Project Katrina

Yet another major revelation in the last week to undermine Bobby Jindal’s consistent claims he has effectively managed Louisiana’s response to BP’s oil spill gusher:

For more than two months, Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana has made it clear that he considers the response of the federal government and BP to the gulf oil leak a failure on many fronts.

But elected officials in Louisiana and members of the public seeking details on how Mr. Jindal and his administration fared in their own response to the disaster are out of luck: late last week the governor vetoed an amendment to a state bill that would have made public all records from his office related to the oil spill.

The measure was proposed by Senator Robert Adley, a Republican, and easily passed the Democrat-controlled Legislature. He told the Associated Press that the veto was a “black eye” on the state. “This governor has opposed transparency for the three years he’s been in office,” he said.

According to the New York Times, Jindal says he vetoed the measure to strengthen the state’s position if it pursues legal action against BP. This argument seems transparently bunk since if any legal action is taken (and why wouldn’t it BTW) would require all those documents to be turned over to BP during discovery.

Other recent revelation include CBS noting that despite Jindal’s attacks on the Obama administration for not delivering enough resources fast enough, Jindal actual held up the deployment of 5,000 National Guard troops authorized by the Obama administration. And over the weekend, the New York Times reported that experts at the state and federal level had panned Jindal’s response, saying the state was ill-prepared for the spill and that Jindal’s attacks on the Federal response smacked of political calculation designed to distract attention from his own failures. Oh you got to love (insert hate) Louisiana politics.

This morning on Face The Nation Bob Schieffer is talking with Florida Governor Charlie Crist, Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour,  and Alabama Governor Bob Riley about the BP oil spill gusher. Jindal has never met a camera he didn’t like, so I kind of wonder what exactly he is doing today.

Her op-ed today in the Washington Post nails it:

Jindal raised eyebrows by departing from the old Republican text in this way. But actually, what’s surprising is that after the worst financial collapse since the Great Depression, the worst mining disaster in 30 years, and what is now the worst environmental disaster in the nation’s history, more conservatives aren’t revising the gospel about the blessings of deregulation and the horrors of government. Despite what should be obvious failings, deregulation, smaller government and privatization remain central to the dominant Republican message.

I mean at what point do the Republicans, or at least a vast, vast majority of the public get that sensible regulation makes sense.