Category Archives: government

Bicker, Bicker, Bicker

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We begin this week at the Capitol with the State Senate trying to work out a conflict with Republican ranks on a new congressional district map.

It’s not a Republican-Democrat fight. It’s a Republican-Republican fight.  Should lines be drawn to eliminate a Democratic Congressman?  Or should the lines be drawn to protect a Republican Congresswoman?  Should Missouri Democrats have only one member of Congress?  Or Two?

Heaven help us if a district might be drawn as a swing district, where the Rs and the Ds might be close enough for a campaign to be competitive.  And interesting.  And challenging for the candidates.

Last week the Senate dissolved into bickering between Republican factions.  Should the map be 7-1 Republican or might it be 6-2 with big city Democratic enclaves guaranteed places at the table?  Neither R faction could pass the bill on its own. An alliance with Democrats might provide the margin needed but the Ds would demand a 5-3 map or one that would give them a better shot at getting a third district.

And that is a bridge too far to cross for the either faction of the Rs.

There was concern that the original proposed district lines (approved by the House) would put the Second Congressional District in jeopardy of turning blue, giving the Ds a third seat. Incumbent Ann Wagner barely has survived the last two elections, drawing less than 52% of the vote each time. Republicans might have to work hard to keep that district under the House-passed map because the Democrats surely would work hard to take it, especially given its new borders.  The ultra-conservatives in the Senate don’t want to worry about that so they filibustered until the other Rs agreed to fiddle with the boundaries and make things look better for Wagner’s chances.

It appears we are to be spared the situation after the 2010 census when the lines were drawn to make our delegation 6-2 Republican by putting two Democratic incumbents in the same district.  William Lacy Clay defeated fellow incumbent Russ Carnahan after Carnahan’s district was re-drawn to include a big chunk of Clay territory in St. Louis.  There are no incumbents running against each other this time.

Lawmakers are working hard to avoid having judges draw the lines. A lawsuit after the 1980 session led to a federal district court drawing new districts for the 1982 election, the first election since Missouri lost its ninth congressional seat.  The court’s map put forty percent of Wendell Bailey’s district into Bill Emerson’s district.   Bailey, whose home was barely inside the new district, established a residence in a new district then represented by Democrat Ike Skelton.  Republicans thought Bailey was the best possible candidate to take out Skelton, and he did run strongly but Skelton, who kept 60% of his old district won—although Baily held him to a 54% majority.

That result points to something important.

Congressional districts that are not drawn to protect incumbents provide better contests for voters to decide which competing ideas best represent them. But in practice, that is not the goal of those drawing the lines.  Protecting the dominant party is the ultimate goal when the lines are approved by a partisan body.  We’ve seen that pendulum swing both ways through the years.

Democrats have a point—that the 2020 presidential race broke 60-40 Republican. Therefore, they argue, the most representative congressional map would be one with which Democrats might be able to win another seat, making the delegation 5-3 and more representative of the overall political face of Missouri.

Republicans have a point—that the most recent legislative elections left the chambers of the legislature two-thirds Republican. Thus, the real-world Golden Rule prevails: He who has the gold, rules.

So the divided Republicans in the Senate bickered the week away last week, seemed to iron out some of the intra-partisan wrinkles as the week ended, and are likely to have a map that makes Second District Republicans more comfortable to start things this week.

Then a period of uncertainty arrives. Somebody could file a lawsuit.

And when this game goes into that overtime, the two teams (or three) that have been playing the game so far will be on the sidelines while a third team controls the scoreboard. And that’s not what the majority party wants.

The Greatest Accomplishment

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We suppose our former governors have, from time to time, been asked about their greatest accomplishments during their terms. Lately, it has become part of the regular business of wrapping up their time in office to publish a glossy, colorful booklet praising themselves.  But apart from the self-serving publications, what do past governors really think is the best thing they did.

About twenty years ago or so, Big Muddy: A Journal of the Mississippi River Valley, published at Southeast Missouri State University, printed a letter from then-former Governor Arthur M. Hyde about “some problem of statewide interest which occurred during my administration.”  The letter was to Dr. Joseph A. Serena, the then-President of then-Southeast Missouri State Teachers College (since 1973 it has been Southeast Missouri State University).

