Steve Kraske, political correspondent for The Kansas City Star, gave Gov. Kathleen Sebelius a B-minus for the 2006 legislative session, noting the passage of her top goals of a multiyear schools plan and the tax cut on new business machinery and equipment. But he noted, “Sebelius finds herself at the end of her term with nary a signature achievement. By that I mean a policy initiative of some sweep that she brought to the dance and passed, although she tried on several health-care issues.”
Sebelius, a Democrat, has always been hampered by a GOP-controlled Legislature. But she’s got to run on something substantive of her own making in the fall re-election campaign. Saying she’s one of Time magazine’s top five governors will only go so far with some of the Republicans who crossed over to her in 2002.
How would you rate Sebelius’ latest performance?
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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18 Comments
The only fair way to rate a Gov would be to compare them with other Governors, and I believe Time mag has done well enough.
She hasn’t rocked the boat or upset toooo many people. Usually that is enough for politicians.
Considering all the right-wing idiotologues in the statehouse, it takes a genius just to keep our fair state functioning . . .
B-
No plan with her name on it for school finance: F.
I give her an I for incomplete.
I am not pleased she was unable to stop the hate amendment or concealed carry.If she could have used her power to lean on selected members of the leg. she MIGHT have been able to stop them.
But she is of course at the mercy mostly of rather doltish Repbulicans. There are too many Joe Blows in this state.
I rate her as “playing it safe”. Playing it so safe, she doesn’t even come to the poker table.
I gave her an “I” also. For insurance company employee.
When Sebelius was Kansas Insurance Commissioner, I had two separate insurance problems. In one case a woman driving wrong way on our “Texas U-Turn” ran head-on into my car at low speed. She claimed insurance but her company canceled her shortly before, so they said. In the other case, I paid health insurance premiums of $100+/month to another company for about a year when I happened to learn I had no health insurance. In both cases, in many letters, Insurance Commissioner Sebelius sided with the insurance companies against me. I recently learned why the third party didn’t forward my insurance premiums to the health insurance company — they were approaching bankruptcy.
So all the letters I received from Sebelius were a lie.
So, I will give her a big fat “F” for everything she does in Kansas.
JWink,All I can say is I am sorry to hear it but you have to understand the position from the perspective in which it was designed. Until just a very few years ago, it was the Insurance companies themselves that elected the insurance commissioner. She is the only elected official that can solicit contributions from those she regulates, and is 4th in line from the throne.It was Sebelius herself that adopted the policy that allows the insurance companies to pay insurance claims for amounts far below the actual damages. She also started a policy of forcing the person to pay for a 3rd party apprasial if they disagreed with the insurance companies settlement price, before deciding in favor of the insurance company. (cuts down on disputes tremendously) It was also Sebelius that allowed them to then call the person making the claim after settling and offer them a “low cost loan” to cover the remainder of the cost of repairs.Lets also not forget that her one of her first actions after becoming gov, was to purchase a building that one of our insurance companies simply could not unload at a price many times higher than it’s value without her help. Ms Sebelius was and remains a very valuable and loyal insurance industy employee, which is the exact and only reason that she is in the office that she holds.
Sebelius has done really nothing good or nothing bad.
She did propose a massive tax incrase two years ago that was thankfully defeated.
The worst thing is that each day/month/year that she’s in office and she doesn’t help enact reforms to get our economy on track is a day/month/year that we’ll never get back.
At least we did get estate tax cut and a machinery tax cut this year.
She’s given few people a reason to vote against her.
I suspect she wins with slightly more of the vote than she did vs. Shallenburger (Which was 52.5%)
She could be defeated if the republicans could run a ticket of competency without the wingnut taint. Of course, that “taint” gonna happen in kansas, the land of wingnuttia ruled by the local taliban.
If you are happy with a do nothing governor so that she cannot be blamed for anything) than Sebelius is your candidate for governor. As in some of the posts above it is pretty clear what she had done or tried to do.
She did purchase a building for the state from her insurance friends. She did sell off some cars. A lot of them were not even drivable but then who was to no that. She had agencies do big contracts with Enterprise to lease $13,000 dollar cars (the purchase price from a retailer) for $10,000 a year. She then paid mileage to employees that if there was a state car to drive it would have been cheaper. So the expense for rentals and gas mileage is more than the state was paying before.
She has tried to raise taxes but thank goodness for the republicans. If she had gotten her way we would have had a tax increase each year just to pay for what she wanted to do. She has talked about all of the waste that she cut out but a lot of that was pumped up numbers. So where were the true savings? You cannot find them.
She violated the ethics rules by soliciting money during this last session and did not self report it. But because she was previously on the ethics commission and most off the folks are her friends she got a little slap on the wrist. She never even admitted it was an error. She did not feel it was really a solicitation. But when others at least called the ethics commission to tell them a violation had occurred in error that were hit with the same amount as the non reporting governor.
