6th District Congressional Candidate Kay Barnes and State Representative Candidate Mike Hepler introduced themselves to local Democrats Thursday at a breakfast in Grant City. Barnes carried her message against what she called incumbent Congressman Sam Graves’ support for big oil interests and promised more accessibility to her office than Sam Graves; Hepler promised to address the problem of roads in the area as well as continue the work of Jim Whorton. Hepler is seeking Whorton’s seat; Whorton cannot seek reelection because of state-mandated term limits. Local candidate Rob Ruckman spoke briefly; he is seeking election as East District Commissioner.
Speaking with Worth County Democrats at a breakfast in Grant City, 6th District Congressional candidate Kay Barnes pointed to the clearest example yet of how badly Washington is broken. She criticized Congressman Sam Graves' February vote to protect the tax breaks for the big oil companies less than two weeks after he accepted a $2,000 campaign contribution from ExxonMobil.
Barnes said to those gathered, "Exxon got what they paid for. Congressman Sam Graves delivered for them and not for you. So just remember the next time you fill up your tank - thanks to Congressman Sam Graves you are paying Exxon twice: once at the pump and again with your own tax dollars. Now, many of you are also going to have to use your rebate check to pay for the skyrocketing gas prices. He is making Washington work for the Exxon executives in Texas, and not for the consumers in Northwest Missouri and around the country. That is the formula for the status quo and I'm as sick of it as you are. It is not going to change until we change who we send to Congress."
On February 13, 2008, Exxon Mobil gave Congressman Sam Graves a $2,000 contribution, and 14 days later Graves voted against H.R. 5351, the Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation Act, a bill which would redirect tax breaks away from the big oil companies and toward renewing the production tax credit for wind farms and creating new tax incentives for solar power and ethanol. Graves is one of Exxon's top recipients of campaign cash. Only 14 other members of the House of Representatives have received more campaign contributions from Exxon than Graves since 2006.
Barnes also criticized the national news media for blaming increasing food prices on farmers. "If the editorial writers from newspapers like the New York Times would come down from their ivory towers long enough to talk to real family farmers, they would know that they are working hard to make a living. Now, in addition to coping with high fuel prices, our farmers unfairly have to take the brunt of criticism for what the big oil companies have done to food prices," Barnes said.
Barnes said, "When elected I will fight hard to pass legislation to take the tax breaks away from companies like Exxon and redirect those dollars to our wind farms and ethanol plants right here in Northwest Missouri. Congressman Graves makes Washington work for the corporate special interests and turns his back on consumers everywhere struggling to pay these outrageously high gas prices."
Barnes also promised to hire a senior staff person who specialized in rural economic development who would act as a go-between between her office and constituents. "By working together, we will come up with a plan to develop our rural economy," she said.
Barnes also said that she would create an advisory group from each of the counties that would advise her on local issues. She said that she would push for the Missouri Downtown and Rural Economic Stimulus Act, which she said would allow state and local authorities to participate in certain federal programs. She said that one of the keys would be to help entities navigate through the act and that there needed to be more resources for them to do so. "I don’t want to promise pie in the sky solutions, but there are answers out there," she said.
Barnes said that she liked her chances against Graves; she said that she nearly had as much campaign contributions as Graves did and had ten times as many individual donors as he did. She said that the only reason he had more was because of $700,000 raised by President Bush and Vice President Cheney as the race has drawn national interest.
Hepler said that he had worked at the local level for more than 30 years and that experience qualified him to be state representative. As a county clerk, he was instrumental in getting a 2006 law requiring photo ID thrown out. "It sounds good until you forget your drivers license five minutes before the polls close and you’re disenfranchised," he said.
He said that he had a proven track record of getting things done as a county clerk; he said that his county’s bridge program went from being one of the worst to being one of the better programs in the state. "And now, I want to do that for the 3rd district," he said.
Addressing the problem of roads, Hepler said that there were two reasons for the deteriorating roads in the area; he said that the MODOT had no plan to address the lettered roads in the area and that part of the problem was the rise of Premium Standard and other CAFO outlets; he said they typically use big trucks that lettered roads were not meant to handle. "The state says they are proud of the economic impact that they bring," he said. "If they are so proud of their economic impact, then why don’t they invest more money in our local roads?" he asked.
Hepler said that he wanted to work for more teacher pay, saying that some people who don’t get a college degree make more than teachers. He said that vouchers were a bad idea because the state should take care of the public schools first and give teachers better pay.
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