MISSOURI ETHICS COMMISSION
CONTRIBUTION OF MORE THAN $5,000.00 RECEIVED BY ANY COMMITTEE FROM ANY SINGLE DONOR - TO BE FILED WITHIN 48 HOURS OF RECEIVING THE CONTRIBUTION
MEC ID: C101013
LET VOTERS DECIDE 6/18/2010
Rex A. Sinquefield Westphalia, MO 6/16/2010 $2,534,000.00
[emphasis added]
Why $2,534,000.00? Why that amount twice? Why not just write one check for $5,068,000.00 and save the money on postage? (Okay, bad question, if you can drop that kind of cash on a right wingnuttia initiative to defund government you're not particularly worried about the cost of postage or even a lack of public services for yourself because you don't need to.) What's with the $68,000.00? Is five million some kind of unlucky number? Just asking.
The folks promoting the repeal of earnings taxes in Kansas City and St. Louis got another economic boost from their supporter. Their web site states:
Welcome to the official website of the Let Voters Decide Coalition. Our group was formed to support the initiative proposed for the November 2010 state ballot...
MISSOURI ETHICS COMMISSION
CONTRIBUTION OF MORE THAN $5,000.00 RECEIVED BY ANY COMMITTEE FROM ANY SINGLE DONOR - TO BE FILED WITHIN 48 HOURS OF RECEIVING THE CONTRIBUTION
LET VOTERS DECIDE 6/4/2010
C101013
Rex A. Sinquefield
Westphalia, 6/3/2010
$2,534,000.00
[emphasis added]
Let's take a look at the "Let Voters Decide" first quarter campaign finance report filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission on April 15th:
Detailed Summary of Committee Disclosure Report
Committe: LET VOTERS DECIDE
ReportDate: 4/15/2010
1. TOTAL RECEIPTS FOR THIS ELECTION PREVIOUSLY REPORTED $0.00 2. ALL MONETARY CONTRIBUTIONS RECEIVED THIS PERIOD $1,000,545.00
9. TOTAL ALL RECEIPTS THIS ELECTION(SUM 1B + 7A - 8A) $1,000,545.00
15. TOTAL EXPENDITURES THIS ELECTION (SUM 10B + 14A) $889,541.68
28. MONEY ON HAND AT THE CLOSE OF THIS REPORTING PERIOD (SUM 25 + 26 - 27) $111,003.32
Okay, let's take a look at where all that money came from. That's got to be a serious grass roots fundraising effort. Wrong:
....Since she [Robin Carnahan] also has a couple of campaign fundraisers scheduled while she's in the capital, Zakula said the campaign is paying for the trip.
Still, the president is not the most popular guy in Missouri, lately. He only had a 40 percent approval rating in the state last month, according to a Rasmussen poll.
But Zakula denied that Carnahan was leaving town to avoid sharing a stage with him.
"She appreciates the support from Sen. McCaskill and the president and she's looking forward to seeing them on the campaign trail this year," he said....
"...He only had a 40 percent approval rating in the state last month, according to a Rasmussen poll..."
....I want to stress that the only point I'm making in this post is that at least in national tracking polls, in any given timeframe, a Rasmussen poll is overwhelmingly likely to show better news for the GOP than any other poll.
To illustrate this point, I generated a series of scatter plot charts using pollster.com's index of polls. Every poll in pollster.com's index is represented on each chart by a dot, plotted horizontally by the date of the poll, and vertically by the results of the poll.
Rasmussen polls are in red; every other poll is in green. Shaded red areas on the charts represent areas where results would favor the GOP.
I think you'll see that Rasmussen polls literally stand out from all the others and they almost always deliver good news for the GOP....
You'd think the Kansas City Star might mention that. If they even knew or bothered to try and figure it out.
The pool report forwarded this evening by the White House Media Affairs Office:
Air force one landed at lambert-st louis international airport at 323 pm local time (423 east coast time).
