First-term Rep. Nancy Boyda, D-Topeka — widely considered one of the most vulnerable Democrats in Congress — looks to be much stronger and more popular than previously thought, judging by surprising new poll results.
The survey by Anzalone Liszt Research found Boyda with a comfortable lead over her two current Republican challengers, leading ex-Rep. Jim Ryun by 17 points, 54 to 37 percent, and up 30 points over state Treasurer Lynn Jenkins, 57 to 27 percent. Moreover, 68 percent of respondents thought she was doing a good or excellent job.
If these numbers are accurate, then Boyda could be a shoo-in for re-election.
Democratic Senate candidate Jim Slattery isn’t the only one impressed by polls showing him only 9 percentage points behind Sen. Pat Roberts. The Evans-Novak Political Report recently said such polling suggests Slattery could give Roberts “a run for his money. If Roberts runs a smart race, he’ll win, but a misstep of ‘macaca’ proportions could put this one in play.â€
Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., dropped below the 50 percent mark in the latest Rasmussen Reports poll — he’s up 48 to 39 percent for Democratic challenger Jim Slattery. Dipping below 50 percent is a key indicator, say some political analysts, that a candidate might be vulnerable. Leading Slattery by only 9 points this early in the race also indicates some weakness.
Roberts is still the heavy favorite in his race. But the fact is, this just isn’t a good year for Republican incumbents, especially those who, like Roberts, have close ties to President Bush. Voters are in a surly, throw-the-bums-out mood. They want change.
Meanwhile, the poll indicates that Barack Obama has cut John McCain’s lead in Kansas in half, from a 21-percentage point lead in May to a 10-point spread in June, causing Rasmussen to move the state in the presidential race from “safely Republican†to “likely Republican.â€
Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., drew the eye of Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” Monday night for Roberts’ long-ago promises, when he chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee, to fast-track the “Phase II” reports examining the Bush administration’s use of prewar intelligence on Iraq. “I’ve got tennis shoes and track shoes on, on Phase II,” Roberts was shown saying in a clip from November 2005. Stewart saved his ire, though, for the media’s neglect of the Phase II report’s eventual release last week — in favor of stories about kissing lesbians, Web gossip and a French daredevil who climbs buildings. “Yes, he was climbing the New York Times building, perhaps looking to read the story about the administration misleading us into a war that you didn’t cover at all,” Stewart responded to one ABC News clip.
It was startling to see a former Bob Dole aide, Nelson Krueger, and a former Bill Graves aide, Judy Krueger, sign on last week to co-chair the steering committee for Democrat Jim Slattery, who wants to unseat Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan. More surprising was a comment Nelson Krueger offered to the Lawrence Journal-World: “I’m excited to be supporting a man who doesn’t burn out, wear out or sell out.â€
But Roberts looks strong in the polls, including a new one by Research 2000 for DailyKos showing a 12 percentage point lead over Slattery. One surprise, considering that Slattery’s last run for office was 14 years ago: When asked for an opinion about him, 85 percent of Kansans had one (48 percent positive, 37 percent negative).
Dan Glickman, former 4th District congressman and current chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America, is supporting state Sen. Donald Betts’ campaign to unseat Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard. But Glickman apparently doesn’t think too badly of Tiahrt, who defeated Glickman 14 years ago. In an interview on the Politico Web site, Glickman was asked how he thought Tiahrt was doing. “I think he’s doing fine,†Glickman said. “I suppose I like him better than my wife or kids do.â€
On the stump in McPherson recently, Democratic Senate candidate Jim Slattery described himself as “pro-choice lite.â€
“I do not believe that federal funding should be used for abortions except in the case of rape or incest. Roe v. Wade is the law of the land for the next six years, and nothing Sen. (Pat) Roberts or I do will change that,†he said.
