The Missouri Expatriate

New Year's Predictions For 2012

2012-01-01T15:11:00.001-06:00

Some feasible, some wacky, some seemingly impossible predictions for 2012:

Despite a down year for Democrats nationwide, Jay Nixon coasts to re-election

Having a near veto-proof majority in the General Assembly is only useful if you can wield it, and Republicans fell apart from the word go during last fall's Extraordinary Session. What should have been a significant push for economic development, disaster recovery efforts, tax credit reform, local control of St. Louis City Police, and clean-up of measures that fell by the wayside last session turned into a two-month vegetable that wound up including a house resolution that inadvertently slammed a company with 15,000 employees in Missouri, and a bill which technically can't take effect without a court order stripping the qualifying legislation.

Of course, Nixon would have been a prime target for a principled conservative, unilaterally "withholding" $170 million from the state budget to pay for disaster relief in Joplin, Birds Point, and the Platte Purchase when a half-billion dollar Rainy Day Fund has been set aside for the past 20 years for that very purpose. (Asking five of the state's 14 public four-year universities to lend that amount from their reserves doesn't bode well either.) But as his most likely challenger Tweeted his way into near-political oblivion, his only two Republican challengers are St. Louis plastics magnate Dave Spence and Kansas City lawyer Bill Randles, a native of Northwest Arkansas. Nixon was an easy winner over Kenny Hulshof in 2008 by picking up 61 percent of the vote in Southwest Missouri. His re-election prospects in the region are buoyed with his bringing about the Missouri Solution to counter the November 2010 passage of Proposition B, and his public presence around Joplin in the months following the tornado of 22 May. Unless Spence or Randles start a massive grassroots push in the outstate, it'll be the same story in '12 even if the GOP candidate for President turns out to be a shoe-in for Missouri's 10 electoral votes.

Despite the persistent "Oust The Incumbents" drumbeat, every member of Missouri's congressional delegation is re-elected. (Yes, that includes Claire.)

Any mention of Congress' disapproval rating should be taken with a grain of salt, at most. There are 435 voting members of Congress, and most respondents who say the place is dysfunctional still vote to retain their rep, because it's the other 434 who wreck the place. This mentality will prevail again in Missouri in 2012, particularly in the outstate. Graves, Emerson, Hartzler, Leutkemeyer, and Long will secure re-election. Cleaver will be in another dogfight with the addition of Ray, Lafayette, Saline, and southwestern Clay counties, but there will be just enough support in the urban core of Kansas City to keep him around. Clay will remain in St. Louis City, and will likely edge out Russ Carnahan should he run for the 1st. Were Carnahan to run for the 2nd, he would probably win depending on the GOP challenger.

Although I am very skeptical of Obama's chances of claiming Missouri's electoral votes, I see Claire McCaskill squeaking out another close victory. She will campaign heavy in the outstate and find a way to deflect the [damn] many [plane] criticisms [husband's $17m income] that [Obamacare] will [Super-PAC after Super-PAC zeroing in on her] be levied against her. Especially if illegal immigration were to become a campaign issue. The GOP will claim a slim majority in the Senate, but it will not be by way of Missouri.

Missouri GOP retain majorities in the General Assembly, but the margin will diminish

The House and Senate will not change hands in 2012. Even with several radical adjustments in the house boundaries, the gap is just too wide for Democrats to overcome in one election (particularly with the growth in the Southwest and sub-suburban St. Louis). However, given the bitter stagnation of the Extraordinary Session, and the prospects of not much more being accomplished this session, it would be surprising to see this many Republicans return in 2013.

Part of the reason that majority will diminish:

The greatest accomplishment of the 2012 General Assembly will involve a boogeyman conjured up for vote-mongering purposes.

Hopefully that boogeyman will be the chronic job poachers from a certain state to the west, but with candidates looking to shore up their credentials, expect bill discussed in detail that target any of these boogeymen:
1. Sharia law
2. Ballot box stuffers
3. Illegal immigrants
4. CAFOs
5. Tax credit junkies
6. Online shopping
7. Term limits

Rex H Susa starts chowing down on medicinal hemp, but he'd rather buy it in Arkansas where sales tax would be a bargain nine percent.

He's back, and in full force. Petitions are circulating around the state on a multitude of issues, most notable an effort by Rex Sinquefield's Let Voters Decide to eliminate the income tax and replace it with a higher, broader sales tax to make up the difference. The Humane Society of the United States, bitter over their ag-jeopardizing Proposition B being substantially reworked with the blessing of Governor Nixon and the Humane Society of Missouri, are fronting Your Vote Counts and pushing a constitutional amendment that would require a 75 percent affirmative vote of the General Assembly to overturn any voter initiative, no matter how flawed the proposal is.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Petitions are in the works for updated renewable energy mandates, medical marijuana, an increase in Missouri's lowest-in-the-Western-world 17¢/pack cigarette tax, the prohibition of eminent domain for the benefit of private enterprise, allowing Missouri to vote early, elimination of property taxes, local control of St. Louis City's police force, reform measures for campaign finance, pay day loans, and an increase in the state's minimum wage by $1/hour. Not all of these will get enough signatures, but expect a lot of zombified soccer moms flooding the ballot box with affirmative votes for those that do after seeing carefully crafted TV ads in-between segments of Extra! and Talk Soup.

The Euro holds on, at least until Ireland defaults.
It's the ticking time bomb that will define the 21st century: whether the sick man that is Europe will be able to recover from what's turned out to be a modern version of Articles of Confederacy. Greece and Italy have taken drastic steps to bring their debt crises under control, but three more Eurozone members are in trouble: Spain, Portugal and Ireland. Even with a centre-right coalition running the Irish Republic, they too will have to make serious changes to avoid defaulting after spending a decade as Europe's fastest-rising economic destination.

Spain and Portugal having to make drastic steps will not impact as much for this reason: the fate of the EU as we know it rests in London's Whitehall. Public opinion of the EU is trending lower and lower. Were Ireland required to make even more drastic steps, supporting the EU will be seen as toxic, particularly in a nation which wails every so often that, "Britons never never never shall be slaves." Seeing the impact of an economic calamity on their doorsteps, rather than in far-flung corners of the continent, will push the Cameron-led Coalition to hold a referendum on the fate of EU membership.

The Euro needs the stalwart financial sector of Canary Wharf to hold on. If they leave the picture, it will collapse and cause greater economic uncertainty that the American economy will have to weather, rather than risk its own solvency for a Marshall Plan 2.0.

Now, the more important picks:

Adele makes a comeback from her throat surgery by recording a stunning rendition of "I'll Fly Away" as the bonus track on her 23 album.

And not just that: She'll record a music video of it featuring the hometown of its songwriter, Albert Brumley

You can't deny the phenomenal vocal power of the Tottenham native. Even if her tracks "Someone Like You" and "Rolling In The Deep" wound up each being played six times a day on CHR and AAA stations, there's dang good reason. After being sidelined last fall with laryngitis that required surgery to preserve her cords, don't count her out. Adele certainly has another album or two up her sleeve, and hopefully someone at Walmart will capitalize on her return by snagging her to sing a bonus track on her next album (which, if the naming scheme continues, would be 23).

Where does "I'll Fly Away" come in? Just 30 minutes away from the Walmart Home Office is the McDonald County hamlet of Powell, which still has a post office and a lot of community spirit anchored by the Albert E Brumley & Sons Publishing Company. Just south of the hamlet is a 97-year-old iron bridge which is unlike any other, and as such was named to the National Registry of Historic Places last year:

The Powell Bridge crosses the scenic Big Sugar Creek, which becomes the oft-rafted Elk River in Pineville. And boy do I mean scenic. Come out here on a sunny spring day and it's the most ethereal blend of natural beauty surrounding a rustic, historic structure. Add in two gems just across the state line: War Eagle Mill east of Rogers and Fisher Ford Bridge south of Siloam Springs, and you'll have the most beautiful music video of 2012. Just make sure the film crew has plenty of Catfish John's.

Mizzou men's basketball finally break through to the Final Four and win their last conference game at Allen Fieldhouse.

Mizzou has the second-most number of appearances in the NCAA Men's Basketball tournament without ever reaching the Final Four, now at 24. Provided the Big 12 doesn't throttle the RPI and momentum of the black-and-gold, this team has all the pieces to persevere and at least make it to New Orleans. And claim a victory over their archrival Jayhawks at Allen Fieldhouse, carrying that all the way to the SEC. And speaking of the SEC:

KU reluctantly schedules Mizzou for football, but only after the Big East successfully holds West Virginia hostage the next two years.

KU do not want to play Mizzou now that the Tigers are preparing to tussle with Gamecocks and Gators. And Mizzou still have three blank spots on their schedule. The only way the rivalry game will continue next season will be by way of the Big East holding West Virginia to the 27-month exit period, resulting in the Big 12 having only eight conference games. This would mean everyone left in the conference would be scrambling to schedule other games. And either they can remain scorned about being left behind and play a cupcake, or boost their strength of schedule by challenging a future SEC contender. This would have certainly helped Oklahoma State this season.

Mizzou's first season in the SEC will result in a respectable bowl bid, likely Chick-Fil-A

Too bad they don't have any in Columbia (or any chicken places not named Lee's or KFC - insert plea for Zaxby's to finally open up in the Show-Me State), but either way Mizzou will appear in a bowl game and pull off a close win against Clemson. Or it might be the Music City Bowl with a solid win over Louisville. However it works out, Mizzou will make a serious push for the SEC East title and come up just short, though appearing in the Georgia Dome to get blown out by LSU/Bama/Arkansas in the title game will be more than enough to put the Big 12 behind them.

The Chiefs FINALLY draft a quarterback.

They need one. They really need one, and this year's crop will be bountiful. Quite likely KC will end up with Aaron Murray, who will emulate fellow Georgia product Matthew Stafford in developing a quality offense. However, they'll only be as good as the offensive line, and if the Chiefs don't stock up, Scott Pioli will find himself curating an art museum back in New England.

The weather will be far less bizarre than 2011, New Madrid Fault notwithstanding
For a state that took twisters to its 12th largest city and a major airport, flooding along its two major rivers, two epic snowstorms, and a heatwave that peaked at 42°C, we're finally going to get a break and have a not-so-harrowing season. Provided the fewer quakes along the New Madrid Fault in the past couple years doesn't mean it's building up for the big one this year.

And Just Like That: A Tweaking

2011-12-09T22:24:00.000-06:00

After the appellate panel realized that several of their Senate boundaries might have violated the state constitution concerning counties with more than one district, four of the six members agreed to a revised map that tweaked several districts in the southwest and around St. Louis. So a couple tweaks in the KC area for my proposed names of each district, as follows:

Missouri Senate (Click for maps)

St. Louis South
St. Charles West
Cape Girardeau-St. Genevieve-St. François
St. Louis Forest Hills
St. Louis Riverfront
Lower Osage
Lower North East
Lee's Summit East-Blue Springs-Odessa
Kansas City East
Kansas City West & Lee's Summit West
Independence & Raytown
The North West
St. Louis North
Ferguson-University City-Clayton
St. Louis Southwest
Upper Gasconade
Kansas City North
Upper North East
Boone & Howard
Western Ozarks
The Central West
The Lead Belt
St. Charles North
St. Louis West
The South East
Lower Gasconade
St. Louis Southwest
Lower South West
Upper South West
Springfield
Upper Osage
Jasper & Newton
Eastern Ozarks
Platte & Buchanan

Naming Missouri's New Districts

2011-12-09T06:45:00.001-06:00

So now the 130th is the 160th, the 20th is now the 49th, and the 8th's split between the 5th, 6th, and 7th. A subdivision in Liberty that was once wholly in the 34th has part of a cul-de-sac in the 17th and the rest in the 38th. But at least the asynchronous 62nd is now in line with its neighboring districts as the 156th.

Anyone else think these numbers are way out there and confusing? Sure brandishing our area codes are even seeping their way beyond their 'hood origins (660 Represent, Y'all?), but who walks around bragging "I'm from the 39th, don't be messing with me?" (And apologies to the newly elected Judy Morgan from the 39th District, who now gets drawn into the same district as a fellow Democrat, Minority Leader Mike Talboy.)

It's simpler to just use numbers, as it's less time consuming to write down names, but what good is a number to describe your area if it's just going to change every ten years? And even if it's going to change every ten years, what difference does conveying "68" make whether it's along Skinker Boulevard or a stretch of the Butterfield Stagecoach Road?

So let's start naming these districts. Be they after counties, county seats, or neighborhoods, names can be tweaked as need be, and the evolution of the districts can be easier to trace than throwing numbers around and watching a number dart from Rock Port to Athens to the Bootheel over the span of 30 years. So here's what I suggest for names of house districts.

General guidelines:

Limit of three proper nouns (similar to Canadian Ridings)
Should be ordered by most population to least
Emphasis on counties for rural districts, cities or neighborhoods if suburban or urban
Cardinal direction should only be used if base location is used more than once
Geographical feature or area if possible and patently unique

And now, the obnoxiously sized lists:

Missouri House (Click for maps)

Nodaway & Holt
Upper Grand River
Kirksville & the Green Hills
Canton-Memphis-Edina
Hannibal North & Shelby
Macon & Randolph North
Lower Grand River
Caldwell & Clinton
Savannah & Buchanan East
St. Joseph Center
St. Joseph South-Buchanan West-Platte North
Platte City-Smithville-Kearney
Platte South
Platte Southeast
Gladstone
Shoal Creek Valley
Liberty South & Claycomo
North Kansas City & Vivion Road
Kansas City Northeast
Independence North & Fort Osage
Independence East
[Kansas City] Blue Ridge
Kansas City East
Kansas City Downtown
[Kansas City] Brookside
Kansas City Troost
[Kansas City] Swope Park
Raytown
Independence South & Kansas City Southeast
Independence Southeast & Woods Chapel
Blue Springs South & Tapawingo
Blue Springs North & Jackson East
Harrisonville-Pleasant Hill-Lone Jack
Lee's Summit East & Greenwood
Lee's Summit West & Longview
Kansas City Red Bridge
Grandview & Jackson Southwest
Liberty North & Excelsior Springs
Ray-Carroll-Chariton North
Hannibal South-Paris-Bowling Green
Lincoln & Troy
Warren-Montgomery-St. Charles Southwest
Audrain & Callaway East
Columbia East & Centralia
Columbia Columns
Columbia Southwest
Boone West-Randolph South-Howard East
Boonville-Fayette-Chariton South
Callaway South
Boone South & Moniteau North
Warrensburg East-Marshall-Pettis North
Sedalia & Whiteman
Lafayette
Warrensburg West & Pettis South
Raymore-Peculiar-Cass Central
Belton & Cass West
Cass South-Henry-Benton North
Moniteau South & Morgan
Cole South & Miller North
Jefferson City
Lower Gasconade & Osage
Upper Gasconade & Osage
Wentzville & Wright City
St. Paul & Lincoln Southeast
St. Charles East
Bellefontaine Neighbors & St. Louis Chain Of Rocks
Old Halls Ferry
Florissant Central
Florissant West
Maryland Heights West & Chesterfield North
Maryland Heights-Overland South
Maryland Heights-Overland North
Hazelwood-Lambert-Ferguson West
Ferguson East & Jennings
Dellwood & Castle Point
St. Louis Kingsway
St. Louis University & Fairgrounds
St. Louis Gateway
St. Louis Hyde Park & Lafayette Square
St. Louis Tower Grove
St. Louis Holly Hills
St. Louis Southampton & Lindenwood
Maplewood-Brentwood-Rock Hill
St. Louis Forest Park
Overland East, Bel-Ridge & Northwoods
University City
Clayton & Ladue South
Creve Coeur & Ladue North
Town & Country
Kirkwood
Webster Groves-Shrewsbury-Crestwood
Affton & Concord
Lemay
Mehlville
Oakville
Fenton & Sunset Hills
Arnold West & Murphy
Ballwin Meramec
Manchester & Valley Park
Ballwin North & Chesterfield South
Chesterfield West & Wildwood North
Dardenne Prairie
Cottleville
St. Peters West
St. Peters East
St. Charles West
O'Fallon
Lake St. Louis
Franklin North
Pacific-Eureka-Wildwood South
Jefferson West
Jefferson North
Arnold East & Barnhart West
Festus & Barnhart East
Jefferson South & St. François North
Ste. Genevieve-Farmington East-Perry North
Farmington West & Park Hills
Jefferson Southwest & Washington North
Franklin South & Washington Northwest
Steelville & St. James
Rolla-Dixon-Richland
Waynesville
Laclede East & Camden South
Miller South & Camden North
St. Clair-Hickory-Benton South
Bates & Vernon
Barton-Dade-Jasper Outer
Bolivar & Stockton
Laclede West & Dallas
Greene West
Springfield North
Springfield Center
Springfield Southwest
Springfield South
Springfield East
Springfield Southeast
Greene East & Webster West
Stone & Christian Northwest
Christian West
Christian East
Webster East & Wright
Houston-Big Piney-Edgar Springs
Dent-Shannon-Oregon
Washington South & the Arcadia Valley
Madison-Bollinger-Perry South
Cape Girardeau Outer
Cape Girardeau Inner
Scott East & Mississippi North
New Madrid-Pemiscot North-Mississippi South
Dunklin & Pemiscot South
Stoddard & Scott West
Butler South
Butler North-Ripley-Carter
West Plains & Caulfield
Douglas-Ozark-Taney East
Taney West
Lawrence
Barry
McDonald & Newton South
Newton North
Joplin Hope
Joplin North & Jasper Southwest
Carthage & Oronogo

Missouri Senate (Click for maps)

St. Louis South
St. Charles West
Cape Girardeau-St. Genevieve-St. François
St. Louis Forest Hills
St. Louis Riverfront
Lower Osage
Lower North East
Lee's Summit & Blue Springs
Kansas City East
Kansas City West
Independence & Raytown
The North West
St. Louis North
Ferguson-University City-Clayton
St. Louis Southwest
Upper Gasconade
Kansas City North
Upper North East
Boone & Howard
Western Ozarks
The Central West
Lead Belt
St. Charles North
St. Louis West
The South East
Lower Gasconade
St. Louis Southwest
Lower South West
Upper South West
Springfield
Upper Osage
Jasper & Newton
Eastern Ozarks
Platte & Buchanan

Lant To Pursue Vacant Seat In McDonald County

2011-12-08T07:20:00.002-06:00

If it hasn't run already, portions of my interview with first-term Rep. Bill Lant will air later today, where Lant announces that he will pursue the new 159th District in McDonald County.

Lant, who currently lives outside Joplin and operates a feed store north of Seneca, was drawn into the same district as another first-term Republican, Bill Reiboldt of Neosho. Reiboldt, currently the vice-chairman of the agriculture committee, lives on his family's farm just outside Neosho, and the 160th district is centered on Neosho. Lant says that he owns land in McDonald County and has been planning to build a home there for some time.

The 159th will contain all of McDonald County as well as the Newton County communities of Seneca and Stella. (In fact, the new boundary between the two districts runs along Iris Road, just south of the feed store.) Previously, Neosho was grouped into the 130th district also containing Anderson, Goodman and South West City, wholly surrounded by the 131st district and the state boundary.

Under Missouri law, a representative is allowed to run for office in another district if he or she is forced out by redistricting. If elected, the representative would have one year to relocate. Already Andrew Koenig (R-Wincester), Jason Holsman (D-Kansas City) and now Jamilah Nasheed (D-St. Louis) have announced plans to run for vacant districts as a result of being grouped into new districts with other incumbents.

Additionally, Charlie Davis (R-Webb City) is said to be moving to a different part of Webb City as as a result of his placement in a district with Tom Loehner (R-Carthage). The line between the 162nd & 163rd districts is four blocks from Davis' house.

Brian Williams Chill Pill Needed

2011-11-30T23:06:00.001-06:00

Brian Williams, who was once anchor at Joplin's KOAM-TV, displayed a most admirable sense of cool and collected composure when fire alarms blared during his live broadcast of NBC Nightly News this week, and likewise when he did spot reporting from his one-time home in the aftermath of last May's tornado.

If only I had that amount of cool this evening when I saw the new maps of the Missouri House and Senate districts. Fortunately, the Senate maps (outside St. Louis) allowed me to regain some composure and stop my neighbors from asking what the heck I was screaming about. Well, when something odd happens close to home, you're inclined to freak out:

This is the House district line between districts 16 (south) and 38 (north & east). In the northwestern corner is District 12, which will stretch from Platte City to Kearney.

You'd expect to see such sawtooth boundaries in urban districts, but we're not talking about two suburban districts. Because of the population distribution between the growing suburbs of Kansas City and the greying breadbasket of Northern Missouri, District 16 will consist of subdivisions ranging from Gashland and New Mark to Shoal Creek Valley and parts of North Brook, while District 38 will stretch from this area east to Excelsior Springs and Missouri City. However, the population of Liberty (the oldest municipality in the Kansas City area), is in for a shock.

After I gave up on using the state administration office's GIS tool, I downloaded the KML files for display in Google Earth, and the results were damning through Liberty.

This is Exit 17, the junction between Interstate 35 and Highway 291. At this point (OK, a few yards away owing to pre-Interstate road alignments) is the confluence of districts 16 (southwest), 17 (southeast) and 38 (northeast). This is where the boundary for 38 really gets screwy. A small subdivision across from Lewis & Clark Elementary is split along its lone, winding street. It then follows Gallatin down toward Ridgeway Road, heads south toward Fairview and then onto the Junior High.

This is downtown Liberty and one of its historic neighborhoods to the west. The red line decides to jog around, going east a block on Kansas, then south on Moss until it hits Liberty Drive, then east onto Mill until it becomes Richfield Drive at William Jewell. The square and college are in District 38; the Junior High and Franklin Elementary, District 17. Again, William Jewell is in a rural district with Excelsior Springs and Franklin Elementary is in a suburban district with Claycomo and Pleasant Valley.

From Richfield Road, the boundary goes south on Claywoods Parkway, the main north-south road through the Claywoods subdivisions. Until it hits this group of houses:

The district boundary breaks away to group the first two houses on Silverleaf Lane, then goes along the backyards of several houses until it reaches a home that has its back against the cul-de-sac on Crimson Lane. The boundary goes along the property lines, through the cul-de-sac, and then makes a due-south dash for the water treatment plant. Yes, that means two houses on Crimson Lane are in one suburban district, whilst the rest of the street is in the neighboring rural district.

I'm hearing stories of how as many as three incumbents could be pitted against each other for one seat (the new District 5 between Shelby, Marion and northern Monroe counties is coming to mind), but this meticulous buzzsaw through Liberty really got my blood boiling. And this could have been prevented had nine Republicans and nine Democrats been able to actually agree to something workable rather than stick with their own political endeavours.

Now, folks going door to door campaigning through Claywoods and Brooke Meadows will wind up cherry-picking doors as a result of oddly drawn lines.

Get the sheers out, folks. Just don't use them when you're on chill pills soon to be named for Brian Williams.

On Disparaging Tweets

2011-11-26T11:00:00.005-06:00

November doesn't seem like a good month to be a Tweeter in a certain state to the west.

This week, regional media was abuzz over a tweet sent by Emma Sullivan, a senior at Shawnee Mission East High School, making a disparaging comment about Kansas Governor Sam Brownback as he was speaking to her school's Youth in Government during a field trip to the state capitol in Topeka. She and her supporters say the tweet (complete with "#heblowsalot") was a joke, but the Governor's office is certainly not laughing, as their complaint to administrators at East has resulted in the school requiring Sullivan to write a letter of apology to Brownback.

While this certainly tests the lines on freedom of expression within the confines of our schools, especially when it comes to social media and politics, I'm only dumbstruck by the lack of decorum exhibited by both parties. While students should not "check their First Amendment rights at the door", as famously phrased in Tinker vs. United States, it was disrespectful of Sullivan to make that Tweet as the governor was speaking to her school group. She certainly had the right to make those comments, but the manner in which it was done lacked tact (and, if such a policy exists, likely goes against the school's code on mobile phone use during class or similar school function).

The governor's office isn't looking any better on this. Sullivan's Twitter feed, prior to this week's row, only had fewer than 100 followers. It was public and open for anyone to find and search. Including Brownback's director of communications, who informed the school about the tweet. Plenty of Brownback detractors are calling the action and mere existence of saved searches scouring the web for anything mention the governor's name as akin to the thought police. While it's unclear whether the governor's office demanded the apology or school administrators suggested the idea, it's a blatant over-reaction.

If Brownback (or more appropriately his staffers) are worried about a singular insult from an 18-year-old, self-identified Democrat who plans on going to college in a different state, how the heck are they going to handle proper criticism from a serious political challenger? And if the school's administration have taken it upon themselves to mandate this letter, complete with talking points, how exactly is this a student making a sincere apology for an act of disrespect and not administrators in Kansas' second-largest school district begging Brownback to not take out his disapproval (or disdain for dissenting opinions) on their funding?

Then again, if Brownback would cut funding or demand apologies because of Tweets that lack all sense of decorum, KU's "Missouri forfeits a century-old rivalry. We win." three weeks ago should bring about a similar action, especially if today's game results in Mizzou claiming a lop-sided win on their way to the SEC East.

The Joplin Spirit

2011-05-28T17:41:00.000-05:00

The following was submitted for publication in The Romney Marsh Times, an internet-based publication serving the Romney Marsh area of Kent.

When I relocated to the Kentish Riviera two years ago, one of the first things I did was review the history of the area I was soon to call home. Although my time in Folkestone lasted far shorter than I had hoped, I left having a greater understanding and appreciation for many of the aspects that form common characteristics in our rechristened “essential relationship”.

One of these common traits is the can-do attitude that a people who fervently believe in their way of life and fellow man, woman and child can overcome any oppressive, seemingly insurmountable obstacle. The Dunkirk Spirit—the rescue of thousands of British soldiers from the onslaught of the Third Reich’s Blitzkrieg—reverberates to this day in the many war memorials, community events, and appeals that bring together villages and towns across Britain. The challenge proved difficult with the arrival of the Blitz, especially in Hellfire Corner. But Britain persevered.

Two years today marks the first time I walked through the garden on Sandgate Road, where Christ Church once stood. Its clock tower remained intact following persistent cross-Channel bombardment, a testament to the Dunkirk Spirit. In the past week, I’ve been reminded of that testament as Mother Nature unleashed her worst on my home state Missouri.

It only took a matter of minutes for a tornado to descend on the south end of Joplin and carve a path of devastation six miles long and in some places a mile wide. The numbers and pictures from the area are jarring: 142 dead, at least 100 still unaccounted for, tens of thousands homeless, nearly $3 billion (£1.82 billion) in damage, and street corners unrecognisable. The cyclone has been described as the eighth-deadliest in the record books, the worst in almost sixty years. And storms causing flash flooding and more tornado scares have only added insult to injury.

While it will take years for Joplin to physically recover, its spirit is far from broken.

Within hours of the storm’s damage airing on local and national television, donation drives and volunteer efforts began sprouting up. The next morning, Americans from every walk of life offered their change, blood veins, and labour to help. Over 65,000 people joined a Facebook group expressing support for Joplin's recovery, also giving survivors a chance to reconnect with loved ones. Church congregations and businesses from Springfield, Tulsa, Northwest Arkansas, Kansas City and beyond sent lorry after lorry containing much-needed essentials. Donation appeals emerged in bank parking lots, hotel lobbies, and even a furniture outlet store collecting stuffed toys. Major sport clubs are in the effort, with the owner of Kansas City’s NFL franchise taking a hands-on role in packing bottled water.

Amid the damage, the rebuilding has already begun. Flags fly full-mast at Joplin’s damaged school buildings, including the high school that must be razed and rebuilt. The St John’s Regional Medical Center, whose nine-storey shell has become the icon of this disaster, is already crafting plans for a new facility to continue their 126-year ministry. While these are critical pillars of any community, it falls on the people who call Joplin home to revive and sustain their wounded hometown.

One would only need dial into any of Joplin’s radio stations to hear their spirit endure. Since 4 p.m. Sunday Joplin’s main ownership cluster has provided continuous coverage, allowing residents to call and tell the world they’re OK, find out information about shelters, and look for loved ones who have gone missing. Several staff members remain at the studios with nothing but what they brought in that weekend, and they remain committed to getting their community back on their feet. I can barely imagine how I would be able to endure were I to find myself in a similar situation, prioritising the needs of my community over the pain of personal loss.

While it is expected of any licensed broadcaster, canine search and rescue team, or national guardsman to provide their public service during a crisis, it takes community spirit to overcome the personal grief and dismay from living in the midst of a nightmare and pull together for the greater good.

The history books will look at the tornado of 22nd May 2011 not as the single twister that destroyed one-third of Missouri’s thirteenth-largest city, but as the calamity that cultivated the Joplin Spirit. An EF-5 cyclone may have uprooted the lives of tens of thousands, but millions of hearts, bound and beating together with prayer, charity for an afflicted neighbour, and sense of duty to restore some semblance of normalcy, will remain firmly entrenched in all who call Joplin and surrounding communities home.

Joplin will persevere. Its streets may resemble a war zone, but its people are resilient and their fellow Missourians stand in solidarity for their recovery.

The Joplin Spirit will prevail.

Fayetteville Finger, Meet Nolte's Notch

2011-03-31T21:27:00.004-05:00

Being situated in Missouri's unofficial 118th County, naturally I've been keeping an eye on the redistricting efforts in the Natural State. Today, Arkansas's House approved a measure that would draw Fayetteville and southeastern Washington County into the Democrat-leaning Fourth Congressional District and out of the third, which currently is centered on the I-540 corridor. The vote went 52-46, with only one of Fayetteville's reps voting for the proposal.

So the talk of gerrymandering down here has giving me a sharpened set of eyes to review the proposed map that Missouri's House Redistricting Committee has placed on its Web site and discussed in earnest today. Naturally, the presumed "odd man out" Russ Carnahan joined with likely primary opponent William Clay in opposing the proposal to split St. Louis City and County among two districts. And with Missouri having to redraw to account for one less district, there will be plenty of fighting in the six weeks remaining in the General Assembly's session.

And while most of the state's focus will be on St. Louis (again, because a member of the Carnahan dynasty is pretty much the "odd man out"), lines have shifted considerably in the Western half of the state.

