Recent Kansas editorials

The Hutchinson News, April 26

Brownback’s view on evolution has room for ancient fossils:

Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback sure seemed to be enjoying his state’s “dinosaurs” last week for a guy who once said he didn’t believe in evolution.

The governor went to the Sternberg Museum of Natural History in Hays, a fitting place to sign a bill into law that designates two state fossils - the flying Pteranodon and the marine creature Tylosaurus mosasaur. The bill got plenty of ribbing from those who see such legislation as a waste of valuable time.

The other comic undertone was the ceremonial bill signing by a governor who raised his hand during a Republican presidential debate in 2007 when the moderator asked which candidates didn’t believe in evolution. Well, at least Brownback didn’t lead a delegation through the Sternberg to explain how the fossils displayed there are either fakes or wrongly dated by tens of millions of years.

Brownback went on back in ’07 to try to explain his nuanced opinion blending creationism and evolution in a convoluted New York Times op ed piece. Maybe his position has evolved further since.

But in any event, it is hard to reconcile fossils of creatures that inhabited the earth about 80 million years ago with the strict Biblical interpretation of human history that dates the earth by about 6,000 years. And even if microevolution explains the legitimacy of flying and swimming reptiles, such as the Pteranodon and Tylosaurus, how can it at the same discount fossils of ancient humans that date back only as far as 7 million years?

Brownback apparently doesn’t discount the fossil records, at least when it comes to Kansas’ ancient reptiles. And variations on intelligent design belief can be used to reconcile creationism and evolution. It doesn’t have to be an either-or argument.

Naming official state fossils may be a waste of time in the big picture. But these new designations do have educational value. When they learn about our state history, our school children will learn about our state fossils, right along with the state bird, reptile, tree, etcetera. And if our schools have any money left for field trips, they can go to the Sternberg and marvel at the fossil-based depictions of marine and flying creatures that inhabited oceanic prehistoric Kansas.

The governor should be commended for recognizing the state’s ancient history, culture and scientific discovery.

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The Clay Center Dispatch, April 22

The costs of abolishing teacher tenure:

The Kansas Legislature’s right-wing has made it easier to fire teachers. Why isn’t exactly clear.

Bad teachers could be fired before with a little effort. They just weren’t. The legislation signed by Gov. Brownback invites and encourages abuse by administrators.

In all likelihood, the kinds of teachers who will be dismissed are older, higher paid teachers and the outstanding teachers who don’t also happen to be able to coach.

Teachers who rock no boats, irritate neither students nor parents nor administrators, and who keep their mouths shut and toe the line for the administration will have the best chances of surviving with their jobs intact.

Do all of that and try to teach in that position.

School administrators are all too often teachers who couldn’t make it in the classroom. They have little sympathy for, or patience with, creative teachers and tend to be as much a drag on education as an inspiration for it.

School administrators are also becoming infamous for not defending teachers when confronted by hot-headed parents accusing the school of picking on their little darlings - the kind of parents who will believe their own kid’s account of an incident before they’ll listen to a responsible adult professional, blood being thicker than common sense.

The percentage of irrational parents increases as years go by and teachers now must face the anger alone.

Teachers already have meager defense against students disrespecting them with foul language, insults or minor assaults such as being poked in the chest. They cannot legally respond verbally or physically to such insults and assaults. And by law, they cannot publicly complain about this state of affairs which keeps up the illusion of peace and order in the school. That is why the public never hears of the situation but it is in every school district.

And while it may be easier to fire poor teachers, the new law strips all teachers of the last shred of protection they had, exposing them to this hostile environment.

The net result will be an outmigration of good teachers and promising school of education graduates to states willing to pay and protect them better than Kansas.

Giving school administrators and teachers authority to defend themselves, and to punish serious misbehavior without fear of lawsuits or reprimand, is the way to clean up the nasty school environment in Kansas. That isn’t being done.

Taking away future job protections that have been in place since mid-century is exactly the wrong thing to do.

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The Manhattan Mercury, April 26

Looser gun laws won’t make us safer:

Once there was reason to believe that Americans collectively would come to our senses about guns and gun violence. If nothing else, maybe the shock of mass murders would jolt us into productive actions.

Such tragedies have made household words of Columbine, Newtown, Virginia Tech and too many other places where individuals armed to the teeth unleashed their rage on innocent people.

