A Tale Of Two Executives

Yesterday, I discussed Barack Obama, who isn't really an executive, but he plays one on TV. Today, given the Gulf spill, I want to talk about a real executive--Bobby Jindal, Governor of Louisiana. Tapped to deliver the Republican response to Obama's first State of the Union address, Jindal gave a less than inspired performance.

I predicted that given his bona fides and drive to succeed rather than to win, Jindal would recover and go on to a notable career in government. The past few weeks have proven me right. While Obama was speechifying, Jindal was acting. While Obama was golfing, Jindal was working. While Obama was glorifying the efficiency of the federal government, Jindal was organizing and putting real people on the front lines of the disaster. While Obama was golfing, Jindal was working into the wee hours. While Obama was golfing, Jindal was rolling up his sleeves and helping his fellow citizens. While Obama was golfing, well, you get the idea.

Many Republicans gave up on Jindal far too easily after the State of the Union debacle, and the Democrats counted him down and out. Both forget that Bill Clinton first burst on the national scene by giving one of the lengthiest, one of the worst, and one of the least remembered keynote addresses in the entire history of the Democratic Party. Since that ho-hum performance, Jindal has gone on to be one of the most successful state chief executives in Louisiana history. He knows when to fight, and he knows when a losing battle is just a losing battle. But the reaction to the Gulf oil spill has been a dramatic contrast between the empty suit in the White House and the dynamo in the Louisiana state house.

Louisiana politics were a Democratic-controlled showplace of hopeless incompetence and corruption even before Katrina exposed the cancer. The Democratic mayor of New Orleans ignored Bush administration warnings about the lack of preparedness for a serious hurricane, and when Katrina hit, he had totally failed to activate local resources in advance of the floods. Afterwards, he made Obama-like speeches while waiting for the feds to bail him out, all the while blaming Bush for his own failures. The Democratic governor agonized, whined and cried like a baby when Katrina hit, but was so busy boo-hooing that she neglected to declare the state of emergency which would have allowed the Bush administration to act in accord with the Constitution.

In total contrast, when the Gulf spill first occurred, Jindal mobilized his emergency management team, got all his state resources in place at the sites of the coming oil slick, and at the very first opportunity declared an emergency that would allow the federal government to act without an unconstitutional invasion of a sovereign state.

Prior to the BP spill but after Katrina, and unlike the former New Orleans mayor and former Louisiana governor, Jindal was able to get the recovery in New Orleans moving, requesting federal assistance only in those areas where state resources were already exhausted or unavailable. In the wake of the economic crash, he pulled Louisiana unemployment below the national average, even though Louisiana under Democratic governments had for decades been well above the national average even during boom times.

Jindal used his power and considerable intelligence to build Louisiana's energy-production sector. That was a major part of Louisiana's economic recovery which was occurring faster than in most other states. And oil was a major part of that recovery. In reaction to the Gulf spill, Jindal garnered his resources and prepared to fend off the encroaching oil. Oil doesn't kill economies, people kill economies. Obama and his gang of econuts and socialists saw things differently. So they imposed a moratorium on all Gulf oil production while they figured out how to make sure only America was permanently prevented from drilling in deep Gulf waters. Jindal worked for less dependence on foreign oil, Obama worked to assure nearly total reliance on foreign oil while his administration of Harry Potters wave their wands to create viable solar and wind energy sources.

If Jindal had shown the same fire and brimstone in his State of the Union reply as he did in attacking the moratorium, he might very well have become the Republican front-runner for President in 2012. But as Ecclesiastes tells us, there's a time and a season for everything. This is quickly becoming Jindal's time and season. While Obama and his Keystone Kops experts dithered, Jindal had early on proposed to dredge around the barrier islands and create berms to keep the spill from coming ashore. Many petro-engineers believe the plan might have worked, but even if it were only partially successful, it's better than anything the Obamists came up with. The problem was that Louisiana doesn't have enough machinery and manpower to mount such an effort on its own. The federal government did, but refused to consider the plan.

In actuality, Jindal had to fight to get the Obama administration to allow him to use state workers and equipment in waters beyond Louisiana jurisdiction. By the time permission was granted, it was too late. The oil was already washing up on Louisiana's coast. But at least Jindal had people on the beaches ready to do whatever could be done to minimize the damage. Meanwhile, Jindal had gone to court to stop the bureaucratic imposition of a moratorium which would deeply wound Louisiana's economy already being damaged by the oil coming ashore. He won, but the Obamists did an end-run and imposed a moratorium anyway.

Jindal addressed his troops (real and metaphorical): "We don't have time for meetings. We don't have time for red tape and bureaucracy. We're literally in a war to save our coast. Every hour matters. Every day matters." It was downright Churchillian. Later, Jindal attended a rally of support for Gulf oil workers now put out of work by the moratorium, and spoke boldly at the rally. "I want to send a clear message to Washington, DC. Our people don't want a BP check, our people don't want an unemployment check, our people want this arbitrary moratorium to end so they can get back to work." Well, there's a novel concept. Working instead of waiting for handouts from the government and money damages from a corporation. It sounds to me a lot like throwing down the gauntlet.

While Obama alternates between vacations and his permanent campaign, Jindal concentrates on doing the very best job he can in his current position and giving little thought to the next election or the one after that. Jindal is a powerful intellect, with real, public and provable academic credentials that make Obama look like he went to a rural junior college. He wasn't much more than a kid when he was given major executive responsibilities. At age 25, Jindal was made the head of Louisiana's Department of Health and Hospitals. He took a bankrupt, incompetent and even dangerous medical service and turned it into an efficient and modern health care system. At age 28, after successfully putting together a profitable plan for Louisiana's use of federal tobacco settlement funds, Jindal was appointed the youngest-ever president of the University of Louisiana system. Academic performance at the University increased dramatically.

In 2000, Jindal was appointed by President George Bush to be the Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for Planning and Evaluation, and he was unanimously confirmed by the US Senate in 2001. By age 30, Jindal already had three times the executive experience that Obama has today. And that doesn't include his current service as governor.

The difference in executive experience and understanding of the requirements of the job show up like a neon sign on Broadway. The BP spill put their names up in lights. Jindal jumped in, ordered, delegated, and acted quickly and efficiently in regard to the Gulf. Obama proved he is OK at golf.