Hyde, a Republican, had been elected in what was seen as one of the great upsets in Missouri elections history in 1920. He immediately cleaned house in then-patronage dominated state government by throwing out Democrats given jobs by previous administrations.

The demand for a modern highway system led to the creation of a State Highway Commission during his term. Public education needs led to the assessment of real estate at its true value, “thereby writing a taxable foundation under the public schools upon which good schools could be built.” He listed the purchase of state parks and putting state charitable institutions under non-partisan control as important accomplishments.

“To my mind, however, the matter of greatest public import was the ‘cleanup’ of the Republican party,” he wrote. What he next wrote about the Republican Party of his time is applicable to either of our major political parties today.

“Á political party justifies its existence only when it offers itself to the people as an instrument or a tool which the people may use to bring about necessary reform, or to accomplish political results.  All political problems are reflected in party action. All matters of governmental action are political matters.  A carpenter cannot use a dull or an “unset” saw to do fine work.  The people cannot use a corrupt or a selfish party to achieve needed political changes. That the realignment within the Republican party was used by the people to accomplish great results is proved by the recitals of the early part of this letter. That realignment is forcing changes within the opposing party.  What a happy day for Missouri when the people have two effective instruments with which to work, when party campaigns are contests as to which party has best served the State, and which offers the most constructive program for the future.”

We offer Hyde’s words less as a commentary on present situations and concerns than as an observation that both of our major political parties are required to do significant soul-searching from time to time if they are to be “effective instruments” to best serve the state or nation and offer “the most constructive program for the future.”

What a happy day it will be, indeed, if we ever reach Hyde’s ideal that the appeal for power must be based on two instruments offering the most constructive service to the people.

(photo credit: 1921 Official Manual of the State of Missouri)

 

Let’s take a breath

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—and count to ten before we blurt out a heated response to something someone has said.

I have a friend who says he hasn’t paid attention to the news for several years.  He seems at peace with himself.  Uninformed, but at peace.

Unfortunately, uninformed people who are at peace with themselves are the kind of people despots take advantage of.

Responsible engagement is a friend of freedom.

But responsible engagement should require thought, not reflex.

Unfortunately, we are living in a time of reflex, encouraged by those who want to take advantage of unthinking reaction for their own political benefit. Mischaracterization too often goes unchallenged on both sides of the spectrum.

God gave us a brain to think with.  God gave us a stomach to digest things with. Too many folks, from our lofty standpoint, have forgotten what is between our ears and seem to believe the thing that fills our bowels with waste is the thinking apparatus.

Case in point (and we’re going to get crucified by some of you for doing this): Mitch McConnell’s statement last week, “If you look at the statistics, African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans.”  The comment, in answering a reporter’s question about Republican opposition to the Voting Rights Act, became Twitter cannon fodder within minutes.

There is no doubt that throughout our land, a lot of nerves are on the outside of people’s bodies. McConnell, a lightning rod for those who think his party leadership would be better for the country if he focused more on service than on power, hit those nerves hard.

From the beginning, we wondered if he would be pilloried for what could have been a clumsy use of the English language. While understanding many would take his comments as racist and an expected attitude toward someone whose party is perceived as favoring limits Black voting, we also wondered if the intent of his remark was that African-American voters are as involved in elections as much as everybody else.

McConnell, instead of apologizing for making his point awkwardly, has given a gut response. He calls the criticism of his comment “outrageous.” He accused some of his critics of spouting “total nonsense.”

After lashing out at critics, he said he meant was that “African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as (all) Americans.”

He cited his record in civil rights issues including the Martin Luther King march on Washington in 1963, his mentoring of Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who is black, and that he has “had African American speechwriters, schedulers, [and] office managers” throughout his political career.

In a time when such defenses would be seen as condescending, he might have chosen to verbalize his defense better.

Kentucky U. S. Senate candidate Charles Booker, who is Black, accused McConnell of thinking “it’s fine for him to block Voting Rights because he has black friends.”

Two points:   First, in earlier times, this instant prairie fire might have burned itself out. But today, social media is a mighty wind that increases the flames.

Second, there were times in our reporting days when someone we were interviewing said something that didn’t seem right the immediate follow up question became, “Are you saying—-?” which either gave the person a chance to dig a deeper hole or a chance to be more clear. Somebody should have asked the question when the original remark was made.

