Oklahoma's Failed Priorities: Oil and Earthquakes, Budget holes, and Abortion

Oklahoma is apparently a state broadly populated with fools and extremists, crazies and "fundies" (evangelical Christian fundamentalists), incapable of EFFECTIVE self-government, and inhabited by haters of the United States Constitution and of true liberty.  (By true liberty, I mean ACTUAL individual freedom, not merely the illusory freedom to conform to unscientific conservative Christianity.)

Last Friday, OK Governor Mary Fallin vetoed legislation that would have made it a criminal offense to perform a constitutionally legal abortion. 

Gov. Mary Fallin has been widely discussed as a potential running mate for Donald Trump.

There is talk of an attempt to override that veto, a vote which would have to occur by 5 p.m. this coming Friday when the lege in OK adjourns.

From the AP:

"I have not made a decision," Sen. Nathan Dahm, of Broken Arrow, told The Associated Press. "That's what we're pursuing, what we'd like to see accomplished."
He said he'll decide during the coming week whether to pursue an attempt — the same week that the Legislature faces a deadline to adjourn while grappling with a $1.3 billion budget hole that could lead to cuts to public schools, health care and the state's overcrowded prison system. They've yet to be presented with a proposed state budget.

Given that Oklahoma has a Grand Canyon sized budget hole, it is grossly irresponsible to waste ANY time on abortion legislation rather than focusing on the state budget.  But of course, that is what the crazies, and the extremists, and the religious fanatics and the science deniers do, instead of doing their jobs.

It's not like OK doesn't have more than their fair share of other problems far more serious than a useless piece of liberty-denying abortion legislation that isn't worth a role of toilet paper in the legislative bathroom, much less the paper on which it is printed.  As states go "OK" is pretty far from being 'okay'.

The state is literally shaking apart due to earthquakes from the pursuit of fossil fuel drilling, with another earthquake earlier today within 30 miles of the state Capitol.

Perhaps the failed prioritizing of the legislature can best be explained by the educational failings of the state.  Oklahoma is ranked among the lowest for education spending at 47th, both for K-12 and post-secondary education.  Those 'Sooners' have been ranked down near the lower half for number of adults with high school diplomas (36th in 2004).  And per Wikipedia:

In the 2007–2008 school year, there were 181,973 undergraduate students, 20,014 graduate students, and 4,395 first-professional degree students enrolled in Oklahoma colleges. Of these students, 18,892 received a bachelor's degree, 5,386 received a master's degree, and 462 received a first professional degree. This means the state of Oklahoma produces an average of 38,278 degree-holders per completions component (i.e. July 1, 2007 – June 30, 2008). National average is 68,322 total degrees awarded per completions component.

Clearly, knowledge, and thinking, are not the priorities of the voters of Oklahoma.  They're more obsessed with interference in the reproductive choices of women and their medical providers.  Because apparently both voters and legislators fail to grasp that there are other things more appropriate and more important requiring their attention.

A picture, (ok, with ten words) is worth a thousand words in conveying a fundamental (as distinct from fundamentalist) concept

Humor with the sting of Truth

An Open Letter to the Clinton Campaign

This year, from Joe Scarborough’s vapid attempt to characterize the working class as “mad at Republicans for not keeping promises to reign in the debt”, to Chuck Todd’s ludicrous assertion that the reason people don’t warm up to Hillary is (mostly) about her inability to show her personal side, I’m struck by just how dumb the political class is about what is going on in America and about what is being thought about by most Americans.
 

Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump, one sincerely the other more or less fraudulently, are gaining traction because of one key and central theme, specifically the fate of average Americans.  Sanders and Trump are speaking to people’s frustration at having spent 30 years (since Reagan) buying into a myth, and during that time have seen their jobs leave, their wages fall or at best remain flat while costs rise, and the opportunities for their children to get an education and have at least as good a life, if not better, than they have, disappear.   This has come about due to competition with offshore labor, through attacks on the worthiness of work and was justified by/motivated from the idea that profit for the shareholders is first last and always the only thing that must be considered.  They (workers) were promised that by focusing on shareholder return there would be more and better paying jobs than those which left, and so more opportunity.  It has not done been true, not even close.  That idea has failed, and failed miserably.  It has lead to greater inequality as we destroyed overtime pay protections and most importantly cut taxes at the top end, motivating the very wealthy to seek and succeed in gaining access to a greater share of the profits they would now got to keep rather than see taxed.

 
The bottom line is this, if Hillary seeks to defeat Trump, a task which should be easy given the man’s enormous flaws, she MUST tap into that anger.  She needs to focus on demonstrating that the DEMOCRATIC PARTY has defended the working class far more than the Republicans, that the Democrats, not Republicans have repeatedly opposed easing restrictions on moving jobs overseas, repeatedly advocated for increasing wages, for making school accessible, making new industries (like renewable energy) the focus of our new manufacturing rather than, as Trump would advocate, reducing wages in stagnant industries so that US goods will be cost competitive with goods produced by impoverished workers in Indonesia, the Philippines or Ghana, so those goods can be sold in the poorest countries to the lowest bidder.  She must stake out the difference between not just her and Trump but Democrats and Republicans in terms of their recent history.  It has been Republicans who pushed the idea that corporate greed was good, even if it cost people jobs.  It has been Republicans who push so-called “right to work” ideas that destroy union protections and Republicans who protected corporations when they declared bankruptcy to shed themselves of pension commitments.  She must also show how her stance defends US worker’s wages and looks to the future rather than simply seeking to chase 3^rd world countries down the rabbit hole of ever deflating wages.  Last, she MUST call out the wealthy in this country as having been unfair to those workers, allowing the US infrastructure to crumble, for making US universities to have to make up lost educational support by increasing tuition, and most of all, for not having shared the pain as jobs went offshore.  She must call them out for pocketing trillions, and not paying their share, while the country suffered and suffers.


So, while I find the issue of Trump's contemptuous, demeaning and blatantly sexist treatment of women in his life compelling, in the end it is hardly the only or even most important issue.  As Bill Clinton once said, "It's the economy, stupid."  That's something Trump seems to get more so than does Clinton right now and that has to change or we're going to elect a man to the Presidency who has an orangutan stapled to the top of his head and who has policy proposals to match.

Fossil fuels go the way of the dinosaur

processing whale oil

We see Oil Companies starting to relinquish their 'drill baby drill' grip on the more expensive-to- extract oil fields.  With high inventories and low prices for an extended period of months, it has become cost-ineffective to extract that oil, which SHOULD be left in the ground, particularly given the fragile eco-systems surrounding them.  We are beginning to see the key phrase 'stranded asset' appear, for example, in the context of Arctic oil drilling.

We see oil economy nations like Saudi Arabia announcing their plans to get out of the oil business over the next twenty years (or less).  They clearly see the writing on the wall, that fossil fuels are done, over, finished, obsolete - and dangerous.  As noted Middle East observer and expert Juan Cole wrote recently:

