Fort Hays State University students Ulises Gonzalez, a Garden City junior, and junior Molly Morgan, a Wilson junior, are campaigning for the 2015-16 academic year for the Student Government Association Presidential and Vice Presidential seats, respectively.
Gonzalez is a double major in Management and Tourism & Hospitality Management. He currently serves as the Vice President of the Student Government Association. Gonzalez has previously participated in the allocations process, the Big Event, Tiger Day at the Capitol, and many other local and statewide initiatives. During his term as Senator, Gonzalez also served as chair of the Student Affairs Committee of the Student Government Association.
Gonzalez stated “Molly Morgan and I, in a collaborative effort, will strive to put the interests of the students first while maximizing their fees at a minimal cost. We are in this with the students and for the students.”
Morgan is a political science major who has been a part of the Student Government Association for three years as a Senator for the College of Arts and Sciences. Morgan has also served as the Administrative Assistant, the Senate Affairs Committee Chair, and the Appropriations Committee Chair of the Student Government Association. Recently this semester, Morgan had the honor of being elected the Allocations Committee Chair for the Fiscal Year 2016 funding process.
FHSU Student Government Association elections will take place through https://tigerlink.fhsu.edu/ starting at 8:00am April 8th and closing 4:30pm April 9th. Voting is open to all Fort Hays State University students enrolled in on-campus courses.
One of the inevitable side effects of watching a movie every weekend for over three years is becoming a little jaded. It becomes harder to please anyone who has ever say in the critics’ seat because they have seen how the sausage is made, so to speak. I try to anticipate and adjust for my bias as much as I possibly can. I’m the first to admit that I’m far from perfect.
That said, “Furious 7” is a steaming pile of garbage that deserves neither its stupefying level of critical acclaim or its bountiful weekend box office total.
This just isn’t a good movie. The “Fast and the Furious” franchise has taken a long, winding road through cinematic history but never has it stopped in a more seedy or idiotic part of town than it does in its seventh installment. The best, and most truthful, way I can describe the latest two episodes of this franchise is this: these films have become moronic “Transformers” movies with fast cars that don’t transform.
The writing is absolutely abysmal, the acting is poor, even from veteran actors, and the runtime is bloated beyond belief. I’m perfectly fine with “stupid funny” movies or “just for fun action” flicks, but “Furious 7” is neither. It’s stupid, but not funny. It has action but it takes itself far too seriously to find the fun in its ludicrous proceedings.
“Fast Five” was an incredibly enjoyable “just for fun” movie. It had everything those types of films need. Installments six and seven tried to up the ante and up the octane by such ridiculous amounts that the resulting mess blasts off from the realm of fun sails obliviously through one trope and camp after another.
Yes, the tribute to Paul Walker at the end was touching. Yes, Dwayne Johnson and Vin Diesel are exciting action stars. However, “Furious 7” is guilty of the most egregious of creative sins -it’s a sellout. Instead of delivering what would tell the best story or be the most entertaining, the filmmakers instead decided to deliver everything they (correctly if the buzz and box office numbers are any indication) thought audiences wanted to see. “Furious 7” is a radioactively glowing example of the business of the cinema industry, which is a shame.
John Richard Schrock is a professor at Emporia State University.
“March Madness” is over. Now name the strong academic programs at Duke University, the University of Wisconsin, the University of Kentucky, or Michigan State University? Most Americans can identify their mascots. Most can tell you which team had the tallest players. But we haven’t a clue about academic programs. Most alumni relate to their alma mater through sports. Whether you graduated from a school of engineering or law or journalism or other field, in Kansas you are a Jayhawk or Wildcat or Shocker or whatever. School identity focuses on sports, not academics. How could it be otherwise?
In two months, I will be back in China, a country that excludes sports from university identities. There are plenty of basketball and table tennis courts on the campuses I visit. But there is no school-versus-school competition that rouses students and binds them to a school mascot or symbol.
Students identify with their university through their school of study. At Northwest Agricultural and Forestry University (their equivalent of our Kansas State University), students get just one day off from academics each year for a large internal sports marathon. Freshmen march into the stadium Olympics-style with their departmental classmates. Both skilled and unskilled compete in a wide variety of sports. But who wins is rapidly forgotten. For the rest of the year, students attend classes. Academics is “Job One.” No Chinese student attends regular universities to prepare for entering the professional leagues.
China recognizes young students who have sports talent. They are channeled through a few elite schools that provide genuine academics while the students prepare for the Olympics and other international competition. Most Chinese cannot even name these few special schools.
