Sheesh. And I thought we Texans had it bad....
3
This is primary.
Kansas can still reject Kobach by voting for a Democrat.
I have read many comments about how life under Kobach would be a disaster. Then, change it while you can.
Then there is that phrase: Fool me once, ...
After Brownback, if you still vote for Kobach, what does that say?
16
Kobach is indeed Trump Jr. Kobach is an egotistical self promoter. He found immigration to be a red meat issue years ago when he was a constitutional law professor at the University of Missouri Kansas City school of law. I had law students working in my office who reported he didn't show up for class most of the time because he was galavanting across the country doing anti immigration ligation. He continued to do this as Ks. secretary of state.
Then he found illegal voting as his next cause. He instituted rules and got statutes passed which basically disenfranchised thousands of Kansans. He was just found in contempt with regard to a case brought on this issue. He has the gall to ask that the citizens of Kansas pay his fine. Plus he decided HE should defend himself, a fool for a client. Not disappointing, it turns out he is a lousy lawyer without knowledge of the rules of evidence.
As part of his voter fraud endeavor, remember he was appointed by Trump to head the national voter fraud commission which was disbanded because there was no voter fraud found.
And now, as secretary of state he is in charge of elections, and his own recount. There is no law prohibiting that, but clearly there is an appearance of impropriety. But he will not recuse himself. Anyone want to bet how this will turn out?
Yes, Kobach represents the worst of the GOP. But GOP voters will support a man who runs for office with a large machine gun on his jeep.
12
Being graduated from these types of prestigious schools apparently does not keep the graduate from becoming very mean and nasty, as Kobach and Cruz regularly demonstrate. These two, among too many others trying to change government, fail to display what people who label themselves as "traditional conservatives" believe about themselves, that they have a fundamental sense of decency and good manners (which they also believe are lacking among all those crazy "liberals"). Yet very few of those "conservatives" have the decency to truly stand up against Trump and all who try to emulate his behavior.
8
The core 40 percent of American voters roughly correlates to the same percentage of "educated" adults who deny evolution and believe that human being in its present form was created by God! These are the people who would believe just anything, any fairy tales and lies, if it's told by certain people &/or in a certain way. US is now the 2nd worst among 36 developed countries (only ahead of Turkey) in terms of percentage of college graduates denying evolution.
Fate of American democracy started its decline mainly since Reagan Presidency who basically started destroying public education (both school & higher education), besides the central architect for Crony capitalism in US. Religion in education and public policy are inseparable now. Crony capitalism makes it far more deadly to American democracy.
Now Atheists & Agnostic people make about 25% of US population, larger than even Evangelical (23%). Yet there is not a single Congressman to represent that huge population, while Evangelicals are the king makers and Trump the king.
It would take long and tedious process to reform our public education system and corporate governance. Till then, era of people like Trump would come quite often.
Remember those days when we used to think how low a President can go- during Bush era? Probably we are yet to see even worse GOP President than Trump or this Kobach.
11
I feel sorry for conservative Kansans. [Along with conservative Texans], they've got to be the most reactionary -- the most socially and economically stilted -- brain-drains in America.
10
Mr. Kobach has regularly sounded the alarm that illegal immigration and widespread voter fraud are destroying this nation.
Everyone knows that Kansas is adjacent to Mexico and illegal immigration is a "yuge" statewide problem.
6
The article erroneously, if inadvertently, suggests that Mr. Kobach is a bit of an outlier, that he represents a segment of republicans (and therefore a small segment of Americans), and is menacing and dangerous. All true.
Except for the part that he is outside of the mainstream of republican politics. The notion that there are Trumpites, and that they make up only 35% of all republicans (or Americans) is floated so often, it has become axiomatic.
This is nonsense. The Ohio special election tells us two very clear things. First, there are more republicans who vote than democrats who vote (and that maybe because there are more republicans than democrats). Second, after two years of evidence about Trump, Ohio is still choosing a republican. In other words, there are more American voters who are either Trumpites, or will vote for Trump, than any other group of Americans. Trumpism is not fringe, it is American mainstream in that it represents at least 50% of us. And 50% of us love the likes of Kobach.
We need to deal with that. Not, as this article suggests, wish for a better republican. There isn't one.
45
The maniacal behavior of Kobach and his Trumpster buddies is exhausting. What sets Kobach apart from the rest is his unfettered intelligence which lacks both morals and mental illness. He isn't someone suffering from clinical mental health maladies like Trump, a person who says horrific things just to hear himself talk. Kobach is 100% intentional and aware of his cons, and he simply doesn't care who he harms with his lies or actions. That makes him considerably more dangerous than #45.
Here's hoping he wins, so he can lose.
38
Kris Kobach, as the editorial states, is the Republican Party at its worst, which is why he will probably win. Kobach’s kind of politics works well in TrumpAmerica and while Democrats celebrate close losses, Republicans win elections.
31
I agree that the issue of voter fraud is a false flag. On other hand, I was waiting for a bus yesterday and a young woman was accosting everyone asking if individuals were registered to vote. A gentleman obviously foreign just immediately started giving her his information and as I was standing right next to them I was quite startled that the woman taking his information made no attempt to ask him about his citizenship before helping him fill out & sign the legal form. It was clear to me he had no idea what he was doing. Quite an alarming situation, no ..
8
@TritonPSH
He had no idea what he was doing? You know that how? Because he "sounded foreign"? I sound "extremely foreign" next to my neighbors, but guess what? I came here legally and subsequently jumped through all the legal hoops to become a citizen. I woild be extremely angry if a poll worker asked if I was legaly registered to vote since I "sound extremely foreign." It's snap judgements like these that fuel the "illegal voters" myth.
11
One might think that, after a lesson in Brownback economics, Kansans might be wise to the fallacies of Republican policies. Yet true karma would be for Kobach to win the primary and lose the general.
18
Apparently, "What's wrong with Kansas" is still wrong with Kansas. Even after Brownback bankrupted the state with his extreme approach to taxes, they keep coming back for more punishment. What is it going to take?
40
Dear Kansans, M.K.K.F., Make Kansas Kobach Free. Make Dorothy Proud. Mr. Kobach calls forth the Third Reich when talking about a woman's right to health care and puts on his jackboots to grind his heel into voter rights. He won't stop. There are plenty of rights he is aching to take away.
There you go Kansas. You can go all in and get behind Trump's chosen one. Say good-bye to the Republican Party you used to know. Join the Kobach Cult today. Lace your new boots up to your knee. Farewell mainstream sensibilities. Just hold your noses. You won't smell a thing.
There is another option. Don't vote for Donald's "fantastic guy". RAW
17
That this ridiculous, yet extremely dangerous, fear monger has received any votes at all a is sad reflection on how far we have fallen as that shining country that many came to hoping for a better life. As each day passes our idiocy is ever more displayed on the world stage. I am truly embarrassed to be an American.
28
The Dems in Kansas, and everywhere in the US need to register and vote on Nov. 6. This is the only method to deter the GOP. That party has accepted Trump's leadership. Trump acts like a traitor and is a pathological liar, enabled by the GOP. Vote out all of the GOP representatives on Nov 6. Start with Meadows (NC) Barletta (PA), Kobach (Kansas), Stivers (OH), Kemp (GA), DeSantis (FL), Scott (FL), Comstock (VA), Meadows (NC), Jordan (OH), Nunes (CA), Gaetz (FL), Goodlatte (VA), Brat (VA), Rohrabacher CA), McCarthy (CA), Sessions (TX), Gohmert (TX), Cotton (ARK), Steve King (IA).
21
I have "reasonable suspicion" that Kansas has somehow reincarnated that pathetic scarecrow Dorothy and Toto met on the Yellow Brick Road. Yeah, that one. The empty suit without a brain.
10
Kobach is a pathetic excuse for a leader in any sense of the word.
14
I was born and raised in Kansas. I find myself thanking the cosmos for the gadzillionth time that I managed to reach escape velocity and never looked back.
28
What the heck is in the water and air in Kansas? First Brownbeck to financially bankrupt the State and now, maybe Kobach to morally bankrupt it. Heartland, indeed -- more like heartless land.
32
What was the point of his elite education at Yale, Harvard and Oxford, huh?
13
@Salye Stein I am unsure that it was really "an education."
4
First Brownback, now Koback. Kansan Republicans' form of self-flagellation.
11
What really is astounding to me is how someone who was summa cum laude from Harvard, Dr. Phil. Oxford, and JD Yale can sound like he just took an overdose of 'stupid' pills. What is going on here?
16
"A former constitutional law professor with degrees from Yale, Harvard and Oxford"
Clearly, a member of the elite.
7
@RRBurgh I wonder if Yale, Harvard and Oxford are proud of this profoundly ignorant grad?
6
I can't wait to hear people try to chant #MKGA!
3
After their last governor and now this guy, if I lived in Kansas....I'd move.
8
Birds of a feather huckster together.
Or, from the musical, “Chicago”,
“Since the days of old Methuselah, everyone loves the big bamboozalah”.
7
The fact that so many overt racists run for office in America is the most frightening aspect of your country's current chaos. There is a sick, sick, underbelly in the land of the free and home of the brave. The problem is that brave people are not afraid...they don't need guns. They don't need walls. They don't need Donald or Kris.
28
Every time I see him Jack Nicholson in The Shining comes to mind....... Unfortunately it seems to go beyond just similarities in looks.
8
If Kansas elects GoBack, then that is a good signal, to just bypass Kansas!
4
George Will spoke of Penceasthe as the most repulsive politician. I’ll assume he hasn’t met Kobach.
10
Kansas is the stereotypical Republican stronghold. The entire government and the preponderance of residents are Republican. Kansas is among the most ethnically homogenous, 80% white Caucasian (non-Hispanic.) Three out of 4 Kansans are Christians. Ethnic and religious purity is an unspoken goal.
Kobach is a real-life redux of Elmer Gantry. It appears that the vast majority of voters in Kansas like what they see and are excited for more. Cruel as this may sound, given its history, maybe it is time for Kansas to fully reap what it has sown.
12
He’s obviously educated beyond his intelligence. Good luck Kansas....
8
As the article states, Kobach has been a (largely) harmless entity for years. So what has changed?
His voters are expressing their rejection of identity politics. Every action evokes a reaction. Physics (and Politics) 101.
2
@Kai
Their rejection of identity politics amounts to white identity politics, which is an enduring tradition in the South that carried over to Kansas and its segregated schools (even though Kansas was a free state). White identity politics is alive and well throughout the country, having been adopted by the party of Lincoln after it was given up by the Dems under LBJ. For a real rejection of identity politics, try Hawaii.
7
@Kai “rejecting identity politics” - By basically waging a war against anyone who doesn’t look like them? Good one! Logic 101- failed by Kris Kobach/ Trump voters
3
Kobach, like Trump is a Mainstream Republican. That goes for elected officials and voters. When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
15
I am amazed that a man such as Kobach with such a sterling education, and a Constitutional lawyer no less, can be so impervious to facts. Did he miss the critical thinking class?
8
The statement "At this point, Mr. Kobach even disturbs many within his own party." reminds me of the Monty Python line "Even the police began to sit up and take notice."
