As a Kansan, I’m rather amused at some postmortems on the Kansas primaries, coming from non-Kansans who probably view the state as little more than the totally flat (it’s not) home of farmers, wheat, and Dorothy Gale.

Let’s consider the defeat of Rep. Tim Huelskamp from the largely-rural congressional District One.

Trump supporters howled with glee about Huelskamp being flattened in his primary by challenger Roger Marshall. Conservative Treehouse gloated that the “rabid, VERY RABID” Huelskamp had it coming (in ALL CAPS ITALICS NO LESS!!) because he dared to support Ted Cruz in the primary, and failed to kiss the ring of Trump.

Ann Coulter, in a tweet reminiscent of Nelson Muntz, joined in the schadenfreude.

Hahahaha! Huelskamp opposed Trump. https://t.co/6Gzco20pb8

— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) August 3, 2016

Rush Limbaugh added to the pile-on of Huelskamp on his Wednesday radio show:

Tim Huelskamp, who was a rabidly anti-Trump incumbent (many thought of him as a Tea Party Republican) got skunked in the primary. He was defeated by somebody named Roger Marshall. And it wasn’t even close. It was a 12-point landslide defeat for an incumbent Republican who went big on being a Never Trumper.

Except. . . Tim Huelskamp was not a #NeverTrump advocate. It’s true he supported Ted Cruz in the primary — along with 51% of Kansas primary voters. But just last month he joined with GOP House Republicans to meet with Donald Trump, and came away from the meeting encouraged. He spoke with reporters afterwards and praised the prospect of a Trump presidency. Huelskamp, as a member of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, said that with a President Trump the committee “will fix” the VA.

But why let facts destroy a narrative?

Consider also that neither KS Rep. Kevin Yoder (my congressman) nor KS Sen. Jerry Moran were eager supporters of Trump. The website fivethirtyeight.com even placed Yoder in the “non-namer” category in its “7 Levels of Trump Support in Congress” for not endorsing Trump by name, but endorsing the “nominee.” Yet both Yoder and Moran were victors against their primary challengers.

No, Tim Huelskamp was shot down in flames on Tuesday because he wouldn’t play games with the Republican congressional establishment. And he touched the Third Rail in Kansas — he dared to incense the powerful agricultural lobby. You just don’t do that among Kansas farmers. Because of his recalcitrance, Huelskamp was removed in 2012 from the Agriculture Committee by then-House Speaker John Boehner.

John Boehner sucking up to lobbyists. Let me show you my shocked face.

Huelskamp’s challenger, OB-GYN Roger Marshall, had the backing of the Kansas Farm Bureau, the Kansas Livestock Association, the National Association of Wheat Growers and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Marshall also received money in outside support from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the ESAFund, a superPAC founded by the Ricketts family. Ads like this played on Kansas airwaves, even in my Kansas City area, far from Huelskamp’s First Congressional District.

And how did ex-Congressman John Boehner react to the defeat of Tim Huelskamp?

Current mood. pic.twitter.com/IeBysAM0tq

— Sean Agnew (@seanagnew) August 3, 2016

So, let me get this straight.

Trump supporters love Trump because he’s an “outsider,” who bucks special interests and has no attachment to the reviled GOP establishment. Yet they cheer when a Congressman who actually rebuked the K Street lobbyists, and who stood up to the GOP establishment embodied in Tea Party-hater John Boehner, was defeated by a challenger backed by lobbyists and special interests.

Will someone please explain it to me?