PROP B'S BIGGEST HURDLE IS FEDERAL JUDGE RUSSELL CLARK

Tomorrow morning at 11:06 a.m., Cape Girardeau native Rush Limbaugh III will host a special edition of his 15-hour-a-week radio show. On Friday Rush will depart from his usual format to welcome as his guest his grandfather and namesake, Rush H. Limbaugh, Sr. The Limbaughs are in Kansas City to attend the annual meeting of the Missouri Bar Association, where Mr. Rush will be honored.

Rush III's show is heard locally on KZIM 960-AM. Reports are that Mr. Rush will discuss American history, our heritage of freedom, and how the United States evolved into the great nation it is today. His incredible memory and the encyclopedic knowledge he brings to bear on these topics will make for highly informative listening.

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Four years ago next month, several of the first columns I wrote upon getting in this business concerned a certain federal judge in Kansas City who had, on his own order, enacted tax increases on real property and incomes to pay for desegregation in that community.

In many columns, I was sharply critical of that judge, a Jimmy Carter-appointed judicial Stalinist named Russell Clark. For my trouble, among other things, I was called a right-wing extremist. My criticisms pale in comparison with the stinging comments aimed at Judge Clark by the Democratic President Pro Tem of the Missouri Senate. His name is Jim Mathewson, and he's from Sedalia. How tough is he on Judge Clark? Judge (pardon the pun) for yourself, from the following excerpt from a wire story generated at last weekend's meeting of editors and publishers in Columbia.

"... [Senate President Pro Tem James] Mathewson, D.-Sedalia, drew applause from the editors when he railed against federal court-ordered spending for school desegregation in Kansas City.

"The state has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in the Kansas City desegregation case and is bracing to spend another $71 million on building programs ordered by U.S. District Judge Russell Clark.

"State desegregation payments are sliced off the top of Missouri's budget. The expected cuts to comply with Clark's order will mean other schools outside Kansas City are to lose millions, Mathewson said.

"`I think it's a sad commentary,' Mathewson said, when a federal judge `can have rape power over a state budget talk state's rights to me.'

"He suggested the trust funds in Proposition B might be beyond the reach of the federal courts.

"`I can't imagine they're going to go into a special trust fund to rape it,' Mathewson said.

"After the discussion, Mathewson said he finds frustration with the desegregation case as he travels in rural Missouri, `because of this judge who never stands for election like we do.'

"Asked about Mathewson's description of Clark's orders as `rape power' over the state budget, Ashcroft said, `That's an interesting characterization and not far from accurate.'"

That's the end of the wire story. Two observations. One: the biggest single opponent facing supporters of Proposition B the money-for-education-bill on this November's ballot is federal Judge Russell Clark, because of the insane rulings he feels comfortable in handing down.

Two, Sen. Jim Mathewson had best be careful. Should he keep talking such unvarnished good sense, folks will take to calling him a "right-wing extremist."