Did I say money? Where are the money interests, i.e. business leaders, to stomp out this insurrection insanity? They and few others have the resources and standing to deal with this appropriately. And I include The Oklahoman in that group. Hello! You shun and snark the Left out of existence in this state, time to do the same for these secessionist racist gun nuts.

I sent the message below to the state chamber, I’m so sick of this shit. I could not care less about the chamber’s elitist goals, but I do care about the suffering that the poor and disenfranchised will have to endure as Oklahoma scoots to last place in education, income, health, opportunity and every scale of reasonable human existence.

I’m sure this state militia story is doing GREAT things for efforts to recruit businesses here to create jobs and build the economy, like all the other back-asswards thinking coming out of the Capitol from these culture war neanderthals and outright racists.

I wish the Chamber of Commerce would come out and publicly and unequivocally condemn this kind of thing so we can begin to improve our profile and get out of 49th place on every life quality list made. Perhaps you could at least have a discrete conversation with some of these wingnuts (for sure don’t leave Kern out) and let them know that the business community will make sure they have well-funded primary opponents come the next election.

Or maybe the organization agrees with Reps. Brogdon and Key — if so please let us know, so all the sane people in OK can leave the state before the next civil war erupts at Ft. Sill.

Edward Kennedy wanted all Americans to have access to the kind of health care he had and to make sure everyone had a safety net in place that allowed them to take the kind of risks necessary to become a millionaire if that’s what they wanted to do. His conservative enemies, on the other hand, want to keep Americans enslaved by the wealthy, in jobs they loathe, scared to make any moves for fear that they will lose everything, including their lives, if they do. It’s the essence of the difference between liberals and conservatives regardless of their personal place in the class structure.

 - digby

Because I have relatives who are conservatives who vote Republican, and some of them are compassionate on a personal basis, they are generous to family and friends and when suffering is directly before them they would give or do most anything — they just vote the complete opposite, and mouth what they hear on Fox because that’s all they hear, because of that, I make a third category in my overall thinking about the character of conservatives.

1. heartless (lobbyists, activists and media)
2. corrupt (all those in elected office)
3. brainwashed and deluded by media and religion (the victims, viewers and voters of 1 and 2)

Yes, there is some overlap.

You could go on for volumes trying to understand their nature, and many have. But in this current political environment, it really is this simple. Why pretend otherwise. Digby again in a later post discussing the horrific scene at a health care reform town hall in California where Rep. Wally Herger, a voluntary member of the federal government who has put his hand on a Bible, presumably, and taken an oath to the Constitution, cheers on a self-described “right wing terrorist” and his cheering neighbors, who seemingly hate the U.S. government as much as Timothy McVeigh or Mohammad Atta did:

I am not the type of person to wish that someone would get sick and lose everything they have, but if I were, these are people I would wish it on. It’s a hateful thing to say, but these are hateful people and I’m not going to pretend they aren’t just to be politically correct. Watch the fevered looks on their faces, high fiving and stimulated to near hysteria at the notion that they are completely self-sufficient and need not care for their fellow man. It’s quite clear that they have no empathy at all and therefore must personally experience things in order to understand them. I certainly can’t see much hope of rationally explaining why they themselves are likely to suffer under their own philosophy and I wouldn’t even bother trying to appeal to them on grounds of being a decent human being.

I guess they think they are immortal. Clearly they believe they are superior. But contrary to this self-destructive, unenlightened worldview, many of them are going to be disabled or stricken with illness and if they are lucky they will get old and infirm. And I hate to break it to them, but every last one of these people, good or bad, fat or thin, rich or poor, is going to die someday. Being a selfish jackass won’t save any of them from that fate.

I guess they think they are immortal. Clearly they believe they are superior. But contrary to this self-destructive, unenlightened worldview, many of them are going to be disabled or stricken with illness and if they are lucky they will get old and infirm. And I hate to break it to them, but every last one of these people, good or bad, fat or thin, rich or poor, is going to die someday. Being a selfish jackass won’t save any of them from that fate.

