Today, via Twitter:

Rep. Vicky Hartzler ‏@RepHartzler

N. Korea spits in our eye again with its nuclear test and our country toys with cutting our defense?! We must totally replace #sequester. 5:04 AM – 12 Feb 13

While Representative Hartzler (r) did not vote for the sequester deal, a whole bunch of republicans (the majority voting for it) did. Speaker John Boehner (r) at the time:

Boehner: I got ’98 percent’ of what I wanted in debt deal

By Daniel Strauss – 08/02/11 07:27 AM ET

“….When you look at this final agreement that we came to with the White House, I got 98 percent of what I wanted. I’m pretty happy,” Boehner said in an interview with CBS News….

….The measure passed the House Monday 269-161, with 174 Republicans backing the bill. Sixty-six Republicans voted against the plan….

And the Twitter responses to Representative Hartzler (r) this morning are priceless:

Edward Maher ‏@EMaher81

@RepHartzler Replace it with what? Or is the GOP suddenly against spending cuts? 5:09 AM – 12 Feb 13

Mike Urban ‏@mju1983

.@RepHartzler Yeah, as a Missourian let me tell you how worried about N. Korea I am………(is that enough dots for the proper level of sarcasm?) 5:18 AM – 12 Feb 13

“….N. Korea spits in our eye….”

If this was a Monty Python script we could hurl surreal insults at them. Oh, sorry, apparently it is a Monty Python script.

The Huffington Post has a nice piece on the ways that Missouri House speaker, Republican Tim Jones, is trying to have his cake and eat it too when it comes to his past ties to looneytunes birther Orly Taitz. On the one hand, he rather ambiguously implies that he disavows his past birther activism, the result, he declares, of being importuned by a “very personal constituent of mine.” (Huh? What could he be trying to tell us – a “very personal” constituent?) On the other hand, he’s currently trying to raise money off the fact that his past stupidity has been roundly mocked in various, putatively liberal venues. The telling passage:

George Connor, a political science professor at Missouri State University, said he does not believe that Jones’s involvement in the birther movement will cause the lawmaker long-term harm, at least in state Republican circles. Connor said as Republican primaries become increasingly conservative, Jones’s ties to birtherism could in fact help his electoral chances.

“If Tim Jones would have any political trouble from this issue, it would be distancing himself from it,” Connor said of the birther movement. “The challenge to Republicans in Missouri is from the right. I don’t see the birther issue or his stance on it becoming an issue. For the most part, everyone is past that.”

On the topic of the Republican party’s current effort to paint itself out of the “crazy, old, white dudes” corner it now seems to occupy, one commentator, I can’t remember who, noted that while national level GOPers were at least trying to be more circumspect in their self-presentation, if not in actual policies, there are still plenty of “wild things” at large at the state level. This particular Tim Jones dilemma, to be a birther or not to be, might just offer a heaping serving of the pudding that proves that particular observation.

Addenda:  Steve Benen weighs in on the GOP dilemma mirrored in Tim Jone’s effort to find a comfortable equilibrium between the respectable and The Crazy:

We talked last week about the new Republican effort to “marginalize” the “cranks, haters, and bigots,” but as we’re reminded regularly, it’s extremely difficult for a political party to ostracize such a significant chunk of its own membership.

[…] the problem isn’t that Republicans have some “cranks, haters, and bigots”; the problem is that Republicans are a radicalized party in which “cranks, haters, and bigots” routinely dominate.

If the GOP intends to stop being, in Bobby Jindal’s words, the “stupid party,” they have a long way to go.

…should lounge by the pool with frosty fruity drinks while people with lower incomes pay a higher percentage of their income in taxes.

Filed on February 6th:

HJR 25

Migrates Missouri away from income taxes to sales/consumption taxes

Sponsor: Koenig, Andrew (099)

Co-Sponsor: Schieber, Ronald (014) … et al.

