# I pit the Kansas House of Representatives for trying to protect our precious bodily fluids **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 24, 2014, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121 "2014-02-24T17:50:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2014, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/41 "2014-02-25T20:05:56Z")
> [@Try2B\_Comprehensive](#): > > The compassionate thing is to find some way to lead people back to understanding what is in their own best interest. Between lashing out at immigrants and minorities, gays, [del]liberals[/del] educated people, government and now tooth decay prevention, they’re going to hurt people that don’t deserve it. > > I don’t know what yet, exactly. Read [this](http://www.thenation.com/article/178496/lasalida-venezuela-crossroads) article about current protests in Venezuela. > [@](#): > > It was into this gaping wound in history that Chávez stepped, first with a failed coup in February 1992, and with electoral victory six years later. Even then, however, there were still no “Chavistas” but only “Bolivarians”—a loose and all-encompassing reference to the great liberator, Simón Bolívar—or more simply: “revolutionaries.” The revolution predated Chávez, and it was always about more than the individual; so too for Maduro today. The state has become today an important terrain for hegemonic struggle, but it is far from the only trench, and those who felt the searing heat of state violence in the past have not been today miraculously converted to naïve faith. **Instead, the movements persist alongside and occasionally in tension with the government: supporting Maduro while building autonomous spaces for popular participation.** > > \ > > Hyperbole seems to be the rule of the day on both sides, and among the fearful exaggerations of the opposition, none looms larger than the _colectivos._ While officially designating the more organized radical sectors of _Chavismo,_ here signifiers float freely in proportion to the fear they represent, with the term _colectivos_ applied to anyone on a motorcycle, anyone wearing a red shirt, anyone too poor-looking or dark-skinned. This is nothing new, either: the 2002 equivalent was the term “terror circles,” a slanderous pejorative used to denigrate members of grassroots popular assemblies who served as the backbone of resistance to the undemocratic coup. These popular grassroots organizers constitute the most direct, organic expressions of the wretched of the Venezuelan earth, the most politicized segment of the previously discarded human mass that the opposition has never cared about for a second. > > **Even _Chavismo_ is not immune to the deep-seated hatred for the poor _barrio_ residents that such terms represent, and to a certain degree the feeling is mutual.** Against the caricatured view that insists that radical popular organizations like _colectivos_ are either blindly devoted or cheaply bought off, these are in reality among the most independent sectors of the revolution, those most critical of government missteps and hesitations, those most familiar with the repressive force of the state and those who demand above all that the social transformation under way move faster. > > These forever victims of the state have nevertheless bet on its potential usefulness in the present, or at the very least have insisted that the alternative—handing the state machinery back over to traditional elites and voluntarily returning to a life on the defensive—is really no alternative at all. This is not a decision undertaken desperately or nostalgically, however, but instead with the most powerful optimism of the will, not premised on the good faith of individual leaders—although there are some who deserve this—but instead because to bet on the Bolivarian government is to bet on the people, to wager on the creative capacities of the poor that always exceeds that state. > > \ > > The media question itself will be urgently debated in the coming days as the conflict between the government and CNN comes to a head. Here too the role of the private media in actively spearheading the 2002 coup looms large in the effort to strike a balance between press freedom and media responsibility (a tension that is not avoided by acting like it doesn’t exist). But these loose threads do not negate the urgency of the phrase that the revolutionary grassroots reserve for those who once governed them, and who today try to do so again, regardless of the death toll: _no volverán,_ they shall not return. > > \ > > The only _salida_ is the first, the exit personified in the more than 40,000 communal councils blanketing Venezuela, in the workers’ councils, popular organizations, Afro and indigenous movements, women’s and gender-diverse movements. It is these movements that have struggled to make Venezuela, in the words of Greg Grandin, “the most democratic country in the Western Hemisphere.” And it is these movements that—shoulders to the wheel of history—are the only guarantors of progress. Emphasis added. Maybe what them Kansans need is summa that “autonomous spaces for popular participation.” I.e., a grassroots left-populism based on “communal councils” that they run themselves. It’s not LW economic politics as such that they appear to resent, it’s **elite** politics, i.e., **somebody else’s** politics. ---
**Author:** ![Kansas\_Beekeeper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@Kansas\_Beekeeper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kansas_Beekeeper)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2014, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/42 "2014-02-25T20:12:16Z")
> [@shiftless](#): > > I lived in Kansas in the 80’s and have family there now. It is a fine state with fine people but there is something very, very messed up in Topeka. It’s like a whole nother world. > > I think the matter is that Kansas is very rural and most of the residents would just like to be left the hell alone and so they vote conservatively on election day and then ignore the idiots in the capital the rest of the year. And those idiots, with no useful tasks to spend their time on, listen to the religious zealots that swarm around Topeka for some strange reason. Except that two main centers of conservatism (conservatism with a religious evangelical/fundamentalist bent) are Johnson County and Sedgwick County, the two counties with the largest populations in the state. ---