No gaggle on the flight to St. Louis. But Reid Cherlin stopped by to chat, and says, on the record, that Robin Carnahan had already scheduled her trip to Washington when Potus decided to come to St. Louis. "Her people have asked if President Obama would please appear with her in a future event soon," Mr. Cherlin said. "We are working on that now."
When I read the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's account of the Tea Party rally in Kiener Plaza last Saturday, I was struck by the claims of one Mike Carey, President of Ohio Coal Association and the Chief Executive of of the American Council for Affordable and Reliable Energy (ACARE), newly formed to fight clean energy legislation:
Mike Carey ... blasted the proposed climate change legislation, saying it would allow Congress to dictate what Americans ate, where they lived and what kinds of vehicles they drove.
Given the now familiar strategy of both the health and dirty energy industries, which is to rev up the seemingly inbred paranoia of the Tea Partiers, Carey's evocation of overweening government control was to be expected - just more of the general Tea Party hokum.
However, in the same edition of the Post-Dispatch, I came across an article that described the events that followed Tuesday, Nov. 28, 1939, "Black Tuesday," when the city of St. Louis was darkened by a fog of coal smoke so dense that "Motorists drove slowly with headlights on. Streetlights, still on, made ghostly glows."
The cheap, high-sulfur coal responsible for the miasma of pollution that had made St. Louis one of the "filthiest" cities in the nation was mined nearby in Illinois, and there were numerous local interests that had a stake in maintaining the status quo. Efforts to do something about the problem were effectively thwarted until Black Tuesday made it clear that there had to be a change. Sound familiar?
Thanks to the shock delivered by Black Tuesday, St. Louis was finally able to take the necessary steps to insure an acceptable quality of life for its citizens. I doubt that many people in the city at that time felt that government was curtailing their liberty when it stepped in and refused to give local mining interests their druthers.
Yet last Saturday, 1500-2000 people, some of whom are probably descended from those who experienced Black Tuesday, were thumping their chests and gibbering about how "big government" wants to take away their "liberty" - all because a majority of the citizens of this democracy elected a government based on its plan of action to safeguard our quality of life and health.
There's been lots of press about Congress cutting off funds to ACORN, but that money is so not the issue. Forgoing 53 million dollars over fifteen years is not going to break ACORN. What is hurting them is that local charitable organizations fear becoming radioactive if they give ACORN funds. Those charities are cautious about being tarred unjustly, though they may know very well how much good ACORN does in the community.
Some of them have had close ties with ACORN for years. For instance, the St. Vincent de Paul church runs a charity that dispenses money to help low income people, the disabled, and the elderly with clean up, painting, even some lawn mowing. ACORN, through its network of members, finds the folk who need and deserve these services and puts them in touch with St. Vincent de Paul. If that kind of cooperation stalls or if charities like the United Way cancel contributions to ACORN, people who are already having a rough go of it are going to face even tougher times. When Republicans hurt ACORN, they're spitting on poor people.
I spent a couple of hours at the ACORN office recently, observing how the staff spends its time. In the (not so) luxurious digs pictured below the fold, they had a staff meeting, and afterwards, James Houston (pictured at right with Ann Chilson) and Roszina Jones-Williams (pictured above with Mike Green) began calling members. A large part of their job is to find out what the members need and help them organize to get it, as well as to educate them about the sorts of help that are available to low income people from the government and from various charities. They collect $10 monthly in dues from their members and provide a wealth of services.
Jones-Williams explained that homeowners might be concerned, say, about nearby nuisance properties. Perhaps someone is parking his car in his yard or there's a vacant building that has become a gathering place. She counsels them on how to deal with that. Or perhaps she tells people who want to buy their first home or who have been in their first home less than three years about tax credits HUD offers worth ten percent of the amount of the home's value. HUD also offers home improvement funds for low and moderate income people.
Yeah, this is a process story. Since we cover politics and government in Missouri and President Obama was here yesterday, we went through the process to be able to cover his trip. Since we don't cover major league baseball (pace RBH) we weren't going to get credentials to cover the first pitch along with 2500 other media folks. Instead, we covered the arrival and departure of the President on Air Force One.