“…estimating Kennedy’s historic imprint is difficult — and not just because we and millions of Americans not living on either coast disagreed with him on the size and reach of government. …”

Funny thing, no one, including the editorial board of The Oklahoman or the morons at Fox News, is having any difficulty with their assessments: radical rightwingers are trashing him, and everyone else is praising his service to country and remarking on his effectiveness in the Senate (something we could use more of, as that body now is principally designed to make sure nothing ever happens). Few of even the most ardent leftwingers are failing to note Kennedy’s tragic flaws and notable mistakes, but these are most tragic because of his huge “historic imprint.” But, like most people capable of civil decency when the balance is clearly on the positive end of the measure, they note accomplishments when the body is still warm and don’t take cheap shots — even those “millions of Americans not living on either coast.”

Kennedy’s legislative accomplishments, which are considerable, have and will continue to contribute great value, and lessen suffering, in the lives of all Americans. Yes, even those living far from salt water.

Speaking of stupid claims, there are “millions of Americans not living on either coast” who did and do agree with Ted Kennedy “on the size and reach of government” (and vice versa) — unlike what this typically propagandistic editorial in The Oklahoman tries to posit.

This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the U.S. Department of Energy.

I then took a shower in the clean water provided by a municipal water utility.

After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC-regulated channels to see what the National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like, using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

I watched this while eating my breakfast of U.S. Department of Agriculture-inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

At the appropriate time, as regulated by the U.S. Congress and kept accurate by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the U.S. Naval Observatory, I get into my National Highway Traffic Safety Administration-approved automobile and set out to work on the roads build by the local, state, and federal Departments of Transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the Environmental Protection Agency, using legal tender issued by the Federal Reserve Bank.

On the way out the door I deposit any mail I have to be sent out via the U.S. Postal Service and drop the kids off at the public school.

After spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the workplace regulations imposed by the Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health administration, enjoying another two meals which again do not kill me because of the USDA, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to my house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and Fire Marshal’s inspection, and which has not been plundered of all its valuables thanks to the local police department.

And then I log on to the internet — which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration — and post on Freerepublic.com and Fox News forums about how SOCIALISM in medicine is BAD because the government can’t do anything right.

hat tip to Americablog.com

A section deals with the recent flap at the Oklahoma state capitol over a prayer said by an openly gay pastor, which was preceded by an introduction of his family and partner/fiance. 20 legislators voted not to allow the prayer entered into the record.

Meadows does the Democratic Party of Oklahoma the big favor of dividing the GOP members into two distinct groups, one of which it condemns not “true” conservatives, and thus not worthy of OCPAC member’s votes.

I say, Yay! splinter away!

Members and friends of the Oklahoma Conservative Political Action Committee (OCPAC)

[...]

– HOMOSEXUAL PREACHER BRINGS ABOMINATION TO STATE CAPITOL

This past Tuesday State Representative Al McAffrey (D-inner city OKC) had the opportunity to invite a pastor to be the Chaplin for the day and open the session with prayer. McAffrey is the only openly homosexual member of the legislature. The “pastor” he asked to give the prayer was the “Reverend” Scott Jones, also an openly homosexual who introduced his “fiancee” Michael, who was sitting in the gallery.
McAffrey asked that Jones’ prayer be recorded in the official minutes of the day, (this is normally only done on Thursdays) Representative John Wright (R-Broken Arrow) objected and called for a vote on the issue.

In my opinion, this was just another cleverly planned skirmish by the homosexuals in the culture war. Radical homosexuals are trying to force society to accept their perverted lifestyle as normal, equal or perhaps superior. Then of course, when normal folks disagree with them, or express that their perversion is “sin” in the eye’s of God as well as all Bible believing Christians (the only real Christians), then the homosexuals play the victim role and accuse those in opposition to their agenda as being haters, bigots, intolerant, narrow minded, red necks and on and on and on. Actually, you don’t have to read many of their notes to people who disagree with them to see that they are the ones that have their hearts full of hate for people who refuse to accept their behavior.

