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Hilarious.
I knew that story was bull .
Gov. Bobby Jindal fights back against those questioning points in his speech
by Robert Travis Scott, The Times-Picayune Friday February 27, 2009, 9:36 PM
Points of contention
• Watch the Harry Lee video released by the governor's office
• Read The Politico blog
• TPM calls Jindal story a "tall tale"
BATON ROUGE -- Gov. Bobby Jindal fought back Friday against reports by national media outlets and Democratic-leaning Web sites that he was inaccurate or untruthful Tuesday night in the Republican Party response to President Barack Obama's address to Congress.
Among the criticisms is that Jindal embellished a story about battling bureaucrats over a Hurricane Katrina boat rescue effort while visiting former Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee. Another criticism is that Jindal's transportation agency is pursuing a passenger rail project from the same pot of federal stimulus money the governor labeled as wasteful pork.
Jindal also criticized a $140 million portion of Obama's stimulus bill for volcano monitoring when much of the money would be used for U.S. Geological Survey equipment to gauge rising river waters and storm surges, which would have applications for coastal Louisiana.
"It's unfortunate that these Washington, D.C., liberals would rather launch baseless political attacks than be a part of an honest, bipartisan dialogue about how we need to create jobs and get our economy moving again, " said Jindal's chief of staff, Timmy Teepell.
During his Tuesday night speech, Jindal tried to convey a theme that Americans and not government make the country enterprising and strong. He told a story he has used often during campaign and political appearances:
Rescue story
"During Katrina, I visited Sheriff Harry Lee, a Democrat and a good friend of mine. When I walked into his makeshift office, I'd never seen him so angry. He was yelling into the phone: 'Well, I'm the sheriff and if you don't like it you can come and arrest me!' I asked him, 'Sheriff, what's got you so mad?' He told me that he had put out a call for volunteers to come with their boats to rescue people who were trapped on their rooftops by the floodwaters. The boats were all lined up ready to go when some bureaucrat showed up and told them they couldn't go out on the water unless they had proof of insurance and registration. I told him, 'Sheriff, that's ridiculous.' And before I knew it, he was yelling into the phone, 'Congressman Jindal is here, and he says you can come and arrest him too!' Harry just told the boaters to ignore the bureaucrats and start rescuing people."
Various media outlets criticized the remarks, some saying he made up the story and was not in the storm area right after Hurricane Katrina. Jindal was a congressman from the 1st District at the time, which covers several parishes in the New Orleans region.
Video of Harry Lee
A video posted Friday on the YouTube Web site by Jindal's office shows Lee giving a speech in Gretna at a gathering of parish sheriffs and other law enforcement officials from across the state who were boosting Jindal's campaign for governor on Aug. 24, 2007.
In the video, Lee says of Jindal, "He was hands-on. The day after (Katrina), Bobby was in my office and said, 'What do you need?' It was not just phone calls. He was in my office."
Lee died Oct. 1, 2007. Col. John Fortunato, spokesman for the Sheriff's Office, said Jindal appeared at the sheriff's offices on the east and west banks several times in the days after the storm. The boat rescue holdup by federal response officials did occur initially as citizens brought their watercraft to a staging area in Jefferson Parish, he said. But the problem was resolved and the great majority of boats were deployed to the flooded areas of New Orleans later that day.
Teepell, who after the storm drove with Jindal to visit various sheriffs' offices in his district, said he recalled being in Lee's office in west Jefferson on several occasions in the days after the storm. Teepell said he remembers the phone conversation but did not know who was talking to Lee.
Lee was recounting the boat rescue story to the caller on the line, Teepell said. The phone call was not taking place while the boats were attempting the rescue operation, but some days afterward, Teepell said.
A distorted version?
Louisiana Democratic Party spokesman Scott Jordan said Friday, "Gov. Jindal told the story in a way that made it sound like he was assisting Harry Lee in the Sheriff's Office as rescue boats were being turned away, which the governor's office now says wasn't the case. The first responders' heroism during Katrina is something that Louisianians hold sacred, and people are upset that Governor Jindal framed the incident as if he was one of those first responders."
Louisiana's transportation department plans to request federal dollars for a New Orleans-to-Baton Rouge passenger rail service from the same pot of railroad money in the economic stimulus package that Jindal criticized as unnecessary pork.
The high-speed rail line, a topic of discussion for years, would require $110 million to upgrade existing freight lines and terminals to handle a passenger train operation, said Mark Lambert, spokesman for the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development.
Jindal's speech criticized the stimulus package passed by the Democratic majority in Congress, and noted examples of projects that he found objectionable.
Spending targets
"While some of the projects in the bill make sense, their legislation is larded with wasteful spending, " Jindal said. "It includes . . . $8 billion for high-speed rail projects, such as a 'magnetic levitation' line from Las Vegas to Disneyland."
The $8 billion pot is for high-speed rail and inter-city passenger rail service projects. The Federal Railroad Administration will make decisions about which grant applications to approve.
The federal stimulus bill does not specifically mention a rail line connecting Las Vegas to Anaheim, Calif. However, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, was instrumental in boosting the amount of money for the rail projects in the stimulus bill. He has said he intends to tap that money for a rail line from Las Vegas to Anaheim, where Disneyland is located.
"It's earmarked by wink and nod, " Teepell said.
According to a spokeswoman for the Department of the Interior, the $140 million apportioned to the U.S. Geological Survey is aimed at long-standing maintenance items, including upgrading equipment to monitor volcanoes.
Benefits for Louisiana
"The Department of the Interior is still finalizing a list of projects under the recovery act, " said Joan Moody. "That money would cover a wide range of science, water and climate change projects. Volcano monitoring is just one of them."
Another major beneficiary would be Geological Survey stream gauges in Louisiana and other states, with the money to be used to install a new high-speed telemetry system that can send data to other locations through a new satellite that will be launched in 2013, she said.
The gauges measure tide levels throughout the year, but also are instrumental in providing emergency planners with real-time information about storm surge heights as hurricanes hit the coastline.
Staff reporters Mark Schleifstein and Bill Barrow contributed to this report
Hilarious.
I knew that story was bull .
Jindal is hilarious, a joke, a macaca mouthing every fundamentalst hard-right "principle", rousing the rabble only on the fundamentalist hard-right.
Last edited by boutons_; 03-01-2009 at 02:49 PM.
Bobby Jindal is all of those things, for good and for ill.
Jindal's in the mix somewhere, but lacks the *star-wattage* of a Romney or Palin.
It tells you something about CPAC that Jindal shaved Palin for second place and Palin tied Ron Paul for third. Geek alert!
Last edited by Winehole23; 03-01-2009 at 10:36 AM.
Newt Gingrich, ten percent in the CPAC straw poll.
Damn, I thought one of your posts was about to get interesting.
False alarm. I can up the double-entendres if you like.Damn, I thought one of your posts was about to get interesting.
I stopped paying attention to anything he had to say after that.
You lasted longer than most.
It got dull but he made a few good points.
Kathleen Parker insists we haven't seen the *real Bobby Jindal* yet.
a republican making up bull ? What else is new?
Hilary under fire in Bosnia. Too easy.
LOL I never would have imagined the republican party would be so haplessly funny....I mean, really....
All I kept hearing prior to his speech was "This would be a unique republican response, given from the point of view of the republican version of Obama"
"This politician is definitely stated to run for president in 2012, he's a republican version of obama"
"His indian immigrant father makes him the perfect answer to obama"
roflroflroflroflroflroflroflrofl
You say this as America is being taken over. Good to see you keeping your eye on the ball.
You say this, then waste precious time and oxygen on Joy Behar.
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