In a time when an inarticulate comment can become a social media hand grenade, it would do all of us well if our public figures allowed a second or two of silence after a question before they say what they mean to be heard. We are so awash in intentionally harmful speech that it is essential that people in McConnell’s position as a political symbol as well as a political leader be more careful in what they say.

It also is more important for those listening to ask, “Did you mean—?” if they can. And it is important for the health of our Republic for those who are quick to condemn to ask if what was said is what was truly meant.

Blurting is not a national virtue.

However, taking a breath is what keeps us healthy.

The parable of the caretakers’ wealthy friends

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And the professor came among them as they convened to determine the welfare of the people.

And the professor said unto them, “Do not foolishly assume that following an unchanging law benefits the great mass of people who have chosen you to make wise decisions on their behalf.  Nor should you find it adequate to proclaim that enriching a few by adhering strictly to the law is good.”

And he said, “Suppose you, as caretakers of the common good, approve a generous spending plan of $32 billion for the benefit of those who have chosen you. And suppose you determine that $32 billion is adequate for the future and ignore the undeserving who believe your good stewardship of financial resources has become inadequate.

“But inevitably the system generates $33 billion in the next year, and $35 billion in the second.  By following the law, friends and supporters of those who established the “adequate” amount can divide the excess totaling $4.5-billion.

“But in the fullness of time,” said the professor, “those who are limited might rise up and say to those they assume to be their caretakers, ‘This is unfair for inflation has reduced the buying power of $32 billion to only $26 billion and those who rely on actually having $32 billion are becoming impoverished and the people who elect the caretakers are suffering.’”

“’You have established by the growth in wealth of your friends and supporters, year after year, the true value of the $32 billion. Yet you have refused to adjust the law to be fair to the greater number of those you serve while bowing to the wishes of supporters who offer benefits to you for being with them.’”

“’But we are only following the law.  We are meeting all of our obligations,’” you respond. “We are blameless.”

And the professor cast disdainful eyes upon them and said, “Your professions are hollow and self-serving! Those you proclaim are well-served are instead growing thin, yea, their ribs are beginning to show.  In the interests of fairness and justice, it is time—yea, it is PAST time—to adjust the law so that they shall be fulfilled.”

“But,” the caretakers said to the professor, “we do not understand why we should be forced to give our excess back to those who fall under the law.”

The professor rose and he said with passion, “Wisdom without honor has become greed.  You have impoverished those you claimed to help and it is time for those remaining with honor to show the courage to recognize what you have done and to correct it to the benefit of the greater public welfare.”

But the friends and supporters did not care about those who were being impoverished as they grew wealthier.  “You cannot change the law,” they said.  “Giving the impoverished dollars that are worth dollars would be punishment for our success.  Have pity on us for we are your friends.”

And the professor stood nearby hoping the caretakers of the public good would see the hollowness, self-serving, and greed of the supporters who demanded protection from those who trusted the caretakers to be just.

 

The Center

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Jefferson City likes to think of itself as the center of the state and it is certainly the POLITICAL center of the state.

But, really, it IS the center of the state according to the census bureau and the post office.

If we could cut Missouri out of the United States (and 161 years ago that was tried unsuccessfully) and balance it on the point of a large pin with all of our people living where they live now and weighing the same, the state would balance on a point just south of Jefferson City.

After the folks at the Census Bureau get done counting national noses they start having fun with the numbers.  Missouri wins twice when they do.

A few weeks ago, the census geeks figured that the national population center is near Hartville, population 594, in southwest Missouri’s Wright County.  Now they’ve figured the population center of each state and Missouri’s balance point is near a bend in the Osage River east of Brazito, an unincorporated community about 12 or 13 miles from Jefferson City.

Brazito is served by the post office in Jefferson City and its street addresses have the Jefferson City zip code of 65109.

So Jefferson City IS the center of the state!  Wink, wink.

The designation as the state’s population center is one of two historical events connected with Brazito. The first is that it was named for a Christmas Day, 1846 battle in the Mexican War by members of the First Regiment Missouri Mounted Volunteers under Alexander Doniphan.

The map is from the book J. T. Hughes wrote about the exploits of the unit, Doniphan’s Expedition, published in 1847, shortly after the group returned from opening central Mexico to American military occupation after the later Battle of Chihuahua. It’s an epic story if you want to learn more about the march from Fort Leavenworth to Santa Fe, the Mexican capital taken without a shot being fired, and then south through the arid country side to the battle site near El Paso and then on to Chihuahua.

