Government run healthcare supporters gathered in Wichita Saturday to protest the Healthcare Freedom Amendment (HFA). The Amendment, sponsored by Reps. Brenda Landwehr, Peggy Mast and Sen. Mary Pilcher-Cook, would try to prevent the federal government from imposing fines, or even jail time, to Kansas citizens who choose not to have health insurance. Opponents of the HFA claim that it would opt Kansas out of any “public option” that passes in Washington. However, no where in the two page document are these provisions found.

The Wichita protest was to target Rep. Landwehr for her support of the HFA and was a follow up to a rally in early November in Shawnee targeting Sen. Pilcher-Cook. At that protest, government healthcare supporters were met by a large group of freedom loving patriots.

The spin from the left was that they were all shipped in by Koch Industries, even though they were unable to produce any evidence of this assertion. One would think big buses with a whole bunch of people would be easy to document. Of course, they are unable to do so because it simply doesn’t exist. Any “busing” by Koch or AFP is pure fiction, a grand lie concocted by liberals to convince themselves only the left can produce an uncoordinated, spontaneous grassroots movement.

The Koch lie seems to be in line with previous attacks by the left, where even they admit they were wrong when challenged to provide evidence.

This morning, I received an e-mail from Melissa “Missy” Cohlmia, the Communications Director for Koch Companies Public Sector. In it, Ms. Cohlmia asked:

“Can you point me to the facts behind this statement? The astroturf movement is paid for by David Koch of Wichita-based Koch Industries to the tune of $20 million of his own treasure.”

Admittedly, I failed in my post yesterday to appropriately link that statement. Mostly, however, that failure was because it’s a commonly known fact that Koch Industries is behind Americans for Prosperity, widely reported by the traditional and non-traditional press.

In fact the truth is AFP now has over 700,000 individual donors. Koch donations now account for less than 5% of AFP’s donations.

But as liberals go, they just couldn’t stop themselves and had to go even further.

One way that’s ever so popular with liberals is parading the children around. We must do it for the children, don’t you know! Thus Kansas’ 58,000 uninsured children becomes the call for more government programs. Of course, never mind there’s already a program out there called Kansas Healthwave. To a common sense Kansan that’d be evidence of a government failure, but to a liberal, it’s a call to more government action.

In fact, it seems the lefties have gotten themselves so worked up, they’ve forgotten what exactly happened in Shawnee less than a month ago.

In a weekend update, the left says things never got out of hand.

Despite the tone of our local Fox affiliate, that morning never got ugly. Passions are high on both sides, but never did the event escalate over some shouting matches.

But just a few weeks later, an organizer with the same liberal blog told a very different story to the Wichita Eagle.

“We had a bunch of (tea party supporters) come out and get pretty much in everybody’s faces,” said Sarah Burris, a spokeswoman for Forward Kansas. “They just want to raise a ruckus.”

Could it be liberals change their story based on what they think will get them the most traction in the press?

It also looks as though it’s okay to come from out of town for the rally, just as long as you make the trek for the right side. Just before the Shawnee rally, liberals had this to say:

…none, I repeat none, of the pro-Reform rally members will be bused in from surrounding areas — like American’s for Prosperity and David Koch did in Washington DC yesterday.

But they boasted of all the out of town folks for yesterday’s gathering:

Many of the demonstrators drove to Wichita from cities all over Kansas. Colin Curtis, of Manhattan made the trip because he wanted to ensure his side was represented in the debate

And I guess when flip-flopping on your version of protest etiquette doesn’t yield the results you want, you can always just start calling names.

From Twitter:

• @sarahburris: If you use teabagger in a press release do we think they’ll use it? #fwks
• @sarahburris: @immunis the experts say only if its in a quote just FYI #fwks

From the Wichita Eagle:

“We had a bunch of (tea party supporters) come out and get pretty much in everybody’s faces,” said Sarah Burris, a spokeswoman for Forward Kansas.

Now that’s a term even the Wichita Eagle won’t publish, try as the liberals might.