It's a little late for Republicans to start worrying about the monsters who took control of their party without opposition. And the cowardly "moderate" conservatives are still protecting the demagogues, and calculating their chances of re-election in the mid-terms.
8
What's so dismaying is that someone with such education, having degrees form Harvard and Yale, plus a Ph.D. from Oxford, can still be so evil and so skewed in his thinking. What a waste. But also, what a terrifying risk. People that smart need not be charlatans and demagogues to be hugely successful. So why then? What evil ends are driving this man's evil means?
14
Please don't lump all Kansans together. Once upon a time we had a moderate government & a Democratic governor (have had more of those than Republican). We're working to restore our state. It isn't easy to fight the good fight behind enemy lines.
21
That Kobach says he would refuse to recuse himself from any vote review involving his political race speaks volumes. Whether it's from paranoia or willful arrogance, or both, it's breathtakingly corrupt, particularly from someone with the gold-plated legal education he received. But then, such corruption could be expected from someone who has monetized his anti-immigrant stance by flogging predictably Phyrric consulting services in Trumpian con-man style to gullible and prejudiced small-community elected officials.
Kobach exemplifies the intellectual but vacuous "local bright kid" who stayed a provincial true believer of his local preacher's diatribes. It made him a white supremacist. Make that a white-conservative-Christianist supremacist. And the desired end of such supremacy justifies any means. That's the mark of sociopathy. He's a dangerous man.
I'd repeat the refrain, "What's the matter with Kansas?" but it's now "What's the matter with the United States?!"
15
Having moved to Kansas from Missouri when I was eight years old, I've always claimed the mantle of being a proud son of John Brown. But from here on, Missouri's my home state.
7
Surely Kobach will lose the general election...even in Kansas. Right? Right?
5
Let's stop calling these disruptors colorful or artfu or entertaining.They should be named for what they are and the editorial pointed to it.They are offensive, often unlawful and they are the real enemies of the American dream and the American values so many have fought and died for. They are beneath contempt.
15
The weakness of democracy is that the people get to vote, and sometimes the "people" are not as enlightened as those with sense would like. Kansas is a case in point. After all, these are the folk who elected Sam Brownback governor. Once in office, he orchestrated such a disastrous slash-the-taxes budget that, among other things, the state could not fund public schools. Is it any wonder that this same electorate, after the Brownback debacle, thinks that Kobach would not be a good idea? The expression "out of the frying pan, into the fire" could not be more appropriate.
But if the good folk of Kansas think Kobach is their man, let them have him. At least if he becomes governor, his idiocy may be contained to the Plains. God forbid he be appointed to any national level job beyond leading that sham voter fraud commission. Even he and Trump could not pretend that cabal was legitimate.
Good luck, Kansas. Be careful what you wish for.
5
Harvard's embarrassment. A degree they wished they had not conferred.
5
You can't blame the paint for being ugly. Mr. Kobach didn't elect himself.
Republican voters have demonstrated time and again that the vast majority of them have a strong taste for overt racism and xenophobia.
The idea that someone who sees a leader in Mr. Trump and a qualified governor in the odious Mr. Kalmbach will somehow come to his senses and vote in a qualified mainstream candidate is both woefully misguided and dangerous.
Our country has a serious problem. We are just a few percentage points away from being overrun by the lowest common denominator.
23
I suggest that Yale, Harvard and Oxford refund Kobach's tuition costs to him, for he has clearly not benefited one bit from their combined instruction. Or perhaps a better solution would be for them to sue Kobach for the defamation and shame he has brought to their reputations.
13
Kansas, the state that gave us the economic and fiscal debacle in the cornfield under Brownbach, seems poised to double down and add even more malignancy to that spectacle.
Message to Kansans .. as you sow, so shall you reap.
10
Seems to make it much easier for Democratic hopeful Laura Kelly .. Trump did not win by a landslide in Kansas and Brownback was about as hated as any politician.
Doubling down on lunatic candidates would not at first glance seem like a winning strategy for Republicans ..
2
"The worst is not
So long as we can say, 'This is the worst.' "
What's the matter with Kansas? so glad I moved away 25 years ago, but it still makes me shake my head. This guy defines the swamp. Elect him and you get what you deserve.
17
Perhaps the NYT needs to change its strategy. There appears to be too many people who fail to see Trump for the sociopath he is (IMO). Perhaps the NYT ought to add more training for those of us who interact with the misguided and want to help them see reality. Like Winston Churchill once said: "Give us the tools and we will win". NYT, educate your readers how to reach those who tenaciously cling to Trump irrespective of the mounting evidence.
Basically, we are in a dead heat concerning which will fail first. Our 240 year old democracy or planet Earth.
All hands on deck.
8
The prospect of living in Kansas with Kobach as governor is frightening to me. I thought that life under Brownback was bad but Kobach has all the conservative Brownbackian tropes plus an unhealthy mega-dose of xenophobia. I'm starting to think a lot of my fellow Kansans just want to watch it all burn.
If Kobach wins in November, Kansas should be prepared to budget for the constitutional defense of his pet ideas. Our tax dollars at work. So far, he hasn't had a winning record doing that. Doesn't say much for having degrees from Harvard, Yale and Oxford either.
54
All I can say is, the nomination of Kobach (should it hold) is the best thing that could happen to the Kansas Democratic Party. Even the Republicans here can see what Brownback has wrought upon our schools and healthcare systems. This is a Republican State, so we are about to learn just how far off the cliff the Republicans here are willing to take us all. I have some hope that sense will prevail. Time will tell.
21
Trump was able to help GOP candidates from loosing. As much as it may seem hard to accept, America loves Trump. Usually mid-terms are bad for the party holding the presidency, but with Trump, the Blue Wave will turn out to be a blue ripple.
2
@David
<40 of America loves Trump. 50% of America loathes him. Results may vary by state. I like Blue's odds.
9
@DavidSpeak for yourself, a lot of America can't stand Trump, his policies and his supporters. Many in America would be happy if Trump and all his sycophants were never to be seen or heard from again.
@David No America does not love Trump. Quite the opposite. His rapid base makes up less than 25% of voters. The Ohio district that has not had a Democratic congressional representative in 38 years ( by huge margins) generally broke even between the Republican and Democrat. That's bad news for Republicans. In Kansas the Trump pick , split the vote with the other Republican. Big deal. Don't kid yourself Trump's popularity is not a big as you think
4
If Kobach can be counted on to do his job professionally, and not influence the outcome of the count, despite his clear dog in the count, then so can FBI agents.
Maybe Democrats should take Kobach at his word and tell his supporters that FBI agents are professionals and deserve the same level of trust.
6
Trump, Brownback, Kobach. What's a Kansas to do?
15
It's as if Dorothy landed in the land of Oz and said, "Toto, it's just like Kansas here!"
6
Kobach's victory is proof positive that a plurality of Kansas Republicans are anti-American moral toadstools who fear and oppose Constitutional democracy.
The G.O.P. no longer is an American political party, it is an agency of Putin's Russian kleptocracy.
Today, Republicans are American democracy's most dangerous enemies.
31
interesting and disgusting details about kobach in this article..... as if i didn't know enough already. however one thing that had escaped me before is his record of higher education. it leads me to consider a few possible conclusions:
1. getting advanced degrees from hallowed institutions does not make someone smart
2. getting advanced degrees from hallowed institutions does not make someone moral
3. there is something psychologically wrong with kobach
4. he does not believe most of what he says and is doing what he thinks is best for him alone.
5. all of the above
good luck kansas, you'll need it.
37
@coale johnson … I agree with your assessment that getting advanced degrees from hallowed institutions does not make someone smart or moral. However, it is surprising to me each time this fact is presented to us so blatantly by people like Kobach.
2
@coale johnson
These days, you might argue that the 'great institutions' are not great. Ted Cruz went to Harvard, Trump went to the university of Pennsylvania (as did his kids, whose collective IQ's and intellectual curiousity is less than my dogs), the conservatives on the Supreme Court went to ivy league laws schools......not to mention Harvard Business School's role in the great "stockholder" management that caused the loss of many millions of dollars and led to several major recessions because their version of ethics is "anything goes as long as you aren't caught, as long as it boosts the stock price".
I have to assume that Kris Kobach's middle name must be Karl or Karey or Kenneth -- we all know what his initials are.
11
@lhc It must be "Kibosh."
3
Kobach is using the Trump playbook: Play on people's basic fears and insecurities--perceived loss of control, fear of losing what they have, conspiracy theories of a "deep state" out to get them, and blaming any problem on others "not like us".
Worked for Trump. And also Putin, Ertogan, Maduro, Duterte and Salvini. Then go back a few years, when it also worked for Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin.
It comes down to the question of whether you want these kind of characters as your leaders, and the country they aspire us to become as your country. We can only hope that Kansans make the right choice.
22
Kansans certainly cannot be so stupid as to elected this turkey as governor, can they? Or did all the smart ones leave for California during the Great Depression and dust bowl years. It is amazing to me that Kobach has risen to prominence in the GOP. And very, very sad.
35
Kansas, home of Quantrills's Raiders and John Brown. These folks just can't make up their minds which way to turn.
16
At its worst? Kobach is no worse than almost every republican on the national level. You have an entire party that rejects basic facts and believes things that aren't true. And media like the NYT are responsible for the false equivalence that somehow both parties are equally to blame for our current issues.
21
It hardly goes without saying that by electing rabble rousers and thinly veiled bigots states like Kansas, Oklahoma, Indiana, Iowa and Wisconsin pose the biggest threat to not only our democracy but also in some sense to the notion of a unified America. The repugnance of the immigrant community be it Latin America or Asia by the white population in these states has been led by politicians like Kobach and aided by a loose coalition of radio shock jocks, wealthy neocons like Robert Mercer, Sheldon Adelson and mainstream media barons led by people like the Murdochs. Their world view is as simple as it was with the colonial European countries a few hundred years ago : The Caucasian population is morally superior to others and hegemony can be established by any means that can be made legally defensible. Hence if the laws do not exist on the books to aid such repugnant behavior, then they simply worked to establish such rules so that they could maraud.
In this day and age, it can be argued that it is somewhat improbable to invade another country to establish hegemony. Instead, Kobach & Co. are simply working hard to plunder within established borders. Over time, such activism gave rise to hideous entities like the KKK. Today that version of the KKK looks and feels like Trump's Republican party.
56
@Chaitra Nailadi
The trouble with the places you name is that they are still too white, which they consider a plus. What I mean by "too white" is that they little to no first hand experience with diversity. They have not eaten with, worked beside, or simply enjoyed a laugh with people who look different from the outside; therefore, they don't know that we are all far more alike than we are different. They have no experience to counter the hate speech that is the daily diet in fly-over country. Lack of exposure (the national draft was good at over coming that) and toxic levels of broadcast bigotry fuels their fear which fuels their hate. Sad.
6
Please, please separate Kobach from Kansans.
The fact that his victory is in question—that he and Colyer remain in a dead heat—shows that Kansas Republicans who support him are not a huge majority.
A constant narrative of Kansans' redness (and redneck-ness) becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, discouraging blue allies from supporting us and making Republicans who pay Kansans lip service seem downright compassionate.
