Topeka ? So the story goes, two candidates were in a real dogfight of a debate. Back and forth they went – for this and against that. As the debate ended, one candidate pointed an accusing finger and intoned: “My opponent is a cattle rustler.”

Later, the campaign manager asked, “Why did you say that? You know that’s not true.”

“I know,” the candidate replied. “I just wanted him to have to deny it.”

The tale illustrates “going negative” – unleashing denouncements, sometimes with a shade of truth but often injected with inaccuracies and innuendoes.

Negative campaigning is old hat in Kansas politics, and there’s every reason to believe voters will see it in next year’s elections.

Two races where negative campaigning is expected are the attorney general’s race and the race to unseat Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius.

Johnson County Dist. Atty. Paul Morrison switched to the Democratic Party in a bid to replace Republican Phill Kline as attorney general in the Nov. 7 general election. Republicans branded him soft on crime, while Morrison said he stood on his record which includes gaining convictions for serial killers John E. Robinson Sr. and Richard Grissom Jr.

“The guns already are being pulled out for that one. The paintballs will be flying,” said Joe Aistrup, head of the Kansas State University Political Science Department.

He said Kline knows about negative campaigns, calling his 2002 primary against then-Sen. David Adkins “an outstanding example of a negative campaign.”

“It was just because the two were throwing one accusation after the other,” Aistrup said. “It started early and kept going, like an endless loop.”

Although the Republican challenger to Sebelius is yet to be determined, negative campaigning will be there, said Richard Heil, chairman of Fort Hays State University Department of Political Science and Justice Studies.

“They will try to paint her as a flaming liberal and she will have to respond,” Heil said. “She can respond with her record.”

Why do candidates go negative? Because it works.

“People tend to remember the negatives more than the positives. It imprints voters with negative memories of your opponent,” Heil said. “The candidate who wins may be the one with the best mudslinger, not the best candidate.”