As for whether gays should be allowed to marry, Slattery said: “Kansans have spoken on this subject and I support their choice.â€
Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., exerted his influence on the fight over a proposed coal-fired plant expansion near Holcomb, to no avail. But at a recent appearance in Garden City, he signaled a willingness to fight on and defend coal plants generally.
“It’s been a tough, tough fight†and “it’s not over,†he said of Sunflower Electric Power Corp.’s effort to overcome an air-quality permit denial.
Of the energy, economy and environment, Brownback said: “These three have to travel together.â€
On coal’s role in the country’s energy portfolio: “The answer’s not ‘no,’ it’s ‘how?’â€
“You can’t run this country from the left ditch or the right ditch. You have to run it right down the middle of the road,†Jim Slattery, who plans to file today as a Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate, recently told a Salina gathering. He also called Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., one of the Bush administration’s “most loyal troops†from 2001 to 2007, and said Roberts has “never had an opponent in his life who’s run a competitive race. He’s in for one this year.†Maybe, but first Slattery has to beat Overland Park railroad engineer Lee Jones in the Democratic primary on Aug. 5.
Washburn University political scientist Bob Beatty noted in the Topeka Capital-Journal that no state has gone as long as Kansas in electing members of only one party to the U.S. Senate. In challenging Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., Jim Slattery seeks to be the first Democrat since George McGill (in photo) in 1932 to be sent to the Senate by Kansas voters.
The latest SurveyUSA poll further suggests that Kansans prefer their U.S. senators not run for president. Sen. Sam Brownback’s approval rating in the state was back up to 53 percent in April, the highest it’s been since late 2006. His low of 44 percent came last November, a month after he ended his campaign for the GOP presidential nomination.
Sen. Pat Roberts, by the way, is going into his re-election campaign with a 54 percent approval rating, up 3 points from January.
Meanwhile, Gov. Kathleen Sebelius’ approval rating has dipped some but is still higher than that of the senators. She was at 61 percent approval in April and March, down from 67 percent in February, after she’d delivered the Democratic response to the State of the Union address, endorsed Barack Obama and been featured in Vogue.
Kansas is represented on both sides of the congressional debate on what to do about high gas prices, and specifically a House-passed and Senate-blocked plan to rescind $18 billion in tax breaks for big oil companies.
“I don’t understand what some members of Congress tell their constituents,†Rep. Nancy Boyda, D-Topeka, told the Topeka Capital-Journal. “They send $18 billion to big oil when people are paying $3.45 for gas. Our farmers and businesspeople are getting hurt badly. Working people are struggling.â€
Countered Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard, who voted against shifting the tax breaks to renewables: “Any tax increase that Congress imposes on the oil companies would only be paid for by consumers through boosted prices at the gas pump.â€
Even as Democrat Jim Slattery was launching his campaign against Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., the latter went on the air with a negative radio ad calling Slattery a “real liberal†and “a Washington lobbyist . . . Gucci loafers and all.†Roberts also had a campaign staffer show up at Slattery’s Topeka kickoff to present the challenger with a change-of-address form. “Welcome to Kansas,†Ashley McManus told Slattery. In truth, though Slattery has been a D.C. lobbyist since he left Congress in 1994, he has owned a home in Kansas since 1974 and never registered to vote elsewhere. Slattery’s response to the carpetbagger criticism? “My opponent is an entrenched career politician who went to Washington, D.C., before Neil Armstrong landed on the moon,†Slattery said.
Meanwhile, the Kansas Republican Party also is wasting no time trying to define Slattery. Check out this JibJab-type animated video that paints Slattery as a Washington lobbyist, failed candidate and “opportunist.â€
Most members of Congress realized the glaring unfairness of expecting employees to know and formally complain about wage discrimination within 180 days of their employers’ decision to discriminate against them, the upshot of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2007 decision in Ledbetter v. Goodyear. But the majority support in the Senate last week was insufficient to put the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act to a vote, with senators including Kansas Republicans Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts, to their discredit, among those standing against the bill. Similarly, when the law passed the House last summer, it did so without the votes of Kansans Todd Tiahrt, Jerry Moran and Nancy Boyda.
