By SJ Otto
Besides the Presidential elections Kansans have a lot at stake this election year. We can’t vote Governor Sam Brownback out of office, but we can take aim at his political lackeys in the Kansas Congress.
Probably the most important candidates and issues in this coming Tuesday are the retention of the Kansas Supreme Court justices who are under attack by a group calling itself "Kansans for Justice." It is real important that we vote "yes" to keep in the Kansas Supreme Court Justices Carol Beier, Dan Biles, Lawton Nuss and Marla Luckert. Unscrupulous politicians are using the victims of the Car Brother (Jonathan and Reginald) Murders to get the people of Kansas to allow Gov. Sam Brownback to pick new justices who will give him a blank check on his policies, such as destroying Kansas education.
If "Kansans for Justice" get their way, Brownback will be unstoppable in his efforts to further defund and destroy Kansas' education system. Also it is dangerous to put in justices who will look only at the effect of victims of crime. If we just let victims go with their gut feelings on these cases, we will not have justice at all. We may see the revival of torture in Kansas. We need fair justices who will look at the cases and rule based on what is just and not just what is popular at the time.
US House of Representative Mike Pompeo is being challenged by Dan Giroux, a Democrat who has put some real effort into his campaign. Miranda Allen is running as an independent against both candidates. Allen and her supporters are upset that Giroux is not pro-choice. Those beliefs are understandable, but the Allen campaign probably hurts Giroux's chances of unseating Pompeo. It is really hard to unseat an incumbent and even harder that incumbent's opposition are split into two parties. There is a real good reason to unseat Pompeo, who is one of the most pro-war, pro-imperialist and anti-privacy rights. My endorsement goes to Giroux.
Another important race is Keith Humphrey, running as a Democrat for the Kansas Senate. He has put up a good active campaign so far to remove Mike Petersen, a Republican and Brownback Supporter. As in most of these races, the easiest thing to do is just vote Democrat all the way down. That way you have no chance of returning one of Brownback's lackeys.
In Some other important races, we need to support Democrat Tim Norton, Sedgwick County Commission seat in District 2, which includes Haysville, Clearwater and parts of Mulvane and south Wichita, from a challenge from Republican and Brownbacker Michael O’Donnell.
We also need to get rid of the ultra-conservatives on the county commission and replace them with moderates who will show some respect for our less wealthy citizens and local area immigrants. In the past Richard Ranzau, Karl Peterjohn and Jim Howell have supported measures to ban any support of the federal Women, Infants and Children program (WIC) from non-citizens. Such a move is designed to starve out the children of non-citizens and the move was just plain mean-spirited. We are now rid of Peterjohn, who lost in the Republican primary. We need to vote in independent Marcey Gregory, former mayor of Goddard, to serve on the commission.
We will likely have more election endorsements and updates as the election draws near. Keep in touch with The Idiot Factor for more election news and updates.