Proposed Effective Date: 8/28/2013

LR Number: 783H.01I

Last Action: 2/07/2013 – Read Second Time (H)

FIRST REGULAR SESSION

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 25

97TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

INTRODUCED BY REPRESENTATIVES KOENIG (Sponsor), SCHIEBER, WILSON, BRATTIN, BURLISON, WHITE, DAVIS, MESSENGER, LICHTENEGGER, HIGDON, SCHARNHORST AND MCCAHERTY (Co-sponsors).

0783H.01I    D. ADAM CRUMBLISS, Chief Clerk

JOINT RESOLUTION

Submitting to the qualified voters of Missouri an amendment repealing sections 1 and 6(a) of article X of the Constitution of Missouri, and adopting eleven new sections in lieu thereof relating to taxation.

Be it resolved by the House of Representatives, the Senate concurring therein:

[….]

….(2) For tax years beginning on or after January 1, 2017, any law enacted by the general assembly that imposes a tax for state purposes that is on or measured by the income or earnings of an individual shall be repealed….

[….]

Section 1(f). The following shall not be subject to any tax imposed pursuant to section 1(e) of this article:

[….]

(15) Sales of bullion or coins, artistic works, precious stones or other tangible personal property held exclusively for investment purposes….

[….]

[emphasis in original]

Ah, defunding government. Another stellar contribution from the right wingnut laboratory of bad ideas.

“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich and the poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.” – Le lys rouge, Anatole France

“…Sales of bullion or coins, artistic works, precious stones or other tangible personal property held exclusively for investment purposes…”

Yes, when you sell your velvet painting of poker playing dogs at the neighborhood garage sale you, like the millionaire who sells their original Matisse at a high end art auction, won’t have to pay any state taxes on the transaction.

Uh, it’s called regressive taxation (from the people who know a thing or two about taxes):

….A regressive tax may at first appear to be a fair way of taxing citizens because everyone, regardless of income level, pays the same dollar amount. By taking a closer look, it is easy to see that such a tax causes lower-income people to pay a larger share of their income than wealthier people pay. Though true regressive taxes are not used as income taxes, they are used as taxes on tobacco, alcohol, gasoline, jewelry, perfume, and travel.

User fees often are considered regressive because they take a larger percentage of income from low-income groups than from high-income groups. These include fees for licenses, parking, admission to museums and parks, and tolls for roads, bridges, and tunnels….

You probably wouldn’t consider a regressive tax structure to be particularly fair unless you were in the one percent. Or, if your political campaign(s) were funded by the one percent.

On the topic of taxes, especially progressive taxation, George Lakoff, the Berkeley linguist and expert on political language, has this to say:

Taxes are what you pay to be an American, to live in a civilized society that is democratic and offers opportunity, and where there’s an infrastructure that has been paid for by previous taxpayers. This is a huge infrastructure. The highway system, the Internet, the TV system, the public education system, the power grid, the system for training scientists – vast amounts of infrastructure that we all use, which has to be maintained and paid for. Taxes are your dues – you pay your dues to be an American. In addition, the wealthiest Americans use that infrastructure more than anyone else, and they use parts of it that other people don’t. The federal justice system, for example, is nine-tenths devoted to corporate law. The Securities and Exchange Commission and all the apparatus of the Commerce Department are mainly used by the wealthy. And we’re all paying for it.

There are many more ways that our tax system subsidizes corporations and the wealthy, but the idea Lakoff is presenting is still pretty clear and not at all hard to understand. Nevertheless, Republicans just don’t get it. Consider State Rep. Jason Smith, currently Missouri House speaker pro tem who, incidentally, just won the GOP nomination for Rep. Jo Ann Emerson’s recently vacated federal seat in the 8th district. Seems Smith shines when it comes to GOP anti-tax bile. Notable quote:

When they tax the rich to give to the poor, it makes us less American … less free.

This man serves in a state with failing infrastructure, 300,000 uninsured, a mediocre educational system, and which, for obvious reasons, attracts far too few of the more entrepreneurial businesses that could actually grow the state’s economy – as opposed to those industries that offer only low-paying scutt work.