Saudi crown prince Muhammad bin Salman announced Friday that Saudi Arabia would use its oil assets to back a $2 trillion sovereign wealth fund. The move suggested to many observers that the kingdom is preparing for a likely end of the petroleum business and transitioning to being primarily an investor. While it is true that the money for the sovereign wealth fund is expected to come from petroleum sales, it also seems clear that the kingdom recognizes that it has a stranded asset that won’t be nearly as valuable in a decade or two as it is now. It could even end up, like coal, being regulated out of existence in many countries.
Here are 3 reasons Saudi Arabia is likely making this massive change in economic strategy:
1. Climate change denial, which the Saudis pushed and helped fund, has failed. A majority of Americans now accepts that humans burning fossil fuels is causing global warming. And that’s in anti-science, capitalist-ridden America. Everywhere else in the world it goes without saying. Since the impact of global warming will become increasingly apparent in the coming decades, likely pressure to abandon burning fossil fuels will grow. Already, most new investment in power plants is in renewables, not coal and gas.
2. Another fossil fuel, coal, is being quickly phased out and will likely be illegal in fifteen or twenty years. It is being phased out by the Environmental Protection Agency because it puts out pollutants, including CO2. The writing is on the wall for coal and petroleum.
3. More affordable, longer-range electric cars are now coming on the market, with the Chevy Bolt due next December and Tesla 3 the following year. Most petroleum is used for transportation, so electric vehicles are deadly to that market. The new generation of electric cars is less than $30,000 in the US after tax rebates. And it typically can go 200 miles on a charge. Tesla is putting fast recharging stations everywhere it can, and people have already gone across the country in a Tesla. Battery costs are falling and batteries are becoming more efficient, so the writing is on the wall for the combustion engine. Consumers are combining electric cars with solar panels on their houses, getting free fuel. Low gasoline prices won’t impede solar car sales because prices would have to fall another dollar US before EVs would not be worth it.
In as little as fifteen to twenty years, petroleum may be illegal in some places; and will be in retreat everywhere. Saudi oil is a stranded asset. So they are attempting to create a revenue stream from investments. As for fossil fuels, their business model is under severe pressure.

And we see economic reports like this one, which for those international oil companies that aren't being open about their awareness of the obsolescence of oil, that their days are numbered if they don't get out of oil, and instead get into something else.  From Climate News Network:

Oil majors told to adapt or die

As profits and prices plummet, the oil conglomerates – some of the world’s biggest companies – have been warned they must change their ways or face extinction.

By Kieran Cooke

LONDON, 9 May, 2016 – At best, big oil companies such as ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron and BP face a period of gentle decline, but will ultimately survive.

At worst, if they do not adapt and change direction, “what remains of their existence will be nasty, brutish and short”.

That’s the core message of a research paper on the oil corporates by one of the UK’s leading energy experts, Paul Stevens, a senior research fellow at the London-based Chatham House thinktank, the Royal Institute of International Affairs.

Present management strategies within the oil majors have failed to deliver value to shareholders, and profits are declining sharply, Stevens says.

There are parallels in the coal industry, and in natural gas. Like the 'olden days' of the 19th century, when whale oil became obsolete (and harder to come by) and was replaced by petroleum products, beginning with kerosene and progressing to other petroleum distillates like gasoline and fuel oil.  Coal is dead; while there appear to be die-hards who cannot accept that change is inevitable, it does not change the reality that we have always evolved new forms of energy - including steam and gas in their heyday, which were then replaced by electricity.

This has been a key issue in the 2016 election cycle, the capacity to acknowledge the dead end of fossil fuel and the need to move forward with new infrastructure, new job training, towards cleaner renewable more modern energy.  Conservatives can't or won't make that change; but if they don't do so voluntarily, it will be thrust upon them.  Their only choice is how they respond to change, not IF the change will occur, or when.

As our readers know, I make it a habit to fact check quotes for accuracy.  Snopes has already investigated the words below.

Those words are plausible, but not verifiable.

But they do seem to be at the very least apocryphal.  I prefer a definition for apocryphal that has always struck me as more satisfying, rather than the dictionary (or theological) definitions.  That more colloquial definition is that if it isn't strictly true or accurate, it could be true and SHOULD be true, that the statement in question captures something of value and validity in spite of origins.

Did it to themselves, while we all watched........the stupider party, with ugly values and priorities, the more conservative they became

Friday Fun Day!

As outgoing president, with the economy improved, and high approvals both foreign and domestic, one can afford a little happy dancing in the White House.

Poor dancing storm troopers, they don't get a chance to be recognized as individuals appearing with the president and first lady.  Still, it must have been a thrill for them to do this!

We have a president and first lady who are both current, and fashionable, and who manage to be fun without being embarrassing.

