Senator Kit Bond seems to be waxing nostalgic about the good old days of the Republican ascendancy when nobody in congress really had to work because the lobbyists did it for them (remember Cheney’s energy bill?). He had this to say about House climate change legislation:
The American people and my Missouri constituents deserve to know why it takes 1,427 pages to address energy issues. What needles are the Majority trying to hide in this haystack?
Who’d ever guess that legislating climate change solutions might be complicated? Clearly not Senator Bond whose ideal seems to be the slim, alternative budget Republicans presented this spring, which, according to Ezra Klein:
… reads like what would happen if The Onion put together a budget. “Area Man Releases Proposal for 2010 Federal Spending Priorities.”
You might be inclined, though, to cut our erstwhile King of Pork a little slack, and point out that he isn’t just accusing the Democrats of putting some real effort into trying to deal effectively with a complex legislative issue, but of cutting closed-door deals, and various unnamed acts of corruption. So my question is just why didn’t Senator Bond object when lobbyists were writing Republican legislation during the Bush years?
Or maybe the real issue, since Bond evokes his constituents in Missouri, is that he just doesn’t think that Missourians are smart enough to handle a little complexity — they have repeatedly elected him to office after all.
“Or maybe the real issue, since Bond evokes his constituents in Missouri, is that Bond just doesn’t think that Missourians are smart enough to handle a little complexity”
On that be would be right!
I grew up in this beautiful state, but the people…ugh!
Go to a Walmart in Farmington or Fredericktown and you will see Missouri…overweight, downsized, Christian, racist, homophobic, Republican, undereducated and hypnotized consumers who fancy themselves, bikers, cowboys and ranchers.
Go to a tavern in any rural town and say just one word, Obama, and listen to what you hear…a tirade of racial epithets and curses. That’s Missouri.
The growth industries in rural Missouri are payday loans, bail bondsmen, used car lots and churches. But there maybe an upside. This economic downturn could spur our fellow residents to start thinking about my two favorite words, PEACE and JUSTICE!
I knocked on a lot of doors in Warrensburg last year.
Of course, I ran into the racists and fundamental Christians who hate Obama.
Yet, you would be surprised by people with the same background were proud to be for Obama.
I was at a local festival in town in my county. The guy selling the funnel cakes was from Springfield. I went to buy one wearing an Obama t-shirt. He came over the Democratic tent we had set up and talked about how he lost contact with family members because of his open support for Obama.
McCaskill showed us we must not give up on outstate Missouri. We may never win it, but we can increase our vote. The poor know Republicans don’t care about them.