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September 15, 2005
Louisiana/New Orleans corruption... so what?
Marvin pointed me towards an article on the poor economic planning of New Orleans and how that left many of its citizens less able to cope with Katrina.
But it also contained the following:
That the governments of New Orleans and Louisiana... are corrupt and ineffective is of course widely recognized.
I've seen this mentioned many other places, and it's always stated so blandly. "Everyone knows that Louisiana and New Orleans have corrupt governments," just like we would say, "Everyone knows that Texas has hot summers." Not only was this not a secret, but it was not really seen as that big of a deal.
Shouldn't we be taking a closer look at this? I'm only marginally interested in how this corruption affected the Katrina reaction (in short, badly). Rather, what I'm really interested in is how the local residents and we as a nation would let such openly acknowledged corruption fester for so long. I mean, this wasn't just partisan rankling that this or that President should be in jail for policy or perjury. No, this was "Hey, the governor just appointed a mobster to the state gaming commission," and "Speeding tickets are $100, though a discount of 50% is available if paid to the officer directly... wink, wink."
And we all shrugged and said, "Well, yeah, but it's the Big Easy."
Why?
In other parts of the country, we're indicting government officials and their friends all the time. And this is for relatively small stuff like campaign finance minutia and tax irregularities. Yes, those are still illegal, but they fall short of things like bribery and obsruction of justice. Hell, in some areas, this kind of political scalp-hunting is replacing football as the main spectator sport. But not Louisiana. Again, why?
I don't really have the answer, but I will say this. I would hope that when a state or local government becomes incapable of policing its own corruption, the next level up would step in and take action. In this case, that would mean the federal government. The problem is that federalism (a good thing, in general) makes is hard for the federal government to come in and enforce state laws, and that's where the bulk of criminal law lies. But maybe in all of this post-Katrina political upheaval taking us all over the landscape from Presidential vacations to the war in Iraq, there might be a little mindshare for giving federal law enforcement the leeway to clean up corrupt state and local governments.
Politics by Dan at September 15, 2005 08:37 AM
Comments
Speaking half-seriously, perhaps mostly metaphorically...
It seems like a geopolitical manifestation of the stereotypical madonna/whore complex. We want to live nice, tidy lives as a rule, but we also want to know that filthy debauchery is easily available just up the highway. Maybe it's more of a superego/id complex. A Skywalker/Solo complex. Han Solo can't live in Round Rock -- he needs a place like New Orleans. And everybody likes Han Solo the best, right?
But if you ever brought a real Han Solo home with you, in a week he'd have shot some guys over a pool game and left a flaming bag of poo on the sheriff's doorstep, and he'd get away with it because he's also supplying the mayor's cocaine habit. So as long as the corruption has the tint of romance, and as long as it's over there, we avert our eyes and think, "Well, if they're happy living that way, and if it makes a nice tourist spot, I guess I can live with it." We don't often ask how many people pay the price for that level of corruption or who they are.
Besides, in the Dukes of Hazzard it's just so darn cute!
Posted by: Marvin at September 15, 2005 05:13 PM
It's kind of like that joke..
man 1: a thief stole my wifes wallet..
man 2: Did you report it?
man 3: No, he's spending less than my wife
Sure La. is corrupt but in the scale of things there isn't a lot to steal. the Feds and dare I say republicans in power make La. look like schoolyard amateurs by comparison. Hell we have schoolboard officials here that are more bent. Sure La politicians are stealing and good ol boy pilfering but they tend to keep it in the state.. the money ends up back in the economy. Hell why raise a fuss and "fix" it when the alternative is slick professional thief politicians that will offshore the profits when they rape the public.
Posted by: satyr at September 16, 2005 10:57 AM
I'm inclined to go with Marvin's Han Solo analogy. Of course, I'm weird, possibly depraved. I want to have the filthy debauchery conveniently close and have there be nothing wrong with it. But then, alas, Han Solo would no longer have his rougish charm. He'd be middle management in Jabba, Inc.
Posted by: Dan at September 16, 2005 07:24 PM