Via @JohnCombest. It's nice of John Brunner's handlers to let him out among the people at Hunter Farms this evening. 

"Kinder says he doesn't understand why Humphreys is upset" -- from today's American Spectator story.

Chris Christie is once again being discussed as a candidate for president, and, if editorial writers and public polling in his home state are any indication, that is a laughable notion. 

However, his trip to Missouri is a fairly obvious attempt to boost his national profile further and create visibility in a traditional swing state. But let's take a look at what a Newark editorial writer thinks about his presidential prospects:

CAN WE STOP THE INSANITY? Chris Christie will never be president. There, I said it. Quote me. Note the date and time. Chisel this onto my tombstone when I pass, probably from Christie Overload.

He won’t be president. Not in 2013. Not in 2017. Not from here to Hawaii. Not from here to eternity.

It looks like some people in Missouri have also been paying attention to his actions in New Jersey. I guess he didn't realize that the way Missourians govern their state is none of his business.   

Very sad news: "Boone County Presiding Commissioner Ed Robb collapsed and died around 10:30 p.m. Saturday after leaving a birthday party for one of his sons in downtown Columbia. He was 69."  Robb served in the Missouri House from 2004 to 2008.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the Robb family. 

Steve Tilley and Rob Mayer on the air

The Post-Dispatch's take on the struggling special session: "In America, but especially in Missouri, money talks. The man most responsible for delaying, and possibly killing, the bill you care about is named Steve Tilley, a Republican from Perryville who is speaker of the Missouri House. In recent years, Mr. Tilley has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from the primary critics of your proposal: retired investor Rex Sinquefield, who also funds the think-tank Show-Me Institute, and developers who get rich from government programs intended to build low-income housing projects. Our suggestion is simple: Next time, put your money on the right horse."

The Star: "What went wrong? The simplest explanation is that Republican legislative leaders failed to do enough groundwork before asking Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon to call a special session. The barriers seen over the last three weeks involve GOP infighting in the Senate and disagreements between the Republican majorities in the Senate and House."

Missourinet's Bob Priddy: "Those of us who have been covering state government for a few decades have done something the legislature hasn’t been able to do.  We have reached a consensus. We agree that we’ve never seen a special legislative session that is such a mess as this one.  There already has been a bunch of finger pointing about who’s to blame.  There is no shortage of suspects."

Video of Speaker Steve Tilley speaking this afternoon after the House adjourned, via Jason Rosenbaum. 

Missourians for Fair Taxation today filed suit in Cole County Circuit Court against the State Auditor for a fiscal note that “does nothing to inform voters of the risky high-stakes gamble they would be asked to take,” and against the Secretary of State for a summary statement that “does not sufficiently advise Missouri voters of the uncertainty and chaos that will be caused by adoption of this amendment to our Constitution.” 

The full petition and the associated press release from the Realtors’ committee formed to defeat Rex Sinquefield’s tax scheme may be read below the jump.

Yesterday, 30 Sierra Club members toured the ABB factory in Jefferson City, MO, where the company makes transformers that are used in wind generators and solar collectors.

The goal of the tour was to see firsthand how renewable energy creates good, family-wage jobs locally and around Missouri.  ABB employs about 650 workers at its facilities in Jefferson City, MO.

The Sierra Club organized the tour in response to Missouri General Assembly actions to curtail development of renewable energy in the state.  This spring, the General Assembly overturned a Public Service Commission rule that would have required utilities like Ameren to meet its 15 percent renewable energy standard (mandated under Proposition C, passed in November 2008) by counting electricity that was either generated or consumed here in Missouri.  By nullifying this rule, the General Assembly is allowing utilities to buy renewable energy credits from anywhere in the world in order to meet its renewable energy targets.  When the wind generators are located in China instead of here, Missourians do not enjoy the benefits of clean energy – including both local jobs as well as cleaner air.

This ABB plant manufactured the transformers that were installed in the Lost Creek Wind Farm, located near King City, Missouri.  Lost Creek is the largest wind farm in Missouri, and utilizes one hundred transformers that were made by ABB.

