Sarah in the Spotlight

++ AGENDA FOR THIS WEEK’S MEETING
++ ANNOUNCEMENTS
++ THE RESULT OF YOUR CALLS ON HJR 1054 THE OKLAHOMAN’S EDITORIAL PAGE
++ IS WRONG AGAIN!
++ SHOULD I GET A MEDAL OR HAVE MY HEAD EXAMINED?
++ SARAH IN THE SPOTLIGHT
++ OCPAC MEMBERSHIP UPDATE

++ AGENDA FOR THIS WEEK’S MEETING

Our 12 noon luncheon for Wednesday, February 10th will be held at Italiano’s restaurant, 4801 North Lincoln in OKC. I am really excited to be able to have Mr. Casey Luskin from Seattle Washington as our speaker this Wednesday. Mr. Luskin is a geologist and attorney who currently is on staff at the Discovery Institute serving as the Program Officer in Public Policy and Legal Affairs. The Discovery Institute was featured in Ben Stein’s documentary EXPELLED that was shown in movie theaters across America. Mr. Casey is also co-founder of the Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness (IDEA) Center ( www.ideacenter.org ), a non-profit helping students to investigate evolution by starting “IDEA CLUBS” on college and high school campuses across the nation. Mr. Casey is published in both science and law journals and is one of the nations top experts and debaters on the topic of Intelligent Design. We are very fortunate to have him at our meeting while he is in Oklahoma. Come early and get a good seat. Don’t miss this meeting or you will be sorry. Home school parents should really try to make this meeting, especially with some of their older children.

++ ANNOUNCEMENTS

WEDNESDAY - OKC AREA - The Business and Professional Chapter of the John Birch Society will hold their monthly breakfast meeting this Wednesday morning, February 10th at the Character First Center, 520 West Main in downtown OKC. Breakfast is served at 7:15 and the meeting begins about 7:40 a.m. Our speaker this month will be State Representative Mike Ritze (R-Broken Arrow). He will catch us up on the progress of this year’s legislative session. This is a breakfast buffet for $6.00 and we always have a great time visiting with one another before the meeting starts. Visitors are welcome.

THURSDAY - TULSA AREA - The Tulsa area Republican Men’s Club will meet, 12 noon at the China King Restaurant, 1330 East 71st. The speaker will be Federal District Judge, Greg Frizzell. Pryor to his appointment he was active in Republican party politics and served as vice president of membership for this very club. Time will also be available for candidates to give short updates on their campaigns. For more information contact Bob McDowell at 481-1051.

THURSDAY - OKC AREA - Oklahomans For Sovereignty and Free Enterprise www.ok-safe.org will hold their monthly meeting at the Village Library, 10307 North Penn in OKC. The meeting will begin at
6:45 and last until 8:15 p.m. This meeting will be geared toward both education and activism.

THURSDAY - MOORE - The Sooner Republican Assembly will hold their monthly meeting at Earls Rib in Moore beginning at 6:00 p.m. The speaker will be Mike Jestes, Executive Director for the Oklahoma Family Policy Council. Following his talk there will be a 2 minute “bully pulpit” available to get your most important point across.

THURSDAY - EDMOND - There will be a 5th congressional district
forum for all the Republican candidates running to replace U.S.
Representative Mary Fallin. The location will be in Constitution Hall at the Nigh University Center on the campus of the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond. The forum will begin at 6:30 p.m. and will be moderated by Stuart Jolly, State Director for Americans For Prosperity (AFP). The public is welcome.

FEBRUARY 19TH AND 20TH - The first ever OKLAHOMA LIBERTY CONFERENCE will be held on these two dates. The location will be the Metro Tech Springlake Conference Center, 1900 Springlake Drive in OKC. The conference will begin on Friday at 9:00 a.m. and run till 9:00 p.m..
Then it will continue on Saturday morning at 9:00 a.m. and run until 5:00 p.m. The general admission for the conference will be $6 in advance or $8 at the door.

There will be a special session with the speaker being Arizona Sheriff Richard Mack, author of the book: THE COUNTY SHERIFF - AMERICA’S LAST HOPE. When Bill Clinton was president and the Democrats were successful in passing the Brady Bill to greatly restrict ownership of firearms, there was a portion of the law which required county sheriffs to enforce the law or go to jail. Sheriff Mack refused to do so and filed a suit against the federal government on the grounds that it violated the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It took 6 years to work its way up to the U.S. Supreme Court and they ruled in Sheriff Mack’s favor.

