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From KSPR comes this story —

U.S. Rep. Billy Long was expected to sell his auction company but instead he decided to just close the doors.

After 29-years Long closed the doors on his auction company and according to his former vice president at Billy Long Auctions Llc. Long sold the company's assets to competitors.

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House rules prohibit representatives from owning a business while serving.

But Long could re-open his business when his service in congress is done.

Long consulted with an ethics committee on what to do with his company.

"He really wanted to clear the books of his business and focus one hundred percent on his role of representative." says Eric Olson.
They said Long couldn't sell the name of the company so Long sold off the assets.

I seem to recall a radio interview Long did where he told the DJ that without him his auction company was worthless. Looks like he was right. Now the question is, when will he get rid of this 1/3 interest in Murney Company?might have killed his mother back in March, 2008.


IN other news, Missouri had third-worst job loss rate in 2010

A year-over-year 0.6 percent decrease in employment put Missouri third-worst among states in percentage job loss last year.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said Tuesday that Nevada suffered a 1.5 percent employment decline in 2010, followed by New Jersey, down 0.8 percent, and then Missouri.

The unemployment rate went up in 20 states last month, the bureau said, down in 15 and stayed the same in 15.

On the flip side, Kansas ranked in the top 10 states for low unemployment rates compared with the national average. Kansas ended the year with a 6.8 percent jobless rate, compared with the national average of 9.4 percent, seasonally adjusted.

Missouri’s jobless rate was 9.5 percent.

The bureau reported this year-end data:

•For Missouri: A civilian labor force of 3,003,800, with 2,647,400 on establishment payrolls, and 285,100 unemployed job hunters.

•For Kansas: A civilian labor force of 1,502,400, with 1,330,200 on establishment payrolls, and 102,600 unemployed job hunters.

| Diane Stafford, stafford@kcstar.com

Remember when Long turned over names of bloggers who were 'worrisome to Long'? Turns out that all those interactions between Long and the bloggers (You remember, the asking Billy questions he wouldn't answer and how he would just walk away from those seeking answers of him) all those events occurred in a one week period in early September during Billy Long's business tour in which he encouraged members of the public to come out and discuss issues. Well, they did. And this was Billy's response. Remember this all took place between September 6 -10, 2010 by several bloggers in the 7th district. Only Clay Bowler got a visit from the F.B.I. though.

Here are the tapes:

Notice in this tape after Billy gets down taking about how important the young people are to him, how he just ignores a question from one of the college students not once but twice.

In clip, Long ignores the questioner:

In this clip, after Long had spoken at Meek's Lumber in Monett, he completely ignores the blogger.

After that horrible tragedy in Tuscon, Long gave Sheriff Arnott a list of names, probably six, of people who were worrisome to him. Arnott to the press and the F.B.I. said the bloggers would be receiving a visit from law enforcement agencies.

These video tapes, all taped in the week of September 6, 2010, show Long consistently refusing to answer questions from constituents.

It wasn't until January, four months after the fact and a week after the Tuscon tragedy that Long decided these encounters were worrisome to him.

But, Sheriff Arnott says Long didn't give him the names, his staff did. But in the tapes, Long is generally alone without staff present -- save for one instance in Monett.

Videotapes don't lie. You have seen citizens question public officials like this frequently-- just watch C-Span. It happened to Roy Blunt. He didn't turn names of the questioners into the F.B.I. If Long embellished his tales of the encounters with the bloggers (I mean the guy's an auctioneer, would he embellish?) to make them more threatening than they were, as he appears to have based on the video tape evidence, Long's motives for doing so become suspect.

Long has a history of playing a victim. You heard that in his tale of what he is giving up-- his auction company...what kind of assets does an auction company have, anyway? A couple of portable pa's? A computer, a trailer maybe and a whole bunch of bidder number cards. He plays the victim with the bloggers.

Billy Long, Sheriff Arnott used the F.B.I. in an attempt to intimidate critics.

I gotta tell you, if the Greene County Sheriff and an F.B.I. agent came to my house (and I live in Greene County so Arnott would be in the right county) and started asked me questions I would have never thought to record the interview, in fact, I would have probably been scared sh*tless and fumbled all over myself trying to answer their questions.

Arnott and the F.B.I. agent --he's the only guy in this whole affair who was doing the right thing. Based on the information he was given, he had to check it out. The only problem is the information he was given was not true.

Bus riders, you watched the videos. did Billy look threatened? Using my favorite John Boehner quote, "Hell NO!" He ignored us most of the time.

I recorded an hour of conversation with Billy Long. His staffer kept telling him that they needed to go to another event. Billy kept talking. The staffer kept trying to shut him up.

At the very end of my conversation with Billy on September 7, 2010, I asked him if he furnished health insurance for his employees. During last night's debate, our favorite auctioneer was asked how much his health insurance cost. He didn't know. Ask his wife, he said.

Ah jeez, this is a guy who wants us to send him to Washington and he wants us to ask his wife how much his health insurance costs. For someone who wants to repeal and replace "Obamacare" you would think that he would know how much his health insurance premiums were costing him, you know, just sort of as a talking point?

But, remember this: on September 7, 2010, I asked Billy Long if he provided health insurance for his employees.

Billy Long replied "They're all covered, I've offered it to them, the ones that don't have, everybody's got healthcare, I offer it to them either in salary and that, and they always take it in salary, so."

Long told me, "everybody's got healthcare."

Then he inserted this caveat: "I offer it to them either in salary and that, and they always take it in salary, so."

But he said, "They're all covered." Then he said, "they always take it in salary".

Doesn't that mean that no one is covered?

Long is Wrong for the seventh district and why the tea party folks aren't letting him that he is selling them out and fast, is beyond me.

Billy hasn't learned that the kind of crap you can pull at an auction, how you can sucker people and manipulate them into making higher bids is fine in an auction setting and joke around and play grabass maybe ok while you are wearing a mike and wielding a gavel but there is no place for such actions and antics when you are a congressman.

A simple search of this blog will turn up repeated instances where Long has embarrassed the district or demonstrated his lack of knowledge of what it means to be a congressman.

A man is known by the company he keeps and Billy is keeping company with everything he said he was against.