The pathetic reign of the dumb

This isn't really a post in that there are more notes to share about both of these figures which we'll get to later. But we really need to mark these quotes down right now for future reference.  Louisiana is at a specific conjuncture of profane stupidity right now. But also it is rich with examples of how even under fascist oligarchy, the leadership is still populated by insecure try-hard types who say and do stupid stupid things. 

For example, the hack bureaucrat installed by the fossil fuel lobby to ruthlessly gut the state's Department of Environmental Quality, despite her no-lose situation and guarantee of lavish personal wealth now and forever, is still this insanely image conscious.. and incredibly stupid about it. 

Louisiana's environmental chief is trying out a different spelling for her last name in agency statements — and it seems designed to strike a chord with residents of the Bayou State.

DEQ Secretary Aurelia Skipwith Giacometto changed the spelling of her last name to "Giacometteaux" in recent communications with the public and media because, she said, she loves Louisiana.

The shift appeared recently in a statement issued on Jan. 7 about the state Department of Environmental Quality's efforts to streamline permitting for the oil and gas industry.

Amazingly, the constitutional hollowness extends even further up the hierarchy.  The current King of Louisiana, for example, is "best friends" with the Governor and can buy or have gifted to him whatever he wishes with no responsibility to anybody for anything. But even from that lofty height, he still has a pathetic need to be liked. He even goes so far to compare himself with current King of America and consequently World's Most Despicably Desperate Man to make that point for himself and for us.  

Guidry also said that, though he is not elected or appointed to a position in an official capacity, he was providing his services to the governor and the levee authority pro-bono. He donated or raised $3 million to help elect Landry during his gubernatorial campaign.

“Look, I’m best friends with the governor. We talk ten times a day, seven days a week,” Guidry said. “Look at Elon Musk, right? There’s a reason why he’s doing something free for Trump — because he knows he can help him. And Trump wants that. There’s a reason why I do what I do free for Jeff because he knows I have nothing to gain.”

In a way, the analogy demonstrates remarkable self-awareness on Guidry's part. But it's also just so so sad.

Of course right up until then it was fine

Jeff and Shane have decided they are gonna put off the deal where they give each other bullshit gigs for a while. 

Guidry is Landry’s top political ally and a major donor to his campaign. Landry also hired Guidry to serve as a “special agent/investigator” for the Attorney General’s office.

Landry reported making between $50,000 and $100,000 in 2020 and 2021 from his role on the Harvey Gulf board, where he provided legal advice. Several experts said the arrangement may run afoul of a law that says the attorney general must devote his full time to that office, as well as of ethics laws that prohibit public officials from getting certain payments and gifts outside of their state salaries.

Landry’s campaign did not respond to messages seeking comment on his resignation.

“He just felt he needed to resign from the board in 2022 to run for governor in 2023,” Guidry said, adding that Landry didn’t provide a lengthy explanation for his decision. Guidry said he replaced Landry with a former schools superintendent from Michigan. The company’s website indicates the new board member is Ronald Wilson.

We'll see how they feel after the election. 

Plenty more where that came from

Just remember these times.  These are the good times. You may think you have hilariously dysfunctional government now but just wait.  Someday Jeff Landry will be Governor. Let's take a look at what his official schedule might be like.

Guidry said Landry spends a few hours a month on his work for the Harvey Gulf board, one of several outside income sources the attorney general claims. Landry also claims full ownership of two staffing firms. He has not answered detailed questions about how much of his time is occupied by running those firms.

It’s difficult to ascertain from a review of public records how much time Landry spends on official duties versus outside ventures. His public calendars are often empty, with the exception of media appearances, often on right-wing channels, including One America News Network and Newsmax.

Ain't seen nothing yet

 Jeff Landry is going to be the most hilarious Governor we've had in a long time. 

The close relationship between Attorney General Jeff Landry and his top political ally Shane Guidry recently added a new layer: Landry took a spot on the board of Guidry’s oil services firm, Harvey Gulf.

