HOLDEN'S UNION ORDER ISN'T PLAYING WELL AROUND THE STATE

Grand pronouncements from on high are one thing. How things play out on the ground are another altogether.

How is Gov. Bob Holden's executive order that effectively unionizes state government playing at the grass roots? The answer is found in two special-election campaigns being run in Northern Missouri for state representative seats. Both have been Republican-held seats, one in Chillicothe and the other in Bethany near the Iowa border. (The Democrats hold a slim, six-seat majority in the House.) Both races are seeing spirited campaigns run by both sides for the Aug. 7 contests. And in both races, as Democratic candidates fight for a seat in the House of Representatives, they are trumpeting their opposition to Holden's executive order issued June 27.

As they try to elect these candidates, the pols over at the Democratic state committee must be nervous, at least if they're reading the Jefferson City News-Tribune. Day after day, the letters to the editor column of the local paper fills up with scathing letters from outraged state employees opposed to the order, citing the fact that they didn't get a cost-of-living raise this year -- and may not next year, either -- but will in all likelihood be forced to pay the new Holden-Union Lug of $20 a month.

Folks aren't as dumb as some politicians seem to think. For a state feeling financial stress, Missouri has taken a step in the wrong direction. The bills doing what the governor's order did have been introduced annually, and defeated annually, in the legislature, for decades. One reason: The multimillion-dollar cost to taxpayers. In the most recent session, that cost was officially estimated at $3.6 million, but would more likely be ten times that.

Seems state employees, along with other taxpayers, have figured out that these millions are pay-off money ill-spent -- money that could have funded modest raises for state employees.

---

Radical enviros' war against people: Few controversies in recent years have made clearer the war of radical environmentalists against people than that unfolding in the Klamath River Valley of Oregon and northern California. In a superb piece entitled "Rural Cleansing" this past week on The Wall Street Journal editorial page, Kimberley Strassel lays bare the radical enviros' agenda: favoring the endangered sucker fish over farmers who need the water released from the dam to earn their livelihood. After the cut-off, the farmers saw the value of their land plunge from $2,500 per acre to about $35. (You can read Strassel's piece free, plus much more besides, on the Journal's fabulous Web site, OpinionJournal.com.) Strassel writes:

"This is what's really happening in Klamath -- call it rural cleansing -- and it's repeating itself in environmental battles across the country. Indeed, the goal of many environmental groups -- from the Sierra Club to the Oregon Natural Resources Council -- is no longer to protect nature. It's to expunge humans from the countryside.

"The Oregon Natural Resources Council has picked its fight with farmers, but its actions will likely mean death to an entire community. The farming community will lose $250 million this year. ... Property-tax revenues will decrease ... Local businesses are dependent on farmers and are struggling financially ... .

"Do the people who give money to environmental groups realize the endgame is to evict people from their land? ... The American Dream has always been to own a bit of property ... ."

~Peter Kinder is assistant to the chairman of Rust Communications and president pro tem of the Missouri Senate.