ANNOUNCEMENTS & GARY BEASLEY’S PASSING

++ AGENDA FOR THIS WEEK’S MEETING
++ ANNOUNCEMENTS & GARY BEASLEY’S PASSING
++ SPEAKER-ELECT STEEL’S RESPONSE
++ THE SENATOR HARRY COATES SAGA
++ OCPAC MEMBERSHIP


++ AGENDA FOR THIS WEEK’S MEETING

Our 12 noon luncheon for Wednesday, December 8th will be held at
Italiano’s restaurant, 4801 North Lincoln in OKC. We will spend some
time discussing the “Do The Right Thing Tea Party” demonstration and
some possible ongoing efforts to try and keep Republicans focused on
EVERY important issue, not just on the important economic issues. As a
guest speaker we will have Mr. Robert Dani, founder and leader of the
High Noon Club, which meets every Friday 12 noon, at H&H gun range in
OKC. I attended this past Friday for my 2nd time and am so glad to see
another vibrant club growing and getting involved to make Oklahoma a
better place. It is billed as a citizens forum for Political Issues. I
want Bob to tell us how the club came about, what they are doing today
and what might be part of their future vision. In addition, if we have
time I want to show a fairly new DVD produced by the John Birch
Society titled: AMERICAN TYRANNY STEP BY STEP - SAVING OUR REPUBLIC.
This excellent production will chronicle some of the commonalities
with all tyrants and more specifically some of the things Adolph
Hitler did once he came to power in an attempt to solidify his power.
The DVD will show some of the parallels between Hitler and President
Obama as his regiments of anti-Americans have worked to solidify their
power. The similarities are shocking.

++ ANNOUNCEMENTS

** Early last week, Gary Beasley’s wife sent me an e-mail to let me
know that Gary had passed away. I probably first met Gary in about
1986 as we were both getting involved in Logan County Republican party
politics. At the time Gary lived in Crescent where he operated a metal
reclamation business with his father.

Gary was very helpful to me when I ran for the State Senate in 1990
against Enoch Kelley Haney from Seminole. He was also one of the first
to attend the Wednesday lunch bunch, which eventually became a
debating society and then turned into OCPAC.

If my memory serves me correctly, Gary had been an anti-war, anti-
American hippy who moved to Belise in Central America. Somewhere
during that time, he had his eyes opened and became a true American
patriot. He had a love in his heart for the nation of Israel and saw
their value as an American ally. He was always articulate in pointing
out the evils and dangers of Islam. In recent years, Gary’s health had
declined as he had been restricted to using a cane or wheelchair and
could only occasionally attend OCPAC meetings. I always enjoyed
hearing Gary’s voice when he would call in to national radio programs,
always expressing his points succinctly. Oklahoma lost a great
citizen. Please pray for Gary’s widow and his family.

** THURSDAY EVENING - MOORE AREA - The Sooner Republican Assembly
will have their Christmas dinner starting at 6:00 p.m. It will be held
at Earls Rib Palace in Moore. No reservations are needed as you can
order off the menu. Pastor Dan Fisher will be speaking about the 7
lies we’re being told about America.

** THURSDAY EVENING - TULSA AREA - The Tulsa area Republican
Assembly will have their monthly meeting this Thursday evening with
the meal starting at 6 and the meeting starting at 7:00 p.m. The
location is the Golden Corral, at 71st and Mingo, just west of Highway
169. Speaking will be Dan Sullivan, the next House Majority floor
leader. Hopefully those in attendance will ask him if he will support
efforts to re-claim our God given rights to bear arms.

** THURSDAY EVENING - ENID AREA - The Oklahoma Council of Public
Affairs (OCPA) and we the people are hosting a dinner event featuring
Cato Institute scholar Timothy Sandefur, author of THE RIGHT TO EARN A
LIVING: ECONOMIC FREEDOM AND THE LAW. The event begins at 6:00 p.m.,
is open to the public and the dinner is free. However, seating is
limited so you must RSVP to Chelsea@ocpacthink.org or call (405)
602-1667. The location will be the Advance Food Complex, 5110
Enterprise Blvd. in Enid (corner of East Willow and North 54th) Mr.
Sandefur is an attorney who specializes in protecting businesses from
abusive government overreach and most especially the improper use of
eminent domain.

