LISA RATHKE, Associated Press

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) — A decades-long national decline in the number of hunters has prompted states to tap into a new group of hunters — people who demand locally produced food, but don’t know the first thing about getting a deer.

Numerous books and blogs on the topic have surfaced, and state wildlife departments are offering introductory deer hunting classes in urban areas to recruit newbies who want to bag their own wild, local meat.

A national survey published last year found the motivation for hunting meat has nearly doubled from 16 percent in 2006 to 35 percent in 2011.

Tovah Cerulli had been a vegetarian and vegan, but turned to hunting because he says there is a direct connection to his hunted meat that he can’t get from store-bought food.

OSKALOOSA – A Kansas teenager died in an accident just before 5 p.m. on Saturday in Jefferson County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2007 Honda Civic driven by  Hunter Levi Terrell, 17, McLouth, was westbound on Kansas 16 one mile east of Oskaloosa.

The Honda passed a pickup and as it reentered the lane the driver lost control and skidded broadside. The Honda entered the westbound lanes and was struck by a 1995 Chevy Suburban driven by Carolanne Todd, 26, Oskaloosa.

Terrell was pronounced dead at the scene and transported to Barnett Funeral Home.

Todd and five children in the Suburban were transported to Stormont Vail.

The KHP reported the occupants of the Suburban were not wearing seat belts.

By Andy Marso
KHI News Service

TOPEKA — Post-election soul-searching by Kansas Democrats includes disagreement over whether Medicaid expansion should have been a larger part of the party’s strategy.

The Democrats lost all statewide races for the second straight time and lost another five House seats to drop their number in that chamber to 27. The defeats were part of a national wave of Republican election wins, but they have nonetheless led to talk within the Kansas Democratic Party about what could have been done differently.
At the top of the ticket, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Paul Davis focused his campaign almost exclusively on school funding, in an attempt to woo moderate Republicans. After leading in polls for months, Davis ultimately fell a few percentage points short of defeating incumbent Gov. Sam Brownback.

Joan Wagnon, chairwoman of the Kansas Democratic Party, said polling didn’t indicate the Medicaid expansion issue was much of a difference-maker with voters. So the party left it up to individual candidates to decide whether to use the issue in their campaigns.

“There was a lot of discussion about the issue, but no strategy, per se,” Wagnon said. “Democrats feel strongly about that issue and felt like it should have been expanded, but Republicans didn’t see it in quite the same way. So it wasn’t an issue that would make headway for us, so to speak.”

Twenty-seven states and the District of Columbia have expanded Medicaid eligibility, while Kansas and 20 other states have not. Policymakers in two states are considering the issue, according to the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation.

A poll released last year by the Kansas Hospital Association, which favors Medicaid expansion, found that 60 percent of polled Kansans supported it.

But the KHA poll never mentioned that Medicaid expansion is part of the federal Affordable Care Act, also known as “Obamacare,” and Wagnon said that makes a difference when it comes to public opinion.

“You have to understand the issue, and it’s a hard issue to talk about and explain,” Wagnon said. “What the Republicans did was they said, ‘Well, this is just Obamacare.’ When they tag an issue like that with some scary words to try to increase the negative feelings, then it’s harder to have a discussion.”

Ryon Carey, a political consultant in Lindsborg and chairman of the Democratic Party’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender caucus, said rather than avoiding the Affordable Care Act, the party should have attempted to explain its benefits to voters.

“Obama’s still president and the Medicaid expansion was enacted under Obamacare, so of course they’re going to scream ‘Obamacare,’” Carey said of the Republicans. “It would have been nice if Democrats would have actually stood up for their signature legislation in 60 years rather than running away from it. (President Harry) Truman would not have run from Medicaid expansion.”

Wagnon said Davis did express support for expansion when asked about it, and Dennis Anderson, the Democrats’ unsuccessful candidate for Kansas insurance commissioner, took a strong position in favor of it.

Down the ticket, Democratic House candidates were left to decide how the issue would play in their particular races.

