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Where did Roy Blunt hide his backbone?

12 Thursday Oct 2017

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Even Republicans know that the current occupant of the white House is a disaster who is endangering the entire country – and they’re willing to talk about it. Privately.

And at least some Republicans are willing to admit publicly what we all know – Senator Bob Corker, Chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, for instance, who has likened the White House to “adult day care,” warning us that if something isn’t done, we’re headed for WWIII. Corker, of course, won’t be running for office and so doesn’t have to fear a primary challenge from the rampaging romper room wing of the GOP, so he has a get out of jail free card when he goes off on the colossal mistake that the Republican Party made in 2016.

Among the Republicans who can’t be bothered to do something to save us from the arrogant imbecile that they, along with the Russians and the “alt-right,” put in the White House is our own GOP Senator Roy Blunt whose response to Bob Corker’s cri de coeur was an exercise in bland fatuousness:

It’s an unfortunate exchange … I would like to see this end,” Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said in the Capitol on Tuesday, adding that he does not, in fact, believe the White House is an adult day care center. “I would encourage them both to stop what they’re doing and get focused on what we need to be doing.”

I despair – “get focused on what we need to be doing,” he says. Like that’s going to happen. And like Blunt doesn’t know that it isn’t going to happen.

But, hey, what Blunt thinks “we need to be doing” is likely gonna hurt the rest of us big time – the guy’s a shill for the big money boys who put Trump in office so he could pack the courts in their favor. The fact that Trump’s crazy spills over to the rest of the GOP, effectively incapacitating their legislative agenda, is probably the silver lining to the Trump Cloud.

Of course, if or when the Trump cloud becomes a mushroom cloud, it isn’t going to make much difference.

*Last sentence of penultimate paragraph sightly revised for clarity (10:51 am, 10/12/2017).

Missouri – where politics equal one sad belly laugh after another

07 Saturday Oct 2017

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Yesterday I wrote that there was a perception that the demented political pixie, Ed Martin, and Josh “Dudley Do-right” Hawley were jockeying for the Steve Bannon blessing in the Missouri GOP senatorial primary lineup. But I spoke too soon. There’s a new candidate and he’s a doozy. Actually, he’s a doozy’s doozy. His name is Courtland Sykes.

Remember Sykes’ name because you may be hearing it lots in the months to come. If the folks in Missouri are as smart as we hope they are, the name will be the butt of lots of hilarity. If we, however, conform to what I fear is an all-too-possible Missouri outcome, it could be the name of one of our U.S. Senators. In the age of Trump, nothing, no matter how outlandish or stupid, can be counted out. And, don’t forget, President Moron took Missouri with points to spare.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch dubs Sykes a “mystery” candidate because he isn’t a known Missouri political entity (actually, with less than a year’s residence in the state, he may not even be properly called a Missourian). But, as the Post-Dispatch profile itself reveals, there’s not much about Sykes that’s mysterious – other than the motivation for his belief that he should run for office. Read the PD article. It’s straight-up reporting and yet it’s knee-slapping funny. Sykes comes off as a cartoon version of Trump – which is a difficult trick since Trump comes off as a cartoon version of a political leader.

Let me count the ways Sykes rings the Trumpian bell. There’s misogyny, bigotry, and stupidity in one neat”outsider” package. He want’s us to know that he’s manly – he characterizes other politicians as “effete.”According to the PD, he had difficulty answering substantive questions and puffed up his credentials Trump-style to inflate his image. Oh, I almost forgot, he hates swamps too – strange how all the political swamp-dwellers want us to know that they don’t really like swamps.

Sykes is betting that Steve Bannon – with whom he “exchanged pleasantries” during Bannon’s recent visit to Missouri – will find the package irresistible. I’d say that whether or not that proved to be the case could provide a type of intelligence test for Bannon, but, hey, the guy went for Trump – and with a little Russian help propelled him into the presidency, so who knows?

In case you’re wondering, the Post-Dispatch consulted with a political science professor at St. Louis Community College and he responded that he’s 99.9% sure that this candidacy isn’t a big joke – or a Democratic Party prank. That comment says it all.

Campaign Finance: Eh, what’s up doc?

