Kansas City Star columnist Steve Kraske shared an out-there theory about why Kay O’Connor (in photo) and Eric Carter got nowhere in their GOP primary bids to unseat, respectively, incumbents Secretary of State Ron Thornburgh and Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger. "Well, they’re both from Johnson County," he wrote. "Rural Kansas and Missouri voters have a long history of turning away from gold coast candidates from Johnson County or the big cities of Kansas City and St. Louis. We’re not like them is the thinking."
Kraske noted that Bill Graves always listed his hometown as Salina, rather than the more accurate Mission Hills.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Registered?
Commenting on WE Blog now requires you to be a Kansas.com member. Use the links above to register, if you haven't already, or to log in.Contact us
Follow us
Daily Archives
-
Recent Comments
- BlueJay on Open thread 11/22
- Regular on Open thread 11/22
- Regular on Open thread 11/22
- Rage on Open thread 11/22
- cosmos_originally on Open thread 11/22
- Chas on Open thread 11/22
- BlueJay on Open thread 11/22
- Boxlock20 on Open thread 11/22
- satatom on Open thread 11/22
- JimJohnson on Open thread 11/22
20 Comments
Your theory isn’t helped by the recent Democratic Secretary of State race, which was won by the candidate from Kansas City. Course that result might have been won by Haley because Beattie lost two “outside the Gold Coast” counties – Cowley and Ford.
The real reason O’Connor and Carter lost was because they were wing-nuts, and because the entire state is rebelling against the neo-conservative agenda – which is why Connie Morris couldn’t win her race in western Kansas, despite a low turn-out Republican primary where they have thought for a long time they could run the table against moderates.
Wichita is the real world.
Johnson County is a white flight community. It does attract businesses and people because of very low crime, good schools, and lack of poor minorities. It’s 96% white. That should tell you something.
Wichita is a true American community with urban poor to the very wealthy and a mixed ethnic percentages that reflects exactly the average of the nation.
Wichita has to face up to many challenges and balances as a real world city. Johnson County gets to shove all of what we deal with to Missouri. All they have to do is keep all of their property values high and out of reach of the poor, then it will continue to enjoy more White Flight from metro KC.
The good thing is that they are on Kansas side. The white flight could have easily went to Missouri side and we wouldn’t be able to enjoy any of their tax revenue benefits.
More power to JoCo. My focus is exclusively Wichita.
Arm pit of Kansas
Joe Williams, good analysis of the stateline political dynamics, with a dash of Wichita boosterism.
The asscrack of America.
And now for something completely different–
http://channels.isp.netscape.com/news/story.jsp?flok=FF-APO-1110&idq=/ff/story/0001%2F20060811%2F1135229446.htm&sc=1110&floc=NI-ne2
Judge Rules Ky. Gov. Can’t Be ProsecutedBy ROGER ALFORD
FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) – A judge ruled Friday that Gov. Ernie Fletcher, under fire for a hiring scandal, is protected by executive immunity and cannot be prosecuted while in office.
Fletcher, Kentucky’s first Republican governor in three decades, was indicted in May on charges that his administration rewarded political supporters with protected state jobs. He has accused the Democratic attorney general of conducting a politically motivated investigation.
Special Judge David E. Melcher essentially stayed the case until Fletcher’s term expires, or unless he is removed through impeachment by the Legislature.
Scott Crawford-Sutherland, the attorney general’s top prosecutor, urged the judge not to dismiss the case, saying no man is above the law
*****
See how it works, folks. The Supreme Court rules that a sitting Democratic President, Bill Clinton, can be harried with an old “sexual harrassment” lawsuit that has nothing to do with his presidential duties, but a Republican Governor shouldn’t be bothered with defending his unethical conflict-of-interest hiring practices.
RedRad:
I’d try to explain the law that applies in each circumstance to you, but you don’t want to understand. You just want to score more cheap points.
Oh well.
Oh, thank you, wise one for condescending to point out how only you lawyers have the fine mental acuity and specialized knowledge to understand what is far too complex for us mere mortals.
BULLSHIT.
Calling it “perfume” doesn’t make it smell any better.
Why don’t you practice talking out of both sides of your mouth at the same time?
That’s a useful skill for people like you.