That decision gives great hope to the 10th Amendment movement stirring throughout the land. The special session to be able to hear Sheriff Mack will cost an additional $12 to attend in advance or $14 dollars at the door. The money to attend the Sheriff Mack event will benefit the Oklahoma Constitutional Alliance (OCA) county deputy sheriff bullet proof vest matching grant fund. Most county sheriff departments are strapped for funds and are not able to provide the vests for their deputies. Following the gunning down of 2 deputies in Seminole County last year we wanted to help raise money for deputies in Oklahoma. The overall event is being sponsored by the Sooner Tea Party. For more information send an e-mail to soonerteaparty@gmail.com I believe we will have tickets to the events at this Wednesday’s meeting.

++ THE RESULT OF YOUR CALLS ON HJR 1084

I received an e-mail this afternoon from a lawmaker informing me that the measure to protect Oklahomans from being forced to participate in a federal health care program has been placed on the agenda to be considered in the Rules Committee this Wednesday. Representative Gus Blackwell (R-Goodwell 557-7384) is the Chairman of the committee and is a reasonable lawmaker. If you have time please call these lawmakers and ask for their support to pass this legislation out of the committee so it can head to the next place in the process.

Following are the committee members names and Capitol phone numbers all of which start in the 405 area code: Mike Jackson (R-Enid 557-7317), Tad Jones (R-Claremore 557-7380), John Trebilcock (R-Tulsa 557-7362), Mike Thompson (R-OKC 557-7403), Guy Liebmann (R-OKC 557-7357), Charles Key (R-OKC don‘t bother he is already in favor of the bill), Joe Dorman (D-Rush Springs 557-7305), Richard Morisot (D- OKC 557-7404), Cory Williams (D-Stillwater 557-7411), Jerry Shoemake (D-Morris 557-7373) and Mike Sanders (R-Kingfisher 557-7407). I will try to keep people informed as to this legislation‘s progress. As I said this is one of the most important pieces of legislation for this year’s session. Thanks for responding to the request to contact Speaker Benge’s office.

++ THE OKLAHMAN’S EDITORIAL PAGE IS WRONG AGAIN!

In an editorial on January 30th the Oklahoman took a swipe as Senator Brogdon, claiming him to be a populist candidate. Brogdon, one of the
3 Republican candidates for governor, is proposing legislation to prevent the Turnpike Authority from having the ability to raise tolls without legislative approval. The Oklahoman said: “We remind Brogdon and his supporters that tolls not only pay for turnpike maintenance but Highway Patrol services as well. Thus, taxpayers aren’t required to fund maintenance or patrols. That burden goes solely to turnpike users, many of them from out of state.”

I would suggest the Oklahoman doesn’t need to provide that 3rd grade information to Senator Brogdon or any of his supporters, they understand that perfectly well. The reminding that should go on in this case should come from Brogdon toward the Oklahoman. One of the reasons the Colonists fought our war of Independence was over the issue of “taxation without representation.” To the Oklahoman, when do we hold elections for members of the Turnpike Authority? Those unelected, nameless and faceless bureaucrats have the AUTHORITY to raise the costs, not only on the unemployed, but also on all the rest of us, without any accountability to the citizens. That is akin to “taxation without representation.”

This nameless faceless bunch at the Authority raised the fees last year, suggesting the increases were needed. A reliable source informed me that the Turnpike Authority was still operating in the black without the increase. In addition, based on their budget, it appears that the Turnpike Authority has been turning over several million dollars each year to ODOT. I must ask why and on what authority?
Brogdon is correct to want to bring legislative oversight to the Turnpike Authority, because lawmakers are not nameless faceless bureaucrats. We know who they are and they stand accountable to the citizens every two and four years.

If the Turnpike Authority is wisely using their fees and the revenues are insufficient, then the legislature can approve an increase, but the Authority should have to justify such and not act like an bunch of elitists, accountable to no one. The Oklahoman is wrong on this one and Senator Brogdon is right on again.

++ SHOULD I GET A MEDAL OR HAVE MY HEAD EXAMINED?

On Monday, February 1st I made the decision to sit in the House Chambers and listen to the Governor’s State of the State speech. I normally listen every year, on live radio. However, this was the first time in person and my head is still hurting. Just a few musings as Governor Henry is certainly a governor with the philosophy of big government.

His desire to “hold harmless” education is pandering to the first degree. The education industry is the most powerful special interest in the state as in most states. Their power is bolstered by people who correctly think education is important, but don’t realize that the path to quality education can’t be attained in today’s government schools, though may good teachers are trying their best. The system now ensures a mediocre to poor quality education. It is really hard to balance the budget in a shortfall by not cutting education dollars when education represents over 55% of the total budget. I appreciate Senator Coffee’s (R-OKC) insistence that education also be carefully considered in budget negotiations.

