In Depth: Melancon vs. Tauzin III (LA-03)

by Tim Tagaris, Sat Nov 27, 2004 at 06:46:42 PM EST

Last week I gave a "cheap seats" overview on the front page of DailyKos on the two Louisiana House races remaining this election cycle. After re-reading the post, I think I cheated the Democratic candidate from LA-3 a bit. It was a bit "information light." So, this time I decided let's take it a bit more in-depth.

Without further ado, let's go inside Charles Melancon (Democrat) vs. Billy Tauzin III (Republican) in Louisiana's 3rd Congressional District.

You can get involved by heading down to the Bayou on a DCCC sponsored trip. Information HERE.

Or, you can contribute to the Melancon effort HERE

More below the jump...

Many of you might recognize the name Billy Tauzin. He has been a Congressman for near a quarter of a century in Louisiana. However, this is not the same Billy Tauzin, it is his son. Tauzin represents the very kind of D.C. entitlement I find abhorrent (on both sides of the aisle). While Melancon might not be the same kind of Democrat many of us are, it is important to note that this seat is a pick-up opportunity, a vote for Pelosi, and a chance to stem the tide of Republican victories on November 2nd.

Race Background

Tauzin knocked out a strong Republican primary challenge, in part by casting his ultraconservative opponent, state Sen. Craig Romero, as a defender of sodomy. Romero, furious that the party backed "the boy," as he called him, said some of the district's voters thought they were supporting the old man, not the son.
Still, with no record to run on, name recognition is probably Tauzin's biggest asset in a district his father held for nearly a quarter-century.

Battle of bitter primary opponents

In an interesting wrinkle, one of Melancon's primary opponents Charmaine Degruise Caccioppi crossed party lines and decided to endorse "Little Billy" in the run-off election. Touché says Tauzin primary opponent Craig Romero. From the Louisiana Weekly

Earlier in the week, Craig Romero told supporters that he would not endorse Tauzin under any circumstances, and when asked for whom he would vote, he refused to reply.

Romero is still bitter about Tauzin's claims that he supported the legalization of sodomy.

One endorsement that might help Melancon in the end is the one from Louisiana's largest newspaper, The Times-Picayune

Mr. Melancon brings a depth of experience that would help him make a quick start in Congress. He served five years in the state Legislature, was executive director of the South Central Planning and Development Commission and was vice chairman of the Thibodaux-based South Louisiana Economic Council. He is a businessman who most recently served as president and general manager of the American Sugar Cane League. He understands the needs of this district and promises to be a consensus builder in Congress.

Head to head - On the issues
Tauzin appears to ripping a page out of the classic Republican playbook. Someone tell me where we have heard this before? From the AP

Taxes are also at the heart of attacks on Melancon. Republican ads paint the Democrat as a tax-loving liberal along the lines of Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy.

In another classic Republican maneuver - Tauzin advocated a 23% national sales tax, and when he was called on it, claimed her never said such a thing. This is a new technique, but one that is catching on in Republican circles (see DeMint) From the AP again...

In ads and on the stump, Melancon accuses Tauzin of backing a 23 percent sales tax "on everything." The Democrat said such a tax would disproportionately affect lower-income families.
Melancon said he is basing his comments on Tauzin's stance on Tauzin's comments about the tax at an Oct. 19 forum in Houma and on a bill currently filed in the U.S. House of Representatives laying out a 23 percent national sales tax.
Tauzin said he has never supported such a tax. Parts of past sales tax proposals appeal to him, he said, such as abolishing certain taxes or getting rid of the IRS.

As many of us know, one of the major fights the next Congress will face is CAFTA, The Central American Free Trade Agreement - or NAFTA on steroids. After reviewing his website, this issue seems to be one that he highlights. From a Melancon Press Release.

. "As the former head of the sugar industry representing 27,000 Louisiana jobs, I know what's at risk here. Louisiana may have taken some hard punches with NAFTA, but CAFTA could be a knockout we may never recover from," said Melancon. "I fought against CAFTA during my time heading the American Sugar Cane League, and I will continue that fight in Congress. If NAFTA taught us anything, it's that we need strong voices in Congress to fight unfair trade agreements that threaten competitive and viable industries and put thousands of Louisianians out of work." Top Washington Republicans, including House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, have renewed their push for passage of CAFTA (Houston Chronicle 11/9/04)

On health care, Melancon echoes the sentiments many of us feel, holding drug companies accountable, and allowing for the safe importation of affordable medicine from allies like Canada

* If a senior is locked into a drug discount card, the drug company should be also. Right now the company offering the card can change weekly what drugs they will cover and the amount of the drug discount while seniors have to stick with one card for a full year
* Keep drug companies from raising prices and then offering "discounts" of the same amount. Seniors need to be guaranteed real savings on their prescription drugs, not smoke and mirrors from drug companies protecting their profits
* Let Medicare negotiate lower drug prices for seniors. Currently Medicare is prevented from using its leverage to lower costs the way the Veterans Administration or even private companies do.

