Candidates on attack In 2003’s close governor’s race, the margin of defeat for Republican Rep. Bobby Jindal may have come from a television ad run by his opponent and now Gov. Kathleen Blanco in the final days of the campaign where a bitter old man who had worked in health care accused Jindal while he headed the state’s Department of Health and Hospitals of making the state’ health care worse. This was despite loads of evidence that Jindal’s leadership had produced a more efficient, better system of care in Louisiana – but given the last-minute appearance of the ad and Jindal’s inability or unwillingness to set the record straight, the ad proved effective. In 2007, about a month before the election, an opponent of Jindal’s this time, Democrat state Sen. Walter Boasso, wants to see if lightning somehow can strike twice as Jindal threatens to leave Boasso and all other gubernatorial candidates in the dust. This time it’s a bitter woman complaining about how she held Jindal responsible for her brother being ejected from state care. But, four years later, the commercial may end up hurting its progenitor more than its intended target. As inane as the 2003 commercial was, to the untutored it at least seemed plausible as the angry old doctor spewed vague, generalized, unverified venom. Coming so close to the general election runoff date it gave Jindal little time to set the record straight, and Blanco was running neck-to-neck with Jindal. But in 2007’s version, Boasso decided he had to strike a month before the primary election given Jindal’s huge lead, leaving Jindal plenty of time to respond (he already has, pointing out his accomplishments as DHH head and the praise heaped on him by the media for his performance), and the specific circumstances of the case leaves all but the most dense viewers wondering about its credibility. Essentially, the old woman makes it sound like Jindal was a meanie who just up and decided personally to throw her retarded brother out on the street just because. In fact, the court case cited in the ad, John B. McNiece v. Bobby P. Jindal, Secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals (docket number Civ.A. 97-2421, decided by the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District, Louisiana on Aug. 26, 1998), shows it was an intra-agency dispute between parts of the department, one part making a ruling on McNiece’s condition that said he had a right to reside in a state institution, the other overruling it which the court said broke federal law. That’s all there was to it. As titular head of the department, Jindal’s was the name on the case, likely his only connection to it. In fact, Jindal probably never even knew of the incident until the suit was filed; the secretary of the department by its own documented processes (at least at present) is not involved in the disposition of any of these cases at all. But the inflammatory rhetoric and distorted tone of the ad makes it sound Jindal actively intervened in order to get his kicks. That is, the commercial is so over the top that only the most brain-dead people (who are not likely to vote for Jindal anyway) even would believe it – as well they shouldn’t, the record shows. It’s the second such attack ad against Jindal after the anti-Catholic ad run by the state’s Democrats last month. Which means by now that Louisiana’s voters are being taught by Jindal’s political opponents that Democrats are going to make the wildest accusations possible in the hopes of defeating Jindal, reducing every time the credibility and thus effectiveness of these attack ads. The difference between the August and Septemeber tries, however, is that this time there is an object for retribution; not a faceless organization but a real candidate, Boasso. The first ad may have worked to create sympathy for Jindal, but the second may serve to hurt Boasso, and not only in that some may be disgusted at the desperation of Boasso. For no doubt there are circumstances in Boasso’s career heading a large organization, his marine firm, where things he barely knew or didn’t know about at the time later turned into contentious legal actions that went against his company. For example, did any employees ever sue successfully for wrongful termination? Or did any government environmental agencies fine it for violations? Using Boasso’s attack ad logic, Boasso would be the one illegally firing people or unlawfully polluting. Jindal has been running ads calling Boasso a hypocrite on insurance issues. Maybe the hypocrisy extends to casting the first stone when, for all we know, Boasso’s own enterprise ended up doing things far worse than Jindal’s former agency mistakenly denying health care to one person. (If you'd like to have Prof. Sadow's column mailed to you, go to http://www.between-lines.com and click on "Join the mailing list!" on the left-hand side.)