The one thing I did agree with the governor was his call to consolidate government agencies. The Republicans, led by Representative Jason Murphy (R-Guthrie) are making headway on that project and perhaps with the Governor’s help they may really make gains this year. Government modernization, passed just last year is already beginning to reap millions of dollars in savings.

The one thing that bothered me the most was seeing so many Republicans act like little goobers in a musical jack in the box. Jumping up and clapping on cue as the governor was proposing some of his big government plans. The one idea that greatly disturbs me is the idea of raising the Rainy Day cap from $600 million to $900 million dollars.
Please let me explain. As individuals, we should want to have a large rainy day or emergency fund. After all, it is still our money while in storage, and it also has the opportunity to bring us an increase as we invest it.

However, when it comes to government, I don’t want large sums of our money held in storage, preventing us from having use of our own money.
More important than that, most lawmakers lack the courage to cut wasteful sectors of government and inefficiencies, much less eliminate those areas of government that involve improper or immoral functions.

It is only in the hard times we seem to be able to cut the size of government. With that in mind, both Senator Ford (R-Bartlesville) and Branan (R-OKC), both offering legislation to raise the cap on the rainy day fund, show their lack of understanding on this strategy. Or perhaps they really aren’t that conservative, but rather have fallen in love with government wanting it to be really successful in every aspect, regardless of efficiency or propriety? These are normally good guys, but hopefully their legislation will die a glorious death somewhere in the process. The current issue of the Oklahoma Gazette has two commentaries (Put up or shut up and the counter point, Money
fights) about the opportunity to act like a true conservative. It will be on the news stands through Wednesday, really worth the read. I think my head is still hurting from having to listen to the governor as his speeches sound as if he is speaking to 3rd graders.

++ SARAH IN THE SPOTLIGHT

With Sarah Palin’s address to the rather small tea party gathering this past weekend in Nashville, she has the liberal loons across America and especially those of the press and commentators in a tizzy.
Their complaints about her are silly and really nothing more than the ranting’s of political gad-flies trying to turn public opinion against her.

I am trying to like her, but as I mentioned last week her endorsement of John McCain in the Arizona senate race shows she is willing to play the kind of games that elect unreliable RINOs like McCain. Her endorsement of Texas Governor Perry also disturbs me. Perry’s recent proclamations about Texas sovereignty and the 10th amendment are helpful, but conservatives in Texas mostly believe he is pandering to them after his several years effort to shove the Trans Texas Corridor down the throats of the citizens of Texas and thus move ever closer to establishing a North American Union. Palin has the opportunity to endorse a true conservative by the name of Debra Medina, but chose to play the game and stay with the typical big government Republican.

As a result of my e-mail last week, one of our readers in the Tulsa area sent me documentation about her support for the Convention on the Law Of The Sea Treaty, better known to its critics over the years as the LOST treaty. The following is her statement in 2007 while Governor of Alaska: “I want to put my administration on record in support of the convention as the predicate for asserting sovereign rights that will be of benefit to Alaska and the nation.” Sarah Palin.

Now folks, Ronald Reagan was very opposed to this treaty as he knew it actually destroys American Sovereignty. If passed it would grant regulatory control over all shipping lanes and mineral wealth in the oceans to the United Nations. It is my understanding that the current version is even worse than when Reagan was President as it now also includes navigable waterways.

Rather than just bowing down to the feet of this charismatic politician, real conservatives need to be asking her questions like what kind of change will you bring to Washington when you support people like McCain and Perry? Also, what is your opinion of the U.N., its agenda and do you still support the LOST treaty. If she does, then someone needs to ask if she would be willing to read a critical report on the treaty or perhaps spend some time with a conservative expert on the subject.

Conservatives must break free from the habit of electing people we like, but rather elect people who will govern according to the principles of good government and protect our national sovereignty among other things.

++ OCPAC MEMBERSHIP UPDATE

In Tulsa this past Saturday, I really got to meet a large number of fine folks. We gathered a large number of new names for our e-mail list and a lot of people obtained a lot of educational materials to further develop their conservative ideology as well as share with others. Memberships continue to come in from all over the state. We are now up to 127 dues paying members. I want to invite folks to join if you have not done so already. Thanks so much for all who have already joined so far this year. For instructions on how to become a dues paying member, see below following my sign off.

I look forward to seeing everyone this Wednesday.

Charlie Meadows
Charliemeadows7@gmail.com