How much of that spending does the state legislature control?

This is disgusting across the board. Why is it that someone would lie? Simple, because rarely does anybody ever apply any rational thought, or checks facts. Regardless of which side you may be on, the other side is a bunch of liars. It's the only time either side is ever right, or agrees with the other side. Everybody tells us they are cutting spending, yet none of them do. No matter what, it's the other guys' fault, sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. But if they're all going to lie, how are we to know?

How many spending cuts did they pass or shoot-down in the process? Who voted how?

I see no reason to keep putting these people in charge of more & more things.
They might just have too much on their plate. We should lighten the load on all of them. Maybe if they had access to less money and fewer responsibilities, things might work better. That's what you'd do with any other employee that lies to you about, mismanages, or lies to you about mismanaging, your money. You'd give him less responsibility, over fewer things. Heck, you might even fire them.

“Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed: everything else is public relations.”
George Orwell

Good work Brian.

It's easy to say they have increased spending, but how much of the increase is mandated by Washington? One item that was not, was a 2% salary increase to MO employees who haven't had a raise in 4 years, do you want to argue with that?

Brian, your political affiliation is showing.

You should hold republicans accountable, but when you make a point of telling us that Jay Nixon, a democrat, wanted a budget that cut spending, you reveal your bias.

You didn't need to make sure we were clear he's a democrat. It was a proposed budget, and you recently railed on tepublicans for slashing budgets while increasing spending.

Couldn't Dear Leader Democrat Nixon jave vetoed the Naughty Republican budget if were such a fiscal hawk, or does that blow your larger narrative zs local cheerleader for the Democrat Party?

And media outlets ponder our distrust. Sheesh.

While the people on the RIGHT are blaming the people on the LEFT and vice versa, the politicians are spending all of our money and taking away more and more of our liberty. WAKE UP! Quit fighting for one side or the other. Fight for the people! Throw them all out in November! (For the annoying politically correct crowd - by "fight" I mean voice your opinions and stand up for them and make a change for the better in the government. I am not encouraging violence.)

Many of the previous commentators have asked extremely introspective questions that Mr. Hook inartfully dodged because he does not know the answers. His purpose in writing this story is clear: he does not like anyone in Republican leadership so he decided to write a fraudulent attack piece. The MO Republicans HAVE consistently cut the State's Budget over the last 10 years. The General Assembly only has control over 9 Billion Dollars of the State's total 24 Billion Dollar Budget and it is within that discretionary 9 Billion that the Budget has been cut, time and time again. How do we know this? Because the Left Wing, Liberal Progressive groups in Missouri HOWL and SCREAM every year the MO GOP lead General Assembly passes a budget because of the "draconian" (the Liberals' word) cuts in the budget! The other 15 Billion in the Budget is tied to federal money & constitutionally mandated items (block grants, Medicaid, conservation, etc.) and can largely ONLY be changed if we had a GOP Gov who would agree to more Medicaid cuts OR if the GOP in DC would reform Medicare/Medicaid. The MO GOP can do NOTHING about the non-discretionary 15 billion which sees the majority of the increase in spending. What the MO GOP can do is to continue to cut and control spending of the discretionary 9 Billion and this HAS been cut and controlled every year. Again, the Liberals and Progs hate the GOP budget, that is why we all know it HAS been cut. Mr. Hook needs to do better research.

I have personally voted to cut the State's budget. Many, many times. I have the budget votes to prove it. Former Speaker Pro Tem/Former House Budget Chairman Carl Bearden has vindicated me on this point and stated it is true. Mr. Mr. Hook is to lazy to review my record and review the budget bills that I voted for that cut the State's budget over the past six years. How do I know I have cut the State's budget? Ask all of my liberal, left wing friends who demonize me every single year for "draconian" cuts to the State budget that the MO House GOP has made. I actually think they would defend me on this very simple, very basic fact that Mr. Hook continues to ignore and falsify. I have voted to cut the State budget. Period.

Perhaps Mr. Stream might deign to answer emails from residents of the 90th (nee 94th).

For the tenth (or eleventh?) time: The budget bills that I have voted for, from 2007 to 2012 have contained MANY actual budget cuts, year to year, fiscal budget to fiscal budget. Again, the experts (not Mr. Hook) who will confirm this are: former Speaker Pro tem/Former Budget Chairman Carl Bearden, current House Budget Chairman Rep. Ryan Silvey and current House Budget Vice Chairman, Rick Stream. And...every progressive/liberal special interest group who is horrified at the massive budgetary cuts the GOP lead General Assembly has inflicted on the State Budget for the past decade. When they tell you we have cut the budget, you can bet you can believe they are not making that up or being misleading! Go to Show Me Progress (as one example) and you will see what terrible budget hawks the MO GOP has been! The only thing "misleading" in this whole drama created by Mr. Hook is his incomplete and inaccurate "reporting" meant to draw attention to his "blog".

Was Mr. Jones born in the USA?

The only reason, I can think of, for Mr Jones to personally attack Brian Hook and his reporting is that he cannot legitimately defend his actions and the actions of the republican led legislature. If Jones has concrete facts to dispute Hook's reporting, then present it. Behave in the professional manner we all expect of our elected, agree to disagree and put the issue to bed. I also suggest that you have your twitter account disabled until you can use it responsibly.

