Allen Icet

Former Representative Allen Icet, now the leader of Missouri's Club for Growth, is pushing Bill Randles campaign for governor. And Representative and Congressional candidate Jerry Nolte (R-Gladstone) graced a Draft Ed Martin event this weekend. 

ABC News reports that a new Kaiser Family Foundation poll shows favorable opinions of the new health care law are up in September...

...even though many people are still confused about the new provisions because (a) it's complicated and (b) Republicans have made it their mission to lie and misinform and scare people about the law as much as possible.  Tellingly, "three in ten seniors polled mistakenly believe that the new law will permit government panels to make decisions about their end-of-life care, dubbed 'death panels' by some."

The good news is that this number is actually down from July, when 36% of seniors believed the lie.  

How does this sort of misinformation make it into the public consciousness?  It's easy to blame more prominent serial misinformers like Sarah Palin, but the serial misinformers in the Missouri GOP have done their part too.  Lt. Governor Peter Kinder imagined new "death panels" on Twitter just last month (!), unable to let the lie die .  Ed Martin told people that the government was going to start euthanizing people last year, and stuck by the lie well into 2010.  House Budget Chair and soon-to-be Missouri Club for Growth chairman Allen Icet said Palin was right, "we will have what she referred to as death panels."  Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer told constituents that the government could start "encouraging assisted suicide or other forms of euthanasia."  Rep. Cynthia Davis said the new health care reform law will "encourage people to die prematurely."  The Missouri Family Policy Council's Joe Ortwerth wrote a column spreading false rumors about the "coercion elements of the end of life provisions."

And the allegedly reasonable Roy Blunt lied to KTRS listeners last August when he said "it's easy for that [death panel] debate to go either way." And for good measure, he added: "You know, when they start talking about doing this every five years, then you do begin to wonder, now, just how committed is the federal government to being sure that that decision's already been made by you well before you and your family face it."

Congratulations to everyone who participated.

Uberconservative gajillionaire Rex Sinquefield donated $25,000 to the Rep. Allen Icet campaign this weekend, his first direct contribution in the contest between Icet and Ambassador Thomas Schweich. 

Still, Sinquefield's late money isn't even enough to keep up with Schweich's last-minute money.  Prominent GOP donor Sam Fox donated an additional $30,000 on Friday, and Lt. Governor Peter Kinder upped his total investment to $220,000 on Thursday.

Lt. Governor Peter Kinder donated an additional $120,000 to Ambassador Thomas Schweich's campaign for State Auditor yesterday; this week's contribution comes on top of the $100,000 check Kinder wrote to boost Schweich's numbers on the final day of the fourth quarter of 2009.

All told, Schweich has been required to raise more than $1.2M from the Missouri GOP establishment to fend off House Budget Chair Allen Icet in the State Auditors race, since cutting his deal to drop his bid for the U.S. Senate.

Schweich expected Icet to get lost and let him have a clear primary (one of those things that Schweich used to hate), but it obviously didn't work that way.

Once upon a time, Schweich declared that "the Missouri Republican Party seems to have no plan for responsible Missourians," decried the "back-room politics of the sedentary, uncreative Republican leadership in this state," noted that Matt Blunt "left the governor's office under a cloud that has not yet lifted," and remarked that Roy Blunt "represents the Republican Party of the past, not the party of the future."  But now that he's found himself the choice of said sedentary, uncreative Republican leadership -- and the beneficiary of their financial largess -- Schweich has been somewhat reluctant to say this sort of thing. 

UPDATE: Phyllis Schlafly doubles down in a follow-up interview: "Yes I said that. It's true, too. All welfare goes to unmarried moms."

Would this do the trick?

Seventy percent of unmarried women voted for Obama. And this is because when you kick your husband out, you gotta have Big Brother government to be your provider. And they know that. And they've, they've admitted that they have all kinds of bills to continue to subsidize illegitimacy that which is now running nationwide running at 41%.

Listen to the audio, as recorded by Progress Michigan:

The Allen Icet campaign found some scary music to go along with their complaints that Ambassador Thomas Schweich doesn't hate Democrats enough.  Behold:

Responding to a complaint filed by the Thomas Schweich campaign with the Missouri Ethics Commission, Allen Icet has decided that Steve Tilley's $25,000 check was just a loan, not a contribution.

Icet spokesperson Steve Walsh: “It’s a clerical oversight. That’s what we're calling it. A clerical oversight."

UPDATE: Icet spokesman Steve Walsh: “It’s a clerical oversight. That’s what were calling it. A clerical oversight."