Yet we haven’t come to our senses. We’ve taken further leave of them. Rather than approve sensible restrictions - laws that would not undermine the Second Amendment - lawmakers in at least six states have since Jan. 1 gone in the other direction. (Also, six states have tightened restrictions modestly.) Lawmakers in states that have loosened restrictions seem to buy into the argument that the more guns there are and the more law-abiding people there are who wield them, the safer we all will be. They’re spurred on by the National Rifle Association, which opposes almost all limitations on gun ownership and for which the right to bear arms includes assault-type weapons.

Kansas is one of the six states to loosen gun restrictions. Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback on April 23 signed legislation that on July 1 will eliminate local governments’ authority to regulate guns and nullify any existing local restrictions. Legislators considered this bill, which the NRA calls model legislation, necessary because some cities, alarmed by previous laws that they deemed hazardous to their citizens’ health, pursued and in some cases approved restrictions within their jurisdictions.

The consistency the law applies is commendable, but it could have been consistently more restrictive. But as has been the case for many years, the arrogance that seems to breed in the Statehouse again led lawmakers to believe they know better than local officials what’s best for the latters’ constituents.

Still, the new Kansas law is almost innocuous compared to the Georgia Legislature’s folly. Georgia’s governor recently signed a law that will allow licensed gun owners in Georgia - and visitors from 28 other states who bring guns into Georgia - to carry guns into bars without restriction. They also can carry guns into airports - though not in secure areas. The law also allows school districts to permit employees to carry weapons at school and allow religious leaders to decide whether parishioners can bring guns into places of worship.

The NRA praised Georgia’s law as “the most comprehensive pro-gun reform legislation introduced in recent history.” Most law enforcement agencies in the state opposed it.

We’re not sure what it is about mass murders that renews enthusiasm for looser gun laws. Perhaps the initial calls for more restrictive gun laws that follow such horrors - calls that are generally constructive though hardly the entire solution - spark a backlash among folks who are convinced that their genuine Second Amendment rights are about to be taken away. We’re just as convinced they’re wrong about that and that a middle ground, however elusive, exists.

But it seems a long way from the Second Amendment to individuals carrying weapons into bars, airports, schools and other public buildings. Such policies represent more of a threat to peace than a defense of it.

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The Topeka Capital-Journal, April 27

Topekans should welcome first lady:

The brouhaha surrounding first lady Michelle Obama’s address to Topeka Unified School District 501’s seniors has been quelled, largely due to the first lady’s offer to change her schedule upon learning of the controversy that greeted news her presence would require significant changes in the traditional graduation ceremonies.

It was a gracious move by the first lady, although she probably wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of speaking to a group that would include a lot of people who were upset that their graduation traditions and plans had been altered so she could address all the district’s graduating seniors. She could have just backed away from the whole thing, however. That she didn’t, and took the high road by reaching out to USD 501 officials to propose an accommodation, indicates she wants to come to Topeka and speak to the young people who have completed high school and are preparing to move on with their lives.

A first lady always receives invitations to speak at more events than she can possibly attend. That Michelle Obama decided to accept the invitation to come to Topeka is an honor, one that now can be recognized as such.

Topeka USD 501 officials in December invited the first lady to speak to the district’s graduating seniors on May 17, the 60th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board, which desegregated public schools. To ask the nation’s first black first lady to address the seniors on such an anniversary was a good idea then, and still is.

School district officials have been roundly criticized for how they handled the whole affair, and perhaps things could have been done better. But there really wasn’t much USD 501 officials could do or say until the White House was ready to announce whether Michelle Obama had accepted the invitation, which it finally did on April 17. Making an alternate plan - such as the one now in place - would have involved some cost, and would have been for naught had the invitation not been accepted.

The schedule now calls for the first lady to speak at a recognition ceremony for all USD 501 graduating seniors at 6 p.m. Friday, May 16, at the Kansas Expocentre. Each student will get a ticket and up to six tickets for friends and family. High school graduation ceremonies will be Saturday, May 17.

Students and parents who reacted positively to the revised plan said their earlier displeasure was with the school district and how it handled the affair rather than with the first lady.

That message could have been made more clearly, but the community gets another chance when the first lady speaks May 16. Topekans should make it clear they are honored by her presence.