So, if I understand correctly all 13 state budgets increased spending. True or False? Mr Hook? Mr Jones? And it appears to be undisputed fact that Mr Jones voted YES on all 13. True or False? Mr Hook? Mr Jones?

Government accounting procedures. We spent 10M on (X) last year, this year we have allotted to spend 10.85M on (X). We determine (X) should only spend 10.5M. lawmakers see this as a spending cut of .35M while the rest of us see it as a .5M increase. Ask anyone what a spending cut is (not a politician) and they will tell you it is spending less money then you spent the year before. Now the easy thing would be for ANYONE to show that state controlled spending went down from year to year while there was a net increase in non-state controlled spending that offset the cuts. Mr Hook is merely stating that the budget continues to increase while representatives proclaim they have cut spending. You can't have it both ways. I believe Mr. Jones has the availability to point out some of the budget cuts that were made instead of trying to make broad generalizations on what was already a broad generalization article.

So then, Congressman? What's your take? True or false? Easy question.

Now wait a minute, again, I'm speaking without knowledge, but just reading what's on this article and comment stream, but this is all a shell game. Mr. Martz description is certainly what happens all the time in government. I don't know if that's what had happened here, it certainly could have. However, we aren't even talking apples to apples. The question isn't easy, because the background of the question isn't clear.

If the federal government portion of the MO state budget increases significantly, the MO House could indeed actually cut budgets across the board, and total spending could still go up. Should the state just refuse and money from the federal government moving forward? At the same time, federal money could go down, the MO House could increase spending, but the total spend still go down. Would you all think the Congressman was telling the truth then since spending would be down?

Mr. Jones may have a twitter problem. I don't know, I don't follow him. However, that has nothing to do with the truth of this issue. Knowing the breakdown between the state monies and federal monies is absolutely critical. Without it, you can't fairly call Mr. Jones a liar, and frankly, he can't fairly call himself a spending hawk.

Either the state portion of the budget has gone up, or it hasn't. If it has gone up, Mr. Jones should explain, if it hasn't, Mr. Hook is bending the truth for his own purposes. All of this other discussion is pure shenanigans.

I follow Brian and the Journal, and know for a fact he is not biased and is an equal opportunity watchdog. It is apparent to me that the budget for all 13 appropriated budgets is higher than last year. And it is apparent that the Congressman voted yes on all 13. So, it is disingenuous, in the best light, to say "I cut spending", no matter where that money came from. He could say a hundred other things as he disburses federal monies that might be genuine, but "I cut spending" is not one of them. It does happen to be what voters want to hear which leads one to beleive it might be a little worse than simply disingenuous and might be outright dishonest. Further, to say "I cut spending" in one breath and "I had no control" in the next borders on ludicrous. You cold as easily say "I did NOT cut spending because I had not control." But, a question a previous poster had about this is interestingly petinent to this discussion. "Should the state just refuse the oney from the federal government" can be as easily and truthfully answered in the positive or negative depending on ones philosophy, but once answered, the Senate and House are in COMPLETE control. There is no "I had no control" as Yoda would say, just "I did" or "I didn't"

But, the Congressman is in good "cost cutting" company. Obama announced proudly last week that he has cut a trillion and has proposed another 1.2 trillion.

I'm in NY and was just wondering if you people in MO are only seeing Obama ads? Thanks!

nah. there are plenty of Romney ads. Not quite 50/50 with obama slightly in the ad war lead.

Thanks, here in NY it's 100% Obama. Was just wondering what method Patch (Huffington Post) was using for ad placements.

I have not seen any Romney ads on the Patch here is St. Louis, only Obama. Might have missed the Romney ads or David may have thought your were asking about TV ads.

Fair enough. Thanks for indulging me!

Also, to a much older comment (and since I can't reply from my "smart" phone), Gov Nixon does claim to have cut 1.6 billion from the state budget on the budget summary his office put out.

Long story short, all politicians say what they think people want to hear. Mr. Jones can be slammed by liberal politicians for making draconian cuts when he's really not cutting anything except proposed budgets, while at the same time, he can claim those cuts and be blasted as at best disingenuous. I'm glad I'm not a politician.

Quick note. Brian hook will be speaking about these issues (and more) tomorrow night (Friday) at 7PM on Missouri Grassroots Radio.

Revenues versus expenditures is what causes debt just ask the federal government. The people of MO were inclined to require a balanced budget only after the state got into some serious financial problems.
Even if spending is held in check from one year to another if the revenues don't come in then budget cutting is required. This is NOT something any legislature should be able to take credit for because economic conditions will have caused it not the legislative body.

Sorry to change the subject, but it is Friday July 27, 11:50 a.m. Monsanto is having their Monsanto Global Engineering Backyard Barbecue at this very moment in Mcdonnel park on Adie rd in St. Ann Mo in the lindbergh pavillion, the furthest one back. This is no joke! They even have the nerve to have a red and white checkered banner hanging up, as if it is some sweet grandmother's church picnic! I urge every thinking, caring person to get out there right now to strongly protest them and ruin their party. I saw them 30 minutes ago, cooking up lots of meat, while I was running in the park. These are the people that brought you genetic engineering on a global scale! This is a golden opportunity to protest them, rarely does one see them out in public, usually they are hiding behind their corporate walls. If you care about the food you eat and feed your children, go out there and protest them, and hold them accountable for all the environmental devastation they have caused! Te4ll every activist of every type to go there right now!GO! GO NOW!