David Barklage

The "Better Leadership for Missouri" campaign committee is back in action, lobbying against the nomination of former state Rep. Bill Ransdall to the State Tax Commission.

The committee has been mostly dormant since 2008, when Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder used the account to benefit from overlimit contributions without actually having the money show up on his official campaign ledger.  Fired Up! first reported on the scheme in July 2008, which was noted by the News-Leader yesterday. 

More recently , the account was used to funnel money from Sen. Jim Lembke (R-Lemay) and Rep. Mike Leara (R-St. Louis) to the "South County Citizens for Public Reform" committee. 

Here's a transcript of at least one version of the calls:

Hello, I am calling on behalf of Better Leadership for Missouri. Senator Frank Barnitz’s nominee to the state tax commission will be appointed this week to a full term. As an interim director Senator Barnitz’s nominee immediately voted to increase property taxes on farms resulting in higher taxes on farmers and higher food prices on our families. Barnitz’s nominee has failed to pledge that he wouldn’t raise property taxes on home owners. To protect Missouri taxpayers we need to let Senator Barnitz know that his appointee to the Missouri tax commission should be withdrawn. Missourians can’t afford higher taxes at this time. Call Senator Barnitz at 573- 751-2108 and encourage him to withdraw his nominee for Director of the State Tax Commission. Our address is P.O Box 903 Jefferson City Missouri 65102.

New campaign finance filings show that House Floor Leader Steve Tilley has enlisted the help of David Barklage's Strategic Communications Group.

Barklage is the the top political consultant and former chief of staff to Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder.

The word on High Street is that the two reached an agreement to work together around Christmas. Tilley's previous strategic consultant and mentor, Rod Jetton, shut down his consulting business in December after being charged with assault.

Roll Call has a rundown of Jack Goodman's consulting team for his bid in the crowded 7th Congressional District primary. 

Miles Ross will serve as Goodman’s campaign manager. Ross was most recently the executive director of Friends of Roy Blunt, plus was Goodman’s campaign manager for his state Senate campaign in 2005.

David Barklage will serve as Goodman’s general consultant. Barklage advised Missouri Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder (R) and freshman Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R) in 2008.

American Viewpoint Vice President Randall Gutermuth will be Goodman’s pollster, while John Thompson will advise communications and John B. Morgan will consult on politics and demographics.

Barklage was last seen handicapping Sarah Steelman's chances for the US Senate based on her outreach to establishment insiders like himself.

Rather than fight for Missouri's families, GOP state legislators insist on fighting amongst themselves. In a must-read piece for The Beacon, Jason Rosenbaum touches on many of the big fights at the Capitol slowing down legislation: Senate Republicans v. House Republicans, Jason Crowell v. Kurt Schaefer, Jeff Roe v. Rod Jetton, John Griesheimer v. "outside forces", John Griesheimer v. Rod Jetton, Kurt Schaefer v. Rod Jetton, Jason Crowell v. Jeff Roe and David Barklage, Jason Crowell's ego v. Ron Richard's ego, Allen Icet v. Gary Nodler, Kevin Engler v. perpetrators of physical violence... 

[W]ith roughly a month to go before lawmakers adjourn for the year, Republicans seem to be turning their aim away from the Democratic governor and instead targeting each other.

Some Senate Republicans are lobbing stinging attacks, questioning the ethics and motivations of their colleagues. Various factions seem miles apart on two of the biggest bills: 1) an economic development package and 2) a proposal to allow utility companies to recover financing costs for the construction of nuclear power plants....

The animosity among Republican lawmakers has been noticeable, going beyond simple differences of opinion.

Just another day in Jeff City:

[Sen. Kurt Schaefer, R-Columbia] who wrote the new version of the Ameren nuclear plant bill, was offended by the robo-calls his constituents received about the bill. The calls were paid for by Noranda, who hired former House Speaker Rod Jetton as a political consultant to help oppose the Ameren bill....

In debate on the floor, Schaefer asked [Jason Crowell, R-Cape Girardeau], who also employs Jetton as a consultant, if he was paying for the robo-calls. Crowell said no and retorted that Schaefer was getting bad information from two other GOP consultants, David Barklage and Jeff Roe.

Barklage is an Ameren lobbyist. Roe is also being paid to work on the Ameren bill, Crowell said.

“Ameren has got Jeff Roe and David Barklage hired on this thing and they hate Rod Jetton,” Crowell said...

Sigh.

From: Martin, Ed
Sent: Tuesday, August 07,2007 5:43 PM
To: Limbaugh Jr, Stephen
Subject: RE: dinner

I am trying ... need to get home and manage the home front.

All the best.

Ed

Ed Martin
Office of Governor Matt Blunt
(573) 751-5261

----- Original Message--------------------------------------------------

From: Stephen.N.Limbaugh.Jr@courts.mo.gov
Sent: Tuesday, August 07, 2007 5:23 PM
To: Martin, Ed
Subject: RE: dinner

To tempt you further, I am serving six reds as a tasting: a Bordeaux, a Burgundy, and a Cotes du Rhone from France, a Brunello from Italy, a Rioja from Spain, and a California cabernet blend. And of course I will have apertifs: Champagne and Tavel Rose. You think the Gov & Mrs. might want to come too on the spur of the moment? If not, anyone else from your office?

----- Original Message--------------------------------------------------

From: Martin, Ed
Sent: Tuesday, August 07,2007 12:040 PM
To: Limbaugh Jr, Stephen
Subject: RE: dinner

I am working on it. Carol has us lined up for some neighborhood function but I am trying to change it!

