"Bobby" Jindal became Louisiana Gov with a $800+ Million budget surplus and guess what?

[KeepItReal]

Gov. Jindal (R-Campaign Trail USA) and his GOP cohorts in Louisiana have managed to turn that surplus into a projected $1.6 BILLION dollar shortfall.

Sh#t is so bad, these GOP clowns have to cut this years budget already in use:

New midyear budget cuts will total $103.5 million, and the state budget hole for the next financial cycle has grown $203.8 million, bringing next year's projected financial shortfall to some $1.6 billion overall.

It's so bad Jindal's trying to sneak in the budget cuts with no review (apparently again):

Gov. Bobby Jindal's administration will present its plan to cut $103.5 million out of Louisiana's current budget to the Louisiana Legislature's joint budget committee Feb. 6.

The Jindal administration will also ask the budget committee to vote on the budget cut plan that day, leaving little time for legislators make changes to what the governor has proposed before they vote.

After Democratic Governor Kathleen Blanco left office, Jindal and the GOP blew the ENTIRE SURPLUS IN LESS THAN A YEAR.

Check this out from 2008:

But while the leading good-government group here, citing that addiction (to oil and gas severance taxes), warned last May against the Legislature’s plan for a $360 million income tax cut, Mr. Jindal called the tax break “terrific news” and happily signed it into law as legislators cheered.

Admonitions on fiscal prudence went unheeded, as they have so often here, and the bill is now due. Earlier this year there was an $865 million surplus; now Louisiana has a $341 million shortfall in its current-year budget, and next year the projected deficit is $2 billion.

How Jindal thinks he is in ANY WAY qualified to be a contender for President of the United States, having driven Louisiana into the depths of economic ruin, is beyond me.

[shenmue]

1. Bet he's shoveling it

to his megachurch friends.

[KeepItReal]

3. By way of school vouchers going to church-run schools, yep that's one way.

eom

[Desert805]

2. From the very first line in the first of your links I clicked...

"Surprising to no one, dropping oil prices continue to make an already bleak Louisiana budget situation even worse.

"The news is bad," said Greg Albrecht, the chief economist for the Louisiana Legislature."



He's a fool enough to those who look without "overlooking" some key factors in projected budgets.


Maybe there's more to it, but after reading that... There's only so many hours in the day.

[KeepItReal]

4. If you dig deeper, you see LA created many way to not even collect oil taxes

Like 24 months of severance tax-free oil drilling and production if you have horizontal or deep well.

[Desert805]

10. Thanks.

I appreciate your reply. There's just so much I can keep up with, and that guy already shot himself in the foot and fell off my worry meter, heh.

I will look further, as your reply made me rethink my own reply as sounding more flippant than I intended, certainly.

Cheers.

[spanone]

5. mr bush accomplished the same with america's budget

Politics More: Deficit CBO Bill Clinton Treasury
CHART: How The Clinton Surpluses Turned Into More Than $6 Trillion Worth Of Deficits

At the Democratic National Convention, Bill Clinton famously opined that 'arithmetic' was the magic trick that enabled him to be the last President to provide a budget surplus.

In 2001, the CBO projected that the total Clinton surplus of about $280 billion would balloon to $5.9 trillion worth of cumulative surpluses through 2011, when in reality the accumulated deficits reached $6 trillion at the end of that time period.

That's pretty bad arithmetic. So what happened?

The U.S. Treasury Department recently tweeted this chart, which breaks down the major drivers that turned a small surplus into a massive deficit:

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/how-clinton-surplus-became-a-6t-deficit-2013-1#ixzz3Q5OqlPlo

[W_HAMILTON]

7. That's a really useful chart -- I haven't seen it before.

I'll be sure to save it so I can use it for future debates

[Sherman A1]

11. Great chart!

Thanks for posting.

[Thinkingabout]

6. By Bush standards this would make Jindal an excellent president. Jindal, the wonder boy on getting

budgets under control, well, so much for that, the truth comes out.

[samsingh]

8. and stupid voters continue to vote repugs into power - they must hate their lives

[Hulk]

9. They just need another tax cut for the "job creators"...

...and everything will peachy again.

Where is the media?

[hatrack]

13. Tracking deflated footballs and Kim Kardashian's butt, silly!

[deutsey]

12. Sounds like it's all going according to plan

Isn't this what the GOP and the wealthy elites want?

Reaganism redux.

[KeepItReal]

14. Jindal is sticking to the anti-tax pledge he made to Grover Norquist

Now I get it:

Grover Norquist is an anti-tax Republican hardliner from Washington, D.C. He is also, according to political analyst John Maginnis, “the man in charge of tax policy in Louisiana.”

Earlier this month, Maginnis explained that Norquist loomed over Gov. Bobby Jindal’s opposition to a bill that would trim state subsidies to filmmakers. There was widespread support for the legislation, and even the Louisiana movie industry was OK with it. But Jindal shares Norquist’s belief that plugging loopholes is tantamount to raising taxes — which is the blood-red line a Norquister will never cross — so the effort stalled. Maginnis observed: “Not even the willingness of those taxed can overcome the governor’s opposition. That’s because he answers to a higher power: Grover Norquist.”

Norquist believes a written commitment instills more discipline, since pols often walk back their verbal promises. Perhaps that’s true. But most voters have never heard of ATR (Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform) and their votes aren’t much influenced by interest-group ratings. One thing that might influence voters, especially in Louisiana, is if they were made aware of the following: The ATR tax pledge obligates its signers to oppose any disaster relief or recovery legislation paid for by higher net taxes, even at the federal level. Imagine if, say, a disaster occurs on the Gulf Coast, and the only viable recovery bill is coupled with a tax of a penny per gallon on gasoline sales in 50 states. ATR pledge signers, even those in the Louisiana delegation, will have to oppose it, stiffing disaster victims along our own Gulf Coast.

http://thelensnola.org/2013/06/06/whos-really-writing-jindals-tax-policy-a-man-who-thinks-world-war-ii-vets-are-un-american/

How adherence this BS Americans for Tax Reform pledge scam is not considered malfeasance is beyond me. Is there a state/local version of the term "Treason"?

[deutsey]

15. It was Norquist, after all, who said:

My goal is to cut government in half in twenty-five years, to get it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.

It was the design behind Reagan's trickle-down "trojan horse" (as Reagan's Director of OMB called it).

[Scurrilous]

16. K & R

[lame54]

17. He and his friends are $8.8 million dollars richer?

[jwirr]

18. Just another R governor showing how government is supposed to work.

[progressoid]

19. Obamaaaaa!!!11

[KamaAina]

20. Wonder how Booby will deal with plummeting oil prices?

[Feron]

21. By turning La. into an open air landfill..

Currently he's selling off parts of the state to the Chinese in order for them to build their toxic plants:

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/1/28/chinese-methanol-plant-in-louisiana-cancer-alley.html