The Star reports this afternoon that the Thomas Schweich campaign has filed an ethics complaint against Allen Icet, alleging that a $25,000 campaign contribution from Majority Leader Steve Tilley should have been recorded as a loan instead of a contribution.  The whole complaint rests on an email exchange between Tilley and GOP fundraiser Sam Fox.

It sure looks like Tilley was trying to save some face with Fox (a big supporter of Schweich's "outsider" campaign) , eight months after his donation to Icet was made public.  If Tilley thought Icet had improperly reported the transfer as he told Fox this week, then why didn't he take that up with his House colleague a long time ago? 

The Beacon has the story today of Allen Icet and Thomas Schweich bickering about who is the biggest "insider" in the contest to see who will take on Auditor Susan Montee this fall. Schweich points to Icet's lobbyist gifts, and Icet points to the fact that Schweich is a lawyer and has campaign donors.  Schweich says Icet's accusation that he was a lobbyist is "bizarre and false."

All this is fine, I suppose, but I'm not sure how any discussion of alleged insider/outsider status can be complete without noting that Schweich once said that MOGOPers need to "shed some light on the back-room politics of the sedentary, uncreative Republican leadership in this state."

Shortly thereafter, of course, Schweich revealed himself to be a big fat hypocrite when he made his own back-room deal to drop out of the Senate race and run for Auditor. Schweich has complained that Icet didn't drop out of the race like he thought he should.

Thomas Schweich might have had some credibility as a fresh-faced reformer in early 2009, but those days are long gone.

Picking up on the hypocrisy in Thomas Schweich's new promise to eschew lobbyist gifts he's hasn't been offered, the Allen Icet campaign fires back with a press release about "mega-donations." From that release:

“If Tom was serious about rejecting special interest gifts, he would return the mega-donations they’ve lavished on his campaign; including the $10,000 he received from Access Health Solutions from Florida on 4/15/2010, the $5,000 he received from the Republican Jewish Coalition PAC on 9/25/2009, the $500 he received from The Stolar Partnership PAC on 10/1/2009 and the $500 he received from the Cooperative of American Physicians from California on 2/1/2010,” explained Steve Walsh, spokesman for the Icet campaign.

What's missing from this list of mega-donations?  The actual mega-donations.  Like $100,000 from Peter Kinder, $20,000 from Scott Wilson, $18,000 from Marilyn Fox, $15,000 from Roy Pfautch, $10,500 from David Barklage's Strategic Communications, $10,000 from David Humphreys ....

Icet explained his sober approach to auditing at the Poplar Bluff 'Patriot Rally' in January

GOP Auditor candidate Allen Icet believes the legislative budget he oversaw as House Budget Chair spends too much money.  But he'd rather you didn't say that the General Assembly failed to pass a balanced budget for FY2011, thank you very much. 

To be clear, Icet agrees that Gov. Jay Nixon needs to cut about $350 million from the budget bills passed last month. And no one can argue that Icet and GOP leaders failed to pass the legislation required to achieve $89M in efficiencies included in their budget bills.  Furthermore, Icet has little room to complain about the reduced revenue projection for next year, seeing how he signed on to the consensus revenue estimate with the Governor and Senate Budget Chair Robert Mayer back in January. 

Icet just doesn't want anyone talking about the legislature's "inadequate" budget while he's out there telling voters about his alleged "fiscal sanity and common sense conservative values."

We couldn't afford Mr. Plumber's appearance fees for this blog post, so I had to run with this picture of a fake Mr. Plumber

Eli Yokley of The Fuse Joplin has an amusing and perplexing follow-up in the Is-Samuel-Joseph-Wurzelbacher-A-Paid-Celebrity-Endorser? saga.  Yokley , who first wrote about the possibility of a fee structure in April, asked Mr. Plumber this week to explain his compensation from the Allen Icet campaign. 

After telling a group of voters at the Icet for Auditor rally to “question” their political leaders, ‘Joe the Plumber’ didn’t appreciate our question.

“Alright – the question almost infers that I'm doing a bad thing, and I don’t really care for the question. That’s one of those questions that’s really silly, you guys pulling the republicans, the republicans pulling the democrats, it’s just a bunch of bullshit,” ‘Joe’ said after being asked whether or not he was being paid to support Allen Icet.

He says, “No I'm not being paid to be here – but my expenses are being covered to be here.”

I really don't understand why Mr. Plumber is so annoyed with this line of questioning. Allen Icet said his campaign is paying Wurzelbacher to be here. "He is being paid to come into the state and help me campaign and get the name out, get the message out," Icet told the News-Leader on April 16. 