**Author:** ![Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/try2b_comprehensive/32/65_2.png) [@Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Try2B_Comprehensive)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/43 "2014-02-26T05:34:01Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Read [this](http://www.thenation.com/article/178496/lasalida-venezuela-crossroads) article about current protests in Venezuela. > > Emphasis added. Maybe what them Kansans need is summa that “autonomous spaces for popular participation.” I.e., a grassroots left-populism based on “communal councils” that they run themselves. It’s not LW economic politics as such that they appear to resent, it’s **elite** politics, i.e., **somebody else’s** politics. Didn’t Kansans lose jobs over the past decades thanks to free trade agreements like what Clinton supported? Wall Street makes money investing in moves like this, but the laid-off workers just get the shaft. Maybe Kansans feel screwed. This kind of discontent might be harnessed by the community councils you mention to pull things leftward I suppose, but then again if they blame the left for their problems, good luck getting them to embrace lefty approaches to problems. I thought they had an axe to grind specifically with ‘the left’. _And_ elites. And [lots of things] Plus, Venezuela has 10x as many people as Kansas who, [according to the World Bank](http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.CD), live on a per capita gdp of ~$12,000, compared to over $50,000 for the US. Kansas’ economic problems just aren’t the same as Venezuela’s, so transplanting techniques from one place to the other might not work. I mean, haven’t the social structures in both places evolved organically? Or are things in Kansas being distorted by our billionaire friends who sponsor Tea Party politics? Are Tea Party elites- other people with other people’s politics- capitalizing on anti-left animus for their own reasons? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/44 "2014-02-26T06:19:02Z")
> [@Try2B\_Comprehensive](#): > > Or are things in Kansas being distorted by our billionaire friends who sponsor Tea Party politics? Are Tea Party elites- other people with other people’s politics- capitalizing on anti-left animus for their own reasons? [Well, yeah.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=704287) ---
**Author:** ![Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/try2b_comprehensive/32/65_2.png) [@Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Try2B_Comprehensive)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/45 "2014-02-26T15:02:16Z")
That suggests to me an answer to the question, “What’s wrong with Kansas?” It says they’ve either been fooled into believing or just don’t understand that the solution to problems doesn’t lie in choosing correctly between ‘left’ and ‘right’. There’s a notion with a lot of people that if we approach every issue from the most rightward position possible, we’ll always come up with the best solution. One could contrast this with the approach of running the math on health outcomes with and without flouridated water and examining what concentrations affect IQ in kids and comparing that with the actual concentration in the water, but just not too loudly, I don’t want to be accused of being ‘elite’ with my fancypants reliance on data and precedent. This is a familiar madness; the next question is, “Why does Kansas have such a bad case of it?” Why is their anti-left, gotta-run-to-the-right horror at the Socialist evils of a proven public health policy so much stronger than their power to examine the evidence in a politically neutral manner? ---
**Author:** ![lance\_strongarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/87869e/32.png) [@lance\_strongarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lance_strongarm)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/46 "2014-02-26T16:15:21Z")
> [@Try2B\_Comprehensive](#): > > Didn’t Kansans lose jobs over the past decades thanks to free trade agreements like what Clinton supported? Wall Street makes money investing in moves like this, but the laid-off workers just get the shaft. Maybe Kansans feel screwed. Sure, but free trade is generally a policy favored by conservatives and opposed by liberals (though there are certain strains of right-wingers who oppose it). Clinton was an anomaly. Maybe Kansans can’t tell the difference though. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/47 "2014-02-26T16:30:33Z")
> [@lance\_strongarm](#): > > Sure, but free trade is generally a policy favored by conservatives and opposed by liberals (though there are certain strains of right-wingers who oppose it). It is a policy favored by both [neoliberals](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism) (e.g., Clinton and the DLC) and neoconservatives, and opposed by paleoconservatives (e.g., Pat Buchanan) and by left-liberals/progressives. Regular liberals (Biden, Pelosi, etc.) go both ways on it, I think. ---
**Author:** ![lance\_strongarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/87869e/32.png) [@lance\_strongarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lance_strongarm)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/48 "2014-02-26T16:33:27Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > It is a policy favored by both [neoliberals](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism) (e.g., Clinton and the DLC) and neoconservatives, and opposed by paleoconservatives (e.g., Pat Buchanan) and by left-liberals/progressives. Regular liberals (Biden, Pelosi, etc.) go both ways on it, I think. Thanks for the elaboration. ---
**Author:** ![Rachellelogram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rachellelogram/32/8689_2.png) [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/49 "2014-02-26T17:25:58Z")
I have been led to understand by multiple dentists that fluoride needs to chill out on your teeth for awhile to make any sort of difference. In other words, I’ve always thought fluoride had to be topical and that ingesting it doesn’t do shit. I’m not saying it’s hurting anything, much less IQs, but can someone explain (in terms a 5-year-old would understand) how ingesting fluoride is doing anything? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/50 "2014-02-26T18:11:01Z")
