Missouri 2010 Election Guide and Ballot Measures

It seems as though it is nearly impossible to find out what is going to be on the ballot and who is running and what the ballot measures mean and how a like minded individual might want to vote.  I am very much in favor of secret ballots but I am also bold enough to tell everyone how I voted; or plan to vote.
In Short, here is my plan: Amendment 1 – Yes; Amendment 2 – Yes; Prop A – Yes; Prop B – NO.  Senate: Blunt; House- erg.  Billy long is a weasel and Eckersley is a Democrat.  Make up your own mind on that one. Auditor – Tom Schweich
Missouri has on senate seat open due to the retirement of Christopher “Kit” Bond.  The other one will not come up for grabs until 2012 at which time if there is any justice in the world Claire McCaskill will be voted out so loudly she will fear to come outside her big house ever again.  The choice this year is between Roy Blunt and Robin Carnahan.  Using my tried and true rule of thumbs 1A and 1B (1A- vote Republican if at all possible; 1B- Never vote with anyone attached to the names Carnahan or McCaskill) I will be voting for Roy Blunt. A Carnahan should not be elected to walk your dog.
My district’s house seat is CD7 and the race is between Billy Long and Scott Eckersley. Billy Long is a weasel.  I do not like the man’s personality, and I think he is of dubious character.  I think he tries to pull off the ‘aw shucks’ country boy persona, but I believe he is more of a Vegas high roller.  I know for a fact that he was being texted his answers at one of the candidate forums during the primary. We could have certainly done better by nominating virtually any other candidate in the republican primary.  Scott Eckersley talks a good game, he tries to sound conservative, but he is on the Democratic ticket.  I know a lot of Republicans plan to back Eckersley.  I am not sure I can do that, but I honestly may try.  I really believe Billy Long is Wrong for Missouri – I am just not sure Eckersley is right.
We also have a vote for State Auditor which is between Charles W. Baum,(L), Susan Montee (D) and Tom Schweich, (R). Rule 1A – Vote Republican.  I will vote for Tom Schweich.
Constitutional Amendment 1 – VOTE YES.  A “yes” vote will amend the Missouri Constitution to require that assessors in charter counties be elected.  This proposal will affect St. Louis County and any country that adopts a charter form of government.  I am always for direct elections; that is the only method to assure any kind of accountability.
Constitutional Amendment 2 VOTE YES
A yes vote on this one will amend the constitution to exempt former POWs homes from being assessed Property Taxes.  POWs are one of the very few groups that I am fully in favor of giving entitlements to.
Constitutional Amendment 3 VOTE YES. 
A yes vote will amend the Missouri Constitution to prevent the state, counties, and other local political entities from imposing any new tax, including sales tax, on the sale or transfer of homes or real estate.
Preventing Governments from levying new taxes?- Hells Yes I am for that.
Prop A – Vote YES
Let the voters decide if cities in Missouri should be allowed to tax the earnings of people who work in certain cities but live outside those cities.  This is a city earnings tax.  The key here is if you pay city earnings taxes you get a deduction on your state taxes.  Eliminating the city earnings taxes would increase the amount of money flowing into state accounts.    Kind of a tricky issue.  People who work in KC but live in the ‘burbs may have to pay city earnings taxes now to fund things in the city.  This may come at the expense of state projects that would benefit their town.  I can see both sides of this a bit, but again, always in favor of letting voters decide.
Prop B VOTE NO
This is all dressed up as “end puppy mills”, which is a nebulous term at best.  But the meat of the language will do very little of what it intends, in fact in some way it will lessen the regulations.  This is purely an attempt to get animal rights legislation started and would be used as a springboard to go after other animal breeders and producers next, to the detriment of agribusiness and our state economy.  VOTE NO to this BS.

	Republican	Democrat
CD1	Robyn Hamilton	Lacy Clay*
CD2	Todd Akin*	Arthur Lieber
CD3	Ed Martin	Russ Carnahan*
CD4	Vicky Hartzler	Ike Skelton*
CD5	Jacob Turk	Emanuel Cleaver II*
CD6	Sam Graves*	Clint Hylton
CD7	Billy Long	Scott Eckersley
CD8	Jo Ann Emerson*	Tommy Sowers
CD9	Blaine Luetkemeyer

