David Vitter
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Sens. David Vitter and Mary Landrieu honored by Humane Society
Posted by Kevin Allman on Thu, Mar 8, 2012 at 10:29 AM
Sen. David Vitter, R-La., was named the Humane Senator of the Year for his leadership on securing needed funding to strengthen USDA enforcement of key animal welfare laws, as well as on bills to require licensing and inspections of puppy mills selling directly to the public via the Internet or other means (the PUPS Act, S. 707) and to prohibit interstate and foreign commerce in nonhuman primates for the pet trade (the Captive Primate Safety Act, S. 1324). Sen. Vitter helped get a bipartisan group of 34 Sens. to join in seeking funding for USDA to improve its oversight of puppy mills, laboratories, zoos, circuses and other regulated facilities; rein in the illegal “soring” of show horses (where trainers inflict severe pain on the animals’ legs and hooves to make it hurt them to step down, so they will exaggerate their high-stepping gait and win prizes); strengthen enforcement of the humane slaughter law; prevent illegal animal fighting; ease a shortage of veterinarians in rural areas and USDA positions through student loan repayment; and help address the needs of animals in disasters. Sen. Vitter also has been a champion over the years on legislation to require accurate labeling of fur apparel regardless of dollar value, to crack down on dogfighting and cockfighting, to ban the creation and distribution of obscene animal torture (“crush”) videos, and to strengthen the law against shark finning (cutting the fins off and throwing the rest of the living animals back in the water).
Vitter announced the news himself on his Twitter feed, noting "My fmly adopted rescue dog-Elle-in '09."
Last month, the Humane Society named Sen. Mary Landrieu its "Humane Horsewoman of the Year":
because of her tireless efforts to introduce and gain support for the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act (S. 1176/H.R. 2966) in the U.S. Senate. We also recognized her successful efforts as a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee to help secure a 40 percent increase in funds for the enforcement of the Horse Protection Act to crack down on criminal soring of Tennessee walking horses in show competitions."
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
David Vitter named one of 10 "Most Conservative Senators" by National Journal
Posted by Kevin Allman on Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 4:39 PM
Sen. David Vitter isn't just conservative; he's super-duper conservative, and he wants you to know it. This afternoon Vitter took to Twitter to announce:
And here's the article, in which National Journal names Vitter alongside such conservative stalwarts as Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla. and Sen. Jim DeMint, R.-S. C.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Poll: Majority of Catholics believe employer health plans should cover contraception
Posted by Charles Maldonado on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 10:53 AM
Catholic Bishops, including New Orleans Archbishop Gregory Aymond, say a federal ruling that will require religious-affiliated employers — hospitals and colleges but not places of worship — to provide employee insurance that includes contraception is “an unprecedented attack on our religious liberty, which is a founding principle of our nation.” (Interestingly, here in New Orleans, the Catholic Loyola University now offers contraceptive coverage in its employee health insurance plan, according to the benefits handbook posted on its human resources web page.)
Their parishioners, however, feel differently, at least according to survey results released today by the Public Religion Research Institute. 55 percent of total respondents — and 58 percent of Catholic respondents — told PRRI they believed that employers should provide contraception coverage. When it comes to religiously affiliated hospitals and schools, only 49 percent of total respondents felt the same way. Among Catholics, however, 52 percent again said they felt those institutions should be required to cover birth control as part of their employee insurance.
Louisiana Sen. David Vitter (a Catholic) has signed on as a cosponsor of a bill, filed by (Catholic) Florida Republican Marco Rubio, that would extend conscience based exemptions to the requirement to any employer, not just religious institutions. Vitter didn't respond to Gambit's request for comment on the issue.
But here's what (Catholic) Sen. Mary Landrieu had to say:
“According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 87 percent of Louisiana women of all faiths have used preventive birth control methods — including preventive birth control medication — at some point in their child-bearing years. It is important that these women continue to have access to affordable, preventive birth control under a doctor’s supervision. Equally important, I am sensitive to the position and beliefs of the Catholic Church on this issue. I am taking this issue under advisement, and will be open to views from a wide variety of organizations and individuals.”
Monday, January 30, 2012
CNN asks Sen. David Vitter about his "serious sin"
Posted by Alex Woodward on Mon, Jan 30, 2012 at 12:10 PM
Following a weekend at the Monster Jam and a live-tweet sesh (both the Grave Digger's paint job and the Robosaurus were "awesome"), Sen. David Vitter appeared on this morning's edition of CNN's Early Start. Host Ashleigh Banfield diverted from discussing the Republican primaries and brought up Vitter's issues with prostitution in 2007.
Banfield had a long wind-up pitch: "I know coming on TV with me today, you had to know that this question was coming, so, and it's awkward for me to even ask it, but I gotta, and I think you know where I'm going with this..." To which a mildly confused Vitter replied, "I don't, but go ahead."
Banfield asked Vitter to compare his prostitution scandal to Republican presidential nominee Newt Gingrich's infidelities, and "what it is like to be a politician who has some serious baggage trying to be elected."