The other historical moment happened on August 9, 1974, about 39,000 feet over Brazito when Air Force One pilot, Col. Ralph Albertazzie, radioed Kansas City ground control from his blue and white Boeing 707, “This was Air Force One. Will you change our call sign to Sierra Alpha Mike 27-thousand?”  (That’s military language to make sure the receiving person knows it refers to the letters SAM.)

“Roger, Sierra Alpha Mike 27-thousand. Good luck to the President.”

“Roger.  27-thousand.”

It was three minutes, 25 seconds past noon.  Someone reached down and locked the box containing the secret military codes.

And the Boeing 707 was no longer Air Force One, the designation given to any Air Force plane carrying the President of the United States. It became another Air Force plane, tail number 27000.

The Airline Owners and Pilots Association says SAM27000 has the distinction of making 1,440 takeoffs as Air Force One, but it landed with that designation only 1,439 times.  This was that odd flight—on which Richard Nixon, heading back to California after his resignation in disgrace, officially left the office of President—

—over Brazito, Missouri when word came that Gerald Ford had been inaugurated as Nixon’s successor.

SAM27000 carried more presidents to more countries for more meetings and on more missions than any Air Force One.  Seven presidents beginning with John F. Kennedy, 445 missions. And, says the AOPA, “no luggage was ever lost.”

The airplane remains the property of the Air Force but it is on permanent loan to the Reagan Presidential Library. Should you find yourself there, you can go through the airplane where history was made over Missouri’s new population center 48 years ago.

(photo credit: AOPA)

 

 

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Racial Centennial

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Lost in this year’s numerous Missouri BIcentennial observance is a CENtennial event that hints at the idea that there is a cultural problem in the telling of our history.  We cannot let this year slip away without observing that—-

A significant event from 1921 has been overlooked.

Republicans gained control of the Missouri House for the first time since the post-Civil War Reconstruction period in 1921. There was something special about that crop of Republicans.

The flavor of the historic moment, and of the times, was captured in the Jefferson CityMissouri State Journal in January of ’21:

The Fifty-first General Assembly of Missouri was about to convene. The majestic corridors of Missouri’s new capitol with their classic lines were filled with people approaching the chambers of the two houses…The hall of the House of Representatives, with its imperial columns and lofty galleries, was he center of attraction…It was the Missouri of Thomas Hart Benton, Francis Preston Blair, William Joel Stone, Francis Marion Cockrell, George Graham Vest, Sterling Price, “Jo” Shelby, and a thousand figures of great renown…

Down the middle aisle filled with Missouri’s chosen, came a negro waiter from the City of St. Louis, fresh from the pots and pans of the City Club’s kitchen. He walked with the assurance of the state’s exalted. He strode with the confidence of one invested with new authority, and his black countenance shown with the pleasure of his new role, his eyes sparkled with delight. Passing beyond the lesser lights, he took his seat near the Speaker’s dais, and claimed his own.  Alone, of all the desks in the hall, his was piled mountain high with floral tributes from his race. Others were bare of decoration, but his was conspicuous for the profuseness of its splendor.

He was the representative-elect from the Sixth District of the state’s FIRST CITY—the wealthiest, most highly cultured constituency in the state. He was the first negro to be elected to the Missouri legislature. Albeit he had neglected to meet the constitutional qualifications of paying taxes, he had  been provided by the St. Louis machine which had selected him, with what is known as a “politician’s lot” a space of ground scarcely large enough to accommodate a good-sized box, with taxes of the princely rate of $1 a year. He had won at the polls, and he held his seat. Walther Hall Moore had become a full-fledged Missouri representative.

The formalities prescribed by the Constitution—fossilized relic of the white man’s rule—were complied with, and the House adjourned.  He stood at his place, with the broad smile, so natural with men of his race, and divided his roses among a congratulating group of Republican members and their wives, who surrounded him in their eager desire to grasp his hand. They bore forth his flowers proudly, while a little group of blacks in the galleries cheered and the Lieutenant Governor of the state—like himself, a St. Louis Republican—welcomed him to his new duties.

