Some people say we’re in the dog days of summer as the Times Picayune wanders off Half Moon’s reservation around 2 weeks too late

Folks it didn’t take long for my email in box to start buzzing with this Michelle Krupa story on Diana Bajoie, a Dollar Bill Jefferson political hack with an extensive background in conprofit earmarking. The buzz of course relates entirely to the fact that none of what Krupa reported save comments from Team Bajoie is new, as it appeared here on Slabbed back on June 6th but more important relates to an exhaustive investigation into the whole “conprofit” earmarking scam done by my colleague Jason Berry over at American Zombie as it related to now congressman Cedric Richmond, whom the Times Picayune enthusiastically supported editorially for the office.  The long and short of it folks is if you want the T-P’s endorsement for political office it clearly helps to be as dirty and on the take as possible.  Jason wisely asks that we all reserve judgment on this story as the behind the scenes is likely to be complex. That said the remainder of this post will examine that complexity.

It all started back in 2010 when Jason began running an expose on Cedric Richmond’s past career as a career politician/political hack in state government.  The return on searching for the truth where ever it led was catching hell from democrat political operatives, duplicity from the GOP side of aisle and grief from the Times Picayune, who took pot shots at him in service to Mayor Half Moon, who backed Richmond to the hilt.  All this caused Slabbed to jump in supporting Jason’s excellent investigative work and in the process, applying the concepts Jason pioneered, Slabbed explored similar taxpayer funded scams in Jefferson Parish involving then Parish Councilman Byron Lee.  I am not claiming Slabbed trail blazed this topic though we did greatly help advance the conversation.

So here we are almost 2 years later and Mayor Half Moon’s pick to serve as interim city council member, Diana Bajoie skated past the local main stream media without so much as a notice of her involvement in the Dollar Bill Jefferson scam despite the fact it was reported in the Times Picayune during the course of their coverage of the Rene Gill Pratt trial. That is until last night.

The possibilities here are very delicious as the behind the scenes turmoil at the Picayune surely feeds into this.  If I were a betting man I’d bet Ricky Mathews will end the Times Picayune’s policy of endorsing crooks for higher office by ending editorial page endorsements entirely.  Maybe the newsroom tires of Mayor Half Moon leading them by the nose in how New Orleans City government is covered.  Whatever is going on the possibilities are both endless and delicious. So while reserving judgment while more information is gathered is certainly wise, speculating on what is going on inside the TP newsroom is fair game.

Whatever the case Bajoie was clearly caught by surprise and that is not necessarily a bad thing.

sop

10 thoughts on “Some people say we’re in the dog days of summer as the Times Picayune wanders off Half Moon’s reservation around 2 weeks too late”

  1. not only was bajoie caught by surprise, mitch and all who surround him were as well. team mitch has a what, me worry? posture. the feeling in the landrieu camp is that mitch is as loved as he has ever been by his constituents and his re-election is an afterthought.

  2. I do believe that one of the new changes at the TP is trying to do hard hitting investigative reporting on political corruption in an attempt to win back subscribers.

    That said, for all the cronies the TP helped maintain a corrupt hold on area politics the TP better do a lot of said stories to win back my subscription. Especially in JP where for years the paper was solely under the control of champagne/caviar lunches sponsored by silver tongued JP politicos.

    1. Yep, Lock, remember Stephanie Grace even bought Aaron Broussard a bottle of Dom Perigon!!!

    2. Nah, it’s the TP m.o. Don’t do investigate stories, but when certain ones bubble up on the good blogs, go with some of them, and then run them into the ground.

  3. Until the TP gets its head out of its ass and does a top to bottom revamp on NOLA.com, their alleged commitment to digital media is nothing but lip service.

  6. pass the t.p.

    The t.p. March 22,2012 article uses a 2006 photo of the Robert’s at 2222 St. Claude Avenue rather that a 2012 picture there by slanted and designed to impliment the spin generated by a Robert organization press releae. The article is misleading and says the grocery store is 35,000 square feet. Public Records at the Department of Sanitation that are signed by Mr. Marc Robert II read that the building is 15,425 square feet of habitable space of a total building size of 31,804 square feet. Sales area vs non sales area and sales area ratio to warehouse space is huge when thinking about loss profits which Mr. Robert’s suit was all about.

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