20 Thursday Jul 2017

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Yesterday at the Missouri Ethics Commission, a dormant republican PAC awakes:

C051039 07/19/2017 RSLC-MISSOURI PAC Republican State Leadership Committee PAC & Individual Account 1201 F Street, NW Suite 675 Washington DC 20004 7/18/2017 $10,000.00

[emphasis added]

They filed limited activity reports in April and July. In January:

C051039: Rslc-Missouri Pac
Committee Type: Political Action
1201 F Street Nw Ste 675
Washington Dc 20004
Established Date: 02/10/2005
[….]
Information Reported On: 2017 – January Quarterly Report
Beginning Money on Hand $554.75
Monetary Receipts + $0.00
Monetary Expenditures – $14.00
Contributions Made – $0.00
Other Disbursements – $0.00
Subtotal ($14.00)
Ending Money On Hand $540.75

[emphasis added]

Okay. Now they have $10,000.00 to play with.

Special elections in the 50th Legislative District and 28th Senate District anyone? Just asking.

Previously:

Tinker to Evers to Chance, from PAC to PAC, from billionaire to PAC… (December 4, 2014)

Campaign Finance: just passing through (November 3, 2016)

Promises, promises …

05 Wednesday Jul 2017

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At this point, Republicans have been reduced to trying to justify stripping healthcare from millions of Americans, including large numbers of working class Republicans, by claiming that they are helpless to do otherwise; they have to “repeal” and – maybe – “replace” Obamacare because they’ve spent the last seven years promising their base they would do away with all such remnants of that black Kenyan’s presidency.

As if the only voters that matter are the so-called base – voters who represent a largish segment of the smallish 30% of Americans who currently identify as Republicans. Anyway, it isn’t as if the members of the Grand Old Party have had any problem breaking other promises. They usually just figure out a way to reframe it or divert attention, and their compliant base mostly goes along.

It’s a fact that repealing Obamacare doesn’t fare well when the full range of actual public opinion is taken into account. Obamacare’s popularity has been growing since the election of Donald Trump put it in peril, until, finally, by March, one could safely say that Obamacare had become more popular than Donald Trump. By the end of June 51-53% of poll respondents said that Congress ought to leave Obamacare in place and/or fix its very fixable problems. Republicans are still negative, but their disapproval, ginned up as it was in the first place, by politicians seeking to sabotage an elected Democratic president, is showing signs that it may waver once the real repercussions are felt.

Replacing Obamacare, in the form of the various Trumpcare iterations produced by Congress, does even worse. In a poll produced at the end of June, just 12% of those polled supported the replacement plans. Other polls find approval ranging from the aforementioned 12% to 18%. Given those numbers, there have got to be lots of even “base” Republicans who don’t think that the GOP is going in the right direction in their efforts to replace the bill.

So much for repeal and replace and promises.

Yet the GOP is going full-throttle toward repealing an imperfect, but functional healthcare plan and replacing it with a widely loathed disaster because … they promised.

So what gives? Do Republicans have a political death wish?

Maybe not. Stop and think: just who plays the bills for Republicans in congress – who are the the people dropping million dollar campaign donations and funding secretive super PACs?

Maybe the promise that Republicans are so hot to keep has nothing to do with the easily manipulated read-meat base, but the people who, in these Post- Citizens United days, pay the bills, the Richie Riches, otherwise known as the oligarchy. The very people who will benefit from the tax cut that Trumpcare funds by slashing Medicaid, one of the most significant components of Trumpcare. The tax cut that many – including Trump – believe to the the first stepping stone to a tax code that only a billionaire can truly love.

Fine. But, please, could the rest of us stop treating the blather about promises and the Republican base as if it has anything to do with reality.

*First sentence in the penultimate paragraph slightly edited.

Campaign Finance: loading up a “little” more

29 Thursday Jun 2017

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Today at the Missouri Ethics Commission for a republican 20th Senate District PAC:

C171164 06/29/2017 Lincoln PAC SRC Electrical 2401 E Sunshine St t Springfield MO 65804 6/29/2017 $10,000.00

[emphasis added]

$10,000.00 is just so populist and grassrootsie.