Consider the current setup of Kansas City and, by extension, the Athenian corridor better known as Highway 63: (derived from The National Atlas' map of Missouri's current delegations)

After the 2000 Census, Jackson County was split between three congressional districts, the bulk containing Kansas City in the Democrat-leaning fifth, a sliver in the stalwart fourth, and an increasingly conservative suburban region added to the expansive sixth. Columbia anchored the ninth district that covered Northeast Missouri and added counties along the northernmost reaches of the Ozarks.

Now, under the House's initial plan, we have this:

Lafayette, Ray, and Saline counties would be added to the fifth, and in exchange for losing Ike Skelton's stomping grounds, the fourth would receive Howard and Cooper counties from the sixth, plus Columbia in Boone County and the southern half of Randolph County, including all of Moberly. The remainder of the ninth would go to the sixth in the north and a new third district in the south. Miller County, which was originally at the edge of the district and jutting between the fourth and sixth, now becomes a critical retention point as the home county of incumbent Blaine Leuktemeyer. To that effect, Cole and most of Camden are added to this re-designated district.

The wonkiest drawings here, though, take place along the major byways of Kansas City's suburbs. With Jackson County's overall population showing little growth, adding Ike's core counties (traditionally Democrat) didn't do enough to bring the district's population up to snuff. Especially after the current portion in Cass County was moved to the fourth, as to ensure that incumbent Vicky Hartzler had the entirety of her home county. And with Eastern Jackson County solidly leaning Republican, placing them in the fifth would cause displeasure in their ranks, despite Sam Graves having to cross through the fifth to get there by car. So enter Clay County, a decent mix of suburbs to the south and west, farmland points north and east:

The line in red denotes the county line not marking the boundary between the two districts. Note that with Jackson to the south and Ray to the east, the fifth district would claim two significant population areas: Excelsior Springs and Lawson in the northeast corner, and several gentrified suburbs in the southwest. While these areas have historically leaned Democratic, this (as well as every other district being redrawn or not being redrawn for lack of enough population to warrant multiple districts in a state) guarantees nothing come November 2012.

Hence, labeling this convenient drawing of the line meandering through Jackson and Clay counties "Nolte's Notch", so named for State Representative and former Gladstone mayor Jerry Nolte. Nolte has generated plenty of attention with proposed this legislation this year, particularly his bills pegging the state's minimum wage to the federal minimum wage, requiring drivers tests to be administered in English, and eliminating the franchise tax over the next five years. Nolte, who is term-limited from the House after 2012, piqued the pundits' attention when he created an exploratory committee to look at a run for Congress when Graves was flirting at the prospect of challenging Claire McCaskill for the Senate.

Less than 24 hours after Nolte filed exploratory paperwork, Graves announced he would prefer staying in the House as chairman of the Committee on Small Businesses. When interviewed by Roll Call's Tricia Miller later that week, Nolte indicated that he would still consider a run for Congress if he happened to be going up against Emmanuel Cleaver, current representative from the fifth.

Cleaver, the AME preacher who was mayor of Kansas City from 1991 to 1999, received a scare from perennial Republican challenger Jacob Turk in 2010. Cleaver won re-election with only 53 percent of the vote, and now serves as chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus.

So lo and behold: Nolte's Notch, encompassing North Kansas City, Gladstone, Claycomo, Gracemor and Birmingham. A chance for him or any Republican who didn't want to challenge Graves or Hartzler to take their aim on Cleaver, and by extension anything remotely to the left of them.

Of course, the Senate has yet to release their proposal, and both are subject to changes large and small as the next six weeks play out. And it's not yet known how the Blue Dog counties of Ray, Lafayette, and Saline would react to being represented by either a minority Democrat from the urban core or a suburbanite Republican from a county that backed Proposition B by a two-to-one margin. But if the House's plan were to hold firm, Missouri could end up with one Democrat out of eight in their House delegation. Presuming, rather prematurely, the chips fall the same way in 2012 the way they did in 2010.

A Refresher Course For Mike

2011-03-23T20:24:00.001-05:00

A Primer From Someone Who Pretty Much Did The Same Thing Mike's Doing:
Left Missouri To Return To An Old Job Just Outside The State

Things have changed rapidly in Northwest Arkansas since the last time Mike Anderson held a job here. Heck, even some things changed since I was last employed south of the border some 22 months ago. But now, since I've been here the last five weeks re-acquainting myself with the turf that formed my initial status as The Missouri Expatriate, I'm going to relay some refreshers to the newest escapee from The Shear-Me State.

There are a lot more people here than there were when Nolan was chased out of town with pitchforks.
Yep, Northwest Arkansas remains one of the fastest growing places in the nation. Two of the fastest growing counties in the 2010 Census were Washington and Benton counties, the two that make up the core of the region. In fact, Benton's rapid growth allowed them to surpass Washington (whose county seat is Fayetteville) as the second-most populous county in the Natural State, with Pulaski still in the top spot. With that in mind…
Ojala que haya aprendido español, laosiano o aún marshalesa.
The rapid growth of population and commerce in the area also includes a large influx of migrant workers from Latin America, Southeast Asia, and the Marshall Islands. Most of them are employed by the poultry behemoth Tyson and their competitors George's, Cargill and Cobb-Vantress. This influx has added a unique character to their places of residence. Be ready to translate to English several signs, especially along 8th Street in Rogers and the east end of Springdale.
Forget Hy-Vee, QuikTrip, and Shakespeare's. They're still not here.
Although the area has a plethora of independent pizza joints (Jim's Razorback, Eureka, Tim's), there's nothing like the unique feel of Shakespeare's. Also, it's going to be hit-or-miss finding Boulevard on tap (though I confess I don't know if Mike's the kind of guy who'll down a pint) or toasted ravioli.

Despite Iowa-based Kum and Go making an aggressive push into the market (and fellow Hawkeye chain Casey's building its first store in Arkansas at Bella Vista's Highland Crossing) Hyvee still hasn't set designs on the area, with Walmart and Harps remaining the main game. (Yes, that means no Schnuks either!) And although QuikTrip is headquartered 90 miles to the west in Tulsa, they haven't touched the area either.
There's still no Bella Vista bypass, either.
Get used to stopping at lights in Jane and stop-and-go traffic between Lancashire Drive and Lowe's, because the Bella Vista Bypass remains nowhere near completion. It's the critical cog that's keeping MoDOT from having US-71 south of Joplin labelled I-49. And if we're lucky, a two-lane bypass will open in four years that'll just provide a shortcut to Hiwasse. Worse, MoDOT's had the funding ready for years, but now as Arkansas's getting their act together to bypass what is now the state's ninth-largest city, MoDOT sits at risk of a massive budget shortfall.
Get ready to elect a congressman from Texarkana. Or Helena-West Helena.
In spite of civic leaders and members of both parties saying how flagrant a gerrymander it is, members of Arkansas' re-districting committees are seriously considering a plan that would gerrymander Fayetteville out of the Third District (which reaches to Harrison, Fort Smith and Russellville) and into the last-remaining Democrat district, the fourth district in the southern half of the state. Supporters contend that Fayetteville's majority-Democrat population believe their votes are being wasted in a district that's been reliably Republican for 30-plus years. However, this gerrymander would be achieved by a "pig tail" through the Ozark National Forest in eastern Sebastian County, entirely surrounded by the Third District. And really, what does a college town surrounded by Walmart, Tyson, and J.B. Hunt have in common with the likes of DeQueen, Crossett and Lake Village?

And yes, Helena consolidated with West Helena, and the city is in fact called "Helena-West Helena".
Didn't like paying to see the Columbia Tribune online? It's worse with the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
While the Columbia Tribune allows you to view ten articles online before making you pay (and you can get around it by reading the Missourian or any other paper in Missouri), you only get an abstract with the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette before they insist you pay to view. Good luck finding any other daily to get freebie views; the closest is Neosho and Joplin, and they're owned by the same people who run the Kirksville Daily Express. Yeah.
Politics and planes aren't a problem here.
No need to worry about fans from either side of the aisle taking "damn planes" to see the Hogs play. Democrat Mike Beebe's well liked here despite Arkansas becoming increasingly red, and he rarely leaves the Little Rock area.
Unfortunately, fluoridated water is.
Despite the EPA advising polities to hold off on increasing the amount of fluoride in their drinking water, Beebe already signed legislation essentially overriding local standards and setting a statewide minimum. So once locating a dentist that's either in the Third or Fourth District that's going to charge a wee bit extra so the office staff can read entire articles online, check to make sure that iconic smile isn't getting scarred by streaks of fluoride.
On the bright side, once the euphoric homecoming passes and Arkansas is still languishing in the just-as-lousy SEC West, XNA has plenty of flights to choose from to escape the throngs of fans that still have Houston Nutt's scalp on the end of their pitchforks.
The only thing missing is Southwest, but sooner or later they'll come here. Heck, Southwest already has an in at Branson's airport once the acquisition of AirTran is complete.

So there's my refresher course. Good luck Mike, because we're both going to need it.

Full Circle

2011-02-21T21:39:00.001-06:00

Last week, I once again became an expatriate of the Show-Me State. I accepted an offer from my once-previous employers, KURM, and again am a member of their programming staff in Northwest Arkansas' Rogers. (And again I must note that views expressed here, past present and future, do not reflect the view of any of my employers, past present or future.)

This could easily be the inevitable death knell of this blog. With Missives from Missouri averaging 25 hits a day on weekly reports from nearly one-fifth the General Assembly, it has simply become the crux of what I publish online. If you haven't already, please start following Missives from Missouri on Twitter as well as the site itself.

However, I'm still that stubborn Missouri mule. I'll probably have something to post here from time to time. Good chance this will become a clip site featuring interviews I've done for them (seeing as the most riveting content on the station's Web site are the rules for Dial-A-Trade; were that not the case this blog would be on indefinite hiatus!)

As it has taken awhile for me to get situated in my flat in Missouri's 118th county, I have only now just gotten around to posting this, and a backlog of missives from the weekend are finally getting uploaded.

So here we go again: yours truly, The Missouri Expatriate

A Setting Everyone in Lohman Needs to Set

2011-02-08T20:43:00.001-06:00

Four Missouri lawmakers and a staffer have had their Facebook profiles hacked into over the past month. According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the victimized profiles logged onto Facebook via the House's public WiFi network shortly before being targeted.

Amid suggestions that the House should tighten access to their network, Facebook has introduced an option where users can log on and and surf with a secure connection. All users need to is go to their account settings and set up HTTPS browsing under "Account Security". Using an HTTPS connection, while resulting in longer waits for pages to load, would result in more information being encrypted when sent to and from the site.

Facebook's new security options includes e-mail and text alerts when a computer or mobile device access a user's account for the first time. They're also experimenting with social authentication, using pictures of the user's friends to verify that the person logging on is not a random hacker.

The change comes as an effort to prevent hackers from gaining access via public wireless networks, like those the House and Senate have in place at the State Capitol in Jefferson City. Since the session started last month, Democrat Stacey Newman of St. Louis, three Republicans (among them freshmen Donna Lichtenegger of Jackson and Dave Schatz of Sullivan) and a legislative aide to another Republican were victimized by hackers.

MoDOT Lets Peyton Manning Decide When Road Work Starts

2011-01-07T17:29:00.000-06:00

Roadwork on Interstate 70 in Jackson County comes down to whether Peyton Manning has a bad day against the Jets tomorrow.

And if Ray Lewis can replicate Oakland's shredding of the Chiefs' offensive line.

The Missouri Department of Transportation are rebuilding the George Brett Bridge this winter, and its start date is contingent on how well the Kansas City Chiefs do in the postseason. The Chiefs host the Baltimore Ravens at Arrowhead Stadium on Sunday.

As the fourth seed, the Chiefs have a slim prospect of hosting the AFC Championship. For that to happen, the Jets must win tomorrow at Indianapolis. Were the Chiefs to win, they would then have to defeat Pittsburgh at Heinz Field, and the Jets would have to overcome their division rivals at New England. So long as a chance exists, MoDOT will delay construction of the bridge carrying the Blue Ridge Cutoff.

However, if Manning plays as he normally does at Lucas Oil Field, the bridge comes down Monday morning, even if the Chiefs win. Either way, crews will have until 30 March to complete construction of the new bridge, in time for the Royals home opener at Kauffman Stadium.

The new Blue Ridge Cutoff/George Brett Bridge is part of a widening of I-70 through the area. The project so far has brought a new bridge carrying U.S. Highway 40 over I-435. By 2012, ramps in the area will be reconfigured to better handle traffic and accommodate a third lane for I-70. This includes eliminating the junction with Manchester Avenue and adding ramps from Southbound I-435 to US-40. Sport fans from the north will have to use this new ramp to access the stadia, as traffic from north I-435 will no longer be able to access Blue Ridge Cutoff via I-70 east.

Missouri's County Seats Might As Well Be Musical Chairs

2011-01-03T16:07:00.006-06:00

As a buff of Missouri history and geography, I naturally take pride in much of what Missouri has to offer. From the scenery of the rustic Ozarks and verdant Green Hills to our many attractions in cities large and small, we have a wonderful state.

And quirky one when it comes to county seats.

Indeed, our first five counties (Cape Girardeau, New Madrid, St. Charles, St. Louis and Ste. Genevieve) all have cities with the same name. And were it not for St. Louis City splitting from the county in 1876, all five would be in their namesake counties. From there, though, it gets confusing. Of those five cities, only three are the county seat. Cape Girardeau County's seat isn't Cape Girardeau, but Jackson.

And yet Jackson County's five hours away from the city of Jackson.

Travel north and west from Jackson and dissociations begin to crop up. At first they're not prevalent; starting with Perryville in Perry County and then Ste. Genevieve. But arrive in Jefferson County and find out that Jefferson City is two hours west, in Cole County. From there things start to get shuffled.

There is no Cole City, but instead a Cole Camp. That's in the north of Benton County. Next to Cole Camp is Lincoln. But Lincoln County's just north of St. Charles County, and their county seat is Troy. At least there's no Troy County, so it's safe to venture west into Washington County.

Washington, though, is in neighboring Franklin County. And right on the border with Franklin County is Sullivan, a solid three hours southeast of Sullivan County in the heart of the north central Green Hills. Go west from Sullivan and arrive in the town of Linn, the county seat of Osage County. But Linn County is immediately south of Sullivan County. And the only Missouri city with Osage in its name is Osage Beach, nestled against the Lake of the Ozarks in Camden County.

Next to Camden County is Miller County, whose county seat of Tuscumbia doesn't sound a thing like Miller. The city of Miller, it turns out, is further southwest, about 25 miles west of Springfield in the northern part of Lawrence County. In the midst of the confusion along Missouri's Rhineland, a dose of sanity goes unnoticed. The town of Gasconade marks the spot where the Gasconade empties into the Missouri River. It happens in Gasconade County, a few miles upstream from county seat Hermann. Just past St. Charles County, where the city of St. Charles has stood as the county seat for nearly two centuries, is Warren County, where Warrenton serves as county sear. And just west of Warren is Montgomery, where Montgomery City helms its namesake county. Certainly, sanity has returned to the state, right?

Unfortunately, just before Warrenton was the city of Wright City, and Wright County is well to the south, 25 miles east of Springfield. With heads hurting, up ahead lies the Kingdom of Callaway, with no city to its name, nor any Fulton County to require an extra two Tylenol from the truck stop across from Ozarkland. Trickle west into Boone County and then find out that Boonville is opposite Boone County in Cooper County.

Best get the extra two Tylenol now, and have more handy when looking north to Randolph County. Just past the line from Boone County is Clark, the hometown of General Omar Bradley. Quiet, picturesque, and only two hours south of Clark County in the northeasternmost corner of the state. Just outside Randolph County in Monroe is the town of Madison. Sure enough, go back to the southeast to find Madison County, tapering the southern edge of the Lead Belt. Fortunately, the detour north nets Monroe City split between Monroe and Marion counties, and Macon as the county seat of Macon County. Further north leaves Knox City just east of Knox County's seat Edina and Lewistown in Lewis County. And tucked in the northeastern corner of Adair County is the hamlet of Adair.

Then the headache returns when finding north of Monroe City, in the county of Marion, a town called Warren. And finding a town called Marionville just east of Aurora in Lawrence County. Lawrence County also claims another two towns with similar-named counties, with Phelps in the opposite corner of the county, but Phelps County two hours northeast on I-44. And Mount Vernon, the county seat, is 90 minutes south-southeast of Vernon County. It's fitting perhaps that no city in Missouri is named Lawrence, but instead a city in Kansas that happens to be the home of the Jayhawks.

And along I-44 is Waynesville in Pulaski County, with Wayne County back in the southeast. Wayne County's seat Greenburg brings back memories of Springfield, the seat of Greene County, and Dade County's seat of Greenfield. Not to mention Lebanon, the county seat of Laclede County, with Morgan just to the southeast in spite of Morgan County being the next county north.

Laclede happens to be the hometown of General John J. Pershing. In Linn County, between Brookfield and county seat Linneus.

Kansas City can't come quick enough, even if it's the largest city in Missouri. And wholly surrounds a speed-trap village called Randolph in Clay County.

Continuing west on I-70, a welcome reprieve from the confusion. No cross-matching names, and north of Marshall in Saline County: a city called Carrollton, in Carroll County no less. Ray County to the west of that, with a town called Rayville northwest of its county seat Richmond. (Never mind the river town of Camden, not to be confused with Camden County's seat of Camdenton.)

Just before Jackson County is another collection of truck stops in Bates City. Have more Tylenol on hand when finding out that Bates City lies an hour south of Kansas City and that its county seat is Butler. Butler County is back toward the bootheel, with seat at Poplar Bluff. Arrive in Jackson County, and the home county of Harry Truman, and the confusion seems to take a back seat for a moment as the sights of the downtown skyline, sports complex, and strong aroma of barbecue overcome the weary traveller.

Intrigued by the patriotism of finding Independence in Jackson County and Liberty across the river in Clay, it's time to travel north (past Claycomo) to find another crop of dissociations. At the border between Clay and Clinton counties is Holt. But Holt County is in the northwest, and Clinton's the county seat of Henry County, two hours south. Holt's county seat is Oregon, and while Oregon County is back down in the thick of the Ozarks, neighboring Nodaway County looks south find the town of Nodaway in Holt County. DeKalb County harbors the same sentiment toward Buchanan, where west of Faucett sits the town of DeKalb.

All the while to the east of Nodaway County, Worth and Gentry sit as friendly neighbors. Both towns in their respective counties, and their county seats Grant City and Albany lie a further ten miles apart from each of them. On the other side of Harrison County is Mercer County, where just north of Princeton is Mercer. It didn't bleed off on Harrison County, where nary a town named Harrison is to be found.

Instead it's Bethany as the capital seat, and Harrisonville sits in the center of Cass County. Further down the chain it's Cassville in Barry County. And Barry? Just a memory, with the short-lived hamlet now part of Kansas City's vast suburbs along its namesake road in Clay and Platte counties. (At least Platte's doing it right with their seat in Platte City.)

At least a trip down Highway 71 toward Joplin will ease the hurting mind (after passing through Harrisonville but not Harrison County and Butler but not Butler County) when arriving at the setting of the classic Patrick Swayze film "Roadhouse". A sleepy town at the north of Jasper County. Called Jasper. Take it easy for a moment, because after the county seat of Carthage and before Joplin is Carterville.

Carter County's at least three hours east, northwest of Butler County. And that will require crossing through Christian County's seat of Ozark before passing through Ozark County. At least Taney has Taneyville and Reynolds is in Reynolds, next to its county seat in Centerville. Next to Reynolds is Iron County, with county seat at Ironton.

Certainly back in Southeast Missouri this perpetual game of musical chairs doesn't continue, confusing newcomers to the Show-Me State?

Not quite. Just to the south of Cape Girardeau is Scott County. Its county seat? Benton. And Scott City, sure enough, isn't in Scott County, but close.

Just cross into Cape Girardeau County, also the home of Bollinger Mill. Bollinger County will wait a few miles to the west.

Assessor Warns Of Higher Taxes On Used Cars, Wants Resident Action

2010-12-31T16:26:00.000-06:00

Personal Prefaces:
I extend my condolences to those affected by this morning's violent storms that have killed at least three people in Washington County, Ark., and at least three more in Dent and Phelps counties in Missouri. My thoughts and prayers are with friends who are in the impacted areas.
I relay the following report with full disclosure of my status as a tax-paying resident of Clay County, Missouri, and owner of a used car which may be impacted.

Clay County residents have received a letter along with their personal property statements, warning them of higher taxes if they don't petition Jefferson City.

In a call-to-action (transcribed below), assessor Cathy Rinehart warns that many will see the value of their used car increase when their tax bills arrive in April. She writes that it's because state statute requires her and the state's assessors to use values from the October issue of the NADA's Used Car Guide.

The rise, she adds, is from fewer new cars being manufactures, thus increasing the resale value of used cars.

Rinehart suggests that residents write to lawmakers in Jefferson City, asking that assessments instead come from the Kelley Blue Book or be based on the vehicle's weight.

Missouri residents have until March 1 to submit their updated personal property lists or incur a late penalty.

The entirety of her letter (formatting & misspellings inclusive) is transcribed below:

Jan 1, 2011

Dear Citizens of Clay County,

There is an issue I would like to bring to your attention. All assessors of Missouri are required to use the October NADA to place values on vehicles. [Statue137.115 (9.) The assessor of each county and each city not within a county shall use the trade-in value published in the October issue of the National Automobile Dealers' Official Used Car Guide,]

In 2011, NADA has increased the value of sevewral vehicle models. In April some of you will be receiving an increase value change notice on your vehicle. This is because fewer new cars were manufactured, and used cars are now worth more.

Because I must use NADA trade-in value I believe the taxpayers are entitled to advanced notification. I believe it is my sworn duty to you, as your assessor, to provide a means to correct this situation for everyone in Missouri. There are two solutions, both involving your help:

Change the law to read that the assessor "may" use the Kelly Blue Book for true market value. (Kelly Blue Book is used by car dealers through out the State. Kelly Blue Book historically represents a lower value than NADA.)
Change the Constitution of Missouri to have the DMV charge you by the weight of the vehicle. Thus eliminating personal property being valued by the assessment department. You would still pay personal property taxes but it would be based on weight vs. value

Your help is requested by contacting your newly elected State Representatives and Senator. Please, call, write, e-mail, snail mail, or talk to your State Representative. The law needs to be changed. Just like you got the law changed to waive penalties for a county error. (Thank you again for your help with that.)

For your convenience on the back of this letter, I have included State Representatives' contact information. Please, help me, help you. The only way we can get a different value guide is with your voice.

Also, to avoid any assessment penalties please fill out the 2011 assessment list and return it to the assessment department before March 1, 2011.

As always, it is an honor to be your assessor.

Sincerely:

Cathy Rinehart
My Motto: “I know who I work for, You, the citizens of Clay County.”

Relegate The Closed-Shop Leagues

2010-12-20T10:33:00.106-06:00

Two bits of sporting news yesterday have got me concerned about the way professional leagues run in the U.S.

Yesterday morning, ace pitcher Zack Greinke jumped the perpetually sinking ship known as the Kansas City Royals, taking cash and Yuniesky Betancourt with him to Milwaukee in exchange for pitching prospect Jake Odorozzi, outfielder Lorenzo Cain, shortstop Alcides Escobar, and Jeremy Jeffress, a pitcher who's one doobie away from being banned for life. While it might prove beneficial for the Royals' youth movement, fans are naturally demure at the news, watching yet another bright star leave the bastion of malaise that's become Kauffman Stadium. Fortunately, those Royals fans were wearing red and more focused on their Chief neighbors, who defeated cross-state rivals St. Louis 27-13.

St. Louis fall to 6-8, assuring them of not having a winning season. And yet, because of losses by Seattle, San Francisco and Arizona today, they remain atop the NFC West division. It's very likely that the winner of this division, who could very well host the defending Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints in the first round of the playoffs, will finish the season with a 7-9 record. Meanwhile, as many as two NFC teams could go 10-6 and not make the playoffs, because of the lopsided strength of the other three divisions in the NFC.

And next year (barring a much-hyped players' lockout) the same 16 teams will compete again in arbitrarily defined divisions to determine who gets to play the AFC winners in the Super Bowl. It's lop-sided competition that only rewards the 32 owners who keep the closed-shop system in operation, usually at the expense of football's fans. It's a closed system that, frankly, runs contrary to the free market principles that many in America tout as being our paramount ideal.

How ironic that a better structure for organizing professional sporting teams be found commonplace in "socialist" nations.

It's time for American sport to embrace and incorporate promotion and relegation.

In baseball, the extensive farm system and independent, semi-pro leagues can serve as a launching pad for a successful multi-tiered system. And the inequity in the payroll and fortunes between baseball's current 30 teams provides a merciful reason to implement such a system.

As for football, it's a perfect tempest to explore the idea. 32 teams, none of which call Los Angeles, Portland, San Antonio, Las Vegas, Tulsa, Orlando, Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, or Guadalajara home. None of which could be playing next season as the gaggle of 32 owners push for an expanded schedule without granting many concessions to their players, all the while pursuing generous tax breaks from state and local governments and charging $8 for a tray of stale nachos. Even if an owner's team goes 0-16, that owner can still sit comfy if the ink remains in the black, especially if the franchise is buoyed by, say, franchises in other sport or a multinational corporation that's their bread and butter. So what if half their roster winds up with permanent brain damage from repeated hits to the head, or they become the most hated entity in their metropolitan?

The current system doesn't put the owner at real risk. So long as they bring in the money and abide by league rules, they're practically safe in their luxury suite on the 50-yard line. On top of that, federal law explicitly grants the NFL, Major League Baseball, and other major sporting leagues exemptions from anti-trust laws in place to prevent monopolies from strangling the free market.

Promotion and relegation will force these owners to the front lines. If their teams don't regularly perform well, their investment is at risk. Americans like to cheer for winners, and if their team's not winning in the top league, their revenue goes down. Owners that regularly let their teams stagnate could easily wind up in bankruptcy court or with a mutiny on their hands, as fans and players flock to teams that will actually give a damn about playing competitively.

Future posts will detail how such a system can come into play for sporting leagues across the nation, from pro football and baseball to the collegiate and even high school.

Kander endorses Sly James for KCMO Mayor

2010-11-10T13:12:00.000-06:00

Another Jackson County Democrat has weighed in on the upcoming elections for Kansas City, this time endorsing a close friend for mayor.

Democrat Jason Kander of the 44th House District issued support for Sly James' bid to become mayor of Kansas City. In an e-mail to supporters, Kander wrote that although James has long been a family friend of his and mentor during his legal career, the endorsement is more than personal friendship.

"Sly’s been a go-to leader in our city’s non-profit sector helping to steer organizations like United Way and Operation Breakthrough. His volunteer service has always been about improving life in Kansas City," Kander wrote. "Moreover, Sly is a small business owner and a professional mediator, experienced in bringing people together and building consensus in tough settings.

"A husband, a father, and a great friend, Sly is one of the best people I know."

Kander added that although he has worked personally with nearly every other candidate that has announced their candidacy for mayor of Missouri's largest city, he believes James is best fit to generate consensus at City Hall.

"In Sly, Kansas City has a rare opportunity to elect a gifted leader who can end the gridlock, produce results and get us back on track," Kander wrote.

The representative, recently elected to his second term in the Missouri House, will appear on behalf of James at a reception in Waldo on Dec. 7.

James is one of at least six candidates who will challenge incumbent Mark Funkhouser for the four-year position. Filing began yesterday and will continue until Jan. 25 in Kansas City as well as in Platte and Clay counties, whose election boards serve the city north of the river.

The primaries for mayor and all 12 city council seats will take place on Feb. 22. The top two vote-getters from each race, regardless of whether one candidate has an outright majority, will advance to the general election on March 22. The March 22 ballot is also expected to ask voters to renew the one percent earnings tax, as promulgated by the passage of Proposition A last week.

Holsman decides against Kansas City council bid

2010-11-09T18:58:00.003-06:00

The depleted ranks of Democrats in the Missouri Legislature will not take another hit.

Jason Holsman, who won re-election to Kansas City's 45th House District last week by a 3-to-2 margin, announced that he will remain in Jefferson City rather than run for Kansas City's city council. In an e-mail to supporters, Holsman admitted that he had seriously considered running for the council seat being vacated by Cathy Jolly.

"I made a pledge to the voters of the 45^th district that I would continue to represent them in Jefferson City and that is exactly what I intend to do," Holsman wrote. "I look forward to returning to the General Assembly and working on legislation that benefits the residents of the 45th district and moves Missouri forward."

In commenting about the decision to not run for Kansas City's 6th district at-large, Holsman added that a need for common-sense leadership was needed at the city level.

Holsman's accomplishments in the last session of the General Assembly include House Bill 1848, establishing a task force that will look into the feasibility of building vertical urban farms, and inserting language into House Bill 2178 that allows cities to establish programs encouraging homeowners to make improvements to their homes that increase energy efficiency or generate energy.

Jolly announced in September that she would not seek a second four-year term to the city council. She spent three terms in the Missouri House representing the district that Holsman now represents.

Had Holsman opted instead to run for city council, his departure would have been the second among Democrats from Kansas City. Yvonne Wilson, senator from the 9th District that covers the historic Northeast, announced last week her plans to step down with two years remaining in her final term. Governor Jay Nixon has yet to set a date for a special election to fill the seat. Wilson, 81, said she plans to spend more time with her husband of 58 years, among others in her family.

Following last week's election, Republicans have a 26-8 majority in the Senate and 106-57 in the House, three shy of veto-proof majorities.

Cornered in the Electoral Paddock

2010-10-28T23:30:00.000-05:00

For the first time ever, I might find myself voting no on every statewide issue, all to stay seemingly consistent with my objections to two entities spending roughly $7 per voter coming out to the polls Tuesday.

Already I've expressed issue with Propositions A and B, owing largely to the overwhelming onslaught of campaign material funded largely (in each issue) by a singular interest who would not be directly impacted by its passage. However, there is another singular interest pushing a ballot issue – a change to the state's constitution at that – that hasn't received as much publicity.

Constitutional Amendment Three was engineered largely by the Missouri Association of Realtors to prevent the state from introducing a transfer tax on the sale of homes and property within the state. Missouri, however, is currently one of 13 states that does not have such a tax in place. Proponents frame this as preventing lawmakers from imposing a tax on Missouri homeowners when selling property on which they already pay annual taxes.

