The Kansas Legislature, in memes

When there aren't enough words, memes never fail

This session started off a little slow, but it’s begun to ramp up in activity the past couple of weeks.

Instead of writing a long newsletter about all the goings on - and the accompanying commentary about the sundry pieces of legislation, I thought I’d rely on the best form of modern communication available - memes.

Marijuana legalization

A lot of Kansans really would like to see some form of update to our marijuana laws - especially since we all get green looking over at our neighbors who have entered the 21st Century.

Colorado, Missouri, and Oklahoma all have some form of legal marijuana. But Kansas is determined to come in dead last - and all those freedom loving conservatives in the legislature are going to do all they can to force Kansans to spend money in other states. Or, if we do see legalization at all, it’s quite likely to only allow THC in pill form. Because how else is a big pharmaceutical company supposed to make money from something you can grow on your own.

Medicaid Expansion

All those waiters, bartenders, hairdressers, clerks, hotel employees, landscapers and other Kansas workers who can’t get or afford health insurance just need to toughen up. Because here in Kansas, we can’t bring ourselves to even have a conversation about how to address our healthcare crisis. Sure, other states have expanded Medicaid and it’s been pretty swell. And sure, people generally stay on it for less than two years because they get some stability and move into higher paying jobs with benefits. But in Kansas, we like to do it the hard way - so grab those bootstraps, pull ‘em up, and pray you don’t get sick in the meantime.

Flat Tax falls flat for Kansans

Sure, a flat tax sounds nice. Especially if your income is over $250,000. But for the rest of Kansas the flat tax is just flat disappointing. While most people in our state wouldn’t get much more than $100 in savings, the wealthiest in the state would save thousands and thousands of dollars. Meanwhile, what most Kansans are upset about is property tax - and that they’re still paying sales tax on food. Property tax valuations came out this week and the numbers are shocking. Instead of spending much time thinking about how to keep Kansans from being priced out of their homes, the Kansas Legislature is spending a lot of time finding creative ways to cut taxes at the top of the income brackets and make it look like they’re being fair to everyone.

Business incentives

Every year the corporate world comes a knocking with their hands out. This year is no different - and with a big budget surplus it seems every company is at the hog trough looking for its extra ration of taxpayer money. In the Kansas legislature, we tend to act as if every good thing comes through business - and that any investment in people is a handout, entitlement, or a waste of good money. But we never apply the same hawkishness to business incentives, tax credits, exemptions, or other corporate charity.

Maybe the Cicero Institute out of Texas should come on up to Kansas with legislation to make corporate panhandling against the law instead of trying to kick homeless people around.

School funding, vouchers, and educational savings accounts

We seem to have this fight every year - and again we’re lining up to take public education dollars and route them to private schools. Why? We’re told its so parents can have a choice in where they send their children - and maybe they’d rather chose to send their kids to private school. But many areas of Kansas don’t have private schools. And let’s be honest - what’s really going to happen initially is that people who already can afford to send their kids to private schools are just going to save some extra money. All the while, the rest of us will still be sending our kids to public schools where chewed up bubble gum and duct tape keeps holding things together.

Business freedom

If there’s one thing big business loves almost as your tax money, it’s making sure no one can ever, ever tell them what to do. We all know that corporate America, left to its own devices, always does the right thing. We TOTALLY don’t have a history of things going off the rails.

What’s next?

Who knows, but the way things are shaping up - I bet it’s going to look something like this….