States rejecting Real I. D. law

The Missouri State Legislature was among the first to jump on board requiring all residents to jump through hoops to comply with requirements of the federal Real I. D. law, one of the laws created after 9-11 which supposedly would make our nation safer.
While Missouri rolled over and enacted the legislation other states are fighting it, just as Missouri should have done:

What state officials are hoping is that Congress will repeal or modify the law, or at least provide some of the billions of dollars the states claim it will cost to establish the new licensing system nationwide.
The campaign features an odd mix of liberal Democrats, offended by a measure in the law that would effectively block illegal immigrants from getting federally compliant driver’s licenses, and conservative Republicans, who see the law as an affront to civil liberties and to states’ rights.
“This is a frontal assault on our freedoms,” said State Representative Jim Guest of Missouri, a Republican who said he was working with more than two dozen states to pass laws opposing the federal statute. “One state standing alone is not enough. But we are already gaining strong momentum here.”

Part of the problem is that no common sense is applied. When people who have had driver's license for 20, 30, 40 years or more have to prove they are Americans, it is a waste of time, both for the citizens and for the government.

Dupont rerun: It's the media's fault

The attorney general says Robert Dupont was illegally running group homes and accepting Medicaid money; the federal government charged him with fraud...and he pleaded guilty. Nevertheless, the Anderson Guest House owner tells the Joplin Globe's Derek Spellman that the media and the government have done him wrong:

Dupont, 62, reiterated that past news reports have painted an inaccurate picture of his background. He had previously told the Globe that he would compile information addressing some of the questions raised about his background, including his 2003 federal conviction for Medicaid fraud and his relationship with a Kansas City, Mo., businessman who was sent to prison for conning an elderly woman out of more than $600,000. Dupont recently supplied some of that information to the Globe, and he also said additional information would come out as the dozen civil lawsuits brought against him unfold in the coming months.

Democrats reluctant to require lobbyists to disclose roles in campaign contributions

It appears Democrats in the U. S. House of Representatives are reluctant to make some of the reforms that are necessary in order to live up to their campaign promises.
An editorial in today's Washington Post indicates Democrats, backed by the infamous K Street lobbyists, are attempting to derail efforts to eliminate the practice of bundling, lobbyists collecting campaign contributions from all of their clients and delivering it to the politicians:

As it stands, lawmakers who happily take the cash and the lobbyists who harvest it for them are all too aware of how much the former are indebted to the latter. The public is left in the dark. If House leaders want to have credibility on cleaning up the "culture of corruption" they decry, they will see to it that the lobbying package that passes the House is as strong on this score as the Senate version.

Turner Report mentioned in 417 Magazine

A big thanks to the people at 417 Magazine, Springfield, who named my blog, The Turner Report, as one of the top five blogs in the 417 region.

What's his story? Old-school ex-newspaperman morphed into 21st-century citizen journalist and government watchdog, all while teaching communication arts in Joplin public schools. He has a crackerjack ability to sift through public records to expose fetid connections between special-interest money and Missouri politicians. Also skewers the mainstream media.
Updates per day: 2 or more
Blogging since: October 2003
Usefulness factor: Helps you be an informed citizen at the ballot box.
Rating: 4/4

It is nice to know that someone's reading.
***
Congratulations to the other four blogs that were on Holman's list, KY3 Political Notebook with David Catanese, The Snarling Marmot with Amy McMasters, Moxie Blog with Dan and Nicole Chilton; and Branson, Missouri, with Darin Codon. Links to those well-deserving blogs are featured on the right-hand side of this page, except for the Moxie Blog, which I need to check out.

GateHouse spending spree to continue

Look for GateHouse Media, owner of The Carthage Press, Joplin Daily, Neosho Daily News and Bic Nickel in this area, to continue its recent series of acquisitions.
In documents filed Friday with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company announced it has secured $960 million in financing, which it intends to use to "refinance existing debt, finance the previously announced acquisition of SureWest Directories (which acquisition is subject to governmental approvals and other customary closing conditions), and finance future acquisitions."

Lamar Chat first with O'Sullivan story

It appears the Lamar Chat page at Lamarmo.com broke the story that O'Sullivan Industries is planning to reduce its Lamar employees' salaries by more than six percent.
KODE had the television beat on the story it appears. The Joplin Globe has a story in its Saturday edition. I am hoping to have a little more on this story on Saturday.