Opposition is few and far between, but the majority of the rhetoric against it has emerged from a gaggle of conservative lawmakers who see this as a wrench about to be lodged in their efforts to introduce a "fair tax" in the state. Passing a law prohibiting the imposition of a sales tax on homes would run very much contrary to the desire of these lawmakers to make consumption-based taxed (for all intents and purposed) the only form of tax implemented in the state.

Another concern raised by this statewide group of Realtors muscling this proposed amendment to the state constitution onto the ballot is the glaring ability for narrowly-tailored interest groups to do the same. Already, with the overwhelming support of the General Assembly in 2009, voters can allow two narrow exceptions to become part of our state constitution.

Constitutional Amendment One would require all counties who have a charter form of government to elect their assessor, except those whose population is between 600,000 and 699,999. Right now, the only county that would be in that population donut hole is Jackson County. In Missouri, counties can either operate under a state-prescribed structure (which calls for the election of three commissioners and all county offices, including the assessor, prosecutor, sheriff, county clerk, recorder of deeds, auditor, and even the coroner) or petition the General Assembly to establish a customized, home-rule charter. These charters are crafted by a panel of citizens within the county, with input from other citizens, and then put to a vote of the voters.

When the General Assembly passed SJR5 last year, only St. Louis County would have been affected by the passage of this law. This was as a result of concerns raised about an appointed official in Missouri's largest county determining some of the highest assessments in the state, and thus, higher taxes. However, residents there passed a change to their charter by a 3-1 margin making the assessor elected. So were Amendment One to pass, it would have no immediate effect until either Jackson County exits this population donut hole or another county attempts to pursue a home-rule charter.

While I like the idea of holding all my county-wide officials accountable, this is a terrible way of doing it, and worse that this donut hole is intentionally written into the state constitution to shield certain entities at the expense of others. The state constitution must be a bedrock of proper and stable governance at the state, county, and municipal/township levels. For lawmakers to put through a narrow yet glaring donut hole, and asking voters to also divest their ability to determine for themselves whether they should allow their elected county leaders to appoint other officials as oppose to make them elected, only serves to make this bedrock a twisted knot of special exceptions and conflicting directives.

It is this reason that makes the next amendment challenging to support, yet heart-breaking to oppose. Voters have the opportunity to grant, via Constitutional Amendment 2 an exemption from property taxes for military veterans who, during their service to country, became a prisoner of war and totally disabled. While our military veterans deserve all the accolade they can get, sadly this method is similarly dangerous in its specificity. We do not have an exact number of how many veterans would qualify, and even if we did, the manner in which the exemption is granted is potentially dangerous for the sanctity of the state constitution.

The exemption is to be added into the first clause of Article 6, Section X of the state constitution, grouping this unknown amount of total-disabled veterans alongside the state, counties, municipalities, townships, and non-profit cemeteries. To group a subset of Missourians, no matter how selfless their sacrifice to their country and the price they paid, in with government entities is like grouping a sparrow with a brood of chickens. It's not the intent of the constitution to group specific citizens with these exemptions, even if we're perpetually indebted to them for their service. Further, the fear of those who are daring enough to speak against this amendment is that were voters to overwhelmingly support granting this exception, less-deserving groups could potentially have precedent to push for their own inclusion.

In the General Assembly, all but seven lawmakers voted for HJR15 placing this on the ballot. All seven happened to be absent on the days the measure came up for a final vote in both chambers.

So here we are, in the electoral paddock, staring at the shears that seek to skew the votes we put into the ballot box Tuesday. However you vote, be sure to hold onto all the wool, and keep it out from over your eyes in the process, by researching the facts and arguments, and surveying the long-term impact your vote could have on all Missourians, from Grant City to Granby to Gray Summit.

Missouri: The Shear-Me State

2010-10-21T21:47:00.001-05:00

With just under a fortnight to go until the biennial madness known as US General Election Season subsides, coverage from around the world increases along with the robo-calls and mud-slinging 30-second adverts. Recently, the BBC's Kevin Connolly breezed through Missouri and commented on our election mood, as well as his affinity for our nickname. Unfortunately, he only touched on the sentiment toward Washington and barely touched on state issues that also face Missouri voters.

Had Mr. Connolly done this, he might wind up coming up with a different nickname for the Show-Me State. Were he to comment on all the ads from Robin & Roy and Ike & Vicky, a more appropriate moniker would have been the Smear-Me State. Or, had he wanted to speak in detail on at least two of the five proposed ballot measures, he just might have developed a different, perhaps fitting nickname:

The Shear-Me State.

The two ballot measures in particular are Proposition A, which would effectively eliminate taxes on earnings, and Proposition B, which would establish additional laws covering the treatment and breeding of dogs. Both are changes to Missouri's revised statutes, meaning that lawmakers could, at any point in the future, pass a bill through the General Assembly to countermand their passage.

To explain why these two measures could turn Missouri into The Shear-Me State, I now introduce Rex H. Susa:Rex H. Susa is not a happy sheep. You see, he's been told repeatedly by singular interests, wooing him by way of millions of dollars of second-rate adverts, to vote yes on Propositions A and B, believing that they're going to help him out, when their backers are instead treating him like the sheep he is so that their agenda can come to fruition at his expense.

Come to think of it, you could write the argument for the opposition of both measures this way:
"Proposition [A/B] is funded singularly by one [outstate arch-conservative billionaire/out-of-state activist organization] driven to single-handedly wreck Missouri's largest [cities' fiscal viability/industry—agriculture—] in the name of [free enterprise/animal rights]. However, it's clear to us that [Rex Sinquefield/the Humane Society of the United States] has no vested interest in [the public safety and infrastructure of/dogs living with loving owners in] Kansas City and St. Louis, and doesn't even put much of [his/their] money toward [developing property/rescuing and caring for dogs] in either city.

"Instead, [he intends/they intend] on duping us to vote to help [him/them] turn Missouri into [an experiment in free enterprise/a vegan paradise] where [cities receive revenue exclusively from a 23% sales tax/stepping on an anthill results in you being arrested for attempted genocide] but they won't have a way to [replace the lost revenue completely/make Missouri meat-free] because we'll travel to neighboring states to [shop/eat Arthur Bryant's Barbecue]. Therefore, we must vote no on Proposition [A/B]."

It may be a dubious argument, were it not for the reality that several opponents of Proposition B, hedging their bets on that argument, also happen to be supporters of Proposition A and chiding Proposition A's opponents who are using the same argument. One proponent of Prop A told The Kansas City Star that opponents relying on that argument were "blowing smoke".

Why must it take two entities, outside Missouri's two largest cities, at least $13 million to convince Missouri voters to vote something in that can easily be overruled, much like how in 2008 the Missouri General Assembly repealed campaign contribution limits voted in by 74 percent of Missourians in 1994? Further, contributions from those two entities amount to only a large amount of cash, with few ideas to back them up. Already a spokeswoman for Sinquefield admitted Sinquefield has no ideas to replace the revenue St. Louis and Kansas City will lose if voters dump the earnings tax in a subsequent vote. And despite many Missourians lining up behind Proposition B, including former Senator Jack Danforth and Cardinals skipper Tony La Russa, Missourians only accounted for $282,000 of contributions to Missourians for the Protection of Dogs, the group campaigning for Proposition B.

I don't take too kindly to Missouri voters like me being treated as sheep by Sinquefield and HSUS, with 30-second adverts trying to pull the wool over my eyes with selective language, pejorative words that start with the letter P, and imagery that makes a deliberate attempt to evoke an emotional knee-jerk reaction. I may come off as a Demon Sheep when I explain my objections to both measures this weekend, but I'm not about to let them turn our bellwether state into the nation's petri dish for their political gambits.

Estão conspirando com o Qataris?

2010-10-20T21:06:00.001-05:00

On the same day the two FIFA executives compromised by a sting reporting job by The Sunday Times were suspended pending a review, another British newspaper has named who they say are the two parties under investigation for vote-trading.

The Telegraph will report Thursday morning that the Qatari committee bidding to host the 2022 World Cup are under investigation for possibly conspiring with the 2018 combined bid of Spain and Portugal, in violation of FIFA's bidding rules. If this proves to be the case, then FIFA could disqualify both bids.

While Qatar remains a longshot for 2022 against the US, Australia, Japan and South Korea, the Iberian bid is considered a rival to England's quest to upend current front-runners Russia. Were the Spanish/Portuguese bid dismissed, England could focus exclusively on the Russians, with the Benelux bid still lurking in the distance.

Fortunately, the date remains 2 December on when we find out whether Egyptian and Peruvian soccer fans will blare their vuvuzelas inbetween bites of Gates' barbecued beef brisket at Arrowhead Stadium in 2022.

Why Murdoch's Minions Might Muck Up FIFA

2010-10-18T21:56:00.004-05:00

We found out Friday that vuvuzelas will not blare en masse from Arrowhead Stadium in 2018. Now we might have to wait a bit longer to see if Lamar's Lair will welcome the world in 2022.

FIFA executives are now saying that they might postpone their vote on who gets to hose the 2018 and 2022 World Cup finals, currently scheduled for 2 December, following a sting expose by The Sunday Times. In their article (complete with undercover videos that are only available via a paid subscription), two Sunday Times reporters pose as English-based lobbyists trying to buy votes for the US' 2022 bid. In particular, they entertain offers from the presidents of football federations in Nigeria and Tahiti, both of whom are on FIFA's executive board and wield clout amongst the African and Oceania confederations.

FIFA have vowed to move swiftly with their investigation, and could suspend the impugned executives as early as Wednesday. Additionally, FIFA's ethics committee are reported to also be investigating reports of collusion between bidding committees, likely concerning vote swaps. While it could be another potential embarrassment for England's hopes to host the 2018 finals, there just might be an underlying reason for this. (Please convert your old UHF antennae into tinfoil hats… now.)

The Sunday Times is part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation conglomerate, the same conglomerate that owns the Sky network of channels in the UK and the Fox networks in the US and Australia. Despite building much of their sport coverage on association football (namely Fox Soccer and Soccer Plus in the US and Sky Sports' Soccer Saturday), none of these channels have ever broadcast the sporting event that's surpassed even the Summer Olympics in cumulative audience numbers.

Since 1994, coverage rights of the World Cup in the US have been owned by ABC, whose parent company Disney also owns ESPN. In England, broadcast rights are split between ITV and the BBC. However, the current partnership is due to expire after the 2014 finals in Brazil, with no current indication of either the partnership being renewed or the World Cup remaining on a government list of sporting events required to be shown on free-to-air broadcasters. In Australia, semi-public broadcaster SBS have the rights.

While a majority of major US sporting events remain on terrestrial or basic cable/satellite channels, in Britain most anything not on the government's protected list has been picked up by Sky or ESPN (which replaced Setanta Sports when the Irish-based channel collapsed last year) on a pay-to-air basis. This includes all Premier League fixtures and high-profile cricket Test series, namely The Ashes.

Were England to win the 2018 bid and either Australia or the United States to follow in 2022, News Corp. would have home turf for eight years. While their newspapers would generate a large following reporting on preparations and whipping up support by way of nationalistic headlines atop The Sun and New York Post, an even larger chunk of revenue could come to them if they had exclusive rights to broadcast coverage in all three nations. Granted, it might not go down well were Fox to pre-empt habitual coverage of Cardinals baseball and NASCAR with 22 guys in shorts chipping a ball around. But the audiences, ad revenue, and ability to force subscribers to pay to view every game would generate far more revenue and profit for News Corp.

While such an insinuation–that a media conglomerate would conspire against its nations' interests as to prevent their domestic competitors from raking in millions–would need a ton of concrete evidence to support, the circumstances seem to connect (if only within the cosy confines of a tinfoil hat). Why would The Sunday Times pose as agents acting on behalf of the US Soccer Federation to sting and expose two corrupt voters that representatives from England's bid courted early in the process? Is it possible that, knowing that the status quo for broadcasting World Cup games will remain in place, News Corp is seeking to undermine or derail the bidding process as to prevent their competition from milking the home-field advantage?

Such a scenario, even if true, would be preposterous to believe and damning if accurate. But should English-speaking nations prevail come December, I suspect the current broadcasters will quickly ink new deals to extend their coverage rights and secure the eventual windfall from broadcasting the world's biggest single-sport spectacle, much to the dismay of Murdoch's empire.

I thought Partisan TV News was suppose to be a Yankee thing

2010-10-01T16:17:00.000-05:00

With election season at its peak in the U.S., televisions from sea to shining sea are tuned to the channel that emphasizes their viewpoints, be it Fox News for the rabid right, MSNBC for the rabid left, or HLN for the rabidly apathetic who don't care who's leading the U.S. over a cliff.

As this display of entrenched partisan nonsense and the simultaneous degradation of enlightened, sensible discourse and the general concept of centrism continues here, across the pond the greatest chance of it happening was scheduled to take place next week. And not by Murdoch-owned Sky News.

The taxpayer-funded BBC could have found itself the epicentre of a partisan programming debate, thanks to three unions who wanted to go on two 48-hour strikes timed to coincide with Prime Minister David Cameron's speech at the Conservative Party's annual conference in Birmingham and Chancellor George Osborne's speech on budget cuts two weeks later. At issue are concessions the BBC are asking members of the National Union of Journalists, Unite and Becta to grant for pension contributions. The cuts largely stem from a freeze into the rate of the annual television license fee and ongoing austerity measures that the Coalition government are starting to put into place.

The timing of the strikes is essentially aimed at the government, running contrary to the non-partisan objectives of the BBC. The unions have little to gain from the Conservatives being back in power. The last time Britain had a Tory government, Thatcher held out against the National Union of Mineworkers, and the unions' resolve fell flat. So the latest tactic: keep the Prime Minister from speaking on BBC by not having enough staff on hand to cover the speech.

Surely a political tactic like this — one activists would crave to use to stymie Fox News or MSNBC's ability to cover current events — would meet with with the leadership of a party still searching for traction despite a post-conference bump in several polls?

To the benefit of those who cling on to the hope of there being any semblance of objective news sources, it didn't. Shortly after the Labour party conference concluded in Manchester, new party leader Ed Miliband (or as the Tory-loving, Murdoch-owned Sun derisively calls him, "Red Ed") called on the very unions that nudged him past his old brother David to become party leader to not go through with the strike threat. Miliband said that the country had a right to hear what Cameron has to say from the Tory conference because the country heard what Miliband had to say. Additionally, several news presenters with the BBC, among them the venerable Jeremy Paxman and political editor Nick Robinson, warned of the action being seen as "unduly partisan"

As a result, principally because of a new offer on the table from the BBC, the strike's off. For the moment. But this threat just may have been the first blow toward the introduction of yet another American vice into British culture. (If only we could stick with continuing to impress Mountain Dew and Chiefs football on the world.)

Unnecessary Wheeling and Dealing

2010-09-28T20:08:00.023-05:00

We are just over two months away from finding out whether a swarm of blaring vuvuzelas will mix with tomahawk chops in the United States for either the 2018 or 2022 FIFA World Cup. If England's Football Association have their way, the US shouldn't bother with 2018.

A spokesman for The FA said today he expects the US Soccer Federation to withdraw their bid for the 2018 World Cup and focus on 2022. In response to that England would, to quote the spokesman, "almost certainly withdraw from 2022." (Which is easy for him to say, as the United States remains the only non-UEFA nation still bidding on 2018, and FIFA rules now prohibit a continent from hosting consecutive cups.) However, Go USA Bid executive director David Downs issued assurances that the US remain in the hunt for either cup.

I'm not sure why England would vocally suggest the US opt out of the 2018 matchup, considering the fracas that nearly scuttled their bid four months ago. While FIFA rejected the claims of bribery made by soon-to-be-ousted FA chief Lord Triesman, it was still quite foolish to make such an accusation.

With the FIFA evaluation teams completing their tour of all nine candidate nations (or nation pairings, in the case of Spain/Portugal and Benelux), the decision rests on them. In the meantime, Americans eager to support the bid can continue to make it known by visiting the bid's Web site.

The Day I Reaffirmed A Belief I've Held Since Eighth Grade

2010-09-21T21:09:00.226-05:00

It has taken far too long for me to ruminate about this, with so many angles, aspects, and division among peers as well as various groupings across our diverse nation. But I've finally settled on one angle: the surefire first-person confessional.

The controversy surrounding Park51 (née Cordoba House, née "Mosque" "at" "Ground Zero", née Burlington Coat Factory) has echoed back and forth from media outlets across the U.S. and beyond the past two months, especially with demonstrations (abandoned or not) that coincided with the ninth anniversary of the atrocities of 9/11. And during my trip to New York last month (photos on the blog's fan page on Facebook) I took a walk down Park Place toward the run-down five-story Italian Renaissance building. And there it stood: the flashpoint testing religious tolerance in the U.S., flanked by a 15-story skyscraper to its right with an AT&T store, another 15-story skyscraper that houses an Amish goods shop, all facing south toward a parking garage and even taller building, across the street where taxis advertising adult entertainment venues in the area cruise.

After standing across the street under construction scaffolding, overhearing a couple people also snapping pictures and talking about the proposed project while two demonstrators utilized their First Amendment rights to show support for freedom of religion, I continued my one-man tour of Lower Manhattan with, oddly enough, one of my core political beliefs re-affirmed.

I, for lack of a better term or way to spin this, am a Tenther.

I believe that problems involving the economic and social well-being of a community and its members are best solved at localized levels. Broad-stroke applications like No Child Left Behind, health care reform, Kelo v. New London, and every perverted interpretation of the interstate commerce clause conceivable, are one-size-fits-all attempts to graft a federal solution onto what are really situations that differ from state to state and district to district. I make no qualms about being among the 70 percent of Missouri voters who backed Proposition C last month.

However, unlike most of the newfound Tenthers out there, I accept a critical tangent of this belief: what's best for one state is not necessarily best for another. Which is why I, as a Missourian, really have no tangible reason to weigh in on whether a New York organization should be allowed by a governing body in New York to build a facility that serves Muslims who live in New York. While I may be able to transplant myself with ease in this great country from state to state as the economy and I please, I am no more a resident of Lower Manhattan than the many pundits, preachers, and politicos who have railed against this proposal. Zoning has long been a local issue, and the boards that voted to allow construction of Park51 did not lose or cede jurisdiction of Lower Manhattan, nor did similar boards serving Arlington or Somerset County, Pa., after 19 (insert choice expletives to your heart's content) terrorists committed the most brazen attack on our country.

Now, I must admit that I did have my reservations about this project. It's within a five-minute walk of Ground Zero, ten if you get stopped at every crosswalk signal and you actually abide by them. The previous name for the project, Cordoba House, was criticized by a politico from Georgia, who said the name commemorated the forcible conversion of the Spanish city of Córdoba during the eighth century. But then I find out the inspiration for the project is a Jewish community center that's operated in Manhattan's Upper East Side since the 1920s, and that a mosque has operated in Lower Manhattan since before the twin towers opened forty years ago. And then there's the strip club advertising itself on hundreds of New York taxis, just one block behind the site.

Instead of figuring out a way to spin a baptism story out of my taking swimming lessons at the YMCA on Vivion Road as a kid, it occurred to me the dangerous precedent that could be set by my supposedly fellow Tenthers, were their vehement objections to a project in New York, waged from far-flung corners of the U.S., enough for a local decision to be overturned. Would they be keen to people from outside Alaska or Georgia telling them what their local bodies they can and can't zone? Would they be willing to cede to a federal government, one that they repeatedly call out of touch with the electorate and having too much power already, the right to determine what is appropriate to place 1000 feet away from a site of historical significance?

If (God, Allah and/or any other deity or deities forbid) a harrowing scar were to be delivered onto Kansas City or St. Louis, I would want anything proposed in its place, be it a memorial garden, Methodist chapel, mosque, Mormon temple, mega-screen complex, or museum where visitors can observe the anhydration of decorative mastic epoxies, to be debated on and decided by our local bodies, free from undue influence by political & publicity-craving forces who have no vested interest in our day-to-day lives. This has been, and should remain, a local decision. And as non-residents of that local jurisdiction, we must respect what has been done, lest we prepare ourselves for people from outside our communities to tell us what not to build in our own back yard.

"Like the Mississippi, it just keeps rolling along. Let it roll!"

2010-08-20T09:12:00.003-05:00

Throughout Britain, particularly London and the South East, commemorations have taken place to mark the 70th anniversary of a speech before the House of Commons by Winston Churchill. In that speech, Winston Churchill uttered the famous line: "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."

The speech, which gave rise to the nickname "The Few" for the RAF personnel who piloted Spitfires, Hurricanes and Lancasters over the skies of Britain to repel the Nazis' aerial assault of Britain, was generally a state of the war report from the Prime Minister. Churchill spends the first third of the speech detailing technological differences between the two world wars, stating that while casualties in the Battle of Britain were one-fifth that of World War I in the first year, the focus had changed from being an exclusively military struggle to total warfare against civilians, aimed at weakening the British resolve.

As Churchill lauded "The Few" he went on to detail the democracies that had fallen under the power of the German blitzkrieg, and assured them that they had a champion in Great Britain and the United States.

The end of the speech, which rarely is discussed in contrast to "The Few", contains a poignant close from Churchill. As he brings up the need for Britain and the United States to come together in common dialogue and defence, he said:

These are important steps. Undoubtedly this process means that these two great organisations of the English-speaking democracies, the British Empire and the United States, will have to be somewhat mixed up together in some of their affairs for mutual and general advantage.

For my own part, looking out upon the future, I do not view the process with any misgivings. I could not stop it if I wished; no one can stop it. Like the Mississippi, it just keeps rolling along. Let it roll. Let it roll on full flood, inexorable, irresistible, benignant, to broader lands and better days.

A year later, with the Battle of Britain won by "The Few" and the Nazi war machine setting its sights east toward Moscow and Stalingrad, Churchill would meet with Franklin D. Roosevelt off the coast of Newfoundland to hammer out the Atlantic Charter. Not only did it provide a foundation on which the United Nations was formed five years later in San Francisco, it also put the final touches onto a special relationship, torn by the Revolution and War of 1812, reunited during World War I, and drawing even closer as two nations divided by common language began to reaffirm their inherent ties.

It was a special relationship that Churchill would grow to appreciate, giving one of his most famous speeches in 1946 on the campus of Westminster College in Fulton. And the United States would pay him back in 1963, as Congress would bestow Churchill with honourary citizenship. (Granted, as Churchill's mother was an American, he could have sought U.S. citizenship outright had he wanted to.)

Indeed today is a day of reflection, not only for the efforts of "The Few" to preserve their country, but their role in helping Churchill defend democracy from a deranged dictatorship and establish the core of the special relationship that continues to ebb and flow through American and British affairs to this day.

It's a Quarter After One, I'm Tanked At The Red Lion…

2010-08-19T01:15:00.028-05:00

I began typing this entry 35,000 feet over Cedar Point, at the same time two lads from Tennessee and their gorgeous lead singer wrapped up a three-day sojourn across the pond, building on the unprecedented chart success they’re achieving.

Lady Antebellum’s trip to Britain may appear fruitless, performing only one concert, and that one to 2000 devoted fans at Shepherd’s Bush Empire in London, but for those pining for the world to embrace the trademark twang of country, that close-knit concert may very well be country music’s equivalent to The Beatles’ landmark 1964 debut concert on The Ed Sullivan Show and at old Shea Stadium.

And Britain may have just warmed up to the format, in particular the three members of Lady Antebellum. In addition to BBC Radio One regularly performing tracks from their newest album Need You Now, the trio of Dave Haywood, Charles Kelley and Hillary Scott appeared on BBC One’s Breakfast Show for a live interview segment lasting just over seven minutes. Need You Now, including the title song and “I Run To You”, have soared on the UK’s charts, echoing the success the trio have registered in the US over the likes of Justin Bieber, Rhianna and fellow country starlet Taylor Swift.

Listing The Beatles as among their influences, and joking that they were once mistaken for Kings of Leon, Lady Antebellum are the epitome of not just the world’s earbuds acclimating to songs about mama, drinking, pickup trucks, and jailhouse blues, but equally of country music evolving from its distinctly rural American roots. Much as the Mississippi delta gave rise to jazz and blues, genres quickly embraced and adapted by legendary British rockers including Eric Clapton and Mick Jagger, country music has now reached a point where it has openly influenced, and been influenced by, the bass beats of classic rock, the somber, soothing tones of adult contemporary, and even the occasional jolt from heavy metal.

Even as The New York Times declared country music dead in 1985, performers rooted in church choirs and old guitar standards began branching out from behind the friendly confines of the WSM microphone at the Grand Ole Opry. Artists, ranging from classic Southern Belles like Reba McEntire to transplants like the Canadian Shania Twain, explored the inclusion of traits from beyond the commonly acceptable bounds of country music. As country music caught on across North America, so too did the outside influences. Shania drew some flack for a song which, for all intents and purposes, could hardly be classified as country. Reba built on her success by way of launching a television series on The WB (and later The CW), running for six seasons. Reba's crossover appeal furthered when she released an album of duets in 2007, featuring Kelly Clarkson, Don Henley, Carole King and Justin Timberlake among her collaborators.

In the past two years alone, country music has reached a point where it is, for all intents and purposes, attached to the mainstream as much as hip-hop and R&B. Taylor Swift’s near-bubble gum pop appeal, with chart success on country and mainstream charts, drew a less than positive response from a certain rapper on a certain live music award broadcast. Soft rock crooners Darius Rucker (of Hootie and the Blowfish fame) and Uncle Kracker have found their ways on the country charts by virtue of including just enough twang for country music stations' programming directors to add them to their playlists.

Many of these artists, though, can also look back to successes achieved by rock-and-roll pioneers such as Elvis and Boddy Holly, or can look to the enduring image of Jim Reeves. Over 45 years after his umtimely passing in a plane crash en route to Nashville, Reeves' booming bass voice against gentle background music continues to resonate in the songbooks of Britain, Ireland, and South Africa, where he spent several months touring in 1963.

Could Lady Antebellum's newfound appeal across the pond result in the potential inclusion of up to 400 million fans, or maybe some Johnny Cash knockoffs in future Eurovision Song Contests? Or has country music morphed into the point where it is now part of the Simon Cowell-fronted-but-really-controlled-by-Sony-investors cookie-cutter music machine, defined only by an artist's preferred training, or what a publicist believes would best market the artist? These are questions that not only tug at the ear of devoted and occasional music fans, but also probe deeper into society.

Whether British fans of Lady Antebellum will delve deeper into the rich history of Country music and find a new genre of their own liking, or start grouping their tracks with Little Boots because both artists play regularly on Heart, will be a test of time. If past results are any indication, though, it will likely be the latter. I've yet to hear Mix 93 or Z100 play anything by Lena or Alexandra Burke.

Freshmen MPs vulnerable to Foot-In-Mouth Disease

2010-08-12T23:13:00.000-05:00

Funny how an outside candidate keen to make himself accessible now, as an elected official, wants to cut off access.

Over the last month Dominic Raab, the Conservative representing Esher and Walton in the House of Commons, has called on a political advocacy blog to pull his e-mail address from their Web site. Raab has told media outlets that his office is being flooded with e-mails from across Britain and that they're unable to handle the volume of correspondence.

The blog in question, 38degrees, bills itself on enabling concerned citizens to sign petitions and pursue group action on various issues, ranging from recalling MPs who may have misused their position to local planning issues including proposed CAFOs and housing developments. For the past month, 38degrees' operators and Raab have exchanged e-mails concerning Raab's request and made those e-mails public.

Raab has taken offence to his inbox being flooded with hundreds of e-mails from concerned citizens across the length and breadth of Britain sending the same form letter advocating for the adoption of the Alternative Vote, the referendum which is slated to occur in May 2011. In the e-mail exchange with 38degrees, Raab has noted that he would welcome responding to individual e-mails from advocates of AV. Both Raab and 38degrees say they have advice from Parliament's Information Commissioner backing their stand on Raab's request.

Now, on the surface, this request appears idiotic. Raab is a public figure now. His e-mails, if they're conducted from a government e-mail account, are subject to opens records laws. (That said, Raab listed a Yahoo! e-mail address on his candidate profile, and if he is still using that Yahoo! account for government business, then that's a slightly different issue here.) And Raab asking people to stop e-mailing him, be it to his Yahoo! or Commons e-mail address, is like asking the Niagara River to stop flowing over Horseshoe Falls.

What his office can do, like what several reps here in Missouri do, is set up a generic auto-reply that acknowledges receipt of an e-mail and explicitly state on there that unless the issue is raised by a resident in his constituency (as verified by post codes) there's a good chance the e-mail won't be replied to or actually be seen by the MP. If an e-mail did not include a post code or did not match those that reside in the constituency (in Raab's situation those would be KT10, KT11 and KT12), then the office staff could label it as low priority. This would be to ensure that the highest priority emails—from constituents and media—would be given top priority.

What concerns me about 38degrees, and what may be distressing Raab, is whether the e-mails he's receiving via 38degrees' mailing system (which is modelled on progressive grassroots sites like MoveOn.org) is mailing the same form letter to all 650 MPs, regardless of the petitioner's given constituency. While it is useful to generate large numbers as to show national opinion on certain issues, an MP's priority must be his/her constituency. If the MP is to be a delegate representing the wishes of his/her residents (as opposed to a trustee), then he/she must be able to discern the voices of his/her neighbours over those of adamant campaigners.

While Web sites like 38degrees, MoveOn.org, (and even Missives from Missouri, to a lesser extent) allow regular citizens to become aware and actively involved in issues affecting their lives, citizens need to be able to think and form opinions for themselves, rather than just fill in a few boxes and go back to watching EastEnders or iCarly. Rather than remaining a sheep under the stewardship of a new shepherd, a truly active citizen needs to be able to articulate their view and personal experiences relating to such issues. Only then will the power of new media reach its optimum.

Divided Attention, Dog Days of Summer Edition

2010-08-07T14:31:00.000-05:00

Just under a fortnight ago I attended the wedding of two college friends. Not only was it the first wedding I attended since things across the pond went the way of Labour when Michael Foot handled the helm, but it was also a mini-reunion of sorts with several peers I hadn't seen since my years at Truman. In particular, I had the pleasure of becoming acquainted with the husband of one of those peers. It was a most enjoyable and informative conversation for both of us, and the insight I gained from it has given me a chance to reflect on, well, the general direction of this blog. Or should I say indirection?

