DC and NOLA Mardi Gras, Redistricting and More

State Rep. Michael Bayham has the unique distinction of being both a freshman legislator, and one of the most experienced legislative hands at the state capitol. He joins Hy and Christopher to talk about DC Mardi Gras, problems with the portNola expansion in Violet, possibilities of tax reform, and carnival politics!

Episode Transcript

(00:03):
Battles, the politicians addressed the digitdatas and magicians. Who's to see the
money? Then you don't, there'snothing to fill the holes? Well then
feeling their packets bid holes, thepoliticians bouncing down the road, every batty'sition

(00:25):
for no month corruption and dysfunction.It's gone to take divide even well,
folks, it's Carnival time political style. The DC Marti Gras just ended and
a lot of deals were made forLouisiana. We're going to share some of
what was going on up at WashingtonMarti Gras, where Speaker Mike Johnson and
Steve Scalise were the new Kings ofWashington. But we're also going to talk

(00:49):
about the kings of what happened atthe Legislative session and there were some surprises.
We're going to talk about the aftermathof the special session with our special
guest Mike Baham. Are you tellingme that Steve and Mike are no longer
the Daulphin and God bless you allout there. You are now listening to
the founders, So the voice ofthe Founding Fathers, your Founding Fathers,

(01:11):
coming to you deep within the bowelsof those mystic and cryptic alligator swamps of
the Big Easy, that old CrescentCity, you know, Marti Garth,
Kings and Queens, et cetera.That's right, that old Crescent City.
And way high up on top ofthat old liberty cypress tree draped in Spanish
mossy is none other then you spendGary Bubba the republic chaplain Hi mccegnry,

(01:34):
who with Christopher Sidmore, your rovingreporter, resident radical, moderate, associate
editor of the Louisiana Weekly newspaper LouisianaWeekly, dot neat And wouldn't that be
like on top of the royal floatat this year it said for the Liberty
cypress tree. You know, yes, yes, yes, yes, it's
a royal cypress tree. And Ileft. It's nade of cypress, royal
cypress, part part of me,folks. I left to have the limb,

(01:56):
the freedom limb where I perch,speaking of going out raped in Spanish
moss folks, speaking of going outon a limb. That brings us to
our special guest joining us as stateRepresentative, Mike Baeham. And he's a
frequent commentator in the show. Nowelevated to the illustrious legislature and very proud
of him that more royalty, moreroyalty. Well, at least we're just

(02:19):
but Mike, speaking of royalty,we got it. Before we get into
Louisiana politics, one of the mostimportant elements of Louisiana politics the average person
doesn't know about happened in the Districtof Columbia at an event you've been going
to since two thousand and two andyou've never missed a year. And that,
of course was not the enthronement ofDrew Brees as the King of Washington
Marti Gras, but all the politicianswho came to play homage to the fact

(02:44):
that Louisiana seems to rule the worldin Washington, d C. What is
Washington Marti Graus, Explain it forthe public and why is it critically important
to this state. Well, I'veattended Washington Marti gar quite a few times
since two thousand and two. Wow. My understanding of the event is that
they basically wanted to bring a littlebit of New Orleans, well Louisiana culture

(03:08):
to the nation's capital. And it'sbeen held at the Washington Hilton for many
years. Because they have they hadone of the largest unobstructed ballrooms to think
of any hotel in Washington. I'mnot sure that's the case anymore, but
I know that's one of the bigreasons why it's been there. I know

(03:30):
that, you know, it bringsthe very large crowd of politicos from Louisiana,
but you know, and it's reallya great opportunity for local officials to
meet with their federal officials because they'reexpecting those meetings. And that's the reason

(03:50):
why I'd always go. I trustme, I do not like getting into
a tuxedo or spending three hundred dollarsfor a ticket where I'm just standing,
you know, and I'm called rippletruss shoes for three hours. Are you
telling me those peasants up in Washington, d C. Do not wear white
tie to their balls. The congressmenwear white ties. Those presenting their daughters

(04:12):
who are princesses wear white ties.You know. The best way to describe
Washington Montagras is kind of like apolitical version of Endemion. It's fairly even
though it's a lot of politicos thatare there. It does cost some money,
but well it didn't cost me,not much because I can't go to

(04:33):
the ball. I just did mymeetings in the lobby, but in the
congressional offices. But you do.It is fairly a galitarian, so it's
not like an old society ball.It won't go through those names. But
but but yeah, galitarian ball,which I like. And it's diverse because

(04:56):
every member of the Congressional delegation hasa crew and uh oh wow, and
you've you've got you know, it'suh you know, people both men and
women participate as part of the crew. Some of the floats they have miniature
floats that they pushed by hand throughthe ballroom and pretty elaborate. Yeah,

(05:18):
so you're getting bigger and better likedown here in New Ways well, and
one of the reasons that got biggerand better is not just because Drew Brees
was going to be king this year, but because a lot of the Washington
establishment was going to play homage tothe fact that both the Speaker and the
majority leader of the United States Houseof Representatives are from Louisiana and key players

(05:39):
in this ball. So it wasn'tjust an accident that they'd signed sixty fifth
Parish was up there as it alwaysis. It really was a place where
Washington was coming to acknowledge Louisiana's politicalinfluence. By the way speaker and the
Speaker of Mike Johnson's credit, hemade himself accessible to all attendees. Like

