Yesterday on our Facebook page someone referred to Greg Plumb of Park University as Professor Plumb and now I can’t get the game of Clue out of my head.
Later this month the Platte City Road District will be applying a new two-inch overlay of fresh asphalt on the streets in the neighborhood where I live, and I’m more excited about this than a grown man should be.
Anticipating the fresh black asphalt has me feeling like a kid on Christmas Eve, not gonna lie. Santa Claus is real, you guys.
He started an unpopular war that tanked the global economy and has Americans fighting back tears at the gas pump and grocery store. His approval rating is as low as Nixon’s at the start of the Watergate hearings. His wife wants to hear from the Epstein victims. He’s saying weird things like “The Pope is soft on crime” and posting AI generated photos of himself as Jesus. He is having middle of the night social media meltdowns that are exposing the fact the cheese seems to be sliding off his cracker.
But President Trump can take comfort in the fact that Sixth District Congressional candidates Chris Stigall and Nathan Willett are falling all over themselves in hopes of getting his endorsement.
Oh, and he still has Fox News pretending all is well.
So he’s got that going for him.
I can verify that you will find no AI images on our social media of Guy Speckman and yours truly depicting ourselves as a doctor or a Red Cross worker. Or Jesus.
More on this at a later time but the Platte City Police Department will be adding 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline decals to their patrol vehicles. The 988 Lifeline provides immediate access to trained crisis counselors for those experiencing suicidal thoughts, emotional distress or any mental health crisis.
I will not be paying money to attend a Royals game until the team starts hitting. At least a little bit. The lack of run production is getting to the point no fans should be charged admission, really.
Will they ever start hitting? The organization has gone through two offseasons now knowing the team’s offense needed significant improvement. As in more hitters. And for two offseasons the Royals front office has failed to upgrade the offense.
And the hitting coach has to be in his final days of employment, does he not? This team is hard to watch.
I hate to say it because he has been such a franchise icon but Salvy looks washed. As in done. As in he doesn’t really look like a professional hitter these days, certainly not one who should be hitting in the cleanup spot. Still doing an adequate job behind the plate. But offensively? Looks like the fat lady is singing.
Hope I’m wrong.
To me, Tony Luetkemeyer seems like the perfect fit for the role of prosecutor for Platte County. And the timing was right for him, with Eric Zahnd deciding to step down at the end of this year, the same time Luetkemeyer is being termed out of his state senate position.
Luetkemeyer is generally very popular politically and has nearly $2 million in available campaign money. Probably would have been an absolute bloodbath had anyone decided to mount a campaign against him.
The Court of Appeals for the Western District of Missouri agrees with the county commission in that the county had the legal authority not to implement that quarter cent children’s mental health tax that was passed by 56% of Platte County voters in November of 2024.
I don’t think the loss on appeal came as a real shock to supporters of the children’s tax. I think they’ve long been making plans to inflict political pain at the ballot box on those who made the choice to ignore the will of the people. Two of the three commissioners involved in that decision are done, so to speak. Dagmar Wood chose to run for assessor in 2024 and lost, so she is already out. Scott Fricker’s spot as presiding commissioner is up this year but Fricker won’t be on the ballot, you recall he withdrew shortly after a criminal investigation into allegedly improperly accessing the prosecutor’s email account came to light.
Mental health tax supporters, you can be certain, were primed and ready to vote against Fricker this year, as were many jail tax opponents who grew weary of Fricker’s temper tantrums, personal attacks, inaccurate statements and Baghdad Bob-like pronouncements during the county’s unpopular jail tax campaign.
Joe Vanover’s spot is up in, checks notes, 2028. I’m guessing there are some folks who have that circled on their calendars.
Remember that criminal investigation into Platte County Presiding Commissioner Scott Fricker allegedly improperly accessing the email account of Plate County Prosecuting Attorney Eric Zahnd? Recently, Fricker posted on Facebook that “the investigation is over.” It appears he later deleted that post.
This week I checked in with Dan Patterson, who is the Greene County Prosecutor in Springfield. Patterson, as you’ll recall, was appointed as special prosecutor in the investigation involving Fricker.
So how do things stand?
“The matter is still under review,” Patterson told me on Tuesday.
(Find Foley daydreaming about new asphalt on his street. Email ivan@plattecountylandmark.com)
