It would appear that the race in the 22nd is not over yet. Democrat Representative Rick Johnson, and Republican Bill Alter are separated by 66 votes. Alter has 6,861 votes (30.1%) and Johnson has 6,795 (29.8%).

The mood at Johnson's headquarters was subdued last night as the final precincts reported in and the separation between the two campaigns vote totals increased. Nevertheless, Johnson was optimistic as he addressed his staff and volunteers telling them that regardless of the outcome, he would continue, "working for the people of Jefferson County … on one side of [the capitol] building or the other."

At the moment the candidates are waiting to hear the results of hand recount of a sample of votes. The Democrats may also be pondering asking for a full recount which would happen later in the week.

A third candidate, Independent Harold Selby, may find himself the target of some Democratic ire. Even Selby admitted that he may end up being viewed as a stalking-horse. Selby decided to throw his hat in the ring to challenge Johnson. Selby has previously represented Jefferson County as a Democrat, but this time decided to run as an independent because he didn't believe Johnson accurately reflected the social fiber of Jefferson County.

That said, Selby himself told KWMU's Tom Weber that he was running on only one issue, the elimination of Missouri's emissions testing system. In a county where roads have played such a big role in political campaigns, it's no surprise Selby gained some great traction.

The Johnson campaign, however, must have been surprised by Selby's effectiveness. Selby was able to gather 6,272 (27.5%) of the total vote. Despite Sen. John Edwards and some of Missouri's top Democrats coming out to stump for Johnson, Selby's campaign was able to draw enough Democratic votes to cause a split, allowing the Republican challenger to squeeze through.

The race isn't officially over yet, however, so there may yet be a new twist in this already strange race.

- Murphy

I noticed an interesting juxtaposition upon opening to the business page of the Post-Dispatch last week. On the left side of the page was a column by Martin Van Der Werf touting the more than 2 billion dollars in new investment in Missouri, while on the other side of the page was a story about Gov. Blunt's recent signing of a worker's comp revision that would limit workers access to compensation.

The St. Louis area is on the verge of a construction boom unlike any seen in perhaps two decades, with contracts for a plethora of large projects about to be awarded.

Overall, construction employment hours have been growing at about 5 percent a year, but it is the size of the projects and the number that will be going up simultaneously that are remarkable.

Martin Van Der Werf,
St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
3/31/2005

"Companies that are in Missouri will look at Arkansas and Oklahoma and determine quickly that they can realize real savings in their workers' compensation costs by moving to one of those other states."

Gov. Matt Blunt
3/30/2005

And a quick look back to Gov. Blunt's State of the State speech…

”My budget calls for significant reductions in spending for some state agencies and programs. It demands that state government live within the people's means, with no new job-destroying taxes that harm working families and diminish future economic opportunities.“

”High workers' compensation insurance premiums are costing Missouri jobs. In 2003, premiums increased by 13.8 percent. These premiums detract from an employers' ability to reinvest and grow his or her business and to hire new workers. Some Missouri companies have discovered that they can realize significant workers' compensation savings by moving to a neighboring state.”

Gov. Matt Blunt,
State of the State Address,
January 26, 2005.

These are two of the three big points Republicans use to sell themselves as pro-business and pro-growth. Tax cuts, reduced workers rights and the third, mentioned elsewhere in the State of the State speech, reducing individuals access to courts (via liability lawsuit restrictions).

Yet billions of dollars in business investment do not appear overnight. SLU's research facility has been on the drawing board for years, as well as the $750 million cement plant (which had been held-up for quite some time due to environmental concerns).

If the previous Democrat-controlled governments in Missouri were crushing the future of job growth in Missouri through taxation and litigation, why have businesses been planning on spending billions in Missouri? The St. Louis area alone has seen hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars in investment despite continuous claims that taxes and red tape are killing growth prospects.

The Republican party changed its anti-tax argument from a moral issue into a business issues during the 1980's. Despite the fact that the U.S. not only has had the lowest tax rate of any industrialized nation, but during the same time period created greater wealth than the world has ever seen. Unreasonable tax burdens are a bad idea in anyone's book, but the taxation bogeyman that Republicans like to trot out to scare people into accepting their other policies (eliminating services that not only help those in need, but also contribute to a better business environment) is nothing more than a smokescreen. Accross the country, states are realizing that they can not function without revenue and even those governors and legislators who pledged fidelity to the anti-tax crusade are realizing the fiscal reality.

Until there can be a more common-sense and economically driven discussion about taxes, the Republicans will continue to cloak their ideology in "tax-relief".