I believe that unless the content of Jones’ prayer was that of confession for his sinful behavior regarding homosexuality and an expression of repentance toward God for his rebellion and perversion, then his being there to give the prayer for the day was an abomination. Based on my reading of God’s Word (The Bible) Jones’
belief that he is a man of God and anyone else who try to justify homosexuality as acceptable, they serve a “god of their own making or their imagination.” They are not serving the God of the Bible and they do not have a relationship with the one and only true God.

Some of the Republican House members walked out, perhaps that was their way to protest the charade, 20 of them voted against allowing the prayer to be recorded and 24 Republicans voted to allow the exception to the norm and have the prayer recorded. May I suggest several possible reasons for the 24 who decided to go along with the desires of McAffrey and the homosexual community.

While most, if not all, Republican House members claim a Christian church affiliation, certainly with some it is more of a social relationship rather than Biblical Christianity. Some may think this is not an important issue and wish it would go away so they could deal with “important” business like determining how they will re-distribute other people’s money. Others may have family members or friends who are homosexuals and have decided to compromise God’s Word and the truth on the subject for their emotional attachments. Perhaps they aren’t mature enough in their Christianity to be able to take a stand against sin, yet at the same time be able to express Christian love toward homosexuals, hoping to see them set free from the bondage of homosexuality. Others might not want to be on the receiving end of the intimidation, hatred, and perhaps death threats from the homosexual community by standing up against their agenda. Just 24 hours in the shoes of State Representative Sally Kern would make the cowardly never want to be in that position. I have already seen some of the e-mails sent to the lawmakers who voted no, and believe me the hateful responses are typical.

Following are the names of those who voted to go along with the homosexual agenda. I will break them into two groups, Those I am not surprised about and those that I am. I am not surprised about Don Armes-Lawton, Eddie Fields-Pawhuska, Steve Martin-Bartlesville, Colby Schwartz-Yukon, Earl Sears-Tulsa, Lee Denney-Cushing, Fred Jordan- Tulsa, Charlie Joyner-Midwest City, Ron Peters-Tulsa, Doug Cox-Grove, David Derby-Owasso, Dale DeWitt-Braman, or Phil Richardson-Minco. With the exception of Eddie Fields, a freshman, every one of these lawmakers have been on the RINO nominee list at one time or another, or in the case of Lee Denney and Doug Cox, they have been the winners of the RINO award.

Following are the names of the lawmakers who did surprise me, Gary Banz-Midwest City, Lisa Billy-Purcell, Cory Holland-Marlow, T.W.
Shannon-Lawton, Ken Miller-Edmond (this guy is a professor at Oklahoma Christian. This is certainly not the perspective of the members of the Churches of Christ that I know), Marian Cooksey-Edmond, Pam Peterson- Tulsa (the biggest surprise of all to me), Chris Steele-Shawnee, David Derby-Owasso, Mike Thompson-OKC, Scott Martin-Norman and Speaker Chris Benge-Tulsa, a person who is supposed to be a social conservative. Of these 24, OCPAC has supported only 4 of them in the past.

Following are the names of the 20 brave lawmakers who voted against the homosexual agenda: Gus Blackwell-Goodwell, George Faught-Muskogee, Lewis Moore-Arcadia, Mike Ritze-Broken Arrow, Mike Christian-OKC, Dennis Johnson-Duncan, Jason Murphey-Guthrie, Mike Sanders-Kinfisher, Ann Coody-Lawton, Sally Kern-OKC, Leslie Osborne-Blanchard, Randy Terrill-Moore, Rex Duncan-Sand Springs, Charles Key-OKC, Pat Ownbey- Ardmore, Todd Thomsen-Ada, John Enns-Enid, Guy Liebmann-OKC, Mike Reynolds-OKC and John Wright-Broken Arrow. Of these 20, OCPAC has supported 13 of them in the past. Only 1 of the 7 who voted the right way on this issue, but did not receive our support, appeared before OCPAC. Had the other 6 appeared for their interview process, I believe we would have supported 5 of them. I believe there is 1 of the 6 who would not have received our support.

