>>>
followers of the nerdland #know about another letters i have to bring out today, #fbj, and the last letters standing for
bobby jindal
, and he comes from my home
state
, and if i could forget to wish him away, because lately if you live in l.ouisiana or just watching the
super bowl
coverage and therefore must keep looking at the television about
louisiana
, there is
bobby jindal
who has made himself in the possibility of his presidential run in
2016
impossible to forget. in a recent "
washington post
" editorial, governor
jindal
appealed to
president obama
for a meeting to advice him on how to fix
medicaid
and pleading for quote, plexability for the states to make their own decision about the program. well, thanks to recently announced cuts in
louisiana
's
medicaid
programs, we know what
bobby jindal
's idea of flexibility lacks like. if you are a poor person living in
louisiana
and living with hiv, you will lose your
case management
visits and if you are a
low income
mother, you can say good-bye to the
home care
visits by a nurse for your newborn, and if you are need of services, forget them, and if you are a
nursing home
resident and you need speech therapy, you can say good-bye to that. thank you,
bobby jindal
. this in a
state
with the highest poverty and the lowest rates of insurance, and for his hopes of being president one day, you can forget it
bobby jindal
, fbj. and joining me is patrick milsap and majev malhotra, an active leader in
american indian
affairs. and i want to start with you, majev, because you wrote a piece in the "
washington post
" about my governor saying that
indian americans
are dismayed to see that he has done knotting for the community while soliciting us for campaign funds, and he has moreched at an earlily age that people of his conservative
state
would elect.
>>
well, the
indian americans
are overwhelmingly supporting
president obama
, and in fact, 84% of the
indian american
vote went for
president obama
, and so that tells you the ideology and the values and the thinking of the
american indian
is opposite of
jindal
. so
jindal
representing the extreme right wing has done two shifts. the first shift he did was when he entered politics, and converted himself to an extreme version of christianity, and wrote to
president bush
that this conversion is going to drive his and guide his political career and got some endorsements and became as white as he could except for the
skin color
. his manners --
>>
and you used passing to describe him?
>>
yes, because the
american experience
being one of immigrants and new people coming to the country is an experience of groups forming identity as
americans
and different kinds of
americans
, and the
indian american
group is a new one and still in the early stages of defining who we are, and so most of us are quite dismayed at the sellout and the hypocrisy of
jindal
, because on the one hand, he has distanced himself from the
indian american
community except for getting funds from them, and on the other hand, very recently, the
republican party
has an
identity crisis
, and realizes the need to be less white, and suddenly, he flips around and says, i'm the guy.
>>
i want to come to you on this because this is one of the lessons of the
republican party
for
2012
and we have a deep bench of republicans of color, and
nikki haley
and susana martinez is on it and my gov governor
bobby jindal
is on it, but when you hear of the authenticity claim that is problematic, what is the republicans hoping that the bench of republican color will move them into the next arena.
>>
okay. let's do a positive and having an elected official in
louisiana
that is not under federal investigation is a huge thing.
>>
we are big on that.
>>
and in
bobby jindal
's favor, he is not being investigated right now.
>>
well, sometimes it takes a couple of years.
>>
well, you never know. and secondly, and the
republican party
actually does have more minorities in governorship than the
democratic party
does.
>>
yes.
>>
and the concern about what
bobby jindal
is doing is to attaching the budget concerns and when you list the things that he is talking about, there is tough, and when you talk about people with hiv not getting treated, that is a hard thing, but that is a financial issue, and to attach that as to that makes him more white or less white, i don't know if that is a fair assessment.
>>
that is fair.
>>
and here is wone thing, all right -- let me jump in.
louisiana
has the second highest black population in the country as you know. and talking about a
state
that are poor, and going to disproportionately bear the brunt of the cuts were not african-
americans
, this would be entirely different conversation. mississippi is 32%, and
louisiana
is 33%.
