The liberal blog SoonerThought- which recently accused us of being “homophobic”- suffers the ire today of fierce second amendment right defender Mike McCarville:

“SoonerThought, a lightly-read blog, introduced race into the U. S. Supreme Court’s 2nd Amendment ruling today…

The writer obviously is ignorant of the fact that “Saturday Night Special” refers to inexpensive firearms that white nightriders wanted to keep out of the hands of Southern blacks in the years after the Civil War. Blacks and poor whites could not afford more expensive firearms to protect themselves, so they purchased the inexpensive weapons they could afford. The primary targets of laws in the South prohibiting ownership of such firearms were blacks; armed nightriders, most of them wearing white sheets or black and white robes, wanted their prey unarmed and defenseless. Three such opponents of the right to keep and bear arms are pictured.” Read more…

Art by Rafael Calonzo, Jr (Supersonicsoul.com)

“It is not our interest to move or relocate the team”

“We fully intend to fulfill our obligation to KeyArena”

“I don’t think having a franchise that is leaving town is very good for anybody.”

“I am absolutely committed to the teams and committed to keeping them in the Seattle region.”

Related:

Paul Jacob: “My question is — Why should any government entity ever be spending taxpayer money on stadiums? There are tickets and promotions and things that raise mucho dinero for franchises. Top players scoop up millions in salary. If big-time sports are not financially viable operations, what could be? And if sometimes owners lack as much money as they might like to spend on a stadium, why should a taxpayer who never watches a game have to pay for it? Read more…

“The worst newspaper in America”

What’s the price you pay in Oklahoma if you want to keep your scandal out of the formerly relevant, worst paper in the country?

How about $1 million? Or perhaps this explains it better.

As you may recall, our blog of commentary and news has broken a number of stories over the years the paper won’t touch. We know that the paper is a joke, and even reporters with the “country’s worst newspaper” say this from time to time to OKPNS privately. Morale is very low at the paper, as the management is banking on the woeful Internet “TV” station, Newsok.TV. We’re especially riveted by the Ed Kelley Show and the Ladies’ Room. Must see TV!

So we turned to the paper today to see how they would follow the blockbuster revelations that Chesapeake Energy has been snared in a campaign finance controversy in Arkansas. We were shocked, shocked I say, to see nothing about the revelations of the Arkansas Gazette reported here Monday! But we did find that Chesapeake is giving OSU some money! Now THAT is quality journalism.

But we have faith in the country’s worst newspaper: we know the Chesapeake campaign story will be in TOMORROW’S newspaper. Just don’t hold your breath.

By Kirk Shelley

In a couple of months the GOP nominee is going to go after Jim Roth an openly homosexual Democrat. I keep hearing that “this race is a slam dunk, the people of Oklahoma won’t put up with that.” The conventional wisdom is conservative Oklahoma will immediately oppose a homosexual candidate.

There is going to be a challenge facing Roth’s opponent in balancing the desire of their anti-homosexual supporters to “go after him” and not alienating socially liberal/libertarian Republicans.

Here are the three major assumptions for making Roth’s private proclivities a major part of the campaign:

1) Oklahoma is a very conservative/evangelical state

2) We hate homosexuals

The first observation is true. We have one of the highest rates of regular church attendance in the country. When I’ve worked with national companies doing voter issue identification work, they keep wondering why voters who are adamantly pro-life are 20% higher than the national average. Our conservative values stick out.

Do Oklahomans hate homosexuals? Well we certainly hate arrogant in your face attempts to push the homosexual agenda down our throats, but then again so do people in other state. There have been parental protests in the liberal states Vermont and California when schools try to cram gay rights propaganda down our kid’s throats.

So what does that mean to the candidate who faces Roth? First your polling and focus groups is going to show that a large number of likely voters are going to vote against a homosexual. The temptation will be bang that issue like a sledge hammer . . . and it will backfire.

Let’s look at some other examples:

· When Roth was running for County Commissioner that was the primary hit against him, it didn’t work.

· David Boren was dogged for years of rumors of homosexuality, but it didn’t work – albeit President Boren attacked the rumor on a stack of Bibles.

· Bill Allian was running for Governor of Mississippi in 1983, several transsexual prostitutes came forward claiming that Allian was a big client. The heavy handed tactic backfired.

So what does it mean? Don’t get in the trap of believing the polls that simply pointing our Roth’s sexual preference is going to win the race for you. Name calling doesn’t win elections; you have to show how a candidates behavior impacts public policy. Some cases are pretty easy. Cheating Spouses = Cheating Politician. Hypocrisy can be identified with a holy roller caught with a prostitute. Some folks are just going to wonder, “what difference does Roth’s behavior make in my utility bill?”

Before the GOP primary we may want to ask the candidates “how are you going to go after Roth?” So here are the question:

· Do you want to make Roth’s public sexual orientation?

· How do you publicize Roth’s homosexuality to those who don’t know it?

· Can you make the case that Roth’s sexuality affects his job?

· Here’s a big one – how are you going to react to some goofy group of citizens who run around with signs that say “God Hate Fags”?

Everyone of these questions has a big up and downside and worthy of some good strategy sessions.

