Questions About Big Government's Hit Piece On Ed Martin

After Dana Loesch criticized St. Louis Tea Party founder Bill Hennessy for attempting to defend Ed Martin against a recent Big Government post, Bill Hennessy predictably apologized to Big Government editor Mike Flynn and Loesch and pretty much everybody else. Interestingly, this is the second time in the past couple months that Hennessy had to retreat with his tail between his legs for advocating on behalf of Ed Martin. In May, after Loesch said she was "aggravated" by Hennessy writing a post saying that Martin was "the tea party candidate," Hennessy had to issue multiple clarifications saying that the post was just his opinion and didn't represent the views of the tea party.

But Hennessy's bowing to authority notwithstanding, I think there are a lot of questions that can be raised about why Big Government was used as a vehicle for a hit piece against Ed Martin. Here are a few:

Why would Big Government publish a post about a Republican primary over a year away from the actual election? I am fairly familiar with Big Government and the site is generally not used as a place for arguments about Republican primaries. In fact, a casual glance shows that out of the last 100 posts on Big Government, the hit piece on Martin is the only attempt to get involved in GOP primaries (It's probably even worse than this, but I'm not interested in spending time on it). When Big Government is used as a forum for primary arguments, it would generally be for races with clear "establishment" candidates versus more conservative or tea partyish challangers, but the Martin/Wagner race does not fit that billing.

Are Mike Flynn and/or Dan Riehl exchanging favors with Ann Wagner? Why would they avoid their site's usual protocol to get involved in a Congressional primary fight in Missouri? It's worth noting that Riehl advocated for Ann Wagner on Big Government during the race for RNC chairs as well. Editor Flynn also spoke positively about her. Is there some reason they're intervening on her behalf rather than letting Missouri voters make up their own mind?

Does Dana Loesch have a reason to root for Wagner? As mentioned above, Loesch has twice attacked Bill Hennessy after Hennessy advocated for Ed Martin. Yet, as far as I know, she never criticized Riehl for sticking his nose in the Missouri primary. In fact, she gave Riehl a #FollowFriday shout-out on Twitter today after Riehl's attacks on Martin. Wagner also used Dana Loesch's show to announce her candidacy. What are Loesch's reasons for apparently taking sides against Martin, whom she supported during the last election? By the way, for the record, Loesch has now supported the establishment candidate over the tea partier in pretty much every local election of consequence since the tea party began.

Does Ann Wagner have anything to do with the hit job on Martin? Is sure would be strange for a national blog to randomly attack Wagner's opponent without any provocation. Does Wagner's campaign have something to do with it?

Obviously, I'm no fan of Ed Martin. But I do find these recent events a little puzzling.