Republicans are predicting the beginning of the end of the tea party in Kansas

[DonViejo]

By Ana Swanson and Max Ehrenfreund June 9 at 6:50 PM

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. – Kansas was at the heart of the tea party revolution, a red state where, six years ago, a deeply conservative group of Republicans took the state for a hard right turn. Now, after their policies failed to produce the results GOP politicians promised, the state has become host to another revolution: a resurgence of moderate Republicans.

Moderate Republicans joined with Democrats this week to raise state taxes, overriding GOP Gov. Sam Brownback’s veto and repudiating the conservative governor’s platform of ongoing tax cuts. The vote was a demonstration of the moderates’ newfound clout in the state Republican Party. Brownback was unable to successfully block the bill because many of the die-hard tax cut proponents had either retired or been voted out of office, losing to more centrist candidates in GOP primaries.

“The citizens of Kansas have said ‘It’s not working. We don’t like it.’ And they’ve elected new people.” said Sheila Frahm, a centrist Republican who served as lieutenant governor of Kansas and briefly as a U.S. senator.

Kansas’s moderate ascendance may portend problems for Republicans in Washington, where many in the party, including President Trump, are pushing to adopt federal tax policies similar to the ones Brownback has installed in Kansas. But while Brownback had hoped what he called Kansas’s “real-live experiment” in conservative economic policy would become a national model, it has instead become a cautionary example.

Brownback and his promised tax cuts were expected to spur enough economic growth to keep the government well funded, but when that economic boom never materialized, state lawmakers faced perennial deficits and had to implement spending reductions to close the gap. And when they did, some lawmakers found that while promising to cut spending plays well during a campaign, the subsequent loss of public services often proves far more unpopular.

“Kansas seems to be ahead of the curve,” said Rep. Melissa Rooker, a Republican who represents a suburb of Kansas City. “If you look at the national political scene right now, I think it seems to me we’re about ready for a course correction.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/06/09/republicans-are-predicting-the-beginning-of-the-end-of-the-tea-party-in-kansas/?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories_kansasgop-730pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.7c31c496af1b

[RKP5637]

1. Now the ass in the WH wants to try it out! n/t

[Me.]

2. Will This Turn Towards Moderates Do In Kobach?

[Beartracks]

3. These sentences caught my eye.

"Brownback and his promised tax cuts were expected to spur enough economic growth to keep the government well funded, but when that economic boom never materialized, state lawmakers faced perennial deficits and had to implement spending reductions to close the gap. "

The expectations were only by Republicans, I bet.


"Some lawmakers found that while promising to cut spending plays well during a campaign, the subsequent loss of public services often proves far more unpopular."

"Unpopular" is kind of an odd word to describe economic damage.

=========

[MiddleClass]

4. Washington Republicans from Kansas we know the way we did it Kansas to perfection

Kansas Republicans in Kansas – WE LEARN FROM OUR MISTAKES – stop – turnaround – run

[Xolodno]

5. Meanwhile in California where the GOP says...

...liberal policies will cause it to implode any day now. The opposite continues to happen.

[tblue37]

6. Kansas was essentially a 3-party state in which moderate Republicans and

center-right Dems formed a coalition against the most extreme right wing Republican legislators from rural districts out west.

But during the Tea Party ascendancy, extreme right wingers, funded by the Kochs, primaried the moderate Republican legislators and took over the legislature. They gave Brownback everything he wanted.

Finally we managed to get a few of them primaried by more moderate Republicans, but only because the total destruction of our economy finally got through to some GOP voters.

[Leith]

7. They Still Won't Get It Through Their Thick Skulls

Their slash'n'cut policies don't work and they never did. But they still keep trying them.