Yesterday, in Butler, Missouri (via Joe.My.God. and Think Progress):

Representative Vicky Hartzler (r): Okay, first of all, are you guys with the Democrats or the Republicans?

Question: So, the, the, uh, two thousand four amendment [crosstalk]…

Representative Hartzler (r): Am I gonna see you next year?

Question: Well, you will when you come to Columbia. [crosstalk]

Representative Hartzler (r): I know. I just wondered, are you friendly or are you not?

Question: Well. [second voice: “We’re friends [inaudible]…”]

Representative Hartzler (r): Oh, no. Okay. All right.

Question: The two thousand four amendment to ban same-sex marriage…

Representative Hartzler (r): Oh, I’m so, I can’t believe you asked me that. I just… [inaudible] [crosstalk]

Question: Well, it’s a a cause, it’s a cause of yours.

Representative Hartzler (r): So, so, sorry.

Question: So, that in, in combination with the statement [crosstalk] you made, uh, earlier this month where you said [inaudible] incest and bestiality. How do you think [crosstalk]…?

Third party: Are you, are you taking pictures, video?

Person on camera: Yeah, sure.

Third party: Okay.

Representative Hartzler (r): No, you misunder, that was a mis, a misunderstanding [crosstalk] of the quote.

Question: Okay, well [crosstalk] Okay. Amendment.

Representative Hartzler (r): Certainly on that, so. [crosstalk] That was really taken out of context.

Question: So, how do you think the, the amendment? [inaudible] How do you think that makes people, young people, like me, who are gay feel about ourselves, to come up in to a society that, to us seems like doesn’t value us in the same way straight people are valued?

Representative Hartzler (r): We’re not, we’re not the ones changing the policy. [inaudible] So you shouldn’t feel bad at all. In two thousand [crosstalk]…

Question: Why shouldn’t I feel bad if there’s an amendment, you champion [inaudible crosstalk] an amendment prohibiting me from…

Representative Hartzler (r): [inaudible] Right now it has been the law of the land for a long time that marriage is a [inaudible] commitment between a man and a woman. All we did in two thousand four is just put that in the Constitution. So we’re not changing policy at all. And, and anyway, so you shouldn’t feel bad, anyway. [crosstalk] It’s nice to meet you guys.

Question: So, you don’t think I should feel bad at all?

“…I know. I just wondered, are you friendly or are you not?…”

Interesting, not all town halls are going to be like the annual “clap louder” convocations of the Chamber of People’s Deputies. On occasion someone’s gonna slip in and ask a question.

Recently:

Are teh gay really so icky, Vicky? (March 24, 2011)

Representative Vicky Hartzler (r) on DADT: it’s all about the plumbing (April 1, 2011)

Rep. Vicky Hartzler (r): teh gay are so icky (June 5, 2011)

Rep. Vicky Hartzler (r): stop being mean by quoting what I said (June 8, 2011)

Today, at the Missouri Ethics Commission:

C091068 06/29/2011 HOUSE REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE INC Realtors PAC-MO PO Box 30635 Columbia MO 65205 6/28/2011 $15,000.00

[emphasis added]

You think the Realtors know how the HRCC spends its money? Just asking.

C031159 06/29/2011 MISSOURIANS FOR KOSTER Eastern Missouri Laborers’ Educational and Benevolent Fund 3450 Hollenberg Dr Bridgeton MO 63044 6/29/2011 $8,000.00

C031159 06/29/2011 MISSOURIANS FOR KOSTER NovaSys Health P.O. Box 25230 Little Rock AK 72221 6/29/2011 $10,000.00

C031159 06/29/2011 MISSOURIANS FOR KOSTER Cenpatico Behavioral Health, LLC 7711 Carondelet Suite 800 Saint Louis MO 63105 6/29/2011 $10,000.00

C031159 06/29/2011 MISSOURIANS FOR KOSTER Laborers Local Union #264 PAC 1101 E 87th St Suite 103 Kansas City MO 64131 6/29/2011 $2,500.00

C031159 06/29/2011 MISSOURIANS FOR KOSTER Heavy Construction Laborers’ Local Union #663 PAC 7820 Prospect Ave Kansas City MO 64132 6/29/2011 $1,500.00

C031159 06/29/2011 MISSOURIANS FOR KOSTER Western Missouri & Kansas Laborers’ District Council PAC 1101 E. 87th St. Suite 100 Kansas City MO 64131 6/29/2011 $2,000.00

C031159 06/29/2011 MISSOURIANS FOR KOSTER Bridgeway Health Solutions Arizona, LLC 7711 Carondelet Suite 800 Saint Louis MO 63105 6/29/2011 $5,000.00

[emphasis added]

The Attorney General (D) continues to do very well.

