Well this day is going great. My car battery died TODAY.

Nevertheless, now I'm at @LouisianaGov's press conference about Hurricane Ida. .@LouisianaGov says there are significant storm surge impacts around Port Fourchon and in Plaquemines Parish. #lalege #lagov

Here's a group of local Louisiana journalists who stayed in the state for Hurricane Ida to provide coverage on the ground during and after the storm. (I am also here in Baton Rouge for the storm.)

Give us a follow for reliable info. #lawx #lalege #ida #hurricaneida These journalists aren't in any particularly order:

@remroc15, @JC_Canicosa, @WesleySMuller, @yawn_meister, @NewsieDave, @DCMonteverde, @harrisongolden, @ArielSalk, @johnstonvon, @ShannonHeckt, @Charles_Lussier, @emily_woodruff_, @AubriRuth, @rc_nelsen ....

.@LouisianaGov has started his afternoon update on Hurricane Ida. You can watch it live here: #lalege #lagov "This is a very strong storm." - @LouisianaGov.

He says winds will be at 140 mph when Hurricane Ida makes landfall.

Almost the entire state is under some type of warning or watch. #lalege #lagov

When Ida meets delta....I've put together a list of the ways Louisiana's delta surge complicates the current hurricane prep and response.

lailluminator.com/2021/08/28/whe… #COVID19 #lawx #lalege #lagov How hurricane response is different because of the #COVID19 delta surge:

➡️Evacuating hospitals is "impossible"
➡️State shelters have fewer beds
➡️Nursing homes can't send fragile patients to hospitals

lailluminator.com/2021/08/28/whe… #lalege #lagov

.@LouisianaGov is starting his press conference on Hurricane Ida (and COVID...and whatever other disaster we are currently having.) #lalege #lagov Today is the one year anniversary of Hurricane Laura and Louisiana is facing another CATEGORY 4 hurricane. #lalege #lagov

It's Friday! Ahead of the storm, here's some non-storm news.....

@remroc15 talked to school districts about the challenges of trying to run school lunchtime (when people can't wear masks) during #COVID19. lailluminator.com/2021/08/27/wha… #lalege #lagov Some of the individuals schools in the UL system shared their student body COVID-19 vaccination rates. (The % of students who have had at least one shot.) Some of this info is based on self-reporting from students. From @JC_Canicosa lailluminator.com/2021/08/27/two… #lalege #laed

FWIW: Some women lawmakers told me that they may see more urgency to fire someone at LSU than @LouisianaGov because they are receiving lots of messages from students/former students who haven't gone public about their bad experiences with certain LSU officials. #lalege When I asked @LouisianaGov why he and the women lawmakers had different opinions on whether more people should be fired at LSU, he essentially said the women lawmakers should name the people they want fired publicly. #lalege

Women in the Louisiana Legislature and @LouisianaGov have had very different reactions to @LSU's domestic/sexual violence scandal.

Women lawmakers want LSU to fire more people over it. @LouisianaGov called LSU's response "reasonable" yesterday. #lalege lailluminator.com/2021/04/09/lou… It's not necessarily new that women lawmakers and @LouisianaGov are having different reactions to LSU's scandal, but it was really apparent yesterday because Edwards and the women spoke publicly about it.

Here's some of what I'm talking about....

.@LouisianaGov has started his weekly press conference.

He is going to go over his legislative package, which can be found here: gov.louisiana.gov/index.cfm/news… .@LouisianaGov is reporting 15 deaths today in Louisiana due to #COVID19. He says he hopes he is getting close to a day when he gets to report no deaths. #lalege #lagov

Sen. Beth Mizell raises concerns about whether the search for LSU president will transparent.

The process -- when @BobbyJindal was in office -- to hire King Alexander was not transparent, to say the least. #lalege Also worth noting that LSU seems to be relatively far away from hiring a permanent president. King Alexander left in December of 2019. LSU looks like its going to be without a permanent president for at least 18 months. #lalege #lagov

There's a lot of new information that is disturbing and upsetting in this most recent @USATODAY story from @kennyjacoby about @LSUathletic.