Landry reported making between $50,000 and $100,000 in 2020 as an “independent board member” for Harvey Gulf, LLC, in his annual personal financial disclosure, filed this month with the Louisiana Board of Ethics. The company does not appear on Landry's disclosures for previous years.

The newly-disclosed business relationship is one of several close ties between the attorney general and Guidry, who is among Landry’s top political donors and a close friend. It’s also unusual: while other statewide elected officials serve on nonprofit boards and have private business interests, none reported serving on the board of a private firm while in office, according to recent personal financial disclosures.

It technically doesn't matter if the Attorney General is on his payroll or if it's the other way around. Maybe it's a little bit of both.

Guidry's role with the Attorney General's office is listed in state records as "special agent/investigator," and he said he remains working as an adviser for Landry’s office. State records list his salary as $12,000 annually as a part-time employee for the past four years.

A spokesman for Landry’s office said Guidry has been on “unpaid leave” as a special agent since 2017 but declined to answer questions about the adviser role or other job titles. Guidry has also used the title “special assistant” to Landry.

Figures like Guidry are always looking for the dumbest possible character to install in the public offices.  Recall that Guidry's fellow industrial titan "kingmaker" Lane Grigsby very nearly purchased the Governorship for Eddie Rispone in 2019. Rispone really only played the buffoon on TV, though.  Landry is a good bit more pure. Which makes him more useful for all sorts of rackets. 

He also reported big increases in income from UST Environmental Services and Evergreen Contractors, two labor staffing firms of which he claims full ownership.

Landry claimed less than $5,000 in income from each of those firms in 2018 and 2019, then reported at least $200,000 from each of them last year.

Ben Landry, the attorney general’s brother who oversees those businesses, did not return messages seeking comment this week on the big bump in income for the attorney general.

Landry formed Evergreen in 2011 during his first year in Congress. It was among three Landry-related firms that applied at the same time in 2017 to import Mexican welders and pipe fitters to the U.S. under the H2-B temporary worker visa program.

Anyway, all of this makes Jeff an ideal candidate to become the next Governor. And since we've all but given up expecting anything except the stupidest of all outcomes, he's likely to be the favorite.  So, get ready to be entertained.

Just put it on the credit card

Jeff Landry should know how that works by now.  He spent enough time last year investigating the way LaToya used hers and couldn't find anything worth prosecuting.  Seems like this should be a pretty simple transaction in light of all that.

A dispute between Attorney General Jeff Landry and a former campaign worker is heating up, with the two tussling in court over what the operative claims is an unpaid debt of between $175,000 and $250,000 from Landry’s 2015 campaign.

The jilted campaign worker, Dwayne Alexander, is a prodigious filer of lawsuits. He has also gotten into past trouble for working as a private investigator without a required license.

Ha ha "prodigious filer of lawsuits.  Technically, it's Landry suing Alexander this time around just to try and get him to back off.   Anyway what Landry tried to buy from Alexander, apparently, were black votes in Orleans Parish because, Landry reasoned, that is what one does.  Landry also must have figured he was being very smart about it.  He shopped around for the right "broker." Alexander was the low bid.

The campaign first got in touch with former state Rep. Sherman Copelin for similar services, but Copelin’s price was too high, according to an affidavit filed by Harvey. Copelin said in a phone interview that he didn’t remember whether such a meeting had occurred.

The Harvey referred to there is Bob Harvey, by the way.  He's here along with Copelin and Bob D'Hemecourt, and Shane Guidry because of course all of them would be in a story like this.... in 1990! Bands are getting back together for this one.  But that's all very fitting since we're also talking about trading favors for favors. 

Alexander makes another eye-popping claim – that Landry’s lawyer, Stephen Oats of Lafayette, suggested he might be able to satisfy Alexander’s debt with public money instead of campaign cash, by expediting a $300,000 legal judgment Alexander is owed by the state in an unrelated matter.

Again, this could probably all be solved with a credit card. But Landry wants to be all hard headed about it.  

