[StBernard] Government has been Bobby Jindal's life since an early age

Westley Annis westley at da-parish.com
Sun Sep 16 11:33:22 EDT 2007


Government has been Bobby Jindal's life since an early age
September 16, 2007

Lisa Kay got her first handshake from gubernatorial front-runner Bobby
Jindal on Thursday.

Kay, of Shreveport, is a foot soldier in an army of the faithful supporting
Jindal's second bid for governor. Her son John, a student at LSU-Shreveport,
is a paid intern with Jindal's local campaign office. Kay said she backs her
son's work and works for Jindal "behind the scenes," including talking up
his personal and professional attributes. She and her daughter Elizabeth
attended Jindal's education plan announcement Thursday.


"I supported him in the last election. I think Louisiana needs to make a
change in a lot of areas. He's got the moral background I approve of."

On paper, the match between an under-40, first-generation Indian-American
and conservative Christian Republicans seems incongruous. Jindal's parents
moved to Baton Rouge before he was born so his mother, Raj Jindal, could
pursue graduate studies in nuclear physics. His mother now is information
technology director for the Louisiana Labor Department. His father, Amar
Jindal, is a civil engineer.

Jindal's parents named him Piyush. Family lore says Jindal adopted the name
Bobby after watching "The Brady Bunch" on television.

Jindal's status as the son of an immigrant family wasn't an issue in most of
Louisiana four years ago, nor is it this year. He offers impeccable
right-wing credentials. Jindal converted to Catholicism while at Brown
University, where he also participated in the university's Young Republicans
organization. He has spoken and written passionately about religion and
chose to make a campaign stop on the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's
landfall at a south Louisiana church near where the killer storm first made
landfall two years ago.

He has worked in government jobs all his adult life. U.S. Rep. Jim McCrery,
R-Shreveport, gave Jindal his first political post, a one-month internship
in his Washington, D.C., office in 1991. McCrery has backed Jindal since.

That connection helped Jindal become secretary of Louisiana's Health and
Hospitals Department. At age 24, when peers were wading through graduate
school or trying out careers, he was trying to figure out how to trim costs
at Louisiana's largest public agency.

More than a decade later, Jindal is still serious and scholarly. He
resembles the student who graduated from Baton Rouge Magnet High two years
ahead of his peers and entered a

premed/medical program at Brown. Jindal switched majors after one semester
and decided to go into public policy instead of becoming a doctor. After
graduating from Brown, he earned a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University.
Jindal holds the equivalent of a master's degree in political science from
Oxford.

High school classmate Martin Johnson described Jindal as "driven" but
"friendly and easy-going" when Jindal was tapped for the state secretary's
job in 1996. Other friends describe Jindal as "humble," a word people also
use to describe his wife, Supriya.

He and Supriya met in high school but didn't date until after Jindal took
over the Health and Hospitals job in 1996. They married less than a year
after going on their first date to a New Orleans Mardi Gras ball. They have
three children.

Jindal has always said he planned to raise his family in Louisiana. After
losing the 2003 gubernatorial race to Kathleen Blanco, he repeated that
commitment when announcing he and his family had bought a house in Kenner.
That move allowed Jindal to successfully seek the 1st Congressional District
seat in 2004.

He has divided his time between Washington, D.C., and Louisiana since
starting his gubernatorial bid. As Jindal travels the state by bus and
plane, he hands out detailed position papers outlining his ideas for
reforming everything from education to governmental ethics. He laid out many
of the same ideas during similar campaign stops in 2003. Jindal also
released detailed plans in 2003.

His appearances thus far have been highly scripted. But that will change
Sept. 27, when Jindal will joust with gubernatorial hopefuls Walter Boasso,
Foster Campbell and John Georges in the first of three live forums.

Jindal has invited the other candidates to issue details about their plans
and, at every campaign stop, calls on the trio to debate issues and ideas.

He frequently criticizes campaigns based on "backslapping," a slighting
reference to Boasso's political style that echoes a Republican attack ad
portraying Democrats Boasso and Campbell as clowns.

Jindal preaches a fresh start for Louisiana, saying he wants to fix what he
considers government corruption then tackle changes to budgeting, education,
health care and criminal penalties.

"My very first special session will be to set the gold standards for ethics
right here in Louisiana," Jindal said.

He believes economic improvement - fueled in part by post-Katrina aid - will
continue, at least in the near future. Jindal wants state officials to plan
for economic cycles instead of living boom to bust and facing periodic cuts
to governmental spending when money runs short.

"I think in the next few years you will see continued revenue growth in
Baton Rouge. The issue is how (do) we make sure we don't waste that budget."

The goal of his proposals, Jindal said, is to help Louisiana move up in
quality-of-life rankings and make it a place attractive to new businesses
and residents instead of the butt of jokes.

"We're the only state in the South where more people are moving out faster
than people are moving in."

Putting his ideas into practice could be tougher than winning the election.

The most recent Southern Media Research poll, conducted in August, gives
Jindal a 63 percent lead statewide. His support is weakest in north
Louisiana and the Florida/River Parishes, the survey shows, but he still
maintains a majority of voters polled there. If public sentiment remains the
same, he could win the Governor's Mansion outright Oct. 20.

But then Jindal would have to face the Legislature, where - despite term
limits - long-time politicos may try to hold on to the status quo.

Shreveport political analyst Elliott Stonecipher said governors aimed at
reform for five decades have smacked into that wall. "For whatever reason,
you are sideways with the good ol' boy leadership.

"It is true that no reform governor has ever been elected to a second term,"
Stonecipher said. "If Bobby intends to try to govern in the same way that he
is speaking during the campaign, he will be blocked at every turn by at
least the state Senate, maybe the House of Representatives."

The post-election question, he said, will be: "Does Bobby Jindal's
background, impressive as it is, equal real knowledge of how things work?"


CThe Times
September 16, 2007




More information about the StBernard mailing list