But Chinese can be just as exuberant fans of sports teams as are Americans. They have professional teams, but they are sponsored by cities—for instance, their Guangzhou Evergrande Taobao Football Club participates in their Chinese Super League. The Beijing versus Guangzhou rivalry is just as emotionally focused as K.U. Jayhawks versus K-State Wildcats. Adults exhibit the same over-the-top excesses. Banners. Bumper stickers. Decorated cars. Tons of sports paraphernalia. But all are unrelated to schooling.
Sports has a valuable place in American education. In the last decades, there has been a major shift in the accomplishments of female students—they are now making up 70 percent or more of all college students. Some of this shift can be attributed to 3-million-plus boys dropping out of American high schools and colleges, videogame-addicted and living in their parents’ basement. But part of this ascendence of girls centers on the assertiveness that playing sports provides. Today’s American girls are participating in sports more than ever before, thanks to Title IX requirements that made sports more available. China likewise provides sports activities in elementary and secondary schools. But it never generates us-against-them competition. And it does not corrupt their higher education.
The extent that some athletics has overridden American higher education was made clear in the recent University of North Carolina scandal. For nearly two decades, some student athletes were enrolled in courses they never attended. They did little to nothing to earn many of their course grades.
The idea that an athlete would attend a college and ignore coursework in an attempt to be exposed to the professional leagues enough to get a million-dollar contract—is rightly seen as corrupt in China. It should also be condemned here.
The bonafide student athlete, who works hard both on the court and in class, is a joy to work with.
But for each student who hits the professional league jackpot, hundreds do not go professional. Some leave school with neither a career in sports nor an education. And some are going through the motions of being a student, their lack of scholarly participation dragging down classes and wasting state tuition subsidies.
At the university level, Mary Willingham, co-author of the new book Cheated: the UNC Scandal, the Education of Athletes, and the Future of Big-time College Sports summarizes clearly the American sports problem in an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education: “What’s happened in our Division I athletic programs across the country is that the athletic machine is in charge of the university. The faculty have lost control there. …The real losers are not the faculty or the administrators or the NCAA. The real losers are the students themselves.”
After reading recent articles in Kansas newspapers, the challenges facing its citizens regarding public education brings many unanswered questions in light of recent state Supreme Court rulings and the work that was done in the past to equalize school finance across Kansas.
As a former Kansas school member and CPA, I am disappointed with what is being proposed by the Kansas legislature. Two year block grants across the state will force school districts to either use up any reserves they have left, raise local property taxes or worse yet cut teaching staff forcing classroom sizes to increase. All of the above is bad for public education.
Funding education fairly was put in the state’s constitution to equalize how you teach students across Kansas. Why should a child born in a poorer district be at a disadvantage from one born is a wealthy district. The Kansas legislature should be ashamed not to mention be certain that their legal liability insurance is paid up.
What good is growing business in Kansas when you can’t even educate your kids? I challenge citizens of Kansas, parents and educators across the sunflower state to stand up and demand equal and quality education for all of their children.
It’s not every day one of my editors asks me to spend the afternoon hunting with them. He wanted to try some spring coyote calling and I needed a story for this week, so off we went.
Mike Alfers, owner and editor of the Rural Messenger, has for many years hunted a large parcel of land north of Lincoln in Lincoln County. According to Mike, the only thing more prevalent there than big bucks are coyotes, and he wanted to try his hand at thinning the pack a little.
After two hours on the road, we met up with the son of the landowner and stopped to look at a shed antler they had found that was from a big buck hunted and seen often this year by Mike and his brother. The antler was not unusually long but was as thick as a man’s wrist at the base and had one large drop tine among its numerous points.
We drove north out of Lincoln several miles then followed a gravel road to a spot on one edge of the property known as the gravel pit. We drove on past it and wound our way slowly up a rutted tractor path to the highest point around and found a couple lone hay bales where we could sight-in Mike’s new .17 caliber Savage rifle. From there pastures stretched out in front of us as far as the eye could see.
Below us, small wheat fields occupied the few acres of ground flat enough to plant, resembling puzzle pieces as they formed themselves to follow the edges of the creek as it snaked its way through the hills.
It was nearly dusk as we set up around the back of the old gravel pit. It lay at one end of a group of trees surrounded on three sides by hilly CRP patches. We hunkered down in a tree row full of prickly thorn trees of some description. One of the “puzzle piece” wheat fields lay a couple hundred yards to our left across the creek. Mike let the electronic caller howl and wail for a half hour or more before we decided to move to a shelf above the creek overlooking the wheat field.
