97,913,200 reasons Bobby Jindal is our GOP Hypocrite of the Week

Gov. Bobby Jindal

Welcome back to the BuzzFlash GOP Hypocrite of the Week.

As we noted on the BuzzFlash Blog, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is a hypocrite on earmarks. After listening to him rail against imaginary earmarks in the stimulus plan Tuesday night, a look at his past revealed a whole different Bobby:

In fiscal year 2008, his last hurrah as a U.S. congressman representing Louisiana before taking over the governor's mansion, Jindal scored big in the pork contest. He, sometimes in concert with other lawmakers, ended up bringing home $97,913,200 in bacon. That put him at the number 14 spot in Taxpayers for Common Sense's annual tally of the most successful appropriators in the House.

And the hypocrisy of that speech didn't end there. Again from our blog:

Jindal's objection over the money going to volcano monitoring sounded like a crafted pop song. He even had a nice hook: "Instead of monitoring volcanoes, what Congress should be monitoring is the eruption of spending in Washington, D.C."

Too bad his factoid wasn't true. ProPublica notes that the $140 billion Jindal was whining about will be spent on "U.S. Geological Survey facilities and equipment, including stream gages, seismic and volcano monitoring systems and national map activities."

But obfuscation wasn't enough for Jindal, so he threw in another batch of hypocrisy.

According to the USGS Web site, "a major goal of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is to reduce the vulnerability of the people and areas most at risk from natural hazards."

So if we take away money for monitoring volcanoes, wouldn't it be fair to cut funding for hurricane watchers as well?

As Pam Spaulding highlights on House Blend, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) pointed out the two-faced move Jindal made when he tried to take all of the stimulus money coming to Louisiana except the money for unemployment assistance. The congresswoman said this on Keith Olbermann's Countdown:

"This is a guy who, while I served with him in Congress, voted for [unemployment] assistance twice, and is certainly willing to take funding from the federal government to help people who are out of a job and out of their home as a result of a hurricane, but not willing to take that assistance when his constituents are out of a job and out of a home as a result of this economic crisis. I'm really not sure what the difference is. A crisis is a crisis."

No wonder the Republican Party loves Jindal so much; he's a classic GOP hypocrite.

Remember our motto: So many Republican hypocrites, so little time.

Catch up with you soon.

This is Bobby Jindal's first GOP Hypocrite of the Week Award. Welcome to the Club. You can see a list of previous nominees here.

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