This is what 'being in touch' looks like!




As Gallup notes, by way of Politicus USA :

Obama’s Soaring Approval Rating Powers Democratic Optimism For 2016

By Jason Easley on Mon, May 2nd, 2016 at 1:36 pm

President Obama's job approval rating now sits at 52%. As the President gets more popular by the day, optimism is growing among Democrats for a big 2016 election victory.

Here is Gallup’s Daily Obama job approval rating:

Notice a pattern? President Obama’s job approval has been a net positive for two weeks.
Donald Trump’s approval ratings have nosedived since last year. According to Gallup, “Since last year, Trump’s net favorable rating (% favorable minus % unfavorable) among all adults nationally has worsened, to -35 in March from -17 in August.” Trump has a 70% unfavorable rating with women. According to the Harvard IOP Spring 2016 Survey, Trump has a (-57) net favorability with 18-29 year olds. In contrast, President Obama has a 55% approval rating with millennials and an overall net approval rating of (+13).

Drumpf, the Republican clown prince (aka presumptive GOP nominee)!

I will venture a safe prediction here. Trump will lose, taking down ballot candidates with him. But in the highly unlikely event he wins the office of presidency, I predict his own party will lead in lynching him, via impeachment, right out of office, within the first six months post-election (and his VP with him).

What was it the failed governor and worse failure candidate Bobby Jindal warned the right? Don't be the stupid party?

Too late!

World Malaria Day 2016

Per the CDC we saw a 40 year high in new malaria cases in the United States in 2013; this is in spite of malaria being supposedly eliminated from within our borders. Part of the problem with malaria and other insect borne disease is of course the creep northward of previously unseen species that are disease vectors for malaria and other illnesses, due to global warming.

It would be nice to believe that we are approaching the eradication of malaria, except that we aren't.

It is true that we have made, world-wide, tremendous strides in reducing the disease, but we are now on the third wave of medication resistant versions of the disease, and we have begun to lose ground again. The best coverage of the problem, along with potential solutions and funding, can be found here at the very excellent site, Project Syndicate's coverage here.

So please stop for a moment and take note of this old, long-standing plague on mankind, and consider that we have the means and the opportunity to do something about it now, while it is relatively small and slow, but we have to have the awareness and the political will to do so.

If you don't support the Constitution for everyone, you don't support the Constitution

image courtesy of Imagine magazine
NOT an actual photo of
TN State Rep. Jeremy Durham

It has long been my contention that conservatives give lip service to the Constitution, but do not in practice support the content in that Constitution.

The continuing hypocritical efforts of conservatives, particularly those who are southern evangelicals, demonstrate equally a desperate desire to regulate the lives of others, demanding conformity to their own beliefs, while not themselves behaving consistently with those beliefs.  We have the interference in the lives of other people, while not managing one's own very well, in the example of Tennessee's own state representative Jeremy Durham, pervert for Jesus.

Evangelical Tennessee State Rep Jeremy Durham Is 'Banished' From Capitol Complex After THIRTY FOUR Women Accuse Him Of Inappropriate Sexual Behavior

Married Tennessee state representative is 'banished' from Capitol complex after THIRTY FOUR women accuse him of inappropriate sexual behavior

Lawmakers in Tennessee have 'banished' a state representative by moving his office at the state Capitol complex after more than three dozen women have accused him of inappropriate behavior. Rep. Jeremy Durham's office is being moved to the ground floor of a building across the street from the Capitol, House Speaker Beth Harwell announced Thursday. According to Attorney General Herbert Slatery's memorandum to Harwell, he is investigating Durham's 'pattern of conduct' toward women after 34 current and former lawmakers, lobbyists, staffers and interns allege that he made sexual comments, used his position to obtain personal contact information from women, try to meet women alone, involve alcohol in his interactions with women and inappropriate physical contact with them while working at Legislative Plaza, CBS News reported.