Previously:

Campaign Finance: loading up for 2018 (June 26, 2017)

Campaign Finance: loading up for 2018

26 Monday Jun 2017

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Today at the Missouri Ethics Commission:

C171164 06/26/2017 Lincoln PAC Ed Pinegar 769 E Hwy 60 Republic MO 65738 Owner Pinegar Chevrolet 6/26/2017 $20,000.00

C171164 06/26/2017 Lincoln PAC Missouri Soybean Association PO Box 104778 Jefferson City MO 65110 6/26/2017 $5,001.00

C171164 06/26/2017 Lincoln PAC Missouri State Council of Fire Fighters APC 29210 SE AA Hwy Blue Springs MO 64014 6/26/2017 $10,000.00

C171164 06/26/2017 Lincoln PAC MO Truck PAC PO Box 89 Eldon MO 65026 6/26/2017 $5,100.00

[emphasis added]

It’s a brand new PAC, supporting “a” republican candidate in the 20th Senate District:

C171164: Lincoln Pac
Committee Type: Political Action
4304 E Serenade St
Springfield Mo 65809
Established Date: 06/16/2017
[….]
Treasurer
Thomas Dale Replogle
4304 E Serenade St
Springfield Mo 65804
[….]

Jay Wasson (r) is term limited out in 2018.

Roy Blunt and GOP sugar mama Betsy DeVos

03 Friday Feb 2017

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Orange Buffoon’s nominee to Head the Education Department is so unqualified that at least two normally compliant GOP Senators can’t bring themselves to hold their noses long enough to vote for her. Here’s how unqualified she is: DeVos has been supportive of shifting public financial support to charter schools. Yet a major supporter of charter schools, philanthropist Eli Broad,  thinks she is so unqualified that he has written to U.S. Senators imploring them to deep-six the nomination.

DeVos will probably make it through the process and end up running the Untied States’ educational system as long as no more than two Republicans defer to a preference for the public good. Why? The lady’s rich. Really rich. And she’s showered many of the very Republican senators who will be voting for her with lots of rich folks special type of pocket-book love. That means very large direct donations as well as big PAC spending.

One of those Senators is Missouri’s Republican Senator Roy Blunt. DeVos has assisted Blunt’s electoral efforts with $33,100. It’s a foregone conclusion that our Roy will vote “yea” when DeVos faces the final confirmation vote. To be fair, Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) got more dosh than Blunt, $43,000, to be exact, and she has elected to follow her conscience and oppose DeVos’ appointment. But she’s the exception that proves the rule.

There’s more going on, of course. There may be some Republicans who are just as ignorant as DeVos and/or are so ideologically blinkered that they think she’s just fine. Our Roy, of course, seems to want to climb the leadership ladder in the Senate, so we can count on him to toe the line even when we suspect he’s smart enough to know it’ll lead to disaster. To judge by his past deportment, Roy’s rule has always been what’s good for donors is good for him, what’s good for him is what he went to Washington for and devil take the hindmost. Missourians are, of course, the hindmost.

Nevertheless, there’s a big question raised by DeVos’ candidacy and the almost lockstep Republican support for a manifestly unqualified, but rich and generous – to Republicans – nominee. Shouldn’t the senators who have benefited most significantly from her largesse recuse themselves from voting on her nomination? Who’s to say if it’s just an “appearance” of corruption or the substance – does any fool really think we can trust the beneficiaries of that appearance of corruption to tell us the truth? Nevertheless, we’re expected to take their assurances of their own probity at face value and shut up about the impropriety of their actions.

DeVos herself has been pretty unequivocal about the fact that she expects her greenback “free speech” to do some big talking, observing in 1997, when asked what she expected to receive from politicians who accepted her money, that ” we expect a return on our investment.” Looks like she’s going to get it. Big time.

Selling government? It’s pretty clear that this is just the beginning. We’ve entered the age of Trump, folks. Americans – or a particular minority of Americans, at any rate, wanted to shake things up. Who’d have guessed that what would get shattered in the process would be the ethical norms we’ve observed or tried to observe for generations?

Running government like an unfettered, unregulated business turns out to be a pretty ugly, cutthroat phenomena and the only folks who make out well are those with power and those with money enough to buy  power. For politicians like Roy Blunt the next few years should rival his heyday when he rode high with Tom DeLay.