We were discussing where best to place ourselves and the caller, when not far to our left coyote howls broke the calm of the evening. It was impossible to know how many were there, as three or four can sound like a dozen. Chills went up and down my spine, but I could honestly have sat down right there and listened to them for hours. The howling quit and I hustled down the hill a bit to a spot where I could watch the wheat field through the trees. No sooner had I settled in than the coyotes began again, this time using all those different sounds they seem to greet each other with just before embarking on the night’s mission. For several seconds whines, barks, cries and yips of all descriptions & octaves filled the air as the group coordinated the evening’s events. Then just as suddenly as it had all started, all was quiet again as the group faded into the still of the evening.
A four-hour round trip was a long time to drive for one hour of coyote hunting, but those couple minutes of authentic, in-the-wild coyote sounds were all I needed to make the whole trip worthwhile; that and several hours of catching-up and reconnecting with a good friend! And before you ask, no coyotes were harmed in the writing of this story!
Steve Gilliland, Inman, can be contacted by email at [email protected].
As you know, I am currently running for a seat on the Hays City Commission. As it works out, this has made me a target of sorts for some ridicule. In a recent Facebook comment made by a former police officer. He made a statement along the lines that the people of Hays forget things all too quickly like “there’s a guy running for city commission” that was arrested for marijuana and something about another person running for a county or school board office that got in trouble for fraud or something along those lines.
The “guy running for city commission” was me. That being said, here’s the long and the short of it. Some 20 plus years ago, I did indeed get into legal trouble for possession of marijuana but, again, that was over 20 years ago. It was a serious offense, and I do not want to try and justify or belittle that. What I can say is that since that event in my life, I have never been involved in anything of that gravity again. I made a mistake, and I admit that. It wasn’t any secret at the time, and I know it is not a secret today either.
After attending more that a year’s worth of city meetings and work sessions, I decided to run for office anyway. I knew there was a possibility that all this might be brought up again but after weighing the possibility that someone might try to make hay out of this versus what I thought I could bring to the table on behalf of our citizens, I felt it was worth the risk and proceeded to throw my hat in the ring. I was also warned by multiple other business owners not to get involved in our city government because it would or could “hurt my business.”
Here’s where I’m at with all this. First of all, I have more faith in the people of Hays than that. I do not believe that if one becomes a part of local government and does a good job of not only trying to be wise with our tax dollars but responsive, respectful and kind to folks who have inquiries, that it should have any negative effect on one’s business.
I also do not believe that the people of Hays are forgetful. I more think that in general, the people of Hays are forgiving. My business has continued to grow in spite of the mistake I made some 20 plus years ago for a number of reasons. I try to treat people like I would want to be treated. I believe that someday we will all have to answer for the things we have done and the way we treat folks so I try very hard to treat everyone fairly, respectfully and in a kind manner. I never overcharge for services and try to stand behind everything we do. I usually try to help out with the bills we make out wherever I can, especially when someone is in a financial bind. I work late at night and on many Sundays to keep jobs caught up so people get the best service and turn around time on the work they need done. I truly care about all eight of my employees and try to be the best leader for all of them that I can. I intend to do no less for the citizens of Hays if they choose to elect me to a seat on this commission.
No matter what the outcome of the election is, I will have no regrets for seeking this office. I have learned a lot about how things work at city hall and I have been very enlightened to the point that I think some changes need to be made. I will not duck my head and put my tail between my legs over any of this stuff from over 20 years ago. I am not proud of it but some of the things we go through in life help make us who we are today and I can look myself in the mirror and know that in spite of human weakness, my heart is good and so are my intentions. Hopefully this note will help clarify any misinformation or rumors that seem to be circulating.
Very sincerely,
Scott Simpson, Hays City Commission candidate
The warm sunny days this week gave us an early glimpse of summer. Suddenly, everywhere I looked I saw children, college students and adults in shorts and sleeveless shirts, working and playing in the sun.
But, as welcoming as these first summery days have been, they are the beginning of problems for some. Our sun-worshipping culture, combined with the popularity of sunny vacation spots, has led to near-epidemic proportions of skin cancer in America.
According to the Harvard Health Letter, “the bronzed youth of the baby boom, now reaching middle age, are the vanguard of the melanoma plague.” According to medical reports, patients under age 40 were rarely treated for skin cancer two or three decades ago. Today, individuals in their 20’s are commonly diagnosed with skin cancer.
Skin cancer is preventable and curable in most cases. The American Cancer Society reports that nearly 5 million people are treated for skin cancer each year. Up to 90 percent of skin cancers could be prevented by protection from the sun’s rays. Because skin cancer is visible, it often can be detected soon after it begins. Rates of cure are high when the cancer is diagnosed and treated in its early stages.
Skin damage from the sun is cumulative, building up over the years. Long periods of daily sun exposure, even if the skin does not burn, add to the risk of skin cancer. The longer the exposure, the higher the risk, and sun exposure during childhood and adolescence plays a major role in the development of skin cancer later in life.