Opponents, mostly Republicans, say the bill would invite lawsuits - a phony argument, as columnist Clarence Page explains on the Opinion pages today. In fact, because salary comparisons are impossible for most American workers to obtain, what the failure to pass the bill invites is more wage discrimination.
Citizens Against Government Waste, a taxpayer watchdog group, is opposing attempts by Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard, and other lawmakers to reverse the Air Force tanker decision. “Any attempt by Congress now to overturn or undermine the Air Force’s tanker award would smack of . . . special-interest politics,†the group said. But Tiahrt responded in a letter to the group’s president that he is trying to protect taxpayers in opposing the contract to Northrop Grumman and the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. “An honest assessment of the KC-767 and the EADS’ KC-30 shows that the KC-30 will cost the American taxpayer at least $40 billion more than the American tanker,†Tiahrt wrote, adding that the contract “is bad for America’s war fighters and bad for America’s taxpayers.â€
Since 1998, “just four of Kansas’ U.S. House or Senate races — fewer than one per election cycle — have been decided by margins smaller than 10 percentage points,†observed Harris News Service. Three of them were efforts to unseat Rep. Dennis Moore, D-Lenexa; in the fourth, in 2006, Nancy Boyda upset Rep. Jim Ryun. Will 2008 be different? Hard to say outside of Democrat Boyda’s district, where Ryun and state Treasurer Lynn Jenkins are in a GOP primary fight. “It’s very possible that it could be the most exciting election year in many Kansans’ lifetimes,†said Bob Beatty, an associate professor of political science at Washburn University.
The CQ Politics blog noted the quiet start to Kansas’ Senate race this year between sitting GOP Sen. Pat Roberts and challenger Jim Slattery. The latter has a Web site — on which he says “together we can reclaim our country, we can restore Kansan common sense and independent judgment to the U.S. Senate†— but so far has declined media interviews. Because the former 12-year congressman for northeast Kansas is a “cut above the little-known candidates on whom the Democrats would otherwise have had to rely†in Kansas, CQ Politics has changed its rating of the contest from “Safe Republican†to “Republican Favored.†It explained: “The new rating means that Roberts is still regarded as very likely to win, but that the idea of a possible upset is plausible.â€
Besides Roberts’ incumbency and 1st District familiarity, Slattery has another problem: the nearly $3 million Roberts has in campaign funds, compared with $250,000 so far for the Democrat.
In a Washington Times commentary, Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., anticipated Pope Benedict XVI’s message to America and asked people to listen closely. “While our nation’s churches will not immediately fill up following his visit, perhaps we can hope for something more modest: an ever-so-slight movement closer to the recognition that we are all one human family.
“These days offer the chance to reflect on things eternal: life and love, Heaven and Hell, human frailty and human destiny. My prayer is that we do not pass it up.â€
Brownback, a convert to Catholicism, also was at the center of a controversy over a Senate resolution welcoming the pontiff. Brownback sponsored the legislation, which passed the Senate Thursday only after language mentioning “each and every human life†was excised at the urging of Democrats, who viewed it as a reference to abortion.
During a campaign event in Winfield last week, Democratic 4th Congressional District challenger Donald Betts countered the idea that, at 30, he’s too young, touting his youth as an asset during what looks like a change election. “I’m right on time,†said the Wichita state senator. “I’m right on schedule.†(The constitutional age requirement is 25.) He also said he wants universal health care for kids, tax breaks for the working poor and senior citizens, and a homecoming for U.S. troops in Iraq. “We need to end this war as soon as possible,†Betts said. “If those soldiers there, those Iraqis, stand up, we’ll stop fighting.†If he won, Betts would be the youngest Kansan elected to Congress and also its first African-American congressman.
