The Kansas City Star, March 4
After Florida school shooting, Missouri lawmakers want to make gun laws even worse
No one can claim that Missouri lawmakers failed to respond to the massacre in Parkland, Florida.
But they have so far failed in how they’ve responded.
Children are trying to do what adults would not, and corporate America - the free market at work, as God and Adam Smith intended - is also going where elected officials fear to tiptoe.
But in Jefferson City, they’re doing Washington, D.C., one better.
In the nation’s capital, they appear poised not to even try to do anything about gun violence right now. Well, not us; in Missouri, lawmakers are moving to make a state with few limitations on gun rights an even more regulation-free zone.
Before you could say “frontier justice,” they voted out of committee a handful of bills that would expand the already long list of where Missourians can carry concealed firearms.
And they voted down bills that would have required background checks and repealed certain provisions of the sweeping 2016 law on concealed carry without a permit.
It’s not too late to pass the identical bills sponsored by Republican Rep. Donna Lichtenegger and Democrat Tracy McCreery that would make it more difficult for domestic abusers to have guns. In fact, to put that another way, it’s too late not to pass them. Already, it’s been two years since lawmakers did away with protection for domestic violence victims.
Lichtenegger calls herself “a proud lifetime member of the NRA,” then adds, “but we also have to show we’re responsible gun owners.” She has spoken with her colleagues about her own childhood experience of watching her father beat her mother, “and people have to know how hard it is to get a divorce from these guys.” She expects her bill to get a vote in committee this week. And its chance of becoming law this year? “It’s not hopeless,” she said, though it’s unlikely to pass as a stand-alone bill this late in the session.
Since a history of domestic violence is so common among mass shooters, and 54 percent of mass shootings between 2009 and 2014 also involved the killing of a partner or family member, this should be something lawmakers could agree on, accomplish and feel good about. But “believe it or not, there probably are some that would oppose it,” said Lichtenegger. Last year, an effort to close the loophole for domestic abusers failed.
Among the gun measures that have moved forward in Jefferson City since the Parkland tragedy are bills that would limit the use of firearm tracking technology and that would allow guns to be transported in cars.
In their ongoing effort to limit local government, Missouri state lawmakers also want to keep municipalities from regulating open carry. And they voted to further expand all of those places where Missourians can bring concealed guns - adding child care centers, government buildings, bars, churches, stadiums, hospitals, college campuses and more.
Rep. Greg Razer, a Kansas City Democrat whose bill on background checks was voted down, said his colleagues “stood on the floor and talked about how awful” Parkland was, and “said ’thoughts and prayers,’ but obviously it did not have an effect on their agenda” even if what he thought he saw on their faces was the desire to vote differently. “So either my bill got voted down because I have a ’D’ behind my name or because they are terrified of the National Rifle Association.”
Even an amendment that would have banned bump stocks was voted down, but not Republican Rep. Jered Taylor’s bill that concealed-carry permit holders who are at least 19 years old should be allowed to carry arms on campus.
Yes, where heavy drinking and mental health issues are major problems. Taylor cited campus rape as a reason that students should be allowed to arm themselves. While we appreciate his acknowledgment of campus assaults, that’s just one more argument against allowing abusers to carry arms, there or anywhere.
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The St. Joseph News-Press, March 1
Research boosts MU, state
Amid persistent concerns about money, the University of Missouri is touting a plan to double research funding from $200 million to $400 million in annual expenditures. It’s a bold vision that holds promise to boost the university’s stature and the state’s economy.
As we have learned more about this, the dramatic step up in research funding appears to be a reasonable goal and one that, once attained, will pay big dividends.
MU already belongs to a prestigious group: the 62 institutions in the Association of American Universities. Membership in the AAU, founded in 1900, is by invitation only and is focused on institutions that are distinguished in their devotion to academic research and education.
MU has been an AAU member since 1908.That tenure is impressive, but the university’s research ranking is not.