- Murphy

Over at the Commonspace Blog, they are reporting that former 3rd District congressional candidate Jeff Smith has been knocking on doors for School Board Candidate Jeff Keaveny. It's an interested pairing, but I must admit that after spending some time talking with Mr. Keaveny I was impressed by his background and his strong desire to cut through the clutter. A point he repeatedly made was that communication is the key in creating any future for the school system. His legal and financial background will give the board an edge in dealing with the complex financial issues. As he said he spends all day managing money for very rich people. You start losing their money, well, there will be little debate just a nice pink slip on your desk.

He doesn't seem to be someone out for glory, but a determined and thoughtful individual. He is certainly doing well for himself and his family and there is little to be gained by wading into the school board debacle unless you truly want to try and help.

If he is elected, I think he will serve admirably.

- Murphy

For those who have been trying to follow the Social Security debacle that has taken up enormous amounts of President Bush's time and political capital: The Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert (R-Ill) has for all intents and purposes declared the initiative dead. Josh Marshall over at Talking Points Memo has the relevant info.

Hastert, who recently made a local appearance in St. Louis for the NCAA Wrestling Championship, says he would have liked to see the as-yet-undefined reform plan for Social Security passed this year, but said it will most likely have to wait until next year.

For a President re-elected with a self-described mandate and political capital to burn, this must be a blow. The President is in the middle of barnstorming around the country trying to drum up support for his Social Security ideas and Hastert's verdict must have resulted in a few raised voices on Air Force One.

The President has been waiting for months for a Congressman to throw himself upon the sword and actually write out a social security privatization plan. The White House believed they could put the ideas out there and at some point someone would propose a plan that the President could endorse or back away from depending on how it played with the voters.

Not surprisingly, the Congress was waiting for the President, while the President waited for Congress; the two parties staring at each other, each one ready to take credit for the other's bold action.

Instead, nothing.

The White House lost what it cynically thought would be its most ardent supporters, the retired and those near-to retirement, right off the bat. Then, once the basic details of the idea were out there, they lost the support of most everyone else, except those who had too closely aligned themselves politically with the President. Everyone else was out of the office when the President came knocking.

This campaign is not over, however. The President still has stumps to stand on, but we can expect a change in the language. The White House is nothing if not an excellent political machine and they know how to turn back into the wind and recover a bit of ground.

Even still, I think the privatization plan is as dead in the water as when it began.

It will be interesting to see how much capital the President has left. He said he intended to spend it, and spend it he did. A second-term President only has so much time before people stop paying attention. You have to use that time wisely and decide which issues are worth investing in. Pick the wrong one, and you may find you have a little less weight to throw around, the parties are already taking bets on 2008.

- Murphy

One detail that stood out during the Congressional debate over the Shiavo bill was an almost complete inability to pronounce Shiavo's last name correctly. Most of the Congressmen pronounced her name She-i-vo, while the correct pronunciation is Shai-vo. This doesn't necessarily mean anything, but it does lead one to wonder about the Congressmen who were taking such constitutionally questionable steps for a person whose name they couldn't even pronounce.

By the time of Congress's involvement, Shiavo's name was nearly a household name. There had been a series of cases involving the family that had gained national attention over the years, yet there were Congressmen giving speeches asserting positive diagnosis of Shiavo's condition (and were near to giving odds on her readiness to spring from the bed) who were unable to pronounce her name.

You would assume that a Congressman would take the time to evaluate a case to have a full understand of the situation, especially in the case of legislation that may raise serious constitutional questions. It would also be fair to assume that through said study (in this case, dozens of court cases, the 14 years of medical records and the numerous journalistic investigations) one would have come across the proper pronunciation of the name of the subject.

While that is not a damning evaluation of individual legislators' understanding, it does raise questions as to the forethought given to such a radical piece of legislation. If the Congress is going to craft legislation that raises so many questions regarding federalism, religion, privacy, custody and proper medial treatment, you would hope that your legislator would take the time to adequately familiarize himself with the relevant information.

That said, when such questionable legislation is created in the name of one individual, you should have the assurance that your Congressman knows the name the person for whom they are working.

- Murphy

The Post-Dispatch ran a hard-hitting editorial this past Sunday. Titled, The Shameless 20, the piece takes the Republican Senators who voted to cut Medicaid to task.

The article hit on all the salient facts surrounding the Medicaid issue. They address the fact that Medicaid makes health care more efficient by providing help earlier, rather than waiting for someone to show up in an emergency room. Preventative care saves everyone money by keeping costs down.