>>
i watched
bobby jindal
all of the way from back when he converted from a hindu. i consider myself sadly a jindalologist, and as he tries to become a national figure, we are in an era of authenticity of politics, and he will have problems, because he not only changed the religion, but the narnlgs and he was in the
bush administration
on health and changed some of the policy positions, and he has even changed campaign tactics and the reason he did not get elected governor and
kathleen blanco
did is because he was the only governor at the time who would not attack somebody, so he has evolved. i am not claiming every one of these things, but the third child, he was mysteriously there and delivered the third child, and i don't know that any or any of the all things lack authenticity, but when you add them together and watch him perform, and he is like the republican
al gore
of in terms of being --
>>
or
john kerry
or something. i want to bring in
state
senator
karen carter peterson
of
louisiana
and chairwoman of the
louisiana democratic party
, and i want to bring her in,
karen
, on this question, patrick said, lo look, and this is fair, because we do have difficulties around this with black representatives as well, but like you don't want to attach some racial or ethnic authenticity on the one hand with policy positions on the other, but the fact is that he's making choices that are
over and over
again just borne by
poor people
and they are overwhelmingly
people of color
in our
state
.
>>
look, melissa, just do a
fact check
, and over the last five years governor
jindal
has cut
medicaid
every year.
louisiana
has won one of the lowest eligibility levels in the country. 12% of the
poverty level
for those people over age 19 not disabled and not pregnant with respect to eligibility for
medicaid
. that is is ridiculous. his
political ideology
and ambition has been paramount in any decision he has made. it has been to the detriment of the citizens.
>>
and look, part of this for me, and again, it is not to say, oh, is he authentic or not, but rather, there is a political point to the authenticity, right? that the issue is that four republicans and when you put
bobby jindal
forward, it is with the sense of a more
compassionate conservativism
and yet, we see no passion in how he is crafting
health care
.
>>
he is a
rick perry
in his skin, and he is uncomfortable. he has rejected
indian american
, and rejected the ethnicity with the groups except when it comes to fund-raising and now that the
republican party
needs somebody who will represent diversity or hoist as a diverse person, he wants to stand up.
>>
well, in some ways
rick perry
got rick perried because he was compassionate in two spaces, he had a position on guard sill that was a
common sense
reasonable position over which he was attacked and then initially commonsense position on immigration and the issue of the dreamers basically in the
public schools
in texas, both of which got him torpedoed.
>>
well, can we -- we have two topics, and two things that i would like to divide up, and number one is talking about poverty, and then talking about neighborhoods of color as if those are synonymous. i think that that --
>>
well, you hang out in
louisiana
and you know that the layover.
>>
i understand that, but to assume, and statistically, it is the case, but to assume that
people of color
is going to be in this other, i can't stomach that, so let's talk about how you deal with poverty and i live in one of the poorest
congressional districts
in america, and the other thing that we have to separate out is bobby p
jindal
the potential presidential contender and
bobby jindal
the governor and you keep saying that these are not compassionate moves, but
louisiana
has a
balanced budget
requirement, and if you cut from one to put somewhere else, and so what other programs --
>>
well, how about raising revenues. so i hear you and one possibility and i will come back to
karen
about this, and one possibility is raising revenue and we know that
louisiana
has one of the most
regressive tax
plans and the governor is encouraging a more regressive one, because it lays on top of the
sales tax
.
sales tax
means that the
poor people
go to buy the
consumer goods
and the groceries and end up playing a higher proportion of the budget while at the same time we are cutting the taxes for the wealthy and
karen
, you are there in the
state legislature
, so how much of this is about the ecomonic of it and how much of it is about the ideological positions for him to go from
jindal
the governor to
jindal
the president.
>>
well, there is no doubt this is for
2016
. a specific example is that two years ago the governor was unwilling to raise the tobacco tax in
louisiana
. the money while all of the republicans across the
state
whether it was
charlie crist
or
haley barbour
in mississippi were willing to raise the tobacco tax because of tough time, and he said not only would he veto it, but they had to pass a
constitutional amendment
to raise the tax on it. we have the low nest the country. and now as he wants to eliminate taxes and
corporate taxes
, but on
sales taxes
, he is putting on the table right now, i'm interested in increasing the tobacco tax, and this is right there the difference of the ideology and the flip-flopping -- go ahead.
>>
well, interesting and we will take a quick break and continue to talk about
louisiana
and broaden it out, because part of what is going on here is the fact that the south is a one-har pi town. -- one-party town. wow. [ buzz ]
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