The Entire Population of Kansas Is About to Lose Its Liberty.
KANSAS CITY, Kan (Reuters) – While still unable to agree on a budget, Kansas lawmakers on Saturday averted a furlough of thousands of non-essential employees by passing a bill defining all employees as essential, officials said.
Republican Governor Sam Brownback said in a statement posted on his website that he will sign the bill so that state services can continue working uninterrupted.
— Kansas averts furloughs for thousands of state employees, Kevin Murphy, Reuters, today
So all state employees in Kansas are essential. Who knew?
I dunno. Sure sounds to me like big gummint. Okay, well, I guess in Kansas these days, mid-sized gummint. But still ….
Scaaaarrrry.
Brownback should “Man Up” and abolish all public education. Privatize all. Think of the savings. Walker in WI should do the same. Show some real conservative principals.
Actually, that’s pretty much what they’re doing. In Kansas, the school year was cut in several school districts because of the cuts in state funding. Just a few more cuts of the size of the earlier ones, and –voila!
Yes, well, and a recent poll shows that George W. Bush has a higher approval rating than President Obama. Snark is fun, of course, but there comes a time when one has to wonder if there really is any hope.
I have long wondered how someone can be so valuable as to be “essential,” yet so dispensable that their pay is an annoyance to be squeezed to nothing. If half Kansas’ “essential” staff start looking for work elsewhere, or never enter the field at all, then what happens to the essential work they are supposed to be doing?
Oh wait. These essential servants are public servants. Serving the public is of no importance, so getting rid of these pesky public servants
with pensions and unions and such is a net benefit — not to the “public,” of course, but definitely to the “private.”
“Yes, well, and a recent poll shows that George W. Bush has a higher approval rating than President Obama.” JackD
Reference please. Not that I doubt that a great many Americans would prefer a dumb ass to a black man as President, but I’d still like to see where such data comes from.
Brownback says that although workers are ordered to work without pay, he cannot promise that they will ever be repaid for their work later.
Worse, since they are ordered to work, they are ineligible for unemployment insurance. And if they refuse to work without pay, they will be fired for cause, which also makes them ineligible for unemployment insurance.
George W. Bush has a higher approval rating than President Obama
If true I suspect a lot of those approve of him being out of office.
Noni
you weren’t listening.
the black worker in the ante bellum south was “essential.”
and it was essential he not be paid.
(and if the civil war taught the owners anything it was that white is as good as black, and it’s cheaper to rent than it is to own.)
Here’s the poll JackD is referring to: http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/03/politics/obama-approval-rating-cnn-poll/index.html
Dear Dale, that’s sort of exactly what I meant, kinda.
Who is it that are essential and why essential they be cheap? Who are defined as necessary or unnecessary? Increasingly, ordinary citizens are becoming unnecessary to the happiness of the deciders, and this includes the people who serve those ordinary citizens. Even cannon fodder is becoming unnecessary. To the deciders, I mean, not to the fodders and mudders themselves.
So this obviously means not a single state employee can be fired or laid off unless they’re immediately replaced.
noni
just so you know
i knew that’s what you meant. always glad to hear from you again.
Ah Dale, the tragedy of irony is that in a clash of ironists, neither is sure whether they’re clashing or cooperating. Or even replying to different comment threads…
unh oh
did i miss something?
Nah, just a stray thought. Or possibly a freerange haiku that hasn’t been trimmed and tidied up yet.
You mean that is not necessary and proper. so at least we are safe from Congress doing the same? Oh wait, PPACA! Congress has done the same and many support such nonsense.
Servitude imposed by the states is no better or worse, or any more legitimate, than that imposed by Congress.
Maybe those workers ought to file a case since Kansas seems to be violating the dormant commerce clause, as compelling persons into commerce is the sole province of Congress!