I’m willing to make a decent bet (tea party supporters) was inserted because the liberal’s spokeswoman decided to use a derogatory term for their opponents rather than show a little class.

Unfortunately, facts don’t get in the way of liberals. Their perception is reality, no matter how skewed it is, no matter how little evidence they have to support their assertions.

It’s the kind of insinuations and lies we should expect from this group in the future.

A TEE Party activist displays his T-shirt

Around 80 citizens attended AFP’s TEE Party in the capital. Activists stood outside the House chambers to greet legislators as they entered and then moved to the viewing balcony to see our government at work. One activist had a campaign flyer from her Senator stating that she had worked to remove the franchise tax, eliminate the estate tax and make Kansas a more tax friendly state. She planned to remind her Senator what she said on the campaign trail.

At noon activist regrouped for a quick lunch. A few legislators joined the group including Sens. Susan Wagle, Dick Kelsey, Mike Petersen and Rep. Steve Brunk. A few organizers quickly addressed the group, including FairTax from Kansas City, Sedgwick County Commissioner Karl Peterjohn and grassroots activist and TEA Party organizer Amanda Grosserode.

FairTax activists have plan in place to bring the FairTax to Kansas. A bill is currently working its way through the Missouri Senate. Advocates noted the devastating effects that could happen here in Kansas if Missouri becomes much more business and tax friendly than Kansas.

Karl Peterjohn gave some tips on effective lobbying. He spoke about the important impact citizens can have on their government.

Amanda Grosserode mention another protest for Congressman Dennis Moore. Details will be announced on their website soon.

Participants were encouraged to visit legislators in the Docking State Office building and in the capital. Some plan to stay and hear the Governor’s address at 4pm if possible. Buses leaving for Johnson County and Wichita will still leave on time at 4pm however.

Reactions from citizens vary. A common theme seems to be the amount of taxpayer funded lobbying that is occuring under the dome. A group from invisiblekansas.com was also under the dome urging no cuts to their taxpayer funded activities. There seems to be every constituency imaginable under the dome lobbying legislators right now except taxpayer citizens.

AFP member Vonda Wiedmer displays her T-shirt message

There’s a TEE Party in the statehouse today. Americans for Prosperity – Kansas has organized grassroots activists to come and encourage lawmakers to not tax their way out of their spending problem. Citizens met this morning at 10am and are now spread throughout the statehouse speaking with legislators about what needs to be done to fix their budget problem. Here’s what AFP Director Derrick Sontag had to say this morning.

• “This is not just your regular veto session. We’ve been spending too much money in this building since day one.”
• Spending has increased by 48% since 2004. “Those are the real numbers folks.”
• “The budget that they are proposing to finish off this year leaves $39, $40 million in the bank.” That’s significantly less than what is required by statute. But then again, statutes can always be changed to suit the situation.
• “If they had just spent what they took in, they’d have a billion in the bank.” 22 months ago the state of Kansas had $1 billion in the bank. Now the state is still trying to fix a $1 billion plus problem
• Legislators knew the problem was coming and yet did ignored their own staff. “They were warned by their own staff two years ago”, that they’d have a negative balance.
• By law the legislative session must be wrapped up in 90 days. “They have nine more days to go.” A tax increase is certainly not outside the realm of possibility. “They’ll get creative and do whatever they have to do at the end of the day.”
• K-12 education is being asked to cut less than one percent of their budget. Yet K-12 spending has increased by 53% since 2003. “It’s simply not sustainable.”

Flint Hills Center investiative reporter Paul Soutar spoke briefly about his newest report on how much money K-12 education is sitting on.

Citizens are now spread throughout the capital speaking to legislators, encouraging them to not raise taxes and hurt the Kansas economy even more. More later in the day.

The Johnson County bloggers at Red County have a nice list posted of what our children and grandchildren will be paying for in the years to come.

