Inauthentic delusional demagogue Gov. Piyush "Bobby" Jindal (R- Swamp) is set to become the next Republican- who- will- never- be- President candidate today. There are at least two interrelated things to know about Jindal: he's been a spectacular failure as governor, and he's a pure-blood phony. Ed Kilgore at Washington Monthly hits on the first feature:
You can expect a fair amount of the obligatory one-day media coverage given to elected officials who run for president to dwell on the irony that the Smartest Man In Every Room is running on a yahoo platform of religious demagoguery and redneck defiance of elites. Having made such a thorough mess of his tenure as governor of Louisiana, however, it’s not like he can run on his wonky accomplishments, though there is a hammerheaded constituency for anyone who just comes out and admits he’s wrecked state government and the education system for the sheer destructive hell of it. (our emphasis)Jindal's attempts to distance himself from his Asian Indian roots is a subject of a profile in today's
Jindal’s status as a conservative of color helped propel his meteoric rise in the Republican Party — from an early post in the George W. Bush administration to two terms in Congress and now a second term as Louisiana governor — and donors from Indian American groups fueled his first forays into politics. Yet many see him as a man who has spent a lifetime distancing himself from his Indian roots.Jindal's rise in Republican ranks peaked in 2009 after his unintentionally hilarious opposition response to the President's State of the Union speech, in which he resembled not a person of presidential caliber but someone who might be a page at NBC. His single-minded pursuit of the presidency to the detriment of his constituents combined with his destructive tenure as governor of Louisiana has left him less popular than President Obama in this red(neck) state, quite an achievement. He also managed to offend British Prime Minister Cameron when he said in a speech in London that parts of Europe and the UK were "no-go zones" because of Muslims. Said Cameron, "When I heard this, frankly, I choked on my porridge and I thought it must be April Fools’ Day. This guy is clearly a complete idiot.”
Last but not least, he also has the distinction (in our minds) of making frequent appearances in our "Today's Dispatches From The Stupid Party" feature, a feature he's probably owed royalties to (nah!) since he coined the term "Stupid Party" to refer to the Republican Party. So congratulations to him for that, too.
BONUS: Mr. Pierce's take on Jindal's sad "cautionary tale:"
He's languishing in Patakiland at the moment. His numbers have to be rounded up to get to one percent. But the cautionary tale about "Bobby" Jindal is this -- sooner or later, every Republican has to join The Stupid Party, and if you leave presidential timber out there in the Louisiana humidity long enough, it warps.BONUS II: At last, The Onion's candidate profile for "Bobby."
(Image: Official portrait of Piyush "Bobby" Jindal, left, and the "real" Piyush "Bobby" Jindal, right; no, he's not distancing himself from his Indian roots much.)