++ SPEAKER-ELECT STEEL’S RESPONSE

The timeline, Thanksgiving day the upsetting article appears in the
Oklahoman, later that day Representative Terrill issued a press
release calling on Speaker-elect Kris Steele to issue a statement
clarifying and repudiating certain aspects of the article. On Tuesday
the 30th I sent out the weekly OCPAC e-mail announcing that the
Oklahoman had not printed Terrill’s press release, so I published it.
The next day the Oklahoman did an article which included an interview
with Representative Terrill. This past Wednesday, Representative
Steele issued a response to clarify his positions, but still left many
concerned about certain issues. Steele’s response was published
yesterday, in Sunday’s Oklahoman as a point of view.

First, let me say the tone of the response was good, it even had some
well thought out verbiage regarding the economy. As an example he
said: “I believe our agenda must take a balanced approach that
focuses on conservative solutions to fiscal and social policy.” Well
stated in my opinion. He went on to say: “ Because the national
recession has left many jobless and created a $600 million state
shortfall, it is clear we must enact sensible reforms that ALLOW
(emphasis mine) Oklahomans to reach their economic potential and grow
our state economy.” Steele continued, “My hope is to ESTABLISH AN
ENVIRONMENT (emphasis mine) in Oklahoma that is conducive to job
growth, job creation and job enhancement. That focus must include
lawsuit reform, workers’ compensation reform, restructuring of the tax
code and similar policies.”

Those 3 paragraphs are excellent if he really understands what he said
as well as what he didn’t say and if he really means what he said.
Note, he didn’t use the words “economic development”, as anytime a
government official at any level uses those words, it convey a message
that it is the GOVERNMENT’S responsibility to develop the economy. If
that is your philosophy, then you believe in fascist (government
doesn’t own, but controls the means of production of goods and
services) capitalism or the words economic development may also stand
for socialist (government owning and controlling the means of
production of goods and services) capitalism.

In either of those two systems, government will pick the winners and
those who get the special privileges or opportunities. In socialist
capitalism, the government will actually own and operate businesses,
thus competing against private entities who will always be at a
disadvantage in that competition.

When Representative Steele uses words like “allow” and “establish an
environment”, those words are as strong as it gets when it comes to
private or free market capitalism. In a free market economy,
government will keep regulations at a bare minimum and businesses will
NOT be taxed. Businesses consider taxes to be overhead and thus
increase the price of their goods and services to cover that overhead
and thus the consumer always pays for business taxes through higher
prices for those goods or services. Politicians love that, because as
they tax businesses, the consumer isn’t cognizant of the amount of
taxes imbedded in the price of a product or service and thus some of
the real cost of government is hidden from the citizens.

In a real free market economy, if consumers aren’t willing to purchase
certain products or support certain services, then they go away. On
the other hand, sharp businessmen may figure out a way to convince
enough in the marketplace to buy or hire products or services to pay
all overhead and have some left over for themselves which is called
profit. Free market economies always see the best and brightest
business rise to the top. In central planned economies, it may be more
likely that the well connected rise to the top and not necessarily the
best business man delivering the best product or service at the most
reasonable price.

Another positive statement in his response was: “We must defend our
constitutional rights, including the right to bear arms, defend
against federal government overreach, and guard against those who
intentionally break the law and pose a threat to public safety.” An
additional strong statement was: “Although some may not realize it,
being polite and civil is not the same thing as being weak.” I fully
agree.

However, there were some things he said, which I have a hard time
reconciling with his actions. First off he stated: “In addition, we
must reform education so Oklahoma children from all corners of the
state can excel in college and thrive in the work force after they
graduate.” With the election of Janet Barresi and the effort of school
choice advocates, the conditions better exist today than ever before
for some badly needed school reforms.

However, Speaker-elect Steele appointed Ann Coody (R-Lawton) Chairman
of Common Education committee and Jabar Shumate (D-Tulsa) as Vice-
Chair. While Shumate is a liberal Democrat, when it comes to education
he is very reform minded. He understands that perhaps one of the best
ways out of the hood is a good education and that school choice is one
of the best hopes to allow children to escape the teacher union
controlled drop out factories in the inner city schools.

