Craziness coming out of Kansas, part I

There were two articles today in the Star, telling two different stories of the lunacy permeating Kansas right now, due to the Right-wing crazies that seem so rampant.

The first, by Steve Kraske, tells of a Johnson County Senator, John Vratil, who is extremely  concerned about education and budget cuts in education in the state house, because of where Republican legislating budget cutters want to take the state:

Johnson County lawmaker fears for Kansas public schools

Sen. John Vratil is talking about the future of Kansas public schools. As far as he’s concerned, that future is fade-to-black bleak.

Under one set of numbers he’s seen, basic state aid per pupil drops from $4,012 a student … to $3,937 … to $3,780 … then to $3,705 by 2013. Flat spending going forward from there.

“You adjust that for inflation and we are spending less for K-12 education than 1992,” the Leawood Republican said.

That will translate to a very different classroom experience, he argues. Teachers will have to be laid off. Class sizes will go up, up, up. Shortages of supplies and equipment are inevitable. Entire school districts will close. Schools won’t be as clean as they once were.

And get this: He says some state lawmakers want nothing more than to rid the state of public education.

That's enough to scare you right there.  Sure, more money never means necessarily better grades and performances from students but if you want really poor results, cut the number of teachers so you have more students per class and that's bound to have negative effects.

The rest of the article tells, frankly, of more insanity.  If you haven't read it and you live in Kansas, you might want to check it out.  (See link below).

More on Kansas kraziness later today.  Unfortunately, we're not done.

Links:  http://www.kansascity.com/2011/03/05/2702025/johnson-county-lawmaker-fears.html

Ever-bigger money buying our elections: Thank you, SCOTUS

"Of the nearly $300 million spent by outside groups so far in attempts to influence the election, the public remains completely in the dark about who’s behind 42 percent of these expenditures, an Election Day analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics indicates."

This due, in large part, to the Supreme Court's "Citizens United" decision, earlier this year, paving the way for corporations and the wealthy to pour as much money into elections and campaigns as they want, with no repsonsible reporting for who is doing what.

First, it needs to be pointed out again that this is bad--patently bad--for the country.

Second, it needs to be said that this trend will only get worse and worse with time unless it's legislated against, to dampen both the amount of money and to track its sources.

It took nearly four billion dollars in campaign money for this election--a record amount.

Next time?  In 2012, all bets and all limits will be off as anyone and everyone with big money and the ability to spend it will be going all out to make sure President Obama and his ilk are or are not returned to the White House.

Because you know this new Republican Congress isn't going to write any laws limiting corporations.

No sir.

Link to original post:  http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2010/11/whos-buying-this-election.html

Formerly for Hillary... now for McCain??

You gotta be kidding me:


Some Clinton Money Edges Toward McCain

Wednesday, July 09, 2008, 8:38:46 AM | Lindsay Renick Mayer

Hillary Clinton's endorsement of Barack Obama last month may not have been enough to win over some of her biggest donors. It seems Obama is struggling to gain favor with Clinton's financial supporters, while Republican John McCain is having some luck with them. In May, when Obama seemed to have his party's nomination in the bag, 115 donors who had given Clinton more than $1,000 donated at least that amount to Obama for the first time, according to CRP data cited in the Wall Street Journal. But an equal number also made their first big contributions to McCain that month. In 37 cases, the former Clinton supporters gave more money to McCain than they had contributed to Clinton, while that was true for only 19 Clinton donors who started giving to Obama. It will be interesting to look for movement by Clinton's donors in June, after she bowed out of the race, but that data won't become available until July 20.

originally from the Center for Responsive Politics web page:
http://www.opensecrets.org/news/atom.xml


What kind of sick, stupid or shallow dumbass could go from wanting Hillary Clinton as their next President, to wanting John "I don't care if they're there 100 years" McCain? Holy cow, people. You cannot possibly be so short-sighted to go from some kind of progressive stance to a reactionary twit. Really. No one can be that out and out stupid or bitter.

Ah, but I forget the intelligence of the American voter.

I give people too much credit, once again.