-a Wichita voter
21
Kobach perfectly represents the 15% of Americans who will continue to identify as Republicans after these crackpots are done disgracing the party. It will be an even more obvious cult, an inchoate mob with flat-Earth beliefs and silly hats. They will break down into sub-cults of lunatics like Q Anaon The entire rest of the world will hold them in contempt, and their response will be, "See, they don't like us." No, we don't. Maybe that isn't about us.
15
I think Kobach and Jim Jordan should form a presidential ticket. It would maximize the toxicity, stupidity, self-interest and greed all in one space. The nation could decide once and for all if this is what we want to become or if there are, in fact, limits on our national debauchery. The jury is out on that question.
46
@Susan
Still far below the maximum. Look at what we've got now.
4
@Susan
As an alternative to Jordan may I propose Maine's governor, LePage. He is jockeying for a position in the Trump administration and is truly disgusting and repulsive enough to deserve one, but maybe he dreams of greater things.
5
Without irony one can say that the GOP has become the party of liars and criminals and their apologists. Who knows why? Why does it matter?
16
"Kobach is the GOP at its worst"
"...the most pernicious public official in America..."
Really? What about Trump? Nunes? Pruitt? Pence? McConnell? Ryan? And pretty much any of the venal, dishonest cabinet?
No doubt Kobach is bad, but he's second string in this government.
40
I think the blue and purple states need to begin erecting more financial barriers between themselves and the Trump states. We need to be sure that Trump supporters are the ones who pay for their own mistakes. I am tired of having the "I'd Rather Elect a Russian than a Democrat" states being bailed out with my tax dollars.
Letting them suffer for their own poor political decisions is not "cruel", it's common sense. No wonder their idiotic extremist movement has gone on so long. We keep bailing them out.
58
After gov. Brownback you would think that Kansas would have had enough but no. "Please sirs can we have more". I have been through Kansas several times and seems like a third world country. My daughter just travel through Kansas two days ago and said that it's one place she would never live and she had no preconseved notiion of what Kansas was like
16
@Brad Sloan I have heard college town Lawrence, Kansas is very nice and liberal.
2
One can always hope those three million illegal voters who cheated Donald Trump out of his popular vote victory find their way to Kansas...
32
Kris Kobach is not the worst of the GOP, like Trump he is the GOP. And the angry white racists of Kansas are likely to make him governor, proving that they have learned nothing from the ruinous reign of Brownback.
21
It's beginning to seem a lot like Russia, everywhere Trump and his friends go. Crackpots and crooks now own the GOP.
19
Mr. Voter Fraud in charge of his own recount. Irony, MUCH ???
Kansas, toronado bait for a reason. Seriously.
22
We are living a nightmare in Kansas. Brownback's rein ruined our state financially in a way that will cause harm for generations to come. Now there is a possibility that Kris Kobach, an evil, racist, xenophobe with ties to white supremacists groups, could make our nightmare a living hell. I cannot comprehend why the citizens of this great state continue to vote for Republican megalomaniacs who are actively trying to ruin the lives of so many Kansans. Personally, I do not know anyone who ever voted for Brownback, nor do I know anyone who plans to vote for the vile miscreant Kobach. But there is no "escape hatch" nor will there be a "deus ex machina" rescue. I do not want to abandon the "Free State" in which my family has lived for five generations. But people like the Koch brothers have infected our state and the country and nothing is stopping them. We have to stay and fight to win back our state and our country. Can we do it?
39
@L J Phillips
"Brownback's rein ruined our state financially in a way that will cause harm for generations to come."
As they say, that is not a bug; it's a feature. That is the outcome the Kochs desired. All the men named by other commenters here are in their pay and service.
10
@L J Phillips Hang in there. As a KU alumnus I knew some of those absolute heroes of your community that brought equality to the campus before, during and immediately after the Wilt Chamberlain era. Chemistry professors named Vander Werf and Kleinberg; black community leaders that fought back when city fathers wanted to bus black students across the River so worker's children moving in for the War (WWII) effort could take their places in the downtown schools. Paul Wilson, who defended Kansas in the Brown v. Board case wrote 'that was a case to lose'. Bill Tuttle, still a hero at KU. Kobach will fail. The State's history will make that so.
@L J Phillips- GOOD LUCK....I hope you find the strength, I hope you find others to work with, and I hope Kobach loses in November, that's the only chance you seem to have going forward. peace
1
Lots of posts here so I don't know if anyone has thought of this likely irony: Two anti-immigrant guys on the ticket, Kobach and Hartman (native Americans? I don't think so). If their ancestors came in the late 1800s they, like many German immigrants, likely lived in a monolingual community with relatives who came earlier (chaining!). More than a few of these immigrants never bothered to obtain formal citizenship but their children were automatically "Americans."
So, let's use the standards of the Trumpians: Find out if their ancestors legally became citizens, and if not, deport their descendants. That should clear out the Heartland really quickly.
23
@websert2000-that's nasty reasoning, stay above the fray....
It's time for Ranked Choice Voting. This would almost make recounts extinct. Not only that, but a vote down ballot would not be thrown away, but may eventually work its way up. It takes a bit longer to determine winners( although St Paul, MN gets it done in less than 24 hours.) Those spoiler parties like the Greens and Libertarians would still get there votes but still be used on the top of the tickets.
8
@CF Farner: or two rounds of voting as in France.
1
As Secretary of State in Kansas, Kobach had one job. When voters went to vote in Johnson County Kansas, the voting machines were not working. After standing in line for a long time, many left without voting and went on to work. He was a failure at the one job that he had.
13
@MidWest
The same thing happened in Ohio in 2004. Ken Blackwell, our alleged Secretary of State at the time, made sure that there were fewer voting machines in Democratic districts and encouraged Republicans to "challenge" voters they thought were "fraudulent." (One of the voters "challenged" by his next door neighbor - the dean of Moritz College of Law at OSU). Kansans, do not think for one minute that this kind of obstruction wasn't deliberate.
7
So Kobach received degrees, including law degrees, from Yale, Harvard, and Oxford. How could a person take so little away from such respected educational institutions?
It’s beyond me how a person exposed to such high quality educations could learn, apparently, so little. More frightening still, Kobach apparently has more than a little political throw-weight in his home state, which is understandably not surprising, but he also has gravitas at the GOP national level, which is downright scary.
This I know: give Kobach and those who back him, including our morally, intellectually, financially, spiritually, and politically corrupt president, even the slightest opening and they will unwind American political history starting with President Truman’s orders integrating the military services and on through Brown v. Board, the judicially ordered racial integration of Southern public schools and colleges, the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act (of which little remains), and more ... much more.
I fully expect DJT to appoint Kobach to a federal judgeship. As I said earlier: scary.
1
@Agent 86
What it tells you is the influence of "liberal " universities has been way overblown by the right, all you have to do is see people like Trump, Cruz et al to see that these schools don't do what is claimed. Put it this way, for all the liberals who have come out of Ivy league schools, if you met the typical ivy league graduate down the road, you would be surprised to find that many of them, a majority, were rock solid GOP voters and had visions of things that would shock you.
@Agent 86 As an alum of two of the institutions you mention, I've asked myself the same question about Kobach. My only answer, though tentative, is Kobach's opportunism and morally vacuous ambitiousness. Granted, Kobach seems well educated--but usually education, along with knowledge and skills, makes one more morally sensitive and insightful, and that hasn't been the case here. Kobach has used his intellectual and legal skills to reject the broad trajectory of the American experience and to pervert American moral values.
And he understands exactly what he's doing.
Kansas could well go for Democrats after the years of Brownback and now possibly Kobach. A sensible down-to-earth Democratic candidate for governor should beat Kobach. Let's not forget that Kathleen Sebelius was a 2-term governor 2003-2009. It's up to Kansas voters to decide.
9
Until people of good faith rise to the occasion and go vote men like Kobach will win elections and continue to bring pain to their states. The old adage “We deserve the government we get” should be modified to read “We deserve the government we helped elect by our apathy and failure to vote.”
5
No article about Kobach should omit his creation and marketing of Cross Check, a pernicious process of checking voter lists in one state/town/precinct against voter lists in another state/town/precinct to make sure people are not voting twice.
Some states enroll in this project as a way to curb this vast voter fraud which they've never been aware of and can't find. The result is that when they find John Public in Kansas and another John Public in New Mexico and maybe a third person named John Q. Public in Florida, two or all three of them are purged from the rolls. It's actually worse if one's name is Jose Martinez.
Kobach is also, not shockingly, a Koch boy of long standing. In that capacity, Kobach helped write the Stand Your Ground Law.
This guy is no gift to the American people. I hope his specific entanglements, "ideas" and racism are aired widely in Kansas should he win the primary.
7
Matthew Dunlap, Maine's Attorney General and a member of
Kobach's election fraud committee , just sent a scathing condemnation of the committee's operations and bias to Pence
and Kobach. More evidence that Kobach should not be elected to public office.
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/08/03/dunlap-accuses-white-house-of-fal...
5
Kobach stands on the shoulders of every coupon-clipper of cynicism in that Party of prejudice, prevarication, and plunder, now protecting Donald Trump's autocracy by purporting to have no choice. Sure, he's bad, but as Frank Bruni will tell you, he's no Vice President.
8
Kobach, the face of the Republican Party. No longer a 'moderate face", much like Brooks, who shows a compassionate side while supporting radical right policies, these guys are mean in policy, and mean on the surface. It could be called "Republicans without pretense".
4
Compared to mr. Kobach, president Trump seems RINO'ish to me. Did the gentleman from Kansas already consider running for the Republican presidential nomination in 2020?
5
Kobach and Manafort case judge Ellis have several Ivy League degrees between them. The U.S. president has only one Ivy League degree. Yet we are told to believe that its the American public education system that has poor outcomes.
1
It looks as though republican voters in Kansas learned nothing after Brownback destroyed the state. If Kobach gets elected they will get what they deserve, although I feel bad for the democrats who live there.
9
Put 10 Republicans who do not know each other, each wearing masks, in a dark room with voice-disguising microphones. Ask them if they agree with the premise that Khris Kobach is the worst Republican alive.
Nine would say yes. They know what is going on here.
Now take away the masks and voice-disguisers and turn on the light and ask the same question. Nine would say no. Today's Republicans do not have the courage to stand up openly for America.
10
Golly, and here I thought Sam Brownback's approach to taxation was calculated to Make Kansas Great Again. Guess Kobach wants to Make Kansas The Greatest Ever Again.
4
Correction to my comment about Matthew Dunlap's condemnation of Kobach's voter fraud investigation. Dunlap is
Maine's Secretary of State, not its Attorney General. His objection to Kobach's leadership of the committee holds and
further suggests that Kobach should not be in charge of any
recount of any election in which he is a candidate. That Kobach
refuses to recuse himself from a possible recount because of the 191 margin is all the more suspect.
4
Don't know that Trump actually won the popular vote but I believe there was considerable fraud in 2016. At the time, some pundits said that the popular vote was won in Southern CA. The only requirement to vote in CA is a drivers license and most illegals have them. They voted in great numbers. Liberals don't like to hear this, of course. The non-citizen vote is how they hope to get their power back.