But yes, you might have to hold your nose at times while supporting Melancon. But like I said, it's a pick-up chance, he will vote for Pelosi over DeLay, and he has some decent issue positions otherwise. Once again, from the Melancon website.

* Abortion
° Strongly pro-life
° Has a pro-life voting record in the Louisiana legislature
° Endorsed by Democrats for Life of America
* Gun Control
° Opposes gun control
° Opposes the assault weapons ban
° "A" ratings with the National Rifle Association and Gun Owners of America
* Gay Marriage
° Opposes gay marriage
° Believes marriage should be between a man and a woman
* Crime
° Supports the death penalty for violent criminals

Unfortunately, his "National Security" issues page is broken on his website and he didn't fill out the NPAT for Project Vote Smart so I can't bring you information about Iraq, Terrorism, etc..
However, when it comes to education, he is spot on - especially in light of the recent decrease in Pell Grant funding by the Bush Administration and his cronies in Congress. Once again, from the Melancon website.

CHARLIE MELANCON - "It's hard to explain to a teacher or first-grader why there are new schools in Iraq, while our schools are in shambles. We need to balance new investments in education with more accountability for the money spent and the performance of our schools. You can't get a good job if you don't have a good education. Our schools are the lifeblood of our economic development efforts. Improving our schools is the most effective economic development strategy we can have."
STRATEGIES:

Increase Pell Grant Program from $4,000 to $5,800 annually, giving economically disadvantaged students a better chance to attend college
Fully fund "No Child Left Behind" to implement more accountability measures in our schools
Support Character Education and Character Counts
Keep our commitment to making college affordable for students who stay in Louisiana
Fund more school construction and school modernization
Work to attract and keep quality teachers in our schools

Little Billy Tauzin III on the Issues
Fortunately, he did fill out an NPAT on Project Vote Smart - it shows just how much of a wingnut this guy can be. Here are some select portions he is in favor of, direct from the form he filled out

Prohibit public funding of abortions and of organizations that advocate or perform abortions. (yes)
Ease federal restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns. (yes)
Repeal federal restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns. (yes)
Allow citizens to carry concealed guns. (yes)
Should the United States decrease its financial support of the United Nations? (yes)
Do you support eliminating taxes on dividends paid to individual investors? (yes)
Do you support using military tribunals to try suspected terrorists when ordinary civilian courts are deemed inappropriate or impractical? (yes)
Do you support a policy of pre-emptive strikes against countries deemed to be a threat to national security? (yes)
Allow workers to invest a portion of their payroll tax in private accounts which they manage themselves. (yes)

And he is opposed to, or undecided about the following - once again, from Project Vote Smart:

Increase funding for national job-training programs that re-train displaced workers or teach skills needed in today's job market. (does not support)
Increase the federal minimum wage. (does not support)
Strengthen emission controls and fuel efficiency standards on all gasoline and diesel-powered engines, including cars, trucks, and sport utility vehicles. (does not support)
Support the U.S. re-entering the Kyoto treaty process to limit global warming. (does not support)
Renew the ban on the sale or transfer of semi-automatic guns, except those used for hunting. (does not support)
Require manufacturers to provide child-safety locks on guns. (does not support)
Should trade agreements include provisions to address environmental concerns and to protect workers' rights? (does not support)

The finances
One last stop in the review of this race. The fundrace. Information gathered from Open Secrets
Top Tauzin Contributors and Breakdown:
Business $89,661 -- Ideological $92,250

Bell South, of which Little Billy was a lobbyist for contributed $17,500 to the campaign effort.

At the time of the last report, Tauzin had raised $603,194

42% of those dollars come from Political Action Committees. As you can tell by the breakdown, a good chunk of that from "values" and "single-issue" PACs.

Top Melancon Contributors and Breakdown:

Business $45,119 -- Labor $62,000

At the time of the last report, Melancon had raised $788,467

Not surprisingly 83% of those dollars have come from individual contributions.

Conclusion

So, at this point the choice is yours. I think its quite obvious who we are going to cheer for in this race. But the question remains, do you want to get involved. Once again, you can do so in the following ways.
You can get involved by heading down to the Bayou on a DCCC sponsored trip. Information HERE.

Or, you can contribute to the Melancon effort HERE.