(05:59):
that, to see a Speaker ofthe House engaging with so many people,
you just don't see that outlook.You know, I've never met John Bayner
because this guy would get whisked aroundlike the President of the United States.
Now I've met nude a few times, but you know, usually you know,
hoity toity affairs. But Mike,Mike had Mike engaged with everybody,

(06:23):
talk to people. God, Imean, I don't think so many people
in one state they have a picturewith the Speaker of the House like we
do. And to Mike's credit,and he is like that high you're correct,
Yes, he's a very look.I've known him since nineteen ninety three.
He jokes that I'm his first campaignvolunteer because he ran for student body

(06:43):
vice president of LSU and I campaignedfor him. Well, I mean,
the learning joke, folks has beenlately that in order to be a leader
of the United States Congress, youhad to have been a member of the
College Republicans between nineteen ninety and nineteenninety seven. So you know you're not
wrong. I mean, you knowyou're not wrong, Mike. You know
he's reminding me of as far ashis openness to the people, where he's

(07:05):
always there for the people. DonaldTrump, well I would disagree, but
well, I know you doesn't readabout every good thing Trump does. Understand.
No, No, I'm going tosay this. I'm going to say
this is very much like I'm goingto say, always been like that.
I'm gonna say this is somebody who'sbeen who's known Mike Johnson as long as
Mike Baham has. Though I'm notas close to him as is, I've
known him just as long. We'veliterally shared slept in the same living room

(07:27):
on the couches during a campaign.Mike Johnson is one of the most humble
people that I've ever met. Andyou can love Donald Trump and admit He's
humility is not one of his greatchrist That's not that was not the topic.
You're taking it out of context.You're taking it out of context.
The context was meeting people, beingwith people, getting to know the people.
He has a history of that fromhis very earliest days in business.

(07:49):
We always knew everybody who's friendly witheverybody and got along with it all right.
But let's let's let's talk about thislike you're telling him whats Mike Johnson
does one of one of the things, Mike way, when the last thing
I got to put in here,I'm sorry, Mary girl, is mart
we gotta take all? Right?Do you do you realize that I used
to go on ski trips many yearsago in the late seventies and eighties with
our Bible study Friday night fellowship group. We had a blast. We'd all

(08:11):
be all over Colorado and the Westand all these different ski slopes, and
we noticed for a lot of normouspeople coming, they were escaping Marti Gras.
But then we began to notice somethingover the year, over a few
years, those groups that were escapingmartigar decided to start their little Morti Gras
parties and on the ski slopes andthe ski lodges and whatnot. And do
you know that every one of thoseparties became a crew and an established Marti

(08:31):
grass. So now all over theRockies you got Marti Gras from the New
Orleans folks. It happens every year. It's amazing, Mike. We do
have a way of taking over everywherearound, especially around Marti grass I had
the same experience of New Orleans expatriots when I lived in London had their
own Marti Graus parties, but theycame to escape Marti Gras and then but
my re established Marti Gras. Youpointed out something that Washington Mardi Gras,

(08:54):
which did start out as we pointedout State Representative Mike Bahamas joining Himikendry Christopher
Tidmore here in the found to showit this week, but you pointed out
that it has become a place wherepeople do actually a lot of political work,
a lot of work on critical issues. That's one of the reasons you
were one of the few local officialsthat consistently when you worked in parish government
for Saint Bernard coming up there andthis year you came with some very important

(09:18):
issues you were talking about. Oneof them, of course, is the
port that is very reliant, thenew proposed port and Violet by the Port
of New Orleans, the very lionin federal money, other issues that impact
your parish, and so you werekind of doing some lobbying. What some
of the stuff you were talking about. We're talking about the problems that the
port would bring to our community,which is a reality and something that some

(09:43):
folks tried to dismiss because they havetheir interests. But a lot of the
people pushing this port don't live inSaint Benard, and the overwhelming majority of
people who live in Sanc Benard opposedthe port. And these individuals, members
of Congress and so forth lobbyist,they see the benefit from a holistic standpoint.

(10:03):
But Saint Bernard has been burdened enoughand we already report are already kind
of double crossed us on the MississippiRiver Gulf Outwood, which was an ecological
disaster that led to eleven feet ofwater being in my bedroom and that of
many other And they're asking us totrust them again on this port. And

(10:26):
and I understand why members of Congressyou know that are just looking at oh,
we need to be competitive, weneed a bigger facility. That's great
that you know, I understand thatlogic, But don't be disruptive to a
community that fought so hard to comeback after Katrina. And and that is

(10:46):
the issue, that is the mainissue I have. We're gonna we're gonna
have to carry that burden and ourbenefits going to be negligible. It won't
any way, shape or form equalwhatever benefit we have. I mean,
and that's that is not fair toSaint Benard. And to be virtally honest,
there was a report that was issuedcalled a Vickerman report, a man

(11:09):
an engineer's who's developed ports, thatsaid that that clearly made the argument that
this is not the ideal place toput this port for safety reasons because if
a ship, when a ship hasto do a turnaround, these large contentner
ships which are much larger than onepeople generally see coming up and down the

(11:31):
river, but that ship, whenit doesn't turn could block eighty percent of
the river at that point. Yeah, and and what if we have another
bright Star incident where the ship losespower and thousand to a levee during a
high doing a high flood stage.I mean, it don't kill us.