Campaign Finance: it’s in their nature

19 Thursday Jan 2017

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In the Missouri Constitution:

Article VIII
SUFFRAGE AND ELECTIONS
Section 23
[….]
(12) Political action committees shall only receive contributions from individuals; unions; federal political action committees; and corporations, associations, and partnerships formed under chapters 347 to 360, RSMo, as amended from time to time, and shall be prohibited from receiving contributions from other political action committees, candidate committees, political party committees, campaign committees, exploratory committees, or debt service committees. However, candidate committees, political party committees, campaign committees, exploratory committees, and debt service committees shall be allowed to return contributions to a donor political action committee that is the origin of the contribution.
(13) The prohibited committee transfers described in subdivision (12) of this subsection shall not apply to the following committees:
[….]
(b) The state senate committee per political party designated by the respective majority or minority floor leader of the senate or the chair of the state party if the party does not have majority or minority party status.
[….]

[emphasis added]

Yesterday at the Missouri Ethics Commission for the republican state senate campaign committee:

C071094 01/18/2017 MISSOURI SENATE CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE Rex Sinquefield 244 Bent Walnut Westphalia MO 65085 Retired Retired 1/17/2017 $50,000.00

[emphasis added]

Ah, they’re obviously intent on making the rubble bounce.

Fun with numbers

09 Monday Jan 2017

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In an earlier post today I noted in passing that Trump’s victory in Missouri was not exactly a landslide and did not represent a majority of eligible voters in Missouri. I laid out the numbers in a footnote to support my casual assertion to that effect:

Missouri’s had 4,109,936 registered voters as of 2012; only 2,808,605 Missourians voted in 2016 – and of those, only 1,594,511 voted for Trump – 39% of the eligible voters in Missouri delivered the state to Trump.

After I made this observation, I began to think about  what it might signify and a couple of things occurred to me:

  • Everyone takes it as a given that in order to survive the red-wave, Missouri Democrats like Claire McCaskill have to walk down the center line, balancing their few deviations leftwards with genuflections towards the right side of the road. But could this careful political parsing be why so many Missourians are politically disengaged? Could it be that lots of Missourians are staying away from the polls because they don’t want to vote the strict all guns, no gays ticket, but they just don’t see that there’s a real alternative? Or at least an alternative that makes its presence known. Could an overly cautious Claire McCaskill be stifling the voter enthusiasm that might reward a more principled progressive stance?
  • Shouldn’t folks like McCaskill and other state Democrats be dong more to combat voter suppression – especially since it’s poised to take off big-time now that the GOP vote suppression gang is running the state show? How about greeting the voter ID perfecting Jay Ashcroft and Josh Hawlely with a lawsuit?

Numbers tell stories, and the story they tell about Missouri’s voter turnout is one of disengagement and apathy that will only be augmented by the machinations on the part of Missouri’s Republican political establishment to keep Democrats away from the polls. Lest you doubt, there’s ample evidence that the GOP voter fraud concerns are directed at keeping as many Democrats from voting as possible. And that’s bad, but just as bad is if the efforts of Grundy-pandering Democrats to work the political room are having the same effect.

Campaign Finance: how convenient

26 Monday Dec 2016

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20161101-img_2939

In the Missouri Constitution:

Article VIII
SUFFRAGE AND ELECTIONS
Section 23
[….]
(12) Political action committees shall only receive contributions from individuals; unions; federal political action committees; and corporations, associations, and partnerships formed under chapters 347 to 360, RSMo, as amended from time to time, and shall be prohibited from receiving contributions from other political action committees, candidate committees, political party committees, campaign committees, exploratory committees, or debt service committees. However, candidate committees, political party committees, campaign committees, exploratory committees, and debt service committees shall be allowed to return contributions to a donor political action committee that is the origin of the contribution.
(13) The prohibited committee transfers described in subdivision (12) of this subsection shall not apply to the following committees:
(a) The state house committee per political party designated by the respective majority or minority floor leader of the house of representatives or the chair of the state party if the party does not have majority or minority party status;
[….]

[emphasis added]

Today at the Missouri Ethics Commission for the House Republican Campaign Committee:

C091068 12/26/2016 HOUSE REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE, INC Friends Of Todd Richardson PO Box 1226 Poplar Bluff MO 63902 12/20/2016 $25,000.00

[emphasis added]

How convenient.