I’ll share some of my favorites:

• $1 billion for NASA
• $2 billion to develop advanced batteries for hybrid cars
• $650 million for the digital TV converter box coupon program (because reality TV spurs the economy)
• $3.7 billion to conduct “green” renovations on military bases (I thought they already wore camo?)
• $1 billion for the 2010 Census (to count just over 305 million people)
• $3.4 billion for fossil energy research (Remember folks, it’s the green Democrats that voted for that…)
• $98 million earmarked for a polar icebreaker (this one just puzzles me, couldn’t we just wait for ‘em to melt?)
• $500 million for forest health and wildfire prevention
• $25 million for the Smithsonian Institution
• $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts

Finally, my ultimate favorite two:

• $10 million for urban canals
• $290 million for flood prevention

If I have to explain why that’s funny, we’re in real trouble.

Nostimulus.com surpassed half a million signatures in the waning hours of the spendulus debate, but it made no difference to the Democrats or three “moderate” Republican Senators. The site is still up if you just feel a need to sign it. I’m sure AFP will keep ownership of the domain name. I have a feeling this won’t be the last “stimulus.”

During the House and Senate debate I had a nightmarish flashback to the last time a legislative body voted on a massive piece of legislation without reading it.

Of course, everyone by now knows what a cash cow state-owned casinos turned out to be for Kansas. And not allowing legislative oversight in the bill, that was an excellent idea. I can only imagine what American citizens will learn about this spending bill over the next year or two.

U.S. House rules state that all conference committee reports must be made available for 3 calendar days before a vote to allow Representatives to read the bill. The Democrat controlled House passed a special resolution to waive that rule so a vote on the 1100 page bill could be taken not even 24 hours after it’s final draft was made available.

Democrat Reps and Senators must be very fast readers.

I can think of a few high points though. Every Representative and all but three Republican Senators voted against the bill. What a dramatic return to conservative principles. It’s certainly refreshing to see that most of our Republican officials intimately understand what lost them the election and what they need to do to begin to win again.

Imagine if Republicans had acted like Republicans several years ago.

Other Kansas spendulus blog posts:

Kansas Meadowlark – “‘Yes We Can’ Pass $787 Billion ‘Stimulus’ Without Anyone in Congress Reading the Bill”
Red County JoCo – The short list of your grandchildren’s debt
Wichita Liberty – NoStimulus.com Effort Crosses 200,000 Petitions
Wichita Liberty – Tim Phillips of AFP explains NoStimulus.com
StimulusWatch.org – Lists all Kansas Stimulus projects

As reported yesterday, nostimulus.com by American’s for Prosperity crashed due to the overwhelming traffic it received after a Fox News appearance by Tim Phillips, AFP President. The site was down for several hours yesterday but still racked up more than 100,000 signatures in just one day, according to an AFP press release today.

“There is growing citizen outrage against this spending nightmare and American citizens are not giving up,” said Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity. “In fact, taxpayers raised their voices louder, doubling the number of petitions in one day.”

If you haven’t already, go and sign the petition at nostimulus.com.

More close to home, you can also do you part for state economic development and lower energy costs by signing the Kansas Republican Assembly’s online petition to build the Sunflower Electric Power Plants in western Kansas. Today’s economic climate no longer allows us to play environmental roulette with our state’s energy policies.

Sign the petition and we’ll deliver this message to your Legislators:

“I encourage you to develop energy policies that are based on proven science to meet our growing need for electricity and allow our economy to grow, while preserving our quality of life in Kansas.”

Sign today!

Here’s the Fox News video that caused the site to crash from overwhelming demand. You have to watch for 45 seconds to a minute before they get to the story…

As many of you may have already noticed, nostimulus.com is down as of right now due to the overwhelming demand to sign the petition against more government spending.

AFP has told me that Tim Phillips earlier today was on Fox News talking about nostimulus.com, which cause the massive demand to sign the petition. They are working on the problem and hope to have the site back up soon. I’ll post here again as soon as I know something.