(11:52):
Well, the part that's got me, Mike, is and that I can't
seem to get any answers on maybeyou had more success And Watchton was right
across the river from the proposed areaViolet or approximately, so Placuamin wants to
do a port and every time Ipoint out, well, that's kind of
got a little bit more political support, and they're wanting to do a container
port that's not part of the Portof New Orleans but basically is doing the

(12:16):
same thing. Why are we havingtwo container ports looking at each other on
either side of the river, BecauseLouisiana does everything on a parochial basis.
And the reason why the Port ofNew Orleans is pushing this container yard in
Saint Bernard is because a jurisdiction.If they had jurisdiction in Placamen, I'm
sure they would have tried to putit there, but they don't have jurisdiction

(12:39):
in Placamen, so they see thatwhere they have jurisdiction, they see they
have control. And that's what thisis about, which is unfortunate. We
don't do things based upon how wellthey're going to work in Louisiana. We
do things based upon who's in chargeof what little area, and the Port
has that land, and they havejurisdiction in Saint Bernard, and that's what

(13:03):
this is about. I wish thePort would work with Placaman's Parish come up
with a cooperative endeavor agreement where theyhave joint control, which the Port of
New Orleans doesn't believe in that theywant to own everything and and go from
there where it makes sense. Imean, why are we sending these giant
container ships up eighty miles ninety milesup the river? Makes no sense.

(13:28):
It could be closer to the mouthof the river. Could be closer to
the mouth. When they talk aboutHouston and in South Carolina, in Savannah,
well look at how close they areto the open ocean. And one
of the arguments that has made well, they've got train connections to where it
comes in. Last time I checked, there are there are rail lines in
Placaman's Parish, they go through thepain one rail line in Saint Bernard,

(13:54):
one coming and going. But thisis all, this is all what happened.
What was interesting, The reason Ibrought up this particular issue is while
you were talking to members of Congressand staff about this issue, two hundred
and eighty eight million dollars in federalfunds went to build this sport almost simultaneously

(14:16):
to Washington, Marti Grass. Theannouncement of the awarding happened all at the
same time. So a lot ofthis is it's a one point eight billion
dollar project. They're taking that outof the the Buyden infrastructure bill. They're
still short. They don't have half, They've got less than half. You
know, they're they're counting pledges,which I haven't seen that money come into

(14:37):
Louisiana yet, So I don't thinkthe port has as much money as they're
making. Everyone they're they're they're they'reprojecting. It's a huge of money.
You know, in the state itgot the money to balance out that one
point eight billion. Well, Ilook, even if these people had a
billion dollars, they're still eight hundredmillion dollars short. It's a lot of

(15:00):
money to say, oh, we'rehalfway there. Well, it's like being
halfway up Mount Everest. Yeah,you're halfway there, but you still got
a very hard climate. Every inchthat goes up goes gets tougher, the
slope is steeper, and the airis center. Mike, here's an idea
for the turning of the big ships. They ought to put a turning base

(15:24):
and along the river there somewhere wherethe ships could turn there. And can't
you can't, you can't, youcan't. That's not even possible. It's
not possible. It's it's because ithas to do with the currents. They
have dredged the river and that's actuallyhaving some interesting effects in our ability to
build wetlands. But you can't actuallybecause of the way the hydrology of the

(15:46):
river is. Do a turning baseand it won't work. We're gonna chancefer
on the other side of the breakand talk about the special Session, of
which you were one of the newestlegislators, but at the same time you
came in with some of the mostexperience of anybody in the House of Representatives,
an interesting coomy. You want toget your take on the special Session.
You've already had some interesting things tosay online and on social media.
But Mike, when you came awayfrom DC, Marty Gras, this was

(16:07):
probably the biggest we ever had.What other issues we were talking about?
And what are your final impressions ofMarty Graus? Now the whole world,
really, the political world was writing. I think Politico itself in the Hill
newspaper had a reporter sitting in thelobby just putting stuff every hour up practically
so well because the press is stilllearning about Mike Johnson. There you know

(16:30):
he This isn't Mike Johnson, isn'tnew Gangrich a known quantity in national circles
because it was minority whip before hewas Speaker, and he was a very
high profile minority whip. Mike didnot come from, you know, one
of the prominent leadership positions to speaker. He wasn't whip, he wasn't Majority

(16:52):
writer. So they're still learning abouthim, and so there's great interest in
anything. Does uh. I wasgonna say that when he first showed up.
I remember all the top news commentatorsand everybody that was saying, who
is this guy? Who is it? We don't anything about him. I
don't know why it's so hard forhim to figure it out, but anyway,

(17:12):
I'm just I am just greatly relievedthat when Saturday Night Live decided to
do their Mike Johnson parody, whichI want him when he got elected speaker
a text and I'm gonn say,man, congratulations, you're about to be
on Saturday Night Live and what Ihaving to actually be in New York.
I'm just I'm just glad that theydidn't get that the guy was dating Ariana

(17:34):
grind Pete, Pete Willson, Pete, what's the name of David Ceter?
What was the what was the spoof? How did they do it? Uh,
they they just kind of it waskind of bland in Vanilla when little
guy came walking in and and becauseSaturday Night Live certainly doesn't do a whole
lot of homework, you know,they just go with it with the rarely

(17:56):
pro conservative or pro republic rare,extremely rare. It could have been funny,
it wasn't even particularly funny, MikeBaham. We do need to come
and take a quick commercial break.When we come back, though, we
want to turn our attention to thespecial session. And you came out of
it because you were in an interestingposition. We'll explain why after these important
messages. Ey teen more of theFounder Show with himik Henry, Christopher Tidmore,
our special guest Mike Bayham. Rightafter this is chapin Hi mc henry.