C001135 06/29/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Gary Robb 5500 Ward Parkway Kansas City MO 64113 Robb & Robb LLC Attorney 6/28/2011 $6,250.00

C001135 06/29/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Anita Robb 5500 Ward Parkway Kansas City MO 64113 Robb & Robb LLC Attorney 6/28/2011 $6,250.00

C001135 06/29/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI K & M Enterprises LLC 1200 Main St Ste 3900 Kansas City MO 64105 6/28/2011 $6,250.00

C001135 06/29/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Robb & Robb LLC 1200 Main St Ste 3900 Kansas City MO 64105 6/28/2011 $6,250.00

[emphasis added]

You think these folks know each other? There’s more for Governor Nixon (D):

C001135 06/29/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Husch Blackwell Political Action Committee 4801 Main Ste 1000 Kansas City MO 64112 6/28/2011 $5,000.00

C001135 06/29/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI MHS Trust DTD 222 S. Central Ave Ste 506 Saint Louis MO 63105 6/28/2011 $5,000.00

C001135 06/29/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI MOSFA PAC INC 221 Bolivar St Suite 300 Jefferson City MO 65101 6/28/2011 $1,500.00

[emphasis added]

That’s a total of $36,500.00 for the governor’s reelection campaign today.

In The Hill:

New Member of the Week: Rep. Hartzler sees God’s plan in politics

By Ramsey Cox – 05/16/11 06:19 AM ET

….According to the Environmental Working Group, Hartzler and her husband received around $775,000 in federal farm subsidies during the last 15 years.

“We do participate in the government programs, like probably 95 percent of farmers do,” Hartzler said. “People who aren’t familiar with the agriculture industry, you know, try and make that look like something exceptional….”

[emphasis added]

From the Environmental Working Group:

Farms Getting Government Payments, By State, according to the 2007 USDA Census of Agriculture

State/Number of Farms/Number of Farms Receiving Government Subsidies/Percent Receiving Government Subsidies

United States 2,204,792 838,391 38.0%

Missouri 107,825 45,102 41.8%

[emphasis added]

That’s some misunderestimate for someone familiar with the agriculture industry.

Sounding like a broken record, today, at the Missouri Ethics Commission:

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Centene Management Company LLC 7711 Carondelet Ave Saint Louis MO 63105 6/26/2011 $20,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Thomas Green 1830 Craig Park Court Saint Louis MO 63146 Law Offices of Thomas R. Green Attorney 6/26/2011 $5,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Liberty Mutual Insurance Co Political Action Committee 175 Berkeley Street Boston MA 02117 6/26/2011 $2,500.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Missouri Insurance Coalition PAC 220 Madison Street Third Floor Jefferson City MO 65101 6/26/2011 $2,500.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI FEAPAC of Missouri 11880 College Blvd. Ste 120 Overland Park KS 66210 6/26/2011 $2,500.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI The Travelers Indemnity Company One Tower Square Hartford CT 06183 6/26/2011 $2,500.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI S.V. Associates Partnership 1830 Craig Park Ct. #101 Saint Louis MO 63146 6/26/2011 $2,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Cottonwood Properties 1830 Craig Park Ct. #101 Saint Louis MO 63146 6/26/2011 $2,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI American Family Insurance Missouri Political Action Committee 4802 Mitchell Avenue Saint Joseph MO 64507 6/26/2011 $1,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Shaffer Lombardo Shurin 911 Main Suite 2000 Kansas City MO 64105 6/27/2011 $25,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI MOSFA PAC INC 221 Bolivar St Suite 300 Jefferson City MO 65101 6/27/2011 $5,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Fred Pryor One Briar Point Dr. Kansas City MO 64116 Retired Retired 6/27/2011 $2,500.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Charles Garney 4200 N Hickory Lane Kansas City MO 64116 Briarcliff Development CEO 6/27/2011 $2,500.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Kimberly Almalech 20875 Saratoga Hills Rd Saratoga CA 95070 None Homemaker 6/27/2011 $1,500.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Fox & Vuylsteke LLP 110 East Lockwood Avenue Ste 150 Webster Groves MO 63119 6/27/2011 $1,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Diana Chancellor 17512 Summit View Place Rdg Glencoe MO 63038 None Homemaker 6/27/2011 $1,000.00

C001135 06/28/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI The Driscoll Firm PC 211 N. Broadway Suite 2440 Saint Louis MO 63102 6/27/2011 $1,000.00

That’s a total of $79,000.00 for today.