If avoiding overexposure to the sun is the primary skin cancer prevention strategy, staying out of the sun will eliminate the risk. But who wants to stay indoors all day? The sun’s warmth and light are relaxing and uplifting and sun exposure triggers the development of Vitamin D in our skin. But the benefits come with a dangerous tradeoff. Each year more than 3.5 million cases of skin cancer are diagnosed in the US, and most of the skin damage we associate with aging – wrinkles, sagging, leathering, and discoloration – is sun-related. So, whenever you venture out in the sun, be smart about it.
To enjoy what the sun has to offer without risking your health, follow these simple rules:
• Seek the shade , especially between 10 AM and 4 PM, when the sun’s rays are usually strongest.
• Do not burn. Even a single sunburn increases your risk of developing melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer, while suffering five or more sunburns doubles your lifetime risk. Avoid spending long periods in the sun, and when you see or feel your skin redden, take cover.
• Avoid tanning and UV tanning beds. According to the Skin Cancer Foundation, a tan is never safe, whether you acquire it on the beach or in a salon.
• Cover up with clothing, including a broad-brimmed hat and UV-blocking sunglasses. Clothing can be the most effective form of sun protection for your skin, but don’t forget to protect eyes from sun damage, too, to prevent serious conditions such as cataracts and melanoma of the eye and eyelid.
• Use a broad spectrum sunscreen with an SPF of 15 or higher every day, year-round, in every kind of weather. Even on overcast days, 70-80 percent of ultraviolet radiation travels through clouds. Sunlight reflects off snow, ice, sand and water, intensifying damaging effects by up to 80 percent. At high altitudes, for example when you’re hiking or skiing in the mountains, the thinner atmosphere filters out less of the sun’s rays.
• Keep newborns out of the sun. An infant’s skin possesses little melanin, the natural pigment that provides some sun protection. Therefore, babies are especially susceptible to the sun’s damaging effects.
• Examine your skin head-to-toe every month. Look for changes of any kind that might indicate skin cancer.
• See your physician every year for a professional skin exam.
If you fry in the sun now, you will likely pay later. Follow these tips and you can enjoy yourself safely outdoors, minimizing the sun’s dangers while maximizing your health.
Linda K. Beech is Ellis County Extension Agent for Family and Consumer Sciences.
For those of you who can remember bringing the new century in on January 1, 2000, several predictions were made about the new millennium, and numerous books were being sold that probably made some author or publishing house a substantial amount of money. Cars were supposed to stop in their tracks, planes were supposed to fall out of the sky and the prognosticators went on and on about the disasters ahead.
As it turned, out none of these disasters occurred, but it sure created a lot of anxiety for a lot of people.
Fast forward to 2015, and be introduced to a renowned economics guru named Harry S. Dent Jr., the founder of Dent Research. Good old Harry has predicted that the Dow Jones Industrial Average will drop from its current 18,000+, down to 6000 by late 2016 or early 2017, so mark your calendars.
In his advertising, it is stated how many predictions of his actually materialized: Japan’s lost decade, the recession of 1990-92, the biggest bull market run in U.S. history, and most recently, the 2008 credit crisis and stock market crash. It sounds pretty amazing, except they omitted the many predictions that did not come true.
In 2000, Dent predicted that the DOW would reach 40,000, a prediction that was repeated in his 2004 book. He also predicted that NASDAQ would reach 13-20,000. In 2006, he revised his forecasts to much lower levels, estimating the DOW would reach 16-18,000, and the NASDAQ 3-4,000. In January of 2006, he predicted the DOW would reach 14-15,000 by the end of the year. It ended up at 12,463, 11% below the lower end of his prediction. It ended 2007 at 13,264, again significantly lower than his prediction of 15,000 by the end of 2008.
The list goes on and on, and although those forecasts have been swept under the carpet, Houdini Harry still claims that not only can you survive all of this, but prosper by knowing the future. And Harry claims to know the future. There’s an old saying; “If you throw enough mud on the wall, some of it will stick”.
There are many others with the same claims and the same strategy to lure you into what they’re peddling. The gold ads are particularly interesting in that these companies feel it’s alright to show the monstrous returns after they pick the time-frame to report. Let’s face it, if we all could look back and do what we should have done, (e.g. buy land when it was $400/acre or oil when it was $20/barrel) we’d all be billionaires. Many of the companies even have testimonies from people on their website.
But, the reality is that no one is going to include a testimony that has bad things to say about your company.
Jeane Dixon led a colorful life and gave us all something to think about with some of her predictions. Probably the most notable being the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. However, John Allen Paulos, a respected mathematician, coined the phrase the “Jeane Dixon Effect.”
