Have our Baton Rouge politicians really cast off their bipartisan ways?

If Governor John Bel Edwards were a chicken farmer, he should be very worried.  Apparently the foxes are now in charge of protecting the hen house.

This mess began when Edwards was denied his request for Speaker of the House.  It had been customary in Louisiana, out of courtesy, to grant such a request for a new governor.  However the Republican legislators along with some influential outsiders chose to deny Edwards his choice. Their excuse was that they presently held a majority in the House and therefore needed a Republican leader.  When Bobby Jindal was elected the Democrats held the upper hand in the House, but out of courtesy granted him his wish for a Republican leader; maybe our present state Republicans just aren’t as courteous as those Democrats.

The House speaker is a very powerful position because not only does this individual guide bills through the House but also gets to appoint the various committee heads and members whose responsibilities include the screening of proposed legislation.  The committees control which bills are presented for possible consideration by the House legislators.  Additionally, committee heads can kill a bill in a committee and prevent it from ever getting to the House floor for a vote by its members.

For the present legislative year the dust has finally settled and the committee heads and members have been chosen.

If one examines the present landscape, it would appear that most of the same influential legislators that were loyal supporters of Jindal’s voodoo fiscal policies have been selected as committee heads and members.

I am confused by this.  How can the same individuals responsible over the last eight years for the demise of our state’s financial stability now be capable and willing to solve its budgetary woes?  Where did this sudden new insight come from?  Did we miss some apocalyptic intervention?

I wish Governor Edwards all the best in attempting to turn things around but I’m afraid he may not get too much assistance from those presently in charge of the chicken coops. If there isn’t some kind of bipartisan political attitude change in Baton Rouge, he may just face the possibility of a complete destruction of his brood.