Inivted guests waiting next to the press pen for the arrival of the President.
And it could happen. The President could decide that he's a little ahead of schedule and go ahead and work the rope line. Then we'd get some nice close up photos and maybe a comment or two. It didn't happen, but you show up just in case it does happen.
Update: Enjoy John Oliver of the Daily Show interviewing Tea Party participants and showing them that there's no real comparison between the British tyranny of 1773 and their perceived tyranny of Obama.
The St. Louis tax day Tea Party was well attended (having been well organized by Republican operatives) had great turnout. Some estimates ran as high as 10,000, but more realistically, it was probably five or six thousand. People had put an impressive amount of effort into signs:
President Obama, Vice President Biden, Secretary LaHood Call for U.S. High-Speed Passenger Trains
Vision for a New Era in Rail Entails Clean, Energy-Efficient Option for Travelers
President Barack Obama, along with Vice President Biden and Secretary LaHood, announced a new U.S. push today to transform travel in America, creating high-speed rail lines from city to city, reducing dependence on cars and planes and spurring economic development.
The President released a strategic plan outlining his vision for high speed rail in America. The plan identifies $8 billion provided in the ARRA and $1 billion a year for five years requested in the federal budget as a down payment to jump-start a potential world-class passenger rail system and sets the direction of transportation policy for the future. The strategic plan will be followed by detailed guidance for state and local applicants. By late summer, the Federal Railroad Administration will begin awarding the first round of grants...
West County Dems in St.Louis is having a trivia night Saturday, July 12th. Clark and I would like to get up a Show Me Progress table (of eight). Anybody else in?
Early on Sunday morning, two unmarked vans headed east out of a Target parking lot in St. Louis, bound for Western Kentucky with 12 passengers. No, we weren't being abducted, nor were we on some top-secret surveillance mission. We were a motley group of volunteers trying to seal the deal for Senator Obama by spending the only rain-free Sunday in recent memory canvassing in Paducah, KY. I had made several of these trips to Iowa on behalf of John Edwards in the summer, fall, and winter (diaried here, here, and here), but this would be my first, and hopefully last, trip out of the state for Obama.
The story, along with a few pics, is below the fold.
I know you're probably looking for someplace to put your activist energy as a long presidential primary winds down, and better yet, get behind one Democrat fighting an extremist Republican.
If you're in the St. Louis area, you're in luck. We are pleased to announce the first official blograiser in Missouri, on behalf of Deb Lavender, Democratic candidate for the 94th District of the Missouri House. Deb is a fantastic candidate running against an awful opponent, so picking her ahead of so many other good local candidates wasn't as hard a choice as we thought it might be. Deb is a Kirkwood physical therapist and small business owner who is running for health care and education reform and to protect our environment. She's also dogged campaigner who's not afraid to make a speech in a crowded bar, put in call time, and knock door after door in her district. Her opponent, Rick Stream, is a far-right Republican who voted for such measures as abstinence-only education in schools and to hurt MOHELA's ability to provide low-interest loans to college students. Best of all, he's beatable. Deb whipped him in fundraising last quarter and is nearly even in cash on hand. And recently as 2006, Democrats held the seat. It's going to take some effort, but it's within reach.
So, here's how a blograiser works. It's essentially a combination meetup, fundraiser, and liveblog. We will meet at the Royale at 7:00pm on May 21st, just like about 30 of us did last fall. This time, we'll pitch in some cash on behalf of Deb, and some of us will give online updates on our respective blogs. You can either bring your checkbook to the Royale, or you can contribute online at Deb's ActBlue page. The suggested minimum contribution is $10, and if you contribute online ahead of time, please print out your confirmation page and bring it to the blograiser.
Date: Wednesday, May 21st
Place: The Royale at 3132 S. Kingshighway in St. Louis
Remember, the action in Jefferson City is arguably a lot more important to us in Missouri than what goes on in Washington, D.C. Winning this seat back for the Democrats is a necessary step to bringing responsible governance back to the statehouse. So let's support Deb!
