Jindal Popular With His Party, But Not His People

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has backed away from his budget plan to eliminate the state’s income and corporate taxes while raising the sales tax and heavily cutting health care and education.  Jindal’s approval rating has dropped to 38%, while support for his plan was at 27%.

Jindal is also one of the GOP governors refusing to expand Medicaid under Obamacare, even though the federal government initially pays for the entire expansion and subsequently pays for almost all of it.  Businesses support the expansion — why wouldn’t they want a healthier work force?

Jindal’s failed budget in some ways makes him a canary in the coal mine for GOP policies.  He’s very much in line with his party and groups like the Club for Growth, but not so much with his red state’s voters, who saw his budget as giving to the rich at the expense of the poor and middle class.

If Jindal really hopes to run in 2016, he needs to thread the needle of re-gaining his popularity at home while hewing to GOP orthodoxy.

The GOP seems to think its hope come from its governors, but when you try to enact its principles in the states, people don’t like the results.  It’s much easier for a congressman like Paul Ryan or senator like Rand Paul to spout this inequality-extending stuff in theory than to live with its unfair consequences in practice.

 

Mitt Did Us a Favor

From “Paul Ryan’s disappearing act,” Jonathan Martin, Politico:

“Last year’s It Boy of the graying Republican Party has been bigfooted by the GOP’s new twin heartthrobs, Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Rand Paul of Kentucky.

“Ryan is actually hurt by having been on the ticket last year.  Many Republican activists had heard of the smart young Wisconsin conservative but not actually seen him up close.  And when they did, well, it didn’t send their pulses racing.

“‘He fell flat out here,” said Sam Clovis, a conservative talk radio show host in northwest Iowa.  ‘He just didn’t measure up to the hype.'”

Just as McCain showed us that Sarah Palin is empty-headed, Mitt showed us that Paul Ryan is empty-hearted.  Ryan had his moment, and he won’t be president.

As for Rubio, he’s very slick, but not very bright.  All he really has going for him is that he is Cuban-American, but the GOP will figure out that Cuba-Americans don’t identify with other Hispanics and, more importantly, vice versa.

Rand Paul may be less weird than his father, but he’s still way too weird to be president.

Jeb Bush has that fatal last name, Scott Walker is arrogant and dumb, John Kasich is arrogant and obnoxious, Bobby Jindal is simply goofy…  I’d go with Christie.  Sure he’s over-the-top Jersey to GOP Southerners, but what are they going to do, vote for Hillary?   He‘d keep red states, swing purple states, and put blue states in play.

Hey, Jindal, Brown Called and They Want Their Diploma Back

GOP Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, one of the 2016 hopefuls, has a degree in biology from Brown University and was a Rhodes Scholar.

Yet, even with his Ivy League education and Oxford experience, he signed the Orwellian “Louisiana Science Education Act,” which in fact has nothing whatever to do with science, but brought creationism to the state’s biology classes.

He also lets state vouchers be used for tuition at bible-based private schools, where kids are taught that The Flintstones is history, not a cartoon.

Um, Bobby, you’re looking kind of cartoonish yourself.

Bobby Jindal’s Freudian Slip

In a conference call for Mitt’s campaign, Jindal had a Freudian slip and referred to Obamacare as “Obamneycare,” that unfortunate (but true) term coined by Tim Pawlently during the primary.

If he had any shot at being Veep, that slip was the “death panel” for his chances.  Mitt is more likely to pick Julia Louis-Dreyfus.

Buh-buh, Bobby.

Rubio Off Guest List

Mittens is having a very high-profile retreat this weekend for his biggest ($50,000 and up) donors and supporters in  Park City, Utah.  VP short-listers Tim Pawlenty, Rob Portman, Paul Ryan, and John Thune will all be there.  Marco Rubio?  His invitation seems to have gotten lost in the mail.

Who else will be there?  Bold-faced GOP names like Condi Rice, Bobby Jindal, Jeb Bush, John McCain, Karl Rove, Fred Barnes.   Lots of super rich Mittmen (and women) like Meg Whitman and Frank Langone.

How Veepstakes Look from the Beltway

The National Journal offers its latest rankings for Mitt’s VP choice:

# 1  Ohio Senator Rob Portman (up from #4)

# 2  Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal (up from #7)

# 3  Florida Senator Marco Rubio (down from #2)

# 4  Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan (down from #1)

# 5  Former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty (up from #8)

# 6 Wild Card (up from #10)

# 7  Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels (not ranked)

# 8  New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (down from #5)

# 9  Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell (down from #3)

#10  New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte (down from #6)

Nobody on this list would get me to vote for Mitt.  I think he’d have to kidnap my son and hold a gun to his head to get me to vote for him.