LOUISIANA

“A big point of contention with Gov. Jindal’s budget is that it gets the state out of the business of covering for bad tax policy at the local level. Local governments assess an inventory tax on businesses’ tangible personal property. The inventory tax is a bad tax, worse than most, as it disincentivizes investment in locales in which it is levied and results in tax pyramiding that ultimately drives up costs for consumers. That’s why inventory taxes are imposed in so few states and those that have them are moving to eliminate them.” – Patrick Gleason/Forbes

“I may not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but increasing expenses on Louisiana businesses while expecting them to create more jobs, make more investments and thus produce more tax revenues is counter-productive.” – Forgotston

“Warren Drake, who spent a decade as superintendent of the top-rated Zachary school system, has applied to take the helm of the much larger but much more challenging East Baton Rouge Parish school system.” – Baton Rouge Advocate

“The U.S. has so much crude that it is running out of places to put it, and that could drive oil and gasoline prices even lower in the coming months.” – NOLA.com

“Former U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu will be the keynote speaker at Southern University – New Orleans’ spring commencement exercises. Landrieu, a Democrat, served nearly two decades in the Senate before losing her re-election bid in December to Republican Bill Cassidy.” – Baton Rouge Advocate

“Leaders from the LSU System’s 10 institutions descended on the nation’s capitol Tuesday to present the system’s data, research and priorities to policymakers to campaign to support higher education. LSU President F. King Alexander said the flagship campus receives about $500 million in funding from the federal government each year in grants and student aid — five times the amount received from the state government.” – LSU Reveille

 

“After meeting with hospital officials, emergency room physicians, paramedics and community leaders, Health Secretary Kathy Kliebert said she is confident other facilities can handle the added load when Baton Rouge General Medical Center-Mid City closes its emergency room March 31.” – Baton Rouge Advocate

“Attorney Gloria Allred is filing a lawsuit Wednesday (March 4) on behalf of a Texas woman who said she was raped by French Quarter hotel security guard during Mardi Gras 2013, according to a news release distributed by the firebrand lawyer.” – NOLA.com

“Community leaders and residents showed up in the hundreds to show support for Fort Polk and the Joint Readiness Training Center on Tuesday. Supporters, many carrying signs, lined the route from Fort Polk to First United Pentecostal Church, where a listening session was held with Department of the Army officials John McLaurin and Col. Thomas O’Donaghue.” – Lake Charles American Press

“The point is Chavis was apparently off campus recruiting for Texas A&M during the time he claims he wasn’t actually employed by A&M. The claim is the crux of Chavis lawsuit against LSU (and Texas A&M, amusingly) that argues he does not owe LSU the $400,000 buyout for breaking his contract. He said he didn’t actually start working for Texas A&M until Feb. 13, his official hire date in College Station, after giving LSU a 30-day notice that expired Feb. 4. But there’s a problem here for Chavis and A&M. And that problem is NCAA Bylaw 11.7.” – Scott Rabalais/Baton Rouge Advocate

NATIONAL

“There is a third choice. If you are not stopping Iran’s program, don’t give away the store. Keep the pressure, keep the sanctions. Indeed, increase them. After all, previous sanctions brought Iran to its knees and to the negotiating table in the first place. And that was before the collapse of oil prices, which would now vastly magnify the economic effect of heightened sanctions.” – Charles Krauthammer/Washington Post

“The Obama administration is pursuing a nuclear deal with Iran that leaves the Islamic Republic a year away from obtaining a nuclear bomb and which, according to experts, gives the United States insufficient leverage to dismantle Tehran’s nuclear infrastructure.” – Washington Free Beacon

“Despite Benjamin Netanyahu’s protestations to the contrary, his speech before the joint session of Congress contained an element of obvious defiance to president Obama. After all, Obama all but forbade him to give the speech and still he gave it. Yet Netanyahu was the hardly the first western leader to exhibit insubordination. The old reliables have been falling away for some time. As the New York Times put it, Francois Hollande and Angela Merkel “split” with Obama over the question of arming the Ukraine.” – Richard Fernandez/PJ Media

“The fate of the Affordable Care Act, the president’s signature domestic policy achievement, is once again in the hands of the Supreme Court on Wednesday. The justices will hear oral arguments in King v. Burwell, a challenge to the financial assistance that millions of Americans are receiving to purchase health insurance. The case is considered the greatest threat to Obamacare’s future since the court considered a challenge to the law’s individual mandate three years ago.” – Washington Post

“This week, the Supreme Court considers King v. Burwell. At issue is whether the IRS exceeded its authority under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act by issuing a final IRS rule that expanded the application of the Act’s subsidies and mandates beyond the limits imposed by the statute. King v. Burwell is not a constitutional challenge. It challenges an IRS rule as being inconsistent with the Act it purports to implement. The case is a straightforward question of statutory interpretation.” – National Review

“Stage 2 of the Hillary email scandal has been achieved, as yesterday’s ‘confused old lady who didn’t understand how email works’ defense utterly collapsed with the Associated Press’ discovery that Clinton’s mail server was located in her house (her estate in Chappaqua, to be exact — the one she had to settle for because she was ‘dead broke’ after Bill left office) and was registered under the name of a man who does not appear to exist.” – Breitbart

“I voted for Donald Trump, honestly. Why, you might ask, as a member of the media, was I interested in having my vote counted at all? Call me a glutton for punishment. Not because I support his policies (to be honest, I abhor most of them) but Donald Trump was at least honest about his faux-seriousness, and I liked his tie. And when I made a valiant attempt at interviewing him, he used such a vast array of profanity that even I was impressed. Sure, within fifteen minutes of him taking the oath of office, there’d be a national requirement that everyone attend a seminar on real estate opportunities, and bombers would be flying out over the Middle East ready to obliterate something — anything — within range provided it had an appropriately enemy-ish sounding name, anyone with that sort of dogged commitment to such an improbable hairstyle can’t help but be steadfast in the face of even damning criticism.” – Emily Zanotti/American Spectator

“The crusade to find some scandal — any scandal — to sink 2016 Republican presidential frontrunner Scott Walker officially jumped the shark on Monday when a deeply concerned American suggested that the Wisconsin governor’s spokeswomen are problematically attractive.” – Daily Caller

“Forty-six percent (46%) of Likely U.S. Voters say they would vote for Clinton in a matchup with Walker if the 2016 presidential contest were held today. But a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that nearly as many (41%) would choose Walker instead. Eight percent (8%) prefer some other candidate, while six percent (6%) are undecided.” – Rasmussen Reports

“If you noticed some of your friends made themselves scarce last weekend, it’s not altogether unlikely they joined the legions of binge-watchers of Netflix’s runaway smash hit House of Cards, the third season of which made its way to public availability early Friday morning. The return of the drama starring Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright as a pair of political grotesques ascending to the White House over 26 episodes’ worth of political machinations in Seasons One and Two have had an exalted profile over the past month; rumors of an early deposit of the show to Netflix subscribers last week nearly set off an online stampede.” – Scott McKay/American Spectator