Day: January 18, 2013

Local good government groups in the news: Say what?!!!

Jefferson Parish activists demand action on proposed contracting reforms ~ Manuel Torres

Welp folks, it looks like Councilman at large/River Birch Landfill errand boy Chris “Mini-me” Roberts has not had enough 5am potty visits to fully learn about the procurement reforms recommended month ago by the BGR. Look no further than the Performing Arts Center debacle to understand the need of getting corrupt politicians outta the government procurement biz.

LANA NOONAN: Expenditure of public funds should be discussed openly ~ Letter to the editor

It appears the editorial police at the Sun Herald are now allowing mention of the Bay Tech Building swindle on their pages, which is progress.  While Slabbed never has a problem properly attributing third party sources certain old line media outlets such as the Sun Herald’s editorial page folks can’t seem to tell certain stories without weaving in some tall tales as well. The Seacoast Echo and Bay Tech? Now that’s funny. 😆

Our friends at We Saw That remember the earliest days of Slabbed’s NOLA area corruption coverage….

If Slabbed the book is ever written, the section on the beginnings of our Louisiana chapter of the Slabbed Nation would certainly start with our coverage of the saga of Jamie Perdigao, a name I’ve seen dropped in comments several times of late here.  It was Perdigao that landed Slabbed on the front page of the Times Picayune, in a story written by Gordon Russell, if memory serves, back in 2008.  It was our coverage of Perdigao’s fight with Jim Letten’s office that would later open doors for Slabbed as a variety of people would end up contacting us as a result of that topic. Jamie Perdigao ended up being crushed and these days he is doing his time at the Pensacola FPC.  More so than anything else though, our coverage of the Perdigao saga along with  USA v O’Dwyer illustrates we call these cases on what we perceive are their own merits.

Though the Slabbed of yore is now long gone, sleeping with the cyberfishes thanks to the Goatherders, snippets of some of our original pages do survive and the good folks at We Saw That linked a post there circa 2008 last night on twitter marking the date that Slabbed landed on their radar.

Since then some of the players in USA v Perdigao, including former Congressman Bob Livingston, have periodically surfaced on these pages.  New Orleans has got to be the biggest small town in the US though the themes of everyone knowing everyone else recur across the deep south.  If you’re newbie to Slabbed and want to understand the inside of the current commenting scandal inside of the New Orleans US Attorney’s office I’d start with USA v Perdigao.

Jim Brown’s Weekly Column: Wake up call for Republicans?

Friday, January 18th, 2013
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

WAKE UP CALL FOR REPUBLICANS?

Where does the Republican Party go from here? Are major changes in both direction and philosophy necessary? Not a problem say some party operatives. Don’t overreact to the latest defeat. The Democrats will screw things up and swing voters will be rushing back to the GOP column in the next election-right?

Senior Bush adviser, Karl Rove, emulates this “stay the course” line of thinking. Rove was in my hometown of Baton Rouge last week speaking to a statewide business group. He espoused the institutional party line that there really is no major problem. The big challenge is mechanical. Democrats just did a better job of getting out the vote according to his analysis. The Republican candidate was a hard sell, and the campaign technology was weak. Oh, and we forgot about the Latinos. But all this, according to Rove, can be fixed in the future.

If only it were that simple. Rove and his cohorts who think along similar lines, are not looking at history. You have to go back to 1988 to find a Republican candidate for president who was able to garner more than half the popular vote. In five of the past six elections, Democrats have out polled Republicans.

Republicans are bragging about holding on to the control of the House of Representatives. But although Democrats won fewer congressional districts, they received over a million more votes. Continue Reading……

Recipe of the day: Ruth

Courtesy On a Steed in comments:

Ingredients

2 cups mayonnaise
1 cup sour cream
2 garlic cloves, finely minced
2 tablespoons onions, chopped
2 tablespoons sour dill pickles, chopped
2 tablespoons capers
1 teaspoon anchovy paste
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon horseradish
1/4 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
salt
pepper
1 tablespoon creole mustard

Directions:

Mix all ingredients well and refrigerate to blend flavors