This is where psychics prove a few accurate predictions and forget about the hundreds that never come true. Some of the most notable failures include: 1) World War III would begin in 1958. 2) A cure for cancer will be found in 1967. 3) Richard Nixon would be a good president. (Boy, did she miss this one. 4) The Russians would be the first to land on the moon.
So if you’d like to get rich quick, and don’t want to rob a bank or win the Lottery (remember for 1 winner there’s 100 million losers), take the same strategy that Harry takes. Talk about all the doom and gloom in the world, and let folks know that if they buy your book or subscription, they will be saved.
More importantly, don’t believe everything you see on Internet, or you might be looking at getting poor quick.
Quite frankly, it’s hard to get rich quick, but it’s not hard to get rich. Simply start saving and the earlier you start, the easier it is.
Tim Schumacher represents Strategic Financial Partners in Hays. [email protected]
The Kansas Senate wants a one-page explanation of higher education’s value. Here goes:
Michael Smith is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Emporia State University.
Kansas Senate Bill 191 would require state universities to issue a “prospectus” to each incoming student. On one page, it would give job placement rates and median salaries, average time between degree completion and job placement, and the number of years to pay student loans, based upon major. This idea recalls Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s recent attempt to erase the University of Wisconsin’s hundred-year-old mission of statewide community engagement, replacing it with job training. It is a nationwide, Republican priority.
What about the students themselves? With apologies to Bob Dylan: there is something going on out here, and the state legislators don’t know what it is.
This semester, my political philosophy students asked me to make the class longer. It seems they were not getting enough time to discuss the books and ideas in class.
Students could not stop talking about Herbert Marcuse, the mid-twentieth-century French philosopher who believed that our society was producing a “one dimensional man”: one who feared imaginary enemies and focused solely on earning and spending income. They devoured the work of Hannah Arendt, a Jewish emigre from World War II Germany. Famous for studying Nazi official Adolf Eichmann, Arendt argued that modern-day society made the activities of “work” and “labor” so all-consuming that most people had little time, or interest, in discovering what it meant to live a genuinely fulfilling, complete life, including political action. Arendt feared a slide toward “rule by nobody”: hardly any single person can be held accountable for the actions of business or government anymore.
Whether or not Eichmann really was a thoughtless bureaucrat, it remains true that citizens who ask critical questions, think, and act in politics can offer us release from a one-dimensional life of graduation, working only for a paycheck, retiring, and eventual death. This class is no left-wing indoctrination: up next are Leo Strauss, the intellectual godfather of modern-day American conservatism, and F.A. Hayek, the legendary libertarian economist who railed against government meddling.
Also at Emporia State, Dr. Joyce Thierer’s Women of the West class is taught on one long evening each week, ending at 10 p.m. Still talking, the students invited their professor to a local all-night eatery for more discussion about the changing roles of women— and pancakes. Our students come from all over, many from rural or exurban Kansas: Emporia and El Dorado, Great Bend and Gardner. They tell us that they have never seen or heard these ideas before. They are hungry for all the material we can give them, and then some. This is the first time I have seen this, since I started teaching in 1995.
Many of our current politicians did not graduate from college themselves, yet they want to control higher education. Instead, our students want to know what it means to live a fulfilling, complete life. Good teaching, great books, and their own curiosity and hard work can help them achieve real intellectual development, preparing them for rich lives and meaningful careers. So ends my one page defense of higher education.
Michael Smith is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Emporia State University.
By RON WILSON Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development
As the rodeo queen rides by, the light flashes from the fancy spurs which she wears on her boots. These attractive spurs were created by a couple of cowboys from rural Kansas.
Ron Wilson is director of the Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development at Kansas State University.
Dan Atkisson and Tyler Brown are the co-owners of Lady Luck Ironworks, the maker of rodeo queen spurs and more. Dan and Tyler grew up near Stockton. They are capable cowboys, having grown up working on farms and ranches.
Dan went to K-State where he studied ag technology management with a minor in animal sciences, and Tyler went to North Central Kansas Technical College in Beloit. After graduation, both came back to Stockton.
Stockton is a rural community of 1,327 people. That’s rural – but there’s more. Dan grew up on the family farm where his parents still live, located on the Rooks-Graham county line. That farm is 20 miles west of Stockton, north of Nicodemus and northwest of the town of Damar, population 154 people. Now, that’s rural.
Dan and his wife Amanda and a young son live in Stockton. He is involved in his community and the farm business. For example, he was selected for the Kansas Agriculture and Rural Leadership program. Dan and Tyler continue to work together.
“We’ve been best of friends since we were little kids,” Dan said. While working on ranches, they also cowboyed together.