Following up on last week's news of 5th Senate district candidate (and current House Democratic Whip) Connie Johnson's possible residency problems, the St. Louis American's Political Eye has some backstory that connects the story to Johnson's frosty relationship with Firefighters Local 73.
If you haven't been following this story, documents have just surfaced that cast doubt on Connie Johnson maintaining a legal residence within her current House district, let alone the Senate seat she aspires to. And by "just surfaced", I mean right after Johnson filed at the last minute for a run at the 5th District seat, somebody sent a packet of documents pertaining to her residence to several local media outlets. The campaigns of Connie Johnson's opponents in the race, Rodney Hubbard and Robin Wright-Jones, have both denied involvement.
More below the flip.
Photo of Connie Johnson speaking at 2007 Take Back America Conference courtesy of Progressive Majority Flickr page.
John Edwards at the press availability after the speech
As a strong Edwards supporter, it had not occurred to me that John Edwards might have a problem filling the Carpenters Union Hall. I badly wanted to see him speak here; naturally there would be many people like me. But early Saturday morning, at about 7:00 am waiting for the bus in single digit cold, I started to realize, "I am not a normal person." Normal people don't go out into the freezing morning cold to see a longshot presidential candidate; normal people sip their hot coffee in their warm living room watching morning TV. Better yet, normal people stay snuggled under warm blankets.
My fears were allayed when I arrived; there were already 30 people standing in line waiting for the doors to open 45 minutes later for a speech that wasn't set to start until over 2 hours from then. That line quickly doubled and then tripled, and after doors opened, the room swelled with over 1000 people spilling into the foyer and into an overflow room in the back.
John Edwards will be speaking at the Carpenters Hall in St. Louis on Saturday morning, and I'm pretty jazzed up about that. I've seen him fielding tough questions in smaller rooms, like at the YearlyKos breakout session, which is honestly the ideal way to see a candidate. But I haven't seen him give a longer stump speech in person yet, and at this stage, he's firing on all cylinders. So if you're in the neighborhood of St. Louis, you should check him out. Doors open at 8 AM.
The other exciting John Edwards-related event happening this weekend is a virtual one not even initiated or coordinated by the campaign. A Daily Kos diarist, KingOneEye, came up with the wildly ambitious goal of raising $7 million dollars for Edwards in a day (otherwise known as a $7 million moneybomb.) With a fundraising policy that precludes him from taking money from PACs and lobbyists, and campaign rhetoric that's sure to turn off the industry donors, it's up to the grassroots to raise the money. Not to mention the publicity for a candidate who lacks media coverage, $7 million would be a huge haul and a shot in the arm. I have no idea whether John Edwards fans can attain this goal, but I'm going to do my part and chip in $50.
If you support John Edwards and his fight for the middle class, put in $25 dollars, at least. Your contribution will be matched by public financing up to $250, effectively doubling it.
The Young Democrats of Greater St. Louis are holding a Iowa returns watch party/mock St. Louis caucus on Thursday, January 3rd. From the release:
St. Louis, Mo. - Gearing up for the primary election season the Young Democrats of Greater St. Louis will welcome Democratic activists to The Royale Food and Spirits for an old fashioned caucus to pick a presidential candidate for the Democratic Party.
The event will begin at 8pm at the Royale Food and Spirits at 3132 South Kingshighway. The results of the caucus should be available around 9:30pm January 3rd while the rest of the night will be dedicated to watching the Iowa returns. You are invited to send a camera and/or reporter to watch the St. Louis Caucus as well as the Iowa Caucus results.
The Caucus will be hosted by 9th Ward Democratic Committeeman Ron Auer and will be monitored by Kyle Dubbert, Republican Supervisor of the Saint Louis City Election Board. While the caucus is non-binding, it will reflect the much anticipated Iowa Caucus and emphasis the caucus Missouri used to hold.
I'll be there to support John Edwards, and below the fold, I'll tell you why.