But again, my attention is divided. Much like how I'm split between covering the news of home and recent happenings in Blighty, city leaders in KCMO are split between what exactly to ask voters to approve with the public safety sales tax due for renewal before June 2011. The quarter-cent levy currently goes towards improving the police department's facilities and equipment, including the new police academy and Shoal Creek Patrol building just outside Pleasant Valley. Several on the city council, backed by police chief Jim Corwin, want to retain the sales tax for this use.

However, Mayor Mark Funkhouser wants to put more police officers on the streets. Citing citizen concerns raised to him, the mayor would instead like to augment the sales tax to foot the salaries of 100 officers, and extend its duration for 20 years rather than 15.

At first glance, I'm inclined to back more police on the beat. That means more eyes watching out for crime, traffic infractions, and kids in need of Royals baseball cards. Unfortunately, the mayor's desire to hire extra personnel by way of a sales tax generates two major problems.

The first problem, more critically, is proposing a sales tax with a set duration (let alone a sales/use tax) to increase the number of personnel serving a critical need for the city. Say you're one of the 100 officers brought in as a result of a passed sales tax aimed at hiring more officers. When that tax expires and citizens don't renew it, or sales revenue plummets more than it already has, your job probably isn't that secure. Even if the advocacy groups and unions do all they can to make sure you get your salary, generate bad PR for the city, etc., it would still compromise the force's effectiveness the same way dumping 100 officers or slashing a different part of the budget would. And further, this fear could easily be played upon by civic leaders looking to subvert such a tax into a gravy train for pet projects, or rely heavily on this tax as to free up money from other sources for said gravy train pet projects.

The second problem, at the moment, is that in Missouri it's not legal to propose such a tax. Until August 28. That's when Senate Bill 981, sponsored by Democrat Victor Callahan of Independence, becomes law. It would allow Kansas City to pass a sales tax of up to one percent to fund salaries of police officers. Unfortunately, while parts of the bill contain emergency clauses, this particular provision did not. Which is problematic as, for the measure to appear on the November ballot, the city must approve ballot wording by the 19th.

As the city is not on the same page on this critical subject, I suspect that voters will face a desperation-induced ballot measure come April, shortly after KCMO voters are worn out from a municipal election that still operates on the oddest dates for elections in Missouri.

Strange Bedfellows At The Westminster Motel

2010-07-29T18:40:00.000-05:00

The strange bedfellows stemming from Britain's nascent Coalition government continue to develop. This week, it's a pairing of Labour's shadow cabinet with 50 backbencher Tories determined to quash the proposed May 2011 referendum on the alternative vote system. Their reasons, largely based on political dogma, are naturally divergent.

The ballot measure, which will go before voters across the UK on 5 May upon passage of the enabling legislation, will eliminate the first-past-the-post system in favour of ranking candidates in order of preference. The system is already in place for electing the mayor of greater London and in local elections across Wales and Scotland, the latter of which will occur simultaneously.

The 50 Tory backbenchers – principally Eurosceptics and right-wing politicians that could pull off a mass defection to UKIP if they really wanted to – oppose this system, believing that first-past-the-post has been a tried-and-true institution that can keep fringe candidates out of Parliament. But instead of going along with their party's coalition agreement, to let the people decide on what system they want, these stuck-in-the-mud traditionalists have every intention of maintaining the status quo.

It must be noted that Cameron, in spite of his willingness to allow the vote, will campaign against it. However, as part of the Coalition agreement between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, the Conservative plurality agreed to let there be a vote on electoral reform (as championed by the Liberal Democrats) in exchange for the Tories' desire to reduce the number of seats in the House of Commons and ensure an equal number of residents in each constituency.

As a result, Labour's leadership, which championed the Alternative Vote (and even passed the original proposal just six months ago) indicate that they may sign onto a motion to oppose the bill alongside the rebel Tory MPs. They fear that the Lib-Con coalition may gerrymander the new constituencies to divide Labour strongholds and render improbable any chance of a Labour or even LibDem government from forming in the near future. Naturally, it's fodder for generating sound-byte rebuttals, as Cameron was quick to call Labour "backtrackers" and "opportunistic".

With Labour's prospective U-Turn on the proposal, should it pass through Parliament only the Liberal Democrats (among the Westminster Three) will be on board with the Alternative Vote, even as they indicated preference to dumping single-seat constituencies in favour of the Single Transferable Vote system, as used to elect legislators in Northern Ireland.

The Coalition That Gaffes Together…

2010-07-23T09:30:00.001-05:00

Were America's 24-hour newsrooms not so enthralled over LiLo's mug shots or when Mel Gibson gets his next one, they might have picked up on these two nuggets that occurred during Prime Minister David Cameron's trip to Washington this week.

First, the Prime Minister admitted to Sky News' Adam Boulton that Britain, while not a pushover, was the junior partner in the special relationship with the U.S. What really irked British media though was not Cameron's admission of this generally accepted reality, but how he qualified it.

Cameron suggested that the UK was also the junior partner in 1940. While this might play right into the hand of my jingoist compatriots who to this day insist America saved Britain's hide in World War II, there's a slight historical problem with this.

As 'The Few' took to the air to defend Britain's skies against Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe, the States remained on the sidelines, limiting itself to not-so-covert assistance of the Allies by way of the Lend-Lease Act. The resolve of 'The Few' prevailed when Germany formally abandoned the Battle of Britain in December 1940, months before Roosevelt and Churchill would meet off the coast of Newfoundland to promulgate the Atlantic Charter, and a solid year before Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. Even after America's "day of infamy", the United States only declared on Japan, which resulted in an invitation to the European theatre through Germany and Italy declaring on the U.S. on 11 December 1941.

Doesn't sound like a senior partner to me.

The staffers at 10 Downing, though, were more pressed into action over another gaffe that had occurred 12 hours earlier at the lectern of the House of Commons. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, standing in for Cameron during this week's Prime Minister's Questions, tussled words with Labour's Jack Straw, who served as foreign secretary and Lord Chancellor during Labour's past 13 years at the helm. In an effort to score a political one-up on the opposition amid a charged climate lacking decorum, Clegg declared: "Maybe he one day - perhaps we will have to wait for his memoirs - could account for his role in the most disastrous decision of all, which is the illegal invasion of Iraq."

Slight problem: a majority of Conservatives, including a freshman MP from the constituency of Witney named David Cameron, backed Tony Blair's government in joining the U.S. in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The Liberal Democrats, when Clegg was representing Yorkshire in the European Parliament, were the largest party in Britain to oppose the war and declare it illegal.

What followed was a stark lesson for everyone running the Coalition government. 10 Downing attempted in vain to qualify Clegg's comments as his own, and then refused to counter them as Conservatives went on the counter-offensive. This also generated confusion over who exactly will declare whether or not British involvement in the overthrow of Saddam Hussein was illegal, as a spokesman for the inquiry looking into the lead up to the conflict said its findings will not include an explicit statement of legality. Further, Clegg's statement from the dispatch box, were it to become a legal reality, could provide grounds to pursue criminal cases against current and former Government officials and even British troops who served in Iraq since March 2003.

While this may not prove too much a dent in the viability of the Cameron-Clegg Coalition, the slip-up in putting party platform over Government position, alongside the repeated yet draining efforts of Commons Speaker John Bercow to maintain order during the first PMQs with a Liberal party member at the lecturn, will give the Coalition reason to re-assess their strategy when dealing with a regrouping Labour opposition and disgruntled backbenchers. For Clegg, it is a stark reminder of the importance to represent the views of the Coalition as a whole when he speaks in place of the Prime Minister. Besides, there now exists a once-monthly session for questions directed to the Deputy Prime Minister, where leeway may occur for where his views as the "junior partner" of the Coalition may differ from the Prime Minister.

A Brief, Yet Somber Tribute

2010-07-21T21:52:00.002-05:00

A typical summer thunderstorm swelled up over the Green Hills of Northern Missouri two nights ago. As it roared its way through my family's long-time stomping grounds, they started giving the Upper Midwest's Doppler radars, storm chasers, and residents concern as they showed signs of dropping a tornado.

As residents and loved ones from afar feared a repeat of the storms that dropped deadly twisters on Milan and Kirksville 14 months ago, NBC Action News assignment editor Nick Dutcher relayed warnings from the National Weather Service by way of his Twitter. When Adair County fell under a tornado warning, I asked him how close it was to Kirksville. He replied with reports of two radar-detected cells in the northern half of the county. Fortunately, the storms didn't produce any tornadoes of significance, if any.

Tragically, our brief exchange of Tweets turned out to be among the last things Nick would do from the assignment desk. Yesterday, police found Nick slain at his home in south Kansas City, and his SUV stolen. Nick was just 30 years old, and friends, colleagues, and media practitioners across the metro are stunned and in disbelief.

I only knew Nick from the many Tweets he posted whilst at the assignment desk: breaking news in the area during the run-up to 10 pm newscasts, extensive severe weather coverage, his love for Celine Dion's repertoire, and the occasional reality TV show. He was one of the few KC-area journalists I followed on Twitter during my eight months in the Kentish Riviera. And as Kansas City media pause to remember the young life taken away from us, I too reflect.

Nick, his family, friends, and the NBC Action News team, will be in my thoughts and prayers.

Meanwhile, KCPD are investigating Nick's death as a homicide, but have no suspects at this moment. Earlier this evening, they located his stolen Ford Escape abandoned just north of Swope Park. Anyone with new information pertaining to Nick's murder should call the KCPD's TIPS hotline at +1 816 474 8477.

Campaign.Mailers{at}mo.gov

2010-07-14T23:00:00.001-05:00

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch's "Political Fix" blog reports that Creve Coeur Rep. Jill Schupp, who is running unopposed for re-election to her House district, sent a campaign mailer from her former aide's Capitol e-mail address. Schupp is quoted in Tony Messenger's report as saying that it was her first time personally using the mass mailing client Constant Contact, that she was unaware that it had been set up that way, and that future mailers will come from a different e-mail address.

The missives in question were sent on 11 July and 11 May, from House.Mo.Gov addresses associated with Schupp and her office. As the operator of Missives from Missouri, I've been anticipating a mishap of this nature, as does happen often when politics mingle with new technologies and concepts.

And in this case, it has. To the untrained eye, Schupp's two e-mails did appear to come from her state office. This screenshot (click for full version) shows how I've set up Google Mail to place a label on every e-mail sent from House.Mo.Gov (Maroon) and Senate.Mo.Gov (Pink)

Also, as you can tell, GOP are Red, Dem are Blue, and e-mails sent by someone in a legislator's office is marked "Staffer". (And you can also tell that I've maintained support for the U.S. Soccer and Missouri's wineries, and even developed an interest in cricket. HOWZAT!)

In that screenshot, the mailing from Schupp, dated 11 July, was tagged as being from a House.Mo.Gov address. And this screenshot adds to that argument, but then re-qualifies it.

Here, the address and subject line affirms the source being from Rep. Schupp's office (and the address being a former staffer of the office), but adds that the e-mail itself was mailed through Constant Contact. However, it was signed by an account referring to Schupp's office and not her campaign, and on top of that (well, at the bottom of the mailing):
A re-affirmation of both the campaign nature of the mailer and the sender's address, from House.Mo.Gov.

Now again, I expected something like this to happen, and rather than continue providing screenshots until this is a shark-jumping, muck-racking escapade, I'll state my personal belief that this was an unfortunate oversight by Rep. Schupp. I anticipate the next mailer of this nature from the representative (provided my e-mail address isn't delisted!) to arrive from a different address. I should note, of course, that generally I don't post political mailers on Missives from Missouri, so as a result I opted to not post information on one State Senate candidate's barbecue for veterans in his district, or a discount that's being offered to readers of another campaign's followers for visiting a new restaurant. Both such items were sent from campaign addresses.

Ideally, lawmakers should follow in the example of lawmakers like Rep. Will Kraus of Lee's Summit and Sen. Joseph Keaveny of St. Louis City and maintain separate mailing lists for state and campaign business. Missives from both lawmakers, among others, have arrived from separate accounts. Reference the first screenshot, where the Keaveny Connection (which is providing exceptional publicity for organizations serving the St. Louis area) is tagged as being from Senate.Mo.Gov, but his later e-mail looking for canvassers for his campaign appears with only a DEM tag.

I have kept a close eye on weekly reports from both state and non-state addresses as to ensure that what's being posted is from a state legislator's perspective and not a political candidate. But of course, the line between state legislator and political candidate is often blurry, with caucuses from both parties providing material for their members to send home. Reports become as much an update to residents as they do a refresher of their legislators' values and political allegiances. State law, however, is clear in two areas:

State resources cannot be used, in an official capacity, for political campaigns.
Any e-mail sent from a state e-mail address to at least two people is available for public review through the Sunshine Law by anyone.

As such, any campaign material sent from either House.Mo.Gov or Senate.Mo.Gov will be published on Missives from Missouri, and I'm afraid Schupp's slip-up is not the only one that's been published in the seven months I've operated this site.

The Special Session That Shouldn't Have Been

2010-07-13T23:07:00.067-05:00

The 1st Extraordinary Session of the 95th Missouri General Assembly continues to linger in the vacant halls of the State Capitol, a session that has brought about some of the most desperate twists in principle by some to ensure the state's economic viability, and conversely the most desperate twists in the state's economic viability to ensure others' principles.

As we speak, a gaggle of staunch conservative senators are in the twelfth hour of a filibuster aimed at killing off a bill laden with incentives to convince Ford to retain two production lines at their plant in Claycomo. Their hope is to put to an end the practice of granting tax credits to practically everything that moves an inch in the state, which they believe is a major reason why Missouri continues to face growing revenue shortfalls.

Which won't get any better if 3700 people in Kansas City's Northland are indefinitely furloughed when Ford relocates their Escape & Escape Hybrid lines to another state.

As it stands, these jobs are gone in a year, off to Kentucky, and with it a large chunk of revenue from Clay County's largest private employer. Revenue that goes into maintaining roads in unincorporated areas of the county, North Kansas City and Liberty schools, and practically keep the village of Claycomo on the map. And even if this bill passes, there is no guarantee that Ford will bring a new model to Claycomo to replace the Escape.

There is, however, an even greater chance of 3700 Missourians being out of a job if it doesn't pass, all in the name of the ideal of free enterprise and small government. Now yes, a large chunk of affected workers can and probably will find a replacement job, but it's very unlikely that such jobs will pay the same. And yes, it might show a growing consumer consciousness for fuel-efficient and clean energy vehicles, like electric fleet vehicles now being manufactured by Smith Electric in neighboring Platte County. But in the short term, this loss will all but ensure a double-dip recession in many areas of Northwest Missouri, as the area adapts to find new jobs and revenue.

Jobs, revenue, impact, and critical specifics that has seen nary a mention in any of the three weeks of debate and political pandering. Instead it's been the need to pass it, the political means to do so, and the opposition from those who see the concept of government intervention at any level as the biggest problem to economic growth and not a possible agent of support.

The bill, should this filibuster come to a close, will likely pass, as Senate leaders say they have enough votes to pass it back to the House, where it will likely receive another round of yeas before landing on Governor Nixon's desk. How it got there, though, is another string of arm-wringing disappointment.

To ensure the rapid passage of the bill through the House, Speaker Ron Richard—comfortably on his way to the State Senate with no challenger in his bid to represent Joplin—wasted no time in pulling from committees two house members who did not express vehement support. Speaker Pro Tem Bryan Pratt of Eastern Jackson County was removed from the Rules Committee after he called it a "bail out bill". Within a day, another Jackson County representative, Will Kraus of Lee's Summit, was removed from the Job Creation and Economic Development Committee after he stated he would prefer to hear both sides of the issue before casting his both. Both Pratt & Kraus were among the 19 nay votes on the bill the House advanced to the Senate.

Senate Majority Leader Charlie Shields of St. Joseph waited until this week to remove Howell County's Senator Chuck Purgason from the Government Oversight and Fiscal Accountability committee. Purgason, under his purview as chairman of the committee, refused to bring the bill up for discussion, also referring to it as a bailout and suggesting that Missouri "sucks at economic development." Purgason suggests that to spur economic development, Missourians should instead dump income taxes and instead charge a higher sales tax to ensure revenue neutrality. Problem with that, though, is that unless it's enacted at the national level, a large chunk of Missourians could drive across the state line and take advantage of what would then be a reasonable sales tax rates in Bentonville, Quincy, and Overland Park, with Missourians nowhere near the border either stuck holding up the bulk of Missouri's revenue burden or renting a U-Haul on a regular basis to hoard up on necessities.

So now we have a filibuster that's stretched into 12 hours, to prevent a bill to possibly save 3700 jobs in the hopes of possibly saving more businesses. Well, one thing's for sure: the bill could have had more teeth. HB2 is a more specific version of House Bill 1675, also sponsored by Gladstone Republican Jerry Nolte. Nolte's original bill would have applied to any industrial manufacturer in the state, be it automotive, chemical, electrical, etc. Because this bill stalled in a Senate committee over the same ideological concerns (on top of issues legislators believed to be more pressing, like changing I-70's name in St. Louis back to the Mark Twain Expressway), Nolte asked the governor to call a special session.

The governor's call specifically addressed the Claycomo plant. As a result, Nolte's bill could technically not be as broad as it was. Thus, the current version on the Senate floor would only apply to manufacturers classified by the U.S. Census Bureau as "Automobile and Light Duty Motor Vehicle Manufacturing". (Interesting enough, according to the Census' 1997 figures, Missouri produced more goods in this category, in terms of dollar value, than all states not named Michigan.) The House attempted to saddle tax credits for senior citizens who own their own home and companies who create information technology jobs, but these were stricken by an earlier Senate committee who said they were outside the Governor's parameters for the special session.

So now, as Ford figures out whether it's still worth it to keep operating the plant they built 60 years ago on land which once was the residence of TWA's Jack Frye and site of Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh's honeymoon, state Republicans squabble with other state Republicans and Kansas City area reps squabble with other Kansas City area reps over the future of one of their most critical economic engines, all over ideological principles.

All the while, 3700 families continue to dread next year when they will need to go thumbing through the help wanted section, trying to find anything that will keep food on the table, much-needed medication in the cabinet, and their kids' fragile college savings viable. And this is where the focus should always have been. For that reason, this session has been one colossal farce played out by the General Assembly and the Governor. And it will be the families affected by this line's relocation—Claycomo's assembly workers, employees of suppliers across the state, eating establishments whose core clientele will evaporate, special education students who can't get the specialized attention they need during the school day because of even tighter budget constraints—who will feel the most pain from this farce of a session.

It isn't Ford who needs the bailout; it's these families, and at the end of the day, it's what the bill in question should truly be about. It's giving Missouri a chance to preserve these jobs and retain a sizable economic engine at a time when no one can risk a double-dip recession.

It's Not Over Yet

2010-06-26T22:31:00.000-05:00

OK, so it turns out the best defense is actually having a defense, which means Americans can now return to watching 43 bulky cars & dozens of guys wielding maple bats make left turn after left turn after left turn.

As incredible as it is to have 12,000 people crowd into the Power & Light District and having that shown on ABC, Kansas City's image as a soccer town can improve greatly if enthusiasts of the game, the cup, and most importantly residents interested in presenting the area as a potential hub of global commerce and sport, continue to show up for the remaining games. It would help KC's image, and that of the USA bid for the 2018 and 2022 games, if fans continued to show up to watch the finals even as our side fell short in matching our best performance in World Cup history.

Safe to say I'm looking forward to watching the championship game there, and at the moment I'll hedge my bets on The Netherlands and Argentina playing for the Jules Rimet Trophy, although I'm hoping for the English to upset Argentina & avenge the "Hand of God" incident of '86, provided of course England get past Germany tomorrow.

Bringing Vuvuzelas To Arrowhead

2010-06-22T00:15:00.000-05:00

World Cup fever is nearing its peak as the 32 nations present prepare for their final group game (or in the case of France, affix picket signs to vuvuzelas), and their respective fans are preparing for watch parties complete with their schemes for how their side can advance into the round of 16. And yes, I'm one of them, having scrawled out on the back of a lunch receipt what it'll take for the US to advance to the single-elimination bracket and maybe square off against the seemingly hapless Aussies as opposed to anyone else in Group D.

Come Wednesday morning, I'll be back to where I've watched the two first games: from the Wizards' official watch party at the Power & Light District.

This scene is from last Friday, when hundreds of soccer (er, football) fans from across the Kansas City metro converged in the open-air pavilion just across from Sprint Center to watch our thrilling come-from-behind victory thrown away by an inept Malian. It has been a wonderful experience to come together as a city, as a community of football fans, and to cheer on the Red, White & Blue when other American sport fans remain obsessed with realigning college conferences. In particular, organizers for Kansas City's watch party claim to have the nation's second-most attended watch party. And it's not just for drumming up support for this year's squad or the Wizards as they struggle through their current MLS campaign.

Kansas City, by way of the $375 million renovation project nearing completion at Arrowhead Stadium, is one of 18 finalists to be a host city in the United States' bid to host either the 2018 or 2022 World Cup, beating out cross-state rival St. Louis as well as Chicago, which hosted the opening ceremonies of the 1994 World Cup. The bid committee, on the city's profile, touts KC's "long and storied cultural soccer culture", as well as ease of access via car, complete with references to tailgate parties and our extensive boulevard system. More than 20,000 people have signed USA's petition list supporting the inclusion of Kansas City in the bid, more than Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles and Washington. A successful friendly between the Wizards and the English Premier League's Manchester United on 25 July—the first event to take place in the renovated Arrowhead Stadium—will solidify KC's role in the USA's bid when FIFA vote in December to award the 2018 and 2022 World Cup finals.

Right now, the USA remain the only non-European nation still in the running for 2018, as Australia, Japan, Qatar and South Korea are opting to pursue just for 2022. Should any of the European nations bidding (Belgium & The Netherlands, England, Russia, Spain & Portugal) be awarded the finals for 2018, then the remaining European bids will not be considered for 2022, under a new rule that requires a continent to wait at least eight years before attempting to bid for another World Cup. Despite growing speculation that a European nation will receive the 2018 finals, the growing support for football in the States, on top of solid infrastructure, ample media and advertising revenues, and state governments willing to throw into stadia millions upon millions of tax breaks, makes such a bid hard to ignore.

FIFA officials reviewing each bid will tour the States in early September, then meet in December to award the 2018 and 2022 bids. Hopefully in June 2018, the world will find themselves enjoying some grilled pork ribs and beef kebabs in the parking lots of Arrowhead, just before blaring their vuvuzelas as Guatemala take on Italy in Group D action.

Divided Attention, Memorial Day Edition

2010-05-30T22:08:00.000-05:00

I had a feeling this would occur, that after the UK election was resolved I'd find myself devoid of intriguing comment. Even as the new coalition government is rocked by its first scandal: the resignation (after just under three weeks) of David Laws—the Lib Dem cabinet member tasked with assisting Chancellor George Osborne of identifying £6.3 billion worth of cuts—after it was unveilved that he claimed £40,000 in rent payments to his partner. (And on top of that, his replacement Danny Alexander, who started out as the government's Scottish Secretary, is also under scrutiny for making use of tax loopholes.)

But instead, much as my attention has been the past three weeks, I'm focused elsewhere. And inbetween watching Mizzou softball win convincingly twice this weekend and the typical Memorial Day fare, I watched (or perhaps more accurately, subjected myself) to this year's Eurovision Song Contest. The great combination of Europop, bizarre and retro outfits, cheesy lyrics, and voluptuous performers from the fringes of the European Broadcasting Union (along with the occasional heavy metal band and obligatory performer from the UK that Simon Cowell would have dismissed from The X Factor before blinking) attracted an audience of tens of millions across Europe last weekend, including 8 million on BBC One & BBC Radio Two to hear 19-year-old Josh Dubovie earn a whopping ten points for Britain with "That Sounds Good To Me". (That happened to net the UK last place for the second time in three years, as the winner from Germany, fellow 19-year-old Lena with "Satellites", netted 246 points. You just might hear that song in the States this summer.)

And then, as I was cutting back and forth between my grandparents visiting from the old stomping grounds for the weekend and Dario Franchitti strolling through Indy at 220 mph, I wondered if such a contest could ever play out in the US. Just picture it: performers from all 50 states (plus DC, Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands, and maybe even the Guam, American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands and the three nations with whom we have a Compact of Free Association) competing for other states' votes by singing original songs (as opposed to covers that make up practically all of American Idol). It'd be a mix of every genre under the sun: mainstream pop, R&B, country, rap, adult alternative, hard rock, acoustic, indie, electronica, Latino, Native American, Asian, religious, etc.

Complications and costs, however, would be numerous. Whichever network were to pick this up would have to establish contests in each state (plus DC, PR, etc. etc.), require their affiliates to carry it, organize phone banks and online/SMS voting and keep it to their state's ZIP codes. This would cause issues with markets that reach into multiple states, as in the case of Kansas City you'd have to run the contest on two separate days and alienate half your audience both times, as viewers with 913 & 785 area codes wouldn't be allowed to call during the Missouri qualifier, and 816 & 660 area codes wouldn't be allowed to cast votes during Kansas'.

And then comes the national contest: would the site be selected in accordance with whoever won the previous year, as is the case with Eurovision? That would showcase several cities across the US as the contest develops, but would organizers instead find it easy to stick with a supposedly neutral site like Las Vegas or New York? In terms of the broadcast, what shows would wind up getting pre-empted? Would hit radio stations be allowed to simulcast it? How many cut-ins would be budgeted for idiotic shameless plugs for upcoming movies bound to flop at the box office? How do you stop Canadians from calling in, or factor in out-of-state cell phones?

Simple enough, you'd probably have two semi-finals, with states pooled at random and then only those states would be able to vote that night, with the top five or so advancing to the national finals. (In Eurovision it's ten per semi plus the hose and "Big Four" of Germany, France, Spain and the UK, but they don't break for commercials so we won't have room for 25 acts.)

And two most critical questions: first, how do you score it? Eurovision uses a system where each country, regardless of its size, allocates 12 points to their top vote-getter, 11 to the second, etc. down to one. Would we retain the same, or would we come up with some bizarre take on the electoral college? Would provisions go into place to prevent states from ganging up on each other (say, Kansans intentionally voting for a handful of states to prevent Missouri from getting any of their points.) or pooling their votes behind a random candidate or ring of candidates from their bloc (most like New England in one bloc and Dixie for another)?

And second, are enough songwriters going to be willing to write 55+ original songs? Certainly several performers would be keep to showcase their original songwriting skills, but will that win the votes? Will eccentric and flashy choreography and wardrobe (or lack thereof) wind up winning more votes instead? Would the music industry, or moreso the radio conglomerates Clear Channel, Cumulus, Citadel, Entercom, etc., be keen to playing these songs?

Critically, will the diversity truly be there? Will enough acts from groups that could be classified as minority or multi-ethnic get into the national final that cries of racism or religious persecution not drown out the competition itself? And for this contest to proliferate, certainly there would need to be a Spanish-speaking counterpart broadcasting it, complete with states allowed to submit entries who perform in Spanish.

Aside from those complications, a US song contest would be quite unique and showcase the diverse, amalgamated ethnic culture that continues to develop in this great land. Now if a network were to run with this, get all their stations on board with it (which would wind up eating into local newscasts), line up the advertisers, and get Tom Bergeron, Mario Lopez, and/or Ellen DeGeneres to co-host the finals. It would unite the nation in a contest that explores the uniqueness of each state while at the same time celebrate the common bonds that make this nation great.

Here's to the Show-Me State's first entry getting douze points from several of its peers.

When Gordo Met Henry Clay

2010-05-11T00:27:00.001-05:00

Gordon Brown's announcement to leave 10 Downing and step down from the leadership of the Labour Party makes the atmosphere more tense for the formation of a new government. Especially as, after a weekend of "cordial" and "productive" talks between the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, one key hurdle toward the formation of a progressive Lab-Lib government is now surpassed. And what follows will likely set Britain's course in the 21st century. And it could be done by way of a "corrupt bargain".

Since Friday, the LibDems have been in earnest discussions with Tory leaders, hammering out common objectives for a coalition government to pursue in the midst of lingering European national debt crises. All three parties acknowledged that, following the Tories winning the most seats and most votes, they should have the first crack at forming the new government. (Brown remains Prime Minister until he no longer commands the confidence of Parliament, be it by a vote of confidence or their lining up behind a new leader.) However, even with those talks going on, some LibDems have begun reaching out to Labour ministers.

On the political spectrum, the centre-left LibDems, and their core of support, have more in common with the socialists-in-denial Labour than they do the Conservatives. Both want electoral reform, a proposal the Tories will need dragged through a bed of hot coals to agree upon. Both prefer further integration with Europe, while some Tory backbenchers could get away with defecting to UKIP. And unlike the Conservatives, both have sizable clout in Wales and Scotland. However, on the critical issue of the economy, the LibDems and Tories are quick to acknowledge the need to cut the government budget in order to curb a record deficit, and would seek to make such cuts. And both the Tories and LibDems want to revise the tax code, though they will likely have different desires on who benefits from such reforms.

To the core supporters of LibDem and Labour, Brown's lame duck declaration removes a major hurdle from the formation of a Lab-Lib coalition. (Granted, Brown's successor would not be formally selected until September at the latest, meaning he could take his sweet time packing the china while Portugal and Ireland go begging to Germany and Benelux for their bailouts.) And that could very well be a part of a bargain aimed at keeping the Camerons from installing a nursery in 10 Downing.

Supporters of a Lab-Lib coalition argue that Cameron, despite getting 36 percent of the vote and 47 percent of MPs, does not have sufficient backing of the electorate, as more people voted to ensure that he would not become prime minister. Indeed, the combined total for Labour (29 percent) and the LibDems (23.1 percent) would create a majority.

Precedents for such a block are few and far between in UK history, but in the US, one watershed election could fit the bill: that of the 1824 matchup between John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson. After no candidate received a majority of electors (William H. Crawford and Henry Clay also received votes), the election was replayed in Congress, where Adams, Jackson, and Crawford were on the ballot. Clay, despite coming in last, also happened to be Speaker of the House. As the story goes, Clay convinced his supporting states to back Adams in exchange for Adams appointing him Secretary of State (the post Adams held at the time). Thus Jackson, the war hero from Tennessee, who had the most votes and most electors, was shut out of the White House when a majority of state delegations (13 of 24) backed Adams.