I have to wonder if Jeremy Durham will have any office when the next election cycle comes around in Tennessee, not even one across the street.  But then again, by promoting the anti-LGBT bathroom harassment bill, he might get in good with those other pervy and ignorant conservative Evangelicals again.  They go in for a lot of forgiveness so long as one conforms and grovels sufficiently, as we have seen in the past.
The establishment clause of the Constitution requires no preferential treatment of religion. That is simple enough, yet conservatives tend as a group, over and over, to attempt to replace democracy with theocracy.

We see it in the mediocre legislators of Tennessee who are persisting in trying to give preferential treatment to the Bible.  Thurs. (April 14th) Gov. Haslam vetoed an attempt to make the Bible the official book of the frankly mediocre at best state of Tennessee.

But the conservative religious extremists in government are hell-bent on pushing this through anyway, and don't give a tinker's damn about the provisions of religious freedom in the Constitution.

From the Raw Story:

The lawmakers who sponsored the measure vowed to hold a vote that would overrule Haslam’s veto. A simple majority in each legislative chamber would overrule his decision.
“According to polling, 62 percent of all Tennesseans favor making the Holy Bible the state book in order to recognize its significance from a historical, economic and cultural standpoint,” the House sponsor, Representative Jerry Sexton, said.
“Senator (Steve) Southerland and I are prepared to move forward with a veto override and we plan to do exactly that.”

Because Tennessee is, apparently, not dumb enough or second rate enough without that next step?  Seriously, this is a state legislature which has far more important and far more legitimate issues with which to properly concern itself than forcing their religion on people.

It made an interesting cab ride recently where my driver, whom we'll call Tom, knowing I do research especially fact checking, asked me if it were true, as he had heard on right wing talk radio (an occupational hazard of cab driving apparently) that four out of the five first presidents had been either ordained as clergy or held a degree in religion of some kind, and therefore that was the reason we have "In God We Trust" on our money and "under God" in the pledge of allegiance.  And no, none of those first five presidents were particularly religious; in fact George Washington is on record as never having taken communion and rarely attended church, and the other four were Deists.

We have been stuck (for the moment) with "In God We Trust" and "under God" because President Eisenhower (I DO like Ike, as Republican presidents go) made a deal with a group in politics known as 'the family', the same bunch of people who started the National Prayer Breakfast.  They are the same group who tried to get the death penalty for being LGBT in Uganda with pseudo-science.  So, we have the family influence continuing in politics, pushing an extreme form of religion, after their early success; but we also got the Interstate Highway Program which dramatically contributed to our success post WW II. 

I'd call that a barely fair tradeoff of good (the highway system) for evil (crackpot religious conservatism).

Conservative Outrage

Less outrage as conservative presidential candidates shoot themselves in the foot, and then plan to wave their guns around at their own delegates.

Yeah.

Those 'family values' conservatives.

Why would Muslims be antagonistic? Why AREN'T they?

Several stories have caught my attention in the past few days. 

One was the news that between 2000 and 2014, hate crimes against Muslims had increased 800%, even as hate crimes overall - at least, those that were reported - were declining.

Another story was the news from the WaPo that the perpetrator and planner of the terrorist attacks in Paris had been arrested, through the direct action and cooperation of a Muslim woman cooperating with authorities (and her husband).  Without this help, it is not certain that the lead Paris terrorist or the related Belgian terrorists, who targeted Brussels in lieu of further attacks on Paris.  As noted in the WaPo piece, one woman helped authorities, while another woman, one alienated by her surrounding culture, helped the terrorists, if only marginally.

“It’s important the world knows that I am Muslim myself,” the woman said, citing that as a reason for being willing to speak to The Post. “It’s important to me that people know what Abaaoud and the others did is not what Islam is teaching.”