Why the JP Sheriff's race matters

Ok that's kind of a dumb post title. The Sheriff of Jefferson Parish is one of the most powerful and consequential political offices in the state.  Of course it "matters" who holds it.  But there is one item buried near the bottom of this juicy Advocate profile of Shane Guidry I think is worth making note of.

Guidry and Normand served as co-chairs of Landry’s transition team. But the sheriff and the attorney general have been at odds over Normand’s refusal to have his deputies seek out and arrest potential illegal immigrants, in defiance of a demand by the Trump administration that Landry backs.

The outgoing sheriff, whatever else we may think of him, at least had enough clout to buck the preferences of State Attorney General and even the President of the United States with regard to one of their most cruel and highly politicized policy priorities. Given everything else this article says about Guidry's importance, not to mention Landry's ambitions, we can expect the pressure to victimize immigrants to increase. Will the next sheriff retain anything approaching Normand's independence?  That's a big question.

So anyway, who bought Avondale?

There's so much excitement this week, it seems like this would have been a bigger deal otherwise.

Two years after it was put up for sale, the former Avondale shipyard has found a buyer, but few details have been released about the idle West Bank facility's future.

Huntington Ingalls Industries executives disclosed the development Aug. 3 in an earnings call with analysts. The Daily Press of Newport News, Virginia, where the defense giant is based, first reported the news Tuesday.

"We signed a purchase-and-sale agreement for the sale of the property," Chris Kastner, Huntington Ingalls' chief financial officer, told analysts, according to the report. "While this is a positive step toward an eventual sale, a comprehensive due diligence process will now be initiated before the potential buyer is obligated to close."

Beci Brenton, a Huntington Ingalls spokeswoman, confirmed the agreement Wednesday but declined further comment.

Nobody is saying who the buyer is but it's obvious a lot of people know. The article points out some things a lot of us in the public already kind of know.  For example, there had been speculation that Avondale would end up as part of the deal between the City and the Port over the Public Belt Railroad. My understanding was that the occupants of the soon to be demolished Gov. Nicholls and Esplanade wharves might be relocated to Avondale. But then we read recently that they're moving to a facility on France Road.

On Thursday, the port's governing board approved the broad outlines of an arrangement that would terminate TCI's current lease in favor of a new deal for property the port will purchase for $10.5 million at 4325 France Road, along the Industrial Canal.

TCI's new lease will be for 20 years and will allow it to occupy the France Road property immediately. It will pay no rent for two years to cover relocation expenses.

That's pretty nice for the tennant that they're making it worth their trouble.  It's also nice they were able to arrange the shipyard purchase at such a steep discount. Really helps spread the wealth around a bit.

In recent months, Huntington Ingalls dropped the asking price for the Avondale property to $95 million from $125 million, Jerry Bologna, president and CEO of the Jefferson Parish Economic Development Commission, said.

Speaking of which,  it also works out well for the France Road property owner that the Port is apparently able to pay almost twiced the assessed value.

The France Road property is now owned by Gulf Coast Shipyard Realty LLC, land records show. That company is owned by a group with ties to Shane Guidry, the chairman and CEO of Harvey Gulf International Marine, a marine transportation company.

The Orleans Parish Assessor's Office values the France Road property at more than $5.5 million.

That looks like a pretty sweet deal for Shane Guidry. Wait. Who is Shane Guidry, again?

During the last three years, Shane Guidry has become Louisiana’s most generous campaign contributor. In addition to serving as the CEO of Harvey Gulf, Guidry is also the special assistant to Attorney General Jeff Landry, where he collects a $12,000 annual salary and oversees the department’s criminal investigations unit. Landry was once Guidry’s personal lawyer.

Please enjoy that article, by the way. Guidry has a lot of friends besides Landry. Billy Nungesser, Cameron Henry, Newell Normand... pretty much all of your favorites and ours show up in there somewhere.  Certainly can't hurt your chances of getting in on the big deals like this.

Anyway, can't wait to find out who bought the shipyard.