It takes political courage to acknowledge and act on the truth that most criminals get out of prison and could use some help integrating into the community. Appreciation is due Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., for being one of the key sponsors of the bipartisan Second Chance Act, which President Bush signed Wednesday and will provide $330 million for re-entry programs targeting job training, literacy and substance abuse. As Brownback recently said of the legislation: “We must stop subsidizing prison programs that do not work and instead focus on programs that will help combat high rates of recidivism.”
The Wall Street Journal made light of the fuss over EADS’ contract to build the U.S. Air Force’s tanker fleet in an editorial headlined “Patriot Tanker Games†and disparaged the calls “for ‘patriotism’ in defense procurement.â€
The editorial also warned about the consequences to Boeing if Congress starts a trade war with the European Union over the tanker. “What’s really going on is a familiar scrum for federal cash, with politicians from Washington and Kansas using nationalism as cover for their pork-barreling. Todd Tiahrt, a Kansas Republican, has even talked about a ban on companies whose home governments don’t spend 2 percent of GDP on their militaries, which would include most of Europe.â€
Having crisscrossed Iowa last year in unsuccessful pursuit of the GOP presidential nomination, Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., has hit the road in Kansas. He reportedly plans to visit all 105 counties, which sounds like good prep work for a gubernatorial run in 2010. On Monday, he spoke to Wichita’s Downtown Rotary Club and attended the groundbreaking for the Jabara technical training center.
Having called Brownback on his absenteeism during his campaign, we should now note that his percentage of missed roll call votes in the Senate is down to 25.8 percent, dropping him from third place last year to seventh among vote missers (after Tim Johnson, John McCain, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and Hillary Clinton).
Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard, not only didn’t support the creation of the new Office of Congressional Ethics but lobbied against its 229-182 passage Tuesday. “If you have a single ounce of self-preservation, you’ll vote no,†Tiahrt urged his colleagues, warning that House members could end up bankrupted by the legal costs of defending themselves.
The new independent panel could investigate allegations against House members, refer findings to the House ethics committee, and issue a public report. Opponents of the new independent panel fear it will presume lawmakers to be guilty. But as two lawmakers have been indicted, two have gone to prison and others have been targeted by federal probes, the House hasn’t done a credible job policing itself on ethics matters.
Maybe time will bear out Tiahrt, but for now, it’s hard to see how an outside panel could do any worse.
Kansas is overdue to have a competitive U.S. Senate race, so a possible challenge by former Rep. Jim Slattery to Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., would be a welcome change. But Slattery’s indecision does not get him off to a good start. After spending three months last year deciding not to run, Slattery reportedly is ready. The late date isn’t the only obstacle: so are Roberts’ $2 million-plus campaign war chest, the memory of Slattery’s most recent campaign (his 28-percentage point loss to Bill Graves in the 1994 gubernatorial election), and how long it’s been since a Kansas Democrat won a Senate seat (since the 1930s).
Rep. Dennis Moore (in photo), D-Lenexa, moved past Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard, as the most powerful member of the Kansas delegation in the U.S. House, according to power rankings posted Monday on Congress.org — though Tiahrt ranks higher within his own party. The rankings were based on dozens of factors gauging how effective a lawmaker is at advancing an agenda. Moore was 106th most powerful out of the 435 members, while Tiahrt was 182nd. But Tiahrt was the 31st most powerful House Republican, while Moore was the 99th most powerful Democrat. Other House delegation rankings were Rep. Nancy Boyda, D-Topeka, 290th; and Rep. Jerry Moran, R-Hays, 364th. In the Senate, Sam Brownback was 56th out of 100 (the 19th highest Senate Republican), and Pat Roberts was 81st. Kansas’ combined state delegation was ranked as the 40th most powerful — or well below average.
First-term Rep. Nancy Boyda, D-Topeka — widely considered one of the most vulnerable Democrats in Congress — looks to be much stronger and more popular than previously thought, judging by surprising new poll results.
