A shockwave is rippling through
“My vision for the state is not a far-right vision,” Koster told The
The bloom was fading from the rose for Koster during last fall’s bruising battle over Amendment 2, it would seem. Koster is a strong advocate for embryonic stem cell research, and efforts to criminalize science by the MO GOP has been a burr under his saddle for a while. He sees it through an economic-benefit lens. “The Republicans are becoming the gang who can’t shoot straight on economic development issues,” he said. Talking about the plans to expand the Stowers Institute that have been tabled for now while the squabbling commences in
Three issues combined to make the option of staying in the Republican Party an untenable proposition:
•An incessant drive by conservative Republicans to criminalize stem-cell research and halt the long-planned expansion of the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in
•A conservative assault on the state’s often-copied nonpartisan judge selection plan.
•A failure to get an economic development bill passed two years in a row.
Yesterday, he quit.
When he left the Republican Party yesterday – with over $640,000 dollars in his war chest for the AG race, all donated by Republicans – he effectively withdrew from that contest. State law does not require that he return that money, but I hope our newest member acts ethically and does so. He also needs to sever all ties with the white-trash Karl Rove, too – he must fire Jeff Roe if he hasn’t already, and publicly apologize for ever being associated with that odious creature.
With the Roe caveat, I am going to be magnanimous here and welcome him aboard, (keeping in mind that he brings with him a streak of craven opportunism a mile wide. Remember that the guy asking for a ride across the river was hatched a scorpion, and act accordingly). That said, we have a big tent, with plenty of room for the moderate Republicans who are feeling uncomfortable with where my Grandfather’s Missouri GOP has gone. I hope Koster is the start of a slow bleed of the current state GOP's life force. I hope there are a dozen more who have some common sense and come on over before the end of the year. The more the merrier and the sooner the better!
I am not saying we should give Republican refugees the keys to the car and a bottle of Beam. I am saying let’s be gracious to those who are disenchanted. It sure as hell can’t hurt us. Missourians are intelligent and pretty much tend toward moderation and get put-off by extremes in all forms. There is a libertarian streak that runs through the state as a whole, left, right and center.
I learned first-hand about Missourians, moderate politics, and splitting the ballot in 1972. That summer I spent on my grandparent’s farm in the
[Cross-posted from Watching Those We Chose]
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