Someone named Scott Canon (and presumably his editors) at the Star's PrimeBuzz blog thinks it's perfectly fine to refer to former Senator and Presidential candidate by a derisive moniker given him by no more balanced media figure than Rush Limbaugh.  

Can we count on Canon and colleagues to head their posts with whatever hilarious impotent-old-man tags we hang on John McCain?  Why am I skepical?

Tell me again about that liberal media, please.
 

Kenny "Fred Thompson" Hulshof just can't get it going.

Over half-way through his primary campaign, Hulshof has yet to field a fully functioning web page.

His site includes the reassuring tag, "full website coming soon."

As is the election.

At least Sarah doesn't leave out an entire decade of her life.

Kenny Hulshof is u­p with a TV ad in Springfield according to the KC Star.  Although I certainly understand Kenneth's need to put up an ad quickly to try to deal with his terrible poll numbers and lack of name recognition.  I was perplexed by the content of the ad.  Hushlof drives down a dirt road in a truck and almost hits a dog.  He walks through a field and invokes faith and hard work.  Says he was taught the difference between right and wrong and knows that "both Missouri and her land are blessed by God."  He says "the basic moral strength of our people" is the foundation of our future.  The ad ends by saying that Kenneth is the conservative for Governor.  So what is he trying to say exactly?  Story Continued »

Tough day for GOP unity in Jefferson City

The Kansas City Star  is reporting that GOP House Speaker Rod Jetton is facing a coup attempt by fellow Republicans.

And the Associated Press is reporting that Sarah Steelman is calling GOP Senators cowards for limiting her authority as Treasurer.

Missing in action was Kenny "Fred Thompson" Hulshof.  According to GOP sources, Kenny was taking his daily nap during the GOP-on-GOP crime spree.  Story Continued »

Judging by what he's been doing since announcing in January that he wouldn't seek a second term, Matt Blunt believes it is his role to be a guy with a big megaphone who can use his ample official resources to benefit GOP candidates by regularly attacking Democrats.  Yesterday's contrived assault on Jay Nixon and last week's childish tilt at Jeff Harris are but the most recent examples.

But despite a concerted effort to be the anti-Nixon, Blunt has been heretofore silent about the specifics of his support in the Republican gubernatorial primary.  One can only imagine that, at some point before August, the sitting governor will roll around to announcing his support for one candidate or the other in the race to succeed him.

The big question about that, of course, is whether his is support anyone wants.

Here's the ad the Barnes campaign just went up with in response to the attack ad Graves launched late last week.  Keep in mind, Sam Graves is starting his campaign with a negative attack on Barnes. 

That tells you an awful lot about him.  Special Interest Sam knows he can't run on his Washington record.

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DNC Chairman Howard Dean today announced the selection of the Blogger Corps for the Democratic National Convention.  Fired Up Missouri was chosen to represent the Show Me State.

As part of the Democratic National Convention Committee's (DNCC) commitment to engaging a broad spectrum of audiences in the 2008 Democratic National Convention experience using new technology and other creative means, Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairman Howard Dean today announced the blogs selected to participate in the DemConvention State Blogger Corps during the four-day event in August.  Governor Dean notified the blogs selected via an online video message available at www.DemConvention.com.

Fired Up is pleased to participate in this exciting endeavor.

If you have ideas about how Fired Up can make the coverage of the convention the most interesting for our readers, share them via the tipline.

If you only read one article today, read this, which details the back story on the Republican attempts to shove through a restrictive measure that will prevent registered law-abiding voters from voting. 

Bush Operative Pushes Voter-ID Law
by Jason Leopold

May 14, 2008—A senior legal adviser to the Bush-Cheney 2004 reelection campaign is working behind the scenes to help enact a Missouri state constitutional amendment that critics say would suppress the vote in the key battleground state this November by requiring voters to show proof of citizenship.

Mark “Thor” Hearne, Bush-Cheney’s national counsel in 2004 and now a partner in the St. Louis, Missouri, firm of Lathrop & Gage, has been collaborating with Missouri’s Republican state Rep. Stanley Cox, the sponsor of the constitutional amendment, Cox’s office confirmed this week...    READ FULL STORY: http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/051308b.html

Legislature ditches increased fees for driving records. 

I wonder if lobbyist Andy Blunt Jay Reichard will still get to keep his bonus from BearingPoint?

As you all know, yesterday Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama appeared in Cape Girardeau, MO to talk about the economy.

A spokesperson for the Missouri GOP was trying to spin that everything was just fine in Southeast Missouri and sent around this pic as proof.

Unsurprisingly, KC Star reporter Dave Helling picked right up on the GOP spin and quickly put up this smarty pants post trying to suggest that the Obama campaign was foolish to be appearing in Southeast Missouri because unemployment is "so low" in Cape Girardeau County.

When did it become okay to run an anti-Nixon attack machine out of the office of Governor?

Makes one think that Team Blunt should be reporting the hours spent on drafting this stuff as in-kind contributions to the eventual GOP nominee.  Of course, I'm not sure Hulshof or Steelman would take the help if it meant having to list Matt Blunt on a report as a supporter. 

In what is perhaps the best use of political cash ever embarked upon by the Missouri Republican Party, campaign finance and other documents show that the MOGOP has, for the last nine months, been paying an internet consultant who runs a political blog that regularly attacks GOP gubernatorial candidates and other elected officials.

According to reports filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission, the Missouri Republican State Committee paid $5,000 on August 31, 2007 to a committee called Missouri Spectrum.  Missouri Spectrum quickly turned around in September of 2007 and made a payment of $2,500 to an outfit called NLB Enterprises. 

NLB Enterprises is, according to its own website, a political communications consulting firm headed by a man named Christopher Arps.  NLB Enterprises LLC was registered on October 8, 2007 with the office of the Secretary of State, and lists Christopher Arps as one of the LLC's organizers on its state filings. 

Interestingly, while it doesn't mention the $14,000 judgment entered against him after a suit by the Ethics Commission, Arps' profile on the site does list a couple of the websites for which he claims responsibility.  One is the MO Spectrum website.  From his Facebook bio:

Does John McCain approve of these tactics employed by Kenny Hulshof's minions at the Missouri GOP, and why hasn't the media asked that question?