Jackson vociferously alleged that the deal was a corrupt bargain, an allegation that, while never proven nor disproven, would result in Jackson's election to the White House four years later and bring about a sweeping new era in American History, as well as the formation of today's Democratic Party. Adams' supporters, many of whom were more opposed to Jackson and his populist ideals, would form the Whig Party, the front runner to today's Republican Party. (Although the parties were not related, the name is identical in etymology as the UK's Whig Party, who eventually became the Liberals and now the Liberal Democrats.)

If later today a Lab-Lib coalition comes about, Tory supporters and Brown bashers who yesterday celebrated the prime minister's act of political seppuku with an extra pint of Guinness will feel jilted like Old Hickory. And that jilted feeling, along with a sagging economy and what will be decried as a "coalition of losers", will only fuel Tory resentment for as long as such a government stands.

But Lab and Lib together will not surpass the 320ish mark needed for a majority, falling about ten short, and even their Ulster counterparts (SDLP and Alliance, respectively), along with the lone Green, won't put them over the mark. Adding the nationalist parties, with both of whom Labour have partnered in devolved legislatures in the past, will put them over the top, but there lies two issues.

First, a vast coalition of minor partners prone to fracturing, where assuaging one's concerns of support could wind up costing them another party's support. Second, with nationalist parties supporting the government, such parties will ensure that government spending remains the same in their regions, meaning any such cuts either occur in areas of solid Tory support (namely, the Home Counties) or they wind up not happening, setting Britain down the path of Greece.

Add to that the fact that whoever succeeds Brown will wind up being the second straight Prime Minister who never led his/her party at the time his party was elected to government. Voter resentment, although not as nationally uniform with regards to the expenses scandal, will only intensify, bringing about great distrust for all parties involved. Such resentment could manifest in the form of electing fringe parties, most notably the BNP or some far-flung idealist party like the Wessex Independents.

It is very likely that events that transpire in the meeting rooms of Whitehall today will prove incredibly pivotal in the economic viability of Great Britain and political future of all parties involved for this coming century. A Tory-LibDem coalition will set about modest austerity measures, all the while giving Labour a change to retool under new leadership (be it Ed Balls, Alan Johnson, or either the Brothers Milliband). A Lab-Lib-everyone-else-whose-name-doesn't-include-Conservative-or-Unionist-who-will-actually-take-their-seats coalition will inflame Tories, inflame a distrusting electorate, and most critically convey continued insecurity to investors still jittery about the Euro and a colleague's inability to discern a B from an M.

It's trying times like these that bring about historical characters like Old Hickory, those that will shape the destiny of nations for generations to come. Or it may just bring about another election right during the middle of The X Factor, with a few more down the pike.

Because it had to be done…

2010-05-05T22:23:00.001-05:00

With apologies to the Chicago Tribune:

Cameron's keys to 10 Downing are somewhere in Belfast

2010-05-05T22:13:00.002-05:00

Polls in the UK are set to open in a matter of hours, and every paper not named Mirror, Guardian, Observer, and Independent is encouraging or all but encouraging their readers to vote Conservative. Only one paper (Mirror) remains supportive of Labour, but is encouraging tactical voting to push Lib Dem candidates in marginal seats with the Tories to prevent David Cameron from moving into 10 Downing.

As the Conservatives figure out what shade of blue carpet to install, they still need to get the keys to 10 Downing (and make sure today's front page for The Sun isn't followed by "CAMERON DEFEATS BROWN"). And rather than Buckingham Palace, where the next prime minister will formally receive the consent of the Queen to form the next government, Cameron will likely need to travel to Ireland.

Of course by Ireland, I mean Northern Ireland, where any seat not won by the Social Democrat & Labour Party or Alliance Party (the latter unlikely to win any) helps the Conservatives. For every two seats claimed by Sinn Féin, the Conservative target is lowered by one. Because Sinn Féin's members will not take their seats in Parliament, they technically can't vote against Cameron forming a government, nor can they vote for any government that'll be perfectly happy to let Ulster leave the UK & unite with the lower 26 counties that comprise the Republic of Ireland.

Additionally, the Conservatives have a firm affiliation with the Ulster Unionist Party. Any UUP candidate elected to Parliament will be expected to support a Conservative government. Problem is that the last time the Tories were in power, the UUP were the main Unionist party in Northern Ireland. Since 1997, the Democratic Unionist Party (who could essentially qualify as Europe's flagship chapter of the Sarah Palin Fan Club) have supplanted the UUP in that role. Worse, the UUP have no incumbents in the House of Commons, as their lone MP left the party and is contesting the race as an independent. Also part of Cameron's Ulster keychain is a likely gain on the border with the ROI: an independent pro-Tory candidate in the constituency of Fermanagh and South Tryone, Rodney Connor, is looking to reclaim this seat with the help of the Tories and both Unionist parties.

The ultimate notch on Cameron's key will come from the DUP, whom Cameron was assailing during a visit Tuesday to Belfast. Cameron, of course, was hoping to sway Unionist & non-sectarian votes to the UUP from DUP, who under the Robinsons have been dogged by scandals involving the typical political trip-ups of sex, money and power. (Sinn Féin didn't come off much better in the expenses scandal, somehow having six-figure access to the Queen's purse strings despite refusing to swear allegiance to her!) But with the DUP likely to remain the fourth largest party in the House of Commons, it would be tactically foolish to dismiss their MPs if they're needed to ensure a majority-backed government.

The Conservatives and UUP, after accounting for Sinn Féin's absentions and the four mandatory non-aligned seats that account for the Speaker and his three deputies, will need anywhere from 320 to 324 MPs for an outright majority. If they find themselves within 10 of that number, they will need to be ready to make concessions to Peter Robinson, especially as he is first minister of Northern Ireland. Those concessions, naturally, will be favourable to Ulster, meaning any drastic cuts a Cameron government will pursue will wind up occurring in greater number to Wales, Scotland, and north of the M62.

While eyes will be focused on three-way races, marginals, and bellwethers, eventually the key to 10 Downing will be found sitting somewhere in Stormont.

Off-mic may not be the best time to Give 'Em Hell

2010-04-29T00:04:00.002-05:00

During his whistlestop speech in Harrisburg, Illinois, one of Harry Truman's supporters shouted to him "Give 'Em Hell, Harry!", to which he replied: "I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell." At least Truman had the courage to do so in their face and not from the comfort of a limo driving away before disconnecting his hot microphone.

As a result, this will be the picture (via the BBC) that will perhaps symbolise the practical end of Gordon Brown's political career: (barring a dramatic turn of events that would easily eclipse Truman '48)

This photo is of Brown listening to a replay of his comments on BBC Radio 2's noon news programme hosted by Jeremy Vine. During his visit, Brown expressed great remorse for his comments and later apologised to the woman he accused of being "bigoted".

As has been reported on both sides of the pond (because American media love to jump on quips like this, thank you very much TMZ), Gordon Brown was meeting residents in Rochdale, a town just north of Manchester, when he received a question from Gillian Duffy, a 65-year-old woman who (until recently) was a lifelong supporter of Labour. Duffy, who said she was only out to buy some bread, is now being seen as the catalyst of what could be the final nail in the coffin of Labour's chances of winning the election.

Her question? Immigration, specifically concerning the influx of people from Eastern Europe. Many of those nations are in the EU, meaning persons from Poland, the Baltic States, Romania, and others can relocate to the UK in almost the same manner someone can move from West Virginia to Iowa. While Brown attempted to point the finger at the media and staffers for not giving Brown the chance to answer the question, he didn't seem interested to answer it on that Radio 2 clip either. (And given what's going down in Arizona, with the prospect of it happening in other states soon, this question really needed answered.)

The gaffe (and now worst-yet breakout of Foot-In-Mouth Disease) could overshadow Brown's performance, and perhaps any worthwhile discussion, during this evening's debate in Birmingham on the BBC. (And, it won't be an opportunity for the SNP to waste most of the UK's time, as a judge in Edinburgh denied SNP's request to require the BBC to include them or block the transmission in Scotland, saying that their filing, "lacks the requisite precision and clarity."

On the bright side, it's been five minutes and Russia's still standing.

Don Quixote and Kanye want shot down by Dewey on live TV

2010-04-27T19:07:00.000-05:00

The final UK leaders debate is two days away (and I just might be able to catch the durn thing live on C-SPAN!), but the BBC is on the defensive again as to their decision to limit the debate to the Westminster Three.

Tomorrow morning a judge in Edinburgh will hear a legal challenge from the Scottish National Party, who allege that BBC's exclusion (plus that of Sky News & ITV) is "utterly unfair". The SNP, who already participated in two Scotland-specific debates with the Conservatives, Labour, and the Liberal Democrats, raised £50,000 ($75,000) to mount the legal challenge, seeking to either force the BBC to include the SNP in their lineup for Thursday. Not to be outdone, UKIP leader Lord Pearson (who is a member of the House of Lords and thus doesn't have to worry too much about his job security come 6 May) is threatening a similar challenge.

At the moment, these two parties combine for one-third of the seats in the Scottish Parliament, 14 seats in the European Parliament, seven in the House of Commons, and two in the House of Lords. In this election, SNP are running in all 59 of Scotland's constituencies but none south of the border, while UKIP are contesting 563 races in Britain. And following the bounce the LibDems have received across the UK following Nick Clegg's dominating performances in the first two debates (at the expense of SNP as well as Labour in Scotland), both parties are wanting a similar bounce from such an appearance.

As I've said in the past, SNP and Plaid Cymru are welcome to debate before all the UK if they're more interested in running all the UK than seceding from it. And frankly, if the ruling does go SNP's way, expect the bloviating lame-duck Man of La Mancha himself to essentially waste the time of everyone not north of Hadrian's Wall, and a door swung open where every piddly-diddly party could petition their way onto the debate, making the entire event a practical farce and logistical nightmare.

With regards to UKIP, they are contesting more than half the seats in the UK, and should have been pursuing already, claiming their representation in the House of Lords, European Parliament, and several local councils. If UKIP were able to do that (and they should have done it last week, as that debate was focused on foreign affairs; this week's will be principally the economy), that would give the Greens and BNP a podium as well. A successful petition by UKIP would likely give their former leader Nigel Farage a boost in his bid to unseat the Commons Speaker John Bercow in his Buckingham constituency.

How to Lose a Pontifical Visit in 10 Days

2010-04-25T23:09:00.000-05:00

When Parliament is dissolved to allow for a new election, MPs who were ministers at the end of the session, along with their counterparts in the opposition, retain their positions in a caretaker government.

Maybe they should have been canned too, especially with the Foreign Office generating and later retracting a list of possible items to include on Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the UK in September.

Now, His Holiness might be cancelling that trip as a result of that list, according to sources in the Vatican. The list, which was marked "should not be shared externally", included such blatantly anti-Catholic suggestions like having the Holy Father bless a same-sex union, commission his own brand of condoms, and ordain women bishops, plus rather nefarious and otherwise outlandish ideas like singing a duet with Her Majesty for charity.

Already Britain's envoys to the Holy See and Italy have communicated grave regret over the list's release and have issued copious apologies, but the mere dissemination of it in official materials indicates a glaring lack of decorum within Whitehall concerning this visit. Especially as the Vatican and the Church of England continue to tussle over the issue of Anglican and Episcopal churches that seek to convert to Catholicism over the push of Anglican dioceses to ordain and appoint women and openly gay clergy.

This has yet to play out in the current election, but given how precarious Labour's standing is, any gaffe involving the Catholic Church (especially with roughly one-tenth of the Great Britain's population professing membership and being in league with the nationalist party in Northern Ireland that actually fills their seats in Northern Ireland) will only damage Gordon Brown's chances of remaining in 10 Downing.

Then again, with avowed atheists Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens declaring their intent to have the Pope arrested in the same manner as Pinochet should the visit go through, maybe the Foreign Office's crude sense of humour has given the Pope the exit needed to avoid their harsh solution to the mess in the church concerning priests accused of pædophilia.

Fancy a flight to Fulton soon, Mr Prime Minister?

2010-04-25T15:19:00.000-05:00

It sounds like I don't have to resort to photoshopping Thomas Dewey's moustache on a picture of David Cameron or creating a mock Sun headline for 7 May to confirm Labour's desire to make this election akin to Truman's underdog victory.

In his closing statement during Thursday's debate (hosted by Sky News in Bristol), Gordon Brown opened with Truman's famous four-word maxim, “The Buck Stops Here.” Earlier, in an effort to present an assertive image (which countered his conciliatory approach in the first debate), Brown channelled Harry by saying in his opening statement: “If this election is about style and PR points, count me out. If it's about the big decisions, if it's about judgement . . . I'm your man.”

Despite the “substance” where Brown had hoped to score points—arguments presented on Britain's foreign affairs and three-way arguments about the EU, Trident nuclear submarines, and immigration—several opinion polls have relegated the current ruling party to third place. In spite of trailing the Tories and LibDems each by four points (as pointed out in this pie chart from the Labour-backing Daily Mirror), Labour could still walk away with a plurality of seats come 6 May, given the eccentricities of the first-past-the-post system that has been part of the voting landscapes for the UK & much of the US the past two centuries.

If that happens, the LibDems will have no part in a coalition government headed by Labour. Party leader Nick Clegg made that clear during his appearance on BBC One's The Andrew Marr Show today, adding he would expect to be Prime Minister if his party received more votes than Labour and Labour wanted to establish a Lib-Lab coalition. Meanwhile, as Labour attempts to channel the spirit of a certain crooner from Graceland, Tory rhetoric now shows signs of slowly opening up to the prospect of a coalition with the LibDems.

With the tide remaining against Labour, perhaps the song “Suspicious Minds” would be an accurate description of much the UK electorate's feeling toward them. And despite claiming substance over style, Labour have been quick to roll out the red carpet, utilising longtime celebrity supporters Eddie Izzard and David Tennant in their party broadcasts. But the Prime Minister has one thing going right for him – he's channelling one of the greatest underdog successes of 20th century politics. And with Clegg going so far as to call Labour irrelevant, Brown just might want his supporters to shout another four-word phrase to propel him into Thursday's debate in the Midlands:

“Give 'Em Hell, Gordon.”

If that doesn't work for him, he'll have plenty of time to embark on a lecture tour starting at Westminster College in Fulton. It'll be a perfect starting point for Brown, not only because it's where a certain leader of the opposition delivered one of the most poignant speeches of the 20th century, but as the son of a Presbyterian preacher, Brown will feel right at home on a Presbyterian college campus.

The Courtship of Nick Clegg

2010-04-19T00:24:00.000-05:00

In what could be the first time since Welshman David Lloyd George was Prime Minister, a Liberal party is at the top of the polls. Granted, it's a pollster working for the Tory-leaning Sun (as reported by the Telegraph, linked instead) and not the actual election, but still: the spike in the polls stemming from Thursday's inaugural TV debate has catapulted the distant third party into a viable candidate for coalition government member and even, depending on how individual LibDem candidates capitalise on their party leader's boost, lead party in a coalition government.

Already a recent Sunday Times polls suggests that Clegg, who is running for just his second term in the only Sheffield constituency not controlled by Labour, is the most popular party leader in the UK since Sir Winston Churchill. And now the media scrutiny, as well as that of the beleaguered governing Labour Party and the destined-for-Dewey '48 Conservative Party, is on the LibDem manifesto: one which professes greater integration with the European Union and substantially decreasing Britain's nuclear arsenal. But as Gordon Brown and David Cameron point their slingshots away from each other and instead aim at Clegg, their underlings are quick to work Fleet Street to respond to the practical inevitability of a hung parliament.

Not long after Clegg's victory in the first debate, Home Secretary Alan Johnson repeated to the Times Labour's assertion that the LibDems are best suited for a coalition government with Labour in the event of a hung parliament. The Tories, on the other hand, contend that voting for the LibDems will only help Labour hang on should it come to a hung parliament, even if the Tories gain more seats and Labour wind up with third overall in terms of the popular vote.

No matter the outcome of the 2010 election, Clegg has become the face of this election, but it won't be him alone who will bring about a monumental surge for the LibDems that will shatter the swingometers and upend my Truman '48 analogies. This Tuesday, the three major parties will face off against their nationalist counterparts, Wales' Plaid Cymru and the Scottish National Party, in televised debates specific to the respective nations. Particularly in Scotland, the LibDems have a strong presence, led by Tavish Scott, while in Wales the LibDem's five Assembly Members are led by Kirsty Williams. For the Conservatives to avoid alienating the LibDems in the event their support is needed for a coalition government, they must hope for enough Scottish and Welsh voters, disgruntled with nationalist agendas, to at least switch their allegiance to LibDem if not Conservative.

Four words that just doomed Labour

2010-04-16T22:34:00.002-05:00

(Note: I would have loved to post this sooner; however, other commitments precluded me from live-blogging this. A Tweet-delayed version can be found by reading my past 100 Tweets or so.)

Anyone who wanted to make a drinking game out of stuff said in Thursday's first-ever debate between the UK's major party leaders would have stumbled out of the pub, along with Labour's chances of regaining a majority of seats in Parliament, by way of these four words:

“I agree with Nick.”

On at least three occasions Gordon Brown said that very phrase when responding to Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg's points on elderly care, right to recall corrupt MPs, and attacking David Cameron's call to set a quota for immigration. Those four words, along with Clegg's assertive and natural performance (which many are comparing to Jack Kennedy) against the typical Labour-Conservative squabbling that's marked Westminster politics since the end of World War II, made him stand out the most in this watershed event. And opinion polls are showing it: The Times has 61% of those surveyed declaring Clegg the winner, with Cameron and Brown each only getting one in five.

This first debate took place in Manchester, long a Labour stronghold as a cog in the industrial machine that propelled Britain into the world's pre-eminent empire of the 19th and early 20th century.

Does your bellwether go "Woo, Pig! Sooiee!"?

2010-04-11T20:46:00.000-05:00

This farmer in Kent hopes his porcine racers will be accurate in picking the next Prime Minister. (From the BBC South East.)

The Kentish Bellwether?

2010-04-11T02:40:00.002-05:00

Prime Minister Gordon Brown officially kicked off his re-election campaign, not from the steps of 10 Downing or his figurative front porch in Kirkcaldy, but in a plush first-class car on Southeastern's High Speed Train One through the North Downs of Kent.

Relying on the 21st century's version of a whistle stop tour, Brown made known the importance of gaining the votes of constituencies along the Thames estuary. This morning's Observer features an analysis of Brown's first campaign tour on Tuesday. From the neighbourhoods and storefronts spread along the Essex & Surrey banks of south and east London, to the estuary towns on the Medway and Channel coast, the key to gaining the mandate for the next government, be it by outright majority or the main party in a hung parliament.

Many of these constituencies – Hammersea, Dartford, Hastings and Rye, Chatham and Aylesford, Dover — Tony Blair's New Labour surprisingly picked up when they handed John Major the worst loss for the Conservatives in 91 years. And these seats, along with several others identified by The Times as seats the Tories must win for David Cameron to outright call 10 Downing home, form what could be one of several candidates for the title "Bellwether of Britain". Much like Missouri and Ohio for US elections, these South East constituencies embody much of what encompasses "Middle Britain": a mix of post-industrial towns that still support Labour, rural villages that embrace Conservatives, and a pool of university-educated youth eager to support the Liberal Democrats or any third party they deem virtuous of their vote (especially the Greens in the case of Brighton Pavilion). In these constituencies, families are looking for answers to pressing issues like the economy, immigration, and integration with the EU, looking for the future MP that will be happy to answer to and serve their neighbours and communities in Westminster.

So are the marginal constituencies of Kent, the fabled Garden of England, a viable candidate to be the Bellwether of England? Perhaps. Working in its favour is Dartford, site of the critical Thames crossing that (by way of the A282) completes the M25 beltway around London. Since 1964, Dartford's MP has always been with the party that formed the majority. And following the ill-conceived urban design patterns of the American suburb, Kent and its many commuter routes has slowly evolved into a coastal chain of exurban towns just over an hour away from London. These marginal constituencies could be recited in the same breath as Gladstone, Mo., Bala Cynwyd, Pa., or East Liverpool, Ohio.

On the flip side, however, is the local structure, but that too can lend support to the claim. Last year, the Conservatives achieved a near-monopoly on the county council, reducing Labour to just two of Kent's 84 council seats and leaving the main opposition party with seven. And The Times' rather generous predictions (by way of betting firm Ladbrokes) has all of Kent turning bluer than Papa Smurf next month. This while American bellwethers tend to have an even mix of Republicans and Democrats in Congressional representation.

Kent has historically been a stronghold for the Conservatives, with Labour holding pockets of support in port towns and villages adjacent to former collieries and Lib Dems collecting support in other pockets. Likewise in the 19th century, Missouri was a reliable Democrat stronghold. Willard Duncan Vandiver, the congressman famous for implying Missouri as the Show-Me State, said in that same quote that Missouri was a state that raised Democrats along with corn, cotton and cockleburs. And in the 1860 election (where Missouri was the only state that gave all its electors to Stephen A. Douglas) several counties recorded no votes for eventual winner Abraham Lincoln. But that didn't stop Missouri from gaining bellwether status and wearing it as a badge of honor.

Throughout the 20th century, the Show-Me State became more cosmopolitan, with expanding suburbs around Kansas City and St. Louis, the development of vibrant college cities in Columbia and Fulton. A solid religious conservative base gained footing in Springfield and the Ozarks, and a storied mining presence, fused with a heritage of French Catholicism, continued in the Lead Belt of St. François and Madison counties. And in the Northern Plans, several communities, many of them depleted of populations following the consolidation of farming operations and the shuttering of their only blue-collar employer, still shudder at the thought of electing a Republican to local office, despite showing the same right-wing religious fervency as the Ozarks. And Kent is among the places where similar change is occurring.

A continued mix of pan-European commerce, London suburbanites and hyper-commuters, union legacies from centuries of operating ports, collieries, and shipyards, all wedged inbetween historic farmlands and estates, and infused with a multitude of ethnicities, give Kent the character that could generate Britain's very own bellwether. And come 6 May, BBC's legendary swingometer may very well sway with plenty of Kentish weight on the arrow.

Avian foot-in-mouth disease outbreak in Scotland wipes out Labour candidate

2010-04-10T08:15:00.001-05:00

The Prime Minister had to deviate from his prepared campaign speech Friday to issue a condemnation of the actions of his own party's candidate.

The Scottish Labour Party has yanked Stuart MacLennan from the ballot in Moray, located along its namesake firth in northern Scotland. MacLennan was found to have made various derogatory comments on his Twitter account, calling Speaker John Bercow and opposition party leaders David Cameron and Nick Clegg various names, referring to elderly voters as "coffin dodgers", and bragging about his alcohol consumption while insulting the whisky distilleries in his own constituency. This dismissal only serves to help the current MP for Moray: Angus Robertson, leader of the Scottish National Party's Westminster Delegation.

Gee, it's not a good idea to post crap like that on Twitter when Sky News is following your every word (well, was before your account was deleted!)

How would this Web site gauge our Congressional Districts?

2010-04-10T02:03:00.000-05:00

A third resource worth perusing during this month of campaigning is a Web site pointing out flaws in the first-past-the-post system that the UK has used to elect members to Parliament for years (and what several other nations have been using as well). Vote Power has calculated how much weight one person's vote has by constituency.

The more volatile a seat is (how often the seat changes hands, margin of victory, population of the district, etc.), the more weight a vote has. On the extremes, Vote Power has determined that the reformed constituency of Arfon in North West Wales has the most sway on the overall vote result, with just over the equivalent of 1.3 times a single vote. The worst constituency is also a new district, Merseyside's Knowsley, where it would take 50,000 voters to make up the moving power of one voter. That's because according to the figures Vote Power has shown, about 70 percent of residents in are believed to have voted for the Labour candidates in 2005.

In terms of constituencies that existed in 2005, the western Wales county constituency of Ceredigion has the most might with 1.220 (4.83 times the national average of 0.253), while Easington in County Durham ranks the lowest, also at 0.002.

While marginal seats are noted for having the most powerful votes in determining the election (it's suggested that despite the anger at Parliament, at least 60 percent of seats will return candidates from the same party), they also wind up having the most "wasted votes". That is, votes not counting toward the winning candidate. In the Labour-strongholds of Easington and Knowsley, only 29 percent of votes are expected to be cast for someone other than Labour's candidates, while in Ceredigion and Arfon, as many as two out of three votes will be cast for someone other than the winning candidate.

This is quite the presentation into the ills of first-past-the-post, both for stable and bellwether seats. A similar presentation could be (and perhaps should be) made later this fall with regards to control of Congress and the Electoral College. It would be interesting to know whether someone moving to Jackson County should settle in Lee's Summit (covered by the reliably Democratic 5th District), shuffle east to Blue Springs (which is the tailbone of an increasingly reliable Republican 6th District), or make the commute from Odessa in neighbouring Lafayette County (where, despite the long tenure of Ike Skelton, the 4th District just might swing to the GOP this fall.)

Online resources worth perusing

2010-04-09T00:09:00.000-05:00

In addition to the BBC's continuous feed of election updates, every major UK media outlet are providing critical resources for their readers/viewers. I'll be highlighting two in particular.

The first is Sky News' constituency guide. Although that link leads to their generic election map, clicking on a constituency's news page leads you to an RSS-fed page for that constituency, featuring the Tweets of Parliamentary candidates and active followers, as well as recent news from reliable local news sources. For example, the page for Folkestone and Hythe features the Twitter feeds of Damian Collins from the Conservatives and Lynne Beaumont from the Liberal Democrats, as well as headlines from the online-based Hawkinge Gazette.

The second is everyone's favourite party platform matchmaker, this one provided by the Daily Telegraph. A voter answers 30 questions about 12 subjects to determine which parties' manifestos are the best fit for them. Although this is standard in every election that's been run in the online age, the Telegraph's engine allows the voter to de-select parties he/she would never consider voting for, or are not running candidates in his/her constituency. And, with separate engines for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, you can see how your political persuasions would fit in different parts of the UK.

Chickens happy to put Colonel Sanders in 10 Downing

2010-04-07T22:46:00.000-05:00

For anyone that trust what the Daily Mail publishes with more than a grain of salt, this item is quite interesting:

Members of the Unite workers union, which includes many British Airways flight crews that went on strike over the last month, have indicated in a poll that they would prefer to see Conservative leader David Cameron become Prime Minister. The poll, which the Daily Mail says was commissioned by the Conservatives but administered independently, finds that 34 percent of the 500+ Unite members surveyed want Cameron as prime minister, five percent more than Gordon Brown. (Only 14 percent favoured Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg.)

Of course, in Daily Mail fashion, that statistic is buried deep in the story. Instead, they trump up the figure where 81 percent say it's "time for a change", implying that an overwhelming majority of this "far-left" union support the centre-right Tories. However, the remaining figures do not fare well for Labour, as three out of four Unite members would prefer that the union not spend their dues on supporting political candidates but instead themselves, and three out of five are dissatisfied with Brown's performance.

Labour and the major workers unions have strayed apart following the largely unsuccessful and violent miners strike of 1984. Arthur Scargill, who led the National Union of Mineworkers during the strike, broke from the Labour Party in 1996 when Tony Blair effectively renounced socialism in Labour's campaign manifestos. The largest union in the UK, the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers, spearheaded a separate electoral alliance of socialist and union-oriented parties in 2009 to contest races for the European Parliament. No2EU, Yes to Democracy, now the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, expresses a more left-oriented brand of Euroscepticism, counter to the pro-business platform of UKIP.

Of course, as this was a poll commissioned by the Conservatives, there probably was no mention of the TUSC in the survey, or the results would have probably gone against their favour. But for the time being, this is another jab at the Labour establishment, painting them as starkly similar to a dystopian Animal Farm, and providing relevance to the ironic statement "Chickens for Colonel Sanders".

And of course, this report (which I've not found published in any other UK paper yet) comes from the same paper which (by way of a different editorial staff, obviously) endorsed Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists in the 1935 election.

IT'S ON!!

2010-04-06T14:03:00.000-05:00

Begin enduring four weeks of campaign slogans, nationalist parties with no chance for even the guest room at 10 Downing clamouring for publicity, and yours truly finding ways to compare Gordon Brown to Harry Truman even though he's been critical of this post-Blair government. The 2010 general election campaign in the UK is underway.

The BBC has a wonderful summary page that provides live updates and, if you are in the UK (or can convince the Beeb that your IP is in the UK), live video of various campaign events.

Already most media are talking about the prospect of a hung parliament, a rather derisive way of saying minority or coalition government, which is more prevalent in other Westminster-style legislatures like Canada (such as the current minority government of Stephen Harper) and Israel (which consistently generates coalition governments). A snap poll conducted on Facebook today by Channel 4 News, as a show of the significance social media networking sites will have on this election, also indicates the prospect of a hung parliament.

Should a hung parliament come about, it would essentially be a victory in the eye (er, eyes) of the Prime Minister. Even if the Conservatives are able to gain the most votes and seats, Brown as the current occupant would be able to stick around until a clear majority came about to defeat his government. From this position he could also establish a stable governing coalition or cadre of small parties (namely Plaid Cymru & SNP, partially ironic considering both are Labour's strongest challengers in Wales & Scotland!) willing to back him on confidence issues. And if the Conservatives, as polls now suggest, have fallen into hung parliament territory following their commanding lead throughout most of 2009's surveys, it will represent a collapse comparable to that of (bottoms up for anyone crazy enough to start a drinking game around this) Dewey in '48 and about half the elections in Canada the past decade.

Only twice since the watershed election of 1945 has Britain had a minority government, both during the 1970s. The first was formed in February 1974 by Labour's Harold Wilson when they claimed a four-seat advantage over the Tories; however, Wilson was unable to gain the support of enough parties to form a coalition (the third-place Liberals only had 18 seats) and had to call another election in October. While Labour won an outright majority in that election, enough by-election defeats and Wilson's sudden decision in 1976 to retire as Prime Minister & return to the backbenches resulted in another minority government led by Harold Macmillan. That minority government was toppled by Margaret Thatcher's Conservatives in 1979.