"The good news is, in America, it's not up to CNN," Vitter said. "It's up to voters." Vitter said what voters will focus their attention on is a tanking economy.
Banfield asked again if Vitter can compare his past "serious sin" to Gingrich's in their respective election cycles. "No I can't," he said, and awkward pauses follow.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
SOPA/PIPA makes for strange bedfellows in Louisiana
Posted by Kevin Allman on Wed, Jan 18, 2012 at 1:32 PM
By now you're certainly aware of the day of protest over SOPA and PIPA, the House and Senate bills that aim to squelch Internet piracy by, well, squelching the Internet. When you've got both The Hayride and Michael Moore objecting to the bills — for the same reasons — well, Congresspeople, to quote Bill Engvall, here's your sign. Seriously, the Hayride's essay is an excellent one:
Who decides what’s objectionable? Who decides which cases have merit? Who decides when to pull the plug on a site? What are the criteria? Just losing money isn’t enough — we have civil law suits for that.Remember; all the while you hunt the wolf; he hunts you. You could be the next to suffer some bureaucrat’s knee-jerk reaction to a perceived slight.
I know personally how badly loss of copyright sucks. But loss of the rights to read controversial copy and ideas sucks worse. It’s CENSORSHIP. It’s a bad thing.
Meanwhile, as the SOPA/PIPA protest goes into the afternoon, GOP heavyweights like Fla. Sen. Marco Rubio and Texas Sen. John Cornyn have backed off their initial support of PIPA (Rubio had even been a cosponsor) — which puts them, like it or not (and they won't) on the side of the Obama administration.
More strange bedfellows: Up in Minnesota, the liberal Democratic Rep. Al Franken is all for SOPA (though his constituents on his Facebook page are most definitely not), while the conservative GOP Rep. Michele Bachmann is against it. So: If you're opposed to SOPA/PIPA, you're on Bachmann's side. And Bachmann is on Nancy Pelosi's side. My head is spinning just typing that sentence.
In Louisiana, the strange bedfellows go in reverse. Both Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu and Republican Sen. David Vitter — who are often at odds both professionally and personally — are not only both supporting PIPA, they're both cosponsoring it. Landrieu provided us with a statement; Vitter's office has ignored our request for one. (That hasn't stopped angry constituents from flooding his Facebook page with comments.)
In the Louisiana House delegation, Republican Rep. Jeff Landry is foursquare against SOPA (he provided us with a two-sentence statement: "This is ridiculous. When is this government intrusion going to stop?"), while his ideological soulmate, Rep. Steve Scalise, is cosponsoring it. Meanwhile, where does Democratic Rep. Cedric Richmond stand? He's supposed to get back to us this afternoon (and we'll update this post when he does).
Cats and dogs lying together! Legislators who usually vote in lockstep in fervent disagreement! Bachmann and Pelosi!!!! What's going on here?
Under the cut, Sen. Landrieu's statement about why she's cosponsoring the legislation — in which she seems to be leaving herself some wiggle room.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Mary Landrieu gets with the Twitter
Posted by Kevin Allman on Thu, Dec 1, 2011 at 4:40 PM
Sen. Mary Landrieu has lagged far behind her GOP counterpart, Sen. David Vitter, in one respect: Landrieu hasn't been down with the Twitter tubes. (Though lately the Vittertwitter has been mostly football-centric, with controversial tweets like "Let's geaux Tigers!" and "Who dat!")
Back in July 2009, I dropped a note to Landrieu's Washington office, asking if she'd ever be joining Twitter, and got this response:
Kevin — The Senator is indeed on Facebook, Flickr and YouTube. The Senator’s presence on each of those social networking sites is currently being beefed up. However, there are no plans for the Senator to begin tweeting.
Someone must have given in or changed their mind, because in mid-November, @SenLandrieu made its debut:
And her famous brother, @MayorLandrieu, encouraged his followers to follow his sister the day after the first tweet appeared.
Landrieu is currently at 712 followers, while Vitter is at 12,286. Advantage Vitter — though, as we've noted in this space before, the junior senator has a way to go before he completely masters Facebook.
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Nungesser, Vitter plan Election Eve state blitz
Posted by Kevin Allman on Tue, Oct 18, 2011 at 1:39 PM
Lieutenant governor hopeful Billy Nungesser and his Senate champion, David Vitter, are planning a seven-city blitz of the state that will take them from Shreveport and Monroe all the way down to New Orleans in 10 1/2 hours. The duo (along with entertainer and former lieutenant governor candidate Sammy Kershaw) will begin at 8 a.m. in Shreveport ("Corner of Bert Kouns and Youree Dr. [look for the giant elephant with Nungesser signs on it]") before hitting Monroe, Alexandria, Lake Charles, Lafayette, Baton Rouge and finally "New Orleans" (actually, Metairie).