“We like those fancy bits and spurs,” Dan said. “Of course, being cowboys, we didn’t have any money to buy `em, so we decided to try to make some.”
They got a forge and started tinkering around with making bits and spurs in a garage. As their skill increased, they started making custom knives and fancy belt buckles.
“We made one for my nephew, and it turned out so well we thought we could sell `em,” Dan said. They went into business together, but they needed a name for the new business.
“I got married five years ago, but Tyler’s still a bachelor,” Dan said. “We decided to name our business Lady Luck Ironworks because he had no luck with the ladies.”
Lady Luck Ironworks made its first buckle in January 2011. Today, Lady Luck Ironworks is a custom made-to-order producer of bits, spurs, knives, and western belt buckles. They can even make metal money clips, rings, bracelets, conchos, and buckles for horse headstalls.
The guys started a Facebook page and started building these products. Each item is handmade, using polished steel, nickel, silver, and more, which can be overlaid with silver, brass, copper, and/or sterling silver.
For spurs, the shanks begin as half-inch plate steel. The rowels are hand cut and filed to shape. Lady Luck Ironworks has built spurs for Miss Rodeo Kansas and Miss Rodeo K-State. In fact, the company has become the sponsor of the Miss Rodeo K-State spurs.
Through Facebook and word of mouth, the company’s products are now being sold from coast to coast. Their Facebook page has nearly 800 likes.
“We’ve sent things as far west as California and as far east as Georgia,” Dan said. Most of their bits and spurs are sold to working cowboys in the central and southern plains. The fancy buckles are a growing part of their business currently.
In addition to the custom designs which Lady Luck Ironworks creates and sells, the company has also donated items for worthy causes. For example, they made an FFA Alumni buckle to support the local chapter as well as one for the KARL program.
Dan was elected to the National Sorghum Producers board of directors. He made a custom buckle which was donated to the PAC auction. This beautiful buckle from rural Kansas was sold during the auction at the Commodity Classic in Phoenix, Arizona.
The rodeo queen rides by, and the light glints from the fancy spurs attached to her boot heels. Those spurs are built by a couple of entrepreneurial cowboys from rural Kansas. We commend Dan Atkisson and Tyler Brown for making a difference with their craftsmanship and entrepreneurship. We hope their success can spur other rural businesses to succeed as well.
Charles C. Haynes is director of the Religious Freedom Center of the Newseum Institute.
Nationwide outrage over Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) — signed into law by Gov. Mike Pence on March 26 — is a remarkable sign of just how far the country has come on the issue of civil rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Americans.
Everyone from basketball luminary Charles Barkley to Apple CEO Tim Cook have sounded an alarm about a law that critics charge will promote discrimination against LGBT people.
Gov. Pence is now scrambling to contain the damage as the “boycott Indiana” movement goes viral. Absent repeal or a major fix, it’s entirely possible that the Final Four will be playing in Indianapolis this week for the final time — a scary prospect for basketball-crazed Hoosiers.
At a press conference this week, Pence kept repeating the mantra “RFRA is not a license to discriminate” — and announced that he has asked the legislature to amend the law to make that clear.
The governor blamed opponents of the law and inaccurate media coverage for creating the “misperception” that Indiana’s RFRA would permit discrimination against LGBT people. While it’s certainly true that heated rhetoric describing the law as “anti-gay” and alarmist media stories contributed to the backlash against the law, that’s not how Indiana’s RFRA got a bad rap in the first place.
In an hour-long exchange with reporters, Pence refused to acknowledge that many supporters of the law — including leaders of conservative Christian groups standing by the governor’s side when he signed the bill into law — pushed for RFRA precisely because they hope it will permit business owners to deny services and benefits to same-sex couples on religious grounds.
As a supporter of both equality and religious freedom, I am torn between celebrating the outrage at the specter of discrimination and mourning the damage done to the cause of religious freedom.
The Indiana debate — much like the RFRA fight in Arizona two years ago and current debates in Georgia and Arkansas — has been so misleading, vindictive and divisive that any rational discussion of if (and how) we can uphold both nondiscrimination and religious freedom in Indiana or anywhere else may no longer be possible.
Here’s the tragic irony: As the governor belatedly admitted at his press conference, the Indiana RFRA is very unlikely to protect religious claims in the way many proponents promise — and thus equally unlikely to bring about the wave of anti-gay discrimination that many opponents fear.
For a fuller understanding of just why RFRA is not (or should not be) the villain of this piece, we need a little history.
Let’s start with the 1990 U.S. Supreme Court decision — Employment Division v. Smith — that sharply curtailed the application of the “compelling state interest” test long used by courts to determine when government laws or regulations substantially burden the free exercise of religion.
