Kansas City’s city manager, Wayne Cauthen, is out of a job after a majority of the KC City Council surprisingly voted to remove him from office yesterday. We don’t talk about city managers too much on the eastern side of the state. St. Louis city does not use one [...]
Organizing for America is planning to begin airing this ad on national cable next week. It was picked from thousands of entries submitted from across the country, and was created by Eric Hurt.
A pretty powerful ad.
[...]
Today marks the two year anniversary of Ed Martin's replacement as chief of staff for former Gov. Matt Blunt.
Hours after his ceremonial pardon of a Thanksgiving turkey, Blunt was repeatedly asked to explain Martin's departure. Blunt refused to offer direct answers, and then finally said:
"If [...]This article in the Fulton Sun details all the things the Fulton Public Schools expect entering kindergartners to be able to do:
Social and emotional skills screeners look for include children being able to go to the bathroom by themselves, sharing toys, sitting and listening, showing independence and learning how [...]
Sen. McCaskill
WASHINGTON — Internet scammers beware. Claire McCaskill’s on a tear.
Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., is “absolutely in a rage” about an Internet scam that bilked her mother while she was online shopping, according to a Senate colleague.
During a committee hearing…
[...]
Bowlin
ST. LOUIS — Mayor Francis Slay has added another member of the Facebook generation to his office staff.
New press secretary Kara Bowlin, 25, began work in Room 200 last week, adding to the crop of 20-somethings that have taken posts…
[...]
Uh oh. News media and bloggers have been reporting all week about federal stimulus dollars going to fictitious congressional districts. The website Watchdog.org reported that, nationwide, the fictitious districts are receiving $6.4 billion in stimulus money.
I did some reporting of my own over at Policy Pulse, the Show-Me [...]
Though the the House ethics committee cleared Rep. Sam Graves last month of wrongdoing connected to an appearance by a friend last spring, the handling of Graves' matter has remained in the news. The House ethics committee and the new semiautonomous Office of Congressional Ethics' [...]
U.S. Senate candidate Todd Tiahrt said today it's time to halt TARP, otherwise known as the Wall Street bailout program.
All unobligated TARP funds remaining after Dec. 31 would be applied toward reducing the national debt, Tiahrt, a Republican, said. It is estimated that $200 billion in unspent TARP funds could be returned to [...]
TOPEKA | Kansas unemployment rate went DOWN in October to 6.4 percent. Down?
Yes, but don’t get too excited. The state’s Department of Labor says the dip (September’s jobless number was 6.8 percent) is mostly due to seasonal factors.
The monthly job data was released this morning by the Department of Labor.
Kansas [...]
By Bill Arthur
If you have previously read my column, it shouldn’t be difficult to ascertain my belief that Barack Obama is the worst President this country has ever produced. I also believe he is destroying much of what has traditionally [...]
From Talking Points Memo:
The new national poll from Public Policy Polling (D) has an astonishing number about paranoia among the GOP base: Republicans do not think President Obama actually won the 2008 election -- instead, ACORN stole it.
Behind the scenes of the Cauthen suspension
Blogging the divide between U.S. and Cuba
A blogger contends that if we stop offering fair trials in the United States, then we have become terrorized, U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill offers up a hand-drawn map of Missouri for [...]
Sen. Claire McCaskill yesterday twittered this:
"If we printed the health care bill in regular size font it would be same legnth as Sarah Palin's book, but with more meat on the bone."
Snappp!
from washingtonpost.com
Growing discontent over the economy and frustration with efforts to speed its recovery boiled over Thursday on Capitol Hill in a wave of criticism and outright anger directed at the Obama administration.
Episodes in both houses of Congress exposed the raw nerves of lawmakers flooded with stories of unemployment [...]
If you haven't sent in your submissions for our Thanksgiving-themed awards, please do so today!
As a refresher, we're accepting nominations for two broad categories of Turkey Day Awards:
Leaders and organizations for whom we are thankful The Turkeys in Missouri politicsSend us your thoughts here.
[...]From The Hill, in an article titled "Vote records can hamper member's [sic] political ambitions":
The last Republican running in a competitive state, Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), will be forced to fend off attacks that, as a former member of GOP leadership, he is a Washington insider. To drive this [...]
The topic of my capstone (thesis) for my Masters in Urban Planning is the pedestrian mall. I’ve taken on the ambitious task of documenting every pedestrian mall built in North America between 1959-1984. So far I have documentation on 135 pedestrian malls created during this 25-year period. Of those I [...]
Scooter J makes an excellent argument against lackluster planning for this weekend's Catholic Conference that's pretty much going to kill downtown biz for the weekend. [...] 
I always thought Council Lady Cathy Jolly was universally beloved because she's a former cheerleader (I think) . . . It turns out that a great many in South Kansas City can't stand her or her Red Light Cameras.' [...] 
The Catholic Key Blog Carries A Papal Message To The Local Catholic Youth Conference . . . It's pretty standard, boring stuff but it's nice that there's no Jazz or BBQ reference which is ritual for anyone mentioning this town. [...] 
Nick Sloan isn't quitting after all . . . Sometimes a lack of commitment is a good thing, or at least that's what I tell just about every broad I know.' [...] 
Carthage-based Leggett & Platt dropped $10,000 into the campaign account of Speaker of the House Ron Richard, R-Joplin, according to a 48-hour report filed today with the Missouri Ethics Commission.
King political prognosticator Charlie Cook has switched his ranking for Missouri's 4th Congressional District race from "a likely Democratic seat" to "a lean Democratic seat" in 2010. The move is minor, and still favors Rep. Ike Skelton. But it's also significant for Republicans who believe [...] 
Charlie Dooley
St. Louis County plans to retire $5,638,791 in bonds two years early. The move would save the county $400,000 in interest costs, but not give the county much room to propose a “no tax increase” bond issue.
“No tax increase”…
[...]Investment staff at the state retirement system would not get bonuses in years when the system’s investments lost money under a plan that tentatively advanced today.
Public Policy Polling released the second part of their recent Missouri poll today. Regarding Gov. Nixon:
It's been a pretty successful first year for the state's new Governor. 42% of voters approve of the job he's doing to 25% disapproving. In a time when the popularity of [...]
Financialstability.gov no longer says “Coming Soon.” Now it reads like any other campaign website:
America is back from the brink of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. It was helped back by the actions of the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve, and especially the forceful [...]
The City Council just upheld Mayor Funkhouser’s surprise removal of City Manager Wayne Cauthen. Councilmembers Cindy Circo, Beth Gottstein, and Jan Marcason all switched sides after originally voting to keep the Manager back in December 2007.
It seems that for the moment that the Manager is suspended with pay. The Council [...]
Updated to include email exchange with Stigall and mayor's office *.
For more years than he can remember, Bill Grigsby was the master of ceremonies at the Mayor’s Christmas Tree lighting ceremony at Crown Center.
Good ol’ Grigs. Smiling. Jovial. Kansas City’s biggest booster, and entirely non-controversial.
“I did it for a lot of [...]
Speaking at last night's term limits forum, Ed Martin let it slip that his "Term Limits for Missouri" organization isn't expected to gather enough signatures for the term limit initiative he filed last December.
"We could gather signatures. I don't know that we will," he said about his proposal [...]
KCTV5 
KC Tribune: Marcason to 
KCTV5: Royals To Debut 
Best crime story of the week from Crime Scene KC: 