The U.S. members of the association include 28 private and 32 public research universities. MU’s total research spending of $250 million annually is in the bottom quarter of public members.
The Columbia Daily Tribune reports MU Chancellor Alexander Cartwright said it would take $102 million to move up to the next quartile and his goal is to double the funding available. The plan includes attracting up to five national research centers over five years. Each center would require $20 million to $25 million annually to operate, and would attract grant funding.
“What we want to do is we want to double the money we are getting from federal, private industry and also from philanthropy,” Cartwright said.
One existing center at MU, the National Swine Resource and Research Center, was established in 2003 and has served a vital role in biomedical research. Swine have proven to be an optimal species useful for investigation of a large number of human diseases.
A major part of the new effort will be the Translational Precision Medicine Complex, a proposed laboratory costing $150 million to $200 million. Researchers from medicine, engineering and other disciplines would pursue collaborative work there focused on major health concerns, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, pulmonary disease and kidney disease.
Cartwright says the university also wants to double money spent on clinical medical trials to provide Missouri residents with access to new technologies and treatments.
Among other things, AAU institutions award 52 percent of all doctoral degrees in the in-demand disciplines of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) and are leaders in awards of patents, creation of startup businesses and producing entrepreneurs capable of attracting venture capital funding.
A big boost in research funding would lift MU’s standing among this group of high-achievers. This is a future MU aspires to, and one we should seek as well.
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The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, March 3
Greitens drags the charity he founded into his ethical muck
There’s no doubt that without Eric Greitens, The Mission Continues charitable organization would not exist. He founded it in 2007 and, for seven years, traveled the country relentlessly raising money for it. By the time he stepped down from its leadership in 2014 to prepare for his gubernatorial campaign, the nonprofit had a budget of $10.9 million and had provided thousands of veterans with fellowships to serve their communities.
The Mission Continues is a terrific organization built from a terrific idea. That’s why it’s so sad to find that Greitens may have exploited it for personal and political gain. Not only did he cheat on his wife, he may have cheated on his charity at the same time.
Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley is now investigating how Greitens’ gubernatorial campaign came to possess the nonprofit’s donor list. Donations to IRS charities are tax deductible, which means taxpayers absorb the tax burden that the nonprofit would otherwise pay. In return, charities are barred from political activity because taxpayer money cannot be used for partisan promotion.
In October 2016, The Associated Press reported that Greitens’ campaign had received more than $2 million from individuals or entities that also had contributed to The Mission Continues. Greitens denied that the campaign had been working off the nonprofit’s list. Such lists are commonly bought and sold by charities for thousands of dollars.
Greitens admitted to the Missouri Ethics Commission last year that the campaign had obtained the list on March 1, 2015, as an in-kind contribution by former campaign manager Danny Laub. The ethics commission slapped the Greitens campaign on the wrist with a $1,000 fine but required only $100 to be paid.
Last week, the Post-Dispatch’s Jack Suntrup reported that the campaign actually had received the list two months earlier. An employee of Greitens’ company, the Greitens Group, emailed it to Laub and another campaign staffer.
“We did not give, rent, sell that list to any campaign or anyone connected to the campaign,” said Laura L’Esperance, a spokeswoman for The Mission Continues.
Greitens also used an email address belonging to the nonprofit to invite potential supporters to meet-and-greet sessions in January 2015, The Associated Press reported. Greitens has acknowledged asking people he met during his years with the nonprofit to support his campaign for governor. Such donors were “investing in leadership,” he has said.
Those donors have good reason to be disappointed now, especially after Greitens admitted to having an extramarital affair in 2015 as he was organizing his gubernatorial bid.
Greitens may well have felt entitled to the donor list from the nonprofit he helped build. But that’s not how the law works.
The sad irony is that by ignoring the rules in service to his ambition, Greitens has dragged an excellent organization into his legal and ethical swamp.
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