The name was WALTHALL, not Walther.  A few days after the condescending description of his entrance into the House chamber he introduced his first bill—making Lincoln Institute “into a State university for negroes” and providing a million-dollar appropriation for that purpose. One account said, “This is one of the things demanded from the Republicans by negroes during the last campaign, but the Republican platform convention refused to include it in the platform.”  Nonetheless, Moore got his bill passed.”

Moore’s district was three-quarters white.  He was not re-elected in 1922, but was elected in ’24, ’26, and ’28.  He was a postal clerk, not a waiter.  He was 34 years old when he first took his seat in the House. He was just short of 74 when he died in St. Louis in 1960.

The year he died, three African-Americans were elected to the House: Baptist minister William Wright, lawyer Hugh J. White, and retired postal worker Henry W. Wheeler. All were from St. Louis.

It took another forty years before the first black State Senator was elected (Theodore McNeal) and the state has yet to elect a person of color to any of its executive branch positions—a century after Walthall Moore walked down the center aisle of the House of Representative to take his seat.

Someday, though…….

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Alright alright alright

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—-As potential next Texas Governor Matthew McConaughey says.

Governor Parson is going to ask the legislature next year to give salaried state workers a 5.5% pay raise and pay hourly workers $15 an hour.

The governor proposes; the legislature disposes.  We’ve all heard that.  So proposing is one thing. Accomplishing something is something else.  But this is a good move.

The state minimum wage is now $11.15.   And salaries for our state workers consistently have been among the bottom five or six states.  Openpayrolls.com calculates the average state employee last year made $28,871, 56.2% below the national average for government employees.

The minimum wage boost would affect about 11,000 state workers.

A review of state employee salaries five years ago by the data-mining study organization, Stacker.com ranked Missouri 47th out of 51 with the highest and the lowest salaries in the same general field—education.  With the average monthly salary of state and local employees then, the average monthly pay for all state and local employees was $3,746. The highest paid industry was listed as “Education,” where the average higher education monthly pay was $6,796. The lowest monthly salary then was in elementary and secondary education: $2.394.

Myron Cohen, a comedian who was a frequent guest on Ed Sullivan’s “Toast of the Town” show, used to tell the story of a fellow who came home from work early and found a naked man in his bedroom closet.  “What are you doing in there?” he is asked.  “Well,” says the naked man, “w-well…..everybody has to be somewhere.”

Somebody has to be at the low end of everything, including state employees.  Missouri has been content to be that “somebody” in too many categories for far too long.  The governor’s proposal is not likely to raise Missouri’s state workers very many notches on the poorly-paid lists.  But a pay raise of about five percent for hourly workers and 5.5% for salaried employees will be a big jump for our friends and neighbors who don’t deserve the disdain they often feel when they disappear each day into the offices and cubicles where the business of a 6.1-million member corporation called Missouri is run.

Unfortunately, there are reports of legislatures in several states that are seeing all of the federal COVID relief and infrastructure funds pouring in and they have started thinking of cutting taxes instead of realizing the advantages that come from the one-time infusion while maintaining competent levels of service under current taxing levels.

We hope Missouri’s legislature will not adopt the same attitude—-although we know there are those who will continue the state’s tradition of taking steps that make it harder for the state to pay for the promises it has made to its citizens for services and programs.

Just this once, let the deserving folks in cubicles have a little financial elbow room.

 

 

The Dark History of Missouri’s first Thanksgiving

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Today’s the day.

Your obedient servant hates to be at home for much of Thanksgiving Day. Working in the newsroom on Thanksgiving morning was a refuge.  The Missourinet always worked holidays because news happens on holidays, too (a major oil spill at Christmas during the Ashcroft administration, for example), so the news staff split the day with one person on duty in the morning and a second one working the afternoon.

The reason for seeking refuge in the newsroom?   To avoid the hours of agony of smelling the turkey being cooked.  Better to get home about 1 p.m. so the torture would last only a short time.  Giving thanks on Thanksgiving Day for the opportunity for newsroom refuge all morning was never publicly expressed but was an unspoken message from your servant to his ultimate master.

Missouri did not formally celebrate Thanksgiving until 1844.  And there is a tragic part of that story.

