Barbara Shelly Discovers Matt Blunt's Belief in God

In a Kansas City Star column titled "Your values are important, as long as they match his", columnist Barbara Shelly discovers Matt Blunt's secret: He's a Christian.

Matt Blunt is still a blank slate to many Missourians.

We know the governor is a new dad, he abhors "job-killing tax increases," and he can stand up under political pressure.

But what else? Blunt is sparing with media interviews, and he chooses his words carefully when he grants them.

So unless you are a Baptist and read a church publication called The Pathway, you probably don't know Blunt thinks public schools should be able to post the Ten Commandments.

Or that he thinks elected officials should, as a "last resort," refuse to carry out a judicial order. Or that he believes impeachment is a "reasonable solution" for judges who "consistently act in a manner that is in conflict with the law or the values of Americans."

These are things the people of Missouri need to know. Blunt's remarks place him in the ranks of angry cultural conservatives who would buck two centuries of tradition to achieve their ends.

Amid her fiery, Blunt-as-Taliban column, she doesn't mention that some judges have interpreted things into the law that aren't there for some hot topics (abortion, gay marriage, and so on). Nor that Matt Blunt does have a micromandate of .8% majority to govern as he said he would when he was running for governor.

Instead, I guess we should fear the coming Missourkhas that women will have to wear and the ongoing communication between the governor and his church publications.

Although I don't agree with every action that Matt Blunt has taken, I do think that he has moved Missouri in a better direction and that he would make an excellent president (the "long-term political ambitions" of which Shelly speaks?).... if and when we draft him as our candidate in 2008