(18:22):
It is Marty guard time, aspecial time for LAMB Ministries. You
can find out all about us bygoing to our website l A M B
n O LA dot com lambnola dotcom. We work with interested the kids
and the urban poor here in theWolves and it's a hot time in the
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if you want to help, weneed all the help we can get.
We need finance support, we needprayer warriors, and we need volunteers.

(18:45):
Just contact us. You can callme chapelhih Mick Henry at five zero four
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(19:29):
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(19:51):
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(20:15):
hope and purpose. Partner with ustoday go to www dot New Orleansmission dot
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(20:37):
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(20:59):
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(21:22):
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the program, my Christopher Tidmore andchaplain Hi McHenry is always Christoph and I
are working so very hard to bringyou the truth, the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth. Andwe got a great truth teller on our
show right now, Mike Bayham.Mike State Representative Michael Bayham, you are

(21:48):
one of the newer members of thelegislature. At the same time you have
probably one of the most season Notonly had you run for the legislature before,
but you served as governmental Affairs directorfor the parish of Saint Bernard,
one of the only officials in parishgovernment anywhere who actually wrote a grant for
your own salary, so you didn'tactually have to the taxpayers didn't have to
cover the millions of dollars that youbrought in for Saint Bernard for infrastructure and

(22:11):
other reasons. You also but youhave You've come up through the legislature.
You knew everybody, so you walkedin in an interesting position as having a
lot of historical knowledge and a lotof operational knowledge of the body. And
yet you were the most freshmen offreshmens. And I'm curious, because you
know sometimes freshmans aren't You ended upbeing somebody a lot of people leaned on
in the special session. Well,my history with the legislature goes back to

(22:37):
nineteen ninety two. A good friendof mine is the nephew of Francis Thompson,
who's been in the legislature since theseventies. And actually I was supposed
to sit next to Francis during insession, but another legislator who was higher
up on the total poll like thatfront seat that Francis had, so he
pulled the high score to use afraternity grow reference card and took the chair

(23:03):
I was supposed to get, SoI'm actually volunteered to go in the back.
If I can't be at the frontof him as well be at the
back. And that's where I'm atnow. But I've been I worked in
the legislature in nineteen ninety five.I was the fact that legislative aid to
Senator then Senator Ce Supercard, whola pea Card rather sorry star trek pronunciation,

(23:26):
but Peacard, who had passed away, was later going to be a
state superintendent of education after he servedin the Senate. But I had some
of these people I've campaigned for overthe years I've known. I've spent a
lot of time up there working oncapital outlay projects, trying to ensure that
Saint Bernard got its fair share forcritical things like jail repairs and a new

(23:52):
special operations facility for the Sheriff's office. So I'm no stranger to the Capitol.
In fact one anything. The guywho was an assistant sergeant at arms
when I worked there in nineteen ninetyfive, the day I got sworn in
as the day he retired his senatehad Senate Sergeant at Arms, John Keller,
who have you know kept in Petchwoodover the years. So yeah,

(24:17):
so I'm not new. A lotof these people I did not through Republican
committee. In one case, Iwas the election day campaign manager for one
legislator, So I actually, infact, I worked on the campaigns of
we have one hundred and forty fourlegislators. I worked on the campaigns of

(24:38):
five of the one hundred and fortyfour, not counting myself. And so
you walked in with a lot ofrelationships. Pretty much, I can honestly
say there's there a few Republicans inLouisiana, frankly a few Democrats who don't
know who Mike Baham was having comethrough, and you walked in not only
knowing a lot of the procedure,you walked into a special session where everything

(25:02):
was kind of accelerated even by legislativestandards, and a lot of the new
legislators didn't know quite what was goingon. And if they expected you to
be quiet, Mike, you weren't. You actually came out as rather critical
of the way and the creation ofthis this new second African American majority district,

(25:23):
the way it was brought about,the way it was come in in
the legislature and how it affected andhow the open primaries went in and it
turned some heads. You came onthis. Can you talk about first of
all, when you when you enteredthere, did you did you have any
indication before we talk about the seconddistrict that the governor was going to go
after the open primary? Was thereany early indication? Well, we knew

(25:45):
that was coming long before because itgot very little play in the press until
the Well, because the press,we don't have the same level of press
coverage that we had twenty years ago. I mean, Ded Anderson World are
gone, so you don't have alot of that technical reporting like look,
Tom Spicky, youwn you could havekilled somebody with it if you hit him

(26:07):
in the head hard enough. Twentyyears ago, that paper was thick.
Now it's kind of like an advertise. It's almost an advertiser, eight pages
in the front section. So youdon't have a whole lot of content,
and you don't have a whole lotof you don't have a whole lot of
press like you used to up there. So that's one of the reasons why
that escaped the public notice because thepress didn't cover it. But that was

(26:29):
well, we knew, we knewwell in advance. Jeff wanted to push
the close primary through. I knewthat before He's before you even announced the
governor. He's been a proponent ata close primary for many years, because
that's how I got elected to Congressin twenty ten, and it's also arguably
how he got unelected. I meanto Congress. He got unelected not because

(26:55):
of a close primary, but becausewe lost the congressional district. They got
merged into an unfre favorable district wherethe guy who who got Whustana he got
drawn into had a very big basein Lafayette that wasn't going to move in.
And and look, I mean,Jeff's a dear friend, We've been
friends since twenty ten. But Ihad advised that he had not pursued that

(27:18):
race, and you know, hejoke said, yeah, it sounded like
my daddy quit bringing it up.But he went in and it did.
It did create some interesting wrinkles inthe pursuit of a second African American majority
district, which, by the way, you know, I was surprised.