Governor Thomas Reynolds, a Kentucky native who had been the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Illinois and after that, served three terms in the Illinois House.  He moved to Fayette, Missouri and quickly was elected to the Missouri House where he immediately became the Speaker.  After a few years as a circuit judge, he became our seventh governor in 1840. His greatest achievement as governor was eliminating imprisonment for debt.  And on October 16, 1843 he proclaimed the official celebration of Thanksgiving in Missouri:

WHEREAS, it is considered right and proper that we should gratefully acknowledge the goodness of God, displayed in the preservation of our lives, our civil and religious liberties, and our republican institutions, and for every blessing, temporal and spiritual, which we enjoy, and

WHEREAS, the protection of the State from invasion, insurrection and intestine commotion, and the citizens from pestilence and plague, equally demands a return of thanks to Him whose arm has brought this protection;

Now, THEREFORE, under a full sense of obligation and duty, and in accordance with the request of various religious denominations, I, Thomas Reynolds, Governor of the State of Missouri do by this public proclamation recommend to the people of the State, that, without any distinction of sect, denomination or creed, they observe Thursday, the thirtieth day of November, next, as a day of Thanksgiving to Almighty God, for his favor extended to us nationally and individually. “Duly signed and sealed under date October 16 1843.

What was the first Thanksgiving like in Missouri?  Amitai Etzioni and Jared Bloom, in their 2004 book, We Are What We Celebrate: Understanding Holidays and Rituals, offer William J. Hammond’s account in the Missouri Republican:

It was the first Thanksgiving Day observed in this state…and you may suppose the most was made of it…There was all sorts of frolicking…

In the morning the…Churches were thrown open for religious exercises and all were crowded to overflowing. The afternoon was observed by the gathering together of all the members of families…as I had no fireside to go to…nor no relation to talk with…the afternoon was spent with me walking like a lost sheep waiting to be gathered into the fold. But the afternoon would not last always, and night came, and with it, my time for fun. There were Methodist Sewing Societies, Presbyterian Tea Parties, and Balls in abundance and it was some time before I could make up my mind which to attend. I finally decided to stick to first principles and go to a Methodist Sewing Society.

The one which I attended was held at Mrs. McKee’s…At an early hour quite a company was assembled…All passed very pleasantly until about 8 o’clock, when Miss Mary took a particular spite against the Piano and commenced hammering it, with vocal accompaniment, which frightened me considerably and I sloped. The evening not being far advanced, I…[gave] the Presbyterians a pop by going to their Tea Party; they had a splendid supper, good speeches were made by several gentlemen, and I regretted that I did not go there first as I never spent my time more agreeably.

Governor Reynolds did not live to celebrate the first official Missouri Thanksgiving that he had proclaimed. On the morning of February 9, 1844, after breakfast and a prayer, Reynolds retired to his office at the first Executive Mansion.  He put a rifle to his forehead and pulled the trigger. He left behind a note: “In every situation in which I have  been placed, I have labored to discharge my duty faithfully to the public; but this has not protected me for the last twelve months from the slanders and abuse of my enemies, which has rendered my life a burden to me. I pray God to forgive them, and teach them more charity…Farewell.”

Walter V. N. Bay, who wrote a history of Missouri’s early judges and lawyers, said, “At the time of his death his prospects for distinction were greater than those of any man in the state, for his finial habits, pleasant demeanor, and unquestioned integrity had made him exceedingly popular, and it was a mere question of time as to his elevation to the Federal Senate.”

Bay, however, suggests “truth and candor force us to state that many of [his] friends attributed the suicide to a very different cause…To be more specific, they believed it grew out of his domestic troubles.”

He is buried in the Woodland-Old City Cemetery in Jefferson City, not far from the grave of Governor John Sappington Marmaduke, whose father, M. M. Marduke, finished out Reynolds’ term.

While there was much “frolicking” in Missouri on that first state-declared Thanksgiving Day, there undoubtedly were several people who recalled the governor who had so little to be thankful for that life was no longer possible.

(Photo Credits:  Missouri Encyclopedia/State Historical Society of Missouri; Bill Walker (tombstone in Woodland Old City Cemetery, Jefferson City).

A Decision

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I have pretty well made up my mind how I will vote in 2022.  I have decided because I remember.

—I remember November 22, 1963 when I had returned to my apartment house in Columbia after student-producing the noon newscast at KOMU-TV, during which we reported President Kennedy had gone to Texas to assure Texans he was not going to dump Lyndon Johnson from the ticket in 1963, and one of my housemates shouted down the stairs as I came through the door, “You better get up here. The President’s been shot.” I was drawing a paycheck from KFRU Radio as assistant news director under Eric Engberg (who went on to a long career as a CBS correspondent) and immediately went to the newsroom where we started gathering reaction stories to put on the air when ABC Radio broke for local coverage. It never did, not for three days.

