The Relentless Lies of Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback
Barbara Shelly covers the thing about Sam Brownback that bugs me the most - it’s that slick evangelical assumption of privilege that as long as you are doing work for Jesus you get to exempt yourself from a few things, like not bearing false witness. It’s the Televangelist approach to life: “I’m entitled as long as I’m getting the good word out,” and you can see it in everything from Sam’s hairdo to his easy but slimy false smile that never quite reaches his cold reptilian eyes.
So Sam and cohorts try to shove Jesus into everyone’s government, and they lie and cheat to get their way because they think they have a get into heaven free card from their anti-abortion grandstanding. We need truthful politicians in office, not zealots like Sam whose practice is bending truths for Jesus.
All politicians spin. They exaggerate and make selective use of facts and data. These are tricks of the trade.
But I have never seen a public official lie as easily and as relentlessly as Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback.
That sounds harsh, and it is possible that Brownback actually believes his own mythology. But much of what he has told the citizens of Kansas is flat out wrong.
Brownback has lied about the fiscal conditions he inherited. He spins a fantasy about a low-tax utopia even as his state is exhausting its budget reserves, staring at more cuts in education, and not experiencing the promised economic rebound. He has salted his administration with sycophants who tell lies of their own.