As of right now, the site says:

Due to the overwhelming traffic, NoStimulus.com is temporarily down. We will be back up and running as soon as possible. Congress should not enact an expensive spending bill under the pretense of stimulus or recovery. Reckless spending of borrowed money was at the root of the financial crisis, and this bill is more of the same. We cannot spend our way to prosperity, and such an expansion of the federal government will put a crushing burden on taxpayers in the long-term.

I hope to have the Phillips video soon as well.

Americans for Prosperity has launched a new website, www.nostimulus.com. The site urges concerned taxpayers to send a message to President Obama in his first major policy initiative that expanding government and growing debt are not adequate solutions during times of economic trouble.

Kansas faces a potential shortfall of $300 million for the current fiscal year, and that budget gap will grow to over $1 billion for FY2010. Our state legislators and elected officials must address our fiscal situation by making those tough decisions on where to trim the budget, and by eliminating wasteful government spending.

According to AFP:

We simply can’t afford to continue spending money as we have in the past. Accepting this potential $1.6 billion in federal dollars will tempt too many legislators to ignore their responsibility to reform the way we spend tax dollars in Topeka . This massive state bailout will not provide the solution to the spending habits our legislators have adopted.

Take moment and visit nostimulus.com.

A blog post by Americans for Prosperity is getting quite a bit of attention on the political blogosphere. The post proposes probable votes of Republican Senators in the recent leadership elections.

It wasn’t the attention the post gathered that I found interesting, rather it was the lack of attention from any Kansas Senate member that I found interesting. Committee assignments left little doubt of who supported liberal leadership and who didn’t.

Julia Lynn was first elected by precinct leaders to replace former Sen. Kay O’Connor two years ago. This November was her first general election to the Kansas Senate.

Lynn’s campaign was infused with thousands of dollars from the Senate Leadership PAC. This is the same PAC that infused $45,000 into KTRM to fund their KKK press releases and their mailers against Sen. Mary Pilcher-Cook saying she didn’t want parents to be able to get help for their sick children.

Lynn describes herself as a conservative and has a pro-life voting record. So why Sen. Lynn has decided to associate herself with this crowd is a little confusing. Is power so greatly desired by some that they’re willing to do anything to get it?

When asked by Kansas Liberty why she cast her vote for liberals, Lynn just flat out lied.

“What I looked at was how much experience they had with the budget and their breadth of knowledge, and the current leadership obviously had a depth of operational knowledge.”

This is the same leadership team that refuses to rule out tax increases to fix the state’s budget crisis. This is the same leadership team that oversaw massive spending increases the past four years. This is the same leadership team that allowed the budget to get where it is in the first place!

Julia, just tell the truth. They bought your seat with Senate Leadership PAC money and now you have to pay them back. Politics would be so much nicer if people just told the truth.

Now, here’s the part I don’t understand.

“Contrary to popular belief, Derek Schmidt is an extremely capable, conservative Republican, and I think our current leadership team knows what we need to do.”

Huh? Schmidt a conservative? The leadership team knows what to do? They can’t rule out tax increases, but they know what to do?

Barnett was probably the biggest surprise. Conservative Susan Wagle was his running mate just two years ago but Barnett decided not to vote for her.

Unlike Lynn, Barnett has a record of leadership roles for conservative causes, most notably during the 2007 session when the now all-too-apparent-fatally-flawed gambling bill was passed.

It’s these outspoken roles and votes in the past that make his leadership vote so confusing. It doesn’t make sense why you would vote for a team that will use their power to stop legislation that you want passed. What good is a chairmanship if leadership won’t allow a floor vote?

Leadership votes will be hard to explain to conservative activists, especially if Barnett chooses to try for higher office again. This is especially true when you look at the quality of candidates conservatives have for Governor (Sam Brownback) and in the first congressional district (Tim Huelskamp.)

A vote for the current team is essentially saying that everything is A-OK in Kansas. That the past four years, when a billion-dollar budget deficit was created, were just hunky-dory.

As far as we can tell, the vote tally seems very accurate. You can read more here.