I must say, though, that Bobby Jindal and his family looked great. Truly. Supriya Jindal was especially ravishing and engaging during the interviews. I absolutely loved how she came off. As far as sending "little starbursts" through the television screen, Supriya owns that volcano-fearing Moose Mama to the north.
Anyway, 60 minutes had a celebrate-the-biography approach to the Jindal story, which is what I expected. They didn't press him repeatedly on any topic other than his ancestry and his ambitions. After making two irritating references to New Orleans and Louisiana being underwater, 60 Minutes followed the "Jindal is a Fresh New Whiz Kid Wonder Boy with Extra Ethics" script to a T.
They interviewed T-P editor Jim Amoss, who said "[Jindal] is the genuine article. He's deeply, by nature, deeply conservative, deeply patriotic."
They interviewed Newt Gingrich, who said: Jindal is the "most transformative young governor in the country."
They interviewed Jindal himself in a still-devastated section of the lower 9th ward, and DIDN'T ask: "If you're really trying to 'fix' Louisiana rather than run for President, what are you doing about this field of ruins we are standing in? Precisely when will this neighborhood be rebuilt?"
Now THAT would be a 60 Minutes-style question, even in a puff piece. (Btw, that reminds me, if anyone out there has a clip of Ed Bradley's 60 Minutes story on Rep. John Kasich from the mid-90's, where they show Bradley's facial reaction to Kasich banging his desk with a toy axe like he's chopping a spending bill down to size... could you please post it on Youtube? Thx.)
60 Minutes didn't interview any critics of Jindal, such as C.B. Forgotston. They mentioned his hard right cultural views, but did not explore them. The exorcism topic was omitted.
Instead, 60 minutes uncritically gushed that Jindal is
an eager and ambitious young whirlwind... [who] doesn't drink, doesn't smoke, doesn't swear and relentlessly hammers his message that the days of corruption and incompetence are over.
Doesn't drink, doesn't smoke... so what does goody two shoes do? Split his medication in half and convince himself that Adam and Eve road dinosaurs to church? 60 minutes just showed Jindal as an ambitious nerd of Indian descent trying to change a backwards state while being a good father.
The harshest claim made about Bobby came during Morley Safer's introduction to the piece, when he described Jindal looking like "an awkward young man" who was "not quite ready for Prime Time" during his GOP address to the nation.
And that's why I was so surprised by the brutally negative, widespread reaction to Jindal's GOP address on Mardi Gras. IT WASN'T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN THIS WAY, PEOPLE. This was not part of "THE PLAN" for Wonder Boy's national ascension. After going around the country doing speeches and fundraisers, Jindal was supposed to appear on Meet The Press, then give the GOP response to Obama, and enjoy two big media puff-pieces (the 60 minutes profile and the Michael Gerson Wapo column) and perhaps even win the CPAC straw poll without even showing up. This was Jindal's officially unofficial national media roll out, and he botched it with a comically cheesy and absurd speech on Mardis Gras. Ouch.
Now, instead of the media introducing Jindal to the nation as "the future of the GOP", he's now known as someone who is "not ready for prime time", and has the gravitas of Kenneth the Page. That's a BIG change in perception.
Here's how the 60 Minutes puffery concluded:
"Well, again, I think it's very flattering. We've just sworn in a new president of the United States. He's, you know, he's barely started. It's way too early to start thinking about who the leader of the party is. And for me, look, I've got no secret plan," Jindal said.
Oh bullshit! Maybe Jindal's letting Timmy "the implementer" Teepell hold the plan, or maybe enough other people know about the plan so that it isn't a "secret" ... but, trust me, Jindal has a plan to run for national office in the next three to seven years. And part of that plan involves travelling to various swing states and explaining how he is too focused on fixing Louisiana's problems to think about national office. Pretty clever.
"But what were you doing in Iowa a coupla month ago?" Safer asked.
Good question, Morley!
"Got a great invitation to come and speak to a wonderful group," Jindal replied.
Here, Safer should've made a skeptical face and asked "Why would a Louisiana Governor with a full plate of challenges make the time to give a speech in Goat Scrotum, Iowa during winter? What was the name of this 'wonderful' group you felt compelled to speak to?" But he didn't.
His visit this fall to Iowa caused a stir, but his speech last Tuesday may have put those great expectations on hold, which may please his wife.
"When you see these speculative stories about him running for president, what goes through your mind?" Safer asked.
"Gosh, no!" Supriya Jindal replied, laughing.
"You may live to regret this," Safer said, laughing.
You gotta love Supriya. Could she please switch jobs with Bobby for a couple years, while he works on his speech-delivery skills?
One last thing. Here's a segment from the 60 minutes story juxtaposed with a recent T-P snippet.
Just weeks after taking office [Jindal] forced through several bills that among other things called for far more transparency in the financial dealings of politicians.
It was a radical break with a tradition established in the 1930s by that powerful and massively corrupt governor, Huey Long.
Long built the towering state Capitol building as a monument to himself. More recently, Governor Edwin Edwards boasted that the only way he'd be voted out of office was to be "caught in bed with a dead girl or a live boy."
Edwards now resides in the slammer, convicted of racketeering. Jindal says the non-stop party is finally over. It's time for the nerds to take over.
T-P:
For Audra Snider, Gov. Bobby Jindal's controversial decision not to accept nearly $100 million in additional unemployment assistance as part of the stimulus package brought to mind a story about how folks in Shreveport refused free textbooks from the state when her great-grandfather, Huey Long, was governor. As Snider, who tends the Long Legacy Project Web site... recounts the history, back in 1928, "the conservative Caddo Parish School Board refused to accept or distribute the free books to students on the philosophical grounds that the proud families of Shreveport should not be forced to accept charity from the state. They argued the governor had no right to dictate how things should be done in their community. Families would purchase the books for the children as usual, and children who could not afford the books would remain unschooled." The board also filed a lawsuit arguing that the free-textbook law was unconstitutional. Long responded by withholding the authorization for the siting of Barksdale Air Force Base in the Shreveport-Bossier area until the textbooks were distributed, because "people so well off don't need an airport." Shaken by the prospect of losing this economic plum, the city leaders of Shreveport relented. The books were distributed to all children regardless of race, class or religion, and Shreveport got its air base. Shreveport's leaders vilified Long as a dictator and later led the charge for his impeachment.
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Update: I can't forget to flag James Gill's brilliantly scathing column that wonders why Jindal would invoke Harry Lee in a political address, period. I nearly spit out my coffee when I read:
Lee always decried racism... but, luckily for him, his constituents didn't think he was serious.
How could they? The only time he seemed in danger of not being re-elected, he announced his deputies would arrest "blacks in rinky-dink cars" if they strayed into white neighborhoods." His political fortunes promptly turned around.
and this
Lee did indeed play a famous role in the aftermath of the storm, but it had nothing to do with rescue efforts. Rather the reverse. When black people desperate to escape the ravaged city tried to walk across the Mississippi River Bridge into Jefferson Parish, Lee's deputies and Gretna cops greeted then with guns and dogs and turned them back.
Then Gill properly bashes Lee for helping to re-elect Dollar Bill Jefferson because he felt "personal malice" towards Karen Carter Peterson for criticizing Lee about the post-Katrina bridge blockade. It's really strong. Savor the whole thing.