But never mind about all that growth and prosperity stuff – none of which, rhetoric to the contrary, really seems to get Republican juices flowing. If Smith and his current cronies in the Missouri statehouse get their way, Missourians won’t have much, but they’ll be “freer,” which in this case means minimal taxes for the wealthy and for businesses, while the middle classes and poor pay proportionally more for government services – including those designed to insure that the haves get more.

This “freedom” song and dance is, of course, old hat. Conservatives frequently try to justify their druthers by appealing to freedom and other abstractions, rather than demonstrating the real-world ways that their proposed policies will make Americans’ lives better. They rarely specify that the right-wing concept of freedom pertains only to market economics. Michael Lind, one of the founders of the New America Foundation, points out that the right wing “idea of ‘freedom’ is a very peculiar one, which excludes virtually every kind of liberty that ordinary Americans take for granted”:

What would America look like, if conservatives had won their battles against American liberty in the last half-century? Formal racial segregation might still exist at the state and local level in the South. In some states, it would be illegal to obtain abortions or even for married couples to use contraception. In much of the United States, gays and lesbians would still be treated as criminals. Government would dictate to Americans with whom and how they can have sex. Unions would have been completely annihilated in the public as well as the private sector. Wages and hours laws would be abolished, so that employers could pay third-world wages to Americans working seven days a week, 12 hours a day, as many did before the New Deal. There would be far more executions and far fewer procedural safeguards to ensure that the lives of innocent Americans are not ended mistakenly by the state.

One thing Lind forgets to mention is that the wealthy and corporations would skate when it comes to taxes in such a right-wing, “free” republic, while the rest of us would probably foot most if not all of the bill for the minimal services government would deliver. Yet Missourians will most likely send Jason Smith to Washington to fight for more of that anti-tax freedom with its corresponding spending cuts, so that we too can enjoy the same type of austerity policies that have plunged Great Britain into double-dip recession.

*Lakoff quote amended to include material inadvertently omitted.

More tenther twaddle, in a bill introduced today:

FIRST REGULAR SESSION

HOUSE BILL NO. 527

97TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

INTRODUCED BY REPRESENTATIVES SOMMER (Sponsor), CURTMAN, LICHTENEGGER, KOENIG, BURLISON, FUNDERBURK, KELLEY (127), BERRY, NEELY, LOVE, HICKS, WILSON, HAAHR, FITZPATRICK, PARKINSON, BAHR AND SCHIEBER (Co-sponsors).

1301L.01I        D. ADAM CRUMBLISS, Chief Clerk

AN ACT

To amend chapter 21, RSMo, by adding thereto one new section relating to the joint committee on the tenth amendment.

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the state of Missouri, as follows:

           Section A. Chapter 21, RSMo, is amended by adding thereto one new section, to be known as section 21.960, to read as follows:

           21.960. 1. There is hereby established the “Joint Committee on the Tenth Amendment”, which shall:

           (1) Identify proposed federal legislation that infringes on Missouri’s state sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution;

           (2) Advise and make recommendations to the general assembly regarding any state legislation necessary to preserve the integrity and principles of the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution; and

           (3) Refer cases to the attorney general when the federal government takes steps that require the state or a state officer to enact or enforce a provision of federal law that lies outside Congress’s enumerated powers and intrudes on the sovereignty reserved to the states by the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The attorney general is authorized to seek appropriate relief to preserve the state’s sovereignty.

           2. The joint committee shall be comprised of six members of the senate and six members of the house of representatives. The senate members shall be appointed by the president pro temore of the senate and the house members shall be appointed by the speaker of the house of representatives. The appointment of members shall continue during their term in office as members of the general assembly or until a successor has been duly appointed to fill their place when their term of office as members of the general assembly has expired.

           3. The joint committee shall hold an annual meeting at which it shall elect from its membership a chairperson and vice chairperson. The joint committee may hold such additional meetings as may be required in the performance of its duties.

