This district is not for sale!

EDITOR'S NOTE: The Natural Resources Defense Council is a not-for-profit organization prohibited by law from contributing to political candidates' election campaigns.

Hollywood has finally found Cape Girardeau! First it was Killshot, and now it's the National Resources Defense Council.

The most extreme environmentalist lobby in the country is coming to the 8th District to back Jo Ann Emerson's opponent for Congress. The NRDC is bankrolled by Hollywood elitists like Robert Redford and Leonardo DiCaprio who want to tell us how many light bulbs and how much toilet paper we can use. But these eco-activists really don't have any clue about Southeast Missouri's issues and needs. To them, the 8th Congressional district is one of those places they fly over in their private jets when they're going from L.A. to New York. The tens of thousands of dollars they are dumping into Missouri to try to beat Jo Ann is an insult to every working family in our district.

Environmental extremists want to beat Jo Ann because she is doing more than nearly any other member of Congress to halt cap-and-trade taxes that would destroy our rural economy. She is limiting the power of the EPA to regulate our homes, our businesses, and our families. She is fighting for thousands of our jobs, which the eco-activists want to kill in the agriculture, manufacturing, tourism, and transportation sectors of our economy.

It's nothing new that enlightened environmentalists feel a need to tell us what to think and how to live our lives. To be clear, we need to make our planet more sustainable, and there are smart choices we can make to balance our environmental future with our economic future. With regard to our precious natural resources, we need to reduce, reuse, and recycle all we can. But when the NRDC tries to buy another soldier for the Pelosi-Reid zombie army in a congressional district thousands of miles from their homes on the coasts, people need to pay attention. Every voter in Southern Missouri ought to take note of exactly whose interests are at stake in the next election for Congress.

John Voss

Cape Girardeau Republican Central Committee Chairman