Following are the names of the ones who walked out or were absent.
Paul Wesselhoft-Moore, David Dank-OKC, Mark McCullough-Sapulpa, Dan Sullivan-Tulsa, Harold Wright-Weatherford, Jeff Hickman-Woodward, Randy McDaniel-OKC, Sue Tibbs-Tulsa, Mike Jackson-Enid, John Trebilcock-Tulsa, Shane Jett-Tecumseh, and Charles Ortega-Altus. Of those in this list, OCPAC has only supported one.

If one of these lawmakers happens to be your state representative and voted the right way, contact them and thank them for opposing the homosexual agenda. If they took a hike or voted the wrong way, remember that on the next election day, along with their scores on the conservative index..

One final thought. It is very easy to see that the OCPAC interview process, while not perfect, has done a very good job of determining candidates who are CONSISTENTLY conservative vs. those who claim to be conservative when they want our votes and our money, then turn out to govern more like a liberal Democrat, rather than a conservative Republican. Therefore, I invite folks to become a dues paying member of OCPAC so we can continue to elect true conservatives to the legislature. To join, please follow the instructions following my sine off.

Charlie Meadows

[In other news, Meadows announced he has stopped using PeoplePC as his email provider. 1996 is heartbroken at the loss of its last resident.]

So I was thinking, what mean things could I do, now that my cover is blown?

How about we distribute the stimulus money, jobs and programs based on how the congressional deleations voted. Ha ha! Imagine the squawks from Inhofe on the Senate floor when that was announced. And Coburn would say “No, no, no! Can I put a hold on that?” The Oklahoman would write a sarcastic editorial about how liberals hate America (okay, they don’t really need to write it, just pull it out of the file), but point out that Carrie Underwood is from Oklahoma, and we should all be so proud.

Speaking of the Gaylord’s personal media projects, I would force them to rename their school to “Gaylord College of Propaganda and Mass Deception.”

Wal-Mart would have to unionize all their employees, and give every woman customer free birth control.

The NRA would have to hold their meetings in the most crime prone area in the chapter’s region.

Jeez, having a black heart is fun. Imagine what I could do if I had actual power or an official platform of some kind, like, oh, I dunno, state representative. I could really make people I don’t like suffer and I wouldn’t even need a rational excuse.

The world wept for joy; Oklahoma spat defiantly. The glory train of history pulled out of the station; Oklahoma waved goodbye and said “good riddance.” Dr. King’s dream came true; Oklahoma slumbered on, curled up on the hearth of racism and addicted to the mind-numbing power of the word “conservative.”

[...] We are on the wrong side of history again, and we’re damn proud of it.

As you might expect, the comments are pouring in at the Gazette’s site, and more than a few folks are telling him, basically, that if he doesn’t love Oklahoma (the way it is, i.e. reactionary conservative and intellectually impoverished), then he should leave it. Others give their own testimony to Oklahoma’s perpetual brain drain which the conservatives wish to push even faster.

But now, John Aravosis, a prominent lefty blogger, has put an excerpt up at his Americablog — without comment, except for the title: How Oklahoma missed the Obama revolution.

Here are some comments from self-identified Oklahomans in response to the Americablog post.

enpassant

I wish I could understand what’s going on with Oklahoma. A reflection of our education?

The media here is very one-sided and talk radio here makes the Pravda seem fair and balanced, it’s 24/7 one wing nut after the other. Is that it?

tbhull

The problem with Oklahoma is the state has one newspaper owned by a wealthy but completely fucked up nazi cracker KKK republican family know as the Gaylords. Until this family either loses their money or dies one way or another, they control the press in this backward ass state and nothing will change that much.

NiNi

I too am proud to be an Oklahoman that voted for Obama. It was a brutal campaign, and I argued with many of my friends on behalf of Obama… lost a lot of respect for them too, as I realized they INTENTIONALLY kept themselves ignorant… watching the McCain-Palin smears work because these peoeple seemed to WANT those smears to work. Very disheartening and disappointing.

