After a defeat in Kansas, Kris Kobach wins an unexpected victory

California court: No special breaks for illegal students

The California Court of Appeals ruled Monday a law allowing illegal immigrants a tuition-break was unconstitutional and contradicted federal law. The decision comes just two months after the U.S. Supreme Court decided not to review a Kansas lawsuit seeking to overturn the similar tuition-break law.

The victory was the result of a long battle waged by UMKC law professor Kris Kobach and the Immigration Law Reform Institute. Kobach was representing a group of out-of-state students attending California colleges who were told they did not qualify for the tuition breaks given the illegal immigrant students.

Opponents of the law argue it is unfair to give breaks to illegal immigrants that are not available for U.S. residents. Proponents argue it provides an important stepping stone for immigrants wanting to attend a college or junior college. [ Read more...]

Precedent may help overturn law giving illegal immigrants special tuition breaks.

California decision may impact Kansas law

The recent California Court of Appeals decision declaring a tuition-break for undocumented immigrants a violation of federal law could cause repercussions for other illegal immigrant benefits.

According to Kris Kobach, lead counsel for the Immigrant Reform Law Institute, the group that argued against the breaks, the 84-page opinion included strong language declaring the in-state tuition in violation of the Welfare Reform Act of 1996. The precedent set in this case, he said, could provide a foundation for overturning other benefit-giving laws.

"Because the Welfare Reform Act prohibits giving benefits to illegal immigrants, [the decision] has an application in any state in America where benefits are given to illegal aliens," Kobach said. [ Read more...]

Committee convinced the findings would be inaccurate. Hafner: "Like nailing Jell-O to the wall."

Report on economic impact of illegal immigration in Kansas pushed back

It’s official. Kansas will not commission a study on the costs and benefits to the state of illegal immigration.

The Legislative Post Audit Committee nixed the study this week, after becoming convinced that findings would be inaccurate and unhelpful in guiding an expected debate on illegal immigration during the next session of the Kansas Legislature.

During a meeting last month, Leo Hafner, deputy post auditor for the Legislative Division of Post Audit, who was assigned the task of performing the study, warned committee members that the time-consuming and expensive effort to quantify the costs and benefits of illegal immigration would be like “nailing Jell-O to the wall.” [ Read more...]

Attorneys blame Morrison's former mistress for convincing him to file charges

Tiller lawyers attack Kline over charges filed by Morrison

In a motion filed Monday, attorneys for a late-term abortionist facing 19 misdemeanor counts in Wichita launched a withering attack on former Attorney General Phill Kline, even though it was Kline’s successor, Paul Morrison, who had filed the charges.

The lengthy motion, filed on behalf of Dr. George Tiller, briefly acknowledged that Kline did not file the charges, but said Kline’s actions while conducting an inquisition of the abortion provider had permanently tainted the case.

Tiller’s lawyers sought either dismissal of the case or suppression of the evidence collected by prosecutors. District Court Judge Clark V. Owens has indicated arguments on the motion will be presented in November. [ Read more...]

Phill Kline's latest prosecutorial success may be his last as Johnson County DA.

Hall gets life without parole in Kelsey Smith murder

In an emotional hearing Tuesday in the Johnson County Courthouse in Olathe, Edwin Hall, 27, received a life sentence without possibility of parole for the murder and raping of an Overland Park teenager.

Hall plead guilty in July of kidnapping, murdering, raping and sodomizing 18-year-old Kelsey Smith after maintaining for months that he was innocent. In exchange for the plea, Johnson County District Attorney Phill Kline agreed not to seek the death penalty.

The case is likely to be the last big prosecution conducted by Kline, who will soon leave office. [ Read more...]

Going down: Readers, advertisers, revenue, stock price, employees

Eagle, KC Star publisher hammered again

The McClatchy Co., publisher of the Kansas City Star and Wichita Eagle, announced Tuesday it would cut its work force another 10 percent as the company's shares continued to disintegrate. MNI shares are now around $3.

The cuts announced by CEO Gary Pruitt come on top of previous announcements earlier this year that brought workforce reductions to more than 20 percent in the last two years.

Analysts blamed the cuts on the disappearing readers and advertisers the company once counted on for revenue. [ Read more...]

O'Neal: 'It’s like they’re saying, "If you want us to cut something, how about we start with the jugular?"'

Regents ignore budget shortfall, seek 4 percent hike

The Kansas Board of Regents defied Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and state lawmakers Monday and submitted a proposed budget that called for a 4 percent increase in funding for higher education for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2009.

In the face of a looming state budget shortfall and a slowing economy, Sebelius asked the board in June to pare spending by a total of 7 percent over the next two fiscal years, a move that was applauded by legislators and taxpayer groups.

Rather than complying with the governor’s request, however, university officials launched a campaign to portray worst-case scenarios that would result if the spending reductions requested by Sebelius were enacted. [ Read more...]

Uses official letterhead to ask for probation for secretary's spouse

Washburn President Farley asks lighter sentence for sex offender

Washburn University President Dr. Jerry Farley sent a letter May 19 requesting a lighter sentence for the spouse of one of his staff members.