Not sure about CD4 or CD7 but everywhere else, Vote Republican.
*Incumbent

-KOOK

Deconstructing our Progress to Communism Pt. II – Commerce Clause

   We the People are engaged in a battle over our future.  Are we going to remain a Constitutional Republic, or are we going to devolve in a communistic tyranny ruled by a politburo of non -representatives elected through sham elections like Iran, Cuba, Russia, or Venezuela?   Yesterday the focus was on the faulty premise that the “General Welfare” clause allows congress to legislate anything and everything under the sun.  Today’s focus is on another clause that our current would-be Kings and Queens in Washington think gives them the power usurp all authority reserved to the states or the people.  The “Commerce Clause”, Article I section 8.3 which reads:

[the congress shall have power…] “To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes”

The part of that statement which so much debate has been centered upon is “To regulate commerce…among the several states." Luckily we do not have to be confused as to what the framers meant, as they clearly laid out their intent in their writings.  reading their correspondence, there should be no debate at all what the proper understanding of those words should be. But as was pointed out yesterday, the small minority of our non-representatives who would hazard a guess as to where their unlimited power is derived from, will likely quote this clause.
Indeed Speaker Pelosi issued a press release on her website in September 2009 where she expressly said just that: Health Insurance Reform Daily Mythbuster: 'Constitutionality of Health Insurance Reform'

“…  But the Constitution gives Congress broad power to regulate activities that have an effect on interstate commerce.  Congress has used this authority to regulate many aspects of American life, from labor relations to education to health care to agricultural production. Since virtually every aspect of the heath care system has an effect on interstate commerce, the power of Congress to regulate health care is essentially unlimited.”

So according to this widely held interpretation these 16 words nullify the tenth amendment.  IF congress can regulate the commerce that goes on within a state because the prices and availability of a product or service in one state impacts the prices and availability in another, then there is literally no end to what they can control.  How convenient  for them.  This is clearly not what the founders meant. The original intent of the framers is clear.  Madison said to Cabell :

“For a like reason, I made no reference to the "power to regulate commerce among the several States." I always foresaw that difficulties might be started in relation to that power which could not be fully explained without recurring to views of it, which, however just, might give birth to specious though unsound objections. Being in the same terms with the power over foreign commerce, the same extent, if taken literally, would belong to it.

Yet it is very certain that it grew out of the abuse of the power by the importing States in taxing the non-importing, and was intended as a negative and preventive provision against injustice among the States themselves, rather than as a power to be used for the positive purposes of the General Government, in which alone, however, the remedial power could be lodged.”
Allow me to translate into more easily understood language. 
I did not refer to the "power to regulate commerce among the several States."  [in my response].  I purposefully left that part out because I always thought that in the future people would misunderstand the meaning unless it was  put into context.  If not, it would be too easy to extend this power to the same level as the power reserved to the federal government to regulate relationships with other nations.  It is very clear that this language grew out of an abuse of power by states that had ports and harbors against states that did not. The language was intended as a protection to keep one state from harming another by restricting its trade, not as an additional power given to the Federal government over the states; however, the Federal government is the only agency we could give this authority to, and so we did.

   Remember, until the mid 20th century any goods received from a foreign nation were received by ship.  This put States without ports and harbors at a serious disadvantage to states who did.  Imagine Kansas or Oklahoma's vulnerable situation if they had to pay taxes  on every product imported to every state that was crossed en route to the final destination.  imagine a ship from China delivering products to the port in Long Beach, CA en route to Kansas.  California could then charge tariffs to Kansas, and every state subsequently after that could charge both CA, and KS, as the product moved across their borders.  What a nightmare that would be.  This is the reasoning behind the Commerce Clause.  The purpose of the Commerce Clause was to keep this internal turmoil out of trade, to allow all the states to access shipping and receiving points.  This is further explained in Federalist #42, and Madison mentions that one of the reasons for this language’s inclusion into the constitution was because it was a noted weakness of the articles of Confederation as well as several Nations in Europe at the time.
It was meant as a restriction on states from harming other states, not to create an  all encompassing evil overlord Fedzilla government. 
Unfortunately over the years the courts have wavered back and forth on this issue and the most recent passing of the buck by the court has been this:
Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority, 469 U.S. 528 (1985),

Of course, we continue to recognize that the States occupy a special and specific position in our constitutional system and that the scope of Congress' authority under the Commerce Clause must reflect that position. But the principal and basic limit on the federal commerce power is that inherent in all congressional action—the built-in restraints that our system provides through state participation in federal governmental action. The political process ensures that laws that unduly burden the States will not be promulgated.

The recent Firearms Freedom laws are set to test this theory, but it is unlikely from the above decision they will. Folks, if we don’t like Pelosi et. al. view of things, we have to vote them out, because the courts are likely going to take a pass on this.  This may be one of the most important litmus tests on a prospective candidate, “what is your opinion regarding the proper role of the Fed with respect to the Commerce Clause”
-KOOK

D.C. Hell on Earth. DemonPass in; Constitution out.

