Shots Fired in '08 GOP AG Primary and Blunt's Caught in Crossfire

The GOP's Freakshow Circus was on public tour yesterday, as Senator Matt Bartle set out his plan to revive the issue of stem cell research on the 2008 ballot in hopes of carving up the Republican electorate in a way most favorable to his burgeoning Attorney General bid. Bartle, along with sidekick Jim Lembke, has begun pushing a constitutional amendment that would undo the stem cell research amendment approved by voters last month.

Bartle's message: get ready for a scorched-earth battle within the Republican caucus that may sacrifice even the GOP governor on the altar of the far rightwing.

For Bartle, the political calculus is elementary. Observers have suggested that there will be a crowded field in the GOP primary for Attorney General in '08, with Bartle, Sen. Chris Koster, and Sen. Mike Gibbons all sure-thing entrants, and with the strong possibility that former House Speaker and current U.S. Attorney Catherine Hanaway will join the field. The trick for Bartle is to stake out the most conservative possible position amongst all candidates, as Republican primary voters often reward the nuttiest of nuts in a multi-candidate primary.

By dredging up the Stem Cell issue, Bartle believes he can activate the sorts of primary voters who are most likely to support him anyway while forcing his opponents to fight for a split of the trifling "moderate" Republican primary vote and marginalizing research supporters like Chris Koster, who is thought to be the most centrist of the potential candidates. For Koster's part, it sounds as though he's ready to take the primary fight to Bartle on the floor of the Missouri Senate:

Sen. Chris Koster, R-Harrisonville, said Tuesday that he, along with other legislators, would aggressively fight the proposed constitutional amendment.

"To replay this fight over and over again is hurting the advancement of science in Missouri, and it's time that it stop," he said.

Gibbons, of course, is in no man's land as he stands to lose in about any scenario. Help stymie the amendment procedurally in the Senate and he splits the moderate, pro-research and business votes with Koster; support the amendment and try to cut into a hardcore religious right base that's apt to dance with the one what brung them by sticking with anti-research champ Bartle.

The biggest loser as these senators fight for prime turf in the Attorney General primary is none other than GOP standard-bearer Matt Blunt. There's no issue that Blunt would rather talk about less than stem cell research. His support for the 2006 amendment ballot measure has left him disapproved of by a remarkable 51% of pro-lifers in the state, and 39% of conservatives. Asked yesteday about the efforts of Bartle and Lembke, Blunt tersely responded that their push was "unnecessary," making his unhappiness manifest.

What has to be even more disturbing to Blunt as he enters a two-year cycle in which he faces re-election is that none of his Republican "allies" in the legislature seem to care about whether their actions hurt him or not, as the focus on stem cell clearly does. Just as the Governor needs the most help from fellow GOPers to survive, those Republicans have found that pushing off from the governor is the best place to be for their own careers.

Bartle and pals may be trying to scrap a freshly minted constitutional amendment, but successful or not they're probably tossing Matt Blunt overboard with their effort. Throwing the embryo out, so to speak, with the bathwater.