Time is running out and the election is December 4th. At the very least, I hope this post provided a source of information about the campaign that will allow you to feel more "invested" on Election Day. At the most, hopefully it spurred you to take a weekend off and head down to the Bayou.
Thanks for listening,
Tim

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thanks ttgaris

Great to hear...interesting stuff

It is weird to see the democrat endorsing tauzin, but Louisiana is weird in many ways (see LA-7)

by JamesMA01 2004-11-26 06:13AM | 0 recs

4a2fab88-ed3b-47a4-8f14-3ec8a24504ac_normal

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LA

Both these races are fluid and pretty unpredictable. I could see either party sweeping, or a switch of the current party holding each of these seats, or holding their own.

by Jerome Armstrong 2004-11-28 07:03AM | 0 recs

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Support Melancon and Mount in LA

Until everyone realizes that we must support candidates like these - despite their differences on some issues - we will never be a majority party again. The same cookie cutter liberal mantra will not work in all 50 states. It is important to support ALL Democratic candidates from those that are most closely aligned to your views to the ones that are not. Why? Because if you do not like TOM DELAY then it is in your best interests to do so. Ted Kennedy probably could not get elected in many parts of the country, nor could Tom Delay. So instead of thinking of the ideal Democrat as 'one' entity, we should be thinking about the ideal Democrat as a fluid entity that represents the views of all folks from Boston to LA from Seattle to Miami.

by southerndemnut 2004-11-28 05:03PM | 0 recs

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About that NPAT

As I've said before, Melancon is the more supportable of the two Louisiana Democrats in runoffs. I know it's a tougher race against Tauzin III, but if you can only help one Democrat, I'd urge you to help Melancon.

That said, I'm going to go a bit off-topic and criticize Project Vote Smart's NPAT. This is a perfect example of buying into Republicans' "framing" of the debate. Here's Tauzin III's rap sheet again, with my comments added:

1. Prohibit public funding of abortions and of organizations that advocate or perform abortions. (yes)
(That is indeed the exact wording from the linked Website.) Why are those three things (abortions themselves, organizations that perform abortions, and organizations that "advocate abortions" [sic]) lumped together in one question? One could certainly be against funding abortions without wanting to block funding to hospitals where abortions may be performed, or wanting to violate the First Amendment by funding opponents, but not supporters, of abortion rights. The wording also mischaracterizes abortion-rights organizations as "advocat[ing] abortions," which is nothing but anti-choice propaganda.

2. Ease federal restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns. (yes)
The highlighted words imply current gun regulations are burdensomely restrictive, just as the opposite would have been implied if they had said "Gut federal regulations...."

3. Repeal federal restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns. (yes)
The yes/no format requires the same question to be repeated - but the only other option offered is "Maintain and strengthen the current level of enforcement of existing federal restrictions...." There is no option to strengthen the gun regulations themselves. The range of debate by Project Vote Smart is itself restricted - ranging from the status quo to NRA wet-dreamland.

Allow citizens to carry concealed guns. (yes)
Should the United States decrease its financial support of the United Nations? (yes)

Again, the only other option is "maintain[ing] our support of the UN; nothing about "increasing" it. The question assumes the acceptable range of debate lies from the status quo to Rethuglican wet-dreamland.

5. Do you support eliminating taxes on dividends paid to individual investors? (yes)
Yet again, nothing about raising dividend taxes. We can either continue giving dividends their current favorable tax treatment, or give them even more favorable treatment!

6. Do you support using military tribunals to try suspected terrorists when ordinary civilian courts are deemed inappropriate or impractical? (yes)
As per the Geneva Conventions, the proper forum is a military court-martial, not a civilian court or a special tribunal. This question seems to have been drawn straight from GOP talking points.

7. Do you support a policy of pre-emptive strikes against countries deemed to be a threat to national security? (yes)
"Pre-emptive" strikes are almost universally supported. If the bombers are on their way, no one argues you should have to wait for them to start dropping bombs before you can shoot at them! The sleight of hand here is the implied assumption that the invasion of Iraq was a "pre-emptive strike." It was not. At best, it was a "preventive" strike (and one based on dead-wrong intelligence, at that).

8. Allow workers to invest a portion of their payroll tax in private accounts which they manage themselves. (yes)
Here, Project Vote Smart omits the "Require workers to invest...." option, so at least the debate doesn't extend all the way to the far right this time. But again, five of the six options listed amount to partial privatization or benefit cuts, and the sixth is an across-the-board tax increase. Nothing about raising the ceiling on Social Security taxes, implementing an earnings "floor," or other progressive proposals.

In fairness to candidate Tauzin III, he does take a few more moderate positions as well. I encourage everyone to follow the link and read it through. But with questionnaires like these, it's no wonder the country keeps drifting to the right.

by Mathwiz 2004-11-29 10:31AM | 0 recs