@George Fisher
Please provide the evidence for your claim. One Maine official who served on the Voting Fraud commission recently published the fact that they could not find voter fraud and that was why they buried their report. He had to fight for months to get the information through FOIA that was not shared with all the commission members before Kobach dismantled it.
8
@George Fisher George, I didn't realize that Putin and the Duma were American citizens. Must of missed that part of the Citizens United opinion.
@George Fisher The driver's licenses issued to undocumented persons in California are clearly marked as such and cannot be used as ID to vote. Conservatives don't like to hear this, of course.
6
I have been following the career of Kris for years. Go, Kris!
1
About 42% of us will invariably vote for the Trumps (ego driven bullies) or true authoritarian fascist-like ideologues.
Half of that 42% is impervious to reason/consequence in their voting - psychological hard-wired RWA.
The other half fall for truthy sounding oversimplification or have parochial aims that override all other considerations or anger/hatred that drives their vote.
The GOP strums the 42%'s cords exquisitely. They need them and thus play a song that resonates well with them.
I am NOT calling that 42% bad neighbors, stupid, or ugly souls. I am NOT saying they are always wrong - or don't have real axes to grind at times.
I am saying that 42% will invariably vote to essentially cast sail FROM modernity, civility, serenity, security of self, egalitarianism, rational understanding, fair play, and the tolerance that embracing equality/individual freedom demands.
This 42% is antiscience in political context. Their models of human society/environment do not comport with reality.
The empirical models/results clearly show our species exists successfully mostly because we mixed, empathized, tolerated, and cooperated inside and outside our tribe.
Their models insist we must we buck the proven long-term successful ones. They are at war with successful biological, social, economic, and technological reality.
The 42% cannot/will not recognize the reality of life past, present, and future.
The 58% must vote to save us from the perverse GOP they WILL perpetuate.
3
Kobach has a counterpart, a real soul brother in the Georgia gubernatorial race. The Republican nominee, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, also heads the state's election apparatus, notable for confusion and mismanagement. He earned endorsements from Trump and side-by-side on the ground campaigning with VP Mike Spence. His TV ads feature him clad in hunting garb, holding a shotgun with a chainsaw on the bed of his oversized pickup truck. Pledging to personally round up "illegal aliens" gave him a landslide victory in the GOP primary. A throwback to the days of Governors like Lester Maddox and Alabama's George Wallace, he is a little more than the Chamber of Commerce wanted. By the way, polls show him winning in November.
7
In the dark future, there will be a Donald J. Trump International Airport somewhere in this country. And perhaps 10 years after that, a Kris Kobach Regional Airport somewhere in Kansas.
If this vision haunts you, vote this November.
It doesn't have to be.
4
After the Brownback debacle and easily predicted failure of essential public services and open legislative revolt the people of Kansas deserve better than Kobachs extremism and subterfuge.
As a resident of Kansas when Nancy Kassebaum and Bob Dole were Senators, I can only wonder “what happened to Kansas?”
18
@Randy: the answer is simple, but many refuse to see it. It's the propaganda which saturates the airwaves, especially in rural areas.
6
So happy for Kris. Been a fan of his for years. An American looking out for Americans.
1
Describing someone as "the worst of the GOP" is a fraught proposition because its worst gets worse with every election.
16
I agree with Kobach's position on illegal immigration. Remittances sent home by illegals should be taxed. They're working illegally and taking jobs and money from our economy. While we're busy deporting illegals, life should be made very tough for those escaping the dragnet, so that, yes, they self-deport. What's wrong with enforcing our immigration laws?
@Jim Tagley … this entire "remittances sent home by illegals" is a farce. Legal immigrants send the bulk of money to their families across the world. Why do GOP people only think Latinos are the only ones with compassion and willingness to help their families?
1
Kobach is bad, but he is NOT the WOST of GOP, Ted Cruz, Nuez, ad McConnell far surpass him and they are more dangerous. McConnell violated his duty as the leader of theSenate Republican majority and prevented Obama from appointig a Supreme Court juage and by doig so, he has damaged the SCOTUS somewhat centris view for generation ad will do so for two generations. And he was supported by Cruz ad his ilk. Kobach will be bad for Kasas but reest of us can survive.
10
If the fish rots from its head, Kobach is right near the gills. He's Trump's kind of guy, one of those "best people" who perpetuates the unreality bubble that Con the Don has created for himself.
4
It's Kansas. They'll elect him. He'll be terrible and his policies will make Kansas even more of a laughing stock. Kansans won't notice or care. Kansas will continue to make people wonder "What's the matter with Kansas."
2
There is the possibility that this man could commonly be considered as crazy.
9
I would ask the voters in Kansas: if you elect Kobach governor, what will you do when the house flips and then Trump is defeated in 2020 and Kobach looks to Washington for help and Washington responds: "Kobach?, Kobach?. Sorry you are not in our contact list." Then the phone goes dead. It will be welcome to payback time, Kansas. You could always try Roy Moore. I believe he his available.
2
Obviously, Kris Kobach is the future of the Republican Party even when this president is no longer in office. The hate, the poison, the rabid racism, the put-Republicans-first is what the GOP has been all about since 2016.
Kobach, like Corey Stewart in Virginia, is a clone of the president. The Republican Party can no longer point to disaffected fringe groups as outriders anymore.
The GOP embodies McCarthyism in the 21st century. They are against everything that America stands for, only their supporters don't care anymore. To hear the president tell it, Kobach and Stewart are “very fine people”.
2
Martha Kent would be sorely disappointed.
>>>>.. political currents that delivered us this president (and Jim Jordan) still rage within the Republican base.>>>
To this liberal, the GOP base - that is the real issue. Let's not dwell on symptoms -Trump, Jordan, Nunez, Ryan. Let's examine who we are as a people. Let's stop imagining who we are and what we stand for. Let's go soberly into the political future. No illusions.
We have a lot of potentially mean people in this country. and they are within inches of asserting evermore control over all our lives.
Vote. It is really important.
2
"Kris Kobach Is the G.O.P. at Its Worst"
The people of Kansas have NEVER failed to elevate the biggest one from the bowl. He's got it made.
1
Just when one think maybe Kansas will rebound after suffering through the years with GOP Governor Brownback, Republicans pick this guy as their candidate for governor.
It begs the question, do Kansas Republicans have a masochist tendency?
14
Quite amazing to me that a constitutional law prof with a pedigree that includes degrees from Yale, Harvard and Oxford would exhibit such behavior, such cretin attitudes. He's either a Very-Big-Time-Con-Artist, like #45, as you suggest here, or his perverse early childhood influences make him a developmental psychologist's dream lab case. Poor Kansas! Of course, they gave us Sam Brownback, whose governorship abruptly bankrupted the state. What Kobach would do to Kansans might stagger the imagination-- as well as their state's legal and financial structures.
6
No, New York Times, Kobach now represents the best of the new GOP. The GOP you refer to is gone. It was replaced by the Trump Nationalist Tribe. You and the rest of the nation need to deal with it. It died because no one fought to save it.
1
"A former constitutional law professor with degrees from Yale, Harvard, and Oxford..." I would call Mr. Kobach's pedigree elite - a word many Republicans say with a sneer. Too bad some folks with these world class educations don't recognize how lucky they are, open their crooked minds, and pay it forward. What good is any of it if you use your privilege to keep everyone else wallowing at the bottom of the food chain.
2
Make Kansas great again? When was it ever anything but a corny punchline?
2
Kobach IS the Republican Party, as is Brownback, as is Trump, as is Ryan, as is McConnell, ad nauseam...
8
Seems to be a significant disconnect in Kobach's life. A Law Professor, education in law from Yale, Harvard and Oxford and yet he ends up being ordered to take six hours of legal education? Hmm. Perhaps he is well trained but made stupid by ideology.
2
To compare Kobach to Trump is of no value. Kobach's failure as a public servant says it all. Kansans are rightfully proud, hardworking people. That Kobach is using them for his own personal and ideological gain is shameful and many Kansans know in their gut that Kobach is not to be trusted. In November, Kansans will put America and their state first by dismissing him. Its in their DNA to do so.
1
There's something naively optimistic about the headline "Kris Kobach Is the GOP at It's Worst." If only that were true!. But Kris Kobach is the GOP at its Aaverage. His determination to suppress the votes of african-american and hiispanic voters is squarely in the Republican mainstream. His ability to get small communities to drive themselves into insolvency, while Kobach emerges with a fat fee comes right out of the Donald Trump playbook.With his rich blend of mendacity, bigotry, and incompetence, Kris Kobach IS the modern GOP
3
The fact that this guy is a wingnut should not discredit perfectly rational ideas such as taxing money flowing out of the US, or limiting immigration to screened, educated persons with the means to contribute to a quality society.
@Spook
You think a republican would ever, ever tax anything big business does? Most of that money "flowing out of the country" is in the coffers of big business. Like the idea that allowing corporations to 'repatriot' offshore money by without taxes were going to create good paying jobs, it is another case of saying something that isn't true or they don't plan on ever doing.
In a very, very crowded field of deeply disturbed GOP politicians, Kobach stands out. Kansas, what is wrong with you?
1
Hey - it's Kansas.
I really do not care if it sounds elitist, because, well, it is, and there's a reason for that.
Kansas is filled, statistically speaking, with people who are less educated and with lower incomes than many states in the country.
They are not the 'heartland' - the idea is ridiculous.
America is 'one' ... but, if there was a heartland, I imagine it would be in that part of the country that *fought* for our independence, formed our country - you know, today's 'blue states'.
But the reality is that people in states like Kansas are more racist, less educated and less willing to see the con man, because they are simply ignorant of sophisticated marketing and advertising (see, FOX non-news) than those states with higher average levels of education and income.
I have been all around the US in my 51 years, and love many different parts - for the people and the land and the 'difference'. But as anyone who has been to Oklahoma, and New York, can tell you ... there are more ignorant, racist people in rural areas, and states, than in urban/suburbs.
So yeah, its Kansas. And their crummy population gets as much say in my Senate as does NY/CA etc. And no vote for the residents - citizens - of DC.
Yup .. a good democracy we have here, eh guys?
9
I thought Kansas learned from the Sam Brownback mess, they should have voted Kobach out.
2
Kris Kobach was behind Oklahoma's anti-immigrant HB1804 sponsored by Randy Terrill and enacted in 2007. Randy Terrill, whose honesty may match Kobach's, served a year in prison for bribery. One can only hope a similar fate awaits Kobach.
3
George Baldwin
Trump's support comes from the "Baby Boomer Bubble", the large and growing number of under-educated, bigoted and gullible Archie and Edith Bunkers who, now retired, sit all day, watching POX News and getting brainwashed; since their already atrophied brains can't distinguish between truth and propaganda.
Fortunately, Baby Boomers are a dying breed and will eventually go extinct. The problem is how much damage they will inflict on the rest of us before they are gone.
When you retire and stop paying taxes, you should lose your right to vote. That would wipe out 90% of the Republican "base"!
1
Kansas is crazy. The state is broke and falling apart and they think Kobach is going to make things better?
26
@sjs @sjs Broke and falling apart BECAUSE OF REPUBLICAN POLICIES.
