This year’s marathon of legislative sessions were not short on biting, sarcastic remarks that prove love and politics don’t mix, Jeremy Alford writes in his latest column.
The sessions lumbered into view on Feb. 13, with Gov. John Bel Edwards apologizing to the spouses and significant others of state lawmakers during his opening address for the first special session.
“To your spouses and significant others who will spend yet another Valentine’s Day without you, I am sorry,” Edwards said.
Sen. Barrow Peacock, who provide several memorable remarks, also noted the lack of love at The Capitol. “Arrows are being shot at me left and right,” he said just prior to Edwards’ February speech. “But they’re not from cupid.” He would later quip: “The reason I wear cowboy boots is because it gets pretty deep around here.”
That first special session lasted roughly a week, Alford writes. Debates focused on how much money should be pulled out of the state’s special savings account.
“Conservatives and the House leadership wanted a smaller number, while Democrats, the Senate leadership and the governor preferred a larger withdrawal,” he says, adding “that put politics behind the steering wheel on a few occasions.”
Lawmakers got a short break at the end of February and in March. They reconvened in April for the regular session on taxes. Alford notes that going in Edwards knew it would be difficult to keep his agenda afloat.
The most prominent topic of discussion on that front was Edwards’ doomed commercial activity tax, or CAT tax.
“It generated countless puns,” he says.
Jeremy Alford publishes LaPolitics Weekly, a newsletter on Louisiana politics, at LaPolitics.com. Follow him on Twitter, or on Facebook. He can be reached at JJA@LaPolitics.com.