"I guess my answer to that is: over 145 requests, seven candidates; I’m a lousy whore."

Samuel Wurzelbacher responds to Thomas Schweich's assertions that Allen Icet 'bought' his endorsement

Samuel Wurzelbacher, hired gun, ambassador squisher

Thomas Schweich wants/needs to change the subject in the GOP's primary for State Auditor, and is poking at Allen Icet's hiring of "Joe the Plumber" for upcoming campaign events. "Rather than earn support and endorsements on merit, qualifications and values, Icet is having to buy endorsements," says Schweich's treasurer.  Icet's campaign has described Samuel Wurzelbacher's involvement as an "endorsement," even though it looks far more like a paid celebrity appearance.

On a slightly different subject: It's worth noting that the current back and forth the  primary relies heavily on the Missouri blogosphere.  Schweich's latest press release focuses on the fees paid to Wurzelbacher, an issue first raised at The Fuse Joplin. The release also cites a Missouri Record piece by David Steelman to back up the argument that Icet isn't the brave conservative he pretends to be.  And, of course, there are Fired Up!'s stories about Schweich's music video.

The Missouri House just approved the Senate's proposal to allow voters to express their feelings about the new federal health care law in the August primary election. If passed, it would add a provision into state statute intended to block the federal government from taxing people who choose not to buy health insurance, though no one seems to know how such a prohibition would work.  Truthfully, it's just a symbolic vote, pushed by the most conservative of legislators to give their tea party supporters a warm and fuzzy feeling.

But just because it may be a meaningless statute doesn't mean it's devoid of political consequences.  Specifically, Republican candidates who have positioned themselves as the 'true conservatives' in their primaries stand to benefit from an excited tea party base.  A few candidates come to mind...

A brand new press release from the Allen Icet for Auditor campaign smacks Thomas Schweich for his "doublespeak" regarding the "Gimme Back My Freedom" music video that has been pulled from YouTube.  Their release:

Video Time-line Shows Schweich’s Inconsistency
Are Tom Schweich’s Song Writing Chops as Bogus as Conservative Credentials?

Eli Yokley at The Fuse Joplin asks an interesting question this morning: Is Samuel Wurzelbacher endorsing Allen Icet out of the goodness of his heart?  Or as part of a squeeze-every-dollar-out-my-Joe-the-Plumber-infamy business strategy? 

Either way, Team Tom Schweich is happy to get a dig in. "All of Schweich's events in the past and for future will be all profit for the campaign–meaning no fees for [Mitt] Romney, [John] Bolton, etc," an anonymous Schweich supporter tells Yokely.

In today's Sedalia Democrat:

Icet, of Wildwood, has solid conservative credentials that should be enough to appeal to Republican voters without having to pander to those who are easily wooed by a pseudo-celebrity. While we are certain that Icet knows the perilous condition of Missouri’s financial situation, we question whether Joe the Plumber, a resident of Ohio, really knows anything substantive about Icet, our state’s finances, what a state auditor does or even where Missouri is on the map.

On April 1, we posted a fake story about how auditor candidate Thomas Schweich might have been looking for a new backroom deal to leave the race. Schweich accepted a deal to quit the U.S. Senate race last year after complaining publicly about Republican powerbrokers' backroom deals to avoid primaries, and has since complained about how Allen Icet didn't agree to give Schweich a clear shot to challenge incumbent Susan Montee. 

We thought the gag was funny, given Schweich's hypocrisy and new disgust for the democratic process, and were delighted to see Schweich and key backer Peter Kinder respond to the post in The Beacon.  But a new story in the Post-Dispatch offers a clue as to why Schweich and Kinder were so quick to respond to an obvious joke:

[Icet't campaign] staff change took place following a meeting between the camps of the two Republican candidates for auditor, Icet and former Ambassador Thomas Schweich, that was brokered by leaders in the Missouri GOP. According to sources with knowledge of the meeting, Republicans were hoping that either Icet or Schweich would bow out of the race, but neither will.

Fifteen employees for MOSERS, the state's chief retirement system, will collect $370,000 in bonuses in June.  The checks were originally scheduled to be cut in February, but the agency is delaying payment until the legislature adjourns. Virginia Young for the Post-Dispatch:

[Rick] Dahl, chief investment officer for the Missouri State Employees Retirement System, will receive a $125,155 cash bonus this summer and up to that amount in deferred compensation, payable in two years.

In effect, he could double his $250,309 salary.

Dahl's 14-member staff will receive smaller bonuses, splitting about $243,000. The payments, originally scheduled for February, are slated to go out in June, a delay designed to avoid public scrutiny amid legislative budget-cutting.