The right has lost Kansas & the loonies are disappearing! Not yet, but soon?

By Diane Silver

Imagine my surprise when I woke up to this pronouncement on Alternet about Kansas, my current place of abode:

"The progressive backlash in my old home state is complete. The right wing not only has lost control of Kansas, they've been virtually thrown out of the state..."

Oh gosh, I wish this were true. I really, really, really do, but this declaration by former Kansan Martha Burk is a tad premature.

That's the bad news.

The good news is that Burk's vision may well come true. It may even happen within the next few years. It just hasn't happened yet.

To claim that it has is to naively misrepresent the situation. Ignoring reality is a lousy way to win elections.

First as a newspaper reporter and now as a political activist and blogger, I've been watching politics in the Sunflower State for more than 20 years. Here's how I read the tea leaves.

In the Alternet piece -- which first appeared in Ms. -- Burk takes note of all the Kansas political news that's been zipping around the media since November.

Yup, our governor is Democrat Kathleen Sebelius, and she is really popular. Her lieutenant governor running mate is the former chairman of the state GOP, and he did switch parties to run with her. Right winger Phill Kline got soundly booted out as Attorney General and another moderate former Republican, Paul Morrison, won easily. Democrat Nancy Boyda scored an upset victory over longtime Congressional incumbent Jim Ryun. A couple of moderate Republicans switched parties in the Legislature and won seats.

Perhaps most important, Operation Rescue's "Wichita '07 -- A Cry For Justice" event was an utter bust. Instead of the thousands who were supposed to march on the Wichita clinic of Dr. George Tiller, only a handful of people came.

But Burk left a lot out of her story, and the missing facts are telling.

The biggest sign that the religious right still has a firm hold in Kansas is the makeup of the Legislature. The Kansas House is still ultra-conservative. In January, House members elected social conservative Melvin Neufeld as speaker.

In the state Senate, a woeful 10, yes I said "ten," of the 40 senators are Democrats. In the House, only 47 of 125 representatives are Democrats. Not all of the Democrats are progressive, or even moderate.

Liberal legislation barely gets a hearing in the Statehouse, while almost anything that limits state services or helps the religious right goes to the front of the line.

It's true that the darling of the religious right, former AG Kline, was soundly defeated in November, but a month later he landed on his feet. The Republican Committee of Johnson County -- the state's most prosperous county -- elected Kline to fill the last two years of the recently vacated district attorney's office.

This resurrected Kline's political career, which up to that moment seemed dead on arrival. Given that Kline may well have national ambitions, it's important to watch what he does.

Kansas' future is important because it has often served as an early warning system for the rest of the nation.

How will we know if the religious right is finally on its way out in this reddest of red states? Look for these signs.

1. Watch the primary battle between ultra-conservative Jim Ryun and moderate Lynn Jenkins. The two are fighting for the Republican nod to run against Boyda.

The primary is 14 months away and the 2008 general election still 17 months off, but Ryun and Jenkins are already going after each other with a vengeance. The most recent ignition point is a Club For Growth ad attacking Jenkins. The tussle has already made the local newspaper and the left-wing blogosphere.

What to Watch
If Ryun wins in 2008, then forget about claiming that the religious right has lost power in Kansas. If Jenkins or Boyda win in '08, then there very well may be hope.

2. Keep an eye on the struggle over the Johnson County District Attorney's office.

Kline already has one Republican and one Democratic challenger. To make matters more interesting, the county Republican Party may already be taking sides -- against Kline.

What to Watch
If Kline runs and wins all the fury his insider election created, then moderates and liberals will have proven themselves to be toothless against the right.

3. Scope out the religious right's effort to retake the state Board of Education in '08.

Moderates won control of the state board in November, but enough seats are up for grabs in the next election that the majority could flip once again.

What to Watch
If all the furor over the right's anti-evolution stand doesn't elect a moderate majority, then the religious right may have years of renewed health.

4. Keep sight of the legislative districts and the leadership races.

This is the down and dirty local level of politics in Kansas. The candidates go neighbor to neighbor, particularly in House districts.

What to Watch
If moderates and liberals can't take control of legislative districts, particularly in the House, then the age of a more moderate Kansas may be another decade or so in coming. The winners need not be Democrats to bring a bit of sanity to the Statehouse. However, they do have to turn away from what folks out here politely call the "social conservative" wing of the GOP. If that happens, and a moderate House Speaker is elected, then folks, we really will have a new ballgame.

Oh my Kansas: Melvin dumps on university towns & it's time for Boyda to get nervous

By Diane Silver

Nope, I haven't fallen off the face of the Earth. I've been chained to the computer working on assignments that will bring in real cash (oh my), and had to cut back on blogging today. However, this is only a momentary burp.

While I was burning up the computer keys, the world just kept spinning. (Imagine) Here are a few links to what I find most interesting about today's news.

Kansas GOP Insider, often a well-informed and astute observer of the Kansas political scene, missed it with his/her prediction that ousted Republican Jim Ryun's early entry into the 2nd District Congressional race would keep others out. State Treasurer Lynn Jenkins has announced, and political folk from Topeka to D.C. are noting that Jenkins entry will create a huge problem for Ryun.

My take on the situation is that Democrat Nancy Boyda needs to be seriously concerned now that a moderate has entered the race. Boyda beat Ryun in November, in part, because she was clearly the sanest candidate on the 2nd District ballot.