Should a hung parliament come about, expect any or all of the following:

Sterling's value at $1.30 by the Fourth of July, USD if the almighty quid's lucky.
A new election right after Christmas (when John Denver takes the Christmas #1!)
George Osborne or Alistair Darling getting the boot to make room for Vince Cable as Chancellor of the Exchequer, as part of a deal to gain the Liberal Democrats' participation in a coalition government.
Nationalist parties to play a role in a coalition. For Labour, they'll try and garner the support of Plaid Cymru and the SNP, on top of their ties with the SDLP of Northern Ireland, and possibly a Green or two that could get elected from Brighton. The Conservatives, which have next-to-no influence in Scotland but a growing base in Wales, will seek the support of both Unionist parties in the Ulster counties.
Even more pages from the Obama playbook (and maybe even Sarah Palin's) making their way across the pond. Again, this is the first election since the advent of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and all sorts of other social networking pages, on top of mobile phones & devices that can allow people to watch campaign speeches from the comfort of a National Express bus stuck in traffic on the M25. Also, it's the first election since Tony Blair left office with military operations in Iraq still ongoing, MPs were building duck moats and teenage lover's coffee houses with taxpayer funds, resentment among voters will be high.

A hung parliament will resolve few if any of these issues, leading to possibly more resentment and demonstrations, along with all parties using these media to keep getting their various message across.

Of course, we have four weeks to see this play out. All aboard!

Whistle Stop Train leaves St. Pancras at 0900

2010-04-05T19:32:00.001-05:00

British media across the spectrum are reporting that Prime Minister Gordon Brown, following a Cabinet meeting and regrouping from the Easter holiday, will head to Buckingham Palace and formally request that Her Majesty (finally) dissolve this current term of Parliament.

Provided he doesn't hiccup and wait for another month, the frustration of British voters accumulating over the past five years—the economy, Iraq and Afghanistan, MPs expenses, government spending in general, the Lisbon Treaty, immigration, devolution—will finally clash in what is the most anticipated election since the polls of October 1992. And with the most MPs standing aside since the war-delayed election of 1945 (where a big-tent Labour majority upended Churchill's postwar ambitions), the stakes couldn't be higher, and the outcome too close to call.

Over the course of the next month we will see all this play out, full-blown as opposed to just in news bits. Complete with duck moats, non-doms, kingmakers, baby bumps, bigots in denial, and the first televised debates between the men who could be Prime Minister.

Game on, Britannia.

Oh, and everyone in Missouri: several municipalities and school districts have candidates and ballot issues for your perusal tomorrow. Please don't be part of the 80% who don't bother to go to the polls tomorrow.

Salt in the wound

2010-03-22T21:39:00.002-05:00

Just two months after publicly calling on Prime Minister Gordon Brown to submit to a vote of confidence, two former Cabinet ministers are now finding themselves on the outside looking in, with thanks to a Channel Four undercover camera.

Geoff Hoon and Patricia Hewitt, who circulated a letter in January encouraging the Labour Party to conduct a secret ballot on Brown's leadership, were dismissed from the Labour benches yesterday after being caught in what appears to be a "pay-to-play" type scheme. Blairites Hoon (who was minister of defence at the onset of the US-led invasion of Iraq) and Hewitt, along with former transport minister Stephen Byers, were cast to the wilderness of the non-aligned benches.

The situation came public by way of an episode of the Channel Four documentary series Dispatches. In this week's episode, a filmmaker teamed up with a reporter from The Sunday Times created a fictitious company based in the US and portrayed himself as a lobbyist looking for favourable treatment. Byers of North Tyneside called himself a cab-for-hire at a rate of £5000 ($7500) a day, while Luton's Margaret Moran, already ousted from the Labour ranks following her excessive expense claims, said in the initial Times expose that she could get a "girls' gang" of high-ranking female Labour MPs to vote however the company wanted with regards to immigration legislation.

And worse for the already defrocked MPs, several of them admitted to the pseudo-firm that they had done so in the past. Byers bragged about how he convinced Lord Mandelson, the business minister, to delay and later amend legislation at the behest of supermarket giant Tesco, and also helped National Express dump their rail franchise in East Anglia. Both Tesco and National Express deny the claim, and Byers has submitted himself for investigation by a parliament inquiry.

The sting programme also made contact with nine other Labour MPs and seven Conservatives. Of those, one unidentified Conservative MP (reported to be Sir John Butterfill) said he could introduce clients to influential ministers for an annual fee of £35,000 ($52,500). It is surmised that he would do this as a member of the House of Lords, as he may be appointed to the upper legislative chamber after the election.

Butterfill, along the four exiled Labour MPs, had all previously announced that they would step down at the next election. In spite of their lame duck status, it appeared on Dispatches as though these MPs were ready to make one last stab in the heart of ethical and transparent government for the sake of personal gain.

Next on Sky Sports: Cameron's Picks for Premier League Champions

2010-03-17T23:15:00.001-05:00

I can picture it now.

Fresh after a tense meeting with his new Chancellor of the Exchequer Vince Cable (the way the polls are going, the Tories just might throw George Osborne under the bus to gain the Lib Dems' support in a hung parliament), the new Prime Minister David Cameron walks into a foyer well-prepared for a high profile TV interview.

Standing by an easel is a face well known to TV viewers across Britain as the man who enlightens his steady followers six days a week: Jeff Stelling, the host of Channel Four's Countdown and Sky Sports' Soccer Saturday.

As the cameras roll, Jeff and the Prime Minister discuss the teams recently promoted from the Championship League: Newcastle, West Brom, and Leicester City. While commenting on the exciting playoff victory Leicester achieved over favourites Nottingham Forest, the Prime Minister makes quick mention on Newcastle's return to the top level, invoking the spirit of longtime manager Sir Bobby Robson. After expressing (otherwise manufactured) shock at the dismal seasons of Plymouth Argyle in the Championship and the woes plaguing the bankrupt, relegated Portsmouth, the two proceed to the key fixtures of the 2010-2011 season.

But before starting, Jeff quickly asks the Prime Minister, who became a fan of Aston Villa when his uncle (a chairman on AVFC's board at the time) took him to a game when the future PM was 13, whether or not any bias for AVFC will show. A brief laugh, then onto the schedule.

Over the course of segments shown throughout the day on Sky Sports, Sky News, then pared off to BBC News (and at least two clips spoofed on Harry Hill's TV Burp and Mock The Week), we find the Prime Minister suggesting how new players to Chelsea's lineup will help them stay strong throughout the season, the great potential for Man City upending Man U in both ends of the Manchester Derby, and his firm belief that Rafa Benitez' time at Liverpool is nearing an end.

All the while, families observing this on Freeview are wondering what the heck the Prime Minister's doing spending several minutes talking about football when he should be fixing the economic mess in which the UK remains. Already he's attempting to maintain a tenuous coalition, needing the support of the Lib Dems to ward off a joint Labour-SNP call for a snap December election. Last-minute jitters in the voters' minds about a new Conservative government, which resulted in the election of the unseating of the Speaker by former UKIP leader Nigel Farage, one Green victory in Brighton, and three BNP members coming within 600 votes of winning their races, have weighed the Sterling lower against the Dollar and barely at par with the Euro. And here he is talking about football.

Sound crazy?

If Cameron's aiming to sweep the Conservatives into power with a playbook that emphasizes a leader's image and personality, then this just might happen. With the election two months away, the race for control of the 650 seats of the House of Commons is boiling down to a contest of the party leaders. (And as pointed out in many of last Sunday's newspapers and BBC's Andrew Marr Show, their wives.) Laced throughout the party manifestos are pictures of each party's leaders, more prevalent than their high-ranking officers who hope to become state ministers. And when the election's finally called, three televised debates between the three major party leaders will take place.

It's a playbook that closely mirrors those that turned a state senator from Illinois into the figurative leader of the Free World and a one-time sports reporter into the poster child of the fervently religious right. And that playbook includes the comfort-content interruptions such as filling out your college basketball brackets (and in President Obama's case, backing out of picking a Mizzou upset over West Virginia — there goes his chances of picking up our 11 electoral votes in 2012!) Despite Obama's push to have a health care reform bill rammed through Congress before week's end, he's also taking time to fill out a women's bracket.

So, if push comes to shove and it becomes necessary for Cameron to pull a PR stunt to stave off a snap election just as he's settling into 10 Downing (or, in the case of Gordon Brown pulling off a Truman '48, yet more rumors of a leadership challenge actually fomenting into a backbencher push to install one of the Brothers Milliband), he just might want to have Sky Sports on speed dial.

And make sure he doesn't mix up Liverpool for Everton. Anfield already have a seething dislike for his supporters at The Sun.

Erin Go Braugh in HD

2010-03-16T22:34:00.000-05:00

If you're in the Kansas City area and haven't found a new "station" broadcasting, you might want to check 103.7 FM tomorrow. It'll definitely set the mood for St. Patrick's Day, as it's broadcasting music to celebrate the holiday. However, you don't want to leave it on too long, as the playlist is repeating every hour or so.

The signal (K279BI) is a 250-watt rebroadcast of content now airing on a digital subchannel of Cumulus' classic rocker KCFX. This is the first I've heard of a translator (the legal term for a low-power rebroadcast of another station's signal) rebroadcasting a digital-only feed; however, I suspect it might becoming increasingly common as stations seek to draw more attention (read: listeners and revenue) to their digital services.

Of course, the folks at Cumulus, fast enjoying higher ratings at many of their stations from the Arbitron's new Portable People Meter system, will have to roll something else out Thursday.

International Response to KCMSD's School Closures

2010-03-11T19:14:00.000-06:00

And right now, the top story on education on most international media's radar isn't yesterday's 5-4 vote to close 29 of the 61 schools currently in the Kansas City (Mo.) School District #30. It's a Mississippi high school's decision to cancel their prom, potentially in response to a request from a student to bring their lesbian girlfriend to the dance and show up in a tuxedo. In fact, the BBC, Daily Telegraph, as well as Canada's Globe and Mail and Toronto Star have yet to post a story about the situation in KCMSD.

Meanwhile, two major British papers have carried the story. The Guardian featured a commentary from liberal think-tank fellow Sasha Abramsky of New York, where he describes the situation in KC as the event schools in California want to avoid. He writes: “Kansas City might well represent a glimpse of a depressing American future: one in which those with resources opt out, en masse, from any and all public services, leaving the public sector to stumble drunkenly from one crisis to the next, a miserable-looking shadow of once-great glories.”

The Murdoch-owned Times published a straight-forward brief from their Washington correspondent.

If you find any articles in international press (even if it's a rehash of wire copy), please feel free to comment with a link to it.

Ruminations upon the loss of a distinctive voice

2010-03-08T19:41:00.003-06:00

Editor's note: issues with the built-in player resulted in the wrong sound clip loading up for some readers. The player has since been replaced with a link to the correct sound clip. Apologies for any confusion.

You've probably heard this voice on multiple adverts and Stations IDs, particularly if you've lived in the Kansas City area:

The man behind the voice, Richard Ward Fatherley, died today in a KCK hospital after suffering a heart attack a month ago. Fatherley came to the Kansas City area in the 1960s to become programming director of Top-40 giant WHB. That, along with his start at WHB's cross-state sister KXOK in St. Louis, gave him the chance to perfect his voice into the consummate radio salesman. When Fatherley retired from radio, he began his own voice-over company, AdVoice. National brands like Baskin Robbins and Simplicity Vacuum Cleaners hired Fatherley to provide his distinct, booming voice for their ads.

Not only was Fatherley a gifted producer and salesman, he too was a historian in his trade. Along with Ray Otis, a fellow former program director, Fatherley researched, wrote and produced an hour-long audio documentary into the role WHB owner Todd Storz played in developing and proliferating Top-40 radio. As Fatherley summarized in Radio's Revolution:

“[Top-40] germinated in the heartland – Omaha – moved quickly down the Mississippi Valley, was perfected in Kansas City, and copied from coast-to-coast. The Storz formula for a successful radio station became the antidote to combat television's raid on radio's revenues.”

Fatherley's account of Storz's contribution, including the story that disproved the fable involving the barroom jukebox in Omaha, would ensure Storz' place in history as the man whose innovations would catch on in Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, and even prompt the BBC to debut Radio 1 and Radio 2.

As part of this ongoing endeavour, Fatherley built a tribute site to WHB and helped establish the Great Plains Radio Symposium at Kansas State University in 2006.

In a roundabout way, it was because of Fatherley's work as a historian and not a producer that attracted me to radio. I came across his work in the fall of 2005, when I was working on a research paper about WHB. I made use of materials Fatherley sent to Truman upon hearing of my project, including a hard copy of Radio's Revolution. As I dug into this material, and other Web sites such as Reel Radio, I found myself drawn more and more into the unique craftwork that is radio production.

By trade I'm a journalist, a current events junkie, rooted in newsprint from as far back as wanting to be on the junior high newspaper in 8th grade even though it was a freshmen-only class. But hearing this production by Fatherley, and other clips he uploaded, lured me away from the grind of weekly print deadlines and into the land of overheated equipment rooms, strung-out wires, and outdated cart-playing software crashing on me every fortnight. Fatherley extended an invite to me to the first symposium in April 2006, but a death in the family prevented me from attending, and thus I never had the chance to meet him.

I'll remember Richard Fatherley, not just as a great voice and radio professional, but also as a historian who preserved the stories of his colleagues and provide an insight into how radio evolved into what it is today in North America. And for that, I say thank you to "our Fatherley friend".

On a visit to the EU Parliament by Kanye West

2010-02-26T17:01:00.054-06:00

You would think apparitions of an attention-hoarding rapper would be non-existent in Benelux. But sure enough, some version of Kanye West made an appearance, whether he liked it or not, on Wednesday when former UKIP leader Nigel Farage went on a lengthy tirade against the president of the EU, former Belgian prime minister Herman Van Rompuy. (The full tirade on YouTube, courtesy of UKIP.)

While evoking Kanye's crass, stage-crashing abilities, Farage compared the first president of the EU to a low-grade bank clerk and called him a quiet assassin of European nation-states. Included in his tirade was a slam on Belgium as a whole, saying that it was a non-country aimed to make all of Europe a place where nation-states ceased to exist. It is widely expected that Farage will be reprimanded for this speech, at most a 10-day suspension.

The Eurosceptic icon is no stranger to controversy in Belgium. Most notably in February 2008, when Prince Charles addressed the EU Parliament on Climate Change, Farage drew attention for refusing to applaud his future head of state at the end of his speech.

However, Farage's barrage on the 62-year-old Belgian wasn't just for the sake of getting free publicity in his campaign to unseat Commons Speaker John Bercow in his Buckinghamshire constituency this spring. Officials in France and Germany, the continent's two major economic engines, have complained about Van Rompuy over-stepping his authority in dealing with the economic crisis in Greece and declaring himself the point man for all European nations in discussions involving G20 nations.

Such a trampling, if accurate, coincides with Britain's Baroness Ashton, the EU's new number two role as High Representative, essentially letting the current president of the European Commission, Spain's José Manuel Barroso, impose himself as the EU's ambassador to the United States. All the while, Ashton, Barroso and Von Rompuy are suppose to represent the collective foreign interests of 27 nations, not just the establishments that not only meet in Brussels but also in Strasbourg once a year for the sake of appeasing the French.

This huge mess might make for an interesting rap by Kanye, if "Golddigger" isn't sufficient for Eurosceptics' tastes.

Lines being drawn & Washington's not part of it

2010-02-24T18:34:00.000-06:00

As the newest dispute over control of the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) makes it way onto the floor of the United Nations, it's been made clear who won't have any part of it: the United States.

It will be reported in tomorrow's edition of The Times that the Obama Administration will not endorse British sovereignty over the contested islands off the coast of Argentina, instead saying that the US only recognises the current, de facto British administration. This, save Reagan's support for British forces to reclaim the Falklands during the 1982 conflict, reaffirms the position US administrations have stated since Britain first assumed control of the islands in 1832.

For those thinking that this position might help the US re-curry support from the nations of Central and South America: don't count on it. This past weekend, as members of the Rio Group met in Cancún, Mexico, to coalesce their support for Argentina's claim to sovereignty over the Falklands, South Georgian and Sandwich islands, that group announced plans to devise a stronger bloc that could possibly supplant the Organization of American States. This bloc, tentatively named La Comunidad de Estados Latinoamericanos y Caribeños, or Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, would include the membership of every member of the OAS except the US, Canada, and Suriname. This includes two members of the Commonwealth, Belize and Guyana. Although foreign affairs officials from both the Rio Group and the US say that this new bloc would not replace the OAS, rhetoric from certain leaders, including Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez and Mexican president Felipe Calderon, might suggest otherwise.

As Rio Group leaders turn up the pressure on the UK to enter negotiations, initial drilling for oil continues 100 miles north of the Falklands. And the island's population, so say British ministers, are staunchly in favour of remaining under the Union Jack. All the while, all we're getting from the White House Press Secretary are his ruminations as a newbie to Twitter.

Coalition collapse sparks appreciation of another coalition

2010-02-23T12:17:00.000-06:00

Much has been written about the missions and sacrifices made by American and British troops in Afghanistan the past eight years, making every strident effort to root out Taliban insurgents and bring peace between rival tribal factions. What hasn't been heralded in the English-speaking press as much are the same contributions and sacrifices other nations have made in Afghanistan, assisting the US & UK through NATO.

One nation's such contributions have just come to light as their government, asked by NATO commanders to extend their mission past July 2010, has collapsed over whether or not to do so.

Over the weekend, the coalition government of Netherlands, led by centre-right prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende, dissolved following the mass resignation of 12 ministers from the Dutch Labour Party. As a result, parliamentary elections are set to occur in June. This coalition government (Balkenende's fourth as prime minister) lasted three years, established when Balkenende's Christian Democratic Appeal aligned with Labour and the centre-left ChristianUnion over his previous, more conservative, coalition partners Democrats66 and People's Party for Freedom for Democracy.

The Dutch currently have about 1400 troops stations in the Afghan province of Uruzgan, bordered on the south by Kandahar. Along with 480 Australian soldiers and Afghan military and civilian officers, the Dutch-led task force has maintained peace in the central province for almost four years. In the process, they've lost 21 soldiers, most notably Dennis van Uhm, the son of the Chief of the Netherlands Defence Staff, General Peter van Uhm. Dennis' death occurred one day following Peter assuming his current post.

At least 25 nations are involved in the reconstruction of Afghanistan. For the US-led effort to root out terrorism, lay the groundwork for a more empowering life for all Afghans, and continue to win their hearts, it's important to not only build and maintain a coalition, but recognize all components of it when credit's due. I suspect most American and British readers aren't aware that hunkered down with British support teams in Helmand are 750 Danish and 150 Estonian troops, or that assisting the German-led reconstruction teams around the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif are 175 Latvians. Even the Republic of Georgia, just 18 months after Russian forces invaded the contested regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, plans to increase their numbers in Afghanistan from 150 to 1000. And Turkey, while hesitant to increase their troop levels alongside the US surge, maintains a force of 1700 troops training Afghan police officers in and around the capital Kabul.

For anyone who regularly includes the American and/or British soldier in their daily prayers, I would ask that soldiers from the various countries that make up this coalition be included as well. For the largest aspects of a coalition to succeed, its smaller components must too be supported and lauded.

As for Balkenende's future, while I do not profess to know a lot about Dutch politics, I find it doubtful that he will not be called on by Queen Beatrix to form a new coalition government this summer.

Chants of "Drill Baby Drill!" echo down Whitehall

2010-02-19T16:26:00.001-06:00

Perhaps instead they're chanting "¡Perfore, bebé, perfore!"

British and Argentine officials are again butting heads over who controls the Falkland Islands, this time because of the prospect of considerable oil reserves off the coast of the two islands. As a British firm has established an oil rig about 100 miles north of the contested islands, Argentine president Cristina Fernandez has ordered checks on all ships approaching the Falkland Islands.

Argentina has claimed sovereignty over the islands, which they call Islas Malvinas, and held them for two months in 1982 before British forces drove them out in a highly anticipated and reported response, resulting in the combat deaths of 650 Argentinians and 250 Britons. Argentina has re-asserted its claims to sovereignty over the continental shelf area stretching from its shores, which would wholly encompass the 200-mile British claim around the Falklands as well as the South Georgia and Sandwich islands, 600 miles to the southeast. These claims will be brought up before a meeting of the United Nations next week.

Both Britain and Argentina have made claims to the islands for almost 200 years, claims which are both supported by key economic allies. While the status of the Falklands was included in the recently enacted Treaty of Lisbon, the new governing document of the European Union, Argentina's claim was renewed when they established a democratic constitution in 1994, claims which have been supported by their two continental unions, Mercosur and the Union of South American Nations.

And caught in the middle, potentially, is the US. During the last conflict, the US maintained an official stance of neutrality. While a NATO ally (led by Reagan's good friend Margaret Thatcher) was attacked, to openly support them would have gone in the face of the Monroe Doctrine and the Organization of American States, headquartered in Washington. (It was later revealed that the US provided tacit support for British intelligence operations.) More recently, the US joined the rest of the OAS in supporting Argentina's call for negotiations with the British over the status of the islands.

This is a sticky situation that does have the potential to make global economic recovery even tougher. Argentina's threats to bar British companies from doing business in their country, with the potential support from Hugo Chavez and other leftist leaders in South America, could further weaken the Sterling in international markets. There lies the risk, however absurd and self-defeating the concept, that if this becomes heavily politicised or even come down to military action, several South American nations may boycott the 2012 Olympics in London. (Ironic considering that the UK refused to withdraw from the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, instead competing under the Olympic flag.)

This is a foreign affairs powderkeg that cannot be taken lightly, and should be watched closely over the coming weeks.

Task force proposal could put grapevines on 18th & Vine

2010-02-16T15:13:00.000-06:00

A bill with wide-ranging support in the Missouri House of Representatives would establish a task force that would explore the possibility of building vertical urban farms in Missouri's major cities.

House Bill 1848, introduced by Democrat Jason Holsman of Kansas City, aims to explore the viability of vertical urban farms in Missouri by way of establishing a 15-member task force.

“It’s really designed to take what we believe is going to be a very positive impact for the community and do the research and gather the information necessary so that way we’re not just saying that it’s going to have an impact,” Holsman said in an interview Tuesday.

The 15-member task force would include among its members the director of agriculture, agriculture committee chairmen from both the House and Senate, a representative from the University of Missouri extension service, and people who are actively involved in sustainable communities. This task force would meet over the course of two years to determine whether such farms could appear on the streets of Kansas City and St. Louis.

“We know this technology exists. We’ve seen the conceptual designs of what’s possible. We know the potential and the benefits associated with that potential,” Holsman said. “But what we don’t know is if we were to subsidize this, if we were to incentivize it, what is the impact to rural agriculture? What does it do to the locations around where we would put an urban farm?”

Holsman said he became interested in urban farms through two chance encounters. First, he received from a constituent a copy of an article in Popular Science magazine describing the technological advances and potential benefits of urban farms. More recently, Holsman and his family explored a conceptual urban farm when visiting Disney's EPCOT Center in Florida.

The 2008 Popular Science article reports that vertical urban farms can run on electricity generated from solar, wind, and sewage. Various fruits, vegetables, and even small animals such as chickens can be grown and harvested in such a strictly climate-controlled facility.

Smaller versions of urban farms already exist in inner cities and can include farmers’ markets and organic and horizontal farms. Holsman said that an urban farm could feed 50,000 people in a metropolitan area.

“The majority of food that’s consumed in Kansas City travels from the coasts. That’s 1400 miles of transit that your peas have to go through,” Holsman said. “They have to be preserved, they have to be put on a frozen truck, they have to be pre-packaged. There’s all sorts of carbon footprint associated with each step of that process to get that food to our table.”

For produce to be consumed locally, it would need to be sold locally.

Ruth Comer, assistant vice president for media relations with Hy-Vee Food Stores, said that each of their stores is granted leeway to stock shelves with local produce, as it is the Iowa company’s goal to source as much from local producers as possible.

She says urban farms would be something Hy-Vee would take a look at, but it would need to meet two criteria.

“The challenges that we run into for a company of our size is first, quantity and consistency of supply from local growers,” Comer said. “Do they on a large enough scale that they can meet our demands and do that on a consistent basis? The second is food safety assurances, just making sure that they have the protocol in place and the record-keeping that they can assure the safety of the food as it passes along the food chain.”

Comer said they are very interested in working with local growers that meet those two criteria.

Holsman adds that building urban farms would not only reduce environmental impact from transportation, but also reduce the use of pesticides and develop self-sustainable energy sources for the facility.

He said this also would create jobs in the inner city that can’t be outsourced.

“If you build a 12-story vertical farm, you're creating inner city jobs that don’t currently exist,” Holsman said. “You’re improving the property values around this farm because now it’s turning a blighted area, a vacant building that was sitting without any revenue in it at all, and now you’re producing food out of it, you’re creating jobs and you’re helping the surrounding areas around it.”

HB1848, which features 48 co-sponsors, has yet to be assigned to a committee. However, Holsman said he has verbal assurances from House Speaker Ron Richard (R-Joplin) that it will be assigned and from Majority Floor Leader Steve Tilley (R-Perryville) that should the bill pass through committee, it will receive time on the floor for debate.

Holsman says he looks forward to fighting hard for the bill and believes urban farms are the future of food production.

“The more we can learn about what that future looks like, the better prepared we are as decision makers to help create that future and make sure it goes in a direction that’s going to be beneficial for the environment, that’s going to be beneficial for the economy, and that’s going to be beneficial for the constituents we represent,” Holsman said. “Producing our own food and doing it in an energy efficient way is the right direction.”

The Orange Revolution Withers

2010-02-15T20:22:00.000-06:00

It was the perfect culmination to an underdog story five years ago. Standing before a joint session of Congress, his face still showing the scars of dioxin poisoning but glowing amid surpassing the struggle he and his people faced just months earlier, the newly elected president of Ukraine, Viktor Yushchenko, commended his American hosts for supporting the development of democracy in the former Soviet nation.

“Citizens of Ukraine gained their freedom due to their courage and support of friends and proponents of democracy throughout the world,” Yushchenko said, closing out his speech to Congressmen, several of whom chanting his name. “In these days I want to recall one of them, Pope John Paul II, who said, ‘Following the path of truth is sometimes difficult, but never impossible.’ We have embarked upon this road and will never step away from it.

“Together, we are many. Together, we are not defeated.”

Last month, Yushchenko received only 5.46 percent of the popular vote in the first round of the Presidential vote. This left his two longtime antagonists—the charismatic centre-right Yulia Tymoshenko and pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovich—to face off in last week's runoff, which Yanukovich won by 3.5 percent despite Tymoshenko vowing to challenge the result.

Yushchenko, despite being hailed as the champion of democracy in the face of an overbearing outside power, placed fifth. His presidency, mired by squabbles with on-and-off colleague Tymoshenko, two dissolutions of Parliament, and even appointing Yanukovich as his prime minister briefly in 2006, had jaded his fellow Orange revolutionaries, tired of the continual infighting and Yushchenko's presidency not meeting the high expectations of five years ago.

When Yushchenko leaves office soon, he will do so with his approval rating under ten percent.

Might not have been a good idea for Kansas City Mayor Mark Funkhouser to invoke the Orange Revolution when he ran for mayor three years ago.

Seeking to mark a change in the way Missouri's most populous city conducted business, the city auditor wore orange ties on the campaign trail, creating a grassroots surge that allowed him to rise just above the crowded field in February 2007. With the endorsement of The Kansas City Star and rhetoric aimed at turning the recent rise of downtown tax abatements and neglect toward the city's neighborhoods, Funkhouser narrowly edged longtime city council member and community activist Alvin Brooks a month later.

But in near-similar fashion to the man whose campaign he idolized, Funkhouser has made his chances for re-election about as likely as snow sticking in Vancouver this month. From the get-go, his desire to run City Hall with ruthless efficiency was put into question with his decision to have his wife Gloria Squitiro serve as a "full-time volunteer" in an adjacent office. Squitiro would later be derided, and even sued on several occasions, as an obstruction to the city's operations. It didn't help Funkhouser either when he briefly accepted a hybrid car from a local Honda dealer, trading in the car he originally planed to use for city business in place of a private-hire contract that cost the city $160,000 annually.

Failing to vet Park board nominees, especially the only one from North of the River when his predecessor had three from that same region, and then joking about the nominee's controversial views on immigration behind her back after spending nearly seven months defending her place on the board. Squitiro's repeated media gaffes and so-so appearances on national television, two recall petitions squashed on technicalities, and now Kansas governor Mark Parkinson calling an increasing lack of citizen confidence in the city "a malaise of mediocrity", don't bode well for the Funk.

Although candidates for the 2011 mayoral election are slowly emerging, there lies a strong chance that no matter the size, the current incumbent will likely meet the same fate as his political idol: exiting the race after getting only five percent of the vote.

Tax-Subsidized TV Blackouts Targeted

2010-02-12T13:43:00.002-06:00

If you want state funds, don’t get blacked out.

That’s the message Jason Holsman, (pictured at right) Democrat state representative from Kansas City, wants to send to professional sports teams across Missouri with House Bill 1986.

Holsman’s bill, which he proposed last week, would prohibit teams such as the NFL’s Chiefs or Rams from receiving state funds in future deals with the state in the event their home games are blacked out by the league’s TV policy.

Holsman, who described himself Tuesday as a die-hard Chiefs fan in a phone interview with The Missouri Expatriate, explains in this three-minute clip about how this bill targets the National Football League's blackout policy:

Rep. Holsman discusses the negative impact of TV blackout policies on state tax revenues

In 2006, Jackson County voters approved a new three-eighth cent sales tax to fund renovations to Arrowhead Stadium and neighboring Kauffman Stadium, the home of baseball's Royals. Holsman says that even as the Chiefs have only mustered nine wins in the last three seasons, ticket price increases and the recessed economy have priced many of his constituents out.

During this interview, Holsman referenced the Royals' increased revenue as a result of an expanded TV broadcast schedule as another reason why the NFL's policy is out of date. The Royals, as well as St. Louis' Cardinals and hockey Blues, are allowed by their respective leagues to pursue individual broadcast contracts for TV. While Major League Baseball prohibit broadcasts of games that conflict with national broadcasts on with Fox and ESPN, the National Hockey League only restrict Canadian broadcasters from interfering with CBC's iconic "Hockey Night in Canada" broadcasts on Saturday Nights.

Holsman's bill would only impact future deals between professional sports teams with the State of Missouri. Current deals, such as $25 million in tax credits for the Chiefs' new training camp facility on the campus of Missouri Western State University in St. Joseph, would not be affected. Holsman hopes that future deals, including sales tax initiatives, will address the issue of TV blackouts.

HB1986 has not yet been assigned to committee. Response to the bill has been generally positive by a nine-to-one margin, Holsman says, with those commenting in the negative suggesting that lawmakers focus more on pressing issues such as job creation.