           4. The general assembly shall provide administrative support and staff as necessary for the effective operation of the joint committee from existing resources. Any expenditure of the joint committee shall be subject to appropriation.

[emphasis in original]

Jobs bill, anyone?

Previously:

HB 181: even more tenther drivel (January 18, 2013) [introduced by the same Rep. Chrissy Sommer (r)]

There is so much win in the following:

Ron Paul Calls on United Nations to Confiscate Domain Names of His Supporters

By RonPaul.com on February 8, 2013

Earlier today, Ron Paul filed an international UDRP complaint against RonPaul.com and RonPaul.org with WIPO, a global governing body that is an agency of the United Nations. The complaint calls on the agency to expropriate the two domain names from his supporters without compensation and hand them over to Ron Paul….

Apparently Ron Paul didn’t like the offer (in a letter [pdf]) he wasn’t supposed to refuse:

….As you may know, over the past few years our team acquired several Ron Paul related domain names that were either passed up or allowed to expire by your staff (including RonPaul.com, RonPaul2008.com, RonPaul2010.com, RonPaul.net, RonPaul.org, RonPaul.info and several others). We initially secured these domains to make sure they would not fall into enemy hands….

….If you do insist on obtaining RonPaul.com (it is the best Ron Paul related domain name), we could relocate our grassroots site elsewhere and sell you the domain name at its current market price of $250,000. That would include a copy of our 170,000 strong RonPaul.com email list….

Okay.

Maybe it’s an Onion piece.

Pass the popcorn.

At the White House petition site:

We petition the Obama Administration to:

To be held Accountable and Impeached.

We the people demand That our rights to the following Constitutional Rights be restored and that Obama not only be impeached for infringing these rights but also be tried for teason for aiding and arming terrorists and the enemies of the American people. The following are a list of rights not only infringed but out right denied by Obama and his administration. We Demand our rights and Liberties be restored now! We also demand your relief of duty President Obama for your violations. The Following rights have been denied to us.

Amendment I

Amendment II

Amendment IV

Amendment V

Amendment VI

Amendment IX

AMENDMENT XIII

AMENDMENT XIV

AMENDMENT XV

Created: Feb 05, 2013

Issues: Civil Rights and Liberties, Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement, Government Reform

Signatures needed by March 07, 2013 to reach goal of 100,000 99,229

Total signatures on this petition 771

[emphasis added]

Right, right, out right.

Apparently neither proofreading nor an understanding of capitalization was an acquired skill.

Do you support Gov. Matt Blunt’s recent decision to cut Medicaid services for Missourians? Why or why not? What suggestions do you have for the Medicaid Task Force that is charged with redesigning the program?

I believe the Medicaid cuts went too far. I agree with the argument that too many people were abusing the program and diverting funds from those who truly needed help the most. However, I think the cuts may have gone too far in hurting our seniors and disabled. I believe we need to look at ways to provide our senior citizens and mentally ill with more affordable prescription drugs. We also need to re-examine our programs to help people who are on Medicaid get back to work. As State Representative I will also fight against allowing our Medicaid program to sunset.

“Smith seeks 150th District seat”. Rolla Daily News. October 19th, 2005.

It was late 2005, lots of people were saying zany things at the time. Youthful indiscretion.

Jason Smith is the nominee in Missouri’s 8th district (or they directly made him Congressman for life if you’re a DC-based political reporter who doesn’t think a 32 year old Congressman could ever think of running statewide in a few years).

Congrats to the current Lt. Governor on pulling himself ahead of Bob Parker while finishing in 2nd place for the nomination. Now that means the special election bill is gonna stall, right? Who’ll carry that bill in the 2014 session if Jason Smith is exiled to Washington DC? Suspense.

Last I checked, an election was still scheduled for June 5th, 2013. State Representative Linda Black of Bonne Terre is the most likely candidate to be nominated by the Democratic party next weekend at an undisclosed location.