1
Kobach engineered the stolen election of 2000 with racist, illegal felon "Caging Lists". No mention of this? Kobach engineered the stolen 2016 election with racist, illegal "Interstate Crosscheck" voter suppression. Why no mention of this? Both Republican ELECTION FRAUD campaigns were disguised in the fake "Voter Fraud" smokescreen. Trump is not "President". He was not elected. He was installed as a dictator to protect billionaires from taxes. How could this editorial omit these two critical failures of our election system? Elections are not a 50-50 coin toss. Every critical battleground election has been won by a fraction of a percent. That can only happen when the losing side steals just enough votes to "win" but not by a wider margin that would expose the sham. That is why the polls have been so wrong. Polls don't lie. Fascists do. Expose this crime against America before we "lose" another 50-50 coin toss this fall.
6
The "Man from Abilene" spins in his grave, as his beloved state, not to mention his political home, is hijacked by hate, resentment, ignorance and greed, all forces that diminish and impoverish working citizens. A tragedy.
This guy is proof that a college pedigree doesn't make a person smart. That joke of an election fraud commission he chaired is exhibit a. I believe Kansans know the score and won't make the same mistake they made with Brownback.
2
Mr. Kobach appears to be so incompetent that even his well-heeled education could not overcome his innate inability.
Kansas? I love my fellow Americans but have to shake my head in bewilderment. The good citizens of Kansas seem to be unable to dig themselves out of now years of destructive voting for their state. Sad! as Trump would say.
1
There are here the expected digs at Kansas as a backwater that would produce a Kobach. But this is not true. Kobach is a product of Harvard University and it's famous professor Samuel Huntington. Best and the Brightest redeux.
2
I have admired this man who wants illegal immigration stopped. Americans first.
2
The sad part is that, in Kansas, even a dishonest demagogue like Kobach will be elected as long as they are Republicans.
7
Worse than Trump? Not possible.
3
Kansas is an absolute disaster. Kobach will make things worse, if that is even possible. In any well-educated state he would lose the general by 25 points.
2
Mr. Kovach is our neighbor here in Colorado. He returned to Kansas fresh from his ill-fated Crusade Against Voter Fraud with his tail between his legs and two--count 'em--two indictments. Out of "millions" he had projected.
Could it get any worse than that? Of course it could!
His two culprits were both registered Republicans that lived near little Kanorado, a border town, who found a way to vote both in Kansas and Colorado, so great was their love for Democracy.
Like so many others, from Paul Ryan to Wilbur Ross, Devon Nunes to Betsy DeVos, they are common grifters selling snake oil to poor voters scared witless by false sightings of every kind of snake by their orange Serpentologist-in-Chief.
When it isn't a Witch Hunt, it's a Snake Hunt.
28
USA will not reconcile with full democracy before a federal non partisan administration sets equal / same voting rules (and voting rights) for all states with the authority to control them…
It's a long long way …
Candidates such as Kobach say more to me about the nature of the American voters than about any individual politician in my opinion. Charlatans and hucksters such as Kobach have been fixtures of US politics for as long as the country has existed.
But until recently they were viewed as outliers by most US citizens, while now they find great favor with a large swath of conservative voters. At one time I thought that staking your future on being the party of crazy was insane, but now I see that it is a winning proposition. That tells me a lot about where we stand today as a nation, and none of it is good.
85
Mao Tse Tung wrote that an insurgent without the support of the people is like a fish out of water. The same can be said of the racist. Racists like Donald Trump and Kris Kobach can exist only if they have the people behind them, and sadly they are doing quite well. Both Trump and Kobach use dog whistles, but these are only additives to their volatile racially charged rhetoric. There is something comforting in having a president or governor voice racist tendencies that so many harbor but don't openly acknowledge. Pogo was right: We have met the enemy and it is us.
See: RevolutionOfReason.com
3
in most high schools American history is poorly taught. Too often the course is taught by football coaches who are more interested in football than the subject matter of the course. In my case the course was taught badly by the basketball coach. I don't know what Trump was taught. I would guess very little.
I taught the American history survey that went from the age of discovery to modern times. I stopped with Ronald Reagan. I retired in 2009.
As I see this country veer towards despotism my background leads me to think that this country would be much better off if Trump's base knew more about American history. They would look at Trump differently. Trump himself I think is unteachable. Most certainly he has little respect for American democracy.
4
According to the KC Star, there are between 5,000 and 10,000 provisional ballots yet to be counted because names didn't match up to the voting rolls which can be traced back to Kobach's campaign to purge voting rolls to make it more difficult to vote. I was hoping he'd be defeated and we'd never hear from or about him again. This race is far from over. Many problems in Johnson County with machines and untrained workers which accounts for approximately 20% of the total votes cast in Kansas. Again make it harder to vote and people will give up.
6
The propaganda presented by naming these right to work laws is outrageous. They need to be called what they are, right to work for slave wages laws. Workers are nothing individually though the propaganda tries to make them appear that they will do better relying on their own individuality. Unions have never threatened this individuality, but have sought to bring higher wages and benefits to reinforce an individual's dignity. Unions are needed more than ever to protect society from the corporate and governmental efforts that would crush us all. Perhaps this Missouri vote is the first glimmer that some workers are waking up to the tactics of their bosses and fighting back.
8
Please do not judge all Kansans by the votes of a few. If you add up the votes for Colyer and the other Republican candidate to the votes for the Democratic candidates you will see that a great many more Kansans are opposed to Kobach than in favor of him. My hope is that those Republicans who voted for Colyer are absolutely opposed to Kobach and will vote for the Democrat in November. Kansas has elected Democrat governors on several occasions. Knowing the even temperament of area farmers, I cannot see how they will elect the media loving, immigrant bashing Kobach as their governor.
5
Education is important! Kansas is the poster state of what happens when education is politicized. The uninformed are easily fooled. It began with creationism over science, and continued with poor economics and belief that it doesn't need to tax to provide services.
33
@tom
Education does not seem to have done much for Kobach.
1
Kansas is a farm state with 45% of economic activity attributed to its 61,000 farms, over a very rural landscape with a population of about 3 million. Much of the farming is family owned and though I couldn't find data on farm workers, many are temporary, migrant workers. 86% of Kansas is white and 6% black. Urbanization (75%) toward Kansas City KS and Witchitaw has decreased the rural population.
I live in rural Maryland and consider farmers to be careful and smart. Their lives are changing more than others and their focus on land, weather and commodity markets set them apart from urbanites. They are traditionally Republicans but why does this demographic support Trump and Kobach?
The discontent in rural Kansas must be similar to other parts of the country. These people are tough and smart. What do we have to learn from them?
11
@William Trainor On one of my drives across the country (something I did several times until 2004), I often stopped to eat at fast food places just off the highway. I noticed the newspaper racks outside the doors of such places were most often filled with local newspapers, which hardly acknowledged the existence of an outside world, let alone reported on its happenings (e.g. trivia like the Iraq War). I wondered "where do these folks get their national and international news from?" . Obviously TV --- and if that is mainly Fox"News" then we have an explanation for many otherwise incomprehensible political choices over the past 20 years. Add to that the TV cop dramas (as entertaining as they are) which can give the impression that, say, NYC is a cesspool of violent crime --- when the truth is quite different --- and you have the recipe for the radical polarization between our urban and rural populations, just the latest version of an antagonism that goes back to the beginning of civilization itself (cf. Sodom and Gomorrah). The irony is that trump and co. are all the spawn of big city --- and represent some of the worst aspects of human nature, yet find their strongest support in the countryside.
@William Trainor
I like that "Witchitaw" play on the pronunciation.
Some defend the idea that Kansas would get what it "deserves" if Kobach wins the general election.
That's a logically absurd conclusion though.
It presupposes that what would be good for Kansas are much more fact-based policies, which would truly benefit ordinary citizens, so that if they elect Kobach, the punishment for electing someone as immoral and fake-news-dependent as him would be bad government, which will hurt his voters, and then (at least we hope) they'll learn their lesson.
The problem is, however, that it's precisely BECAUSE Republican policies are so bad for ordinary citizens that those same citizens become vulnerable to fake news in the first place.
You can't support free college tuition, for instance, and then blame people living in states where college is almost unaffordable for not having the tools to distinguish fake news from proven facts.
It's BECAUSE a democracy needs well-informed citizens in order for it to work, that GOP voters don't "deserve" even less access to information and fact-checking skills training and HC etc., but rather deserve even MORE than others to finally become empowered enough to react and be able to force the GOP to come up with real leadership - both when it comes to moral values and science-based policies.
The worst we can do now is to give up on Trump voters because of the fact that their uninformed actions are destroying America's greatness.
More than ever, we have to reach out in order to become a more perfect union.
23
@Ana Luisa
Thank you for this comment. There has been a dangerous trend of insulting Kansans (and other red staters) over election results, when curiosity about what elicited the results would be better for everyone.
I am a Kansan working overseas. I notice that national opinion-makers often dismiss places like Kansas as irredeemably red, which results in less outside support for blue candidates there, which (not surprisingly) leads to more red victories, which leads to more dismissals of Kansans, which perpetuate the cycle. In an environment where Kansans feel insulted or ignored by blue folk, even a red candidate who pays them lip service comes off looking pretty good.
We can't win in red states if we don't respect and value them.
8
@Avery Udagawa
Exactly. What this country needs right now is maybe what Kristin Neff calls "fierce compassion".
That means:
1. cultivating self-compassion: if you were lucky enough to have the tools to resist the current tidal wave of fake news, and you see how it's destroying this country day after day, then you have to give yourself the full permission to acknowledge that this is hard, what you're going through right now. This hurts. And we have every right to feel hurt, and to hate seeing our greatness disappear and feeling powerless to stop it etc. It's NORMAL and completely understandable to feel all that we're feeling today. So let's try to be kind for ourselves, rather than hating the fact THAT we're hurting and hating so much.
2. Cultivating compassion: NOBODY deliberately believes fake news, and nobody gets fooled deliberately. By definition, if you feel that a fake-news-dependent politician such as Kobach is right, it's because you do value the truth, and you do value making America greater. Those values we all have in common. We are ALL human beings first, and all want the best for ourselves and our country, by definition.
And once you believe fake news, you truly get scared of immigrants, you truly believe that Dems are "bad people" etc. So you suffer, and that suffering we can certainly understand, even though we disagree.
It's only when we forget to do this that we might associate "justice" with having GOP voters suffer even more because of GOP policies.
@Ana Luisab This is another example showing the effects of the decline of local newspapers and the impact of such on local and state politics.
"Awkwardly, as the state's top election official, Mr. Kobach would be the person charged with overseeing any recount of votes. Unless he recused himself, which he has said he would not."
This man is totally happy letting the fox guard the chicken coop. This is tantamount to inviting Putin's cyberthugs over here to monitor, and if needed, supervise recounts of the fall midterms.
I'm amazed that a man educated at Yale, Harvard, and Oxford would use his education to undermine the rule of law and America's constitutional values.
But to call Kobach "trumpier" than Trump, or Trump with the proper legal pedigree, begs the question, to what end?
Totalitarian states always have some folks with brains and background to provide the legal underpinnings for heinous acts.
