First off, when was the last time Kansas was the leader in something? Yes, Kansas and Kansans have done great things throughout the years. We were the first to allow women to vote before the country decided to write an amendment, however, we also were the first to promote prohibition. Kansas was one of the many reasons the Civil War began and Kansas may have even had the actual first battle of the Civil War. We do good things here, excluding prohibition, and we are good people but not for awhile. Now when we seem to "lead" in things, it usually winds up embarrassing up. Remember when Kansas said you couldn't teach evolution in school? We became the laughing stocks of the world. Not of the midwest, not of the country, the world.
And that's what baffles me. The Republican leaders think that eliminating things such as art, abortion providers and state taxes and drafting legislation requiring a birth certificate to vote is a good idea but when you think about it for more than five minutes, that logic falls apart. Eliminating programs designed to pay for art makes us look stupid and keeps people who want to pursue a career in art (writing, painting, countless others) from moving here and forces artists who are here to have to move elsewhere. Shutting down abortion providers is dangerous as women who need to get an abortion have to travel out of the state instead of just going to the nearest city. Sure, you can argue that accidents can happen on your way to an in-state provider but I'd rather be killed or maimed in my own state. Eliminating state taxes also seems like a good idea. But then property taxes and local taxes go up. And they don't just go up, they skyrocket because the city and county have to make up for what they are now not receiving from the state. As for the crackdown on voter fraud, no one has been able to show any instances of voter fraud in the state of Kansas. And the one instance I could find was in Ohio where, out of over 9,000,000 votes cast, 1 was fraudulent because the woman used her husband's name.
So why do these Republican politicians target Kansas and not a state that is relevant to leadership or even the presidency? Surely, New York, California, Massachusetts, Florida--even Pennsylvania and Ohio are more important, right? But all the states that lead the country now sometimes vote liberal. In Kansas, only parts of Wichita, Kansas City proper and Lawrence are liberal and when combined with the Kansans in western Kansas and the rich Johnson County pricks, the Democratic vote is typically cancelled out. But from what I learned just by living in Kansas and going through our former governors, when the people of Kansas don't like who's representing them, we will vote them out. Remember, Jim Ryun?
