Chuck Gatschenberger

Last month, we brought you the story of Don Wells (R-Kwik Kash) and his struggles with dissenting voices and votes in this great experiment called democracy.  Today, we learned that Chuck Gatschenberger (R-Lake St. Louis) is also having trouble with this everybody gets a vote (and only one vote) concept. 

This morning, in the House Local Government Committee he chairs, Chuck tried to cast votes for at least one, and perhaps two, absent legislators.  Fortunately, alert members of the minority and staffers challenged his attempt to imagine how absent members might have voted, and he was ultimately unable to cast more than one vote from his chair.

Republican legislators may have finally found an example of voter impersonation fraud they've been so desperately seeking.

The Missouri News Horizon has put together a nice video featuring comment from Rep. Joe Fallert (D-Ste. Genevieve), Pat Dougherty of Catholic Charities (a former state legislator from St. Louis City) and Brent Butler of the Missouri Insurance Coalition explaining why Chuck Gatschenberger's (R-Lake St. Louis) mean-spirited drivers license proposal is bad news. 

Also remember that Missouri State Highway Patrol Capt. Tim Hull told the Tribune in January that "the patrol sees no safety issues for drivers who are not well-versed in English."

Nolte and Gatschenberger

Reps. Jerry Nolte (R-Gladstone) and Chuck Gatschenberger (R-Lake St. Louis) both say they want all of Missouri's drivers to take their driving tests in English because they're concerned about safety, and not because they think xenophobia plays well with voters back home.   Nolte's bill to do this, HB167, was approved by the House Rules Committee yesterday, and will be debated by the full House soon. 

If there is an honest concern with safety from Nolte and Gatschenberger, then why aren't they listening to the Missouri State Highway Patrol, whose members know a thing or two about the current system and what causes unsafe driving conditions?  Here's an overlooked passage in the the Columbia Daily Tribune story that informed the world of John Cauthorn's (R-Mexico) hatred for Teh Spanish:

The Missouri State Highway Patrol conducts written tests of would-be drivers in 12 languages, including English, said Capt. Tim Hull, director of the public education and information office. The languages include major European languages such as Spanish, French, Italian and German, as well as Chinese, Greek, Korean, Russian, Vietnamese, Japanese and Bosnian.

If a driver cannot pass the road test, they may hire, at their expense, an interpreter from a state-approved list, Hull said.

With road sign colors and symbols based on an international standard, Hull said, the patrol sees no safety issues for drivers who are not well-versed in English.

Safety “is the reason you want to make sure the driver understands the test they are taking,” Hull said.

The GOP move to make roads less safe is also opposed by the hippies at the Missouri Catholic Conference and Catholic Charities.

Rep. Chuck Gatschenberger (R-Lake Saint Louis) was the primary co-sponsor for Rep. Stanley Cox' (R-Sedalia) bill (HB131) to "gut" the just-approved-by-voters Proposition B.  When the bill was heard before the House Ag Policy Committee in January, Gatschenberger testified that Proposition B is, in the words of Show Me Progress writer Sarah Jo (who was in attendance), "an infringement on the right of breeders to make money and pay their bills."  And in the days just before the November election, Gatschenberger advised his constituents to vote against Prop B because "we have enough laws specific to this issue [puppy mill abuses] already in place."

Gatschenberger also cosponsored Rep. Tony Dugger's (R-Hartville) HB94 to repeal the law outright. 

But now, the Suburban Journals' Steve Pokin reports that Gatschenberger think all of this repeal talk has gone too far, and he's "not in favor of changing much of anything."

Like fellow St. Charles County representative Sally Faith, Gatschenberger has resorted to the lame "I just wanted a debate on the bill I co-sponsored" excuse. Please.  The repeal proposals would have been heard with or without their move to ignore their constituents, and they know it.

To make matters even more embarrassing, Gatschenberger claims now that he "hasn't read the bills."  

Yikes.

Hey everybody: Nevermind, we don't need to focus on the difficult state budget situation or the damage that might be done to Missouri schools. Also, ignore those decisions to go after Missouri workers and many other legislative schemes. 

The Missouri State Legislature definitely needs to spend more time talking about Federal issues. In fact, it might be one of the only things that saves Missourians from some of the harmful state legislation that is being proposed.

Today, Rep. Chuck Gatschenberger (R-Lake St. Louis) announced that he's fixing to tell the Federal Gubmint something about the debt ceiling, and dadgummit they better listen. He's even having one of them there press conferences!!!

State Rep. Chuck Gatschenberger, R-Lake St. Louis, plans to lead a news conference next Monday afternoon in the House Lounge that will focus on the proposal he has sponsored -- House Concurrent Resolution 19. HCR 19 calls for a constitutional amendment to "require that an increase in the federal debt be approved by a majority of the legislatures of the separate states."

As it stands, it's now up to Congress to approve any increase in the federal debt. With the debt limit expected to be reached this spring, some Tea Party groups and other conservative activists oppose increasing the limit.

 Jason Noble has the amusing and frustrating story over at the Prime Buzz of Rep. Chuck Gatschenberger (R-Lake St. Louis) using big boy words in a recent constituent newsletter about federal health care reform legislation. Here's an excerpt, as posted by Noble:

Today, Rep. Cynthia Davis (R-Other Universe) introduced HJR 49, a constitutional amendment very similar to the Missouri Roundtable for Life's latest ballot initiative (their 30th in 22 months) that would, in supporters' words, "stop taxpayer funding of abortion, human cloning, and embryonic stem cell research because they all destroy human life."  

Though it's not entirely clear at this point, the Roundtable's endorsement of this new approach may indicate that they're not able or interested in collecting the signatures to put anything on the ballot this year.

Just like the Roundtable ballot initiative it replaces, the language in Davis' proposal would allow lawmakers to withhold public funds to Missouri universities and hospitals to block lawful stem cell research, and could even prevent grants and private foundations from going to institutions like the University of Missouri. 

Steve Kraske reports in today's Star about the curious financial arrangement of Speaker Ron Richard's legislative director, Tom Smith.  Smith is a "key player" in the assigning of bills to House committees, and also happens to run a business that collected $500k last year from Republican candidates last year:

A top aide to the speaker of the Missouri House runs a political consulting business on the side that generated nearly $500,000 last year, records examined by The Kansas City Star show.

In his public job as legislative director, Tom Smith holds significant influence over the life or death of bills moving through the General Assembly. Critics said his political consulting business raises questions about the potential for a conflict of interest in one of the most powerful offices in state government.

Previous Fired Up! coverage of Smith's self-dealing can be found here.

Of course, Smith denies any hint of wrongdoing, and no Republican legislators remember an explicit demand from Smith.  “I think it’s absurd that someone could buy 1,000 pieces (of mail) and somehow have a level of influence,” Smith says. 

I think it's absurd to think that Smith's clients are only buying 1,000 pieces of mail.