She has not led the charge on any major issue. She talks about doing something but when her polling shows her that she is not on the right path she just stops talking about it. Example – she proposed a very large tax increase but when it was getting bad reviews she backed away and left Bill Kassebaum blowing in the wind with her democrats because she was not going to down with a sinking ship. She proposed an education plan one time and got shot down so she decided to sit on the sidelines with that issue. She would talk about education being important but do not ask her to take any action on the issue.
She tried to get Hillary Care health programs but when her polling showed they were not what people wanted she just backed away quietly. So now she will campaign that she tried to get a lot of warm and fuzzy health programs for the people but those big bad republicans just would not let her do it. But if you will just give her one more chance as governor she knows she can get those things done. Why can’t she get things done? Because her polling gets in the way and she cannot go against the polls so she allows them to stop her from doing anything.
The list of her do nothing as governor can on and on and on. She was big on giving illegal’s driver licenses and thank goodness she was stopped. She did not bring it up again because her polling showed it was not a positive for her (or anyone else for that matter) She was successful in getting the illegal’s in state tuition at our universities. She has also asked them to get out and vote. How will they do that? If she vetoes the campaign reform bill she can get them to vote with advance ballots.
When she was insurance commissioner she said that she would not and did not take any money from the insurance companies because she did not think it was right to take campaign money from the industry you regulated. Well guess what? She did not take money from the insurance companies but she did take money from the insurance agents (who she also regulated). Now she likes to say that she did not know they were agents but if she really was concerned (as she said she was) then she should have verified with the licensed agents list and on a lot of donations they are required to get the occupation of the donor. So once again she did it on the sly but tells the people that she is being honest and forthright.
You should really ask yourself if you want someone that does things behind closed doors or even misleads or do you want a governor that is up front and you know exactly where they stand and what they intend to do.
GOVERNOR IT IS TIME TO COME CLEAN WITH THE PEOPLE!!!!!
So, Atlas. Do you believe you’re John Galt?
If I mistaken wasn’t the last across the board major tax hike done when Bill Graves and the Republicans controlled Topeka?
Graves and the moderate Republicans raised taxes 3 out the last 4 years of Graves’ second term.
Graves raised taxes in 2002. It was the largest tax increase in Kansas History. Part of that was because of 911 and the other was because he was not willing to make tough budget cutting decisions. Graves had enough of his type people in the legislature at the time to get a tax increase passed. I do not recall other tax increases (as stated by a previous post) during the last four years of Graves’s terms. It was sort of funny how the democrats said they wanted a tax increase but when it came time to vote there were several of them voting no. But there were some democrats that said they were willing and they showed that willingness by voting yes.
If Sebelius had gotten her way she would have had the largest tax increase in Kansas History. But she was blocked by the legislature from doing so. She was trying to do it from behind the scenes (which never works) by having Bill Kasebaum carry her water but it went down in flames. Kasebaum in his attempt to get re-elected went down in flames. The governor figures it was risky to be out in front on taxes and she was right.
One of the ways the Sebelius has gotten by without raising taxes is the republicans holding her feet to the fire and she has been raising fees (fees are suppose to be for a specific program) like crazy and then taking money from those fees to pay for other programs. So she has done tax increases you just don’t see the fee increases as much.
I would love to see governor non-leadership defeated, but not if it means more wingnuts in topeka.
If you repubs could run someone other than hypocrits, talibaners, and ficscal idiots, maybe we wouldnt HAVE governor non-leadership now.
Having said that, why cant you republicans understand simple math and simple finances? Maybe you need two cigar boxes to keep it all straight, the way you love things :) You know, in money, out money, and a reconciliation some where along the line?
“If Sebelius had gotten her way she would have had the largest tax increase in Kansas History. But she was blocked by the legislature from doing so.”
Oh yea, we wouldnt want to “pay as we go” or reduce the state’s debt load. We wouldnt want to improve our state’s credit rating, which, btw, fell to ONE STEP ABOVE CALIFORNIA’s as a result of the graves years and the REPUBLICAN CONTROLLED LEGISLATURE.
So… the kochs get tax breaks, the state’s financial picture worsens, and we are only one step above california where the credit rating is at the lowest notch.
Yep. True believer republicans. Spend money like drunken sailors on messed up priorities and then cut taxes at the same time. Real fiscal responsibility. How is that working in washington? No better than kansas? Big surprise on the republican finances there.
Just who do you think is gonna pay the piper when all you tax and spend deficit republicans are gone?
That’s right. The adults.
Please go play in the traffic children and let the grownups run the state.
How’s that famous kansas republican leadership been working? The last I knew the LEGISLATURE passed the budgets. And how long have the republicans controlled the kansas taliban, I mean kansas legislature?
Yea. Since god was a pup.