Under the pre-Smith regime, many religious claims for exemption from laws that substantially burdened the practice of faith were accommodated — unless the government could demonstrate a compelling state interest in refusing accommodation and no less restrictive way of accomplishing that interest.
In the three years following Smith, more than 50 reported cases were decided against religious groups and individuals. As a result, a broad coalition of groups from across the political and religious spectrum worked to pass the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1993. The intent was to “restore” pre-Smith protection for religious freedom by requiring the government to demonstrate a compelling state interest for denying a religious accommodation or exemption.
Then in 1997, the Supreme Court struck down RFRA as applied to the states, although, as we saw in the Hobby Lobby decision last year, it still applies to the federal government. Since that time, 19 states — now 20 with the addition of Indiana — have passed state RFRAs. Courts in at least ten other states have provided the same level of protection through religious freedom provisions of state constitutions.
Indiana’s RFRA appears to go beyond similar laws in other states by, for example, explicitly extending protection to corporations (and not just “closely-held corporations” as in the Hobby Lobby case).
But many legal scholars agree that business owners cannot use RFRA — in Indiana or anywhere else — to discriminate against LGBT people. As Indiana University law professor Daniel Conkle (a supporter of LGBT rights who testified in favor of the Indiana RFRA) has pointed out, that there are no RFRA cases where the court has upheld a religious claim in a discrimination case.
“The ‘license-to-discriminate’ argument that seems to have this relentless repetition,” Conkle told the Associated Press, “is just legally wrong.”
Properly understood and applied, RFRAs are an important protection for free exercise of religion — especially for members of minority religious groups who often need exemptions from government actions that burden the practice of their faith.
Enacting RFRAs to fight the effects of same-sex marriage not only gives RFRA a bad name, it poisons the well for religious freedom.
Instead of using RFRA as a weapon in the culture wars, religious people seeking religious exemptions or accommodations need to sit down with the other side and seek common ground on how to both uphold LGBT civil rights and protect religious freedom. If Utah can do it, so can Indiana.
I predict the quick fix to RFRA proposed by Gov. Pence will not be sufficient to undo the damage caused by this controversy.
To send a clear, unmistakable message that Indiana does not discriminate, Indiana lawmakers must pass — and the governor must sign — a statewide law protecting LGBT people from discrimination.
Once discrimination is off the table, RFRA opponents — many of whom were RFRA proponents 20 years ago — might once again see the merit in legislation that guards the free exercise of religion.
If lawmakers don’t act quickly to undo the damage, the real fallout from the Indiana debate will be “religious freedom = bigotry.”
And that would be a disaster for the future of religious freedom in America.
Charles C. Haynes is director of the Religious Freedom Center of the Newseum Institute, 555 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W., Washington, DC 20001. Web: www.religiousfreedomcenter.org Email: [email protected]
Each day, farmers and ranchers pull on their boots, roll up their sleeves and go to work outside rural communities across Kansas. They perform a litany of chores – feeding and doctoring livestock, cultivating their crops, pulling maintenance on machinery, paying bills – you name it and farmers and ranchers do it.
John Schlageck writes for the Kansas Farm Bureau.
While all of these activities are necessary, agricultural advocacy has become a farmer and rancher’s most important chore. Farmers and ranchers have an obligation to provide the public with an understanding of their profession.
Never has it become more important to help consumers understand how important agriculture is to the well-being of our economic future. Without continuing success in the farming and ranching sector, consumers will be in danger of losing the high-quality, affordable food so many expect and take for granted.
How do farmers help consumers understand their profession?
It begins with the commitment of farmers and ranchers to tell their side of the story whenever and wherever the opportunity presents itself. Whether you talk to grade-schoolers, service clubs or state legislators, remember to practice the art of relationship building between rural and urban, between agricultural producers and consumers of agricultural products.
When you have an opportunity to talk about production agriculture, do just that – talk about agriculture. Leave the other so-called “hot” topics of the day alone. Let someone else talk about them.
With less than 2 percent of our population engaged in food production, do not miss an opportunity to tell your story. If you are asked to comment about a recent election, talk about it with an agricultural flavor.
Talk about how you believe your elected official will be able to work with you to make sure our state and nation makes energy development, rural transportation and finding new markets agriculture’s top priorities.
Give people a glimpse into your profession – a subject that affects your bottom line and one that affects the well-being of your family, their families – everyone. It’s easier than you might think to initiate a conversation about farming with your urban cousins.
Begin with a common denominator when talking to city folks. Start by discussing with them the fertilizer they buy for their gardens is no different from what you, as a farmer, put on your crops. The rose dust, herbicide or insecticide used to control scab, crabgrass or mosquitoes is similar to the plant protection chemicals you use.
