Embarrassment in Kansas

If you've ever arched an eyebrow at Kansas politics, I suspect your eyebrows have pushed right up past your hairline this week.  The Kansas legislature needed to redraw four maps this year, based on the results of the 2010 census, to make sure that each state and each US representative and senate district had roughly equal populations.  The short story is that the Kansas legislature dithered and squabbled so long without coming to any agreement about how the maps should be drawn that the whole mess got dumped onto three judges who had to get things figured out in a big hurry.  If they hadn't done so, no one could have filed to run for office in any district because no one would have known which yet-to-be-determined district they lived in.  The election filing deadline was on Monday of this past week.

The judges cited the gerrymandering and political feuding that had characterized the legislature's efforts and made it clear that they wanted no part of it.  With a cold eye toward the numbers, they sliced and diced till they had boundaries for every district that needed definition.  In the process, a lot of things turned out looking pretty topsy-turvy.  According to today's paper, 25 state house districts ended up with no incumbents, 21 districts had two, and two districts had three incumbents. Several incumbents scrambled to move to a different residence, with less than a week's warning, so that they could run again in a district that included part of their old territory, but not their current residence.  Others demurred from entering a race they had intended to enter before they saw the new realities, and still others from the same party who were incumbents and are now in the same district will duke it out in the primaries.

Bruce Buchanan, former editor of the Hutchinson News, and now president of Harris Enterprises Inc.,  publisher of a number of daily newspapers, quoted in today's paper part of the judges' statement:  "The feud primarily pitted GOP moderates against their more conservative GOP colleagues.  Failing consensus, the process degenerated into blatant efforts to gerrymander various districts for ideological political advantage and to serve the political ambitions of various legislators."  (editorial page, A12, 6-13-2012)

Buchanan also berated all the local representatives for their criticism of the judges' decisions, noting pointedly that one of them, who has served as Speaker of the House for a number of years, was more responsible than most for the embarrassments coming out of the legislature.  Buchanan said he should have publicly thanked the judges and then faded quietly into retirement rather than offer vociferous criticism for the "gerrymandering" the judges engaged in.  Buchanan calls it chutzpah.  I'd call it the kettle calling the pot black.

Buchanan noted one hopeful result of the upheaval:  New blood will likely enter the political fray.  Perhaps that change will translate into more principled behavior in the future.  If that happens, all of our eyebrows can settle back into their normal position.

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In another editorial in today's paper (by Dan Deming), he gives kudos to two News reporters who  have done an outstanding job of reporting on city/county/school matters:  Ken Stephens and Mary Clarkin.  I don't always notice who writes what I read in the newspaper, but I echo Deming's sentiments on this subject.    Getting the facts right and making it fair are both important, and I appreciate every news person who does this.

Within the past week, one issue of the paper contained four full pages on the re-mapping of the legislative and congressional districts.  Someone did a lot of research to bring together all the information necessary for reporting well on this subject.  I thank them for having done the necessary work to make it happen.