Ruestman continues to do National Rifle Association's bidding

The biggest conceit about HB 60, the second attempt by Rep. Marilyn Ruestman, R-Joplin, to enact a frontier justice bill for Missouri, is her claim that she offered the legislation because of the people who came to her crying about this need to defend themselves.
That might have passed the truth test, were it not for the fact that cookie-cutter laws of the same kind, a key legislative goal of the National Rifle Association, have been enacted in 15 states.
As I have noted in previous editions of The Turner Report, Ms. Ruestman pays her annual NRA dues out of her campaign contributions, legal, I imagine, but questionable nonetheless. Ms. Ruestman needs to pay her NRA dues out of her own pocket, just as her most favored constituents do.
I would argue that Missouri (as well as the other states) has no need for a bill allowing people to use deadly force to defend their lives and property. They already have that right under present law. All the new law does is make it more difficult for law enforcement officers to prosecute or even interrogate those who abuse their new-found freedom.
In an article in this week's Chart, the Missouri Southern State University newspaper, Ms. Ruestman says people actually do not have the right to defend themselves and she explains her bill:

"A lot of people think you can already do that, but you can't," Ruestman said. "You might be sued and lose the home you were defending.

"I have even found cases where someone had defended themselves and bonked someone on the head with a lamp or something. Then the victim, the person who's home in which this occurred, was sued by the criminal's family. This doesn't sound very fair to me."
Ruestman said until now it's been thought that if someone enters your home that you should retreat or take time to figure out what their intent is.
"That maybe okay in some instances, but in some instances you're not going to be able to ask them what they intend to do to you," Ruestman said. "To me this is a victim's rights bill. This says we're the victim.
"It's our home, for heaven's sake, let's be able to protect it."

It would be nice if Ms. Ruestman would give specifics about this court case...and even nicer if she noted all of the cases in which people defended their lives and property, and other than questioning by the police (which should happen when anyone is killed or injured by gunfire, no matter what the circumstances, did not run into any problems at all.

At least in this article, Ms. Ruestman does not continue to talk about all of her constituents who banged on her door, demanding that this legislation be passed.

'First at Five' a big improvement over 'Live with Gary and Tiffany'

At long last, the sad experiment of changing the KSN 5 p.m. newscast into a Regis and Kelly type coffee klatch has ended and "Live with Gary and Tiffany" has been replaced by "First at Five."
The change, I believe, took place a couple of weeks ago, and while many of the same elements remain in the show, sometimes all that is needed is a slight change in the packaging. This is one of those occasions.

KSN improved its program by:

-Eliminating the annoying opening, which made anchor Tiffany Alaniz appear to be more like Vanna White than an experienced news anchor. In that opening, Bandy was simply Bandy.

-Dropping the banter at the top of the show and starting with hard news and weather. I find it hard to believe there weren't news personnel at KSN who weren't embarrassed when the other stations' 5 p.m. newscasts led with some news story of some importance, many times one with tragic overtones, and Gary and Tiffany were talking about Gary's haircut, or a vacation, or Brad Pitt.

-The times I have heard the anchors of the newscast named, it has been Tiffany Alaniz and Gary Bandy, rather than the other way around. A station has a serious problem when it gives top billing to a clowning weatherman (that is not an indictment of Bandy, there is a hallowed place in our culture for clowning weathermen, as long as they are serious when the weather turns bad and Bandy always has been) over a veteran newscaster.

The 5 p.m. newscast appears to be on more solid ground thus far.

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Former Hollinger CEO to write Nixon biography

From the too good to be true category:

Former Hollinger International CEO Conrad Black, who faces federal charges in connection with his alleged fleecing of funds from his company, is going to write a biography of President Richard Nixon, according to an article in today's New York Post:

PublicAffairs will publish the tome in the United States as part of its fall list, the company said yesterday. The book is now in final edit. Black's massive criminal fraud trail is slated to begin in mid-March in Chicago on a wide variety of charges including money-laundering, mail and wire fraud, and racketeering when he ran Hollinger Inc. "He both knew Nixon and knows what it is like to be under tremendous public pressure," said Peter Osnos, PublicAffairs founder and now its editor at large.

Previously, Black wrote a biography of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

American Publishing Company, the United States subsidiary of Hollinger International, at one time owned The Carthage Press and the Neosho Daily News.

Ice storm waiver bill handed to tourism committee

You might expect that Rep. B. J. Marsh's bill to allow school districts to waive days missed during the recent ice storm would be handed to the House Education Committee, but that's not the case.
According to the House website, the bill will be heard in the Tourism Committee, which is headed by the Springfield Republican.
HB 678's 29 co-sponsors include five Joplin-area representatives, Ron Richard, R-Joplin, Marilyn Ruestman, R-Joplin, Kevin Wilson, R-Neosho, Bryan Stevenson, R-Webb City; and Ed Emery, R-Lamar.
No date has been set for a committee hearing.