LOUISIANA: Party Pooper

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"The most important things in life have nothing to do with party," said Louisiana Governor Buddy Roemer last week after abandoning the Democrats for the G.O.P. The move could save his political neck in a three-way re-election race next fall against Republican State Representative David Duke, an ex-Ku Klux Klan leader, and former Governor Edwin Edwards.

The White House encouraged the switch of the Harvard-educated Roemer, 48, who was known as a fiscal conservative and social moderate while serving in Congress from 1980 to 1988. But the change by no means assures his victory, even though white supremacist Duke has been disavowed by the Republican , leadership and the flamboyant Edwards was paraded before the public in the course of two corruption trials that ended in acquittal. In Louisiana politics, being a scoundrel is not necessarily a liability.