Via Matthew Yglesias, a nifty website gives you a demographic profile of your ZIP code. Something that stands out in my area: there's a 9.4% unemployment rate, yet a whopping 24.3% of my neighbors live below the poverty line.
Incidentally, the highest poverty rate of any ZIP code in the state is 69.2%, and it's not in any inner city, but rather in Brownwood, MO, just southwest of Cape Girardeau.
The metro St. Louis area isn't a greenitarian's utopia. Hardly. But there are folks aiming to change that.
Since Scorecard.org ranks St. Louis as the second worst city in the country as far as pollution, their efforts are needed and welcome. A simple chart here shows how awful we are. We're ranked #19 in smog and #10 in particle matter. We get an F from the American Lung Association.
The city of St. Louis is taking some baby steps toward greener buildings to relieve our pollution and plans to take bigger steps. The only thing definitely happening is that the two new recreation centers being built will be green buildings. And the rumor is that the new Centene building will also be green.
Following up on last week's announcement, if you're in the St. Louis area, you should drop by the Royale tomorrow evening for a meetup of local bloggers. The Royale is cozy enough that you should be able to spot the group, but for identification purposes, I'm the guy wearing a "I Got Pssst at YearlyKos 2007" T-shirt.
Date: Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Place: The Royale at 3132 S. Kingshighway
Time: 6:30 pm until ???
A group of Missourians who attended Yearlykos 2007 last month has organized a follow-up meeting in St. Louis on Tuesday, September 18th. If you are 1) a progressive Democrat and 2) a blogger, commenter, lurker, candidate for office, and/or elected official, you are welcome to attend!
The details:
Date: Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Place: The Royale at 3132 S. Kingshighway
Time: 6:30 pm until ???
About the location: The Royale is a nice, relaxing bar where you can also get a good, decently priced meal if you can't grab some food beforehand. It was actually profiled on the Food Network show "Recipe for Success" when it opened. It's also a hangout for local politicians and activists - Jeff Smith kicked off his state senate campaign there, for example.
If you're in the St. Louis area, please join us. It will be a good chance to meet fellow progressives face-to-face and have a little fun. See you on the 18th!
Apropos of hotflash's diary about Blairmont being cleaned up just for the legislators' tour, PubDef has an account of Matt Blunt's recent photo op visit to North St. Louis as part of Cool Down St. Louis.
With temperatures above 105 degrees and surrounded by the stark signs of urban decay - boarded up buildings, piles of bricks, homes with fallen porches - the Governor's people and representatives of Cool Down arrived to the 4300 block of Linton Avenue in the comfort of air conditioned cars. A Mercedes and Lexus stood out in their the impoverished surroundings[...] The group knocked on three pre-screened doors and offered residents free air conditioners before taking the podium to congratulate each other for a job well done.
However, in the same edition of the Post-Dispatch, I came across an 
There's been lots of press about Congress cutting off funds to ACORN, but that money is so not the issue. Forgoing 53 million dollars over fifteen years is not going to break ACORN. What is hurting them is that local charitable organizations fear becoming radioactive if they give ACORN funds. Those charities are cautious about being tarred unjustly, though they may know very well how much good ACORN does in the community.
I spent a couple of hours at the ACORN office recently, observing how the staff spends its time. In the (not so) luxurious digs pictured below the fold, they had a staff meeting, and afterwards, James Houston (pictured at right with Ann Chilson) and Roszina Jones-Williams (pictured above with Mike Green) began calling members. A large part of their job is to find out what the members need and help them organize to get it, as well as to educate them about the sorts of help that are available to low income people from the government and from various charities. They collect $10 monthly in dues from their members and provide a wealth of services.
So, here's how a blograiser works. It's essentially a combination meetup, fundraiser, and liveblog. We will meet at the Royale at 7:00pm on May 21st, just like about 30 of us did 
The metro St. Louis area isn't a greenitarian's utopia. Hardly. But there are folks aiming to change that.
About the location: The Royale is a nice, relaxing bar where you can also get a good, decently priced meal if you can't grab some food beforehand. It was actually 