At 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, January 6, 2009, the Sedgwick County legislative delegation will host a public hearing and inviting public input in the Jury Room of the Sedgwick County Courthouse, 525 N. Main, Wichita, Kansas. This is your opportunity to address your concerns to area legislators prior to the convening of the 2009 legislative session in Topeka on January 12, 2009. Entry to the Courthouse will be through security on the north side of the building. In past years speakers have been given approximately 3 minutes to speak depending on the number of people wanting to speak.
Category: Kansas state government
The U.S. Taxpayer — AKA second, third or even fourth class citizen
Here’s a note I received from someone who isn’t appreciative of the tax collector. This reminds me of the Internal Revenue Service’s effort to improve “customer service.” That’s funny. It reminds me of David Henderson, who wrote “calling taxpayers customers of the IRS is like calling chickens customers of the egg farmer.”
I received a nice letter on New Year’s Eve from the Kansas Department of Revenue telling me that I owed so many dollars of tax penalties and interest. I had filed an extension in April. Now I did expect a bill from them but what wrenched my stomach was the bold sentence toward the bottom of the letter that read:
“PLEASE NOTE: Failure to respond timely could result in legal action such as the filing of a tax warrant, garnishment of wages and bank accounts, or seizure of real and personal property.”
Hello???
We have millions living in the US without any documentation — but that’s okay they deserve amnesty.
We are giving billions to banks who are not “trickling down” their ability to give credit.
We are giving billions to auto makers who should be in bankruptcy for being idiots.
We give billions to countries who don’t like us.
We give billions to lazy and/or drug addicted people who did not pay attention in high school in the form of welfare …
But you threaten to take my house, my wages and throw me in jail over less than a thousand dollars!
Wake up Americans! Your desire to care for the world has made the US Taxpayers slaves to the system. They say the average taxpayer works until sometime in April just to pay our taxes. Imagine if that work had to be done in some sort of concentration camp — or dare I say plantation?
Then maybe the system would change. Apathy amongst the taxpayers is what is making us all slaves. As individuals we can’t do anything, but perhaps the taxpayers should be the ones protesting down the streets for once.
Jonah Goldberg to Speak at Kansas Summit
Here’s a message from Alan Cobb of Americans For Prosperity.
I’m pleased to announce that Jonah Goldberg, syndicated columnist of National Review Online and best selling author of Liberal Fascism will be joining us on January 10th in Wichita.
Register today for Kansas’ second Defending the American Dream Summit, America’s foremost free-market voices, top experts on grassroots mobilization, and Kansas’ largest gathering of grassroots leaders from across the state in a massive show of force for our shared belief in lower taxes and more limited government.
Registration is $39, and includes breakfast, lunch and admission to our general session of speakers.
Confirmed Speakers Include:
Jonah Goldberg, Syndicated columnist, National Review Online, author of Liberal Fascism
Mike O’Neal, Kansas Speaker of the House
Greg Schneider, Author of the newly published Conservative Century and Senior Fellow — Flint Hills Center for Public Policy
Susan Wagle, State Senator, former Speaker Pro-tem of the Kansas House
Professor Steven Ware, Author of Selection to the Kansas Supreme Court
Dave Trabert, President, Flint Hills Center for Public Policy, reforming the Kansas property tax
Chris Steineger, Kansas State Senator
Click here to register for this event.
AFP Defending the American Dream Summit to be Held in Wichita
Americans For Prosperity — Kansas announces Kansas’ second statewide Defending the American Dream Summit. This event will be on Saturday, January 10 from 9 a.m. To 2 p.m. at the Beech Activity Center in Wichita.
The featured speaker is Jonah Goldberg of National Review Online. He’s also author of the recent best-seller Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning.
Registration is only $29 until December 31st and includes breakfast, lunch, and admission to the general session of speakers.
I’ve been to several AFP statewide summits in Kansas and Texas, and the national summit in Washington. AFP always puts on a great event, and I urge you to register early and attend. Click here for more information and to register.
KU Study an Embarrassment to Sebelius
Writing in National Review, Denis Boyles says:
In the first study to measure the result of pouring all that money on the noggins of schoolkids, the University of Kansas’s Center for Applied Economics has released a study poetically entitled, “The Relationship between School Funding and Student Achievement in Kansas Public Schools.” The verdict? So far, the funding has produced “little evidence of improving student outcomes as measured by test scores.”
Kansas Taxpayers Network, The End
The Kansas Taxpayers Network under the leadership of Karl Peterjohn has represented Kansas taxpayers for 15 years. Due to Karl’s election to the Board of Sedgwick County Commissioners, change is coming. KTN is merging with Americans For Prosperity — Kansas.
This photo shows the KTN booth at this year’s Kansas State Fair. I spent three days helping work in the booth, meeting taxpayers from across Kansas. (Actually, not from across all of Kansas. In three days no one from Johnson county signed our petitions.)
Voting for change in the Kansas Senate … not
The Americans For Prosperity — Kansas blog has a post Voting for change in the Kansas Senate that explains the importance of the recent leadership elections in the Kansas Senate.
This election was important because there was a clear choice. As the post says: “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.”
The post makes what appears to be an accurate estimate of who voted for each side in this secret ballot election.
Low marks for Gov. Sebelius on Cato Institute grade card
Americans For Prosperity — Kansas reported last month on Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius regarding taxation and spending in Kansas. As reported in Low marks for Gov. Sebelius on Cato Institute grade card, she doesn’t fare well. While supporting some business tax cuts, spending in Kansas has been out of control for some years. This rapid growth in spending and the constituencies that have become accustomed to it is what makes me believe that spending cuts will be difficult, if not impossible, to accomplish in the upcoming legislative session.
The entire Cato Institute report is available here: Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors: 2008. It’s worth reading.
Previous coverage:
Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius Scores Low AgainKansas Tax Increase Not Ruled Out
The Kansas Liberty story Lawmakers start looking for ways to meet deficit tells us that tax increases may be forthcoming in Kansas: “Both Senate President Steve Morris, R-Hugoton, and Vice-President John Vratil, R-Leawood, have not ruled out raising taxes.”
These two gentlemen, fresh from their victories in their senate leadership races, will play important roles in the upcoming legislative session. Their lifetime ratings from the Kansas Taxpayers Network — 32.5% for Morris and 18.2% for Vratil — tell us that neither of these leaders shy away from tax increases.
