

Kennedy believes Washington is broken

Oct. 12, 2008
John Kennedy is looking to unseat Mary Landreiu as U.S. Senator to Louisiana. The three-term state Treasurer is a former Democrat turned Republican.
John Kennedy is looking to unseat Mary Landreiu as U.S. Senator to Louisiana. The three-term state Treasurer is a former Democrat turned Republican. / Louisiana Gannett News

John Kennedy

Party: Republican

Birthdate: 11-21-1951

Birthplace: Centreville, MS

Residence: Madisonville

Religion: Methodist

Offices held: State Treasurer: elected 1999, re-elected 2003 and re-elected without opposition 2007

Unsuccessful runs: U.S. Senate 2004; State Attorney General 1995

Graduate education: Oxford University, England; BCL degree in civil law

Graduate education: University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA; JD degree in law

Undergraduate education: Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN; BA degree in political science, philosophy and economics


BATON ROUGE -- Armed with a message of change and a new political party that supports him, state Treasurer John Kennedy has set his sights on a big target, incumbent U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu.

Kennedy said he's running because "I think Washington is a mess. It's broken. It's in the ditch. I think they have lost their way. It's probably the people and the culture, both.

"I can't think of a single problem they have solved for the American people -- not the kind of problem that worries moms and dads when they can't sleep at night because they're worried about something. I think I can do better."

With a law degree from the University of Virginia and advanced training at Oxford, he concedes that he misses the money and "the competition in practicing law, but I like government. I figured out early on that this is what I wanted to do and I'll do it as long as the people will have me and it remains fun."

He keeps up with the law by teaching courses at the LSU Law School.

Kennedy switched from the Democratic Party, which he says he seldom agreed with, to the Republican Party Aug. 27, 2007, and on Jan. 14, 2008, waltzed back into the treasurer's office unopposed. He had already started his Senate campaign.

"Party has never been the most important thing in my life," Kennedy said when he announced his change in parties. Although he endorsed John Kerry four years ago, he says the Democratic Party didn't suit him and now says the endorsement was "the biggest mistake of my life."

The Democrats have launched an attack using all the ammunition gathered by the Republican Party four years ago when he ran for the Senate as a Democrat against Sen. David Vitter and was heavily critical of the GOP.

Kennedy called President Bush's tax cuts "nonsense on a stick" and said he was "not an Election Day Democrat."

His campaign tries to work around those charges and responds with attacks on Landrieu. He also works to tie himself to Sen. John McCain and Landrieu to Sen. Barack Obama.

A key element in challenging Landrieu is "I disagree with Sen. Landrieu on the approach to the job. I think she sees being a United States senator as being a money collector" -- bring federal money to the state. "I think it's a lot more than that.

"A United States senator is supposed to lead, they're supposed to have vision and they're supposed to solve problems and they're supposed to establish policy. Yeah, you're supposed to bring money back to your state when there's a need but it's more than being a money collector."

Part of the campaign against Landrieu is that she gets earmarks -- money specified in the budget for particular projects. She's particularly criticized for securing one for a reading program in Washington, D.C., and New Orleans because, shortly afterward, she received a major campaign contribution from the supplier.

Kennedy said he doesn't believe that all earmarks are bad but "the process for all earmarks is bad. They tack them on like Christmas tree ornaments in committee behind closed doors. Nobody knows who offers the earmark. Nobody knows anything about the entity getting it or whether it's an appropriate use of taxpayer money.

"If all of these earmarks are good, how come all these senators won't take credit for them, won't lay claim to them?" he asks. "We need to change the process" and have senators discuss whether they are worthwhile.

Asked about the flood of negative ads, Kennedy said "You have to defend yourself. I went up with my first ad in the middle of August -- a positive ad. Sen. Landrieu had been up sooner than me because she had more money. The day I went up with a positive ad, she went up with a negative ad. You have to defend yourself and that's what I've done."

He estimates that Landrieu has "spent a lot more money attacking me" than he has spent on ads targeting her. "I wish there were no negative ads but you have to defend yourself and I have done that."

