Moderate losses in the Kansas primaries could be due to a number of factors, including the movement of moderate Republicans out of the Republican Party. We remain concerned about the massive amounts of deceptive campaign postcards launched against incumbents who support public education. We are also concerned about the role of anger in local election outcomes. In 2016, it was our side that was angry. We had seen the lasting impact of devastating tax cuts and cuts to our schools and a legislature full of un-representative representatives who refused to rectify the situation. So we voted them out. Now, our side is not angry, at least not at the local level. The Gannon case has led to increased school funding, and the bad bills haven’t been passing in our legislature. Does that lead to complacency and amnesia? Will our side vote for the correct people in down-ballot races? Will we remember that the promise of tax cuts is also the promise of budget cuts to schools? Will we remember the tough votes cast by incumbents who saved us from a fiscal and educational disaster? Or will we let the legislature look again like the 2014 legislature until we get angry again? “Absent a rational argument for a functional government, the carpet-bombing on behalf of far-right candidates appears to have one goal: to keep people angry.”‘If you choose your candidate based on who can say the nastiest thing about their opponent,” Kessinger said, ‘you’re picking for the wrong reason.'”Berger’s advice for voters: ‘They have to get past the hyperbole. Look past emotional arguments and make sure you know exactly what the issues are. You have to be an informed voter. That’s your responsibility. That’s incumbent on all of us.'”What happens, Kansas, when anger wins?”

Kansas’ far-right organizations want to keep you very, very angry