If you thought the allegations couldn't get worse, they can and they did.....

usatoday.com/in-depth/news/… Sharon Lewis, from LSU Athletics, said when she tried to push back against Les Miles' demands that she fire Black female student workers and replace them with blond (and white) student workers or "lighter skinned" Black female student workers....she was punished. #lalege

Rep. @RayGarofalo is the head of the Louisiana House Ed Committee. He filed a bill to block teaching and training about systemic racism and sexism in K-12 schools and universities.

.@LSU told @JC_Canicosa that it had "no comment" on the bill yesterday. lailluminator.com/2021/04/06/lou… LSU's comment is interesting, in part because @RayGarofalo may have filed a bill after LSU hosted a panel discussion on "White Rage" -- which he complained about.

The bill might also make it harder for LSU to respond to its sexual violence scandal, advocates said. #lalege

In light of the @USATODAY reporting on sexual misconduct/domestic violence allegations within LSU's football team, I decided to ask what type of preventative training was being done in LSU athletics. Here are some of the highlights of what I found... lailluminator.com/2021/02/08/lsu… From 2016-2020, the bulk of LSU Athletics' sexual misconduct prevention training was provided PFA Consulting, a group owned by former Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe. During this same time, nine members of the football team were accused of sexual misconduct/domestic violence.

One Breaux Bridge pharmacy tells me they had already signed up 70 people to get their 100 doses of vaccine by the end of last week and filled up the other 30 slots this morning. On top of that, they have 100 additional voicemails from people seeking the vaccine. #lalege #lagov The pharmacy is going to spend all day today scheduling appointments with the people on their list...and tomorrow and Wednesday they will actually administer the shots. Again, there's only 10k doses at pharmacies and 480k people ages 70 and over just became eligible. #lalege

Today, commercial pharmacies in Louisiana are expected to get 1000s of #COVID19 vaccine doses for the first time. Also, this week is the 1st time lots of ppl who aren't health care workers/institution residents are eligible to receive the vaccine. #lalege lailluminator.com/2021/01/04/7-t… I've put together a list of things you should know about Louisiana's vaccine distribution at the moment. You can find it here. lailluminator.com/2021/01/04/7-t… #lalege #lagov

To accommodate social distancing, they've also stuck voting machines in hallways in the coliseum....They aren't just on the main arena floor. Last week, election officials told there would be about 100 machines in the building. #laelex This is kind of nice. Every time there's a new voter, an election official yells "FIRST TIME VOTER!" and everyone cheers. #laelex

NEW PODCAST: I interviewed @Louisiana_sos (who oversees the state's elections) about what to expect on election day tomorrow. lailluminator.com/podcast/what-t… #lalege #lagov .@Louisiana_sos says he expects voter turnout overall to be around 70 percent which he characterized as being "about the norm" for a presidential election. The 2016 presidential election turnout was about 68 percent. #lalege #lagov

I'll get off this @LSUfootball stuff after this last comment.

My concern is that one of the most powerful institutions in the state (LSU) hasn't been honest or transparent about what's happening with #COVID19 when it was in their best interest not to be honest about it. It's not really about whether players should be playing football or not. It's about the fact that @LSU is making a lot of decisions right now that could potentially affect the health of hundreds of thousands of people in our state.

Today, I had an extended interview with St. Louis County Executive @DrSamPage about the region's response to the #coronavirus. You can listen to it on the Politically Speaking podcast feed through your iPhone/Android...OR by going to this link. news.stlpublicradio.org/post/political… In the interview, @DrSamPage started off saying one of the biggest challenges in containing the #coronavirus is the lack of widespread testing.

"The news of the day really is we don't have enough testing. ...It completely changes how we approach this public health emergency."

A little bit of an update on my personal #coronavirus situation....

My spouse got tested this afternoon at @FollowMercy in St. Louis County. We were told they would tell us the result of the test in 48 hours. This morning, the City of St. Louis health department called us and said that we might qualify for testing because the federal government now deems people who have traveled to France to be high-risk. We were in France last week for our honeymoon.

So here's my personal #coronavirus story....

My spouse and I got back from our honeymoon in Paris yesterday. This morning, my spouse woke up with a mild fever. We decided to call his doctor and the city health department to notify them since we had been overseas. Under normal circumstances, we wouldn't have taken my spouse to the doctor for this mild illness. But of course, we don't want to be spreading #COVID19. My spouse is also on an immunosuppressant so I wanted to make sure he was ok. He is a "high risk" person.