Asked about what bothers him the most about Landrieu's and the Democratic Party's ads, Kennedy said "I don't know that 'bother' is the right word. I regret the inaccuracies."

Topping that list are ads that he said "implies that I was implicit" in abuses in the Citizens Insurance program "when I was the whistleblower" and "say that I want to privatize Social Security. Nobody's for that."

Landrieu is critical of Kennedy serving on the board of Citizens Property Insurance Corp. while board members and employees went on junkets and ran up huge tabs for hotels, fishing and golfing trips, food, drink and expensive cigars, but not doing anything about it.

"I did do something," he said. "This was employee abuse of an expense account. The way you catch it is by doing an audit and we caught it by doing an audit."

Kennedy said that despite ads and Landrieu statements to the contrary, he and McCain are not suggesting privatization of Social Security. Instead, he said newcomers to the system should be given the choice of investing their own contributions in the stock market or securities.

The problem with Social Security, he said, is "you go to the lock box and open it up and you've got all these IOUs. Congress keeps borrowing from it."

Kennedy defends his ads proclaiming Landrieu "the most liberal senator in the history of Louisiana," although they do not mention Huey Long, whose Share the Wealth program was considered so liberal it was just short of Communism.

"I don't think we've ever had a United States senator who voted to affirm Roe v Wade three times," he said. "I don't think we've ever had a United States senator who opposed the NRA in the United States Supreme Court over the Heller case in Washington, D.C.," or "endorsed for the presidency of the United States the most liberal member of Congress" or voted "the largest increase in the history of the United States of America."

He also criticized Landrieu's 2001 vote against drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Reserve but acknowledged that she later voted to allow drilling there.

He also is critical of her opposition to producing oil from shale deposits in Colorado and other states, although she says she is for it.

"She voted against it -- twice," Kennedy said. "There's more oil there than the entire Middle East and I just don't know why she opposes it. When I point out that she has, she gets angry, but votes are votes."

Landrieu cast the deciding vote in the Senate Appropriations Committee against an amendment sending the oil shale issue to the Senate floor. In the committee, she said she favored production but believed that a Colorado senator who opposes the move should have been there to vote and he asked her not to allow the move to go forward.

"That's Washington inside ball at the worst," Kennedy said. "That's why people don't like Washington, D.C., and have lost confidence in Congress."

The challenger also questions why Landrieu voted against sending more troops to Iraq "when the surge is working. ... If we would have listened to Sen. Landrieu and Sen. Obama -- they voted to unilaterally withdraw in March of this year -- we would have chosen to lose. That's the kind of judgment, or lack of, that's fair to criticize in the Senate race."

Kennedy also criticizes Landrieu for securing federal money.

"When a group like Taxpayers for Common Sense calls your senior senator the second biggest 'Pork Spender in the United State Senate,' that reflects on Louisiana," he said. "At least in their judgment, our senator is No. 2 in wasting taxpayer money. I consider that a very serious thing. Our taxpayers worked hard for that money."

Asked about the major difference between him and Landrieu, Kennedy said "I think that Sen. Landrieu truly believes that the only problems in America and in Louisiana are those problems that the federal government just isn't spending enough tax money on.

"And I don't believe that. I'm a good enough Methodist to believe that our maker gave us free will and with that free will goes responsibility and there are some problems we have to solve for ourselves. Government can't solve them and government shouldn't try to solve them."

Kennedy said another difference is that he believes in the private sector solving problems and she believes the public sector should. "In almost every case, if government can do it, the private sector can do it better. We just have a different philosophy about the role of the federal government."

"I believe people in American ought to be able to own a gun if they want to, educate their children the way they want to, worship in the way they want to without asking government's permission," he said. "I think Sen. Landrieu would probably support regulation of all of those areas."

Should he lose the race, Kennedy would return to the treasurer's office since he just started his third term. He said he would stay "as long as I enjoy it" and people re-elect him. "I do this because I like it and I do think I can make a contribution."


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