It also address the ignorant assumption that Medicaid only serves those who are too lazy to help themselves. In an age when more and more people find themselves working low-wage jobs with no benefits who can't afford the hundreds of dollars a month that insurance can cost, using the government's resources to help offset some of those costs is the ethical thing to do. Medicaid also helps those who are retired or disabled and are unable to go out and find other means to cover expenses whose growth consumes more and more of their fixed income.

They also pointed out the irony that 17 of the 20 Senators who voted for the cuts receive benefits paid for by the taxpayers.
Politicians have come under fire in the past for receiving medical benefits and they have argued, correctly, that their government responsibilities may not always allow them to earn much when the legislature is not in session and since they make so little, they need the benefits they might not otherwise be able to afford. But how can they also argue that it is wrong to use the government's resources to help the other Missourians who can't cover the rising cost of health care?

One final point they make, which is somewhat overlooked, is that the state investment in Medicaid is reinforced by federal funds. These funds not only represent heath care services, but it is also money going into Missouri's economy. The hospitals, clinics, doctors and nurses who provide heath care, as well as all the suppliers who support them benefit, and as a result Missouri's economy benefits. They all pay taxes and spend their money in their community. Cutting $250 million in state funds results in an overall loss of $737.4 million in investment. That is even before the investment multiplier kicks in. There is also an economic impact due to lack of insurance. It means more work hours lost as well as higher treatment costs that may eventually be passed onto the consumers (the people of Missouri). Lost productivity and higher costs will stifle business growth faster than any lawsuit.

Certainly there are ways to try and reduce the costs of heath care, but those require time and effort. Knee-jerk cuts to Medicare are bad for Missouri, no matter how you look at it.

- Murphy

The owner of that sweet St. Louis landmark, Crown Candy Kitchen died this past Sunday of complications due to Parkinson's disease. The Post-Dispatch has a good story on the history of that timeless shop and the family that owned it.

I remember many a night trekking up to Crown Candy from South City. My father or one of the other parents form the neighborhood would drive us up after school functions. It didn't matter if it was a game or one of the mandatory school band concerts. I think my father really enjoyed going and he used us as an excuse. Now that I think of it, he was always the one to suggest Crown Candy as a post-event stop.

I even know a few people who still make it there about once a week for a sundae or a split.

- Murphy

The Post-Dispatch endorsed Democrat Rick Johnson in the race for the 22nd District Senate Seat.

This race has generated a lot of interest. Both the state and national parties are watching to see how this race plays out. The 22nd District isn't an essential seat, in that it won't change the Republican control of the state government. However, the 22nd is a Democratic stronghold and the Republicans are going to see if their success in other parts of the state will help them break loose a just enough voters in the 22nd.

Johnson is the presumed winner in this race, but the interesting aspect is what effect Republican Bill Alter's campaign will have. Unless the Republicans make a good showing in this race, it may represent a breakwater for the Republicans in Missouri. They may have scooped up all the territory they can reach.

If the Republicans do come out strong, it may lead to more high-finance campaigns targeting any and every Democrat in the state. It is unusual to see State Senate candidates use television, like Alter has done, but the Republicans obviously feel that it can make the difference.

Yet their focus on high-profile, high-expense advertising may be undercut by Johnson's focus on door knocking and hand-shaking. Johnson has a large number of volunteers out canvassing the county and he has focused on personal contact.

Reports from the field have indicated that, due to the fact that both candidates use their naval service in their bio, some voters think Johnson has his own t.v. ads out there, even though he doesn't. This doesn't bode well for Alter, but the confusion may worry both candidates in that the voters aren't all that aware that there is an election coming up.

Johnson may be hurt less by this confusion thanks to his focus on traditional door-to-door politic, but no politician likes to hear that the voters don't realize an election is around the corner.

This race has been described by some as a referendum on Gov. Blunt's policies, and it may well be. Alter has aligned himself in terms of policy with Blunt. Yet it may also play a larger part. as a thermometer for Republican v. Democrat policies in out-state areas. We will have to watch the final days and look at the returns before the tea leaves really begin to speak.

- Murphy

The Republican Party in Missouri has for decades touted itself as the party of fiscal responsibility. This has been a constant rhetoric in party-line arguments. You often hear it from those who support the Republican party as well.

The refrain is that the Republicans will let you keep your money and give you a smaller government. It makes for a good soundbite but, as is the case with most slogans, it doesn't exactly jive with reality. While most sales pitches include some fine print, these claims never do.

