New Committee Created to Study How to Reduce the Size of State Government.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – The Missouri General Assembly gave final approval this week to legislation authorizing the creation of a new committee charged with exploring options for reducing the size of state government and improving efficiency. Rep. Tom Flanigan, R-Carthage, helped lead the effort to secure passage of SCR 54.

SCR 54 authorizes the creation of the Joint Interim Committee on Reducing the Size of State Government. The committee will be charged with examining each department and agency of the state in order to determine programs or bureaucracies that should be eliminate or reduced. The committee will also have the responsibility of developing recommendations and strategies for reducing the size of state government overall.

"It’s an issue that warrants further investigation and I think the committee represents an ideal way to develop ideas that will improve government efficiency, reduce the amount of bureaucratic red tape, and save additional dollars," said Flanigan.

NASCAR THIS WEEK

By Monte Dutton

Sponsored by Curry Automotive

Bowyer Is Long Overdue

RICHMOND, Va. -- The prevailing view is that the Aaron’s 499, run at Talladega Superspeedway and won by Kevin Harvick, was a NASCAR classic.

It all depends on the perspective, or so said Harvick’s Richard Childress Racing teammate Clint Bowyer, who finished seventh in that race.

"It was boring as far as my situation went," said Bowyer. "I rode around in the back and snuck in and got a decent finish out of it. That’s the only way I can get a good finish there.

"I hate doing it. It’s boring and no good for your sponsor and everything else. But ... I needed to get a good finish."

Now, one week later, Harvick is the Sprint Cup point leader, Jeff Burton is ninth and Bowyer 12th, meaning that all three are in position to make the Chase. That, of course, is still 16 races away.

Only a Cup regular since 2006, Bowyer has already made the Chase twice, finishing third in 2007 and fifth in 2008. All three RCR drivers made the Chase in 2008. None did so in 2009.

Bowyer, who will turn 31 this month, has collected three top-10 finishes in the past five races, finishing 12th in the most recent at Richmond International Raceway. He drives the No. 33 Cheerios/Hamburger Helper Chevrolet.

Twice a Sprint Cup winner, Bowyer has gone 72 races -- exactly two seasons -- since his Richmond victory on May 3, 2008.

"Not winning ... you never get over it," he said. "We are racers and grew up racing and winning races. I hate losing. It has been a long time since we won a Cup race, and we’re long overdue. I feel like it’s our turn, and we need to get it done."

Bowyer’s two victories occurred at Richmond and New Hampshire.

"I think the RCR short-track program has always been good," he said. "This track (Richmond), I don’t know why, it just kind of fell into my driving style. I love this place. You have got to get up on the wheel and make it happen at a track like this.

"I think this is a perfect size race track. It’s just fast enough that you get that sensation of speed that we all like, and it’s just short enough that we can beat and bang on each other, and root and gouge for a win. That’s what puts on a good show at tracks like Richmond."

A neighbor’s got a friendly little dog. It isn’t necessarily ‘fraid of it’s shadow or anything, it just isn’t an obnoxious type animal.

The other day, the daughter walked in the house after not bein’ around for a few weeks. She was wearin’ sunglasses and a hat of sorts. Didn’t look like anything the dog could identify with and it startled the mutt.

The dog went ta growlin’ and barkin’, and the neighbor came rushin’ to the kitchen to see the problem. After a moment of calmin’ down the dog, it returned to its oversized puppy self, lickin’ the daughter’s hand and wantin’ to play.

I suppose a good bark, even when it’s used mainly to draw attention, does have it’s place. It’s surely better than whimpin’ off to a corner to hide.

This is some fact, but mainly,

Just Jake Talkin’.

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CLICK and CLACK

TALK CARS

Dear Tom and Ray:

I’ve heard that each gallon of gas burned by a car releases about 20 pounds of CO2 into the atmosphere. I’m not a chemist, but even allowing for some creative reactions and recombinations going on, how does combusting about six and a half pounds of fuel turn into 20 pounds of CO2? I can’t quite get the math to add up. What am I missing? --Mike

Tom: You’re missing the oxygen, Mike. The ideal air-to-fuel ratio in a car is 14.7-to-1. So to combust a pound of fuel, you need to combine it with almost 15 pounds of air.

Ray: that means in order to combust a gallon of gasoline - which weighs about six and a half pounds - you’d combine it with almost 100 pounds of air! So, you can see quickly how you can end up with 20 pounds of a single byporduct.

Tom: During combustion, a bunch of the carbon molecules (C) in the gasoline attach to two oxygen molecules (o) from the air, and come out the tailpipe as CO2. And CO2 - one carbon and two oxygen molecules - weighs about three times as much as the carbon molecule you started with.

Ray: Burning gasoline is a complex equation. You end up with all kinds of byproducts, including CO2, H2), HBO, Cinemax, Flomax, etc. But the way you get 20 pounds of CO2 from six and a half pounds of gas is by combining the gas with a heap of oxygen during the combustion process.