If Kobach manages to get himself declared the winner, and Kansans opt to elect him governor, well, all I can say is, Kansas, you're going to get what you deserve.
I understand the state is just beginning to work its way out of the ugly effects of years of draconian tax reduction. With Kobach at the help, spewing poisonous rhetoric to justify further economic and political tightening in the name of ethnic purity, I can't imagine the state being able to recruit the level of business required to keep the state functioning.
46
@ChristineMcM
Right out of the Brownback and into the Kobach. Good grief!
Let's hope the recent Republican anger over the Kansan budgets that forced Brownback out, spill over into the mid-terms and prove that Kansans are actually smart enough to not get fooled again.
I'm patiently awaiting the outcome.
There are two possible exits to the obscurity that Kobach deserves, and I am not sure which I prefer. First is for him to lose this election so that we don't have to hear from him again. The second is for him to win this election but then to have him soundly beaten in November. Either way, Kansas voters should reject this inciter of social disorder from their political life.
41
Kansas has seen Republican rule devastate the state by almost every measure. Job creation, economic growth, education, inequality, etc. A vote for Kobach is a vote to stay the course.
Good luck with that.
77
" (...) Mr. Kobach so violated basic courtroom rules that he was (...) ordered to take six hours of legal education."
Now combine this quote with a passage a bit higher up in this editorial:
"A former constitutional law professor with degrees from Yale, Harvard and Oxford (...)"
and you cannot but realize that there is something profoundly wrong with how we educate our "elites".
All our best universities have only one goal: to transmit information/knowledge. They are then "free" to use that knowledge to increase America's greatness ... or to destroy it.
Why would we consider this "freedom" to be a good thing? Why aren't we including training in how to become a good and honest human being into "elite training" programs?
It's not as if we don't know how to train these things. For 2 decades already, neuroscience has shown/remembered that:
1. altruism is as much a human innate instinct as egoism.
2. where Darwin has shown that the SPECIES most adapted to a new evolution in a habitat shared with other species, is the one that will survive such an evolution, he has also shown that among mammal INDIVIDUALS of the same species, it's individuals with the best collaboration skills who survive and thrive.
3. empathy and compassion are natural/innate, BUT have to be trained, as skills, in order to develop and become present in daily life.
4. we're only as compassionate as the extent to which we trained self-compassion, so real compassion does not imply harming ourselves ...
32
@Ana Luisa I have to believe that Kobach's true nature showed at least a few times during his legal education. Maybe to the point where he appalled his fellow students and/or instructors. I wonder how they can incorporate the tendency to asocial/destructive behavior into their assessment and awarding of grades and degrees.
7
@set
Maybe it doesn't have to be assessed (because indeed, how to do so?).
Maybe it would already make a huge difference if compassion and self-compassion training would be integrated in every year's program and students would have to at least be present and participate in order to obtain any degree ... ?
That would mean that obtaining an "elite education" would FINALLY include getting access to scientifically proven tools to develop superior/elite moral skills too.
Because after all, isn't that what even Trump supporters somehow refer to when they tend to hate the country's current "elites": the fact that many Americans coming out of our elite universities haven't developed any sense of moral compass/compassion at all, and proudly wear an "I don't care, do U" attitude wherever they go, including when it comes to caring about 99% of the American people?
@Ana Luisa
People seem to forget that even "elite" colleges and universities graduate students who are at the bottom of the class. Graduates of less-prestigious institutions may still be better educated and knowledgeable than someone who boasts a Yale (or Harvard or oxford) degree but with barely passing grades.
1
It’s important to realize that Kobach did not receive 50% of the Republican vote. The majority of Republican primary voters supported either Barnett, Selzer, or Coyler. None of these three candidates are like Kobach.
So a majority of Republican voters, and strong majorities of unaffiliated and Democratic Kansas voters, don’t want Kobach.
If either Selzer or Barnett had chosen to recognize their obvious and predictable role as spoilers for Kobach, we wouldn’t be lambasting the entire state for being schmuchs right now.
First and foremost, its the poor choices of certain Republican leaders, not the people, that opened the door to the possibility of a Kobach general election candidacy.
41
@AJ Very true. But as we know from the national election of 2016, winning a majority of votes is not necessary to be elected. An this flaw in our system upends "for the people by the people."
26
@AmbroisineAnd Kobach could win with a 40-45%% plurality in Kansas this November, with wealthy businessman Greg Orman running as an independent.
@AJ The other Republican candidates may not be quite so horrific as Kobach. But they are, indeed, like him in many sad respects. The entire party has gone haywire.
My mother (now deceased) was born and raised in a small town in Kansas, and as a young woman received a first class education at the University of Kansas at Lawrence. Although she left Kansas when she married, she remained keenly attached to her home state, and was devastated when the Kansas Board of Education made its infamous decision in 1999 to no longer teach the theory of “evolution” in the public schools. Although the teaching of evolution was reinstated in 2001, I’m glad she was not around for the Brownback years and now the rise of despicable figures like Kobach. She would have been heartbroken.
135
My family came to Kansas from Virginia shortly before the Civil War because Kansas was a free state. My great-great grandfather was an early governor and US senator. My parents, myself, my husband, and two daughters all received fine educations at the University of Kansas. I know very well why your mother was proud of her home state. I’m saddened and dumbfounded by what it has become.
10
Republican politicians in this age are the most destructive force in the nation. Make Kansas decent, again. "To the
stars through difficulty," the State Motto, recognizes
the difficulty of such an endeavor as returning its governance
to decency, but what a great moment it would be - from the
heartland.
32
Prediction: Those who should most naturally find this man anathema will fail to vote.
This HAS to change -- but I'm only vaguely hopeful.
38
Thanks Jack... don't forget to mail the coats to morty! lol
Kobach's victory is tantamount to winning a battle but losing the war (and that's assuming he ultimately takes the primary).
The fact that Kris Kobach is so extremely far right that he can't win any solid majority even among Republicans bodes ill for his prospects with a general election.
It will be doubly satisfying that when Kobach (and, by extension, Trump) loses in November, he will do so at the hands of real voters, not the fraudulent ones he and Trump lie about.
26
I thought Kansas folks including republicans had enough of hard right policies for their state. There's no rainbow at the end of this story for the state.
37
Please do not use the term Republican base. It seems to refer to a fringe of the party. In fact, it is nearly the entire party. This is main stream republicanism. Koch and trump are the heart and soul of a white nationalist party—the Republican Party. When they talk, they speak for Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, and John McCain. This is not fringe stuff. If it were not so, Mitch and company would have stopped it.
46
Kris Kobach is not the G.O.P. at it's worst. It's the G.O.P. at it's present and future.
64
@ m@rk - Bingo! We have a winner!!!
@ m@rk Yes, he is truly wonderful.
The voters of Kansas have proven time and time again that they are incorrigible knotheads unable to recognize their own best socio-economic interests. Thomas Frank documented this pattern of self-desctructive voting years ago. If they can't learn from their experience of having elected people like Brownback and Kobach, then let them reap what they sow.
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@expat and why do they vote against their own best socio-economic interests? The answer is ....Racism.
Go to Kansas, talk to the people, listen to how they speak and watch how they behave. It is a largely white rural state that has a fear and hatred for non whites. It's true. Hate to say it, but it's true. The proof is how they vote. When nobody can see them, they vote for a racist agenda - every time.
1
Apparently individuals who have attended the best institutions of higher learning can also be dangerously ignorant and irrational. If Kobach wins the Republican spot for governor in the 2018 November elections, I hope that the majority of voters in Kansas put decency and country ahead of the Trumpian Party and vote for the Democratic candidate in order to save our precious democratic republic.
24
@Joan
The GOP will liberally fund the Independent candidate to make sure any vote for other than the Republican candidate is split.
This ain't their first rodeo.
7
Given Brownback got re-elected while the state's solvency was in dire straights due to his draconian taxcut policies, it is, sadly, quite conceivable that Kansas will again elevate the worst and put Kobach in the governor's office. No one can rule out the deeply entrenched corrupt absurdities of Kansas politics or, for that matter, that Kobach is just the sort of candidate to take full advantage of it. I feel badly for the people of Kansas.
16
About every other year I will be driving through Kansas on a Sunday and be seized by the feeling I am in a Hitchcock film. The AM radio has absolutely nothing except religious broadcasting. If you are not on the interstate finding a gas station, an anything open is a fools quest. The severity of the landscape only adds to the uneasiness - the only people I meet who seem to know there is an outside world are truckers or the Indian (not Native American) families working in the Motel 6, Motel 8, etc . Politically whenever I sit down at a Denny's or whatever what I hear is hysterical fear of non-whites flooding in. As if. Given the opportunity prairie dogs would get out.
195
@max buda What is wrong with communities being mostly white? Sounds like racism. Hmmm.
The Kansas City Star reports that Kobach will not recuse himself from overseeing the recount for his own election.
Contempt for ethics seems to be another common trait that he shares with his mentor in the White House.
Funny how the folks who holler the loudest about "voter fraud" turn out to be the ones most keen on keeping their own ability to influence the outcome of elections.
151
@Joel Geier-Indeed. Kris Kobach was successful in disenfranchising over 1.1 million in 7 battleground states. Trump met with Kobach just days after the election. With just 77+K votes giving him the WH--he had reasons to thank Kobach.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/the-gops-stealth-war-agai...
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/trump-blows-the-gops-cove...
2
Education and admirable professional life don't guarantee an individual will be without prejudice or receptive to other cultures.
Mr. Kobach has had an enviable education but the list of universities attended is a reminder that such a first-rate education doesn't necessarily provide a first-rate individual.
Compare Barack Obama's education at Harvard and Columbia, then senior lecturer of constitutional law at the University of Chicago all of which gave our country a humane and thoughtful man.
One man white, the other African American - one man a bigot and racist, the other open and inclusive.
40
Kansas - how are those wheat shipments going. Kobach - wow. Kansas voters actually vote for a guy like this. Unbelievable. Looking up the definition of JayHawkers. Remember, a hawker is and always has been a seller of snake oil.
12
I am a native Kansan -- born and raised in the southwest suburbs of Kansas City, Mo., and educated at the University of Kansas. But beginning with Gov. Brownback, and certainly with Kobach, I have been unable to proudly claim my Sunflower State heritage. Shame on Kansas Republicans.
174
Pretty much every objective observer agrees that voter fraud represents a tiny and insignificant percentage of total votes. It would not surprise me to learn that vote counting fraud might be a greater problem than voter fraud. It would also not surprise me, given his record of dishonesty, if Kris Kobach committed vote counting fraud.
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@B. Windrip Touche the hypocrisy of this Kobach fellow just makes your head explode. There was a decent GOP about 50 years ago. Today it's an arm of the Kremlin. One of our great historians will write the definitive book on how a major party went from loving America and american ideals to wanting us to become a dictatorship of the most corrupt kind.
1
@B. Windrip-The evidence is in on the lengths Kobach will go; voter suppression, voter role purgring, and lying to gin up fear are his specialities.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/the-gops-stealth-war-agai...
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/trump-blows-the-gops-cove...
They're all winning. Last night's OH 12 (most likely).