Ed Martin
Office of Governor Matt Blunt
(573) 751-5261

----- Original Message--------------------------------------------------

From: Stephen.N.Limbaugh.Jr@courts.mo.gov
Sent: Tuesday, August 07, 2007 10:36 AM
To: Martin, Ed
Subject: Re: dinner

Simon's home. 6:30. Peter K is wearing shorts. Barklage will be there too. Be prepared to sing at the piano with Di. I will bring a song book or two with my fine wine.

----- Original Message--------------------------------------------------

Campaign finance reports filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission by Peter Kinder's re-election campaign and a supposedly independent committee suggest that Kinder used an elaborate ploy to retrieve and utilize overlimit contributions raised between January and August of 2007 while campaign contribution limits were lifted.  Monies raised over the limits during that period were ordered returned to contributors by the Missouri Ethics Commission.

Ultimately, Kinder benefited by the use of more than $150,000 that had been returned to contributors by his campaign but later routed into another committee over which his campaign retained de facto control.

In a story on the Jetton-Kinder ethics showdown, Rosenbaum writes...

Barklage noted that Kinder never agreed to hire Jetton and had had no
idea whether he would have. A spokesman for Kinder said the first-term
lawmaker would not have hired Jetton.

Ouch! From statewide elected office to freshman legislator in the space of one sentence.  Of course, we should be so lucky.­ 

Part of the reason why the GOP rationale for eliminating campaign finance contribution limits ("We need to do away with limits so we can have transparency!") is so transparently bogus is that the High Priests of GOP campaign hackery go to such great lengths to avoid what few opportunities for transparency the current laws provide.

Consider the subject of a post which I just unpublished from the site, which was about payments by the GOP's Majority Fund Inc. to a consulting outfit run by Weston McKee for "grassroots development."  The payments wound up in the coffers of a consulting firm called "Laurus LLC."

But the Majority Fund's April Ethics Commission report says it paid $12,000 to "Larrus LLC."  And of course, anyone looking to learn anything about "Larrus LLC" --e.g., to find out who, precisely, is getting that money-- would be frustrated in that task since searches of the State's corporation database reveal nothing, because no such LLC exists under that name.

McKee has worked for the Fund for the last year and a decision was made in January to stop paying fees directly to McKee and instead begin paying them to an LLC he controls.  What do you suppose the odds are that Majority Fund
treasurer Buddy Hardin and mastermind David Barklage really didn't know
what the name of McKee's firm are?  I'd handicap the chances at slim to none.

Back in June we wrote about Paul McKee's hiring of close Peter Kinder advisor David Barklage while the lieutenant governor was pushing a massive developer tax credit of which McKee would have been the sole beneficiary.  Now there's more proof --hidden in a poorly-reported Ethics Committee in St. Charles-- that a close ally of McKee's moved tens of thousands of dollars to businesses run by David Barklage over the same period that Kinder ran interference for McKee's $100 million tax credit.

Damir Huskic

James Harris

David Barklage

Buddy Hardin

Jeff Roe

Though we've already examined Peter Kinder's intimate involvement in passing the Paul McKee tax credit bill (HB 327) through the General Assembly this past session, the subject of how the lieutenant governor came to be engaged in the issue hasn't come up.  Any analysis of that topic must include facts about the extraordinary lobby business of one Melanie Moore (in photograph at left).

Several weeks ago, FiredUp Missouri learned that multiple outfits owned by developer Paul McKee --who stood to be the sole beneficiary of tax credit legislation championed by Kinder-- had hired Melanie Moore to lobby on their behalf.  Moore has been connected to Kinder by virtue of her public appearances with the Cape Girardeau Republican at events such as 2005's Inaugural Ball.

Whether payments made by McKee to Moore were for substantive lobbying work or merely served as "inducements" for Kinder to push the bill vehemently is a question that remains unanswered.

To make matters more suspicious, Moore actually went to the trouble of beginning to do business under a different name and closing her old lobbyist registration on the same day that FiredUp posted on lobbyist/client connections between a McKee business and another Kinder loyalist. 

Virginia Young and Jake Wagman of the Post-Dispatch had an interesting story last weekend about a $100 million tax credit bill which passed the legislature this year, the benefits of which would accrue exclusively to one man, developer Paul McKee.  While the piece does well to focus on the key involvement of Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder it completely glosses over the role of longtime Kinder henchman and GOP operative David Barklage in the execution of the scheme.

The story recounts the full-court press put on by McKee --including the hiring of a full complement of Blunt-favored lobbyists-- to pass the tax credit package:

A clearer picture emerged in Jefferson City this year, when the
Legislature approved a $100 million tax credit for large-scale
developments in impoverished areas. McKee spurred Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder
to champion the bill, hired several lobbyists to push it and gave
thousands of dollars — and use of a corporate plane — to politicians
who helped pass it.

Missouri's Senate Republicans have long used a continuing ethics committee called the Senate Majority Fund as a vehicle for raising big checks from lobbyists to bankroll Senate campaigns (and for keeping the English family clothed and fed).  But apparently that committee's time has come and gone.  In its place is a new committee with the same mission but a shorter name --Majority Fund, Inc.  

And the new committee, which is apparently such a hot commodity that it began raising lobbyist dollars even before it was registered with the Missouri Ethics Commission, is run by two officers who know well how the GOP money game works --Blunt fee agents William "Buddy" Hardin and Patricia Thomas. 

This story from the St. Charles Suburban Journals provides some fascinating insight into the lengths to which GOP operatives are willing to go to win an election.

But the hypocrisy of this quote cannot go without comment:

For at least 10 years the GOP has supported incumbents in primaries,
Barklage said. Brazil wasn't helped by the fact that one of his
supporters was seen with a Democrat, Barklage said.

"Any time you have a Republican cooperating with Democratic interests it gives us a little heartburn," Barklage said.

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