Nuff' said.


-Kook
via iPhone

This is a story nearly as old as time itself

It really all comes down to who knows better.  It is the same story that most of you are familiar with as being told by Braveheart.  The Scots-Irish is the culture that more than any other begat the USA.   It goes way, way back to the time of the Romans several years before Christ’s birth, but really takes off not long after his death.  The Roman army conquered the south end of England but was never able to really take the north because there were crazy people up there who fought like madmen and painted themselves blue, they were called Picts.  They refused to bend a knee to a far away authority.  Their culture was based on family ties, personal honor, and leadership was only accepted after it had been earned.  Allegiance was to the most local level.  In AD 122 Hadrian began construction of a wall between the ‘civilized’ part of the island and the wild north. Kings tried again and again for literally hundreds of years to bring these ‘savages’ into line.  They burned whole towns, slaughtered them in droves but never, eva, eva, won.  These people had freedom hard wired into their DNA.  The Scottish ‘nobles’ eventually were bought off and became ‘civilized’ to the British way of thinking, but still the people themselves never submitted.  They did not view allegiance the same way as the Brits. The British view was of wealth and property, poor people owed their allegiance to their rich ‘betters’.  Scotsmen knew in their hearts every man, prince or pauper, was free, and as stated before their allegiance was to their Kin, then their Clan, then their neighbor clan. They were not isolationists like the gypsies, did not have a class caste system like the rest of Europe, and they freely intermarried with other groups, who then became Scots.  This is what we think of as  a “grassroots” organization now. Their religious affiliation was Protestant and they were some of the first.  The Brits had always also had difficulty with the Irish, for differing but similar reasons.  They decided getting the Scots to move into Ireland would allow them to take both Ireland and Scotland in time.  Bad plan.  Many Scots moved to Ireland in the Ulster Plantation under a colonization plan dreamt up by the Brits.  Soon the Irish and the Scots were fighting each other…when they weren’t both killing the English.  The Irish and the Scots had similar views on Freedom, but differing views on Religion.  Then the first colonization of North America began.  Some Scots-Irish left Ulster to come to the “new world”  with the Puritans thinking they too could have religious freedom, and to their way of thinking they were protestants just like the Puritans.  Not true.  The Puritans idea of religious freedom was that everyone should be ‘free’ to worship as the Puritans did (Everyone was entitled to their opinion, as long as it was the Puritan opinion).



  Scots again refused to be assimilated, and were pushed further west into the Appalachian mountains, which was similar to throwing Brer Rabbit into the Briar Patch.  More Scots came and they stayed in the Mountains, moving South all the while. They intermarried and had lots and lots of little Scots-Irish babies (up to 40% higher birthrates than other immigrants at the time).  Ohio was opened for settlement and by this time the Native Americans or “Indians” were wise to this tide of white men and so began killing of the more gentrified of the English settlers…  The aristocracy in Britain thought they knew just the people to send over to make the Indians lives rough…the Scots.  They sent Scotsmen literally by the boatload to cheap land on the wild western frontiers as as a buffer between “Civilization”  and the “Indians”.  The Scots did as predicted and more.  The Scots kept coming, causing at least one wealthy landowner in England to lament (paraphrasing) “why are we letting them move if it is only so that they can have a better life, how does that profit us?” because he was losing too many tenants on his vast landholdings. The Scots kept pushing the Indians, and still managed to cause problems with their more ‘enlightened, wealthy, and civilized betters’  When the American Revolution began many in England saw it as nothing more than just one more Scottish rebellion, some called it exactly that.  The vast majority of the Scots stayed out of the fray until the English using their typical bullying tactics that had so enraged Scotsmen for eons, really went too far.  Then buckskin Scots came down out of the hills near Kings Mountain and destroyed an entire British Loyalist force 10 to 1.  Then they did it again at Cowpens, which the Brits never recovered from, ending in their defeat at Yorktown.  The Scots refused to bend a knee, and the USA was born. Down through the ages, the Scots-Irish CULTURE, meaning not only those people descended from the Scots, but also those who became culturally inseparable from the Scots,  have fought in more battles and done more to defend Freedom than any other group of people.  They have given us most of our  presidents (61%), many of our founding fathers were Scotsmen by birth or culture.