On the other hand, while Representative Coody is a nice person, she is
a retired educator of 39 years and in my opinion is so engrained into
the system as to be an impediment to real reform. I made this clear to
Steele a year an a half ago and he either forgot, disagrees or has a
different opinion. It will be interesting to see just how much real
education reform we can get past Coody in the powerful position in
which Steele has placed her.

Steele said we must defend our constitutional rights to bear arms, but
then chose Dan Sullivan (R-Tulsa) to sit in the all powerful floor
leader’s position. As we live today, our rights to bear arms are
greatly infringed. During the session earlier this year, Sullivan was
a huge impediment toward “restoring” those rights. In addition Sue
Tibbs (R-Tulsa) was also a big problem earlier this year and now
Steele has appointed Tibbs to be Chairman of the powerful Public
Safety committee, the committee in which all second amendment issues
will most likely survive or fail.

And while Steele tried to diminish conservative’s and Christian’s
concerns by proclaiming he is pro-life, he failed to mention several
serious problems such as where he stands on the invasion of illegal
aliens, the growing threats from the expansion of Sharia Law and the
advancing agenda of the homosexual community. The abortion issue is
vital and we as Christians must never go to sleep or turn our backs on
this issue. However, God has a perspective on all issues and we need
to pay more attention to these other issues than we have in the
past.

On Wednesday, December 1st the Oklahoman had a front page article on
the Business section titled: “Oklahoma ready for a fight”. Oh really,
has legislative leadership and the Oklahoma business community finally
grown a spine and are they truly over their cowardice? The article is
about new regulations the TYRANTS at the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) are about to impose on Oklahoma’s 6 coal fired power
plants. Supposedly to clean up a problem which basically doesn’t exist
or if it does, it wouldn’t be caused by our power plants, but rather
those in Texas.

In the article, Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ)
Director Steve Thompson said officials are not optimistic the U.S. EPA
will approve the state’s plan to reduce emissions that affect
visibility in federal wildlife areas. If the EPA slaps these excessive
new regulations on the State of Oklahoma it will mean a huge increase
in electric utility rates for consumers and our businesses alike. It
will really hinder having an environment for a vibrant economy. These
“fighters” are hoping newly elected AG Scott Pruitt will be willing to
go into the courts on behalf of Oklahoma.

I hope Pruitt will take the feds on and believe he will. However,
during this year’s legislative session, Representative Sally Kern (R-
OKC & Bethany) authored a bill to allow Oklahoma citizens to amend
our constitution to establish the Oklahoma DEQ and the Corporation
Commission to be have the final say on all environmental issues. House
leadership (of which Steele was a part) wouldn’t stand behind Sally
during this year’s session and Thompson was against the measure along
with some of Oklahoma’s major corporations.

The reason? Sally was told that since the Obama administration didn’t
like Oklahoma (because every county voted for McCain) they were
fearful that if we stood up to them in this manner, the feds might
punish Oklahoma businesses, especially those in the energy industry,
by not allowing them to sell their products outside the state under
the justification of the interstate commerce clause in the U.S.
Constitution.

That fear of the feds is why I suggest the terms “spineless” and
“cowards.” If we would alter our State Constitution to reflect our
superior “states rights authority” we might have to go to the courts
on that issue. On the other hand, we might really push back and just
ignore an unconstitutional order coming out of a federal court on this
issue and just see how far the feds would push it.

In the mean time, as I said a few weeks ago in one of these e-mails,
the newly elected Republican majority in the U.S. House of
Representatives have enormous power to protect the states in this
regard. Since all funding and spending bills must originate in the
U.S. House they could simply cut the EPA’s budget in half or
completely de-fund this liberal bastion of excessive power. Nothing
like being out of a job or missing their paychecks to explain to
nameless faceless bureaucrats what is acceptable and what is not.

I liked much of what Kris Steele has said, but the proof will come in
the pudding, which will soon be made known. We are looking for action
more than just words.

++ THE SENATOR HARRY COATES SAGA

Of all the elections for the good guys this year, none disappointed me
more than seeing Harry Coates, the liberal State Senator from Seminole
slither to victory over a good and Godly man, Tim Clem. Oh, I was
plenty disappointed that Randy Brogdon failed to beat Mary Fallin in
the gubernatorial primary, but I always knew it was an up-hill battle
for Randy and the odds were against him. Even at that, he did very
well and came within a little over 4 and a half percentage points of
forcing a run-off, an event of which I feel confident would have gone
in Randy’s favor.