—-I remember April 4, 1968 when a phone call to my apartment told me Martin Luther King had been shot, and another call later that he had died. I was in my first months as news director of a radio station that used to do news in Jefferson City. It was a daytime-only station and I had to wait until the next morning to report the story. And a few days later I was inside the Jefferson City News-Tribune building when Lincoln University students turned violent outside the newspaper’s doors when the editor refused to retract an editorial run a few days earlier critical of Dr. King.  A flying piece of glass came within inches of hitting me in the eye.

—-I remember June 5, 1968 when another call came to my apartment, early in the morning. “Kennedy’s been shot,” said the newstipper.  “Which one?” I asked because just a few days before handsome, young Ted Kennedy had strode into a room at the Holiday Inn to speak on behalf of his brother. “Robert,” said the caller.  The morning newspapers that had gone to press the night before were reporting that RFK, as he was being called, appeared to have won the California Democratic Primary. He was shot at 2:15 a.m., our time. Radio news people like me delivered the shocking news heard by those having breakfast that Kennedy was in critical condition.

—I remember June 6, 1968, when the phone rang again in the darkness.  “Kennedy has died,” said the caller.  He died at 3:44 a.m., our time.  The newspapers that morning reported he was still critical.  I joined other broadcasters breaking terrible news for a second straight morning to thousands of people again having breakfast.

—I remember September 22, 1975 when the national networks’ evening newscasts were interrupted by word that a woman had tried to assassinate President Ford in San Francisco. We later learned that the first of two shots she fired from only forty feet away had missed the president’s head by only five inches.

—I remember March 30, 1981. It was just before 1:30 in the afternoon in the newsroom of The Missourinet when the UPI wire machine bells began ringing with the bulletin that President Reagan had been shot and others had been wounded.  Throughout the afternoon, we were reporting reactions from our people in Congress as well as our state leaders, knowing no more than most other reporters how close we were to losing another president.

I remember these events vividly, maybe more vividly than many because, as a reporter, I was instantly and intensely involved in telling the stories to others.

I remember fears, especially in the 60s, of where our country was headed, fears that were rekindled in 1975 and in 1981.

They were nothing like the fears today.

Nothing, because the fear did not originate within the government.

Yesterday I watched the United States House of Representatives censure Republican Congressman Paul Gosar for his Twitter video showing an animated attack on Democratic Congressman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and an attack—with swords—on President Biden.  Majority Democrats forced the action after Republican leaders in the House refused to publicly say one critical word about Gosar’s action.  His “apology” during discussion of the censure resolution was no apology and was instead an attack on Biden administration immigration policy.

Only two Republicans voted for the censure resolution, which also takes away Gosar’s committee assignments: Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, who will leave the House at the end of this term, and Liz Cheney of Wyoming, whose courage in standing against the “Big Lie” has led the Wyoming Republican Party to say it no longer recognizes her as a Republican.  Kinzinger had argued that failure to hold Gosar accountable “will take us one step closer to this fantasized violence becoming real.”  It is difficult to disagree with that fear as we continue to watch the violent rhetoric that dominates one side of our political spectrum today.

Gosar reportedly told his caucus he doesn’t support political violence. He said he had not seen the Tweet and he pulled it from his account when he learned about it.

So far we have not heard any of the leaders of Gosar’s party express any misgivings about his video or disagreement with their former president’s comment that “it’s only natural” that some of those storming the capitol in January wanted to “hang Mike Pence.”

The failure of party leaders to show any spine in the face of intentional and ongoing stoking of barely-latent fires of violence and their groveling at the feet of a man who is a stranger to honesty, empathy, courtesy, respect, and other Christian values leaves me with no choice.

In normal elections my votes are scattered on both sides of the ballot. As of now, I will fill in the little box next to only one Republican’s name next year.

Only one.  Because I am so terribly disappointed in those for whom I might otherwise vote in their reluctance to stand for the values I thought they had.

I remember 1963.  And ’68 and ’75 and ’81. Never then was I so fearful for our freedoms as I am now. Never have I had so little faith in those I should trust to be servants of the people.

