Focus On US Senate Race

By Bob Sullentrup and Kevin Tull

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Tamara Millay, US Senate candidate, will face in the LP primary election on August 6, Edward J. Manley who "was convicted in July 1980 of Assault with Intent to Kill with a Knife" according to a press release from MO AG Jay Nixon.

We have Tamara Millay's press release, at the time of this writing we had not been able to acquire a press release from Mr. Manley.

PRESS RELEASE

In 1998, Tamara Millay entered the race for Kit Bond's U.S. Senate seat and came out a winner -- of sorts. In an election marked mostly for mudslinging and name calling between Bond and Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon, Millay presented the Libertarian Party's ideas calmly, cleanly and forthrightly, garnering respectful treatment from the press for her performance in the campaign debates. And, while not elected, she polled more than the 2% required to maintain the Libertarian Party's status as a "major party" in Missouri, with ballot access next to the Republicans and Democrats.

That ballot access paid off last year when the Libertarian Party won its first partisan election, re-electing Chillicothe mayor Jeff Foli on its ticket. And Millay threw her hat into the ring again on Tuesday, filing to run in the party's U.S. Senate primary for the Senate seat currently held by Jean Carnahan (D) and sought by former congressman and gubernatorial candidate Jim Talent (R).

One candidate, Edward Joseph Manley of Hillsboro, has already filed, making the primary a contested race. That's fine with Millay. "At this time, Libertarians' biggest task is getting noticed, getting the word out that we exist. Contested primaries give us an extra chance to reach out and campaign. They make it possible for voters who have traditionally regarded themselves as Democrats or Republicans to look into another approach."

That approach, says the 34-year-old St. Louis County resident, is needed now more than ever. "The pundits say that September 11th changed everything. But if you look at how our government has acted over the last six months, it quickly becomes apparent that things haven't changed at all. The dust of the World Trade Center hadn't settled before politicians were back at the old game of tax and spend. All that changed was that they wrapped themselves in the flag and started calling anyone who objected 'unpatriotic.'"

Libertarians place great emphasis on civil liberties at home and non-intervention abroad, an approach that Millay says is the only solution to America's current problems. "We don't beat the terrorists by turning our country into a police state, and we only encourage them with our continued interference in the affairs of other countries. Every attack is worse than the one before it, and every attack is used by politicians as an excuse to do more of the things that made us a target in the first place."

Before Tamara Millay had signed up to run for US Senate, Mr. Edward J. Manley had hoped to run uncontested on the Libertarian Primary ticket.

Here's more information on Mr. Manley; reported from two conversations that Manley had with State Chair Bob Sullentrup and Show-Me-Freedom Editor Kevin Tull:

On May 8, 2000 the St. Louis Post Dispatch reported Edward Manley had pled guilty on July 30, 1980 to a felony assault with intent to kill for stabbing Louis Wayne DeRousse with a hunting knife in 1978.

The 46-year-old Manley filed for Sheriff in March 2000 as a Democrat and was forced off the ballot. Missouri State law prohibits convicted felons from serving as sheriff. No such provision exists for US senatorial candidates.

Manley has never tried to hide or deny his conviction. In fact, when Mr. Sullentrup called Mr. Manley on March 9 and spoke with him for about a half hour, he said his life experiences are an asset. He’s been in a number of institutions from the state’s foster and juvenile-court systems to prison to half-way houses to group homes to a mental institution, and he’s learned from all that.

The Post Dispatch further reported Manley’s incident occurred when he was 19. The assault, for which he served 22 1/2 months of a seven-year sentence before being placed on probation, stemmed from a fight he had after drinking "nearly a half gallon" of vodka. He stopped going to school at age 9 after his parents divorced.

If elected, Manley said to Sullentrup, he would surround himself with some city judges he knows because "they know the law" and could advise him.

When Manley spoke with Kevin Tull in late March it was clarified that the judges Mr. Manley proposes splitting his salary with were not local city judges but celebrity Judges Joe Brown, Greg Mathis, and Divorce Court's Judge Mablean Ephriam as well as Judge Mills Lane. When asked by Mr. Tull how he felt about the war on drugs he said that he believed marihuana should be legalized, but he believed in stronger enforcement of existing laws against all other drugs.

Mr. Manley told Mr. Tull that several years back as he matured in his views about the drugs that he used to consume, he realized that the people he used to consider his friends were now deserving of incarceration.

He told Mr. Tull about some friends that were traveling from Missouri to Florida to purchase some large quantities of cocaine who had invited Mr. Manley along for the ride. Upon Mr. Manley's acceptance of his friend's offer he immediately called the local branch of the FBI to let them know about the trip. To the FBI's credit they said there was nothing they could do until the drugs were actually purchased, which this editor thought was strange knowing that just carrying large amounts of cash is a reason for arrest, and seizure of cash, which of course has no legal rights. The Florida FBI seemed more interested in Mr. Manley's story, but they failed to show up to bust his friends during the transaction, or after. According to Mr. Manley, he and his friends were able to make it back to Missouri and before the local FBI could bust his friends they were able to hide or distribute the coke. To Mr. Manley this was what he perceived as the failure of the war on drugs.

Mr. Tull posed the worlds smallest political quiz to Mr. Manley and found that he leaned libertarian on half of his answers. Mr. Tull sent a large sampling of Libertarian literature to Mr. Manley, at his request, so that he can learn more about Libertarian principles. Edward J. Manley has overcome a tragic and violent past, and yet appears to have turned his life around for the better.

We hope this article is informative and helps the readers make informed decisions when voting in the primary on Aug. 6^th.