Sometimes common ground revolves around nutrition. A good analogy could be the parallel between a person’s need for healthful food and a plant’s need for a well-balanced diet.
It’s easy to move from nutrition to some of the more difficult challenges facing agriculture. Topics on everyone’s minds today include safe drinking water, availability of credit and fiscal responsibility.
Today, many people are concerned about chemical run-off into rivers, lakes and streams. As a farmer you cannot afford to overuse these expensive chemical products. Tell them that. Let them know you, more than anyone else, are concerned about the land where your family lives and works.
Public understanding of how a modern farmer runs his/her operation is only half the challenge. Perhaps equally important is the need to be sensitive to the concerns of the community.
Remember that people, most of them living in towns or cities, are the ones who call for regulations and new laws. It is this public that will enforce them.
In the end, ironically, it is the public who will suffer if the laws have a negative effect on our food production and consumption system.
Tell your story – the story of agriculture. No one else is going to.
Let consumers know the value of food. Tell them how you go about producing the healthiest, best tasting food anywhere in the world. It’s a story only you can tell and tell well.
This is your livelihood. You are food producing specialists. You must tell your story.
John Schlageck, a Hoxie native, is a leading commentator on agriculture and rural Kansas.
John Richard Schrock is a professor at Emporia State University.
My high school student, a senior, had a dilemma. He wanted to be a medical doctor and he had been accepted into the pre-med programs at both Johns Hopkins and Harvard Universities. I was not too sympathetic about his “problem.” He was fortunate and would do well at either school.
Back then, I was teaching at Hong Kong International School. Virtually 100 percent of our students graduated to attend (mostly elite) colleges and universities. HKIS served children of consulate officials and corporate families. Highly skilled upper level folks from Union Carbide and Caterpillar and other international companies came to Hong Kong for twice to triple their regular U.S. salary and with all housing, school and medical expenses paid. Highly-educated and motivated parents had hard working and motivated kids.
Simply, we turned out the best because we only took the best. There were no poverty kids in our school because there were no Westerners living in poverty in Hong Kong. None from broken homes. We had no “high need” or “at risk” kids. Class grades were not bell-shaped but were mostly A’s and a few B’s. Everyone was college-bound.
HKIS raided American schools. They brought over the best-of-the-best teachers they could find. But that was not the most critical factor. When we had a student teacher rookie, or a local hire who was not a veteran, the students’ performance remained high. Pull that whole HKIS faculty and put them in an inner city school in our big cities, a school serving students from poverty homes and mostly single parents, and there would be few students with the dilemma of choosing between Johns Hopkins and Harvard. Despite their best efforts, that bell-shaped curve would shift lower.
Unfortunately, teachers are seen as the only factor in student success. Perhaps this wrong perception is due to the 1988 movie Stand and Deliver where Jaime Escalante taught students calculus. What was not discussed in the film was that the students who remained in his class were those who were motivated and hard working. While his students at Garfield High School, East Los Angeles from 1974 to 1991 were not wealthy, they were there because they could meet his expectations for rigor and hard work. The lazy, those who had fried their brains on drugs, the videogame addicted—were not in his class.
Unfortunately, Schools of Education invented “outcomes.” List the outcomes you expect and then hold the teachers “accountable” for meeting those outcomes. It is simple-minded.
But apply this mythology—that all students will meet outcomes—to medicine, where every patient who enters a hospital will come out cured. Nope, the best of doctors lose patients and the best of teachers lose students. Outcomes are always narrowly defined. In medicine, if we define “healthy” as a normal temperature, doctors would distribute aspirin to get everyone’s fever down, since that is the measure of the hospital and doctor, and ignore conditions that are not measured. That of course is exactly what has happened under the last decade of No Child Left Behind outcomes that only measured language and math—the rest of the curriculum got shortened or dropped.
For patients whose chances of surviving are least, their only hope may rest with the best surgeon. As a result, the best surgeons may have the highest death rates. Use outcomes bean-counting and they will be penalized. Hospitals will then play “hot potato,” re-directing ambulances bringing in terminal patients.
Measuring and awarding money based on “outcomes” is now the political football in the Topeka Legislature. Some want to measure outcomes 2-years-out; others want the bean-counting to begin immediately. They are both wrong. You cannot improve education by funding schools based on simple-minded measures any more than you can improve medicine by funding hospitals on their survival rates. Rich schools will get richer. Poor schools will get poorer.
Good education depends on good teachers. Under the current oppressive actions and bad attitude of most state legislatures, the number of young college students who want to enter teaching is nose-diving not only in Kansas but nationwide.
