Kansas Republicans need to let it go.
Laura Kelly is our governor. She is a Democrat.
But on Friday, Susan Wagle, Senate President, once again tried to make the case that Kellys agenda should not be recognized because she won only 48 percent of the popular vote.
That Kris Kobach, the Republican nominee, garnered 43 percent of the vote; and Greg Orman, the independent, 6.5 percent, seems not to register on Republicans radar.
Instead, they are fixated on denigrating the more than 505,000 Kansas voters by saying their candidate is somehow a figment of our collective imagination.
Because Wagle is distracted by a possible race for the U.S. Senate in 2020, shes hungry for headlines and has resorted to two failsafe tactics: Tax cuts and controversy.
As for the first, she appointed a committee and named herself as chairman to change Kansas law so that corporations and individuals with overseas business will not be taxed on their profits. The bill would mean an additional $54 million to individuals and $137 million to corporations.
The Kansas House Taxation Committee has muddied the bill by coupling a tax cut on food sales to it, in the hopes it would then be veto-proof by Gov. Kelly.
When it comes to school funding or expanding Medicaid, the Republican default is controversy.
Frequent rhetoric by Republicans paints this as a battle against the Kelly administration that they will win.
We dont want war. We want solutions.
At a recent hearing before a Senate committee on school finance, representatives of more than 40 school districts asked the state to comply with the state supreme courts directive to include the inflationary adjustment of $90 million a year. That alone would end the years-long battle over school finance and put Kansas public education on the soundest footing its had in decades.
But Republican leaders dont want to be convinced of the measures merits and are now on track to making school finance once again their raison detre.
In regards to expanding Medicaid, Rep. Brenda Landwehr, chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee, admits she is skeptical of its value, relying on the false assumption that it would be too expensive and only benefit the able-bodied.
What Landwehr refuses to acknowledge is the tens of thousands of Kansans living on sub-standard wages who cant afford health insurance and with 90 percent federal funding, the tens of millions it will bring our way.
