Missouri’s Governor Nixon asked the Missouri Attorney General to file suit in court to block the Army Corps of Engineers from blowing up the Birds Point Levee.
Blowing the levee will flood farmland and about 100 homes in Missouri, but not blowing the levee could very well endanger the entire town of Cairo, Illinois. A few years back, I wrote about Cairo, Illinois the town that pulls you in, as it pushes you away.
When Time covered Cairo, Illinois last year it described the town as poor, black, and ugly. It is, indeed, very poor and predominately black, but I cannot find it ugly. Or if I do, it’s an ugliness that reflects the south and our history and the civil rights fight and all that is both good and bad about this part of the country.
I guess the best description I have of Cairo is that it is a very real town.
Of course, none of this matters to the Missouri governor who wants to protect the farmland of Missourians. Missourians who happened to know they were building farms on lands designated as spillway, and that there was a potential for the Corps to breach the levee if flood proportions matched that of the 1937 floods. Well, we’re about to pass the levels of the 1937 floods.
The bill we fought so hard for, Proposition B, was killed today. It was killed by the state legislature, and it was killed by Governor Nixon. It had the honor of dying in a bi-partisan fashion, killed by Democrat and Republican alike.
I have found there is one thing that can bring both parties together: the vote of the people. All we have to do is enact direct democracy at the national level, and politicos from both parties will bond tightly, in a mutual shared horror of “we the people”.
Governor Nixon manufactured a “compromise” that was supposed to be an improvement of the bill the legislature began, but as I’m writing over at Puppies at Burningbird, it was a simple matter to discover the gaps and loopholes the breeders can easily find in this new “improved” law. Not only was Proposition B ripped to shreds today, but it was done so with compliance by a couple of major players in the animal welfare movement in Missouri: the Humane Society of Missouri and the Missouri Alliance for Animal Legislation. Some would say they meant well; I will be charitable and just call them foolish.
Betrayed. I feel betrayed. But I don’t matter. What does matter is that the dogs were betrayed. In the end, even the most progressive of people on Twitter were implying that, after all, they’re just dogs.
Susan Redden in the Joplin Globe on Governor Nixon’s “solution”:
I can only imagine how the lawmakers must feel after passing legislation and then seeing the governor turn around and propose his own plan. They must feel like the voters who passed Proposition B.
Leaving aside this being a politically stupid move, the demand for a signature on SB 113 is nothing more than a way for the SB 113 supporters to gloat about their control—over the state, over the state leadership, and over the will of the people of Missouri.
If Governor Nixon vetoes SB 113, these same leaders would hustle their butts in order to ensure the “compromise” is passed. So the question is: is Nixon as politically astute as some people claim him to be? Not if Department of Agriculture’s Jon Hagler’s appearance at the pro-SB 113 rally is any indication.
In his speech to the SB 113 supporters, Hagler stated that “Missourians, not outside state interests, control our state’s future”. I have to wonder who Hagler think voted for Proposition B last November. Last I heard, you had to be a resident of this state in order to vote in Missouri.
By his statement, does Dr. Hagler consider St. Louis, Kansas City, and all the urban centers that voted for Proposition B to be “outside state interests”? How about the people in his wife, Representative Linda Black’s, district? They voted for Proposition B—does that mean the people in Representative Black’s district are somehow “outside state interests”, too?
We assume that Dr. Hagler meant HSUS with his little quip. I guess a national organization is an “outside interest”. Does this mean, then, that lobbyists from the NRA will also be shown the door in Jefferson City? After all, it was lobbyists from NRA, another national organization, and hence an “outside interest”, who helped overturn the voter-approved measure on conceal carry.
Let’s be blunt, gentlemen: what you’re saying with your actions and your speeches is that you’re not interested in representing the people of the state— not if it means going against powerful agribusiness interests. The bottom line is that the people of Missouri voted for Proposition B. To not support the people of this state is nothing more than pandering to special interests for the purposes of political expediency.
By the way, I joined the HSUS today. Since I also live in St. Louis, I guess that makes me a double-outsider to the folks in Jefferson City.
