GOVERNOR FORTIFIES HIS LINK WITH UNIONS

A little-noticed statement by Gov. Mel Carnahan this past week should receive a lot more attention than it has from Missourians who care about the future of our state government. At the Lake of the Ozarks Monday to speak to a meeting of the state AFL-CIO, Carnahan exhorted delegates to give him larger working majorities of Democrats in both houses of the General Assembly. "Our majorities [in both the House and Senate] are too close," Carnahan told the labor delegates. "We cannot do some of the things we ought to be doing in this state. This is an opportunity for us to change those margins, change the complexion of the Missouri legislature."

Down what path would such changes take Missouri? Credit should go to Associated Press reporter Scott Charton, for following up on the governor's broad statement and supplying specifics. Charton, who was there covering the event for the AP, asked the governor to identify an issue that a stronger Democratic majority could pass. Carnahan answered: "We have not been able to move public employee collective bargaining, and that's an issue that I think is appropriate. Carnahan said he would like to sign a law allowing collective bargaining for state employees. "That's something we would move on with different majorities. It's something that I've been for."

There you have it, folks: Vote for Carnahan for another four years, and give him widened Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, and you'll likely have a unionized state government in your future. The evidence from other states, even those with no-strike clauses in their laws, is that this will mean an explosion in illegal strikes, higher costs of government and, inevitably, higher taxes.

In one sense, Gov. Carnahan is to be commended for his brazen honesty in baldly admitting this agenda to unionize state government and so to plunder the taxpayers. Four years ago, many Missourians thought they were electing a rather moderate conservative sort of governor, a man who, after all, was a small-town lawyer and former school board president from Southern Missouri. The reality, as laid bare in this revealing statement of the agenda for a Carnahan second term, has been much different. The reality is that Gov. Carnahan has played hand in glove with the liberal agenda of Bill and Hillary Clinton and has been absolutely as liberal as he can possibly get away with.

If Missourians approve this agenda by giving Carnahan a second term and increased majorities in both houses, we will deserve the disaster that awaits us down this road. Missourians who don't want our state to head down this path should get involved to ensure that it doesn't become a grim reality.