By Janice Francis-Smith
The Journal Record
10/26/2006

OKLAHOMA CITY – A lobbyist for specialty hospitals stands ready to do battle again in 2007. Lobbyist Patrick Gaines represents the Independent Medical Providers Action Council of Oklahoma Inc., also called IMPAC. Members include about 15 of Oklahoma’s 140 specialty hospitals, medical facilities that focus only on specific procedures, such as heart surgery.

In Oklahoma and nationwide, the proliferation of specialty hospitals has raised concern among some health care officials, particularly advocates of large general hospitals. Some analysts find general hospitals increasingly lose lucrative procedures like heart surgeries to specialty hospitals. General hospitals use such revenue to offset money lost providing emergency care for people with little or no health insurance.

On the other hand, specialty hospitals often rate higher in patient care and customer service surveys.

A temporary federal moratorium lifted this year had prevented construction of specialty hospitals for nearly two years as health care professionals studied the impact such facilities had on the industry. With that moratorium ended, analysts foresee construction of more specialty facilities in the near future.

Gains expects some industry leaders will seek both federal and state legislation to slow that growth.

In past years, Oklahoma legislators failed to pass bills requiring specialty
hospitals provide a mandated level of charity care for the uninsured or underinsured. The last one considered proposed both specialty and general hospitals pay into a fund to leverage federal Medicaid dollars. Specialty facilities opposed the measure on principle, said Gains, since the fund would primarily benefit general hospitals.

On the federal level, some have called for reinstating the moratorium.

“Congress can talk about something for years and never do anything about
it,” said Gaines. “We hope it stays just talk.”

By CURTIS KILLMAN World Staff Writer
10/27/2006

Drew Edmondson crashes an industry media event taking aim at his campaign ads.

Attorney General Drew Edmondson crashed a press conference Thursday called by the poultry industry to criticize his campaign ads.

The back-to-back press conferences, held at the downtown Tulsa Press Club, represented a live version of the media campaigns both Edmondson and the poultry industry have waged against each other during this election season.

The back-and-forth nature of the event even featured a poultry industry representative quizzing Edmondson about his prior claims that the poultry industry is the chief reason for degradation of water quality in the Illinois River watershed.
Read more…

State Senate Republican Leader Glenn Coffee said polls released today by the Tulsa World are “old news” and do not reflect GOP momentum in several key state Senate races. Coffee said that attack ads launched this week by the DLCC (The Democrat Legislative Campaign Committee) proves that Democrats are worried about losing their majority in the Oklahoma Senate.

“These polls are old news – about 10 days old, in fact. They don’t reflect the current reality on the ground, which is that Republicans have gained momentum in our key races,” Coffee said.

“Our plan is to win three or more seats on election day, not to be ahead in a newspaper poll taken three weeks before the election. I strongly believe that our strategy is working, and that voters in these districts are on track to make history by electing the first- ever Republican majority in the state Senate,” he said.

Coffee provided OKPNS a breakdown of the important Senate races this election cycle and questioned why the Tulsa World did not release polling data for Senate District 24, where one of the Democrats’ most vulnerable incumbents, Daisy Lawler, is in big trouble in her race against Republican challenger Anthony Sykes.

“Daisy Lawler and her liberal East Coast friends from the DLCC are already spending tens of thousands of dollars on attack ads to prop up Daisy’s failing campaign. This is evidence that Daisy Lawler is in huge trouble in this conservative district, which doesn’t like her liberal voting record – from giving in-state tuition and scholarships to illegal immigrants to voting to block an amendment to immediately eliminate the death tax,” Coffee stated.

In Senate District 18, Coffee said an attack ad launched by incumbent Mary Easley and the DLCC is backfiring.

“We’re seeing significant Democrat voters moving toward Republican Mark Wofford because of these misleading attacks. The Wofford campaign has already received dozens of calls of support from democrat voters who can’t believe that Mary Easley is attacking Wofford and fibbing about her own liberal record on illegal immigraton,” Coffee said.

Coffee said that in Senate District 12, trial lawyer John Mark Young has stooped to attacking Brain Bingman’s character, and is hiding from his own record as a trial lawyer of representing some of Creek County’s worst criminals.

“Democrats were caught off guard by U.S. Senator Tom Coburn’s TV ad supporting Republican Brian Bingman, so now the Young campaign has brought in a group of Washington, DC, liberals backed by Hillary Clinton and Howard Dean to falsely attack Brian Bingman’s character,” Coffee said.

In Senate District 2, trial Lawyer Sean Burrage is trying to hang on to a razor-thin lead that is shrinking daily, Coffee said.

“Despite spending half-a-million dollars donated by power-hungry trial lawyers, Sean Burrage’s campaign is gasping for air. He has spent a fortune on TV ads, yet our internal polling shows he hasn’t moved an inch in weeks and is actually losing ground to Republican Ami Shaffer,” Coffee said. “Ami Shaffer has soundly defeated Sean Burrage in every debate, and the average Democrat voter is shifting away from Burrage, who is the powerful politicians’ choice, and moving toward the people’s choice, Ami Shaffer.”

Coffee said there is also an indication that Republicans are picking up momentum in several other Democrat-held districts: Senate District 26, where Republican Todd Russ is facing trial lawyer Tom Ivester; Senate District 16, where Republican Ron Davis is running against liberal John Sparks; and Senate District 32, where Democrat incumbent Randy Bass is being challenged by Lt. Col. (ret.) Ed Petersen.

As we correctly stated recently, elections seem to always bring out Democratic politicians at African American churches and symbolic events. Governor Henry has gone a step beyond the usual pandering by signing basically meaningless legislation yesterday at the Capitol. The legislation the good governor signed, clears the way for developing an African-American Centennial Plaza on the grounds of the state Capitol.