Previously:

Campaign Finance: another big dollar day for Governor Jay Nixon (D) (June 28, 2011)

Campaign Finance: The Governor (D) is on a roll… (June 25, 2011)

Campaign Finance: a gubernatorial fundraising ping pong match (June 24, 2011)

Campaign Finance: The Governor (D) Strikes Back, part 2 (June 22, 2011)

Campaign Finance: The Governor (D) Strikes Back (June 21, 2011)

No.

On a vehicle in west central Missouri, obviously one of the 27 percent.

It has to be someone with a really short attention span.

Yesterday, at the Missouri Ethics Commission:

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Strong Garner Bauer PC 415 East Chestnut Expressway Springfield MO 65802 6/25/2011 $50,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Stephen Gorny 5519 E Mission Drive Mission Hills KS 66208 Bartimus Frickleton Robertson & Gorny Attorney 6/25/2011 $30,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI James Frickleton 3012 W 117th St. Leawood KS 66211 Bartimus Frickleton Robertson & Gorny Attorney 6/25/2011 $25,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI James Bartimus 11150 Overbrook Rd Ste 200 Leawood KS 66211 Bartimus Frickleton Robertson & Gorny Attorney 6/25/2011 $25,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Zevan & Davidson Law Firm 1 North Taylor Avenue Saint Louis MO 63108 6/25/2011 $25,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Dollar, Burns, & Becker, LC 1100 Main Street Suite 2600 Kansas City MO 64105 6/25/2011 $25,000.00

[emphasis added]

That’s $180,000.00 in big dollar contributions. But wait, there’s more:

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI The Benson Law Firm LLC 111 S. Baltimore PO Box 219 Kirksville MO 63501 6/25/2011 $5,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI John Larsen Jr 1108 Olive Street 4th Floor Saint Louis MO 63101 Larsen, Feist & Hess, PC Attorney 6/25/2011 $2,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Andrew O Brien 7101 Westmoreland Drive Saint Louis MO 63130 O’Brien Law Firm Attorney 6/25/2011 $2,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI The Padberg & Corrigan Law Firm 1926 Chouteau Ave Saint Louis MO 63103 6/25/2011 $2,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI The Law Offices of PalmerOliver PC 205 Park Central E. Ste 511 Springfield MO 65806 6/25/2011 $1,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI John Boyd 612 NE Seabrook Court Lees Summit MO 64064 Boyd & Kenter, PC Attorney 6/25/2011 $1,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI John Cook 715 N Clark Cape Girardeau MO 63701 Cook, Barkett, Ponder & Wolz Attorney 6/25/2011 $1,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI Michael Feist 3225 HWY. 13 W Harrisburg IL 62946 Larsen, Feist & Hess, PC Attorney 6/25/2011 $1,000.00

C001135 06/27/2011 JAY NIXON FOR MISSOURI C H Parsons Jr PO Box 428 Dexter MO 63841 Parsons & Wilson Attorney 6/25/2011 $1,000.00

[emphasis added]

Did you ever think we’d see the day when a four figure contribution wasn’t that big a deal? Me neither.

By the way, that’s a total of $196,000.00 in one day.

Representative Michele Bachmann (r).

None of the others even come close.

Representative Michelle Bachmann (r): …But what I want them to know is, just like John Wayne was from Waterloo, Iowa, that’s the kind of spirit that I have, too…  

John Wayne was born Marion Robert Morrison in Winterset, Iowa, in 1907.

[emphasis added]

The republican governing philosophy makes a whole lot more sense now, in a Jonathan Swift non-ironic sort of way:

Michele Bachmann promises to be a clown and kill teenagers

Posted on: June 27, 2011 4:09 PM, by Greg Laden

…And she still doesn’t know where anything is…

Michele Bachmann promised, in an interview associated with her announcement to run for President of the United States (POTUS) and Effective Leader of the Free World (ELFW), that she would become a professional clown and murder dozens of teenage boys and young men.

Or, perhaps, she is just confused…

The big one in the batch was Citizens United [pdf]. This continues the corporate free speech atrocities, as today the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Arizona’s longstanding public campaign financing law, 5-4:

…ROBERTS, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which SCALIA, KENNEDY, THOMAS, and ALITO, JJ., joined. KAGAN, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which GINSBURG, BREYER, and SOTOMAYOR, JJ., joined…

ARIZONA FREE ENTERPRISE CLUB’S FREEDOM CLUB PAC ET AL. v. BENNETT, SECRETARY OF STATE OF ARIZONA, ET AL. No. 10-238. (2011) [pdf]

Under Arizona law, candidates for state office who accept public financing can receive additional money from he State in direct response to the campaign activities of privately financed candidates and independent expenditure groups. Once a set spending limit is exceeded, a publicly financed candidate receives roughly one dollar for every dollar spent by an opposing privately financed candidate. The publicly financed candidate also receives roughly one dollar for every dollar spent by independent expenditure groups to support the privately financed candidate, or to oppose the publicly financed candidate.

