In contrast to the polarized electoral environment of the 2010 elections, the year of Sen. David Vitter and the tea party, the winning place to be this year was in the middle. In Louisiana, the political center has been a dangerous spot to occupy in the open primary elections of the past, when the strongest Democrat and the strongest Republican squeezed out moderates in the middle. But when one side dominates, as Republicans do now, and an internal struggle ensues, as it did in this election, power flows down the mainstream. That Gov. Bobby Jindal did not draw a known candidate was the result of more than his massive campaign war chest scaring off competitors. Conservative as he is, he made a point of governing from the center, or close enough to it, to marginalize his critics on the left and, yes, the right. If Jindal did well not to have potent enemies, re-elected Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne benefited from not having certain powerful friends. To not be the choice of Vitter or Jindal was all that many Democrats and mainstream Republicans needed to know to pick him over Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser. The two powerful Republicans, particularly Vitter, seemed to make the point for Dardenne that he was his own man. Read the full column here.
(John Maginnis publishes LaPolitics Weekly, a newsletter on Louisiana politics, at LaPolitics.com.)
