Responding to the good news that the state expects to collect $252 million more in taxes this fiscal year than previously estimated, Sherriene Jones-Sontag, spokeswoman for Gov. Sam Brownback, said: “Now is not the time to go back to wasteful spending.” So what is wasteful? The main spending increase being debated in the Legislature is restoring some funding to K-12 education. Is that wasteful? How about restoring some funding for mental health services, which have been hit hard with budget cuts? Kansas Chamber of Commerce president Kent Beisner once accused the Legislature of catering “to the needs of those at the government trough.” Is that the Brownback administration’s attitude?
Charles and David Koch have filed a second lawsuit against the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank they helped found. Their latest lawsuit accuses Cato of a “board-packing scheme.” Cato’s board of directors voted last month “to increase the number of seats on the board and to fill those seats with four previous members whom the Kochs had removed,” the Washington Post reported. Meanwhile, Michael F. Cannon, the director of health policy studies at Cato, wrote an open letter to the Koch brothers warning that a Koch takeover would undermine Cato’s credibility. “Cato scholars fear your lawsuit, because even the perception that a think tank is dependent on a single financial interest is enough to wreck its credibility,” he wrote.
UPDATE: Melissa Cohlmia, director of corporate communication at Koch Companies Public Sector, responded that the Washington Post was incorrect in saying that Charles Koch and David Koch had four members “removed.” She said the Kochs requested that the vote on the board members be delayed. When that didn’t happen, the Kochs voted to retain two of the four board members. Regarding the concern about independence, Charles Koch said: “We seek to elect board members and officers who will ensure that Cato becomes increasingly effective in advancing liberty while remaining dedicated to its core principles. These officers and directors would act independently from me or any other individual.”
A Mormon president? A second term when the unemployment rate is 8 percent or higher? Conventional wisdom would nix either scenario for November. But it’s been wrong a lot over the past 64 years, noted University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato (in photo) in a Politico commentary. In 1948, President Truman was so unpopular that the election was supposed to be a formality. The 1960 thinking went: “No Roman Catholic, much less an inexperienced 43-year-old, is going to win the White House.” Sabato noted that 20 years later it was: “Ronald Reagan is much too far to the right, and he’d be the oldest president ever elected.” How about 1992? “Oh, sure, America is going to oust a war hero for a draft-dodging, pot-smoking, womanizing governor of Dogpatch,” Sabato wrote. In 2000, it was thought “the voters’ populist distaste for dynasty” would deny George Bush the job. And eight years later: “An African-American with a thin resume at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? In which parallel universe?”
Responding to the good news that the state expects to collect $252 million more in taxes this fiscal year than previously estimated, Sherriene Jones-Sontag, spokeswoman for Gov. Sam Brownback, said: “Now is not the time to go back to wasteful spending.” So what is wasteful? The main spending increase being debated in the Legislature is restoring some funding to K-12 education. Is that wasteful? How about restoring some funding for mental health services, which have been hit hard with budget cuts? Kansas Chamber of Commerce president Kent Beisner once accused the Legislature of catering “to the needs of those at the government trough.” Is that the Brownback administration’s attitude?