Kansas House Speaker Melvin Neufeld, yet another Republican, seems to have mixed up community colleges with universities. His newest idea is for the good people of Lawrence, Manhattan, Emporia, Fort Hays and Pittsburg to tax themselves to pay for needed repairs at state universities.

Granted, I'm not objective. I live in Lawrence and would have to pay the increased tax, but does anyone else see how odd it is to claim that the rest of Kansas doesn't benefit from its state universities?

There is the whole eco deco thing (the idea that university research and resources help spur economic development in the state). There's also the fact that the universities serve thousands of Kansas students from outside the school's home counties.

Students from all 105 Kansas counties attend the University of Kansas. Of the approximately 20,500 students from Kansas who attend KU, about 16,300 are from counties other than Douglas, where KU is located.

If Melvin gets his way, then those of us who live in university towns will actually pay more for our kids college education, then Kansans who live in neighboring Shawnee County, for example. This isn't even remotely fair. It's also not smart.

Short-changing universities only short changes the entire state.

Kansas: Jim Ryun says he is running again, but the GOP might balk

By Diane Silver

It's only been four months since the last election, but already deposed Republican Congressman Jim Ryun is throwing his hat back in the ring. Ryun was upset in November by Democrat Nancy Boyda.

Boyda won't be the only problem Ryun will face, though. Apparently, the Kansas GOP is already balking, and other Republicans will probably enter the race.

I know the professional politicos need to think about this, but frankly, I'd like to wait a tad, and see what Boyda does in office. Actually, I'd just like a little break from all the campaigning.

Kansas Congresswoman Nancy Boyda vows to concentrate on service

[updated 7:45 a.m. 12-19]

Newly elected Democrat Nancy Boyda - the woman who beat the seemingly invincible Jim Ryun -- talks about the future, being new in Congress and the meaning of service in a Lawrence Journal-World interview. Here is the full transcript of the interview.

Kansas: The political obituaries of social conservatives Jim Ryun & Phil Kline

By Diane Silver

The top leaders of the state's social conservative movement -- a Republican congressman and the state's attorney general -- are now history, and it's time to dig into exactly what felled Jim Ryun and Phill Kline.

Rep. Ryun jumped into the discussion today by noting that the REAL reason for his loss was that his campaign volunteers were overconfident. Ryun also noted that everyone from his victorious, Democratic oponent Nancy Boyda to the news media were out to get him. My only comment is, ah, OK.

Oh, and Ryun finally noted for the first time that as far as the war in Iraq goes, "things are not going well."

Meanwhile, Washburn University political scientist Bob Beatty summed up Kline's defeat at the hands of Democrat Paul Morrison.

"What I think we're seeing is that voters were wanting an alternative to Kline, and as soon as Morrison gave it to them, the election was over."

AP writer John Hanna went through a lot of words before he got to Beatty's quote, which I think is the heart of the matter. Even the GOP agrees.

"We anticipated by time election day rolled around that (Kline) was going to lose by double digits," Republican State Chairman Tim Shallenburger said in an interview. "He was plagued by missteps and misstatements and people who disliked him picking at him for four years."

And so it goes...

Meanwhile, it looks like Ryun's political career is probably over. However, rumors continue that Kline will rise again, perhaps in 2008 to challenge Boyda in the 2nd Congressional District.

Stay tuned.

Kansas: Depressed Republican turnout may have defeated Jim Ryun

By Diane Silver

Did Democrat Nancy Boyda beat Republican Jim Ryun because Kansas voters were turning away from the GOP, or was something else at work?

Siege Mentality raises that question with an interesting county-by-county analysis of Boyda's victory in the 2nd Congressional District. Good old Siege looked at the votes in 2004 as compared to 2006 and finds that low GOP turnout doomed Ryun. Siege notes:

From these numbers, it's clear that talk of a realignment in Kansas politics is premature. If enough Republican voters had turned out on Tuesday--if Ryun had been able to get within a few hundred votes of his 2004 totals--Boyda would have lost big. 2006 was an extraordinary election year, and it's unlikely that she will face the same combination of energized Democrats and dispirited Republicans in the near future.

I agree that Boyda is only going to be a one-term member of Congress if she doesn't find a way to bring more voters to her side. Her margin of victory was simply too small for her to take that seat for granted.

I'm not certain, yet, what to make of the race, except that old ideas of who's who and what's what in Kansas need to be tossed. Unfortunately, our analysis is hampered by the fact that no one did any exit polls in Kansas (or at least, not as far as I know). I would have loved to have seen the results of such a survey.

Many thanks to Siege for doing the analysis.

Kansas: Nancy Boyda's win over Jim Ryun may hold the key to the political future

By Diane Silver

Democrat Nancy Boyda's victory over incumbent Republican Jim Ryun ranks among the most stunning upsets of the entire election.

Democrats, moderates and progressives from the Beltway and beyond would do well to understand exactly what happened in Kansas' 2nd Congressional.

I took a first swipe at analyzing the upset at around midnight. Another Kansas blog, Seige Mentality, did a great job of outlining all the possible factors that may have contributed to Boyda's win.

It's probably impossible right now to say exactly what happened. We all need a little more sleep and a lot more time to look at the data. But one thing seems clear, at least to this bleary eyed Kansan.

Moderates and progressives can't give up on red states. We are not, and probably never have been, as inherently red as people think.