Mr. Shelley is President of Shelley Strategic Services. His consulting for pro-business organizations has included successfully completed projects in Iowa, Oklahoma, Indiana, Kentucky, Nevada, New Mexico, Mississippi, Arizona, Louisiana and Alabama. As a general consultant, Mr. Shelley has worked on 137 State House and Senate campaigns in 5 states and has a winning percentage of 92%.

A graduate of East Carolina University, Mr. Shelley lives in Oklahoma City with his wife and four children.

Hat tip: The Lost Ogle

Just how Commissioner Roth likes his men; stiff and hard. If he could only get him drunk!

Synopsis: Men in drag singing to impeach Rep. Sally Kern. Some liberals have WAAAAAAY too much time on their hands!

We guess Ronald Reagan’s 11th commandment doesn’t apply when the person you’re bashing is dead!

By Rep. Tom Cole 

Obama has been compared to many iconic figures in American political history. But last week we saw another aspect of the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee’s character and political style that ought to give every seasoned observer across the political spectrum pause. Obama’s decision to break his word and opt out of the public financing system and the manner in which he justified that decision were Nixonian to the core.

The facts of the matter are simple enough. Obama made verbal and written promises to accept public financing in the general election campaign if his Republican opponent would agree to do the same. John McCain has indicated he will do so, even in the face of Obama’s reversal. So, in his first consequential decision since becoming his party’s nominee Obama chose to break his word to the American people. Richard Nixon would understand. Obama is betting that his liberal allies and the media will too. Read more…

Picture courtesy of Conium

The website www.oklittermarket.org has been deactivated. Why is this important you ask? This is the website which promotes animal manure transfer programs and puts buyers and sellers of poultry litter together to move poultry litter out of nutrient-threatened watersheds. More strong arming from W.A.D.?

Related:

FLASHBACK: The Means Justifies the Ends Mr. Attorney General?

Rush Limbaugh knows a liberal when he sees one, and he sees one in Mickey Edwards.

Edwards, the former Oklahoma congressman who was run off by Oklahoma voters in 1992, recently engaged in a back-and-forth conversation with OKPNS after we exposed Corporation Commissioner Jeff Cloud’s ties to the ultra-liberal think tank, the Aspen Institute.

Edwards attempted to deflect the heat Cloud was catching after the public learned thorough OKPNS’ posts that Cloud was happily affiliated with the left-wing group. Cloud, whose poor work ethic is unattractive to the private sector, foolishly promoted his ties to the liberal group. While we do not know if Cloud was unaware of the group’s leftist pedigree, or if he simply didn’t understand, the damage was done, and Edwards tried to rescue his clueless pal by launching a broadside at OKPNS reporting, claiming he and the institute were not liberal, but nobody was buying.

So today, Rush Limbaugh comes to witness on the side of OKPNS original assertions: Mickey Edwards is indeed a Republican turned liberal, and his fellows at the Aspen Institute, including rate-raising Corporation Commissioner Jeff Cloud are too. From today’s Rush Limbaugh Program:

“Anyway, back to Mickey Edwards, a retired congressman from Oklahoma. Now, Mickey Edwards used to have a very conservative pedigree. Mickey Edwards was one of the three founding trustees of the Heritage Foundation, and he used to be the national chairman of the American Conservative Union. However, when Mickey Edwards left Congress, he taught at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and the Harvard Law School for 11 years. He’d been ensconced at Harvard a long time. He’s also been one of those guys calling for a Republican Party reformation along the lines of the other sellouts in the party.

“Edwards is married to Elizabeth Sherman, Ph.D., well-known Democrat political operative from Massachusetts. Sherman directed the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy at the University of Massachusetts and served as a research fellow from 2001 to 2004 at the Center for Public Leadership and the Institute as for Politics, 1994, both at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.” Well, that explains it. There’s always — there’s always! — a woman involved in this somewhere along the way. A good conservative guy from Oklahoma, goes to Washington. He’s one of the original trustees at the Heritage Foundation, falls in love with some liberal babe and that’s it, it’s over. Read more…

Related:

OKPNS: Mickey Leftwings Strikes Again!

Once again, the political amateurs that run Chesapeake Energy’s public affairs have thumbed their noses at the rules, and once again they’ve been exposed, only this time the punishment may be more than public humiliation. From The Arkansas Democrat Gazette:

“House Speaker-designate Rep. Robbie Wills reported a $2,000 contribution for the primary election from Chesapeake Operating Inc. on May 19, after reporting a $1,000 contribution for the primary election from the same Oklahoma City-based firm on Oct. 12. Under state law, the contribution limit in state races is $2,000 per candidate per election.”

After their attempt to repeal Oklahoma’s immigration reform law was exposed and subsequently abandoned under humiliating circumstances, they have put the Arkansas House Speaker-designate’s career in jeopardy over bungling of that state’s campaign finance laws. The Gazette today exposed the wrong doing, with someone named Danny Games playing the doofus role Chesapeake employee Tom Price played in the Oklahoma escapades.

Doubtless Arkansas ethics officials will be looking into this matter, and we will report on this developing story.