18 March 2007

is no breaux a go?

it looks like louisiana's republican party registered an account at youtube to release online an anti- john breaux ad called "above the law." [length:29s]. in the town talks st patricks anniversary editorial (see link) they are calling attention to that ad. the ad turns on the question of whether or not senator breaux is a lawful candidate for governor of louisiana; citizen of louisiana or of maryland. lets see...it could be another media hoax though. we dont know, because we havent yet read article IV section 2. of the louisiana state constitution. article IV section 2 is the part louisiana's republican party cites in their ad. one side says that senator breaux isnt a lawful resident based on information he swore to in his maryland voter registration card. then another side says that he is technically a lawful resident because senator breaux owns an interest in (heir?) property at crowley. someone else wrote into the town talk's your mail recently and said that the senator owned property next to her in grant parish, louisiana.

ok we went ahead and read it since we had to look the link up . article IV sec.2 states:

§2. Qualifications

Section 2. To be eligible for any statewide elective office, a person, by the date of his qualification as a candidate, shall have attained the age of twenty-five years, be an elector, and have been a citizen of the United States and of this state for at least the preceding five years. In addition, the attorney general shall have been admitted to the practice of law in the state for at least the five years preceding his election. During his tenure in office, a statewide elected official shall hold no other public office except by virtue of his elected office.
a december 2000 voter registration card #253982 says that john berlinger breaux "now registered at talbot county" maryland using an acadia parish address of 1017 N Ave H crowley, louisiana. ah ha! the out could be in that it says on the card "You are not a registered voter until you receive your voter notification card. if you do not receive your voter notification card in three weeks, you should contact your county board of elections."

so we suppose the key is to find out if senator breaux has voted in talbot county. if not he can say that he never received his voter notification card and no one could prove otherwise. thats exacly what senator breaux is going to do! here is a recent bayou buzz article by mike bayham. mr. hayham writes:
This past week must have been one of the strangest for the Registrar of Voters in Talbot County, Maryland as a number of Louisiana-based reporters and bloggers placed calls about the affluent county’s most famous Cajun immigrant [...] According to public records, Breaux and his wife Lois registered to vote in October 2005 in the upscale community of Easton. Oddly enough, Mrs. Breaux cast ballots in the 2006 Democratic primary and general election yet the county voter registrar has no record of the former US Senator actually voting since registering.
so we dont know looks like he's gonna skate. its still suspicious and a bit shameful to us because we can understand someone not voting for a year but not six years and especially a former united states senator. so next we have to consider what benefit if any did senator breaux gain from registering or at least appearing to register to vote in talbot county, maryland? did he do it to qualify as a maryland citizen to get any deductions on state property or income taxes? if so would that be enough to establish senator breaux as a legal maryland citizen even without voting once?

so it would seem that this is going to have to be solved in the courts soon, or else this spring republicans and democrats sign off on it and waive everything. the last thing we want to see is a filing in jindal v breaux.
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the comment left by ebh8769 says it all..

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