However, I really believed Tim Clem had a very good chance of beating
Coates, winner of OCPAC’s RINO Award in 3 of the past 8 years with
Coates also finishing as runner-up on 2 other occasions. The saddest
thing of all was that information of his alleged affair with the
Republican lobbyist Haley Atwood was exposed by her husband the day
after the filing period ended in a meeting where he served on the
staff of governor Henry but we couldn‘t figure a way to use that
information in a proper manner.

I tried to call hubby Atwood at his home phone number and was
surprised to receive a call from Haley the next day wanting to know
why I wanted to talk with her husband? She put me on notice that the
rumors of the affair were a private matter and that they would handle
it privately. Because of Oklahoma’s invasion of privacy laws, I
couldn’t reveal too much in the e-mails without putting myself at some
risk of legal action. I did tip off one of the local TV stations and
gave as much information as possible to an investigative journalist in
hopes he could break the story. I even gave him the tip to look into a
trip to Colorado where Harry and Haley were both present at the same
time and to check on contribution records or lobbying contracts.

However, nothing came of this until this past week when the Oklahoman
broke the story big time. Besides the Atwoods getting a divorce,
Harry’s wife of 39 years is bound to be suffering, and who knows if
their marriage will survive. About the only good that came out of the
whole affair so far is that Harry had to drop out of his bid to become
the next Senate President Pro-Tem.

As a point of interest, shortly after the election I was contacted by
Stu Phillips, editor of the Seminole Producer. He wanted to know if I
had any of the campaign literature that Harry had sent out? He was
particularly interested in anything that had Harry and his wife
together. I believe that Lance Cargile was the campaign consultant for
Harry and had put together a slick piece with Harry and his wife
sitting at “Pops” in Arcadia, supposedly having a good time. Another
picture showed them walking hand in hand, oh so lovely, but apparently
such a false presentation of reality.

The voters should have elected Tim Clem on the issues, with this
affair as just one more reason they should have turned him out.
Unfortunately, there just weren’t many people who knew about it and as
always, all elections are first and foremost about the quality and
character of the voters. Secondly, elections are about the candidates.
If you have a majority of poor quality voters, then your have poor
quality lawmakers. Fairly simple, but it is the way our founders set
the system up and it works.

The contract to build and or operate a new juvenile center should
probably be re-bid, making sure all bidders meet the same standards
when it comes to secure beds and that Coates or Atwood didn’t use any
undue influence in the process. It is hoped that kids who are put in
these centers can be reformed. However, most of them are very angry
and rebellious and as such they are dangerous to themselves as well as
others. Many of them, perhaps most, will go on to fill our prisons or
get a needle in their arm as they grow older regardless of our efforts
to reform them, but for now they must be controlled.

In the past, Coates has often appeared to me to be an arrogant bully.
He is the definition of a RINO, a distinction in which he seems to
revel. He is an embarrassment to the Republican party and if he has
gained any humility through these events, he should resign his
position. Not that he probably cares about my opinion, but I also
suggest he humble himself, repent before God and cry out to be fully
restored in that relationship. Hopefully he and his wife will find a
way to restore their marriage.

++ OCPAC MEMBERSHIP

This Wednesday will be the deadline to join OCPAC for anyone wanting
to vote to determine which candidate we might endorse and support in
the up-coming special election to replace Todd Lamb for the Senate
district #47 seat.

To be able to vote in any OCPAC election, our by-laws require a member
to have their dues paid 2 weeks prior to any vote and they must be
present to vote on all candidate endorsements. If you are a dues
paying member for 2010 (there are 287 in that category) you will
qualify. All memberships being paid since the middle of October are
for 2011. As long as you pay or your dues or your membership check is
postmarked by this Wednesday, December 8th, you will also be eligible
to vote on the 22nd. We have already had a good number of people join
since we stopped taking additional memberships for the 2010 calendar
year. Thanks to everyone who is supporting our efforts in this
particular way. Instructions to join are below.

I look forward to seeing everyone this afternoon for the trip to
Bartlesville and/or Wednesday for our meeting.

Charlie Meadows
Charliemeadows7@gmail.com