RedRad:
Just as I suspected. It’s not actually that complex. It can’t be, if I can understand it. The point is, you don’t want to understand.
Where shall I start. Off the top of my head, without any annoying research, here’s the basics:
If Kentucky is like most states (and the Feds), impeachment is the sole means of removing the executive. Since prosecution is an executive function, and the president (or governor) is the chief executive, it has universally been held that a sitting executive may not be prosecuted for a crime. He may, however, be impeached and removed (two separate steps, remember), and following that removal, prosecuted.
By contrast, the suit against Clinton to which you refer was not a criminal prosecution brought by an executive branch agency, but a private action brought by a private individual – a civil suit. Further, since it did not involve Clinton’s actions while in office, it was not protected by sovereign immunity. Thus, the suit could go forward.
There you go. Not that hard. Will that matter? Probably not.
Well, nice explanation, GMC.
Except you left out one little point–no sitting president had ever been exposed to a civil lawsuit until Paula Jones and her legal team, who included Ann Coulter, took it to the Supreme Court, who — surprise, surprise — ruled for Jones.
Strangely, the case that 9-11 widows have filed against Bush for not doing enough to protect the Trade Center seems to be going nowhere.
Oh well . . . there’s one set of laws for the powerful and another for the rest of us.
I suppose you’re going to explain that as “soverign immunity” because Bush was president at the time.
Which apparently is a term that means “you’re legally responsible for what you do before you’re President, but not after.”
Okay, well, that’s certainly fair, so long as the idea of “no one is above the law” is not important to you.
But still, I have to feel sorry for Paula Jones. Her 850,000 dollar settlement all went to –surprise, surprise — pay her lawyers.
After her spread in Penthouse and her celebrity boxing match, her 15 minutes of fame being used by the right-wing smear machine has been used up.
Now, how’s she going to pay for the nose-job? Or was that Linda Tripp?
They all start to run together, don’t they?
Is there a point to the last three rants? A common thread? Any semblence of sense? NO??
Unless you have any evidence to the contrary, as I stated above seems to be the state of the law. You’ve provided none, so you’re left with bitter drivel.
So sad.
Here’s the point, and it’s not just at the top of your head:
You’d be a lot happier if you’d just recognize that your profession and all its trappings is a pretext for the rich and powerful to do what they want.
Trying to reconcile the contradictions between that reality and the false idealist smoke screen the powerful throw up is what gets you all tied up into knots.
“your profession and all its trappings is a pretext for the rich and powerful to do what they want.”
Ah – now I know. I’m part of the conspiracy. There I was, only three years old, standing on the grassy knoll that Dallas November. And hiding the aliens from Roswell. And I hate to divulge this, but . . . .
There’s a map on the back of the declaration of independence! Put there by Masons! Seized by the Knights Templar!! Guarded by the Council on Foreign Relations!!
It’s called rule of law. Please.
Oh, goodie, the old reductio ad absurdium . . . don’t deal with any possible truth, just ridicule it.
You don’t need a “conspiracy” to have a collusion of interests. Collusion in democracy is much more subtle than conspiracy, so much so that the people engaged in it are not even fully aware of what they do.
Noam Chomsky argues this in his book “Necessary Illusions”:
“In the democratic system, the necessary illusions cannot be imposed by force. Rather, they must be instilled in the public mind by more subtle means. A totalitarian state can be satisfied with lesser degrees of allegiance to required truths. It is sufficient that people obey; what they think is of secondary concern. But in a democratic political order, there is always the danger that independent thought might be translated into political action, so it is important to eliminate the threat at its root.”[68]
See the way the press in this country has become stenographers for the administration. As a result, they have more “access” and are rewarded by the administration.
The WH gets what it wants, and so does the press corps.
The people, as always, get screwed.
No conspiracy, just collusion–working together for mutual gain.
Wow-
If Chomsky said it . . . well gosh, it must be so.
That’s a credible source. If Chomsky is the well-spring of your critical thinking, well, I think I understand. I’ll just talk to the adults.
If Johnson County is Kansas’ ‘gold coast,’ what’s Wichita?
Wichita is the cesspool of the Tax Maneuvers.
GMC70, you are REALLY smart – teach us, o wise one. We want to be JUST like YOU
As well you should, ddub! ;-)