Funmurphys: the Blog

It's A Beautiful Morning - State and Local

Yesterday's election went well IMHO, both nationally and locally. Sadly, Al Hanson (convicted felon) wasn't voted Missouri's State Auditor, but then I didn't expect that. But all the Amendments, Propositions, etc. actually went the way I voted, something that hasn't happened before. Some of them were very close, what were people thinking close in some instances. Some people wanted to send the tax on cigarettes through the roof, and that was only narrowly defeated. It might have passed if they had only proposed to hike them to the roof I suppose. The logic on this was classic Catch-22 (which, BTW, I saw at the Kirkwood Theatre in my yute) -- not only would the tax stop a whole bunch of smokers from smoking, it would also generously fund a bunch of Good Programs, some of which were, natch, anti-smoking programs. How it could raise money if people actually stopped smoking (or forced people into the black market, more likely) was never explained.

The only sadness in the results was that Craig Borchelt lost to Buzz Westfall for county executive, even though I expected it. The only thing that Buzz ever did to recommend himself to me was to call a judge a liar, although the trouble was it involved a case he badly blew as county prosecutor (Dennis Bulloch - which, having occured pre-internet doesn't exist as far as Google is concerned, but you can read the book). After he was first elected to county exec, it was like he joined the witness protection program, which was fine by me, except he has a propensity for scandals that somehow never seem to matter.

Missouri, fine bellweather state it is, now has a Republican House and Senate for the first time since, ah, oh, Harry S Truman was still a state legislator. Our current Democratic Governor is wildly unpopular, even with yellow dog Democrats who wouldn't vote for him for dog catcher (that's a direct quote from an acquantance who has never, and I mean never voted for a Republican, not even once). Missouri, like most states, got into a budget crunch earlier. The same day Governor Holden announced a new initiative to improve math education, he also announced that a 3 percent reduction in expected revenue would require an 18 percent cut in state expenditures. So in a couple of years we won't have Holden to kick around anymore, although it could easily be a different Democrat.