With that said, I was also very surprised at the number of adamantly Republican friends that voted for Obama and not McCain. I’d say at LEAST five of my formerly Republican friends wound up supporting Obama, and that’s actually an amazing number for “these here parts.”

I still drive around town with my Obama-Biden magnet on my car, and feel prouder than ever to be the kind of Oklahoman that the majority of these shit-kickers don’t understand. It was also very, VERY fun gloating after having spent two elections in a row being teased and laughed at when “their guy” won *cough* stole the election.

I am also proud to say that I’m leaving this state in the spring, and heading for greener pastures [Portland, Oregon]. This is a tough, tough place in which to live when you’re not a Jesus freak. But at least while I was here, I remained a very proud, educated, liberal, open-minded “outsider.”

bumpkis

BARTCOP is from Oklahoma…very astute and funny pol blogger…blue all the way.

cheesesauce

I am proud to be an Okie who voted for Obama. I had bet a military person a dollar that Obama would win. He was so seduced by all of the tripe eaters and bullshitters on TV / AM radio that he would giggle every time he saw me so confident was he of a McCain/Palin victory. That being said, he showed himself to be an honorable person and paid up on the bet. I haven’t spent the dollar yet. I’m trying to decide what to do with that kind of prosperity. : )

The great blog Down With Tyranny regularly has insightful posts about Oklahoma politics, with some of the best rants against Inhofe for years now, and was a good source of info about the Andrew Rice campaign. Today, a look at what the hell happened in Oklahoma last Tuesday. Leading in to the piece is a photo from the Dust Bowl which still epitomizes Oklahoma’s seemingly hopeless situation.

Can You Guess Which State Was The Most Reactionary In This Year’s Elections? Hint: Think Rodgers and Hammerstein

But the state least connected to the American mainstream and most politically isolated on Tuesday was poor, sad, reactionary Oklahoma, which gave almost 66% of it’s vote, the most of any state, to McCain. While analysts are working on a post-mortem, or autopsy, on McCain’s no longer twitching campaign, Oklahomans must be wondering what’s wrong with the rest of America.

Daily Kos’s most famous and beloved Okie diaries, droogie6655321, riffed off Thomas Frank’s 2005 examination of Kansas politics, with What’s the Matter with Oklahoma?

What I’m not interested in is sweeping generalities about Oklahomans. If you want to call us all ignorant, misinformed, racist or backward, I suggest you do it an upcoming open thread and not here. As unfathomable as it may seem to us, there is a reason why Oklahomans choose Republicans over Democrats, and I want to know why.

Droogie’s question generated 988 comments and was followed by Sooner Kos discussion threads here and here

The traditional media weighed in on the anomaly which is Oklahoma. The New York Times:

Where Tuesday’s Tide Was All Republican

“Oklahoma Democrats, with very few exceptions, are the old-line white Southern Democrats,” said David Ray, another political scientist at the university. “They don’t like liberals or liberalism.”

Indeed, the state has a political landscape closely resembling that of the old solidly Democratic South, especially in its southeastern corner, known as Little Dixie, where many Southerners settled after the Civil War. When conservatives of the Old South began abandoning the party decades ago, Oklahoma’s Democrats lagged behind the historical trend. Further, the state has relatively small black and Hispanic populations, and so the Democrats did not absorb as many new voters from those groups as in the states of the old Confederacy.

These days Oklahoma Democrats dread running for local office in presidential election years, for fear of being associated with liberal nominees at the top of the ticket.

“Being liberal in Oklahoma, with the exception of a few legislative districts, will not get you elected,” said State Representative Joe Dorman, a conservative Democrat.

[...]

But Mr. Gaddie said that perhaps the most important factor in Mr. McCain’s strong showing here was religion. An Edison/Mitofsky exit poll found that more than half of Oklahoma voters identified themselves as evangelical Christians and that a heavy majority of them had voted for Mr. McCain.

