By RANDY McCLAIN Capitol news bureau
The League of Women Voters staged a lunch-time debate about this fall's elections Thursday, but other issues took a back seat to a heated discussion about Gov. Mike Foster's relationship with the racially divisive David Duke.
"Do we want the governor of Louisiana giving $150,000 to a racist and a Nazi?," asked Trey Ourso, executive director of the Louisiana Democratic Party. "The governor has no problem calling his political opponents slime-balls, nut-cakes and vigilantes, but when it comes to denouncing David Duke the silence is deafening."
Ourso was one of two invited speakers for the league's luncheon, which was designed to spur voter interest in the governor's race and other elections this fall.
It was held three hours before the state Board of Ethics fined Foster $20,000 for two instances of failing to report campaign payments to Duke in connection with the purchase of a political mailing list in 1995 and 1996.
Metro Councilman Mike Tassin, secretary of the state Republican Party, spoke on behalf of Foster at the league's luncheon. Foster's chief of staff Steve Perry, who attended as a spectator, rose on several occasions to defend Foster as well.
After the lunch, Perry said he doubts revelations about Foster paying $152,000 for a mailing list of Duke supporters will hurt the governor's re-election bid or overshadow the good the administration has done.
"Gov. Foster has been all about helping people overcome poverty. It's not at all about race," Perry said in an interview after Ourso blasted the governor's political ties to Duke, a former Ku Klux Klan leader.
Tassin said Foster doesn't have a prejudiced bone in his body. "I hear people saying that maybe Mike Foster is a racist or something. But Mike Foster has done more than any other governor I can think of to promote racial harmony," Tassin said.
Ourso questioned Foster's interest in racial harmony. "The governor wiped out affirmative action programs the minute he took office (in 1996), he has referred to the city of New Orleans as a jungle, he paid David Duke $150,000 for a mailing list and then he hid it," Ourso said. "I don't know how that leads to racial harmony." Perry said Foster did away with "minority set-aside programs" when he took office in 1996 because 90 percent of the money "was going to white women" and very little was going to the black business community. At the time, Foster gave a different reason. He said affirmative action aggravates racial divisions by giving one race preference over another. Ourso praised Texas Gov. George W. Bush, who attended a fund-raiser for Foster this week, for denouncing Duke. Ourso said he wishes Foster would do the same. Tassin countered by saying Foster has never supported Duke's views on race or "his fascist policies." Tassin said, "We (the Republican Party) just happen to be stuck with him." Ourso said he believes the Duke-Foster connection will be one of several key issues in this fall's governor's race.
Stephanie Anthony
P.O. Box 337
Baton Rouge, LA 70805
http://www.angelfire.comla2/LaDemocracy/
stephanieanthony@yahoo.com
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