Recent Missouri editorials

The Joplin Globe, Aug. 5

Missourians on Tuesday spoke their minds on Medicaid expansion.

More than 53% of those who went to the polls endorsed it.

We urge lawmakers to accept that as the will of the people and move on.

We’ve seen too many recent instances where voters have spoken their minds - unambiguously - only to hear some lawmakers argue that the public has been hoodwinked, that voters didn’t understand what they were doing, that lawmakers know best and it is up to them to set things right for the good of everyone.

• Like Right to Work: Two years ago, in August 2018, Missourians went to the polls and by a margin of nearly 7-3 rejected a right-to-work measure. Lawmakers that spring had passed a right-to-work measure and former Gov. Eric Greitens signed it into law, but unions took their case directly to the people, gathering more than 300,000 signatures to force a statewide vote. Despite that lopsided result, some Republican lawmakers vowed to resurrect the issue soon afterward, and no doubt it will be discussed in the next legislative session.

• Like Clean Missouri: Clean Missouri was a constitutional amendment that enacted long-needed lobbying reforms as well as tighter campaign finance limits, and most controversially, it also created a new redistricting process. More than 62% of voters approved. Before the final votes were even in, some lawmakers said voters just didn’t understand the issue and had bought a pig in a poke. Lawmakers proposed their own alternative, which will appear as Amendment 3 on the November ballot, but already some of the state’s Republicans leaders - most notably John Danforth - are urging voters to reject it and stick with Clean Missouri.

• Like Minimum Wage: A similar tale unfolded for the minimum wage increase that went before voters in November 2018 and was passed - again by with an approval rate 62%. It raises the minimum wage to $12 an hour by 2023. Come January, some lawmakers were working to repeal it.

As for Medicaid expansion, we say: Leave it alone.

It was just last fall that Missouri Gov. Mike Parson vowed to uphold the will of the voters.

“If the people of the state of Missouri - that is their will and they vote to do that - that’s what I’m supposed to do is uphold the will of the people of this state, and that’s what I intend to do regardless of whether I agree with the issue or whether I don’t.”

We urge him to remember his pledge.

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The Kansas City Star, Aug. 9

Are two of Missouri’s top Republicans willing to risk lives to score political points?

Gov. Mike Parson and Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft’s aggressive push to reopen K-12 schools, deadly pandemic be darned, has struck an increasingly callous note in recent days.

Missouri has not yet managed to slow the spread of the coronavirus, and Parson, who has declined to impose a statewide mask mandate, has shown no interest in taking even simple steps to protect public health.

But Parson and Ashcroft are willing to risk the health of teachers and students by urging them to return to in-person classes even as COVID-19 cases continue to multiply.

“We have to get our students back to high-quality learning,” Parson wrote in a recent Twitter post. “A lack of in-person learning can deprive students, especially our most disadvantaged students, access to important services.”

The message came a week after Parson suggested schoolchildren would contract the coronavirus, and that they would eventually “get over it.”

Ashcroft offered a similarly tone-deaf argument, suggesting that fathers should be willing to risk death to send their children back to school.

“At some point, we need to just put our heads down and say we’re gonna get through it, and we definitely need to send our kids back to school,” he said in a radio interview.

He later backtracked.

But the question remains: Why push a return-to-school agenda amid a pandemic? It is important to get kids back to school, but above all else, it must be done safely. Somehow, that point keeps getting lost in the school-is-worth-dying-for message.

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The St. Joseph News-Press, Aug. 10

There’s nothing wrong with a little healthy skepticism regarding medical marijuana in Missouri.

Is the promised economic boost oversold, much like those of riverboat casinos 25 years ago? Is there enough research to really understand health benefits and potential side effects? That’s not even getting into the way that licenses were awarded.

But voters in 2018 gave convincing approval to the legalization of medical cannabis. The constitutional amendment passed with 65% voter approval, better than “Clean Missouri” ethics reform and better than Medicaid expansion. Attitudes have evolved on marijuana, so much so that elected lawmakers and government bureaucrats seemed caught off guard.

It took only 19 months from the passage of Clean Missouri for state lawmakers to pass a proposed amendment to the amendment, which appears on this November’s ballot. Medical marijuana? There’s still no dispensary open for business, 22 months after voters approved the constitutional amendment.

Those who see medical marijuana for what it’s meant to be - a form of relief from immense physical pain - could be forgiven for asking, “What’s taking so long?” Before you say COVID-19, which is a reason, remember that voters approved language that required the state to begin accepting applications from medical marijuana patients in June - of 2019.

Also note that the state isn’t willing to keep moving the goal line on when our taxes are due, despite the economic consequences of the coronavirus. Most of us only got a three-month reprieve.

On medical marijuana, some chalked up the the delay to resistance from Missouri elected officials. Clearly, some are uncomfortable about liberalization and a rightly cautious of using medical cannabis as a Trojan horse for recreational legalization.

More likely, medical marijuana is stuck in the bureaucratic tall weeds, an example of government agencies managing to over-promise and under-deliver. Dispensaries were supposed to open this summer at the latest, but now state officials are promising September. It would come as little surprise to see the date pushed back to later this fall.

Granted, even without a pandemic, Missouri faced the daunting regulatory task of opening its doors to a new industry that was relegated to the black market for decades. But Missouri is not exactly at the tip of the spear. There must have been playbooks in other states to examine.

Those who see false promises in medical marijuana might not be terribly confident about this product bringing Missouri much more than more marijuana. But they might have even less confidence in our government’s ability to usher in and regulate this emerging industry,

The voters asked for it. At some point, you have to deliver.