The Missouri Expatriate did interview Holsman about another bill he's sponsoring, HB1848. That bill would establish a task force that would explore the viability of converting vacant buildings in Kansas City and St. Louis into vertical urban farms. That interview will appear here early next week.

One, two, three, four: rank them on the ballot so

2010-02-09T21:42:00.001-06:00

The British House of Commons today passed a measure that would ask British voters whether they wish to switch voting systems for future Parliamentary elections.

Currently elections to the House of Commons, as well as most county and town councils, use "first past the post", where the candidate with the most votes wins, regardless of what percentage he or she received. This referendum measure would ask voters if they, starting with the election after next, wish to implement the alternate or "instant runoff" voting, where voters would rank candidates by preference rather than just vote for one. In that system, a candidate must have 50 percent of the vote to be named the winner. In the event no one has 50 percent, the candidate with the least number of votes is eliminated, and next preference votes on the affected ballots are counted. This continues until a candidate has a majority of combined votes. This system is already in place notably in the election for mayor of greater London as well as several nations' presidential elections.

However, with elections to occur in the next four months, this measure must clear all remaining hurdles before the current Parliament is dissolved. With fierce opposition expected in the House of Lords, namely from entrenched traditionalists convinced that first past the post keeps extremist candidates out of office, it is very unlikely that this bill will make it to Her Majesty's desk for her Royal Assent before the next election. And should the Tories, the vast majority of whom voted against this measure today, claim the majority in the next poll, it is very likely that they will scrap the vote.

The Liberal Democrats failed in an effort to amend the proposal altogether, wanting an earlier referendum on their preferred system, the Single Transferable Vote. In this system, constituencies would need redone altogether to establish multi-seat (likely by county or unitary authority) constituencies. STV is currently in use across Northern Ireland and in Scotland's local elections.

Not Supporting Cap & Trade = Supporting Terrorists?

2010-02-08T17:32:00.005-06:00

A recent ad targeting opponents to last year's Clean Energy Act has drawn the ire of campaigns of those targeted.

Posted below is the ad from VoteVets.org, the political action committee composed of veterans from Iraq & Afghanistan generally opposed to further military action there as is, and their linking Missouri Congressman & GOP Senate candidate Roy Blunt to sympathizers of terrorism against American interests:

VoteVets.org also posted similar videos on YouTube attacking Wyoming's John Barrasso, Iowa's Chuck Grassley, Illinois's Mark Kirk, Kentucky's Mitch McConnell South Dakota's John Thune, and both of Indiana's senators, all of which were voiced by veterans from their respective states. With the exception of Dick Lugar, McConnell & Barrasso, all of VoteVets.org's targets are vying for the Senate this November.

At issue is Republican opposition to HR 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act, which passed the House last July and is awaiting debate in the Senate.

Already the spot has drawn criticism from Blunt's son Matt. The former governor tweeted disgust that his dad's picture was superimposed over footage from the 2000 terrorist attack on the USS Cole.

"Recently saw the offensive ad by [Robin] Carnahan supporters claiming my dad @Roy Blunt supports terrorists. Very offensive," Matt Blunt wrote. "It's one thing to use images to remind ourselves that we have enemies. It's another to use them to claim an American supports terrorists.

"The idea that opposition to cap & trade (a big tax most Missourians oppose) equals support for terrorists is as ludicrous as it is offensive."

Of course, VoteVets.org's ads (which, excepting Indiana and Wyoming, has an identical script) do not explicitly mention "cap-and-trade", opting to instead focus on the importation of foreign oil. And they happen to highlight countries on the background map (Egypt, Kuwait, and Lebanon) which don't appear on the list, which is identical throughout the ads. Given that it's a 30-second spot, chances are the list & map highlights are largely arbitrary.

And worse for the PAC: Mark Kirk was among eight Republicans that voted in favor of HR 2454, the eight bi-partisan votes needed to ensure the bill's narrow 219-212 passage in the House. None of the ads cited the roll call (in the case of Kirk and Blunt) or where they derived the current senators' opposition to the bill.

This comes two weeks after a certain terrorist on the FBI's Most Wanted list decided to weigh in on climate change. Last month, Osama bin Laden himself declared that global warming would be less of a problem if people stopped doing business with American companies, and dumped the dollar altogether. Now it seems that opposing cap & trade would help him too.

As important as it is to ensure a clean environment and attempt to ensure a self-sufficient and renewable energy supply, it would be helpful to not resort to invoking the War on Terror to get a point across, and better yet to not do it as sloppily and cookie-cutter as this is playing out.

Reminder for voters in Branson, St. Joseph & St. Louis City

2010-01-31T20:48:00.000-06:00

Residents in three of Missouri's house districts have the opportunity to elect a new representative to the General Assembly this Tuesday.

For St. Joseph's District 27, Democrat Pat Conway faces Republican Jason Gregory. Conway is a lifelong resident of St. Joseph and is in his seventh term as county clerk. Gregory, also a lifelong resident of St. Joseph, is currently the Director of Business Development for Health Choices of Northwest Missouri. The vacancy occurred in September when Democrat Ed Wildberger was selected by Governor Jay Nixon to become Buchanan County's Recorder of Deeds.

In District 57, located in the western portion of St. Louis City, voters will choose between Democratic nominee Hope Whitehead and independent candidate Karla May. Whitehead, an attorney who once worked for the city prosecutor's office, edged May out for the Democratic nomination, despite coming under fire for owing delinquent property taxes, which she has since reconciled. Even if May wins, it is likely that she will caucus with the Democrats. This solidly Democratic seat became vacant following Talibdin El-Amin pleading guilty to a felony charge of accepting a bribe worth $2100 from a convenience store owner involved in a dispute with the city of St. Louis.

In District 62, which covers Branson in Taney County as well as much of southern Stone County, Republican Nita Jane Ayers opposes Libertarian Patty Tweedle. Ayers is a real estate agent in the Table Rock Lake area. Tweedle, according to a Missouri Libertarian Party news release, describes herself as a homemaker and former professional who has lived in Branson the past 15 years. The former occupant of the seat, Dennis Wood, resigned when he was appointed to fill a vacancy in the Stone County Commission.

Barring any unforeseen calamities in the next week, the only remaining vacancy will be District 56 in Lee's Summit. Republican Brian Yates announced in November that he was forgoing his last year in the House so that he could spend more time with his family.

Polls open Tuesday at 6 a.m. and will close at 7 p.m.

Campaign Web sites:

Blair faces the barbie's flames about Baghdad and Bush Jr.

2010-01-28T23:05:00.000-06:00

For over two months, the UK media have been glued to proceedings occurring in a meeting room at the Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre, just west of the Houses of Parliament. During this time, five Privy Councillors have questioned, surveyed and grilled everyone involved in Tony Blair's cabinet at the time the UK, US, and other Coalition forces invaded Iraq in 2003, aiming to find if any actions taken were illegal or just plain dumb.

In a little under five hours, the former Prime Minister himself will go before the panel. Naturally, Blair's responses to the panel's questions (including a panelist who said five years ago that Blair & George W. Bush will one day be compared to Churchill & FDR) will make for a highly anticipated session, as audience passes were snatched up in a matter of minutes. Over the days leading up to Blair's appearance, members of his Cabinet and inner circle have provided evidence as to how and when Blair & Company made the decision to join the US in taking military action. (The BBC, which has aired the proceedings on their news channel with a one-minute delay, has a recap of all the proceedings here.)

One member of Blair's cabinet has yet to face questioning, and will do so within the next two months: his Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown. And since the inception of the inquiry, he's proven to be better at making waffles than even Eggo. Consistently bowing to pressure from opposition parties and even anti-war critics from his own backbenches, Brown first relented on his initial plans to not make public the inquiry's proceedings. Then, aiming to avoid more potential embarrassment before the elections he's dawdled on calling for almost three years, Brown made every effort to postpone his testimony until the next Parliament was seated.

But aside from Brown's trademark dawdling and backpedalling, tomorrow (er, later this morning) will mark the most critical day of the inquiry, as we'll hear from the Sage of Sedgefield, the architect of New Labour, and America's biggest quasi-socialist ally (who would have brown-nosed his way into a White House run by the staunchest of Libertarians) what exactly was going on in the months prior to every TV news network in the Western world showing grainy images of tanks rolling across miles of endless desert, as sketched out infamously by Geraldo Rivera.

Will Blair refute the claims of a member of his foreign corps that a deal was "signed in blood" with the Bush Administration almost six months prior to the invasion?
How will Blair explain warnings issued about there not being enough helicopters to support both operations in Iraq and Afghanistan?
What exactly will Blair say about the weapons dossier he released in September 2002, which has since been found to have contained glaring inaccuracies?

These answers will likely register in the mainstream American press, which has given their audiences no clue as to this inquiry even occurring.

Hitting the Century

2010-01-23T20:22:00.000-06:00

That title is the only reference you're getting to this being The Missouri Expatriate's 100th post. On to business from southern Kansas City.

Earlier today at their annual school retreat, the Hickman Mills School Board voted by an 8-1 margin to reorganize their secondary schools to better reflect the changing population of the district. That is, their decreasing population and tax revenue. At the heart of this reorganization is the consolidation of Hickman Mills and Ruskin high schools.

Indeed this is an end result of population changes in this area: initially the home school district for Harry Truman, the area sprouted up during the initial waves of urban sprawl. Not even the Ruskin Heights twister of 1957 would impede its growth, as evenutally it became home to the once-bustling Bannister Mall. Sam Walton would use the district as a testbed for his ideas in retailing, first opening a Ben Franklin there in 1956, six years before the first Wal-Mart, and then the ill-fated Hypermart in the late 80s. But as populations moved further south, into Johnson and Cass counties plus districts in eastern Jackson County, Bannister deteriorated beyond operability, and so did the area's reputation. Repeated efforts to revitalize it, including plans to build a major soccer complex for the Wizards, have floundered.

So now the district's left with a loss of 1500 students over the past 10 years, with a city struggling to come up with a viable plan and sticking with it. As a result, consolidation from two high schools and two middle schools, but instead a structure that's done a certain district in the Northland wonders the past 20 years. Next month, the board will decide which among their four secondary school buildings—Ruskin and Hickman Mills, plus Ervin and Smith-Hale middle schools—will serve as their grades 6 & 7 middle school, their 8 & 9 junior high, and their grades 10-12 high school.

While it will be unfortunate for one neighborhood's alma mater to close, and for as many as 60 secondary teachers to have to find work elsewhere, this can become the reorganization needed to rejuvenate the potential of the district's students. (I must say that I speak as someone who attended that "certain district in the Northland", and during my studies in education theory found that Liberty's secondary school structure was considered one of the most effective at dealing with issues involving adolescents, both academically and personally.) If Hickman Mills can tighten their belts and provide adequate class sizes and attention to their students, both in terms of academics and personal development, they can pull this off. If they are able to retain enough staff to deal with problems before they fester and devolve into potentially violent incidents, they will see improvements that can bring people back into the district and bring about the economic revitalization they're needing.

Most of all, if they can weather the emotional storm over a neighborhood losing their school and convince effective parents that they can and will pull this off, this will prove beneficial in the long run for one of Kansas City's oldest school systems.

Best wishes to everyone in Hickman Mills during what is a trying time in their district's history.

Yes, I'm noticing the patterns

2010-01-21T15:00:00.001-06:00

As I'm getting everything sorted on my first full day back in the terra cognita of Northern Missouri, I'm keeping up with the Republican responses to Governor Nixon's State of the State address, which he began delivering as my flight was touching down at KCI. And I've noticed two things that are worrying me:

There are two responses, each being utilized by more than one state legislator. One is a prose version of the formal response delivered by Lt. Governor Peter Kinder, the other is a more condensed response. Already I've uploaded two missives which are near-identical repeats either.

And yes, that's how it's going to be. Missives from Missouri desires to publish every weekly column and news release, and to do so with each legislator's full knowledge of it rather than invoking the Sunshine Law. If they're same, it's the legislators' prerogative, just as it is your prerogative to cast a vote for them or someone else.
Numbers of missives being published are disproportionately Republican. Again, it's just how it goes. Simply, more GOP reps & senators have availed themselves of the opportunity to have their missives published on Missives from Missouri than their Democratic counterparts. Ideally, I'd like 100% participation from both sides of the aisle.

Meanwhile, it's too quiet here. Could use a station for a high-speed train service. And some chicken jalfrezi. And two from the top and four from anywhere else to reach a target of 629.

On the bright side, I'm not going to cost Missouri a congressional district!

2010-01-20T18:38:00.007-06:00

Again, this post is rigged to go up at about the time my flight into KCI should be crossing the border into Missouri. Again, "should be" because of the risk of snow, and the TSA freaking out about posts timed to coincide with flights overhead.

This particular post (the second of two) is set to go up at this time because, from this point on barring a job opportunity out of state (or leaching off my younger brother at his pad in JoCo), The Missouri Expatriate is now officially a repatriate. And with two months to spare before the upcoming Decennial Census.

As early as 2005, when I spent hours plugging numbers into an Excel spreadsheet for a series of stories I wanted to set 40 years in the future, I came to a harrowing realization that Missouri, the great American bellwether (or weathervane), wasn't gaining enough population to retain their nine Congressional districts. Since then, stories have floated around about whether Missouri was on track to lose that ninth seat or not. In 2006, Census calculations showed that Missouri was projected to be four positions shy of retaining its ninth seat. That calculation was reaffirmed three years later. My concern about this was heightened to the point that when a bill granting the District of Columbia a voting representative and Utah an extra rep, I petitioned senators Bond and McCaskill to support it for the sole reason that it would increase the likelihood of Missouri keeping its nine seats.

Fortunately, the recent (as of one month ago) projections from the Census have Missouri retaining its ninth seat. Meaning that in spite of our state taking a strong stand against illegal immigration, same-sex unions, and overzealous property developers aiming to bypass county zoning ordinances with little to no regard for their neighbors, Missourians should still have nine reps to threaten with pitchforks if they don't vote a certain way.

Just remember that when the Census form arrives in your mailbox in March, fill it out accurately and send it back promptly.

Personal note: yes, I do acknowledge that it appears very disingenuous that 17 hours after saying goodbye to my (can't believe I'm calling her this) ex, I'm raving about my participating in the Census. Yes, I'm hurting, I'm wounded, my pocketbook isn't exactly in tip-top shape, but as Eric Idle once sang: "Always look on the bright side of life." (content advisory: language) So that's what I'm doing.

Repatriation

2010-01-20T07:15:00.075-06:00

At the time this post goes public, I should be 12 hours away from setting foot again on Missouri soil. I'd like to say "will be", but for all we know, I might be snowed in on the M25, or there might be a rather lengthy customs and border interrogation waiting for me at O'Hare.

At this time, I'd like to disclose to the readers of this blog that my wife and I have made the mutual yet painful decision to separate. After giving it a go and trying out life in a foreign country, unfortunately we were unable to make it work. I do consider this a most unfortunate event, and I still value her as a friend. But in the course of my eight months in the UK, we faced a series of setbacks and conflicts that ultimately brought us to the realisation that we were simply incompatible.

It has taken me awhile to accept this, but sad to say I have done so and am moving on. In some respects, though, I haven't. For all we know, right now I could be balling my eyes out so obnoxiously that I'm preventing my plane for Chicago from leaving the gate area. (Of course, with travel security precautions heightened to their highest levels in three years, this post being automatically set to come up whilst I'm over County Roscommon will probably ring a few alarm bells in some corner offices at MI5 and/or the NSA.) I have had two weeks of packing and reflecting in the Folkestone Downs to come to terms with this and prepare to move on, back to terra cognita.

Not only will I miss the good times I shared with the Misses, but I'll definitely miss the Kentish countryside. Kent is truly the Garden of England, an area of steep, rolling hills, filled with woods, grazing pastures, and farmlands, even more pristine with all the snow that's descended on us the past month. And it's all connected by public footpaths and bridleways that would take lifetimes to traverse completely. Probably because I'd have to stop at every pub along the way, order a pint of ale & a packet of crisps or a warm meal, look around at the character and history engrained into the place, and move on after a good laugh or two. Yeah, I'll miss that too.

And believe it or not, I'll miss the food. Yes, a lot has been said about English food being bland and boring. From now on, anyone who says that gets a spoonful of Colman's Mustard jammed in their mouth. Tell me that's bland and boring! While recipes of English mustard have made their way to the States, several food items that I have enjoyed eating in the UK haven't caught on. Chicken Tikka Masala, Yorkshire puddings, squash, back bacon (which is a lot larger & juicier than American bacon made from pork bellies), cooking with extra virgin olive oil: all edibles that I will miss & seek to replicate once I set foot back in the land of Gates' Bar-B-Q, Taco Bueno, Mountain Dew, crab rangoon and deep-fried Twinkies. At least I've left behind a sensational barbecue sauce recipe.

And as wonderful it will be to be running this blog and Missives from Missouri from Missouri, I'll find it most unfortunate that I won't be in the UK when the next general election takes place. I was really looking forward to witnessing first-hand a monumental election, where for the first time since 1945 at least one out of every five seats in the House of Commons will be open. But alas, I will do so again from the transatlantic sidelines, spending a future Thursday evening staring at David Dimbleby & crew for hours simulcast on C-Span.

I will miss this nation. Even if Westminster needs to empower voters with a recall and the Hancock Amendment impressed on them to curtail government overspending, England is a wonderful country and one that I hope to visit again and very often. And even if I never leave the US again, I will remain the Missouri Expatriate, with eight months exposure of driving on the left side, merchandise labelled in 20 different languages (and priced in Sterling, Euros, Swiss francs, Czech koruna, and Polish zloty), and scenic views of the English Channel on my back. An experience that, in spite of the damage my pocketbook and résumé took, I am glad to have undertaken.

For now: it's the figurative Parent's Basement. Once I get through border controls at O'Hare.

Saturday Night and I'm thumbing through my passport

2010-01-16T18:19:00.001-06:00

I got my paperwork back earlier this week, and I'm sorted out for the time being.

For the 70 percent of Americans that don't have a passport, they're missing out on not only the opportunity to tour the world, but also some inspirational words printed on the top of each page. I figure I'd quote them below and encourage everyone reading to reflect on them.

"O say does that star spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave." –Francis Scott Key
"…and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth." –Abraham Lincoln
"We the People Of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." –The Preamble
"The principle of free governments adheres to the American soil. It is bedded in it, immovable as its mountains." –Daniel Webster
"Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair." –George Washington
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." –from the Declaration of Independence
"We have a great dream. It started way back in 1776, and God grant that America will be true to her dream." –Martin Luther King, Jr.
"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and success of liberty." –John F. Kennedy
"This is a new nation, based on a mighty continent, of boundless possibilities." –Theodore Roosevelt
"Whatever America hopes to bring to pass in the world must first come to pass in the heart of America." –Dwight D. Eisenhower
"For this is what America is all about. It is the uncrossed desert and the unclimbed ridge. It is the star that is not reached and the harvest sleeping in the unplowed ground. Is our world gone? We say 'Farewell.' Is a new world coming? We welcome it – and we will bend it to the hopes of man." –Lyndon B. Johnson
"May God continue the unity of our country as the railroad united the two great oceans of the world." –inscribed on the Golden Spike, ceremonially installed on 10 May 1869 at Promontory Point, Utah
"We send thanks to all the Animal life in the world. They have many things to teach us as people. We are glad they are still here and we hope it will always be so." –Mohawk version of the Thanksgiving Address.
"The cause of freedom is not the cause of a race or sect, a party of a class – it is the cause of humankind, the very birthright of humanity." –Anna Julia Cooper

"Every generation has the obligation to free men's minds for a look at new worlds . . . to look out from a higher plateau than the last generation." –Ellison S. Onizuka

Cupcake-Gate 2010: Shuffling might not appese Sinn Féin

2010-01-11T18:54:00.001-06:00

Owing to the title of my last post on the tense political situation in Northern Ireland, I am henceforth declaring this scandal to be known as Cupcake-Gate. (Where have you gone, 'Geordie' Georgie Best? all Ulster turns their lonely eyes to you, woo woo woo.)

Peter Robinson will take a six-week leave from his post as First Minister so he can patch things up with his wife Iris and refute charges that he covered up her improper expenses.

Robinson, who was facing calls to resign from his leadership roles at both Stormont and Westminster, where he leads the nine Democratic Unionists, made the announcement today on the first day of business in the new year. Although the DUP tossed Mrs. Robinson from their ranks after her admitting to an affair with a 19-year-old entrepreneur in 2008, its leadership declared 100 percent support for Mr. Robinson's role as party leader. (This does include the blessing of the Rev. Ian Paisley.)

While Robinson takes time off to salvage his political career, the enterprise minister Arlene Foster will assume the duties of First Minister. Foster will have to hold steadfast against threats from Sinn Féin to pull out of the power sharing agreement that has kept Stormont in operation in 2007.

Their threats, however, stem from the issue of whether Stormont should assuming policing and judicial duties from Westminster, an issue over which the DUP and Sinn Féin have tussled since Stormont regained devolved autonomy. Even as dissident republicans are blamed for bombing the patrol car of a Catholic police officer, the issue over how soon Northern Ireland should control its own forces threatens the stability of the government. With Foster being the DUP's third First Minister, Sinn Féin would need to visit their GP if they couldn't smell weakness and instability.

If Sinn Féin's Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness were to resign in protest, or had Mr. Robinson been ousted, then both figures would have been ousted per the peace deal. If the two parties don't agree to resolve the issue, then Stormont is dissolved, and Westminster's Secretary for Northern Ireland Affairs will either need to set a new election date (which will wind up being one month before the general election) or recommend that the Prime Minister re-impose direct rule of Northern Ireland from London. This just might creep into the general election, resulting in Plaid Cymru and the SNP gaining a bloody shirt to wave toward their fellow nationalists.

For Stormont to survive, a true desire to work beyond union/republican, Protestant/Catholic divides must take place. If that happens, then the ultimate peace has been achieved. If not, look out Brussels.

Next #FollowFriday might include a federal inmate

2010-01-10T12:09:00.001-06:00

Four months after his grassroots-oriented political campaign came to a crashing halt, former state senator Jeff Smith is now making waves by Tweeting from prison.

Smith, who was sentenced to one year and one day after pleading guilty for obstructing an investigation into improper campaign expenditures, is communicating to the outside world through his Twitter account. Shortly after entering prison in Manchester, Ky. this week, Smith began sending e-mails to a political supporter of his, who then posts the updates on his behalf. (I'm scratching my head as to how the heck he has e-mail access behind bars.) Already Smith's tweeted of being elbowed in basketball and having a very skilled chess player as his cell neighbor.

Expect a wave of interest in this political and correctional oddity in the new future. National & international media, the clock is ticking.

Hidden in Stormont's pantry, with the cupcakes

2010-01-08T13:06:00.002-06:00

The ongoing saga on the peace process in Northern Ireland has taken a bizarre turn involving power, sex, money, and anti-depressants. While the last of Northern Ireland's paramilitary groups are decommissioning all their weapons, the battlefield may reignite, all thanks to the startling shenanigans unveiled by Belfast media this past week. (Granted, that battlefield will likely be strictly political.)

In the halls of Stormont, Northern Ireland's devolved government, its first minister Peter Robinson is now under fire, accused of withholding information about business transactions involving his wife Iris. The accusations were presented in BBC Northern Ireland's Spotlight programme, where 21-year-old Kirk McCambley admitted receiving £50,000 from Mrs. Robinson that she secured from two property developers for the purpose of the two opening a café in a council development project in Castlereagh, a suburban borough of Belfast. McCambley's bid was the only one submitted to the Borough Council, on which Mrs. Robinson serves (in addition to being an MP & MLA).

Earlier this week, Mrs. Robinson admitted to having an affair with McCambley starting in March 2008, which lasted six months. She also admitted that she attempted suicide after her husband found out about the affair a year later. The revelation coincides with Mrs. Robinson's decision to step down from politics altogether over the next year. While other Northern Ireland parties agreed to give the Robinsons space so they can attempt to save their marriage, revelations of Mr. Robinson's alleged role in helping his wife secure the back £50,000 loan from McCambley have negated that armistice, and potentially put the existence of a devolved government in Northern Ireland into jeopardy.

Under the Good Friday Agreement of 1998, Northern Ireland regained devolved powers from Parliament under a power-sharing arrangement. That authority was suspended twice in 2001 for 24 hours and again in 2002, with that suspension only lifted five years later when both Unionist parties and the republican Sinn Féin agreed to a new arrangement, complete with disarmament mandates for paramilitary groups possibly lined to all parties.

The Robinsons are considered the "power couple" of the Democratic Unionist Party, which over the past 15 years has overtaken the Ulster Unionists as the principal Unionist party in Northern Ireland. With nine members in the House of Commons (led by Mr. Robinson, succeeding the party's co-founder, the Rev. Ian Paisley), the DUP are currently the largest party in Parliament not named Labour, Conservative, or Liberal Democrat. And they're not novices to trouble, especially in the case of Mrs. Robinson: in 2008, she called homosexuality "an abomination" days after a gay man was assaulted in Northern Ireland. And when reports emerge last year that the Robinsons claimed expenses on the same bill worth £1223, amongst other reimbursement claims totalling almost £325,000 from Westminster and Stormont, Mrs. Robinson called the reports "a witch hunt".

Should these accusations prove the downfall of the Robinsons, the DUP will have a power gap that could result in an imbalance between the Unionists and Nationalists. At the moment, the deputy first minister is Martin McGuinness of Sinn Féin. Were the Robinsons forced out, although the DUP retain the largest grouping in Stormont, the turmoil of having another new first minister in the same terms will convey considerable weakness, especially as general elections approach within five months. While both the DUP and UUP are pledging their support to Conservatives should the Tories be in a position to form the next government, the damage from these allegations could damage both parties, as UUP's decline over the past ten years also also resulted in more seats for the Labour-backing SLDP and the highest numbers of Sinn Féin MPs in Parliament. (Again, Sinn Féin's MPs will not sit in Parliament as they refuse to swear an oath to The Queen.)

Simon and Garfunkel might have a repeat number one in the UK this week, or least parodies in English, Irish and Ulster Gaelic. Perhaps their lyrics are chillingly accurate for the Robinsons right now:

“Laugh about it, shout about it, when you've got to choose,
Either way you look at this you lose…”

In case that red badge to the right hasn't caught your attention already

2010-01-06T18:09:00.000-06:00

Today is the first day of this year's Missouri General Assembly. And with a gunkload of more snow already falling on Missouri (that'll inundate the UK weekend after next – you've been forewarned again, Eurostar!) they won't convene on Thursday or Friday.

It gives everyone plenty of time to check out my new project, Missives from Missouri. This new project will post the weekly missives and news releases from many of the 197 members of the General Assembly. As of today, at least 23 members (14 house and nine senators) have indicated they will submit, or already are submitting, content to Missives from Missouri. And that number will grow as the session progresses.

Over time, it's my hope that Missives from Missouri will become a key addition to your bookmarked pages of Missouri political Web sites. This site will become an aggregate of reports and releases, sorted by legislator and the bills they mention. Any comments you may have about it, feel free to leave them here.

When once just isn't enough

2010-01-06T08:28:00.000-06:00

The major parties are already beating the war drums in anticipation of the general election set to occur within the next five months. Already Tory leader David Cameron unveiled a draft section of his party's manifesto (complete with him pictured at least twice in the preface) where the Tories make themselves out to be the party that will best support the National Health Service. Labour, meanwhile, might not wait until the election to pursue a new leader.

Two former Cabinet ministers, Leicester's Patricia Hewitt and Ashfield's Geoff Hoon, have circulated a letter calling on Labour MPs to conduct a secret ballot to reaffirm the leadership status of Prime Minister Gordon Brown. In the letter, the two express concerns about Labour in-fighting distracting the party from getting their message out to voters, which could made the difference between a hung parliament and an outright Tory majority. Hewitt and Hoon add that supporters of Brown should sign onto this as a way to solidify Brown's role, and if those opposing Brown fail to unseat him, they would have to grudgingly support him as a result of the majority support.

While the press might present this as an inherent sign of weakness in Labour, such a vote would actually show that the power of democracy - the very thing that brought Labour to the forefront of British politics when enfranchised working class voters, tired of shifting rhetoric and fence-jumping by the Conservatives and Liberal parties, backed Labour candidates in increasing numbers. For Labour to go through with this would be to allow democracy to do its things. (Granted, it's just MPs sitting on Labour's benches voting on it, but at least it's better than leaving it to an elite cabal of champagne socialists.)

If Brown emerges from this challenge with majority backing, he will have a boost of confidence that could cause The Sun to embarrass itself akin to "Dewey Defeats Truman". But if Labour rebels have their way and oust Brown, they may bring about a fresh helmsman akin to John Major taking over the Conservatives after Margaret Thatcher failed to secure enough support to remain Prime Minister in 1990. However, that leadership contest occurred two years before the polls. An eleventh-hour change at the top for Labour would, while assure the election as occurring on June 3 (as this would not be a vote of no confidence in the government as a whole), have a monumental task of re-establishing itself on short notice in a hostile political and economic climate.

Apparently Eurostar needs more advance warning for winter storms

2009-12-24T17:48:00.000-06:00

How about nine days?
Seven inches of snow is likely in the Kansas City area, perhaps resulting in carolers singing of this White Christmas being a nightmare instead of a dream come true. This means, if my past two major winter storm comparisons are indeed a reliable indication, the Channel region should expect this maelstrom on or around 3 January 2010, if not sooner as a result of the nor'easter that froze Washington D.C. earlier this week.

Since Eurostar and other European transportation agencies somehow were caught off guard by last week's wintry mess (which has doused Iowa in blizzard-like conditions the week before), I thought I'd do my part and serve as a harbinger.

Christmas Messages

2009-12-24T14:54:00.000-06:00

Tomorrow, after families across the UK finish their turkey dinners complete with Christmas puddings and mince pies (and where it would be a very bad idea to try and bite into a Christmas cracker), many of them will sit in front of the TV or radio and receive The Queen's annual Christmas Message, set for broadcast at 1500 GMT. (Many others will be hitting refresh on YouTube for the video to appear.) This year, Her Majesty will give praise to the Armed Forces, who have taken considerably heavier losses in 2009. This year's broadcast was produced by ITN, who alternate with the BBC.