Former representative Ann Mah, unsuccessful in her attempt to retake her Topeka seat from Republican Ken Corbet, said she didn’t make Medicaid expansion part of her campaign, though she supports it.

“The Legislature had painted the Medicaid expansion issue with such a broad brush,” Mah said. “People, they just say ‘Obamacare bad.’”

Nancy Lusk, a Democratic House member from Johnson County who was re-elected, said she declined to campaign on Medicaid expansion because she had limited time to try to get her message across while going door-to-door. Lusk said she chose instead to focus on the state’s impending budget crisis.

Mah said that also was the focus of her door-knocking visits. At the thousands of homes she visited, Mah said only a few people came to the door wanting to discuss Medicaid expansion.

“Those were medical professionals who knew we needed it and weren’t getting it,” Mah said. “Or they were hospital employees and their hospitals were really taking a hit.”

In Kansas, Medicaid expansion would extend coverage to an estimated 151,000 people with annual incomes up to 138 percent of poverty – about $16,100 for individuals and $32,900 for a family of four.

Increasing Medicaid coverage would decrease the amount of uncompensated care Kansas hospitals must perform each year.

Julie Menghini, a Democratic House member from Pittsburg, said she campaigned on Medicaid expansion, sending out two or three mailers on the issue in part because she knew that hospitals “really, really need to see it happen.”

Menghini said polling in her district suggested the issue would not be “a huge win” for her, but it “wasn’t going to be a negative either.” She narrowly lost to Republican Chuck Smith, a well-known high school football coach, but said she did not think Medicaid expansion was a factor.

“Frankly, my race didn’t end up being about issues,” Menghini said. “It ended up being about who can say the craziest, meanest thing about me and get people to believe it.”

Jim Ward, a Wichita Democrat who has expressed interest in replacing Davis as House Minority Leader, said Democrats used Medicaid expansion as an issue in the election, but “clearly not enough.”

“Candidates I talked to were encouraged to use it,” Ward said. “I think it still is a very potent issue.”

Ward said the tide is turning in favor of expansion as more Kansans hear the practical arguments for it and grow weary of the ideological arguments against it.

“The ‘This is just Obamacare by another name’ (argument), it doesn’t work,” Ward said. “People see the dollars and cents, and the opponents’ arguments are shallow. More and more people nod their head when I start talking Medicaid expansion.”

Wagnon said the need for expansion is increasing, both for low-income Kansans and the hospitals that serve them. Regardless of how the issue was treated during the election season, Wagnon said her advice to Democrats during the next session is unequivocal.

“I hope they push like crazy to get it passed,” Wagnon said.

Andy Marso is a reporter for Heartland Health Monitor, a news collaboration focusing on health issues and their impact in Missouri and Kansas.

JUSTIN PRITCHARD, Associated Press
MITCH WEISS, Associated Press

Leaders of the nation’s system for helping people injured by vaccinations are vowing to better publicize the little-known program.

Meanwhile, the judge who oversees a special vaccine court worries that if more claims are filed, they will take even longer to handle than they already do.

The comments were made to government investigators, who reported on the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program several days after The Associated Press detailed the program’s problems.

The AP found that instead of speeding help as intended in the rare cases when a vaccine seriously hurts someone, the program has heaped additional suffering on thousands of families.

The Government Accountability Office’s report, released Friday, noted many claims now involve adults and flu shots, not children who received government-recommended vaccinations such as measles and chicken pox.

LONDON (AP) — Experts have a message for anyone with webcams, baby monitors and home security cameras: change your password now.

Britain’s Information Commissioner’s Office said Thursday that footage being collected from security cameras — such as closed circuit television networks or built-in cameras like baby monitors — is being posted to the Internet.

A website based in Russia is posting live footage of homes and businesses after having used the default login credentials for thousands of cameras.

The ICO is joining with its counterparts in the United States, China, Australia and Canada in warning consumers about the Russian website.

The Russian site takes advantage of the fact that camera users receive default passwords to get devices working — such as “1234.” Many manufacturers also put default passwords online.