We hold that Arizona’s matching funds scheme substantially burdens protected political speech without serving a compelling state interest and therefore violates the First Amendment….

Because the compelling state interest, in the opinion of the court, must be that anonymous corporate money trumps everything.

From Justice Kagan’s dissent:

….The First Amendment’s core purpose is to foster a healthy, vibrant political system full of robust discussion and debate. Nothing in Arizona’s anti-corruption statute, the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Act, violates this constitutional protection. To the contrary, the Act promotes the values underlying both the First Amendment and our entire Constitution by enhancing the “opportunity for free political discussion to the end that government may be responsive to the will of the people.” Id., at 269 (internal quotation marks omitted). I therefore respectfully dissent….

….Indeed, what petitioners demand is essentially a right to quash others’ speech through the prohibition of a (universally available) subsidy program. Petitioners are able to convey their ideas without public financing-and they would prefer the field to themselves, so that they can speak free from response. To attain that goal, they ask this Court to prevent Arizona from funding electoral speech-even though that assistance is offered to every state candidate, on the same (entirely unobjectionable) basis. And this Court gladly obliges….

….Most important, and as just suggested, the very notion that additional speech constitutes a “burden” is odd and unsettling. Here is a simple fact: Arizona imposes nothing remotely resembling a coercive penalty on privately funded candidates. The State does not jail them, fine them, or subject them to any kind of lesser disability. (So the majority’s analogies to a fine on speech, ante, at 19, 28, are inapposite.) The only “burden” in this case comes from the grant of a subsidy to another person, and the opportunity that subsidy allows for responsive speech. But that means the majority cannot get out from under our subsidy precedents. Once again: We have never, not once, understood a viewpoint-neutral subsidy given to one speaker to constitute a First Amendment burden on another. (And that is so even when the subsidy is not open to all, as it is here.) Yet in this case, the majority says that the prospect of more speech-responsive speech, competitive speech, the kind of speech that drives public debate-counts as a constitutional injury. That concept, for all the reasons previously given, is “wholly foreign to the First Amendment.” Buckley, 424 U. S., at 49….

[emphasis added]

The motto of the “balls and strikes” Roberts Court: Them that has the gold, makes the rules.

Previously:

Those who have the gold get to rule (June 10, 2010)

HB 1201 in Jefferson City: public campaign financing (April 5, 2009)

Missouri campaign finance legislation: same planet, different worlds (February 14, 2008)

Union workers at Missouri American Water Company are holding out against the contract the company is trying to force on them. Actually, “contract” is too generous a description of it. It’s more like a caricature of a contract. A burlesque. A sick parody that offers a two percent raise, coupled with a 50 percent rise in health care premiums and deep cuts in services. Oh and by the way, there’s a clause in there that destroys the union, granting the company the right to outsource whichever jobs it jolly well decides to.

The workers have demonstrated in front of the company headquarters and most Saturdays they show up in front of the home of one or another of the company executives for informational pickets. A week ago Saturday, I visited with a dozen or so brave, persistent souls who were standing on the sidewalk in front of the Webster Groves home of the company’s Human Resources Manager, Ann Simmons. One of the workers, Jim Wheaton, told me that a man had passed them a few minutes before I arrived and had said that he sympathized with their need to fight back but that they were out of line to picket particular execs at home. Blink. How dare they embarrass a woman who has sat in contract negotiations and supported taking their union away from them? How loutish, how uncivil, how unrefined of the workers to publicly scold Ms. Simmons. After Wheaton remembered to close his mouth, he asked the passerby if the man had a better solution. “Well no.”

Jim and Cheryl Wheaton

I do. I have a better solution. These twelve brave souls need to show up at Ms. Simmons’ home next Saturday with an additional 200 people. Or better yet, 500. They need to make sure that the media know they’ll have hundreds of workers  blocking the sidewalk all up and down both sides of that quiet little neighborhood. Every week. They need media attention. Now, while Americans are pissed off at the attacks on worker rights, NOW is the time to make a very public spectacle of what Missouri American Water is trying to pull.

“Oh really,” those twelve dogged picketers say. And how do you propose we conjure up those other 500 bodies? We’ve misplaced our wands.