Meanwhile Channel 4, a year after choosing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for their alternate broadcast (and giving him prime time billing as opposed to running it against The Queen), has selected Katie Piper, a 26-year-old who survived an acid assault engineered by her ex-boyfriend Daniel Lynch. Piper's story, whose dreams to become a television presenter was derailed by the assault, leaving her blind in one eye and requiring at least 30 surgeries to restore her facial skin, was documented by Channel 4 last October to high acclaim. Her five-minute message, aimed to provide hope and optimism, will air at the same time.

Fortunately, for homes with digital TV, they won't have to choose between the two. As Channel 4 has a time-shifted channel, digital TV viewers can view the alternate message at 4 p.m.

Another American export to arrive in Brtiain

2009-12-21T17:50:00.000-06:00

In the past five year, the US has exported to the UK in droves restaurant brands, High School Musical, obnoxiously expensive school dances, baseball jargon, Premier League goalies, The Apprentice, yours truly, and now the crème de la crème: Prime Minister's Election Debates.

Long discussed but never agreed to until now, the three major Westminster parties have agreed to have their leaders participate in three 90-minute debates, set to take place on ITV, Sky News and BBC. Regional debates for Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland will also take place. Three potential problems will crop up when these debates debut, perhaps as early as February.

First, nationalist parties (Scottish National Party and Wales' Plaid Cymru) are threatening to take all three networks to court and sue their way onto the nationwide debates. While they have the chance to make their case against the Labour, LibDem and Tory leaders from their respective devolved legislatures, they also argue that having nationwide debates doubles the publicity of the Westminster Three. This brings about another tangent to the West Lothian Question, which asks why Scottish MPs have an opportunity to weigh in on affairs in England when they and English MPs aren't able to weigh in on Scottish affairs. Why would voters in Kent or Cornwall care what Alex Salmond says about a domestic issue when the SNP or Plaid Cymru have no desire to run candidates in England? If either party want in the debates, then it would be to their advantage to campaign to put their leader in 10 Downing, rather than pursuing independence.

However, both parties can point to Canada for support, as Canadian broadcasters have had televised leaders' debates since the election of 1968. Their qualifications are that a party must have one MP in order for the party leader to appear. This ensures the place of le Bloc Québécois, the nationalist party who only runs candidates in Quebec, and thus a debate exclusively in French. Indeed the SNP & Plaid Cymru can potentially push for debates to occur in Scots Gaelic and Cymraeg, and potentially as many as 11 parties on a leaders' debate in the UK, including the Irish republican Sinn Féin party and one-member parties Independent Kidderminster Hospital & Health Concern and Respect - The Unity Coalition. Factoring in the European Parliament, UKIP and the BNP could both make claims to become part of the leadership debate, which by then might as well be turned into a game show called "Westminster Squares" or a farcical school cafeteria food fight. The fear of this, however, could bring about a worse response and put it down to two parties, shutting out the third that could easily become the figurative kingmaker in future elections.

Second, as it stands, each debate will be televised on only one network at a time. This leaves out Channel 4 and Five. Worse, should the election occur in May or June, ITV could pull a devious stunt and run "Britain's Got Talent" against the broadcast of the remaining two debates on Sky and BBC. For these debates to gain enough traction and be seen not as a ratings ploy but instead a worthy tool of informing voters, they should be operated by a multi-network commission and allowed to be broadcast on every network that wants to allot time for it.

Third, critics of the debates argue that placing the party leader on a nationwide televised debate puts more emphasis on the leader and party brand, detracting from the individual running in each constituency for his or her party. This criticism, however, can be levelled against any function involving the role of a party leader—Prime Minister's Questions, Question Time, election party broadcasts, the party manifesto—and is mostly a reaction to the evolution of the role of Prime Minister the past 200 years, and by extension party leaders. The debates, however, would harden the role of the Prime Minister as an executive, whereas the position remains in the legislative branch with powers delegated by the monarchical executive. By debates being televised to millions, several of whom won't bother to read the manifestos or even push the Red Button to review the party broadcasts, individual candidates could find themselves in a more narrow definition of their party, and deviating from that image could cost both them and their party.

While this is a major step forward in bringing election processes to the masses of today, the potential changes it may make to how elections play out could be few and minimal or quite drastic.

Now THIS should have been #1 in the UK this week!

2009-12-21T16:03:00.000-06:00

Forget X Factor and Rage Against The Machine. The BBC has posted a message from a group of sewer workers from Thames Water.

Most enlightening and hilarious. I wonder if people will follow their lyrical subterranean advice.

So 103 years of tradition is bunk?

2009-12-17T17:54:00.000-06:00

With the eleven universities in the Big Ten Conference likely to agree to a plan to add one or three more members in the near future, speculation in the media is turning widely to the prospect of Mizzou defecting from the Big 12. If such discussions transpire to where Mizzou does make the move to a Big Ten+2, they will leave behind a conference whose predecessor the Big Eight (formerly Big Seven, Big Six, and Missouri Valley) they helped form in 1907, along with Kansas, Nebraska, and Washington University in St. Louis.

Now while the Big Ten has a plenty of tradition as America's oldest collegiate athletic conference and serious academic acumen, Mizzou would be getting all this for the sake of milking more out of the St. Louis market:

No guaranteed Border Showdown with KU. The MU-KU rivalry has its roots in the run-up to the U.S. Civil War and was one of the many spawns of a great American university tradition, Homecoming. In its place would be Mizzou's only current rivalry with a Big Ten school, Illinois, whose roots is exclusively in the fact that the biggest city on the Missouri-Illinois border is St. Louis. In football, this game is already set to expire after next season. Aside from this, Mizzou has no significant rivalry with any other Big Ten school, except Northwestern in the contest for best journalism school.
Longer travel times. Instead of being the easternmost member of the Big 12 Conference, Mizzou would become the southernmost and westernmost of a larger Big Ten. Also, its longest trip won't be a 695-mile sojourn to Boulder to take on a so-so Buffalo squad, but an 800-mile odyssey to challenge Joe Paterno's vaunted Penn State Nittany Lions.
One heck of a tougher schedule just to get into a BCS bowl. Instead of playing perennial powerhouses Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas, Mizzou instead goes up against Iowa, Penn State, Ohio State and Wisconsin. While a Big Ten+2 western conference might result in Mizzou often rising to the top for a new championship game, winning that championship game would have Mizzou going to Pasadena with a likelihood of getting speared by USC in the Rose Bowl.

But of course, this isn't happening tomorrow, and that's only from the football perspective. When factoring in all sports, the Big Ten offer more (12 men's, 13 women's) than the Big 12 (10 men's, 11 women's). In men's basketball, Mizzou would have to put up quite a fight against Tom Izzo's Spartans of Michigan State and typically tough teams at Wisconsin and Ohio State, of which only Wisconsin would be in a western division.

Unfortunate for Missouri tourism revenue, especially Kansas City, leaving the Big 12 for a Big Ten+2 would cause the state to lose its pivot point in attracting conference tournaments (because why would KU host such tournaments in Missouri?) and instead become a fringe area. Chicago's central location would be reinforced, with St. Louis likely to be seen as a bone thrown to the west when Minneapolis/St. Paul and Milwaukee won't do. It would be imperative for Mizzou officials, and by extension state lawmakers, to consider this when making statements regarding the prospect of Mizzou jumping conferences.

But this is all speculation. For starters, the Big Ten have to agree whether or not to seek a 12th school, or go further and expand to 14 or even 16. And then there are other schools they are destined to consider, likely Big East schools like Syracuse, Rutgers and Pittsburgh. And they just could find a way for Notre Dame to shrug off its staunch independent mentality and embrace a place in a historic conference (then again, I've been dreaming of a Notre Dame-Mizzou game for years now.)

Raging against the same machine…

2009-12-17T08:18:00.003-06:00

Author's note: this was reported today by the Daily Star, the lowbrow sister of the Daily Express. All the guy probably did was what I did once I read the story: find the names on the same list on Wikipedia.

When it comes to the UK music charts, the most coveted prize of the year is to have the most popular song at Christmas. As described by the BBC in 2001, winning the honour conveys the ultimate sign of name recognition in the UK, guaranteeing a spot on talk shows and Top of the Pops programmes. Schemes to obtain the top spot, attempted as early as 1973, were lampooned in the comedy film Love Actually with a parody of The Troggs' "Love is All Around".

Since 2005, the Christmas Number One spot has been dominated by winners of The X Factor, Britain's counterpart to American Idol. As the final episode airs two weeks before Christmas, demand for the new release of the show's winner ultimately spikes. And while Leona Lewis has made waves on US charts, I'd be surprised if anyone back home has heard of Shayne Ward, Leon Jackson or Alexandra Burke. And now there's another representative of the music "establishment": Joe McElderry, an 18-year-old from the Tyneside town of South Shields and winner of this year's hotly contested X Factor. His single "The Climb" (which is a cover of Miley Cyrus) was produced by SyCo, Simon Cowell's recording label, which is part of the Sony Music conglomerate.

However, those tired of the bubble-gum, sugar-coated covers that are churned out by Simon Cowell are rallying on Facebook to get a different song at the top. Enter Rage Against The Machine and their 1992 debut single, "Killing In The Name", complete with 17 mentions of one obscene word. The band, along with several UK radio personalities and the first winner of X Factor, are expressing support for the endeavour, which has been made easier this year by purchased downloads now counting in the charts. Earlier today, a partially edited version of song aired at the end of an interview with the band on BBC Five Live (and by partially, I mean a refrain featuring said obscene word aired four times before being yanked from the air.) Also today, the online music magazine Gigwise claims RATM is surpassing McElderry by 65,000 downloads.

"Killing In The Name" was released by Epic, also a subsidiary of Sony Music.

Even if Cowell is going to blow a gasket being unseated by anarchists, someone in a hi-rise on New York's Columbus Circle is still revelling in turning anarchists into a different breed of sheep. All the while, the real X Factor (where Christians are concerned) isn't factoring on the charts. The last Christmas song to reach #1 during Christmas was a 2004 remake of the 1985 Band Aid hit "Do They Know It's Christmas?"

If I had to choose one song to download this week, it's going to be this one. It just happens to be another Sony artist.

Ninety-eight turns out to be too great

2009-12-15T01:30:00.000-06:00

Last week I became aware of a wonderfully devised infographic by The New York Times showing the increasing number of food stamps recipients across the US. The Times found that over the past two years, program participation has ballooned to now encompass almost one in eight Americans, and twice as many children.

Missouri was highlighted in the related article as having signed up 98 percent of eligible Missourians, and having five counties (Pemiscot, Dunklin, Ripley, Mississippi and New Madrid) among the 25 counties in the U.S. with highest participation. An additional 16 counties in Missouri, ranging from St. Louis City to McDonald County, have half their children receiving food stamps.

Now, it turns out the high participation numbers reported to the US Department of Agriculture wasn't entirely because of a successful push to get qualified families on the dole, but instead a computer glitch that has kept figures inflated since September 2002. The most common miscalculation came when a qualified resident would leave a household but not be deducted from the count.

A recalculation is underway, which could bring Missouri's count down by as much as one-fourth. The big hit, however, could come from Missouri repaying $4.4 million in bonus benefits granted to the state for its high participation rates.

Onward Christian Hoteliers

2009-12-09T11:41:00.000-06:00

Report from the BBC just over an hour ago

A Christian couple from Liverpool have been cleared of charges that they insulted a Muslim guest at their bed & breakfast because she was wearing a hijab.

The hoteliers, Benjamin and Sharon Vogelenzang, faced a judge in a Liverpool Magistrates Court this week following accusations made by Ericka Tazi, who spent much of March 2009 at the B&B to attend classes at a nearby hospital. Tazi, a 60-year-old who converted to Islam 18 months ago, accused the Christian-devout Vogelenzangs of calling her a terrorist and insulting her choice of religion by comparing the Prophet Muhammad to several infamous dictators. The couple, while admitting that they did weren't fond of Tazi's apparel selection, seeing it as a form of bondage, they say the discussion wasn't as heated as Tazi claims.

Judge Richard Clancy, who was hearing the case, ruled following two days of testimony that the evidence was inconsistent to the charges presented and threw the case out. While the Vogelenzangs were quick to offer praise to God and their supporters for holding prayer vigils, business to their B&B has dropped by 80 percent.

Indeed a case of "she said, she said" heightened by the differing, entrenched views of two Abrahamic religions. Hopefully, both parties in the case will during this festive season find cause to, while extolling their beliefs, gain a degree of tolerance for others. If anyone is destined or inclined to convert, he or she will do so best when he or she is the one seeking out for spiritual guidance.

Marceline trumped by wicked roundabout

2009-12-08T13:50:00.001-06:00

Walt Disney World recently completed a contest to find its first twin community. Evidently they didn't want to look toward Linn County and Disney's boyhood town of Marceline, but rather in the UK. Now twinned with the Magic Kingdom and potential site of Disney's utopian EPCOT: the magic roundabout and still-depressed town centre of Swindon in eastern Wiltshire.

Swindon's entry, submitted by a 20-year-old bank employee, beat out 24 other entries to win the honour from the Florida resort. She, along with her nephew and niece, will travel to Florida to unveil the plaque declaring the twinned status between the 28,000-acre complex and Swindon. So what drew the Mouse to Wiltshire?

In addition to the complex-yet-safer Magic Roundabout (drivers-eye view from the Swindon Advertiser) it appears as though the Seven Dwarfs would like to work for the many industries situated in Swindon, including the hub of Isambard Kingdom Brunel's Great Western Main Line from London to Bristol and car factories for Renault and Honda. Meanwhile, anyone from the Mickey Mouse Club who wants to become a Hare Krishna would feel right at home in the UK's largest concentration of practitioners. And being on the M4 between London and Wales, Lightning McQueen can use the fabled roundabouts to mount a challenge to Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton when the British Grand Prix returns to Silverstone, roughly a 90-minute drive northeast to the edge of Northamptonshire.

Here's to hoping that MoDOT, just days after their divergent diamond won praise from Popular Science magazine in their Best of What's New year-in-review, doesn't find reason to put in a magic roundabout of their own in Linn County, or suggest Florida do the same outside Downtown Disney. I sense such a roundabout would confuse the heck out of drivers guiding buses to the next Bell Game.

The Windmills of Scotland

2009-12-04T15:05:00.001-06:00

The Scottish National Party might want to consider adopting a new patron saint: Don Quixote.

Of course, the Catholic Church (and any mainstream religious operation, for that matter) wouldn't allow the canonisation of a fictional character. But on the day dedicated to the patron saint of Scotland, this past Monday, the SNP made known yet again their desire to tilt the windmills of the 300-year-old Acts of Union. This time, the SNP-led minority Scottish Government released their long-awaited white paper which spells out their plans to pursue a referendum next year asking voters on whether they want to commit Scotland to independence from the United Kingdom.

This report, which would have reached 200 pages with just a few more pictures of SNP leaders in front of saltires, details their findings from two years of meetings and forums. It also comes just days after the SNP were soundly defeated in the Glasgow North East by-election by a rebounding Labour. But the report could be summed up in one vague, idealistic paragraph:

"We want independence for Scotland. We want to run our own things. We already run some things, but we want to run everything. But we don't mind keeping your NHS doctors, your passports, your Queen (she descended from our Stuarts, after all) and even your Pounds. After all, we're part of one big European family that'll listen to us, embrace us as a new member, and bail us out if this doesn't work, right? Right?"

Throughout the paper, the Scottish government's position makes clear their desire to achieve independence, explaining where they are currently inhibited under the current devolution scheme and where independence from the UK would increase Scotland's international representation and potentially its economic growth. Their conclusions and goals for independence, however, showed their only assurances as Scotland taking full responsibility for their affairs, while not sufficiently indicating how becoming a more vocal voice in bodies such as the European Union or United Nations would benefit Scotland. Even when it comes to the referendum they want to have next year, they even suggest that such a question posited to the voter have more than one option, as opposed to the typical yes-no ballot question that would be seen as binding.

It would be delusional for Alex Salmond's cavalry of Rocinates to assume that they can somehow supplant the remnants of the UK on the UN Security Council, let alone push for a reform of the 15-member body. Or for an independent Scotland to be the one voice that suddenly convinces stubborn Czechs, Aussies and Arkansans to combat climate change. Or for an independent Scotland to be taken seriously as a partner in the fight against global terrorism, when the lone man convicted of bringing down Pan Am Flight 103 spent just two weeks in prison for each victim of the bombing.

It's not helping our Gaelic Quixotes either that two of the windmills they must charge at are the two banks chartered in Edinburgh – the Royal Bank of Scotland and Bank of Scotland. Both banks are now owned by holding companies (RBS Group and Lloyds, respectively) which are owned partly by British taxpayers (again respectively, 58% and 43%). Would an independent Scotland be capable of propping up these two banks? All the while, will the muscle an independent Scotland suddenly gain in Brussels ensure that the big banks "come back into the real world"?

If failing to keep Labour from regaining Glasgow North East doesn't indicate to the SNP that they're losing touch with the future citizens of their independent Scotland, then the fate of their candidates in the next general election will determine that. At their most recent annual conference, the SNP boldly declared that they would become the kingmakers come June, claiming 20 seats at Westminster and determining who in a hung parliament would become Prime Minister. Elections to the Scottish Parliament follow in 2011.

These lofty goals are about to smack head-first into the two-metre long blades turning the mill on the barley for future bottles of whisky. Lofty ambitions with vague means to achieve the end is bound to cause heart-wrenching setbacks.

Tinfoil Hats Don't Ward Off Extradition Papers

2009-11-27T12:15:00.001-06:00

I might have to remember that in the event the Home Office somehow has misplaced my visa application. This is becoming evident as lawyers for 43-year-old Gary McKinnon are down to last-ditch efforts to prevent his extradition to the U.S. to face charges of hacking into Department of Defense computers. McKinnon, who has been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, a higher-functioning form of autism, says he did access those computers but he was looking for evidence on UFOs, specifically whether the US government was covering up information on their existence as well as their propulsion systems.

While this defense might bring about a chuckle on the US side, the case has generated widespread disapproval in the UK. Yesterday, Home Secretary Alan Johnson again declined to intercede, saying he was powerless to prevent the move and added that he had received assurances that McKinnon's condition would be taken into account with regards to his custody while in the US. Government critics, including a committee in the House of Commons, say McKinnon's mental health is too precarious to allow his removal from the UK, while others have pointed out apparent inequities in the extradition treaty between America and Britain.

Unfortunate for McKinnon, he picked the weeks following 9/11 to start gaining unauthorized access to DoD computers and look for this information on UFOs. This is a gross breach of national security, and while more needs done to safeguard IT resources, breaking into a foreign government's computers is a form of cyber warfare. As he could have gained more sensitive information if he had wanted, McKinnon must face the music, and unless the US expresses willingness to set up a temporary courtroom on Grosvenor Square in London, his extradition is thus necessary. Likewise, if a US citizen were to hack into the UK's Ministry of Defence computers looking for information on something as benign as who's contracted to forge the Victoria Cross medallions, he or she should expect ramifications from UK authorities.

Conversely, should McKinnon find himself in a US courtroom, his diagnosis of Asperger's must be weighed when it comes to sentencing. 70 years does seem excessive for someone with a mental condition, especially if such a sentence is served in Leavenworth. As McKinnon has admitted on multiple occasions to the BBC his actions, a plea bargain which would allow him to serve the majority of his sentence in the UK would be wise.

Therefore, instead of McKinnon's advocates convincing a UK government that is struggling to find some remnant of credibility to hold onto, they should instead put the pressure on the US State Department to be the compassionate ones. After all, it was Barack Obama who won the Nobel Peace Prize in spite of declining to issue a pardon posthumously to boxer Jack Johnson. If he wants to prove to a growingly skeptical international community that he does aim to "strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples," he could start by scrapping extradition and either hammer a plea deal with McKinnon or let him be tried in the UK.

Didn't hear this in the Queen's speech last week

2009-11-25T17:58:00.000-06:00

Last week, the last annual State Opening of Parliament occurred, where Her Majesty The Queen read the annual goals of the House of Commons. By "Annual Goals of the House of Commons" that pretty much meant the Labour Party Manifesto for the election on or before 3 June that they've been dawdling on calling. One thing that wasn't mentioned in the Queen's speech that might catch many residents of the UK and Commonwealth off-guard is about to be proposed by prime minister Gordon Brown later this week when Commonwealth heads of government meet in Trinidad.

The Prime Minister wishes to remove provisions that bar Catholics from assuming the British throne and also discontinue the automatic elevation of male heirs. If other Commonwealth government heads agree to pursue similar bills in their respective parliaments, they will remove a roadblock installed to assure the succession of Protestants (namely members of the Church of England) since the Glorious Revolution 321 years ago. In the UK, the measure was introduced earlier this year by Evan Harris, the Liberal Democrat MP from Oxford West. Government officials in March prevented the measure from coming up for discussion, but the Prime Minister indicated interest in debating the issue a later date, after meeting with members of the Royal Family about other possible changes to the line of succession.

Brown does make it a point to note that the measure is to ensure that no discrimination exists in the manner by which the Head of State of the 16 Commonwealth realms is selected, and for that should be applauded. Where opposition to the idea exists, principally from Australia and Canada (according to Brown & Harris during Question Time today), might need better justifying. If members of Kevin Rudd & Stephen Harper's respective governments object to the prospect of a princess assuming the throne over her younger brother, then there lies a serious problem. Ironic, considering that Canada gained Dominion status in 1867 from Queen Victoria and full independence from Westminster in 1982.

It again must be noted that in addition to being the sovereign leader of Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and 13 other countries, the person seated on the British throne also is the sovereign of the Church of England. As sovereign of the Church of England, he/she is responsible for appointing (by way of clerical committees fleshing out candidates for the Prime Minister to formally nominate) the spiritual leader of the church, the Archbishop of Canterbury. While the monarch's role is largely ceremonial in this process, they still retain by law the ability to not grant royal assent to the appointment of new bishops. Thus, it would make sense for the monarch, as a fellow member of the Anglican Communion, rather than a Catholic, Southern Baptist, Sikh, etc. etc., to make the appointment. Conversely, Catholics likely would not be fond of Anglican bishops sitting in the conclave to select the next pope, nor would a Latter-Day Saint be thrilled at the prospect of a seat on the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles filled by someone who has no intention of accepting the Book of Mormon as word incarnate.

This chief concern, coming as the Roman Catholic Church earlier this year announced plans to allow Anglican parishes which disapprove of changes within the Church of England to convert to Catholicism, needs adequately addressed and resolved by Commonwealth leaders this weekend should any such change to the rule of succession take place. Or, they can take the easy way out and either do nothing, declare a universal separation of Church and Crown, or abolish the monarchy altogether and become republics still aligned in an organization that British governments have gradually let become supplanted by the EU.

Eight Hours of Daylight

2009-11-09T08:44:00.000-06:00

Welcome to November, where the sun's setting over the North Downs of Kent at 4:30. By month's end, it'll be just after 4:00.

Meanwhile, a side project I've been working on for the Romney Marsh Times has finally been published. Enjoy this interview I conducted with lifelong James Bond fan and expert Graham Rye.

Things should be picking up in the coming days. Along with the nightlight.

What's Eating Johnny Bull?

2009-10-22T16:10:00.001-05:00

Much of the UK is on edge tonight for one of two (if not both) reasons. This morning, members of the Communications Workers Union began organised work stoppages throughout Royal Mail, picketing the services' proposed modernisation efforts. Those efforts include Royal Mail's proposed introduction of automated equipment that would sort mail in the order the postman/postwoman would deliver it, which would eliminate hundreds of jobs, and the prospect of privatising the service.

Today drivers and workers at mail processing centres picketed, and tomorrow the delivery and collection staff will picket. And with no desire for the union, Royal Mail magaement, and government ministers to come to an agreement, the CWU has announced that additional stoppages will be planned for next week. Trick or Treat.

Meanwhile, the politically minded are in heated debates over whether tonight will mark a "red letter day" for democracy or its darkest hour. Earlier today, under intense security and with throngs of protesters outside White City, the BBC's weekly Question Time took place with Nick Griffin, leader of the controversial far-right British National Party, on the panel along with Justice Secretary Jack Straw. In spite of multiple criticisms about the prospect of the appearance on this high profile Q&A programme legitimising the presence of the BNP in British Politics, the BBC's chiefs say that because they have been elected to local councils and now the European Parliament, they are entitled to appear on the show.

On the flip side, several who oppose the BNP's message of anti-EU, "British & Celtic Folk > anyone who produces just enough skin pigment" say that having Griffin appear on Question Time will put the spotlight on the extremist views of the party, who only three years ago removed anti-Semitic clauses in their constitution, and are just now relenting to calls on removing race restrictions on their membership.

The buzz over the past week, and much of the programme slated to air on BBC One in about 20 minutes, focused squarely on scrutinising the views of Griffin and the BNP. Earlier this week, retired generals launched a campaign saying that there was nothing British about the BNP, and demanding the BNP cease using images of Winston Churchill and the Spitfire fighter plane in their campaign material. News agencies profiled districts and council boroughs where the BNP had won seats. All the while, the party considers this bonus coverage and is comparing it to the rise of France's le Front National 25 years ago.

I will likely react to tonight's Question Time once it airs. And my new BS detector arrives in the post.

Shull & Moriarty wish they thought of this…

2009-10-21T01:12:00.002-05:00

While nepotism has been frowned upon in US Politics, and its practitioners scolded in some states, efforts to shun it in the UK are causing some MPs to find ways around new rules proposed by an in-house auditor.

This morning, BBC South East reported that Susan Gale, who has worked in her husband Roger's Parliament office since his election from North Thanet (surrounding Margate in easternmost Kent) in 1983, has written to an employment solicitors agency looking for advice on how to keep her job should rules make it illegal for MPs to hire family members for their offices. Reportedly, she says that she would either have to divorce her husband to remain at the job or become unemployed.

A statement of that nature would get the "Really?" treatment from Saturday Night Live's Weekend Update. While I'm half-tempted to come up with one bordering on half-researched ad hominems, I'll concede to the master Seth Myers. After all, he'd execute such a rant much better and be surrounded by an audience already laughing uncontrollably just after midnight.

If the Gales are serious about divorce for the sake of keeping her on the gravy train in the midst of a recession, as oppose to coming up with a budget like most of Middle England, this would perhaps be the first instance of a sham divorce in modern history. No one's going to believe there was a lack of love or irreconcilable differences. Especially if such a divorce was genuine, in which case where was the love to begin with?

This duo have been a steady force for the Tories in East Kent, claiming the seat when it was established in 1983 over a last-minute campaign by Cherie Booth, who wound up in 10 Downing a decade later as Mrs. Blair. But with public distrust down to a point where Average Joe voters are threatening to vote for the reactionary BNP just to send a message, no seat is safe. To publicly say something of this sort shows a complete disregard for the people's interests in Parliament. To say you would go so far as to discard participation in a noble institution like marriage just to keep feeding at the public trough shows complete callousness and lack of concern for proper use of the taxpayer's money.

It's bizarre loophole exploitations like this that make taxpayers angry as hell. At least it's nice to know that Peggy Shull & Judy Moriarty didn't think of this when they helped their kids out 15 years ago.

On Fairy Tales

2009-10-16T19:55:00.001-05:00

This past week, I've been reading one newspaper non-stop: the Labour-leaning Guardian, and they've been telling fairy tales. Included in each issue the past week were booklets containing some of the most well-known fairy tales, which I've been accumulating for use a few years down the road in the event the Mrs. and I beget little Missouri expats (although in most likelihood, they'll be Kentish expats in Missouri). To get the most of the £8 we've paid to collect the booklets, I've subjected myself to the Guardian's telling of the ongoing fairy tale of how little Gordy will rise back to the top, even as his Commons leader defiantly challenges the retroactive application of new reimbursement limits.

(Sidenote of great importance: one ongoing tale where the valiant hero is the Guardian just hit the denoument, as they have achieved victory over the nefarious villain Trafigura over the oil firm's attempts to squelch Parliament debate, coverage of such debate, and court rulings squelching coverage of such debate, over Trafigura's alleged dumping of oil waste off the Ivory Coast. A much-needed victory for free press that even resulted in Gordon Brown applauding a motion from a Tory backbencher.)

Chief among the Guardian's fairy tales was spelled out on Sunday, when they told about the story of David the Etonian going to Brussels to tag up with Polish apologists, Latvian SS-lovers, and Czech global warning sceptics. Among the articles telling this story, foreign secretary David Miliband penned a column criticising the Conservatives for aligning with such parties instead of sticking with the mainstream conservatives parties fronted by Sarkozy, Merkel and Berlusconi. The tale spelled out over the course of seven pages, including an extensive piece on the leader of Poland's Law and Justice Party, Michal Kaminski, who stymied Poland's attempts to apologise for atrocities committed on its Jewish residents during Nazi occupation in World War II. What makes this heavy coverage a fairy tale is this:

There isn't as much concern about the European Parliament in Middle England as there should be. I noted four months ago that the big winner of the night when the UK counted its European Parliament voters was Yasmina from The Apprentice, as that aired on BBC One while the two BNP members elected to Parliament made their victory speeches on BBC Two. To further the apparent contempt shown for those elections, BBC dumped The Apprentice finale from its regular slot on Wednesday as to avoid conflicting with a World Cup qualifier game on ITV, where England demolished Andorra 6-0.

So what impact is a Conservative side shying away from its natural connections to the continent's centre-right and Christian Democrat parties in favour of parties with global warming sceptics and questionable stances on same-sex rights? Frankly, I doubt that's going to weigh on the mind of British voters when the next election rolls around. As much as UKIP would like the debate to be focused on the growing control of the European Parliament in Brussels/Strasbourg on UK affairs, parliamentary expenses, the economy and government spending will be front and centre in the next election, which again will be no later than 3 June.

Please note that I'm not in defence of this grouping. While the Tories formed this group of anti-Federalists to hammer a Jeffersonesque approach to running the EU, this new group only accounts for ten percent of MEPs. And given the far-right stance of some of these parties (including Latvia's TB/LNNK, which has only one MEP), they might be more suited for the BNP than the party set to form the next government no later than June.

Honeymoon over

2009-10-09T22:03:00.000-05:00

Even if the Mrs. and I weren't able to go on honeymoon, it's about time I get back here. Only one post in the past month, not counting my earlier one today. That's not what I had in mind.

Rest assured, in-between the paperwork, CV-editing, dish-washing, etc., I will get back to posting here. More likely than not, a review of the Lisobn Treaty and likely appointment of Tony Blair to be Europe's John Hancock is on the books.