I will not vote this Saturday.
Voting for Jeff Landry was never an option. Landry's a jerk who has shown the same respect for the President that he'd show any black man he met on the street.
Charles Boustany eliminated himself as an option by the cynical and dishonest campaign that he has run.
First, I don't believe there is any significant difference between the voting records of Landry and Boustany — despite the millions of dollars they've spent trying to convince us that there is. At the end of the day, both Boustany and Landry vote in lockstep with the House Republican leadership against President Obama's policies. If he's for it, they're against it.
Boustany, though, has been counting on Democratic votes to win re-election all along. If it was a Republican primary, Boustany would likely suffer the fate of other 'establishment' Republicans who were challenged by Tea Party types and be rejected by the members of his own party.
Instead, Boustany and his handlers have run a cynical campaign that attacks the President and his policies (dishonestly on one issue) while trying to woo the votes of Obama supporters, particularly those in the African American community.
They have apparently decided that they must attack the President to hold a respectable portion of the Republican base; yet, they still work to woo enough Democratic votes by capitalizing on his family's reputation in the community and funding campaign operations of certain supposedly Democratic interest groups.
The Boustany and Obama signs outside the so-called United Ballot operation during the primary was the purest distillation of the Boustany campaign's cynicism.
This week, my household got another mailer from Boustany in which he lies about the President and then crows about his opposition to the Affordable Care Act.
The lie is Boustany's assertion President Obama's bias against the oil and gas industry. The President did impose a moratorium on deep water drilling during the middle of the worst oil spill in U.S. history and during hurricane season. The BP well blew oil into the Gulf of Mexico for more than 80 days. The moratorium was the subject of an intense propaganda campaign, but the facts are that there were very few jobs lost due to the moratorium. The $100 million fund created by BP and managed by the Baton Rouge Area Foundation to help workers affected by the moratorium paid fewer than 1,000 claims.
The U.S. is experiencing an oil and gas production boom under the Obama administration. Charles Boustany cannot bring himself to admit to this fact because it is considered heresy among Louisiana Republicans.
Boustany also proudly points to the his many votes against Obamacare. What Boustany is saying is that he is proud to oppose this law that is good for the people of his state and his district: provides tax credits to more than 10,000 small businesses in his district to help them offer health insurance benefits to their workers; that stripped insurance companies of the ability to take away your coverage in the event of an adverse diagnosis; that eliminated the pre-existing condition exclusion for children (and will eliminate it for adults in 2014); that allows children up to the age of 26 to remain on their parents' health insurance policies; is closing the Medicare prescription drug doughnut hole; and will offer the opportunity for about 75% of the working age adults in this state who do not currently have health insurance to get that coverage through either the Medicaid exchange or health insurance exchange programs that will become operational in 2014.
These positions are not different than Jeff Landry's. But, Jeff Landry is not seeking — and depending on — the votes of Democrats to win election.
I will not reward Mr. Boustany's cynicism by essentially ignoring his attacks on President Obama but giving him my vote.
I'm not voting Saturday. I'm not helping Charles Boustany's cynical game succeed.
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