(27:40):
The governor is the closest thing toan elected king. The governor of Louisiana.
But I will say I was surprisedthat there wasn't more voices in the
legislature like yours said, is itreally necessary that we we create the second
black district right now? Even withwhile this is being fought off in the
courts. You made that point,and a couple other people did, but
it was actually pretty muted. Overall. No one wants to be sideways with

(28:02):
the governor. And look, Iwould have liked to have been able to
vote with Jeff on everything. Imean, Jeff's a friend of mine.
He's going to be a very goodgovernor, and I did not want to
start off on the wrong foot.But I'm there. I Am not there
to please to serve the governor.I'm there to serve my constituents and my

(28:22):
parish being split through the middle ofa residential neighborhood into two congressional districts.
And they didn't even do it becauseof race. They're doing it because they
had to grab people. They neededwarm bodies to make the numbers work.
Because the irony of it is.The line on the south side of Judge
pres Drive, which is the mainthoroughfare in Saint Bernard, stops right before

(28:48):
you get to the predominantly minority majorityprecincts. So they're just grabbing bodies at
that point, you know, inorder to make the math work once out
the whole, if you will.And I look, I was not happy
about about having to give that speechand cast that vote. I wanted to

(29:11):
support my governor. But at theend of the day, I have the
view that I'm there for four yearsand I could be thrown out in four
years. I could be reelecting fouryears. I may say I'm done with
this in four years, because youknow the legislature. You know, we
may be the princes of of governmentand Baton Rouge were paid like paupers,

(29:33):
and you know it is it isnot. I tell you, if followed,
you can't afford a yacht on thatsixteen thousand dollars a year, sixteen
eight hundred. But I don't getthe don't forget the eight hundred. That's
that's that's critical. But state representwhen I'm when I'm plipping q paws,

(29:55):
I mean, but but I'm serious, because let me tell you this,
that job is. Whoever says thatjob's part time has never been in a
legislature. Yeah, no, it'sit's it's definitely, And I mean just
to look at you. You hada special session, there was talk of
another special session. We can talkabout that, and then of course a
regular session for three months and therewas There's very little that's part time about

(30:18):
being a state representative in anything you'vegot, You've got meetings with state departments,
you have meetings with constituents, yougot town hall meetings. To do
the job right, you have tobe look, I have been in nothing
but meetings since January eighth, andreally January seventh because they had to push
up the governor's inauguration the day beforedue to the weather. But it is

(30:42):
a it is a full time job, but a part time salary. That
is the best way to describe it. And if you look at the number
of people elected to the legislature withoutopposition, that's a problem. And it
was rick people's ability to run forthe office. Now I knew going into

(31:03):
it. I'm certainly not complaining aboutthe situation. And before I got in
this race, I thought long andhard about whether this is good for me.
Because this is this I'm twice asbusy as my previous job, with
eighty percent less pay, but it'simportant to my community and I wanted to

(31:26):
give my community a good representative atleast for four years. And you had
fought, and you had fought veryhard, Mike, outside of the legislature,
with all your contacts, to makesure State Bernard was not divided into
three state rep districts, spreading inother parishes that it would have a state
representative speaking for the parish. Well, we've already been carved up into two

(31:48):
Senate districts. So but you can'tput a price on that. And look,
the parish needs to have an effectivelegislator. And that's why I did
it. I mean, if Iwould have seen someone, if a lawyer
or someone who's independently wealthy, thatthat was committed to doing everything I would

(32:09):
be willing to do and work withpeople to get the interest of the parish
advanced and protected, I wouldn't havegotten this race. And well I would,
I would say, Mike Baham,not to blow your own horn,
but a lot of them might nothave had the background and expertise and knowledge
on drainage and other issues that youcouldney and that and that may have been

(32:30):
and that that's correct, but thiswas you know this is a hard job,
and I tell people in fact,when I run into my colleagues and
uh, they introduced me their wivesof spouse, I think the spouse,
so thank you for letting your husbandor your wife serve here, because no

(32:51):
one understands the burden you carry.Forget the politician, the husband or or
the spouse or the wife at homehas to has to do a lot more
shoulder a lot more burden, bothfinancially and man and keeping the family together
and making sure that the obligations areman You know, to me, this

(33:12):
drives people to corruption. If they'renot getting a decent salary, are they
going to how am I to makethe money? And then then he come
drives him anyway, It's well,I think you have some people that people
that are generally generally start off likethey know that going in, but I

(33:34):
think that the spot and the freshmendon't quite get it. They kind of
give you a quizzical look. Butwhen I talk to someone who's in their
second or the third term. Theyhad one representative's wife who I'm not going
to mention, she started crying.She's like, this is the first time
anyone's ever recognized what we sacrifice.And if you look at what judges get

(34:00):
paid, assessments get paid, Clerksof court get paid, district attorneys,
parish executives, mayors, legislative aidsto everyone, but the legislature aids to
the governor. It is it isamazing the dichotomy. Yeah, but you

(34:21):
can't you get what you pay for? How many legislators are there? Totally
counting Senate and one hundred and fortyfour that's kind of the Senate in the
House, yes, okay, thirtyone hundred and five, So raising their
salaries by you know, not makingthem rich and let me maybe up to
fifty thousand or some I got thatthat would not be too big of it.
There was would there was a discussionfor a while of tying legislative salaries

