Randy Turner Reports of Congressman Billy Long's Financial Problems

Billy Long ran on a send a small businessman to Congress to fix Washington's problems. It is being reported by another blog with connections to the Southwest Missouri media that Congressman Long may be experiencing financial problems as well. This of course could throw another wrench in the Billy Long ethos, which can no longer claim it's fed up after embracing the Washington establishment.

Randy Turner, who has connections to KY3 and often posts his political commentary on KY3's Web site, is also reporting of possible financial woes in Long's pocket book.

You may remember BBCW broke the news of Long's financial problems last week, and we learn Turner too is reporting on the possibility Long may be in trouble based on Tom Stilson's campaign ad attacking Long, who had to borrow large sums of money from a family member which may suggest Long himself may not even be credit worthy with the banks.

Here's BBCW from July 10, 2012:

Congress is full of businessmen who realized they weren’t really all that good at business and look to Congress as a means to build wealth beyond their wildest expectations. –Mike Church, June 28, 2012


Tom Stilson recently launched an attack ad against Billy Long that suggests Congressman Long may be having personal financial issues. In his attack ad Stilson says Long has borrowed lots of money from his father in personal loans and may be as much as $6 million in personal debts.





This is very interesting because rumors have been going around Southwest Missouri for a number of weeks now suggesting Billy Long may have been in financial crisis when he decided to run for Congress two years ago.

I want to remind you what Billy Long said shortly after announcing he was running for Congress during an interview with the Springfield Business Journal in December 2009.

SBJ: How has the recession hit your company? 


 BL: It's hurt our business like everybody else's. People think auctioneers will do better in bad times, but the truth is, we do better in good times, when there's a lot of demand in the market. ... Right now, there's not much demand, and there's a lot of supply. People will call wanting me to auction their house, and maybe they owe $180,000 and it's only worth $150,000 now. 


Word going around Southwest Missouri is if you look in The Daily Events, a newspaper that lists home foreclosures, you may find Missouri's Seventh District Congressman Billy Long may have been having financial problems that may have been influential in his career change and his decision to run for Congress. According to the to someone connected in the Southwest Missouri real estate field, as Long was campaigning for Congress with the auction business suffering as the housing bubble burst that Long may have been facing foreclosure on his Highland Springs mansion on the southeast side of Springfield, an exclusive gated community with a golf course and country club highlighting the community.

This is all very possible when you consider how thin most Americans spread themselves before the housing bubble hit. Republican establishment types before Long was elected to Congress cited how inactive Long was in politics until after the housing bubble hit. They said they never saw him at fund raisers and campaign events working for Republican candidates. It was only after the housing bubble hit that Long began getting involved despite telling the tale on the campaign trail that he thought about running back when Roy Blunt first ran for Congress but didn't want to raise his daughters in Washington, DC.

You have to consider Billy Long in his middle 50s. Here is a man hearing the reports the industry he built his life around may not recover for a decade or more, desperate as home sales went down as the housing market crashed, possibly overextended by living a life based on the economic boom of the previous two decades found himself stretched too thin and ill prepared for life after the housing market crash and decided he would do what so many others have done before--get rich off the backs of taxpayers. Claiming to be "fed up" Billy may have just gone to Washington ready to take advantage of a system where people like the high school history teacher before him become multi-millionaires in the public service sector.

So why does this matter?

Billy Long ran on his send a businessman to Washington ethos to go fix Washington. If Long was hiding that his house wasn't in order to begin with during the campaign then he had no business presenting himself as a solution to Washington's bigger problems.

The question is: does Tom Stilson have a July surprise for Billy Long? Has he invested in the expensive subscription required to open The Daily Events' Web page to look to see if there is truth to Long's Highland Springs mansion being listed for foreclosure. Stilson obviously knows something about Long and it appears he might be ready to play this card as he is setting up the scenario that Billy Long's personal finances may have been in shambles as he looked for security in a government job. This is going to be interesting to watch.

Of course, Congressman Long's rebuttal is simple on this. Long took chances with a lifetime investment in a small business that hit hard times, and what has Stilson done? He still lives at home with mommy and daddy. Like I said, this could be interesting to watch.

http://www.news-leader.com/article/20120615/NEWS06/306150027/Billy-Long-real-estate-Blunt