(Also, the Libertarian Party nominated Bill Slantz of St. Charles today to carry the mantle of liberty and receiving random protest votes)

“…Goodness, I could spend several weeks teaching about intelligent design creationism – it would be great fun and I’m sure the kids would enjoy it.”

Previously:

HB 291: keping misooree stoopit (January 24, 2013)

“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. “ (February 8, 2013)

From RationalWiki:

cdesign proponentsists

The term “cdesign proponentsists” came into being following the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial in Pennsylvania over the legitimacy of teaching intelligent design as science.

A crucial piece of the defense (pro-intelligent design) was a book called Of Pandas and People which was marketed as a science textbook for middle and high school children. During the trial, previous copies of the book were subpoenaed for review. It was demonstrated that, whenever previous versions of the book had the terms “creationist” or “creationism” or some similar form, it had been replaced in almost all cases with the terms “design proponents” and “intelligent design” in later editions….

….Investigations subsequent to the case showed that, in one particular case, an editor had apparently copied and pasted “design proponents” over the word “creationists” but in doing so had pasted over only part of the latter, resulting in a weird neologism, “cdesign proponentsists”….

[emphasis added]

Game, set, match (from a commenter at Washington Monthly – Missouri’s Creationism Legislation Introduced by “Science Buff”):

Paul Burnett on Sat 9 Feb 2013 10:47 AM

That’s actually not a bad idea. Tell the students all about the Dover Trial, and how the judge ruled that creationists lie under oath. Discuss how the creationists’ star witness said under oath that for intelligent design creationism to be accepted as science, the definition of “science” would have to be so dumbed down that astrology could also be defined as “science.”

Explain that after the 1987 US Supreme Court ruling against “creation science,” a band of fundagelicals got together at several venues, including the Bible Institute Of Los Angeles (now hiding under the stealth name “BIOLA University) and invented the current form of intelligent design creationism.

Explain how the term “cdesign proponentsists” (Google the term if you’re not familiar with it – it’s a great story) came to happen and how the publisher of “Of Pandas and People” lied under oath that his company was not a religious publisher, only to be handed an IRS “religious exemption” form with his signature on it.

Show the kids the position papers from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the National Academies of Science and all the other actual science organizations denouncing intelligent design creationism as a pseudoscience – look up the Wikipedia article “List of scientific societies explicitly rejecting intelligent design”.

Goodness, I could spend several weeks teaching about intelligent design creationism – it would be great fun and I’m sure the kids would enjoy it.

Heh. Unintended consequences.

Right.

Yesterday, at the Missouri Ethics Commission:

C001135 02/08/2013 A BETTER MISSOURI WITH GOVERNOR JAY NIXON Peabody Investments Corporation 701 Market Street Saint Louis MO 63101 2/6/2013 $25,000.00

[emphasis added]

Right.

Campaign Finance: it just keeps rolling in

….Somebody thinks he isn’t:

Tony Messenger @tonymess

@eyokley To me it’s a moot point because I don’t think Nixon is a candidate in 2016. But I realize I’m in the minority there. 5:21 PM – 23 Jan 13

[….]

Really? Entities write $25,000.00 checks to campaign committees for politicians who aren’t running for office. Fascinating.

Previously:

Campaign Finance: it just keeps rolling in (January 31, 2013)

Campaign Finance: it’s not like they’re writing $10,000.00 checks because they think… (January 31, 2013)

Campaign Finance: yadda, yadda, yadda… (January 20, 2013)

Campaign Finance: tell us, already… (January 18, 2013)

Campaign Finance: we’ve got the power (January 15, 2013)

Campaign Finance: oh, they see (January 13, 2012)

Campaign Finance: Who’s next? (January 11, 2012)

Campaign Finance: jumping on that bandwagon to who knows where (January 6, 2013)

Campaign Finance: it’s not a Hemi (January 2, 2013)

Campaign Finance: dialing for dollars (December 30, 2012)

Campaign Finance: no difference, then? (December 23, 2012)