(34:45):
to teacher pay state teacher pays,which, to be birtally honest, I
think that's the smartest play. Yeah, because that that incentivises the legislature.
They're raised peach teachers pay. Butregardless what we have, you can't complain
about the legislative pay while being finewith the assessor and everyone else appeals judge,

(35:15):
you knows, Mike, are theseare these are six sugar jobs,
Mike Baham changing gears. One ofthe things that I was pleased to see
was some address of tax reform.One of the things that I was questioning
with Jeff Landry's entire campaign was hewasn't talking about taxes Richard. He did
appoint Richard Nelson as the head ofthe Revenue Secretary, who was talking about

(35:35):
major tax reform. But there seemsto be some move on tax reform.
And I'm curious from from a groundview from the House of Representatives. You
have a sales tax that's coming upfor a neewal that may or may not
last, and you've got conversations aboutthe corporate franchise tax and the income tax
itself. Are we going to seeany major tax reform this coming legislative session.

(35:59):
Well, it may not be thisyear. Next year is the fiscal
session, so some of the taxstuff may be put on hold till lend
Bard mind that state is going tobe not as rosy flush, thank you,
in a few years. So Ithink Governor l Andry's got an eye

(36:22):
on the realities of things, andI can tell you we do need to
be more competitive on our taxes.But one thing you know, talking to
representatives of business interest, I learnedwas their big issue isn't the cost of
doing of paying taxes, it's thecost of compliance that drives them crazy.

(36:45):
And I even have one person that, look, we'll pay more in taxes.
We want the we want the taxcode to be simplified in the reason
and because it's a byzantine and that'ssomething I think we need to work with
work on now. I'm always meansso a lot of these tax issues are
going to come before me. Butif you had if you had one piece

(37:08):
of legislation you would sponsor when itcomes to taxes, what would it be?
I mean, specifically, get themread of corporate franchise makes us on
competitive that that passed the last legislature. It was veto and it was vetoed.
But we do need to we doneed to get rid of that.
Way we reintroduce that, I thinkI think Mike wouldn't be alone with that.
I think it's going to be reintroducedvery quickly. Yeah, it's going

(37:30):
to be and probably the individual isgoing to reintroduce it as the son of
the senator who who sponsored it lasttime, Senator Alliance's son Robert, but
I wouldn't be shocked if he handledit. His father was chair of the
rev and Fisk Committee. State RepresentativeMike Baham is joining us, and we've

(37:52):
got a lot of issues we're comingin our last few minutes. It is
Carnival and that brings up some questionsabout revelry, but also crime and crime.
Has been in the news about thegovernor saying he wants to make a
major commitment of the state police.Last time state police were in New Orleans,
it was the French Quarter. Fromthe comments the governor made in the
middle of the week, it seemslike he wants to make a state a

(38:14):
commitment of the state police to theNew Orleans area that's even bigger than that,
maybe a large section of the city, an entire troop under its purview.
But he's going to be coming tothe legislature from money for that.
Do you think there's support for it? I would welcome it. You know,
at first glance, we'll have tosee where we are fiscally, but

(38:35):
we you could having a greater policepresence, I mean, because NPD is
clearly understaffed. That helps, butyou need to have a prosecutor who will
press charges right, and you needto have it where someone who has taken
off the streets for being upon beingcredibly charged with a violent at criminal act

(39:01):
needs to stay off the streets.You know, we just lost one of
our kids again. I work withArin City kids and we just had one
of the gunned down by a gangbanger in a car. And the question
is, because the District Attorney ofNew Orleans, Jason Williams, has allowed
the Attorney General's office to do onanyone arrested by the state police. So

(39:22):
there at least seems to be somemovement on that front. I was actually
astonished when that happened, but itseems some positive. My question is,
Mike, there's so many infrastructural needsas well. You're dealing with major drainage
issues in Saint Bernard looking for appropriations. But you've spent a lot of time
in Orleans and politics, and youknow the Sewage and Water Board is a

(39:44):
state agency. One of the otherrecommendations was a state a complete state takeover
of that. Do you think there'ssupport for that in the legislature. I
think so. I'm going to beI'm on House municipal so that may be
going before me as well, dependingon where the bill goes it's assigned.
But we New Orleans, and tosome degree, well to a large degree,

(40:08):
New Orleans needs to do its partto clean up attack by cleaning up
politicians. Come election day, youcannot vote the same way and then hope
for the best. That's the definitionof insanity, political insanity, if you
will. Indeed, there needs tobe new leadership in city Hall committed to

(40:29):
making reforms and committing to competent administration, and New Orleans hasn't had that.
I don't think anyone, regardless ofparty, regardless of where they live,
regardless of race. I don't thinka majority of anyone feels that the city's
been well run now. And evenI was astonished recently about how few personnel

(40:52):
there are actually forget doing anything,answering the phones, having any direction the
city of New Orleans has not recoveredfrom the pandemic and actually having any contact
with the outside world. So it'sit's one of those issues that you know
is perennial, but it comes inwhat are we're talking about surgeon waterboard connected
to Mardi Gras. We're gonna haveis a surgeon waterboard going to step up

(41:15):
to the plate and in some waycontribute maybe the line that trucks up to
for people to I know, Idon't and most people don't know. I've
known Mike for over thirty years.But you're a huge Carnival lover. I
know. I remember in high schoolyou would you would take taxis from your
grandfather's taxi account into New Orleans justto make parades. What is It's kind

