It’s not until next Septermber when we have the primary election for David Vitter’s US Senate seat here in Louisiana, and already the campaign is starting to heat up.  Whoopee, that means we’re in for a full year of those tantalizing negative campaign ads! We have one candidate painting his opponent as a child-molsting Nazi. Meanwhile, the other casts his opponent as a wife-beating Osama bin Laden hell-bent on selling the country down the river for a couple of rocket launchers.  And if there happens to be a runoff, we get extra innings! At least it is good for the cash-strapped advertising budgets of the media outlets, if anything.

Louisiana is considered a red state, which means that a significant percentage of the voters are rednecks.  This fact has a significant bearing on campaign strategy.  To be successful, the candidates must direct thier appeals to this constituency, so look for campaign slogans to appear on cans of Busch beer, packages of smokeless tobacco, boxes of shotgun shells, and country music CD’s.  There will also be the compulsory whistle-stop tours of honky-tonk bars throughout the state.  Tee shirt advertising works well too, as long as it is camouflage-colored or has the candidate’s name accompanied by a picture of a fish or game animal.

By contrast, my native state of Maryland is considered a blue state.  It is called that because a lot of people there are constantly depressed.  There, the strategy is more to get your views out by advertising on the TV and radio talk shows.  A lot of people in the blue states tune into these, which explains to a large degree why they are so depressed.  Since they spend so much time at home alone with their TV’s and radios, tee shirt advertising doesn’t work well in those states.

That all being said, let me introduce the two major candidates who will face off in this slanderous duel. The incumbent is David Vitter.  He is best known for admitting that he had sinned after his name turned up in a D.C. Madam’s little black book.  I still don’t understand how being a sinner makes a U.S Senator stand out from among his colleagues. We’ll see if it becomes a factor in the campaign.  If anything, it could sway the Bubba vote in his favor.  Being on a high-class call girl’s A-list is the stuff of dreams for rednecks.

  His opponent is Congressman Charlie Melancon. Mr. Melancon’s chief claim to fame, as far as I can tell, is that he took a trip on the taxpayer’s dime to go to the South Pole for a New Year’s Eve Party.  He claims he went there to study climate change, but that doesn’t add up for me.  After all, the climate changes a lot more right here in Louisiana than it does on the South Pole.   I don’t think the trip will score Charlie many points with the Bubbas of the state.  Maybe if he’d brought some ice back with him to chill down their beers it could have helped.  At least they’d have been satisfied their tax money went for something useful.

So, I give the early edge to Vitter in this one, but there’s still time.  Charlie could pull a rabbit out of his hat by getting arrested speeding in his bass boat drunk with double the legal limit in his ice chest, blaring Hank Williams Jr. so loud thast every game warden in the parish could hear him.  That would be a very hard act for Vitter to top.