Mr. Gaddie, himself a pollster as well as a college professor, said: “A question we always ask in our polls is ‘How often do you attend church services?’ If a Democrat is not going to vote for a Democrat, they are a frequent church attender.”

Another advantage for Mr. McCain was that the state’s economy, based mostly on the oil and gas industry, has been buffered somewhat from the national economic slowdown. Unemployment remains low, the housing market stable.

For all of that, the Democratic Party is far from dead in Oklahoma, especially in the state’s southeastern section, where, despite the social conservatism, many people still talk about the New Deal and revere Franklin D. Roosevelt.

and Washington Post also remarked on the Oklahoma phenom.

As Much of Nation Went Blue, Okla. Applied Extra Coat of Red

Exit polls found that more than half of Oklahoma voters identified themselves as white, evangelical or born-again Christians. Of those, a heavy majority went for McCain.

State Republican Chairman Gary Jones said it was “not so much an issue of race,” but rather of conservative Oklahomans voting against someone known as “the most liberal member of the Senate.”

Jones said the conservative positions of McCain’s running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, helped motivate Oklahoma voters.

One thing all these analysts seem to agree on is that Oklahoma not being so hard hit by the economic downturn played a part in the election results. We just aren’t hurting as bad as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina, et. al.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. But in Oklahoma, the pain wasn’t great enough to trump the other ideology (“family values”) and/or misconceptions about Obama as elsewhere in the nation.

If Obama does a good job as president, which I expect him to do, perhaps Oklahomans will at least drop the latter rationale for not voting for him when he runs for re-election in 2012.

This is Sarah Palin, from a speech supposedly made to demonstrate “Commitment To Children With Special Needs”

This is a matter of how we prioritize the money that we spend. We’ve got a three trillion dollar budget, and Congress spends some 18 billion dollars a year on earmarks for political pet projects. That’s more than the shortfall to fully fund the IDEA. And where does a lot of that earmark money end up? It goes to projects having little or nothing to do with the public good — things like fruit fly research…

As any half-functional high-schooler knows, much of what we know about the causes and treatment of genetic disorders (like Down Syndrome, which Palin’s youngest child has) is grounded in research on fruit flies.

If this is the path Christianity is on, and it certainly seems to be (with apologies to my intellectual Christian friends who are sadly in the minority of their faith), then, thanks to the principles of evolution, it will be extinct in a couple of generations. Good riddance. That level of stupid simply cannot sustain itself.

A science blog, BiochemicalSoul, said this:

To decry research in [condescending and amazed tone] “the fruit fly” is a testament to the true idiocy of this woman and to the failure of our public education system. In fact, her own father, Chuck Heath, was a biology teacher – obviously a complete failure of a biology teacher.

(Well Palin herself has been a failure in passing on her values — abstinence outside of marriage — to her children, so there you go: epic FAIL.)

But I liked what Newsweek’s Richard Wolfe said: “This is the most mindless, ignorant, uninformed comment that we have seen from Governor Palin so far, and there’s been a lot of competition for that prize.”

So, yeah, Sarah’s a winner of many prizes. Now go back to Wasilla with your crown and STFU.

Update:

Mithras looks ahead to Palin’s designs on 2012, in a very fun, snarky read:

All this just goes to prove one thing: John McCain used to be a maverick, but isn’t any longer. Sarah Palin is the true maverick. She’s so mavericky, she realized McCain was no longer a maverick a millisecond after the convention, long before anyone else. She’s the ultimate maverick, immune to coercion, restraint, prudence, education, facts, intelligence and common sense. She goes her own way. That’s just what the country is hungering for: A combination of early-Alzheimer’s Reagan and George W. Bush circa Katrina.

And found at Crooks & Liars:

In fact, irony of all ironies, fruit fly research has actually aided in understanding a genetic component or predisposition towards autism.

2008:

Music by Hookers and Blow. So wish I was kidding. Nice family values you got there, Johnny and Sarah.