Are They Really Republicans?

This is a question every Republican voter should be asking themselves as they go to the polls on Aug. 2. As usual, there are a lot of crowded primary races, and primary voters will be tasked with paring down the candidates. Hopefully, voters will choose the actual Republicans. 

A whole lot of those candidates have no business running as Republicans. Actually, there are quite a few elected Republicans who probably ought to wipe the elephants right off their literature. (There is even one candidate who changed her voter registration from Democrat to Republican eight days--so she was a Republican for a whole week-- before filing to run for office as a Republican. (Ahem. Kim Palcic.)

In Kansas this cycle, primary voters and people with televisions and internet connections are being bombarded with (mostly) nonsense about the eeeevil conservatives who refuse to just pony up more cash for public schools. I am going to call myself an exception: We should fire the Kansas Supreme Court Justices over this ridiculous, unlawful situation.

When these donkeys-in-elephant-costumed candidates come to your doorstep, you should be asking how well their values align with the Republican Party platform and the Kansas Republican Party platform. In many, many instances, these candidates and electeds haven't even bothered reading the documents that supposedly guide their alignment with the Republican Party.

Now, I don't agree with EVERYTHING in the national GOP platform. Adopted at the national convention in 2012, It's a 62-page document with disgraced Gov. Bob McDonnell's picture on it. But I can count on a few fingers the items with which I disagree.

For example, I am not a big fan of prohibiting legal behaviors. If gambling is legal in casinos--shamefully, Kansas casinos are actually OWNED by the state, gross-- I don't think legislators should make it illegal to do it online. The Republican Platform, however, sees the issue differently.

Millions of Americans suffer from problem or pathological gambling that can destroy families. We support the prohibition of gambling over the Internet and call for reversal of the Justice Department’s decision distorting the formerly accepted meaning of the Wire Act that could open the door to Internet betting. 

This is one very small, very specific instance where I disagree with the platform.

Other issues, like the issue of life, is baked into various parts of the platform. It's an issue that appears repeatedly throughout the platform. Kansas has a lot of Republicans who regularly vote against pro-life legislation. This is no small, very specific instance of disagreeing with a tiny portion of the platform. 

Perhaps most prescient in the upcoming primary, the GOP platform specifically and clearly states:

We condemn attempts by activist judges, at any level of government, to seize the power of the purse by ordering higher taxes. 

Um.  There are a whole lot of so-called moderates cheering about a Kansas Supreme Court who continually does just that.Meanwhile, the Kansas GOP platform says this:

Taxpayer funding of lobbyists and lawsuits against additional state funds should be prohibited.

If you're a Republican, if you identify and agree with the majority of the party platform, you should cast your votes for actual Republicans. And if those so-called Republicans want to change the party, I suggest they work to get seats at the tables where these documents are drafted. (Hint: To my knowledge, they haven't tried.) Instead, they've hypocritically joined a party with prescribed certain beliefs and then voted or advocated repeatedly for just the opposite. It's dishonest. No one wins when the intellectually dishonest are elevated to elected office.