(Interestingly, both the Monroe and Baton Rouge stops have the instruction: "Look for the statue of Drew Brees." Huh? There's a statue of #9 in Monroe??? A quick call to the campaign cleared it up: Nungesser, Vitter, Kershaw, et al. will be traveling with a Drew Brees statue. No word on whether the "statue" is an inflatable, or one of those car-dealership giant stick figures that flails around due to a fan at the bottom. Also no word as to what the steadfastly non-political Mr. Brees thinks of all this; to my knowledge, he hasn't endorsed anything more controversial than NyQuil.)
- FACEBOOK/BILLY NUNGESSER CAMPAIGN
- Peanuts, the campaign mascot for Billy Nungesser's lieutenant governor campaign.
It's an ambitious schedule, particularly in regards to Baton Rouge, where the meet-and-greet is scheduled to begin at 4:30 p.m., meaning they'll hit Red Stick rush hour traffic on their way to Metairie.
Full schedule and details under the jump.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Landry, Vitter meet with oil regulators on drilling
Posted by Alex Woodward on Tue, Oct 11, 2011 at 2:35 PM
When Rep. Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia, was denied last month from meeting with officials from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE), he said the agency was acting "like the CIA and the Gestapo." He later defended his choice of words, and today, Landry, along with U.S. Sen. David Vitter, got that meeting — an almost two-hour long discussion at the agency's office in Elmwood.
Following the morning meeting with BOEMRE officials (including director Michael Bromwich), Landry and Vitter set up a press announcement outside the building, with a podium and placards dramatically illustrating the economic impact of denied oil drilling permits. Landry and Vitter both agree that getting those permits (and the hundreds of jobs they'll create) is pivotal for creating more jobs and alleviating a federal deficit.
"The purpose of this meeting is to make sure the information given to us in Washington is the same going on here as well," Landry said. "And how we as legislators can help to address the lack of permitting going on in the Gulf of Mexico since the Deepwater Horizon incident. We hope it’s a step in the right direction to getting the Gulf back up and running and people back to work."
Vitter, a regular Landry supporter and political partner, said the meeting was an attempt to "bridge a huge gap in terms of the reality we live in and feel every day along the Gulf coast in terms of our energy industry, and what our administration led by first the president of course and Ken Salazar, Secretary of the Interior, and Michael Bromwich, who was in the meeting today, keep talking about." Vitter pointed to a chart that referenced the election of President Barack Obama and hiring of Salazar — a red arrow dropped from nearly $20 billion in federal revenue in 2008 to zero by 2011. Another chart showed oil lease sale revenue collapse from nearly $10 billion in 2008 to zero by 2011. A map showed oil leases fleeing the Gulf to a dozen other countries. "These are great American jobs we need to preserve and build here," Vitter said. "As these two charts illustrate, it’s major revenue for the federal government to help with lessening deficit and debt. (It's the) second biggest source of revenue (for) the federal government after only federal income tax."
But the meeting wasn't that productive. Vitter said Bromwich wasn't ready to respond to a list of questions about permitting, and the pair did not address securing environmental protection and fishing jobs in the Gulf. (Landry later told Gambit, when asked how to ensure both a speedy permitting process and environmental health, "The first thing I want to ensure is everybody has a job.")
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
BP dollars closer to Coast, while oil regulators are "Gestapo"
Posted by Alex Woodward on Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 12:26 PM
In July, a bipartisan group of Gulf Coast senators introduced the RESTORE Act, which, they promised, would ensure 80 percent of the fines BP incurs from Clean Water Act violations for the Gulf oil disaster would be divvied among states on the Gulf Coast — rather than the feds.
The act passed the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, chaired by Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and now makes its way to the Senate floor.
"This is the most important step Congress can take to ensure that the Gulf Coast recovers from the economic and ecological destruction caused by the oil spill,” said Sen. Mary Landrieu in a statement. “By directing BP penalty money back to the states that are dealing with the clean-up and restoration from this devastating spill, we help ensure that the Gulf Coast continues to thrive for decades to come." Landrieu also thanked Sen. David Vitter, who co-sponsored the bill.
Meanwhile, Rep. Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia, defended his statement that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE) is "like the CIA and the Gestapo" when he wasn't able to meet with BOEMRE staff to discuss stalled drilling permits. He defended his choice of words to Politico:
I mean at the end of the day it's a term referencing how the actions are being out there. ... I mean I'm not going to get into this political niceness. You know, it's a fact. The man is not allowing U.S. congressmen to visit their offices. There's something wrong with that. ... The people in my district are suffering down there. I've got no apologies, if anything (BOEMRE director Michael Bromwich) owes me and the people in my district an apology. ...It is what's wrong with Washington in the federal bureaucracy. We — the people of my district along with every other United States citizen — pays their check. It isn't the other way around. No apologies."
In a letter to Landry, Bromwich was none too pleased with being compared to a Nazi: "Your comparison of the minor inconvenience you experienced to the tactics and methods of the Nazi secret police is simply unacceptable from anyone, but especially from a public official.”
Godwin's law states that any discussion or argument ultimately will reduce itself to "Well, you're a Nazi," or, "Well, that makes you Hitler." Apparently we've reached that point in the drilling debate.
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