Today's Washington Post profiles Gov. Bobby Jindal and his active response to the Gulf oil spill crisis.
Today's Washington Post profiles Gov. Bobby Jindal and his active response to the Gulf oil spill crisis. The article comes on the heels of a similar Post feature story which contrasted Jindal's hands-on approach to the more laissez faire attitude of neighboring Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (Barbour has likened the spill to a gas sheen coming off ski boats: "We don't wash our face in it, but it doesn't stop us from jumping off the boat to ski,").
Today's Post story frames Jindal as an engaged leader, at his best in times of crisis:
Indeed, in a crisis marked by desperate improvisation -- where the search for solutions has turned to golf balls and top hats -- nobody is matching Jindal's frenetic vigor. Local observers say the oil spill is testing the promise that almost three years ago made this son of Indian immigrants governor: that he could keep his catastrophe-scarred state safe, through good data and hard work.
"He's there because of Katrina, he's there because of the failed response to a disaster, and I think he recognizes that," said Kirby Goidel, a political science professor at Louisiana State University. "He absolutely has sort of over-learned that mistake."
Read the full story here.