

Thus McHale’s stepping on his crank today.

We invite Mr. McHale to contact us at The Hayride and offer whatever comment he wishes to explain what connections he believes Sen. Vitter has to O’Keefe and his group, why he thinks those connections inform a necessity for Vitter to denounce the “Louisiana Watergate” which occurred Monday and why it was necessary to issue a statement at all on the events in question. If he’d like to apologize, that’s welcome. If he’d like to make a case for Vitter being the mastermind behind Flanagan and Basel dressing up like members of the Village People at Landrieu’s offices, that’s fine, too.

As for O’Keefe, it appears there is more to the story than the criminal complaint says. He and his people appeared to be quite confident and happy-go-lucky as they exited official custody today, which would indicate they’re either completely out of their minds or they know something the rest of us don’t. The Associated Press reported that unnamed federal officials made the allegation that Stan Dai, the intelligence community-affiliated member of the foursome, was found in a car with listening apparatus, but that doesn’t exactly jive with other reports which indicated that Robert Flanagan and Joseph Basel, the two operators who barged into Landrieu’s office decked out as telephone repairmen, were not found with wiretapping equipment when arrested.

It might well have been illegal activity, and if it is the Hayride has no objection to O’Keefe and his crew getting the full brunt of Jim Letten’s considerable prosecutorial skill – after all, you can’t roll into a U.S. Senator’s office and try to con your way into the phone closet to do something nefarious. But “Watergate?” Sounds dippy.

Maybe when Buddy Leach takes command of the state Democrat Party we’ll get a little better political discourse.

But don’t hold your breath.

Finley, who has been a federal prosecutor, judge advocate and Lieutenant Colonel in the air force reserve, has spent the last 18 years in federal service. She seems to be perfectly well qualified for the position, which came available after its former occupant, Donald Washington, stepped down to take a position at Jones Walker in Lafayette.

Finley’s nomination, however, is drawing suspicious glances from at least one of Louisiana’s senators. Republican David Vitter has placed holds on several nominations of prospective judicial officials in an effort to force Obama to address the status of the U.S. Attorney from Louisiana’s Eastern District, Jim Letten. Finley is headed for a similar fate.

“I congratulate Ms. Finley on her nomination. But I also again ask the president to directly address the need that Jim Letten continue to serve as U.S. attorney in the Eastern District to continue his vital prosecutions of political corruption,” said Vitter in a statement today. “Both Senator Landrieu and I fully support this, as do Louisianians of all walks of life. Let’s confirm that he’ll be there and move forward with the president’s other nominations.”

Vitter plans on placing a hold on Finley’s blue slip as he has done in the case of Obama nominees Brian Jackson, to a federal judgeship in Baton Rouge, and Genevieve Lynn May, to a U.S. Marshall’s post in New Orleans, until the president formally re-nominates Letten to his post. Both Vitter and Landrieu have asked the president to renominate Letten rather than just leaving him to wonder daily whether someone else will have his office when he shows up to work, and the response has been nonchalant at best.

Landrieu’s rhetoric in response to Vitter’s leveraging tactic has been a little heated. Last week, she told the Times-Picayune “Sen. Vitter’s partisan antics will do nothing but hurt the people of Louisiana who need these positions filled,” in response to his placing a hold on “blue slips” for Jackson and May. Finley, like Jackson and May, was a Landrieu recommendation.

It’s questionable whether an appetite exists for another pea from that pod. Such an appetite would have to be ravenous in order for it to do John Georges any good in his attempt to succeed Nagin in the city’s top job.

Georges was caught on audio making ludicrous statements to the Orleans Parish Democratic Executive Committee about how Mitch Landrieu hasn’t done anything about Jim Letten remaining as the U.S. Attorney in the city, among other things. The rant, captured by lefty blogger Eli Ackerman at wecouldbefamous.blogspot.com, set off a good deal of controversy in the city, not to mention a good bit of ridicule of the failed 2007 gubernatorial candidate, who has crossed the spectrum from being a registered Republican as late as 2006, an independent when he broke a state record for a major gubernatorial candidate by spending some $61 per vote in 2007, and a Democrat now in pursuit of the mayor’s job.

Asked about his dippy speech on Friday, Georges told the Times-Picayune the whole thing was a goof. And oh, by the way, the cigarette and video poker magnate informed the paper that he’s crazy like a fox because he was actually just trying to herd his audience away from endorsing Landrieu – and lo and behold, he was successful since the OPDEC ended up endorsing Troy Henry.

Impressed yet? Here was Georges’ actual quote:

“I went into that room with the look of a serious-looking guy,” Georges explained. “I went in there and kicked into this routine and blamed Mitch for keeping U.S. attorneys and not having hospitals. I knew I couldn’t convince a group of people that after switching parties I could get their endorsement. But I knew it would cost Mitch millions of dollars by (Landrieu) not getting the endorsement.”

And here’s a little more:

“It’s a room of 100 mostly African-American Democrats,” he said. “Some are with Bill Jefferson. Some are with Marc Morial. Who knows who these people are? I walked into a room of strangers.”

The takeaway from this? John Georges is his own biggest fan. And he’s really funny…but not in the way he thinks he is.