As Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline prepares to defend our state’s death penalty before the U.S. Supreme Court next month, an ongoing prosecution by his re-election opponent illustrates another of the law’s flaws: its seemingly uneven application. Although the 2002 murder of 19-year-old Ali Kemp at a Leawood swimming pool was “incredibly heinous,” Johnson County District Attorney Paul Morrison said this week, it doesn’t meet the “aggravating factors” criteria for the death penalty in Kansas. So if Benjamin Appleby is convicted, his maximum sentence would be life. When the death penalty is and isn’t applied may make sense in a court of law, but it clearly doesn’t pass the commonsense test among Kansans or victims’ survivors. Roger Kemp, the victim’s father, said: “If the Kansas laws don’t protect their innocent women and children, what good are they?”
Posted by Rhonda Holman
The defense is summing up its case today on whether the Dover school district in Pennsylvania can require that its high school biology students be read a statement saying that “Darwin’s theory” is not a fact and that intelligent design is worth studying. The New York Times has an interesting article today on the nonprofit law firm that is providing counsel to the school district. Attorneys for the Thomas More Law Center have been encouraging school boards for years to challenge evolution by teaching intelligent design, and finally found one to do it. Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the center, said the center’s role is to use the courts “to change the culture.” So they are fighting judicial activism with judicial activism?
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
One of President Bush’s strengths is that he isn’t satisfied with incremental change; he wants bold reform. And to his credit, one of his reform goals is overhauling the tax code. A presidential advisory committee recommended two options this week to simplify and restructure the tax code. Its proposals will face a steep political hill, as special interest groups will oppose many of the recommendations. For example, the finance and real estate industries will fight any move to end or limit the mortgage interest deduction. But the tax code is far too byzantine, to the point that citizens and businesses are spending billions of dollars each year just on compliance costs.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
The No Child Left Behind law relies on testing to measure students’ progress. But this New York Times article points out that there are often large discrepancies between the results of the federal and state mandated tests. Take, for instance, Florida. On the federal test in 2005, 30 percent of the state’s fourth-graders were proficient in reading. But on the Florida state test, 71 percent of fourth-graders were proficient in reading in 2005. Big difference. And that’s not unusual, the article said.
Kim Karesh, spokeswoman for the Tennessee Education Department — which has also seen big differences in its state and federal results — brings up a key point: “In education these days, we talk numbers until we’re blue in the face. But there’s a bigger philosophical question: ‘Can you really boil it down to a number?’”
Posted by Melissa Cooley
Seems the rumors of Michael Brown’s parting with the Federal Emergency Management Agency were greatly exaggerated. Though Brown quit as FEMA director on Sept. 12, he is into his second month as a government contractor, and at the same $148,000 annual salary rate. “We don’t want to sacrifice that ability simply in order to make an image point,” said Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. Ability to do what? Fail spectacularly? Makes you wonder if “Scooter” Libby’s White House consulting contract is ready yet.
And Brown’s Aug. 29 e-mail trail, as recounted by The Washington Post, confirms that Brown’s focus was not on Katrina’s wrath. When a FEMA flack complimented Brown’s appearance, he replied: “I got it at Nordstroms. . . . Are you proud of me?” and later wrote, “If you look at my lovely FEMA attire you’ll really vomit. I am a fashion god.”
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Texas, reportedly is acting as if his relinquishing of the job of House majority leader on Sept. 28 was but a dream. He’s still officing in the leadership suite, presiding over private meetings, lobbying members to vote a certain way, and being followed around by three Capitol Hill bodyguards — even when he’s in Texas for court appearances related to his two indictments. Is it dedication or defiance? Either way, somebody needs to start telling DeLay to lay low.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Just when you think every possible evolution joke has been told at Kansas’ expense, here comes another one. This one in the San Francisco Chronicle’s “Bad Reporter” comic strip declares, “ ‘Stork theory’ to be taught alongside pregnancy theory in Kansas schools,” then concludes, “Avian flu scare forces Kansas to postpone all births.” How can we ever thank the conservative majority on the Kansas State Board of Education for our state image’s extreme makeover? How about by ensuring an ideological board makeover next year?
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Everybody talks about the need for leaders, but the planned Kansas Health Foundation Leadership Center aims to do something about it. To be announced this morning, the center expects to open in downtown Wichita by spring 2007, then draw on $30 million in foundation funds over 10 years to help cultivate the leaders Kansas will need to handle its challenges locally and statewide in the coming decades. Many won’t see an obvious connection between leadership and health, the Wichita-based foundation’s mission. But the center is the latest example of this impressive foundation’s big thinking, which in this case could result in not only better health but a better state.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