(41:37):
of interesting. We spend we cancellour lives for for for four weeks for
Carnival, and but we we kindof sometimes don't pay attention to what's going
on around us. What can Carnivalteach us about doing things that are right?
And that you kind of take hisinspiration as a legislature. That's an
interesting question, Chris. Carnival isit's part of our identity, it's part

(42:01):
of our culture. We the paradesare generally run pretty well, but I
think we we need to do abetter job with the non fun times,
if you will, you know,the demand the mundane stuff, and it's

(42:22):
one thing to be prepared, likethe US Marines from Art Frankdimion or Bacchus.
And look, I agree with someof the stuff. The mayor has
done this business where people are droppingour furniture and driving off. That's ridiculous.
You got people claiming parts of theneutral ground like their Oklahoma Sooners,
you know, kind of Stoga wagon. But but and look, I agree

(42:46):
at the Mayor's office on that point. I hope they do take that stuff
down. It's ridiculous, it's entitled. I mean, you can't even you
can't even cross the neutral ground becauseyou've got a bunch of abandoned ladders acting
like a great I mean, servingas much of a barrier as we got
on a southern border. Mike.We only have about a minute left.
Any final thoughts, Mike, AndI've got one final thought. Mars was

(43:08):
great this year. You're talking aboutegalitarian organizations. Mars is for everybody,
is founded by the military. It'sa military parade. It's one of the
best martigar parades going, Mike.If you have a military background, you
have to join. Are any kindof police, farming, winner first responders
are just none of that. Butyou just want to be with a military
parade, you should check it out. Mars. It's a great parade,

(43:29):
all right. Any final thoughts andcarnival or anything else politically, I would
like to put a plug in forthe Nights and Nemesis Parade that will be
in sync and Ard it's our onecrop parade. We haven't shall met good
this weekend. Keep an eye outin case you're any shifts due to the
weather issues. I'm looking forward toseeing chaos and pretty tie and muses,

(43:52):
the three I guess cleaner satirical parades. I've already checked out the Rex floats
with the of Kadi O'Hearn, whichMarti gar can teach you a lot about
culture and our literature here in NewOrleans. Yeah, he's a great and
and and and that is really onearea where we do things right with the

(44:14):
because the parades are not run bythe government. The parades are private organizations.
And and they provide they raise awarenessof our culture and our history and
our heritage. Yeah, and uh, and I'm very glad that Rex is
doing something on left Katioharne because heessentially gave the repute the identity of New

(44:35):
Orleans. We've made billions of offof and succeeding decades from tourism, right,
the first Carnival cookbook, the firsttravel Guy the first columns about the
oddness and wonderfulness of New Orleans.All for offt Carrier he Mike ban when
it comes to oddness and wonderfulness.We love having you on and we're hoping
to have you'll do the regular thingmonthly and give us updates what's going on.

(44:55):
You know. Marty Gar even droveout the carpetbackers with our let's not
get in that argument no time.But all favorite state representative Mike Baham,
we're good. You've been on ashow many many times as the commentator.
We'd love to have you back asnow as being within the system and tell
us what's really going on. Alwaysa pleasure. Thanks Mike, God bless

(45:15):
you. Yes, sir, outhere by folks will be back with a
patriotic moment right after these important messages, Stay tuned more of the Founder Show
with Hig McHenry and Christopher did moreright after this. Speaking of Mardi gar
parades, what's the biggest problem peoplehave finding a place to go to the
bathroom. Well, the chickery houseand the rink are actually providing bathroom services

(45:36):
at a low cost. Right atWashington and Britannia where you can actually buy
tickets for you and your loved onesto go to the bathroom, as well
as a beer, food, wonderfulred beans, everything all available at the
Chickery House right on Washington Avenue,right off the parade, right at the
corner of Britannion Washington Avenue. Cleanbathrooms and food and beer and all those

(45:57):
wonderful kingcakes and treats all available theChickery House for every parade night throughout the
carnival season. Just check him outat the at the corner of Washington,
Britannia, the Chickery House for allyour beer and bathroom needs. Well,
folks, we're back in this Chappaheimmak enry, and it's not time for
us to go into our chaplain bya patriotic moment where we just take a

(46:21):
brief moment to remind you of thebiblical foundations of our country, our Judeo
Christian jurisprudence, and today we're goingto talk about none of Then a local,
a famous local father, Abbe Roquette, Adrian Roquette. He was quite
a man. He was born heretwo hundred years ago in the New Orals
area in the French Quarter. Camefor a very prominent wealthy family, Creole

(46:42):
family, and he loved the ChoctawIndians. He got very close to him
at a very young age when hewas like in grammar school or something in
that age, you know, tentwelve, and he was always going to
be with him. He would hangout with him in the French market.
His family owned a lot of landon the north shore, and from their
farms there and everything, he wouldgo join up with their camps and there
where the Indians were. And hejust loved Indians. And believe it or

(47:06):
not, he fell madly in lovewith an Indian princess O'shula, which means
bird singer in Choctaw, and shepassed away. It broke his heart.
He was a young teenager and hebelieved he could never ever ever find another
like O'shula. So he decided thathis only choice was a priesthood. He
wented the priestsood he became a veryfamous priest, and not only that,

(47:27):
he became one of America's greatest literaryfigure who is actually very good friends with
Left Cartier, left Katia Herne,and the Europeans considered him to be the
greatest literary figure America ever produced duringhis day, and he did everything.
He did prose, he did poetry, he did song music. His music
was like today, they'd be inthe top forty. U Jojo Macure was

