Opinion
Why Kansans should face our unflattering past
The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Jim Ogle is executive director of the Lawrence-based Freedom’s Frontier National Heritage Area. I’m in the history business. No, I cannot claim the title historian. I […]
Congratulations to all of the Kansas Republicans who have already won in November
Before we close out primary week, let’s toast the members of the Kansas Legislature who can already plan victory parties on Election Day three months from now. A few special folks can take leisurely walks from now until January because no one from the opposing party filed to run against them. To no one’s surprise, […]
Why I wrote 500 toe tags during a pandemic in Kansas
The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Huascar Medina is the current Poet Laureate of Kansas. I recently completed the task of filling out more than 500 toe tags for an art installation. […]
Primary election results: Welcome to the new Bleeding Kansas
Congratulations, Kansas. When all of the mail-in ballots are counted in the next few days, a historic number of you will have voted in the pandemic primary. It was an extraordinary display of democracy. One of your rewards will be to suffer through three more months of a U.S. Senate race. Vanquishing Kris Kobach, Bob […]
Privacy concerns surrounding ksvotes.org pale in comparison to Kobach’s Crosscheck
The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Mission Hills resident Anita Parsa is an election security activist. In January 2018, working with Rep. Brett Parker (D-Overland Park), I approached members of the Kansas […]
Happy trails to a grand champion Kansas statesman
Don Hineman is such a gentleman he still calls the man who booted him from his leadership position a friend. Hineman is a farmer from Dighton, out west. He’s also a Republican state representative who serves around 22,000 people in Gove, Lane, Logan, Scott, Sheridan, Trego and Wichita counties. This week, or the first time […]
Many Kansans support medical cannabis. The Legislature won’t give us a vote.
The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Lisa Ash Sublett is the president and co-founder of Bleeding Kansas Advocates, a patient advocacy group. At the beginning of the Kansas legislative session of 2019, […]
Kansas school districts should prepare students for the possibility of teachers dying
The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Matthew Grobe is a radio talk show producer in Kansas City. During the recent discussion at the Kansas Board of Education about local school districts reopening […]
My grandparents taught me that some Kansas values are nonpartisan
The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Liz Hamor is a third generation Kansan. “How have masks become a political issue?” When a friend exasperatedly asked this question rhetorically, I’d already been turning […]
This Kansas Senate candidate can’t apologize enough
It’s been almost a decade since Virgil Peck first apologized. “Looks like to me, if shooting these immigrating feral hogs works, maybe we have found a (solution) to our illegal immigration problem,” Peck, then a state representative from southeast Kansas, said during a legislative committee hearing back in March 2011. This made national news. “He […]
Kansans in care facilities have a right to visitors — it’s time to give them a voice
The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Mitzi E. McFatrich is the executive director of Kansas Advocates for Better Care. We see the images — older adults in beds and wheelchairs, separated by […]
Hey, Kobach and Marshall: By attacking trans people, you hurt Kansas
Kris Kobach made his name by punching down. He rose to prominence by targeting undocumented immigrants, one of the least powerful groups of people in this country. Over the summer, increasingly abandoned by his party in the race for Pat Roberts’ U.S. Senate seat, Kobach threw punches at an even less-powerful group: transgender people. In […]