No wands required. It’s as simple–and as daunting–as forming a metro wide alliance of progressive groups–not just Missouri American Water workers, but NEA and AFT teachers, UAW guys and Teamsters, plus all those people who belong to liberal entities like Jobs with Justice, Pro-Vote, Alliance for Retired Americans, Coalition for the Environment, Sierra Club, Women’s Voices Raised for Social Justice, Young Democrats and Show Me No Hate. It’s the “You get my back and I’ll get yours” philosophy. And I can even tell you who is proposing to act on that idea. Missouri Progressive Action Group (MOPAG) is touching bases with all the stakeholders I just named and many more and inviting them to a conference where such an alliance might be formed.

Let me offer an example of what such an alliance could achieve. Last month, when I was in Cheyenne for a couple of weeks, I needed a haircut. I was explaining to the hairdresser, a gay man named Joe Corrigan, what MOPAG is about and he told me that Wyoming, a very red state, has a statewide progressive alliance. He said it was so effective that it managed to stop every one of the anti-gay bills introduced in the legislature. When one of the bills was being discussed in committee, Corrigan told me, a burly construction worker got up and told the committee members that the bill under consideration was immoral. “It’s wrong and unamerican to target people just because they’re gay,” he said. Joe said that testimony was so much more effective than if a gay hairdresser had spoken. I asked why the guy had done it. “Why? he said in disbelief. “Because. He’s union. He’s in the alliance!”

Missouri progressives already do a lot of good coordinating, of course. Unions working with progressive groups managed to stop dead every one of the anti-worker bills in the last legislative session. Pro-Vote has had an alliance for years, and now they have a new executive director, Matt Patterson, who is working to breathe more life into it. But a more encompassing vision might accomplish even more. It might, for example turn a couple of hundred people out in front of Ann Simmons’ home in Websters Groves on a regular basis. It might instill the fear in badly behaved St. Louis corporations of facing a unified front from working people.

An alliance like that could target one or several Republican held seats and put a lot of boots on the ground to shove out of power a few those legislators who hate public schools, poor people, puppies and pensions for working people. A professional researcher and pollster, a lifelong Democrat, has offered MOPAG her services free to help us design and do a poll in whichever area we choose to target.

MOPAG’s next meeting is this Saturday at the St.Louis County Headquarters On Lindbergh at 12:30 p.m. If you’re a St. Louisan who wants to take action instead of kvetching about the sorry state of affairs, be there. Or call Rea (314-727-7374) and ask to be added to the MOPAG listserv. But if you join, do it knowing that sometime soon you’ll be asked to do something.  

There’s an interesting footnote (the second) in Justice Alito’s concurrence to Justice Scalia’s opinion in BROWN v. ENTERTAINMENT MERCHANTS ASSN. (No. 08-1448) 556 F. 3d 950, affirmed. (2011) overturning California’s ban on selling or renting violent video games to minors:  

…Under the California law, a game that meets the threshold requirement set out in text also qualifies as “violent” if it “[e]nables the player to virtually inflict serious injury upon images of human beings or characters with substantially human characteristics in a manner which is especially heinous, cruel, or depraved in that it involves torture or serious physical abuse to the victim.” §1746(d)(1)(B). In the Court of Appeals, California conceded that this alternative definition is unconstitutional, 556 F. 3d 950, 954, n. 5 (CA9 2009), and therefore only the requirements set out in text are now before us….

Why should our video games be any different than our society?

Poll finds lack of support for ‘torture’ investigations

updated 3:16 p.m. EDT, Wed May 6, 2009

“…Roughly one in five Americans believe those techniques were torture but nonetheless approve of the decision to use those procedures against suspected terrorists,” CNN Polling Director Keating Holland said. “That goes a long way toward explaining why a majority don’t want to see former Bush officials investigated…”

Washington Post-ABC News Poll

This Washington Post-ABC News poll was conducted by telephone April 21-24, 2009, among a random national sample of 1,072 adults using both conventional and cellular phones…The results from the full survey have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points…

…30. Obama has said that under his administration the United States will not use torture as part of the U.S. campaign against terrorism, no matter what the circumstance. Do you support this position not to use torture, or do you think there are cases in which the United States should consider torture against terrorism suspects?

4/24/09

Support not using torture – 49%

There are cases to consider torture – 48%

No opinion – 2%

1/16/09

Support not using torture – 58%

There are cases to consider torture – 40%

No opinion – 2%

Do you think the undecideds work in the video game industry?

Previously: A Small Clique Of Legal Extremists… (February 24, 2008)