I’ve had a few folks send me a link to the “analysis” story at the left-wing Guardian UK caterwauling over the wipeout of the Democrat Party in Louisiana over the past few days, so I guess it’s worth commenting about here.
Barely so, though.
In case you aren’t aware of the subject matter at hand, here’s a taste…
When Louisiana’s attorney general, Jeff Landry, won the open gubernatorial primary on 14 October, it not only ended eight years of relatively productive bipartisan control of the state’s government: it marked a hard-right shift in Louisiana’s politics that could set back environmental policy and human and civil rights for decades to come.
Oh, yeah. It’s one of those. And there’s more. After noting the histrionics of one Bob Mann, soon to be ex-LSU journalism professor, there is this…
To outsiders, Mann’s reaction may seem dramatic. Louisianans understood fully: in 2021, Landry used his office to try to pressure LSU into dismissing the professor over his argument that the university needed to require students to test regularly for Covid-19. The incident wasn’t isolated. In February 2021, Landry filed a lawsuit against the Times-Picayune reporter Andrea Gallo over her investigation into sexual misconduct charges against one of his closest aides. Landry ultimately lost his meritless case. As Gallo noted, winning wasn’t necessarily the point. “I think that it sends a very clear message to reporters, and to the public of Louisiana, that if you request documents from the attorney general’s office you better watch out, because you might be subjected to a lawsuit,” Gallo told the US Press Freedom Tracker, a website that documents attacks on media in the United States.
And this…
In 2022, Landry had a simple message for women in Louisiana who opposed the abortion ban that took effect when the US supreme court eliminated the rights Roe v Wade had once established. “If you don’t like the laws in the state, you can move,” Landry said. Of course, most people in Louisiana – where the median income is just over $27,000 a year – can’t just pick up and leave. Which means they’re all but stuck with Landry as governor for at least four years come January.
Then the piece trashes Cameron Henry as the new president of the state senate, an ascension Landry endorsed, because the former leadership of that body had been so “bipartisan.”
But then of course there is this…
As the Times-Picayune also noted when writing about Henry’s ascension, Landry has made it clear in private conversations he wants people loyal to him in key leadership roles. That means he is unlikely to face resistance to many of his policies. For women, Black people, the LGBTQ+ community and others in the hard right’s crosshairs, that’s an ominous possibility.
Cory Dennis was Landry’s campaign manager and will certainly occupy a key role in the administration. Cory is black. He’s one of several expected key players in a Landry administration who are black.
We could go on quoting the highlights – or lowlights, if you prefer – from this piece. But what you need to understand is this isn’t a Guardian story per se, in that these isn’t objective journalism from 50,000 feet, left-wing though it might be.
This was a ringer piece. It was written by John Stanton, whose “day job” is as the editor of the New Orleans Gambit, the formerly independent alternative rag now owned by John Georges – who also owns the Advocate. Georges’ people won’t even publish Stanton’s ravings in the pages of the Advocate, so now he’s writing for a publication an ocean away to trash Louisiana’s conservatives.
OK, so you don’t have a clue who John Stanton is. Fine. Here’s a sampling of his offerings…
LOL @RepGregMurphy just said Americans appreciate the GOP's "rugged individualism." Because yes, the first thing I think of when i hear "rugged individualism" is a bunch of paunchy white men in matching bad suits with double chins and new born baby soft hands
— john r stanton (@dcbigjohn) October 19, 2023
Jeff Landry ran a campaign on jailing and permanently stigmatizing Black youth as criminals, hurting the poor and running LGBTQ people out of the state if they don’t like losing basic human rights. pic.twitter.com/HMqo1Hg9mb
— john r stanton (@dcbigjohn) October 16, 2023
Lol this guy is not a democrat. https://t.co/Adu7TWRQxb
— john r stanton (@dcbigjohn) October 16, 2023
Bracing for the incoming “Now that he’d elected let’s give Jeff Landry a chance to show he’s not so bad” takes which will make my brain melt
— john r stanton (@dcbigjohn) October 15, 2023
What you get when you worry about who’s a better fascist than Jeff Landry so you can throw the election that way but fight internal party fights with the gusto of a presidential campaign is, in fact, Jeff Landry.
— john r stanton (@dcbigjohn) October 15, 2023
If “unhinged communist” comes to your mind, that’s a pretty spot-on take as to who this guy is. He’s a left-wing polemicist who gets commissioned once in a while to spew bile in the big “progressive” rags when he’s not running Gambit further and further into the ground.
Nobody really cares what he says. But he might be worth watching over the next four years, because what’s going to happen is that Team Landry isn’t going to take being libeled on a constant basis like, for example, Team Jindal did. They’re likely to shoot back.
And as that prospective back-and-forth escalates, which it might, you could well see Georges feeling some pressure.
John Georges wants to be liked. Not all that long ago he went on Moon Griffon’s show and gave the “really, you guys, I’m super conservative” speech. That didn’t go well, particularly when Griffon challenged him on how slavishly the Advocate followed John Bel Edwards’ line. Georges’ response was that you just can’t find conservatives who’ll work in the newspaper business.
Except you can find less unhinged people than John Stanton. He obviously didn’t bother.
So when Team Landry decides to be even less cooperative with Georges’ media outlets than they’ve been so far, it’s probably going to make him uncomfortable. And how is that going to play out?
We just don’t know. But there’s plenty of popcorn, so feel free to grab some for the show.