Sports: Wrestlers hit mats in Eureka See B1
THE IOLA REGISTER Locally owned since 1867
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Monday, January 25, 2016
Rulings revive push to revamp Kansas courts By JOHN HANNA The Associated Press
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Republican Gov. Sam Brownback and his allies are trying to revive their push to remake Kansas’ courts by stoking public outrage over its recent rulings on abortion and the death penalty. Brownback has repeatedly advocated overhauling how Kansas Supreme Court justices are selected, saying in his most recent State of the State address that the current
system is “controlled by a handful of lawyers.” Change requires amending the state constitution, a difficult process in which the governor and his allies have been stymied. While critics describe the current system for selecting Kansas Supreme Court members as undemocratic, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Jeff King said rulings voters dislike can get their attention. “It may raise the importance of a good method of se-
Efforts to repeal state’s death penalty may be stalled
lection to people in the public who haven’t thought about it before,” said King, an Independence Republican who advocates change. Prominent GOP conservatives immediately called for change after the U.S Supreme Court ruled that Kansas’ highest court was wrong to overturn death sentences for Jonathan and Reginald Carr. The brothers had faced execution for four murders in Wichita in December 2000 fol-
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding the death sentences of three convicted murderers in Kansas may undermine support for a bill that would repeal the state’s death penalty, a sponsor of the measure said. The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday reversed a
See COURTS | Page A4
Moran teen achieves Boy Scouting pinnacle By RICHARD LUKEN The Iola Register
Raymond Alumbaugh’s fellow Boy Scouts will miss him, not only for his dedicating to the Scouting life, but also for his cooking. “Raymond is something of a gourmet cook,” his Scout leader Stacie Sigler explained Sunday, at Alumbaugh’s Eagle Scout Court of Honor. “With him, we knew his patrol would probably get a fantastic meal.” But now that Alumbaugh, 18, is nearly finished with his formal Boy Scout career, Troop 55 needs a new cook. “The first meeting without Raymond, the food was a disaster,” Sigler said with a laugh. Alumbaugh, a 2015 Marmaton Valley High School graduate, earned the Eagle ranking Sunday as the final See SCOUT | Page A4
Raymond Alumbaugh, center, Moran, receives his Eagle Scout pin from his mother, Sarah, and father, Andrew, during an Eagle Scout Court of Honor Sunday in Iola. REGISTER/RICHARD LUKEN
Kansas Supreme Court ruling and upheld the death sentences of brothers Jonathan and Reginald Carr, who killed five in Wichita in December 2000. It also reversed the Kansas court in the death penalty case of Sidney Gleason, who was convicted of See STALLED | Page A4
East Coast digs out from blizzard NEW YORK (AP) — East Coast residents who made the most of a paralyzing weekend blizzard trudged into the workweek today amid slippery roads, spotty transit service and mounds of snow that buried cars and blocked sidewalk entrances. In Brooklyn, only one teacher at the BedfordStuyvesant New Beginnings Charter School called out, despite more than two feet of snow in the city. “A lot of teachers are taking the train instead of driving,” said Wanda Morales, director of operSee BLIZZARD | Page A4
Rhetoric on military preparedness doesn’t always match reality By RICHARD LARDNER The Associated Press
EDITOR’S NOTE — An occasional look at public statements and how well they adhere to the facts WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush says the Obama administration has “gutted” every weapons system in the U.S. military’s inventory. GOP rival Donald Trump says the military is a “disaster.” Florida Sen. Marco Rubio maintains that President Barack Obama is more interested in providing money to Planned Parenthood than for the nation’s armed forces. Gutted? Disaster? Trashing Obama and arguing that he has failed to spend enough on defense has become a staple for Republican presidential hopefuls. At the debates and campaign stops, they’ve cast him as a feckless commander in chief, standing idly by while the world’s finest military withers away. What’s lost in the din: Money spent on weapons modernization is on par with the George W. Bush admin-
istration. The military cuts that GOP contenders are complaining about were approved by Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill. The military budget is being squeezed by the insistence of lawmakers in both parties that money be spent on bases and equipment that the Pentagon says it doesn’t need. And the government spends roughly 1,000 times more on the armed forces than on Planned Parenthood. A few of the GOP candidates’ claims and how they compare with the facts: “In this administration, every weapon system has been gutted,” Jeb Bush said at a debate in South Carolina earlier this month. THE FACTS: Total spending for the modernization for major weapons systems actually has remained stable since Bush’s brother, President George W. Bush, left office in January 2009. The department’s “selected acquisition reports,” which detail past, current and future investments in dozens of weapons programs, show the value of the military services’ mod-
Quote of the day Vol. 118, No. 61
ernization portfolio in November 2008 was $1.64 trillion. The latest reports, from March 2015, show a value of $1.62 trillion. The armed forces are undergoing a transformation, according to the Defense Department’s budget strategy. The military services will no longer be sized for large, pro-
longed operations — a reference to the lengthy wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which involved massive reconstruction and humanitarian relief components. The focus now is on building a high-tech force that is nimble enough to defeat Islamic State militants and much more sophisticated adversaries.
“You don’t pay taxes — they take taxes.”
— Chris Rock 75 Cents
For example, the Air Force is pushing ahead with the development and acquisition of an advanced bomber, known as Long-Range Strike, to replace the aging fleet of B-1 and B-52 bombers. The B-52s were first deployed when Dwight Eisenhower was president. See RHETORIC | Page A2
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