Governor steps up to the scale and issues weight loss challenge

LJWorld.com weblogs Statehouse Live

Posted by Scott Rothschild January 7, 2013 at 1:20 p.m.

Governor steps up to the scale and issues weight loss challenge

Vowing to reduce the size of the state's waistline, Gov. Sam Brownback on Monday launched a weight loss challenge.

"We have a problem in America with obesity and gluttony," Brownback said.

Gov. Sam Brownback weighs in for weight-loss challenge. by Scott Rothschild

Five-member teams were invited to weigh-in through Jan. 15 and eat healthier and become more active. The state team with the largest weight percentage loss will win a monetary prize that hasn't yet been determined.

Nearly 350 teams have signed up. Brownback also encouraged non-state employee groups, such as businesses and municipalities, to accept the challenge and provide incentives for weight loss.

Brownback's team included himself, Transportation Secretary Mike King, Acting Labor Secretary Lana Gordon, Commerce Secretary Pat George, and Kansas Adjutant General Lee Tafanelli.

At a news conference in the rotunda of the Statehouse, Brownback announced his team weighed a total of 1,043 pounds. Individual weights were not revealed as team members stepped up to a scale that had a visual barrier.

Lt. Gov. Jeff Colyer, a physician, said he hoped the challenge would help Kansans learn more about diet and nutrition. "This will affect your entire life," he said.

More information on the challenge is available at www.weightloss.ks.gov

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merrill 4 months, 2 weeks ago

A monetary tax dollar prize that has yet to be decided...

AMC Theatre now owned by a Chinese investment group won a sweet tax dollar monetary prize.

Worker's taxes siphoned off by their bosses Thursday, April 26, 2012 | Posted by Jim Hightower

Where is the $47 million tax dollars that belong to Kansas taxpayers?

My congratulations to workers in 16 states – from Maine to Georgia, New Jersey to Colorado! Many of you will be thrilled to know that the income taxes deducted from your paychecks each month are going to a very worthy cause: your corporate boss.

Good Jobs First, a non-profit, non-partisan research center, has analyzed state programs meant to create jobs, but instead have created some $700 million a year in corporate welfare. This scam starts with the normal practice of corporations withholding from each employee's monthly check the state income taxes their workers owe.

But rather than remitting this money to pay for state services, these 16 states simply allow the corporations to keep the tax payments for themselves! Adding to the funkiness of taxation-by-corporation, the bosses don't even have to tell workers that the company is siphoning off their state taxes for its own fun and profit.

These heists are rationalized in the name of "job creation," but that's a hoax, too. They're really just bribes the states pay to get corporations to move existing jobs from one state to another, or they're hostage payments to corporations that demand the public's money – or else they'll move their jobs out of state.

Last year, Kansas used workers' withholding taxes to bribe AMC Entertainment with a $47 million payment to move its headquarters from downtown Kansas City, Missouri, to a KC suburb on the Kansas side, just 10 miles away. What a ripoff! Among the 2,700 corporations cashing in on such absurd diversions of state taxes from public need to private greed are Goldman Sachs, GE, Motorola, and (((AMC Entertainment has since been sold to Dalian Wanda Group of China. )))

When this tax deal was cut AMC and Cordish Co. of Baltimore were partners. As of 5/25/12 this partnership is becoming history.

As with many buyouts/mergers people lose jobs sooner of later due to the expense of purchase. Is all of the above legal as far as the $47 million tax dollar give away is concerned?

Where is the $47 million tax dollars?

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