What's The Matter ...?

... with Kansas? Again? Last year, the state slashed its education budget, in an attempt to roll up history, not just this century, but the last, and the part of the previous one right back to the state's founding. After a draconian cut in the budget for public schools ran into trouble in the state courts, the governor appealed to the state Supreme Court to try to overturn a decision mandating an increase in the per-pupil formula. The state, the lower court said, had not met its constitutional obligation to provide "suitable" funding. If the Supreme Court upholds the ruling, the latest word is that the state constitution will be amended to remove the word "suitable." Oh, and while they're at it, they will remove such matters from the jurisdiction of the state's court system.

Governor Sam Brownback, a conservative, enthusiastically led the state legislature to enact a $1 billion tax cut, benefitting those with higher incomes, as a prelude to the education defunding. He also attempted, by executive order, to defund completely the state's Arts Commission; Kansas is now the only state that has done so.

But all that, it seems, has been insufficient to restore Kansas to the condition of pristine, self-reliant purity that it enjoyed back in 1861 when it was admitted to the Union after a bewildering series of territorial constitutions that alternately permitted and prohibited slavery. Yes, they eventually outlawed slavery as a condition of the entrance of Kansas as a "free" state. But in recent years the good people of Kansas have experienced a refreshing turn backwards, or at least away from the current national trends. In Kansas, life begins at fertilization, for instance; I've no information on how many unborns are claimed as dependents on Kansas tax returns, however.

Also, in Kansas a pharmacist is entitled to refuse to fill a prescription for a drug if he "feels" it may cause an abortion.

But the latest is pretty amazing, even for Sam Brownback and Kansas. House Bill 2453, "An Act Concerning Religious Freedoms With Respect to Marriage," allows pretty much anyone in the state to refuse service to someone if, in the opinion of the person, doing so would violate his or her religious beliefs "regarding sex or gender."

"Religious beliefs regarding gender?" Oh, my. So I could refuse to serve women, for instance, if I believed that they should not appear in public unaccompanied by a male relative. That's not the objective, of course; the goal is simply to legalize discrimination against homosexuals, and anyone else whose (suspected) sexual orientation or practices, or whose gender, might offend the religious beliefs of the person otherwise obligated to provide such service.

This applies to government agents, by the way: a court clerk could refuse to file a document by which a lesbian couple tried to register the purchase of a house.

Kansas, tired of receiving insufficient attention from the rest of the country, calls attention to itself --as a laughingstock.