Research by Nobel-prize winning Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov seems to be playing a role in Missouri political campaigns this year.
In the late 19th century Pavlov decided to investigate “psychic secretion,” a phrase he felt was more dignified than saying he was studying dog spit. He notice dogs began secreting saliva before food was actually put in front of them. He associated delivery of food with various sounds that dogs would assocaite with food delivery and found that dogs would begin to salivate if they heard the sound–it was not always a bell–even if there was no food. The concept is called “conditioned response,” or “conditional response.”

We’ve already seen Pavlov at work in Missouri politics. It’s not a bell. It’s two words: NANCY PELOSI.

The mere mention of the name of the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, a Democrat, apparently is intended to produce an immediate reaction, a negative one in this case. We even heard it used in a fairly bizarre way (some people thought it was bizarre) in the Republican primary for Auditor where Tom Schweich linked her name to his fellow Republican Allen Icet. Schweich tarred Icet with the Pelosi brush by criticizing him for taking trips to “Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco.”

Yikes!!

Icet as far as we know has never associated with Speaker Pelosi and as a loyal Republican certainly would not be likely to support her political philosophy or her specific positions. But he allegedly took trip to San Francisco. Not just any old San Francisco. He went to ‘NANCY PELOSI’S San Francisco.”

One observer we know has suggested we need political salvation from political salivation in the next three months.