Kobach.
Etc.
Trump's appearances, touting his gibberish that, inexplicably stands (in) as an agenda is firing up and turning out his base, and they will do whatever DJT says.
I am starting to believe this is just how it's going to be, through 2018, 2020 and beyond. Up until now, had hoped there would be a turn to sanity and humanity among the electorate. Losing that hope.
I fear that if the election for that cretin Roy Moore were to be held this Nov., instead of last year ... he'd have won also.
Yes, Kobach is awful, terrible, everything you say. But he has a LOT of company, and what's most dispiriting are the hordes of voters more than ready and willing to say 'yes' to all of this.
SAD :(
56
@jazz one-We all need to pay closer attention and demand fair and transparent elections. These people are getting into office and amassing power because they control the voting systems and can suppress votes and gerrymander their way into permanent office. The morally-challenged Kobach is a prime example.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/10/voter-suppression-may-have-...
Kansas elected Governor Brownback, who promptly destroyed the state budget with a tax cut that did not perform as promised. I’m not confident that they’ll make a better decision this time around.
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@Koyote I read that, if elected, Kobach promises to lower taxes.
At some point, you have to give people what they want and let them live with the results.
46
@Mor How is that thinking working out with the Donald? A big zero across the board, of course.
If Dorothy Gale had woken up Wednesday morning from her trip to Oz and saw that the malignant and despicable Kris Kobach had been selected as the Republican nominee for Governor she would have said: "Toto, I have a feeling we're still not back in Kansas."
29
Not so fast, Kansas: Florida is poised to elect Ron DeSantis as its governor, one of the looniest members of the House "Freedom Caucus", as trumpy as Trump himself, only smarter. Apparently Rick Scott, whose company (Columbia/HCA) perpetrated the largest Medicare fraud in the nation’s history, wasn't evil enough, so they're kicking him upstairs to the US Senate. DeSantis will make Scott look like Pope Francis. As he is planning a presidential run, DeSantis will have to fight Kobach and others as the next Great White Hope. But remember, when the chips are down, nobody out-crazies the Sunshine State!
56
In his defiance of the Kansas Republican Establishment--and there is one--Kobach is taking the calculated risk that a narrow victory will give him dominance of the state sufficient to bludgeon the party leadership across enlightened, small- town Kansas. But he will not destroy the anger across the deep mid-section of Kansas and across more liberal northern Kansas--rural and urban--about what Sam Brownback did to destroy education and highway spending--and the gathering dismay about Trump's tariff treason to Kansas farmers. It is more than ironic that a brilliant tactician who is embarrassing the Ivy League and Oxford in his preposterous, shallow lies is also taking the scales from the eyes of people he and Trump seem to despise--ordinary folks like the mechanic I talked to today. He has several children, several of them teachers and two now candidates for doctorates. He likes Trump but despises Kobach for what he is doing to public schools. He was willing to entertain a discussion about the similarity between the two. At some point, the real impact of Trumpian policy absurdity is going to erode the edges of the too-much-feared Trump base. That's already happened in Kansas. In any case, I invite Times readers to look again at the broad base of rural Kansas counties where Kobach lost. It is nothing like Thomas Franks' caricature of small-town idiocy. Rural Kansas is deeply uneasy about Trump and Kobach.
170
@David A. Lee ...and many would hope that rural America as a whole is now deeply uneasy about Trump and his ilk.
1
@David A. Lee - a note of exception. It is time we started looking at our 'elite' educational institutions, Ivy/Stamford/MIT/Oxbridge, for what they really are - training grounds for the children of the 1% and staging platforms for the conversion of bright young 'others' to join the 1%.
1
Sorry, David, I'll only believe that Kansans are deeply troubled by Trump and Kobach when they stop voting for Trump, Kobach, and others just like them.
1
Mr. Kobach's obsessions were an expensive hobby for his state clients. The alignment with Trump's anti-immigrant bigotry is a dark mirror, and many do not like the family separations and cruelty of caging children, putting them in detention centers where they are abused, and making orphans out of small children who have loving families.
I saw a quotation from one Kansas soybean farmer who said farmers are frequently asked about their support for Trump, and he said his support was for his family.
Trump's trade wars are hitting Kansas hard. Whether the moderates continue to prevail in Kansas after all of the damage that Brownback did will be interesting.
The Democratic candidate Laura Kelly has pledged to be the education governor. This is a stark contrast between candidates.
19
"A former constitutional law professor with degrees from Yale, Harvard and Oxford...." Oh, my. One can only sigh. Let's hope more ballots were cast by Kansans who voted based on Heartland values and wisdom than by those swayed by Kobach's racism and lies. Fomenting fear and hatred is a vicious and despicable political strategy largely responsible for the cultural malaise afflicting us. There's no greatness ahead for anyone who falls under its dark spell.
20
With "What's the Matter with Kansas?", published in 2003, Robert Frank, a native Kansan, wrote what I believe is the first exposition of Red State woes.
Amid the incisive descriptions and commentary, his most heartfelt statement was: "I GOT OUT!"
Kansans, you have a last chance to redeem yourselves in November.
19
This man has been educated at some of the best schools on the planet. Too bad he threw his energy and talents into disenfranchising American voters.
77
In my opinion, most Kansans [and about all Republicans in the state] still perceive the world as flat. So it's very easy for them to fall for the latest snake oil from the likes of Kobach and Trump.
I lived in Kansas for a decade in the 20th century, and hoped that someday, Kansas would join the 20th century.
I'm still hoping that, here in the 21st.
44
@Mensabutt
Having driven across Kansas east to west and west to east several times, Kansas is very flat. I can see why Dorothy was glad to leave, but Kansas still has the man behind the curtain.
11
Really? Stereotypes are rude. I know there was a white nationalist rally in Portland, Ore. last week. So should I assume all Oregonians are racist Nazis? Didn't think so. There are a good chunk of Kansans who know the earth is round and would never vote for Kobach.
It is very disheartening that Kobach is still a presence in Kansas politics. The people of Kansas are much smarter than that. They are not backwoods rubes. Most are well educated, highly literate.
Colyer gave a talk at my temple a few months ago. He discussed his adventures doing charity medical work in African war zones. Highly respectable and very dangerous work. I don't agree with his politics at all. Typical Republican supply side stuff and no fan of LGBT causes, but I suspect as a physician, he is playing that card to the crowd and realizes people are born that way. Anyway, he has both feet firmly planted on the ground.
Kobach is a nut. There is no comparison. He just lost a court case about his ridiculous voter fraud campaign. The judge tore him apart. That hasn't slowed him down one step. He had his day in court, lost terribly and continues on beating the drum of the massive non existent voter fraud. He refuses to accept that the reason he can't find it is because it doesn't exist.
That's sounds like a nut to me. I would much rather see the governor race between two normal people than a nut and one normal person. The nation just went through that and the nut won.
Kobach is a very dangerous person to the body politic. The sooner he is relegated to the pastureland of failed politicians, the safer this nation is.
390
@Bruce Rozenblit I grew up 10 miles from Kansas and have wondered for years how and why they went off the deep end. There seems a certain passivity among large sections of the population much like I have seen in my home state of Oklahoma. How was Sam Brownback re-elected after his disastrous first term? In his own way he was just as nutty as Kobach.
31
@Bruce Rozenblit Can you tell us something about the democrat running running for governor or is it just a foegone conclusion that a republican will win?
@Bruce Rozenblit Evidently, the people in Kansas AREN'T smarter than that. Or there's something seriously wrong with their electoral process.
3
Korbach and his voter fraud commission claimed that thousands of out-of-state Democrats had been bused to New Hampshire to cast illlegal votes. Even after it was pointed out that out-of-state students attending NH colleges and universities were allowed to vote in the state, the commission stuck to it’s bogus accusation.
68
Kris Kobach and other Republicans have no problem with disenfranchising millions of Democratic voters, why would computerized election fraud be out of the realm of possibility?
The problem with our elections is that the vote-counting system is undemocratic. The public has no way of knowing if election results are legitimate. Our ballots, the memory cards and source code have been deemed to be “corporate property.” The system has been set up for concealment.
German Court Rules E-Voting Unconstitutional https://tinyurl.com/za778ju
Plaintiffs argued that computerized voting “was not transparent because the voter could not see what actually happened to his vote inside the computer and was required to place blind faith in the technology,” and that “the results were open to manipulation.”
Uncounted: Computer Security Expert Bruce O’Dell https://tinyurl.com/y96acl8y
“If you have means, motive and opportunity [to covertly shift votes on a massive scale], and there isn’t systematic vote manipulation going on, it’s only because the insiders at those three [voting machine] companies are too timid or too stupid to do it. And I don’t think that they’re stupid and I doubt that they’re timid.”
CEO Wally O’Dell wrote in a 2003 fundraiser letter for Bush that Diebold was “committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president in 2004. A documentary regarding the Bush/Kerry election:
Uncounted: The New Math of American Elections (full length) https://tinyurl.com/y84c3o8o
79
@RLS My wife was an employee of IBM for forty years. She started as a programmer, promoted to soft ware developer, next to certified data base expert, and finally to project manager. When Diebold claimed that, given the configuration of the machines, no one could tamper with the program, she was appalled at the bare-faced lie. She showed me (less than a novice) how any reasonably competent programmer could rig the computer to record any number of votes for Clinton (or other Democratic candidate) as votes for Trump (or other Republican). So, for example, given the soft-ware as described by Diebold at the time, one could rig the computer to record every fourth or fifth or tenth or whatever vote for Clinton as a vote for Trump. Easy as pie, she said.
99
Harper’s Magazine: How to Rig an Election https://tinyurl.com/y9xx63f6
A shocker: In 1996, Chuck Hagel ran for a Senate seat in Nebraska, two weeks after leaving his position as chairman for Election Systems & Software, a voting machine company called American Information Systems at the time. Hagel went from being far behind to “winning” by 15 points in an upset against Ben Nelson, a popular governor who won in a landslide two years earlier. AIS counted the votes. Charlie Matulka, Hagel’s opponent in his reelection race, asked “Is this the fox guarding the henhouse?”
An interview with Victoria Collier about the need to bring democracy back to our vote-counting process. https://tinyurl.com/y8jg6a2e
Election Theft in the 21st Century with Jonathan Simon https://tinyurl.com/ydz3jcvj
“The idea that we have an unobservable vote-counting system should strike people on its face as insane.”
Mark Crispin Miller: Can U.S. Elections Really Be Stolen? Yes. https://tinyurl.com/y96scqlt
“There are some very realistic solutions to this horrific problem, solutions that other countries have used. We need hand-counted paper ballots, counted out in the open. We need to get rid of computerized voting. We need to get rid of the private interests involved in the system. We need people to be registered automatically on their birthdays. And we need to make Election Day a national holiday. These are certain basic reforms that we can do and that will actually return this country to its people.”
71
@RLS Keep hammering away at this. Your single-minded focus on this topic has affected my own thinking, and hopefully that of countless others. Good work!
3
"Kris Kobach Is the G.O.P. at Its Worst"
More like he's the worst among equals. His philosophy of voter suppression is party-wide, and there's no more current example of this than the special election in Ohio. In all the media punditry about the close result (including in the NY Times) I have yet to see any questioning of the approximately 3.5K "provisional" ballots - they seem to be just accepted as a fact of life. Why????