(47:47):
one of his famous songs. Butnone of us have been translating too English.
It's still in French. And theJudgment of Wisdom collection at two Lane,
the Two Lane Archives. One daywe got to get that train translated,
folks. Anyway, he had ahuge impact. And let me tell
what he thought about America. Hesaid America was the home of liberty,
of freedom, of greatness. Whenhe's coming back on the boat from France,

(48:12):
he'd been there, sent to studyat the Sarbone. When he's coming
back, he's longing for the beautyand the godly foundations of America that he
kept talking about and what it meantto him. You see, he knew
that America was great because America hadbiblical and godly foundations. And he went
on to prove it by becoming agreat missionary to the Choctaw Indians. They
called him chata Ema that means likea Choctawi translated. He and his brother

(48:35):
translated the Bible into the Choctaw language. He had one of the greatest funerals
in this city, with half theChoctaws in America all coming to New Orleans
to be part of it. Theman was an amazing, amazing man,
and his body disappeared. Nobody knowswhat happened to it. It is believed
that it was taken from the graveand brought to the North Shore, where
it was buried with his beloved o'shulaby the Choctaw Indians. Story. Folks,

(49:00):
what an American hero and what aman who knew God. What about
you? Do you know God?Have you come to that place in your
life where you know for certain thatif you die tonight you're going to Heaven?
Father Workcats certainly understood that, andboy he believed it, and he
was a great revival preacher. Folks. This is all it takes. It
takes the faith of a little child. And you get it because it's free.

(49:20):
Always remember it's free. If youtry to pay far to earn it,
you'll never get it. I don'tcare how religious you are, you'll
never get it. You'll never enoughmoney to buy it. So just give
up on all that. That's calledrepentance. When you believe you can't save
yourself. You just repented. Youknow. He does that the best,
the worst sinners, because they knowhow rotten they are. That's why they
were the ones who were the oneswho were the greatest followers of Christ,
and the most followers were the worstsinners because they knew they could never do

(49:42):
it. And Jesus showed them how. It wasn't what they were doing,
it was what he would do,of course, not what he did when
he died on the cross for allof our sins, I mean, all
of the day you're born, theday you die. Your tiniest to your
greatest sins were all washed away withthe precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.
He took care of that love problemand your next love problem, death,
He took care of that when herose from the dead to win for
you his precious free gift of resurrection, everlasting life. If you've never done

(50:07):
this before, folks, you needto stop right now and do it.
Believe with all your heart that Jesusdied for all your sins, was buried
and rose from the dead, Jesuswho's perfect God and perfect man, all
the way God and all the wayman. Never forget him. Believe in
Him, put your hope in yourfaith in Him, and God guarantees you
everlasting life and you'll never see hell. And folks, you know what,

(50:28):
it's now time for us to gointo the results of this kind of thing,
as we now go into our Chaplainbab Bah testimony time. And we
have a great friend of the showwho's here to tell us his father's story.
Christopher, take it away. WhatI want to talk about is the
last minutes of life at Carnival.And what do I mean by that,
Well, three hundred and sixty fivedays ago from when you're hearing the show,

(50:49):
my father died. It was interestingthat he didn't actually die then he
ended up dying in June, buthe was born again in Christ. In
the hospital right at Carnival time,he had a heart attack and he was
full of anxiety, and he'd alwayshad an active faith, but he didn't
display it. And then strange sortof thing happened. He began to actually

(51:13):
think about Christ and he actually hadmoments, but he was holding back in
his last few months of life,having this heart attack the way saying intellectually,
well I believe, of course,but not really feeling it, not
having the faith of a little child. And the reason I tell you this
is because of his last few hourshe was still resistant to surrendering to the

(51:35):
idea of Christ. What I meanby that just simply accepting the joy of
being saved. And then on hisdeathbed, where he's still very conscious,
he had actually told me he didn'twant a lot of what he called nonsense,
a lot of spiritual moments, untilI actually had a priest and a

(51:55):
minister come in and see him.Minister prayed over him, the priest prayed
over him. And my dad wasnot Catholic, he was a Protestant,
but I said, give him lastrites. It can't hurt. Something happened.
My father was full of anxiety.He wasn't afraid of death precisely,
but he was full of anxiety.And suddenly a peace came over him.
And at that point you'd like,oh, okay, well, it's just

(52:19):
a peace. Except as he's dying, he sees little children. He's saying
out loud, little why are allthese children here? And then he says,
I see these angels around me.And to tell you, folks that
my father was the last person onearth who would have said something like this,
gave it, and he died withsuch a peace because in that moment
he truly surrendered himself to Jesus Christ. I'll take a deathbad confession any day

(52:43):
of the year, any night ofthe year, anytime. And by the
way, the scripture says, sufferthe little children to come unto me for
of such as a kingdom of God. That was Jesus in Luke nineteen.
So, folks, the point is, it's never too late. There's never
a sign that you can't say,Jesus, please come into my heart,
amen and focus. Not time forus to close with a mon Saint Martin
singing a creole goodbye and God blessyou all out there. Does this have

(53:08):
to be the end of the nerd? You know? I love you.
In the pam land, I cansee across a million stars and I look
in we can mosey. It's thesun time. I suppose you couldn't call

(53:39):
it a cray if we take justa little little longer to see algou the
calling cREL good