They cannot be servants of the people if they are slaves to one who demands their obedience and countenances every vulgarity that stems from his gross failures of character.

I am but one voter and I am easily dismissed.  But I doubt that I am just one.

I desperately hope that I am not just one.

 

 

Who should control sports wagering?

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Kurt Erickson’s article in last Friday’s Post-Dispatch should be a warning that the state’s control of casino gambling is in danger.

Erickson wrote that four of our professional sports teams are launching a petition campaign to legalize sports wagering, an issue the legislature has talked about for several years but has been unable to get out of its own way and approve.

The St. Louis Cardinals, the St. Louis Blues, the Kansas City Royals, and the St. Louis City soccer club have filed nine proposed petitions with the Secretary of State. One of them will become the focus of a campaign to amend the constitution to allow sports wagering. The proposals also establish various tax rates and earmark revenues from sports wagering.

Some of the proposals will lower the overall tax on casino gambling by creating a super-low rate on sports wagering revenues. The proposals also change the way funds from gambling taxes are allocated.

Both are issues of legislative concern—-and of concern to educators in particular.  Both are issues the legislature dealt with in the 1990s when casino gambling was first legalized. The earmarking of funds from casino gambling has been a legislative prerogative from the beginning. The legislature changed the earmarks once, moving portions of casino admission fees from support for early childhood education to support for nursing homes and cemetery development for Missouri veterans.

Legislative leaders need to protect the general assembly’s authority to determine the best interests of the people of Missouri—the people who send their representatives and senators to the capitol on their behalf.

The only way to do that is to approve sports wagering during the 2022 legislative session.

The BEST way to do that is to recognize that casino gambling laws enacted in the 1990s are no longer adequate thirty years later at a time when casino gambling as an industry and  public access to casino gambling are changing.

Additionally, it is time the legislature recognize that the two-dollar admission fee established in 1993 has become a multi-million dollar liability to the state and to the casinos’ own host communities.

Proposed legislation has been written, but not introduced, that addresses all of those topics.  One of the major provisions is increasing the admission fee to a contemporary amount that is the equivalent of 1993’s two dollars. The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics says the equivalent for this fiscal year is $3.67.  A new estimate will be released in February, during the legislative session.

The proposed legislation increases the admission fee to $3.50, leaving seventeen cents unclaimed.

The proposed legislation increases the admission fee to $3.50.  We know the casinos will vehemently oppose this provision because they like to keep a dollar-67 in 2021 dollars for every two 1993 dollars they give the state (which have a purchasing power of only a dollar and nine cents now). They’re happy getting richer and richer while the state gets poorer and poorer

The proposal leaves seventeen cents unclaimed. The filing of the possible petitions has prompted a suggestion for the remaining seventeen cents.

We know from past experience that the private owners of professional sports teams will expect the legislature to put up state taxpayer funds to help pay for a new stadium. The tub-thumping for a downtown Kansas City Royals stadium is well-underway, in fact. The state does not have the major funds the teams want it to commit without cutting funding for other state programs.  A provision not yet in the suggested gambling reform bill could direct the unclaimed seventeen cents into a state fund for construction and renovation of professional athletic facilities, alleviating the inevitable pressure on the state for help with new professional facilities.

With wagering being permitted on sports, it is only proper that part of the proceeds from that activity be directed in that direction.

One reason sports wagering legislation has struggled and foundered in past legislative sessions is the effort to bring so-called grey-market gambling machines in convenience stores under state regulation. Efforts to make the two issues run in tandem have been counterproductive.

There is no doubt that it is important the state regulate those machines. But the stakes have been increased enough on sports wagering with the proposed petition campaign that the two issues should be separated and sports wagering should be a higher priority.

Nothing in what has been written today should be considered as opposing either sports wagering or regulation of the grey market convenience store machines. The author does not oppose either but does believe our gambling laws are outdated and are costing the programs the state once promised would be funded by those taxes and fees tens of millions of dollars a year.

The governor and the legislature have many issues to consider as priorities in the 2022 session. One of them is changing the law to make it harder to circulate petitions. We hope that issue will not obscure the importance of the sports wagering effort.

The proposed petition campaign should make state authority to regulate gaming and to appropriate the proceeds from it one of the major issues as a stand-alone matter that will not be endangered by other issues.