Kansas GOP Insider (wannabe): Special Session Nonsense

Thursday, June 23, 2016

Special Session Nonsense

A bunch of loons will descend on Topeka this morning--and I'm not talking about legislators. (Ba-dum ching. I'll be here all week.)

This school funding issue is a red herring and a political shell game designed to force Republicans to raise taxes. The end goal is a political one--calling Republicans "hypocrites." 

This was never about the children. It's about the adults. 

Adults, and probably some misguided children being used as political tools, are going to descend on the Capitol today. My hope is that they'll behave and listen and learn. But if history is any indication, these folks may curse and even spit at legislators. This happened recently. Specifically, I heard horror stories from when the KNEA rallied to advocate against making changes that limited some of the things that teachers unions can negotiate. (Legislators did what needed to be done and overhauled 1970s collective bargaining rules.)

Today, there are no good solutions (other than ignoring the Court's June 30 deadline and no one has the courage to do that). 

I hate the "plan" on the table right now, but it very may well pass. Boo. There are two potential ways this thing fails: 

1. Since Sens. Susan Wagle and Terry Bruce are attempting to out-conservative one another in the lead-up to leadership elections in the Senate next year, one or both may be willing to play hard ball and advocate for calling the Court's bluff. I have my fingers and toes crossed, but I hear Wagle is #TeamBadPlan, so we'll see. 

2. Enough of the liberty-leaning conservatives refuse to fall for this bad plan. I don't have high hopes for this either. Some of the liberty-leaning conservatives will refuse to vote on the plan unless it's tied to some policy legislation--like the Constitutional Amendment telling Courts to stuff it. But there may not be enough of those folks to prevent this horrid plan. 

My sincere hope is that legislators realize that all of those boneheads rallying today don't speak for anyone but themselves. They don't speak for me. They don't speak for all parents. They don't speak for all teachers or school board members or school administrators. Those people, a majority of which will be on the public school dole, speak only for themselves. Please remember that. They're screaming the loudest, in part, because they can. Thanks to their unions and shadow groups funded by John Vratil and friends, they're well organized, and they've been working on this for years. Conveniently, they also don't have to work in the summer. 

There is another side to this issue, and we're at our desks hoping you'll spare our pocketbooks, not just today, but long term. There will never be enough money to satiate them, and if you give the Court's and the Unions the idea that they can make funding decisions by taking hostages and threatening to close public institutions, it's game over in the long term.

1 comment:

  1. Susan Wagle has never been conservative, Terry Bruce always has. No contest there.

    ReplyDelete