How can we say that legislation establishing an African American Centennial Plaza is symbolic and meaningless? It’s meaningless because the development is estimated to cost 4 million dollars with half the costs required from private donations. Here’s the rub. The legislation Henry signed forbids supporters from asking the state for money to help pay for it! How much have supporters raised so far- $30,000.

According to The Oklahoman, civil rights activist Clara Luper “scolded” the Governor saying, “They should give us respect. It’s not their money, we all pay taxes.” Henry further patronized the African American’s in attendance by saying, “I think the African-American Centennial Plaza is an extremely important project for Oklahoma.”

It was so important Governor – that in a year with record budget surpluses and your high approval ratings – you didn’t feel it was important enough to use a little of your political capital to secure SOME funding for the project. Some things never change!

*More*

From Today’s New York Times: Democrats Fear Disillusionment in Black Voters

From the Powerline blog:

“If black Americans don’t feel especially motivated to vote for Democrats, as the Times fears, maybe it’s because they’ve noticed that several decades of voting for Democrats has done them no perceptible good. Or maybe it’s because the black candidates with whom voters want to identify are Republicans like Michael Steele.”

ODP attempts to help flagging Hunter campaign with intelligence insulting press releases

ODP Media Release: Hunter Supports Smart Science; Fallin Denies Life-Saving Research

(Thank goodness Dr. Hunter doesn’t support dumb science!)

Mary Fallin Opposes Breast Cancer Research; Sen. Judy Eason McIntyre At Home Recovering

(A woman with a daughter opposes breast cancer research??? Give me a break!)

Tin Ear – An insensitivity to subtlety or appropriateness in verbal expression. ~ Dictionary.com

The Oklahoma Political News Service is pleased to announce that Comanche County Democratic Chairman Mike Weddington is the recipient of our first ever “Political Tin Ear” Award. Mr Weddington – who was called out by us and The Oklahoman recently regarding his racist email and innuendos against District 62 candidate T.W. Shannon - incredibly still doesn’t get it.

Weddington seems to believe that he can deflect his racist venom by rehashing his alternative strategy of now questioning Mr. Shannon’s impressive educational and business credentials (Read below)

Anonymous sources have told OKPNS that Weddington and the Reese Brothers have been taken to the woodshed by Oklahoma Democratic Party officials for their tactics.

“The fact still remains that he has NEVER denied the questions, and furthermore, what do you think he would say if he knew that the republican party approached Janice Drewry first, and wanted her to change parties and run as their candidate? I bet he would understand why they asked him to uproot his family and move back to Lawton from his OKC metropolitan home and pretend that he has been in Lawton all along. I can only imagine the embarrassment (sic) he would feel knowing he is being played as a political operative (republican puppet). Hope he hasn’t sold his other house, he may still be able to move back there on Nov 8th and resume his occupation, whatever that was.”

Madame Askins, fresh from her recent “Wine Tasting & Art Auction” fundraiser, has learned how to be “nuanced” in her answers to controversial questions. We can’t blame her for not wanting to upset her ritzy patrons, especially after they presumably wrote her thousands of dollars worth of checks – in between discussing abstract art and sipping Bordeaux.

While most ordinary Oklahomans (Democrats & Republicans alike) are strongly against gay marriage and can’t relate to the circles Madame Askins apparently runs in, she responded with this Clintonesque answer regarding gay marriage at the KFOR town hall debate last night.

“My religion believes marriage is between a man and a woman. But my religion also is the same one that teaches me to treat other people the way I want to be treated and to show tolerance … and that’s what I intend to do.”

As one political observer noted to OKPNS, “She sounded like a blue state Democrat trying to split the difference — not offend traditional Oklahoma voters, but throw a bone to gay activists in the liberal Oklahoma Democrat base.”

The observer also noted that this isn’t the only policy area that Oklahoma Democrats have been accused of duplicity:

“Oklahoma Democrats have for years told voters in districts they are pro-life, then go about quietly killing pro-life bills in committee once at the state capitol. Incidentally, only in the past two years of House Republican control did any significant pro-life bills make it to the governor’s desk. Brad Henry was then forced to reverse his on-the-record pro-abortion stance and sign the bills.”

Law provides vital protection for America

President Bush’s signed the Secure Fence Act this morning. The Act provides for more than 700 miles of border fencing in trouble spots along the southern U.S. border. It also strengthens port security through additional physical barriers and greater use of state-of-the-art technology and surveillance. In addition to securing our southern border, The Act requires the Department of Homeland Security to assess vulnerabilities on the northern border.

The Oklahoma House delegation voted in favor of the bill last month. Congressman Istook, who has been one of the leaders in Congress in the fight to secure America’s borders, today praised this new legislation.

“America’s immigration and security laws are worthless unless we have control of our borders,” said Istook. “Until we have greater control over who is entering our country, we are more vulnerable to attack, more vulnerable to drug trafficking, and open to illegal aliens and criminals flooding in.”

By MICK HINTON AND BARBARA HOBEROCK
World Capitol Bureau

Donations to out-of-state groups are being funneled back to the state via ads for key legislative races.

OKLAHOMA CITY — Oklahoma corporations and individuals have given hundreds of thousands of dollars to out-of-state political organizations that are now spending money in the state.

Two Washington, D.C.-based groups — the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee and the Republican State Leadership Committee — have begun targeting key state Senate races. Both have ties to their respective national parties and the goal of influencing local legislative races.

Internal Revenue Service documents show that donations to the two groups are coming from Oklahoma corporations and individuals. Donors cannot designate where their contributions are spent. Read more…