One of the members of the Louisiana Senate most deserving of our ire when that body broke faith with the people who elected it during the spring legislative session was Bret Allain, a third-term Republican from Franklin.

We said none of the current members of the Senate deserve re-election, and that was a reaction to the Senate voting 39-0 over the Memorial Day weekend (when nobody was paying attention to them) to break the state’s statutory spending caps and thus bring on an orgy of state government largesse to local governments for pork projects and wasteful swag. Sort of a legislative equivalent of a Las Vegas hookers-and-blow weekend.

Allain was one of the most outspoken advocates for hookers and blow, and as such he’s also one of the people most responsible for the structural mess the state budget became. The policy wonks and budget hawks have found so many mistakes in the state’s bloated, ridiculous budget document that the Senate’s Finance Committee actually suggested that Gov. John Bel Edwards veto the budget so they could get another crack at it.

This is directly on Allain, by the way, as he signed his name to the conference report on the budget. He didn’t just vote for it; he was directly responsible for what’s in the document as one of the conferees.

The perception here is that Allain acted as he did because he was a pet poodle of Edwards’ in the Senate; it turns out that while that body contains 27 Republicans out of its 39 members, pet-poodledom is pretty rampant nonetheless.

But Edwards isn’t very appreciative of his Republican poodles, and something happened yesterday which set the Louisiana Freedom Caucus loose to clobber Allain with one of the more entertaining press releases we’ve seen…

Governor Snubs Good Old Boy Allain With Veto

BATON ROUGE—Governor John Bel Edwards has vetoed the signature, legacy legislation of Sen. Bret Allain, who represents Iberia, Lafourche, St. Mary and Terrebonne Parishes. This much-needed corporate franchise tax phase-out plan passed both chambers of the legislature with strong support and would help set Louisiana on a path to prosperity, attracting business and good-paying jobs that are currently moving to our neighboring states all along the Gulf Coast because of our high tax and insurance rates.

Sen. Allain was appointed to serve on the conference committee that stripped money from his own constituents at the behest of Senate President Page Cortez and Speaker Clay Schexnayder who worked hand-in-hand with Governor Edwards to bust the budget spending limit set by the Louisiana Constitution. At their directive, Sen. Allain’s committee punished the constituents of 19 House members who would not vote in lockstep with the Good Old Boy Network to bust the budget spending limit.

The irony here is that Sen. Allain’s kissing the ring of the governor did not save his own project on the very day he had the hubris to condone the punishment of Rep. Beryl Amedée at a luncheon in St. Mary Parish. Rep. Amedée voted against Allain’s conference report that slashed funding for the repair of roads and bridges that have fallen into disrepair, in order to spend millions of your tax dollars on things like dog parks, band uniforms for high schools and colleges, a charity supporting flowers and a cultural museum. It was Sen. Allain who was appointed by Senate President Cortez to serve the Good Old Boys’ interests, which was meant in this instance to punish people like Rep. Amedée because she dared to vote against the wasteful spending.

“Senator Bret Allain’s SB1 was a bit of badly needed tax reform that would have provided a shot in the arm for Louisiana businesses. Once again, John Bel Edwards has proven that he does not care about creating jobs, or assisting the working people of Louisiana. He is, and always has been, a big government liberal. This veto proves it yet again,” said Representative Alan Seabaugh, Chairman of the Louisiana Freedom Caucus. “It is also a slap in the face of Senator Allain who has spent the last eight years rolling over for the governor, supporting his liberal policies, and giving Edwards virtually everything he asked for.”

Beryl Amedee is the secretary/treasurer for the Louisiana Freedom Caucus, which is why the press release went out. The Chamber of Commerce in Morgan City had their legislative after-action review luncheon Wednesday in which a bunch of the local yokel politicians decided they’d turn the affair into a struggle session for her, with Allain as the chief inquisitor.

We watched the video; we weren’t all that impressed with his performance. We frankly thought she wiped the floor with him.

But then he had his corporate franchise tax bill vetoed, and all we could do was laugh. He looks like an utter jackass now.

It doesn’t really matter, because Allain is term-limited and his political career seems like it’s over. At one point there was some buzz that he would pursue one of the statewide offices, but nothing much came out of it; nobody really thinks of Allain as anything more than an utterly mediocre state legislator (he couldn’t get elected Senate president over Page Cortez, for crying out loud).

But his son Robert is running for the seat he’s vacating.

This isn’t intended to trash Robert. We can’t say he’d be the state senator his father has been. What we can say is that Brett Allain’s performance in that legislative session which concluded earlier this month, a performance which has continued all the way up to this week, has not done Robert any favors.