This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Feb. 19, 2010 - U.S. Rep. Roy Blunt -- Missouri's best-known Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, is capping a busy week by launching today a " 19-city 'Jobs for Missouri's Future' bus tour" in which he plans to " visit with workers and small business owners to discuss solutions to help create jobs for Missourians right now."
The tour begins this morning in Sedalia (home of the Missouri State Fair). Blunt, R-Springfield, provided no specifics of the individual stops during Thursday night's surprise announcement of the trip, other than to list the cities on his tour. They include St. Louis.
The tour appears aimed, in part, at countering the jabs Blunt has taken this week over his opposition to the federal economic-stimulus package, which was approved by Congress a year ago last Wednesday. Blunt had voted against it and told reporters at various stops in central and western Missouri this week that he sticks by that stance.
But Democrats pounced when Blunt showed up Wednesday at the groundbreaking for a Springfield project partially funded with federal stimulus money.
On Thursday, for example, the Missouri Democratic Party circulated video from a Springfield TV newscast in which Blunt, while at the groundbreaking, criticized the federal stimulus as being "more about creating government jobs that it was about creating private sector jobs."
Blunt apparently was referring to the use of federal stimulus money in some cities, including St. Louis, to pay for police or fire department jobs, or to avoid teacher layoffs.
Said Blunt in his tour announcement:
"Working families are struggling in this terrible economy. We must start producing jobs now -- today -- and build solid, family-supporting work for the future. The so-called 'stimulus bill' and other big government programs have failed to deliver jobs. Missourians rightly demand progress and action now. They want government to get out of the way, so that Main Street employers can begin creating good-paying, sustainable private-sector jobs."
The list of communities on the tour, as released by the campaign: Cabool, Carrollton, Dexter, Fredericktown, Jefferson City, Lee’s Summit, Liberty, Mansfield, Marshall, Nixa, Popular Bluff, Potosi, Richmond, St. Louis, Sedalia, Van Buren, Warrensburg, Willow Springs and Winona.
(Coincidentally, Blunt's tour comes just shortly after a Democrat running for the U.S. House in southeast Missouri, Army veteran Tommy Sowers, had completed his well-publicized 28-day tour of communities in the 8th District. But that's another contest, for another time.)
Blunt's tour also comes amid heightened criticism of the congressman from Votevets.org, a veterans group that supports the energy bill that passed the U.S. House last June but remains stuck in the U.S. Senate. Blunt had voted against the measure, siding with critics who say that its anti-pollution proposals -- including the "cap and trade'' provision -- will lead to higher energy and utility costs in states like Missouri that rely heavily on coal.
(Click here for some nonpartisan background on Votevets.)
Votevets has been running a statewide ad campaign in which it accuses Blunt of "siding with Big Oil," and notes that the United States imports a significant amount of its oil from Middle Eastern countries that the group says "fund terrorists who attack us."
On Thursday, Votevets launched an automated telephone-call campaign in Blunt's southwest Missouri congressional district. In an appeal similar to the TV spot, the calls ask listeners to encourage Blunt to change his mind on the energy bill.
The group also conducted a conference call Thursday featuring several Missouri veterans who echoed those sentiments, and accused Blunt of, in effect, helping terrorists.
Blunt is among several members of Congress around the country, mostly Republicans, targeted by Votevets. Republicans, including Blunt, contend that the group doesn't really represent veterans and is simply a vehicle for liberal political activists. Blunt has called their attacks out of line, and his campaign has formed a "Veterans for Blunt" group that includes his son, former Gov. Matt Blunt.
(The current Votevets' ad campaign in Missouri is run by its nonpartisan nonprofit arm, which does not report its donors to the IRS, and is not required to. Its political action committee does report its donors to the Federal Election Committee.)
Votevets' advisory board listed on its website does include some prominent Democrats, including former Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, retired Gen. Wesley Clark and Tammy Duckworth, currently an assistant secretary for United States Department of Veterans Affairs.
All three are military veterans, as is co-founder Jon Soltz, who said in a telephone interview Thursday that Votevets' conservative critics prefer to attack the group rather than what it stands for.
"They're on the wrong side of the troops and they know it," Soltz said. "They obviously don't want to talk about Roy Blunt being bought and paid for by Big Oil."
Soltz that Votevets expects to continue to be active in Missouri and will be targeting Blunt for much of this year -- at least until the congressional fate of the energy bill is resolved, or until he changes his mind about the measure.