Richard Blevins was charged with aggravated indecent online solicitation of a 13-year-old child and received 32 months in prison. Farley requested Blevins be given probation instead of prison.

The letter was sent on university stationery and was signed "Jerry B. Farley, President." [ Read more...]

Cost? Already nearly $70K per year per inmate. So far, only two successes.

SRS seeks $90 million to expand Sexual Predator Treatment Program

Kansas Social and Rehabilitation Services this week asked the Legislature for almost $90 million to expand the state’s sexual predator unit at Larned State Hospital.

Michelle Ponce, SRS communications director, told KansasLiberty.com some of the new funding also would be used to increase staff at the unit, and to expand a second unit at Osawatomie State Hospital that houses offenders who are poised for release.

SRS officials believe the sexual predator unit, which currently holds 168 convicted sex offenders, will run out of space by 2012 unless an expansion occurs. If no expansion occurs, she said inmates would likely have to double up in rooms designed to hold one offender. [ Read more...]

Sebelius, wind energy developers lobbying Congress for extension of tax incentive

Tax incentive for wind energy producers set to expire

A government tax-incentive subsidy that has led to a spike in wind energy production in Kansas is set to expire in December unless Congress acts.

On Monday, Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and Lt. Gov. Mark Parkinson sent a letter to Kansas’ congressional delegation and to leaders in the House and Senate lobbying for at least a three-year renewal of so-called energy production tax credits.

“Extending the PTC for at least three years will allow manufacturers and developers time to plan, which will benefit our statewide growth in wind,” Sebelius and Parkinson wrote. [ Read more...]

Try Missouri. Smokers may not be smart enough to quit, but they're smart enough to drive. Jonathan Williams explains in a Kansas Liberty comment.

How far will Kansans go to save a dollar a pack?

Once again, a politician has decided to take aim at "Big Tobacco" – this time, it’s Kansas’ own Kathleen Sebelius.

During a recent press conference, Governor Sebelius said she plans to put a 50 cent per pack cigarette tax increase “right back on the table.” Unfortunately for the governor, hiking taxes on smokers is one of the least effective ways to raise long-term revenue for the state.

Cigarette taxes always look attractive to lawmakers on paper, as revenue forecasters often show a windfall of projected receipts from the tax. However, in the real world, people respond to incentives and cigarette taxes have been shown to encourage smokers to avoid high-tax jurisdictions. As state after state has learned, the promise of substantial cigarette tax revenue often goes up in smoke. [ Read more...]

The Week on the Web

...in a London belfry. The Times (UK) has a brief look at the new contenders entering the equity marketplace battle with the venerable London Stock Exchange. Among them, BATS, a newcomer, locally-grown:

Bats, is expected to open for business next month. Bats, which was set up in 2005 in Kansas City, Missouri, is reckoned already to have taken more than a tenth of equities trading in the United States. It has taken up residence in the old Robert Fleming offices in Copthall Street for its London operation.

Last week, it was cricket in Topeka. Now this. Newsweek's take on "America's third-largest stock exchange" is worth a peek, too.

Getting real about wind is what the Kansas Independent Oil & Gas Association's Edward Cross did yesterday in the Abilene Reflector-Chronicle. The call-out:

Installing compact fluorescent lights in every U.S. light fixture meets 4 percent of our energy needs. A million wind generators addresses only 1/7th of our energy needs and would require a surface area larger than all of Kansas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma covered border-to-border with wind generators.  Replacing 10 percent of the gasoline in the U.S. with ethanol would require every inch of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio just for feedstock.  We need all forms of American energy for the future, but the point being made here is that the pace of transition from fossil fuels to viable alternative energy sources will be much slower than is commonly assumed by the public and promoted in political advertisements.

Every energy forecast from every energy agency in the U.S., Europe, and elsewhere predicts the vast majority of our energy will be fossil fuels through 2050.

Be right back after we drive this beer can over to the recycling center. Just doing our part.

The best even-numbered highway in Kansas. Lynn...somebody (no last name, for some reason), who blogs at Nebraska Views, turned her attention southward this last weekend and discovered US 36, the modest stretch of asphalt that links a parking lot in Colorado with another parking lot in Ohio. The occasion: The annual US 36 "Treasure Hunt."

A friend asked me if I was interested in riding along with her and 3 others to the Great US Highway 36 Treasure Hunt across Kansas on Friday. Of course I said yes and was it a blast! The gals picked me up a little before 7 am that morning and the 5 of us headed west then south towards Norton our first town to search the many many vendors set up around town for antiques, flea market stuff and plain old garage sale finds. We could have spent the entire day just in Norton as there were over 50 different vendors in that town alone. After lunch sometime we left Norton and stopped at quite a few more on our travels east. By the time we were at Smith Center most of them were closed for the evening. I didn't have anything particular I was looking for but ended up with quite a few items and didn't spend much money in the process.

Okay, just so you can keep this in perspective: US 36, we can all agree, is one of the Midwest's coolest streets. How cool? So cool that driving from Norton to Smith Center is a blast, exclamation point included.

A Preview of the Coming Week