 
   The battle is the same today in the 21st century. The Puritans, the Elite, Our Betters, the Democrats, the proponents of European Socialism believe they know better than us.  Us, of the Mountains of Appalachia, the Carolinas, descendents of the first settlers of Ky, TN, TX, AR, and the Missouri Ozarks and all points West.  Our ancestors were at the forefront of the frontier and settled the West because no one else was tough enough, crazy enough restless enough to do it.  They were always fighting and moving to try to keep their individual freedoms, to be LEFT ALONE.  Today we are called Hillbillies, Rednecks, Rubes, Hicks, Uneducated and Unenlightened.  We are the faceless ignorant electorate, “those People” in the “Flyover”.  What we really are is the Poor but Proud, the  Entrepreneurs, The self made men and women  who frickin run this country, just like our ancestors.

You. Are. Not. Our. Rulers.

-KOOK

Billy Long is Wrong

Billy Long is Wrong: With Regret: Discovering the Ugly Side of Politics on a Personal Level Below is a repost from our good friend Clay’s, the purveyor of BBCW, other website covering Billy Long.  Billy Long is a candidate in the Mo-7 race for Roy Blunt’s soon to be vacated seat. This race is shaping up to be HOTLY contested.  Billy Long has been a front runner in the race…up until this latest shenanigan (hopefully).  Billy Long is a wealthy businessman who plays the “Aw Shucks good ol’ boy” but  he appears to be as “crooked as a sidewinder”   Or  “Crooked as a Dog’s Hind Leg”…or for those of our readers not from the south that would be… “unethical”. 

Clay was feeling sort of mean spirited because of his pretty astringent coverage of Billy Long’s campaign so far, he was just about to extend an olive branch…when BLAM! all of Clay’s suspicions and suppositions turn out to be SPOT ON regarding the W.I.Q., that would be Weasel In Question, Billy Long; who has aspirations of joining all the other “ethically challenged” Weasels in the District of Criminals.

The fact is, Billy Long proved he is WRONG for the position of representing us. Billy Long is Wrong For Missouri.  Billy Long proved he is unethical.  Read the post below and you will understand why; the days where you can Bribe, Blackmail, Extort, and generally Payola your way to office are OVER if we of the Pro-Liberty Coalition have anything to say about it…

In case your were wondering I repeated Billy Long’s name several times in this post to get the Search Engines to crawl this hot breaking Billy Long News faster about how Billy Long is Wrong for Missouri, and how Billy Long is Unethical, and How Billy Long has no business in Washington. I also want to mention that if things work out I will be in Ozark tomorrow night and will hopefully be able to report how Billy Long is a Weasel, Billy Long, Billy Long, Billy Long…

With Regret: Discovering the Ugly Side of Politics on a Personal Level

When I decided to challenge Billy Long’s candidacy for Congress, I hoped that I could encourage the debate of the important issues that face our country and our lives with a focus on the preservation of our Constitution. I saw the massive amounts of money Mr. Long was collecting and feared money would be the deciding factor in this election. As someone concerned for the future of our great Republic, I hoped for better.
This is the reason I decided to challenge Mr. Long. Even if he won the primary, I knew Southwest Missouri would be better off because of the push for a real debate to bring out the best candidate. I never intended this to be a witch hunt. I have spent many hours listening to what Billy Long was saying, and I grew more concerned over his candidacy.
It should be no surprise the Web site ‘LongisWrong.com” was having an impact in the way his campaign was run and possibly the shaping of the race in August. It was my wish to bring about an issues focused campaign that looked beyond the free t-shirts and bumper stickers at the meet-and-greets and the high tech billboards along Southwest Missouri roadways with Mr. Long’s campaign colors. With lots of regret, we may never dive into this seventh district race with a push for the real issues to be addressed.
After seeking counsel through friends, family, religious leaders, and journalists, and considering all the factors that may affect the lives of many people, I have decided to come forward in hopes that my actions will return ethics to Southwest Missouri politics and possibly politics in Washington as well.
I attended the Joplin Federated Republican Women’s meeting on March 2, 2010 at Pizza by Stout. The featured speakers of the event were candidates running for Missouri’s Seventh Congressional District seat now filled by Roy Blunt. After the meeting was over, Billy Long quickly approached me and asked me if I would be willing to sit down and discuss his campaign and my views of his candidacy over a cup of coffee.
While I will leave most of the details of the conversation off the record for now, I was surprised and disgusted by what took place towards the end of our conversation. My wife had just joined us after leaving the meeting room and sat down at our table, and I continued my conversation with Mr. Long listening to him react to the Long is Wrong Web site. I had raised some Constitutional concerns in our conversation about his candidacy, and I had pointed out a few of the great American tales that drive my passion for the Constitution. Mr. Long tells me he is impressed with my knowledge and that I would make a good addition to his own campaign. He asks me to consider it. He then tells me that if I stop doing what I am doing, referring to the Long is Wrong Web site, that I could have a position in his campaign.
I cut the conversation short after this, and as we got up to leave the table, Mr. Long once again invited me over, this time using a Star Wars reference asking me to join the ‘dark side’ (sic).
It is with great sadness that I discuss this today. All I hoped for was to raise the debate in Southwest Missouri to a higher level that directed our country in the right Constitutional direction. Instead, I am having the deal with what I feel is a bribe, to get me to remove the Long is Wrong Web site. This is not what I wanted to bring about in the seventh district. In fact, I have a heavy heart even discussing this as I was exposed to the dirty truth of politics in America today on a personal level by a man who claims a vote for him is a vote to send a citizen to Washington.
I wish I had never sat down and had coffee with him. I hate the position he has put me in, and I hate how this feels inside.