> [@Rachellelogram](#): > > I have been led to understand by multiple dentists that fluoride needs to chill out on your teeth for awhile to make any sort of difference. In other words, I’ve always thought fluoride had to be topical and that ingesting it doesn’t do shit. I’m not saying it’s hurting anything, much less IQs, but can someone explain (in terms a 5-year-old would understand) how ingesting fluoride is doing anything? The mechanism is described [here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluoridation#Mechanism). ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/51 "2014-02-26T18:21:23Z")
> [@andros](#): > > :sigh: > > At least they get to _have_ fluoride in their water. Goddamn ignernt fuckos here in Portland managed to scrap a fully-funded fluoride initiative here. Our idiots come in two flavors: knee-jerk right-wing and extra-crunchy granola. Substitute “Calgary” for “Portland” and I concur. We’re not known for our crunchy-granola-ness here, but apparently we have a full complement of junk-science-believing idiots. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/52 "2014-02-26T19:50:09Z")
> [@Cat\_Whisperer](#): > > Substitute “Calgary” for “Portland” and I concur. We’re not known for our crunchy-granola-ness here, but apparently we have a full complement of junk-science-believing idiots. From down here, Alberta seems to be a more shocking outlier in Canada than Texas is in the U.S. ---
**Author:** ![Old\_Time\_Hockey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/a9adbd/32.png) [@Old\_Time\_Hockey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Old_Time_Hockey)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/53 "2014-02-26T20:09:47Z")
> [@Cat\_Whisperer](#): > > Substitute “Calgary” for “Portland” and I concur. We’re not known for our crunchy-granola-ness here, but apparently we have a full complement of junk-science-believing idiots. Sadly, as far as Calgary likes to believe its advanced, what with actually electing a Muslim Mayor and all, this decision has always puzzled me. It came before I was paying attention, and it would be great if Nenshi could find a way to get it back onto the ballot next time, if only to give me the opportunity to see who the morons are that actually believe this junk science. ---
**Author:** ![Old\_Time\_Hockey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/a9adbd/32.png) [@Old\_Time\_Hockey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Old_Time_Hockey)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/54 "2014-02-26T20:17:21Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > From down here, Alberta seems to be a more shocking outlier in Canada than Texas is in the U.S. That’s only because Texas has so many other States to compete with for outlier status, like pretty much the entire Deep South, Arizona etc. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2014, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/55 "2014-02-26T23:23:53Z")
> [@Old\_Time\_Hockey](#): > > Sadly, as far as Calgary likes to believe its advanced, what with actually electing a Muslim Mayor and all, this decision has always puzzled me. It came before I was paying attention, and it would be great if Nenshi could find a way to get it back onto the ballot next time, if only to give me the opportunity to see who the morons are that actually believe this junk science. My husband had the dubious pleasure of debating former Alderman and former MLA Jon Lord over fluoride in drinking water online - he simply wasn’t interested in listening to the actual facts of the issue. He kept providing cites to debunked junk science articles that had sources like the great scientific minds [Andrew Wakefield](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Wakefield) and [Jospeh Mercola](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Mercola). As a public servant and policy maker it would behoove someone like Jon Lord to do better research than that, but he didn’t. Current Councillor Druh Farrell was the biggest supporter of taking fluoride out of Calgary’s water - we haven’t argued with her online, but I suspect she’d go to the bad same sources for her arguments. From [this article from May, 2013:](http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/05/24/fluoride-increasingly-removed-from-water-supply-despite-lack-of-evidence-it-is-harmful/) > [@](#): > > To flouride’s{sic} many supporters, the decision has led to utterly predictable results: Calgary dentists are already reporting an increase in tooth decay since fluoride was removed in 2011. Colour me surprised. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/56 "2014-02-27T06:38:03Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Exposure [to dihydrogen monoxide] is ultimately fatal in **100% of cases!** Not just in humans, but in **all known species!** Well, if evolution were possible, we’d all have evolved to tolerate it, or even thrive on it. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/57 "2014-02-27T07:00:41Z")
We did, and then the Irish found an improvement. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/58 "2014-02-27T07:06:53Z")
> [@Kansas\_Beekeeper](#): > > Here’s a fun article about a bill introduced by a Kansas Legislator trying to block a primary challenge. His day job is a minister. The fun part is the possible (probable) involvement of prostitutes. > > [Bill to require 2-year district residency on shaky ground](http://cjonline.com/news/2014-02-24/bill-require-2-year-district-residency-shaky-ground) > > Background article. > > [Sixteen years span dual mysteries of Haysville lawmaker](http://cjonline.com/news/2013-05-11/sixteen-years-span-dual-mysteries-haysville-lawmaker) > > Idiots like this are why Kansans get such stupid legislation. But people voted for him. Well, considering that Kansas Senator Pat Roberts doesn’t live in Kansas … ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 7:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121/59 "2014-02-27T07:11:50Z")
You blame him? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-kansas-house-of-representatives-for-trying-to-protect-our-precious-bodily-fluids/682121.md?page=2)