According to Thom Hartmann, a liberal commentator who usually has his facts right, nearly all of these ballots were in poorer and minority parts of mostly Democratic Franklin County. Coincidence? I don't think so.
114
@mancuroc-Thanks for pointing out the suspicious entry of these provisional ballots. The Ohio GOP has shown willingness to go to great lengths to tamper with elections and block voters. And now the latest...
Supreme Court’s conservative justices uphold Ohio’s voter purge system
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/6/11/17448742/ohio-voter-pu...
2
It is very difficult, if at all possible, to be "quite possibly the most pernicious public official in America," when America has given itself the likes of Donald Trump, Jefferson Sessions, John Bolton, Steve Mnuchin, Betsy DeVos, Larry Kudlow, Ryan Zincke and Lord know who else.
And this doesn't even count the Trump appointees who have exited the stage because they were too execrable to survive even by Trumpian "standards."
367
@John lebaron said: It is very difficult, if at all possible, to be "quite possibly the most pernicious public official in America,"
John, it is a hard job, but SOMEBODY has to do it, right?
Why not a lying scoundrel like Kobach, who makes up "proof" that millions of illegals voted, when as Secretary of State of Kansas, he himself was obliged to, and DID, CERTIFY that the election results in the State of Kansas were legitimate, and that the election laws were carried out appropriately.
2
@John lebaron-I couldn't agree more! The list you provided, although incomplete as you mentioned, is unbelievable. Trying to find an ounce of honor or patriotism in the bunch of them is impossible. When a vacancy is created in this administration I am no longer surprised by the choice of a new deplorable to fill it. A chemical and coal lobbyist as head of the EPA? Amazing.
2
@John lebaron
Devin Nunes
Greg Gianforte
"What's the Matter with Kansas?"
-Thomas Frank 2004
Interesting read in these "specia"l times. Kobach is a great example of how far a populace can be moved further and further to the right, with just a continuous dialogue of a few meaningless issues.
If Kobach does win the parties nomination, it could help the Democrat, Kelly, running for Governor. Let's hope so!
135
@cherrylog754
And I thought that if Trump won his party's nomination, it could only help Clinton win the presidency. How wrong I was! Never underestimate the stupidity of voters.
4
Ultimately, bad press is better than no press for Kobach. It is the Trump way. Colyer has no name recognition. Most Kansans don’t even know that Colyer is the incumbent. Kobach’s incoherent ramblings and fear-mongering appeals to a majority of an uneducated rural electorate that spends more time worrying about the weather than politics. It is truly embarrassing that Kobach has law degrees. The last trial showed his tyrannical methods as he essentially bullied the court, but didn’t get away with it, fortunately. I pray that Orman, the independent in the general governors race, gets out. If he doesn’t, he will split the Dem vote and Kobach will have an easy win.
102
I read that it was Johnson County Republicans that put Kobach ahead of Colyer last night. I know perfectly well-educated Republicans who voted for Kobach, and openly admit it.
Orman, the Independent running for governor will not pull out of the race. He is young, good looking, wealthy, and has politics in his blood. He came close to beating Sen. Roberts. Why shouldn’t the Democrat running for governor withdraw?
3
@Duane Coyle
"He is young, good looking, wealthy, and has politics in his blood."
And what are his relevant competencies?
@Duane Coyle After the Democratic candidate stepped aside to give Orman a clean shot at Sen. Roberts, Orman still lost 53.1% to 42.5%. Not all that close.
Why should a Democrat who earned a
clear win in a public primary step aside again for someone who hasn't won anything, just because he's handsome and has a lot of money? Orman knows exactly who and what Kobach is. Why should Orman, who's demonstrated he has no path to victory, behave in a way that makes it far likelier for Kobach to win?
That Kris Kobach could be summa cum laude at Harvard, followed by both a Marshall scholarship to Oxford and a J.D. from Yale suggests that James B. Conant’s overhaul of the postwar American university was a failure. Perhaps shifting the focus back to the humanities from the sciences might get us a leadership class that acts out of wisdom and grace, rather than merely knowledge and self-interest.
341
@Walter Bruckner I believe that Kobach was a government major rather than math or science. He has demonstrated multiple times that arithmetic and statistics are very challenging for him. I think a year or two of ethics and morality studies might have done him some good. I do with the NYT or WaPo would look into his academic career and what he was like then, because he certainly is a piece of work now.
24
@Walter Bruckner Excellent points! And, if I recall correctly, many college's and universities eliminated, Ethics courses about thirty five years ago!
13
From the perspective of a long-time Kansas City resident who has observed Kobach's career up close and personal, I can state without equivocation that he is a fraud, a fraud of such standing that he's an unmitigated embarrassment to our species. He's either an unrestrained liar or drop dead insane... his seemingly universal functional incompetence is at odds with his claimed educational resume. One suspects that his history of achievement is as fraudulent as his politics. He almost makes Trump look intelligent by comparison.. no mean feat.
12
One would have thought that education was the very best solution to most our needs. Now, I ask, what IS the matter with Kansas?
155
@JSK36 As I understand it, Kobach's wife home-schools their 5 daughters. Perhaps that is what he wants to see statewide?
2
You've got to spend some time there to understand.
2
possibly a good person to run against, even in KS. who else so well deserves to lose?
with Kobach's educational background, the assumption is he is smart. so, considering his statements, policies, associations, and platforms, the conclusion is that he is crazy and well as mean.
KS has already suffered long enough under crazy, mean governance. maybe they have learned something from the experience.
if not, then what's wrong with Kansas?
220
@ Pottree, Joseph Geobbles obtained a Doctor of Philosphy degree from the University of Heidelberg in 1921. "Smart" people can be evil.
3
There are many in Kansas who find Kobach utterly reprehensible. Hopefully there will be enough to ensure he is not elected Governor. Personally, if he were to be elected, I will be strongly tempted to move on to bluer pastures.
281
@JAE-Agreed. Kobach should not have the power to control vote counting/recount methods. Prior to and through the 2016 election, Kobach helped run a criminal operation to disenfranchise millions of legitimate voters in Kansas and elsewhere. He lacks even the most modest ethical standards required of government officials. I hope the state's residents will mount a court case to require an independent vote audit, if he squeaks by.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/trump-blows-the-gops-cove...
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I find it ironic that Kobach’s election bid requires a recount, and that new voting machines are a cause for slow results. Are the new machines totally electronic? Do they have paper output? How can they recount electronic votes? Will Kobach claim voter fraud if he loses?
It is a shame that such a well-educated person uses their considerable skills for things other than improving his State’s residendts’ welfare, but in pursuing a nationalist agenda (to be kind).
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It sounds like the GOP strategy for the fall is the mirror image of what the Dems did against Trump - spend all money and energy on disparaging the opposing candidate, rather than focusing on the local issues.
It seems the Dems have learned since 2016. That’s not to say they’re perfect. I don’t think Bernie Sanders’ “Democratic Socialist” is going to play well with anyone save a small minority. Better to focus on local conditions that have the attention of the electorate. Surprisingly, the health of the economy and the GOP tax cuts aren’t playing well. People seem very interested in the healthcare mess, something the GOP started to address and failed. The GOP’s answer, pick apart the ACA and disenfranchise even more voters.
A huge tailwind for the Dems would be if Nancy Pelosi agreed not to run for House leader (majority or minority). She had her chance and she failed. The Dems are looking for an infusion of youth and new ideas addressing local concerns. Pelosi doesn’t fit and neither does Schumer, or Warren for that matter. Pelosi has done her job, and for the good of the country and her party, needs to call it quits.
And yet her ego mimics Trump’s. She will be a drag on the Dems efforts this fall. Probably not enough to prevent the Dems from retaking the House, but preventing them from becoming a partly that will actually do something for their local constituents.
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Agreed on Pelosi... I'm a hardcore Democrat... have been for over 50 years, but she's like the head of Medusa, turning even Democrats to stone. I can't believe she truly understands the negativity she generates.
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@Hey Joe Nancy is OK. Gets a lot of bad press, but a proven legislative leader. Smart,experienced, pragmatic. For me, age is not an issue - wisdom prevails and I see no loss of brain function. Leave her alone.
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@Hey Joe
Nancy Pelosi a failure? As Speaker of the House, she was the most effective crafter of legislation in US history. You may not appreciate experienced people , but you can't change the history of Pelosi's leadership when the Democrats had a majority. Ryan was a shiny new model, but has he accomplished anything?
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The citizens of Kansas didn’t learn a thing from the tax-cut debacles of two-term former governor Sam Brownback. His disastrous tax cuts for businesses resulted, among other hardships, in some schools ending their school years months before schedule due to lack of funding.
The people of Kansas richly deserve the politicians they elect.
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@Mike, yes, those who voted for Brownback did learn something when they elected new representatives who killed his tax cuts. We are recovering now. Granted, Kobach feels Brownback did not go far enough so he is worse in many ways than Brownback. Interestingly enough, two of the four school districts suing the state for inadequate funding reside in counties that went for Kobach. Those are the people I don't feel sorry for, and deserve what they get - or don't get.
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@Mike Agreed, but Congress does not deserve Republican politicians and the rest of America does not deserve vacuous, self-serving Koch sloganeering. Kansas can argue foolishly, do what it wants, but Kansas politics is toxic to America.
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@Mike I would agree that the people of Kansas deserve what they vote for, except that it doesn't affect only them. Electing ppl like Kobach or Brownback leads to uneducated youngsters who believe evolution is a hoax, vacciness are bad, and black and brown people are ruining America. They grow up and they then vote for completely unqualified people for national offices, including our current wreck of a president.
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In Blue Colorado, both liberals and conservatives have watched the Kansas Experiment championed by Brownback and others with keen interest. Kobach and and his crew have demonstrated that not only is Kansas hostile to outsiders, but Kansas now is unwelcoming to new business; the miracle of new business creation that Brownback promised never happened. Wichita is filled with vacant buildings downtown, and small Kansas towns are emptying out at an accelerated rate.
To a fair extent, one of the values of having 50 states is the potential for each state to be laboratory for policies that may run counter to the mainstream. Massachusetts and Romneycare comes to mind. Kansas has been one of those experiments, and may offer valuable lessons learned to the other 49.
The big takeaway for Colorado may be that extreme positions to the left or the right are eventually untenable. Colorado welcomes anyone, expects a full day's work for a full day's pay, and is growing almost too quickly.
Kansas wanted to keep Kansas 'pure', and with Kobach's efforts, they will achieve exactly that; pure, and increasingly poor.
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@UTBG-Hopefully Kansas voters are paying attention to the world of hurt landed on their state by Trump tariffs. That is if their local newspapers don't fold...
"Kansas' economy absorbs the largest per-capita job loss in the nation if President Donald Trump imposed a 25 percent tariff on imports from China"
http://www.salina.com/news/20180502/kansas-no-1-loser-in-tariff-war
"A trade war with Canada would hurt all Kansans"
https://www.kansascity.com/opinion/readers-opinion/guest-commentary/arti...
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