Billy Long is Wrong

Keep your chin up, Clay

-Kook

Oh, wait, no way, you're kidding, he didn't just say what I think he did… did he?

Ummm yeah, he did.  Talk about being clueless and tone deaf… he gets the Biden Award for Sheer Stoopidity®

Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, is the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and he recently had this to say:

he expects Democratic Senate candidate Martha Coakley to “win in Massachusetts.”

Van Hollen said Republican predictions that the political climate had changed so much that they can capture the 40 seats needed to regain control of the House was “pure hallucination”

“Why would you hand the keys to the car back to the same guys whose policies drove the economy into the ditch and then walked away from the scene of the accident?” Van Hollen said. “For the Republicans to say vote for us and bring back the guys who got us into this mess in the first place, I don’t think it’s a winner.”

Health Bill Can Pass Senate With 51 Votes, Van Hollen Says - Yahoo! News

A democratic operative should NEVER EVEEEERRRR talk about cars, ditches, bridges…

See for all of you just joining the class; Ted Kennedy held the seat that is currently being decided on in the special election… there was this incident with Teddy, and Mary Jo, and a Bridge….oh hell, never mind, if you don’t get it you never will.

And I thought RNC had a dumbass as a chairperson. 

-KOOK

"The Tea Party" party

Doesn't this sound great:

The "Tea Party" Is Now Official in Florida

Posted by Stephanie Condon

(AP Photo/George Ruhe)

The "Tea Party" is now an official political party in Florida.

An Orlando lawyer named Frederic O'Neal has registered the Tea Party with the office of the Florida Secretary of State, Politicoreports, and intends to run candidates against both Republicans and Democrats in state and national races.

"The current system has become mired in the sludge of special interest money that seeks to control the leadership of both parties. It's time for real change," O'Neal reportedly said in a press release.

One of Florida's most prominent Republicans, Gov. Charlie Crist, already faces a conservative challenger in his bid to become the GOP's 2010 Senate nominee. Conservative Marco Rubio is gaining credibility among the state's conservatives, and has won the endorsement of the anti-tax, pro-limited government Club For Growth.

The split among conservatives and moderates in the Florida GOP is part of a larger debate within the party about the future of its identity.

O'Neal, the new chair of the Tea Party in Florida, reportedly compared his party to the Conservative Party in New York's 23rd District -- another example of the GOP's moderate-conservative fissure. In a special election to represent New York's 23rd congressional district, Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman drove out the local Republican Party candidate, Dede Scozzafava. The district is Republican-leaning, but the Democratic candidate ultimatelyprevailed over the Conservative in last Tuesday's election.

Even though the conservative lost in that race, "tea partiers" and other conservatives "remain convinced they're on the right side of history," CBSNews.com's Charles Cooper wrote. "And in writing down their morning-after election analyses... they also delivered a hard-edged message to the Republican establishment: Get behind us or get out of the way."

The Tea Party has been registered with the state since August and is one of 32 minor political parties certified in Florida, Politico reported.

Warning: this so called "tea party" party is Bovine Scatology at it's finest. This so called party was founded by leftists in an attempt to split the votes between Independents and Republicans in the upcoming midterm elections in 2010. Do not buy into this scam or the scam artists behind it as our nation's future is at stake. They realize that polling indicates roughly 30% of Americans would vote for an independent or "tea party" affiliated candidate, 20% would vote Republican and 38% would vote Democrat. If they can capitalize on this split, the 38% voting Democrat wins, but if the 3o% and the 20% split between independent leaning and Republican leaning candidates are even close to being unified the "Party of NO" wins. Dems have used this to attack Republicans falsely since Obama's selection, and yet I believe it could be a winning idea if used properly, but that is subject matter for my next post.