In Sam Brownback's Kansas,
constitutionality is optional
This won't be a particularly insightful post, mainly because I'm just tired of these people and wish they would go away, or secede, or whatever it is they need to do to separate themselves from the rest of modern society and live out their lily-white no-immigrant no-Muslims no-athiests no-gay-people no-liberals no-moderates no-funny-dressers Talibanesque fantasies about how a country should be run (tip: land in Somalia is very, very cheap these days). No such luck, however.
I'm often convinced that far-right conservative political leaders are not so much interested in the "governing" part as they are in some secret back-room wager on who can be the biggest public jackass, the most often, and on the most issues. Nobody could blame you if you put money down on Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback in a bet like that: After all, the extreme and impressive degree to which he sucks is legendary even among Kansas schoolchildren. Someday there is going to be a statue of him in the Kansas capitol, and on the bottom will be a dedication to a great man who proved that while anyone can be a jackass, it takes true commitment to become the greatest jackass, someone known for their numerous prejudices, thin-skinnedness, nearly sociopathic lack of compassion, and so many other things that the bottom of the plaque will simply have an asterisk and a note on the bottom to check Wikipedia if you want to know more about Sam Brownback, who dedicated his life to competing for the title of History's Greatest Jackass.
This is one of those stories that can be explained solely by said jackassery:
On Friday, Kansas Governor Sam Brownback released a long list of state statutes that he thinks are outdated and should be tossed out. He even issued an executive order last year to create a new position, the Office of the Repealer, to come up with that list. But his final product did not include the repeal of the state's anti-sodomy law.
Despite the fact that the Supreme Court ruled that anti-sodomy laws were unconstitutional in 2003, Kansas has kept its own law on the books.
Mind you, the law only covers same-sex sodomy, not different-sex sodomy, I suppose because Kansas conservatives just like the different-sex version so very very much that they couldn't possibly pass a law against that. And, as stated above, the law is unconstitutional. It can't be enforced. You would think if there was an "outdated" law ready-made for Brownback's Office of the Repealer to haul off and repeal already, it would be one that cannot actually be acted upon.
In normal circumstances that would be true, but normal circumstances do not take into account that Sam Brownback is competing for History's Greatest Jackass, nor that, like most of his contemporary far-right Republicans, he has absolutely no issue with passing, enforcing and/or keeping-on-the-books laws that are anti-constitutional but nonetheless make him feel good or pander to the right crowd. The Constitution is something to carry in your pocket, not something to actually govern by, after all. That would be silly!
So even though the law was widely targeted as an obvious candidate for repeal, it didn't make the cut. And Brownback isn't talking:
Mr. Brownback, who is a vocal opponent of same-sex marriage on religious grounds, declined to comment, and his spokeswoman would not say whether he would support repealing the law against same-sex sodomy, a misdemeanor that officially carries a prison sentence of up to six months.
Dennis Taylor, the secretary of the State Department of Administration, which assembled the list, declined to discuss why the law was not included.
“What we’ve proposed is what we proposed,” Mr. Taylor said.
Translation: We're going to keep this stupid, pointless, unenforceable law on the books because the governor and his far-right base demand the continued right to have unconstitutional, discriminatory laws on the books, even if the mean old Supreme Court says we can't actually charge people with that stuff. Who knows: Maybe Christian Sharia will finally be implemented in America, and then those laws will be just fine again!
If it seems I am being overly harsh towards or dismissive of Sam Brownback, it is because Sam Brownback has had a long political career, and at every point during it has done his level best to take the most jackassish stance. Even, as in cases like this, when there is just no rational reason for doing it other than pure spite and/or pandering. As was the case for that poor high school student who found herself in trouble with her school for tweeting that Sam Brownback sucked, my defense is simple: No, he really does suck. A lot.