What the Republicans fail to explain is that there is an essential and intimate feedback loop between all sectors of the economy. It's a simple matter of supply and demand, and this is especially the case with government services. Often these are essential services provided to people of lesser means but can also include financial help to businesses. The basic idea behind both is that small investments now can lead to greater returns down the road. Often when it comes to social services, people factor in a moral or ethical obligation, which I agree with, but isn't essentially the best argument.

The Republicans in Missouri, however, have proven that short-sited political gain is more important than responsible fiscal governance. Their number one pledge is, "no new taxes," regardless of the nature of the situation. The Republican Majority leader in the U.S. House, Tom DeLay, once said there is no more important goal for a nation at war than to cut taxes. While no one wants to be taxed unnecessarily, revenue has to be collected in some form or another.

Instead Missouri Republican's first order of business has been to eliminate spending in areas they philosophically despise, despite reasonable and practical arguments for their continued existence. The most glaring example would be the recent vote in the Senate to cut medicare to almost 100,000 people in Missouri, mostly women and children with little in the way of financial resources. In other cuts the Republicans clearly demonstrated little care for the effect their actions would have. Governor Matt Blunt said that he was just trying to make changes to the program when he reduced First Steps funding to $0. He barely took the effort to create believable political cover. Blunt has since spent the past months trying to backpedal away from that decision.

The Senate President Pro Tem, Michael Gibbons (R-Kirkwood), acknowledged tonight on the Jaco Report that the individuals cut off form Medicare assistance in Missouri will most likely end up using emergency room services to meet their medical care needs. Gibbons argued that the cuts were not done out of malice towards the poor (which I can believe) but necessary in order to get Missouri's budget under control (which I don't believe). Gibbons said that raising taxes wasn't enough because the costs are increasing at an enormous rate; 1 billion every five years according to Gibbons.

Yet while on it surface that may sound like a reasonable argument it ignores the reality that people will have to get services somewhere and the most likely place will be local emergency rooms. All this does is move the burden of the costs from the state to private interests. In addition, cutting medicare will decrease the chance that people will receive preventative care, which means when they do arrive in already strapped emergency rooms they will be more expensive to treat. These cuts even affect areas like providing crutches and wheelchairs.

The medicare cuts will have an even greater impact because of the resulting loss in federal funds. Any cuts Missouri makes to medicare result in parallel cuts in federal aid. Thus hundreds of millions of dollars in additional cuts to the medicare program as a whole.

One of the driving forces behind the increased cost of medicare is not population growth, but rising health care costs. It costs more money to receive medical care than it did 10 years ago. Asking health care providers to take on the additional burden of tens of thousands of individuals who cannot pay for the services results in increased costs to the providers who must then pass on their increased costs to their paying customers, which includes the government of Missouri as well as its citizens.

As a result, instead of working with medical providers to find effective ways of reducing costs, they simply exacerbate the problem while claiming to be working for fiscal responsibility.

In order to achieve a few narrow-minded philosophical goals, no taxes and no social services, they have increased the price we will all be paying. There is no form of responsibility in modern Republicanism besides these two goals and the citizens of Missouri will bear the brunt of their hostility.

- Murphy

Representative Kenny Hulshoff (R-Columbia) has left open the possibility that he may co-sponsor a bill that would reverse House ethics rules changes made earlier this year. From The Hill's Tipsheet:

Republican rules
Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-Ohio) and Rep. Kenny Hulshof (R-Mo.), the two Republican members removed by the GOP leadership from the House Standards of Official Conduct Committee along with former chairman Joel Hefley (R-Colo.), are declining to join Hefley in co-sponsoring a bill to repeal changes made earlier this year to House ethics rules. The bill is sponsored by Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.) and would reverse changes to ethics procedure that GOP leaders implemented in the rules package for the 109th Congress. LaTourette dismissed out of hand the possibility of co-sponsoring Mollohan's bill. But Hulshof said he would not sign onto the bill at this time, leaving open the possibility of future support. So far Hefley and Rep. Chris Shays (R-Conn.) are the only Republican cosponsors. Rep. Rob Simmons, a fellow Republican centrist from Connecticut, said he will not sign on as a cosponsor, indicating that Mollohan has a way to go before attracting significant Republican support for his bill.

Hulshoff and LaTourette were removed from the House ethics committee because they stood up to Republican Majority Leader, Tom Delay (R-Texas). The ethics committee reprimanded DeLay three times last year for ethics violations. The move was seen by most as a blatant attempt to wrangle in the ethics committee and punish Republican members who would seek to question DeLays numerous questionable tactics.

It was announced a few days ago that DeLay is yet again being investigated for possible ethics violations involving overseas junkets to South Korea.

- Murphy