Week in Review: March 10 – 16
- Mar. 16, 2012
- 515 Comments
This week in politics, we saw Rick Santorum gain some momentum after winning the Kansas Caucus on Saturday.
He won 51 percent of the vote in the Kansas Republican Primary Saturday, sweeping every county in the state that recorded votes, except for Lane County in western Kansas. Mitt Romney followed with 20 percent, and Newt Gingrich had 14 percent. Ron Paul, who spoke at the Lied Center Friday night prior to the caucuses, came in fourth place with 12 percent of the vote.
On Tuesday night Santorum continued to gain ground when he swept the primaries in Alabama and Mississippi.
After the losses Tuesday night, many were wondering whether this would be the last straw for the Newt Gingrich campaign which has netted only two victories in the primary race so far — in South Carolina and Georgia. He, however, has denied that this is the end of his campaign.
Associated Press — 2012 Presidential Primary Results
Next up, Missouri will hold its caucus on Saturday, March 17. The state has 52 delegates.
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The Kansas House has been busy this week, passing a couple of bills sure to impact young voters.
The House has OK’d concealed carry in government buildings, but after many objected, they’ve created an option for universities and hospitals to opt out.
In a previous PoliticalFiber.com survey, we asked whether you thought concealed carry should be allowed on college campuses. Here’s what you had to say:
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The Kansas House also proposed eliminating taxes on groceries, which would directly benefit nearly every Kansan.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, people aged 25 and younger spend about $2,197 on groceries each year. By cutting taxes on that, this age group will likely save about $138 every year.
However, to the state, that means a decrease of upwards of $350 million in tax revenue. That, coupled with other tax cuts that were proposed, could leave the state cutting services as well as taxes.
This plan comes as an alternative to the ones proposed by Brownback and Republican leadership earlier this year and must still clear the Senate, where it will undoubtedly face scrutiny and changes.
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There were lots of headlines this week bemoaning the situation of the millennials, and since we all like reading about ourselves (is it self pity?) here’s a roundup of those stories:
The New York Times published an opinion piece called The Go No Where Generation that bemoans the lack of mobility displayed by Gen Y.
The likelihood of 20-somethings moving to another state has dropped well over 40 percent since the 1980s, according to calculations based on Census Bureau data. The stuck-at-home mentality hits college-educated Americans as well as those without high school degrees. According to the Pew Research Center, the proportion of young adults living at home nearly doubled between 1980 and 2008, before the Great Recession hit. Even bicycle sales are lower now than they were in 2000. Today’s generation is literally going nowhere. This is the Occupy movement we should really be worried about.
The solution, they say?
For about $200, young Nevadans who face a statewide 13 percent jobless rate can hop a Greyhound bus to North Dakota, where they’ll find a welcome sign and a 3.3 percent rate. Why are young people not crossing borders?
Some millennials were a bit unhappy with the portrayal. Here, they speak out in an Atlantic piece.
From the Pew Research Center: When Does Adulthood Begin in This Economy? and, Social Networking Sites and Politics
From the Atlantic: Why is the GOP Suddenly Turning Against College? and The Misunderstood Consequences of the Student Debt Crisis
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