After a two-month bathroom break, wealthy GOP donors have started sending checks to Peter Kinder again. Here's a snapshot of donations worth more than $5,000 reported to the Missouri Ethics Commission since July 27.  

Brian Nieves likes it Hard Core.

-- Forwarded message --
From: Brian Nieves 
Date: Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 4:24 PM
Subject: 2nd Annual, 2nd Amendment Freedom Rally & Gun Show!!
To: 

Calling All Patriots ... Join Senator Brian Nieves for our 2nd Annual, 2nd Amendment Freedom Rally & Gun Show!

Saturday, Oct. 1st from 10a-4p at the Franklin County Baptist Association Building. Located in Union, Mo. at 785 Butterfield Dr.   The building is easy to find on Hwy 47 between Union & St. Clair.

Top Door Prize of the day ... Your choice of a Glock 23 or 27 - The G23 & G27 are Brian's personal favorites for conceal carry and you may end up taking one home!

Come Celebrate with the Senator who may very well be the Missouri Senate's most Hard Core Supporter of our God Given Right to Protect Ourselves and the 2nd Amendment that acknowledges that Personal Right!

Many of you joined us last year for this Very Unique Event so you know how much fun it is.

* Patriot Booths
* Vendor & Display Booths
* Guns Guns and more GUNS!
* Local 2nd Amendment Celebrities
* Live Outdoorsman Demonstrations
* Good Food, Good Fun, Festivities & Friends
* AR-15 and other "Black Gun" demonstrations
* Come select that new or used gun you'd like to buy
* Did we mention there will be Guns Guns & more GUNS!??!

h/t TPM

The Hotline's Sean Sullivan surveys the GOP landscape in Missouri: "[O]utside money and a weak environment can't overcome deeply flawed candidates. Just look at Colorado, a state positioned to flip Republican, but which elected a Democratic governor and a Democrats senator due to weak opposition. What's already out there about Kinder is bad, but not impossible to overcome. But if more new negative news surfaces, it could doom his chances. In the Senate race, there is still time for Steelman, Akin or Brunner to emerge as credible challengers, but so far, McCaskill hasn't yet met her match."

From the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities' Off the Charts blog:  "Deep poverty — that is, the share of the population with incomes below half the poverty line — rose by a statistically significant amount in 40 states (including the District of Columbia) from 2007 to 2010 and fell in none, Census Bureau data released today show."

According to the census bureau, 385,117 Missourians lived below half the poverty line in 2010. 

Simply unacceptable.

More from the latest Public Policy Polling survey:

Roy Blunt is proving to be a pretty unpopular Senator.  Only 33% of voters approve of the job he's doing to 42% who disapprove. Independents split against him 28/44 and only 54% of Republicans are happy with him compared to 63% of Democrats who give him poor marks.  The fact that Blunt won such an overwhelming victory last year even though he's so unpopular is really symbolic of how brutal the climate was for Democrats in 2o1o- the GOP could have put up most anyone and won the Senate race in Missouri last year.  Blunt's someone who could be really vulnerable if he was running in a year that was good for Democrats or even pretty neutral.  But his timing was perfect last year.

As the Star's Dave Helling notes, PPP's work the last cycle "actually exhibited a slight bias toward Republican candidates," despite their progressive orientation and client list.

At Crooks and Liars, Brad Reed writes that Tim Noah “makes an excellent point that it's become perfectly acceptable for elected officials to claim that showering already-wealthy people with even more money is the only way to create jobs since they otherwise might feel sad and lose their will to work.”

Yes, we've had our fair share of "trickle-down" troglodytes for some time now. In 1932, FDR used the phrase to criticize Hoover and Mellon. But similar phraseology pre-dated even that one. Here's William Jennings Bryan in 1896, in a section of his famous Cross of Gold speech: 

There are two ideas of government. There are those who believe that, if you will only legislate to make the well-to-do prosperous, their prosperity will leak through on those below. The Democratic idea, however, has been that if you legislate to make the masses prosperous, their prosperity will find its way up through every class which rests upon them.

Miss Liberty thinks William Jennings Bryan was a man before his time and asks if he will please come back!

This is the time where most people would say I told you so, but that would just be childish.