And then there were the assorted stories where conservative candidates for President, and their assorted official advisers, advocate EXACTLY the kind of thinking that ENCOURAGES hate crime attacks on Muslims, and DISCOURAGES the very essential cooperation of Muslims to combat terrorism.  That ranges from fear peddling false stories about sharia law in cities like Minneapolis, to banning Muslims (except a few rich personal friends of Drumpf) from entering the country.

We have Ted Cruz wanting to turn Muslim neighborhoods into heavily patrolled police states, not unlike the Nazis did with Jews. Cruz claims when pressed that he would work with Muslim community leaders, but his tone and intent give no basis for those communities or their leaders to work with him.   And we have Donny Drumpf advocating that along with torture for Muslim prisoners, and the killing of their families, which would be a human rights violation.

I doubt law enforcement would be willing to cooperate.  As noted by anti-terrorism expert in the city of New York, site of the 9/11 attack (among others) :

Both de Blasio and Bratton pointed out that the NYPD has more than 900 active Muslim officers.
“I have over 900 very dedicated officers in this department, many of whom do double duty,” Bratton said. “They serve as active duty members of the U.S. Military in combat, something the senator [Cruz] has never seen.” [or Trump/Drumpf either -DG].

I don't know about you, but that certainly would not motivate me to cooperate with authorities, and that kind of antagonistic proposals would certainly provoke the opposite response.   This is an insult to all of the Muslims, and there are many, who have put their lives in danger to defend this country against all threats, including terrorism.  This is an insult to the many Muslim members of law enforcement as well, who protect this country, as noted by authorities in cities like New York, scene of the 9/11 attacks. 

As noted by alternet:

Of course, the claim that Muslims pose a greater threat is patently false. There is a long and disturbing history of domestic terrorism committed by people of Christian backgrounds, from the Oklahoma City bombing to the Charleston church massacre. A report released last year by the New America research group found that, since September 11, 2001, non-Muslim domestic terrorists posed the greatest security threat.

We have insanely false statements made by the Cruz campaign advisers and supporters. One example would be Clare Lopez, who made inflammatory false claims on St. Cloud radio, unchecked by a crackpot right wing radio host and hate monger.

From the City Pages:

Clare Lopez told her lie on something called "Ox in the Afternoon," a St. Cloud-based radio show, where she implied that Minneapolis was setting itself up for a Brussels-style terrorist attack by giving over control of the streets to religious law. "In Minneapolis, for example," Lopez said, "places where police don't go, because they know they'll be attacked, have been attacked in the past, and places where police know Shariah is being practiced." Once Clare had established the underlying lie, she expanded. "Now, Americans might not know this, but, under Shariah, honor killing, female genital mutilation, domestic abuse, underage and polygamous marriage, are all part of Shariah. Those are all part of Shariah." Lopez went on to imply that Minneapolis was, by allowing the made-up stuff she just talked about, making itself vulnerable to a homegrown terrorist attack. "Because we have, like Europe, like Western Europe, allowed in, and invited in, populations of Muslim migrants and refugees, who do not have the same worldview — the same principles, the democratic, constitutional principles that we live by in this country — their worldview is completely different than all of that. Because we've invited them in and allowed them not to assimilate, we are inviting the same kind of problems here that we're seeing in places like Brussels, Belgium, and Paris, France."

This reminds me of the shallow and simplistic thinking we saw from the right to protect the US from an epidemic of Ebola, recommendations which the science and medical communities argues were the worst possible responses (like banning travel from Africa) combined with unconstitutional actions against Americans. These are people, whatever level of education they have attained, who respond with emotions, with feelings, not with rational thought, reason or logic. These right wingers endanger us all, both inside and outside our borders.

The last gasp of the Leith NoDak takeover attempt by Craig Cobb, Trump supporter

In the 2016 election cycle, no surprise, given the pandering to white supremacists by Donald Drumpf and his family, Craig Cobb is a supporter.  Last October Nightline did an interview with Cobb.

Cobb is delusional if he thinks the problems people have with him are in any way discriminatory or contrary to his first amendment rights.  It is a sadly conservative phenomenon when those who attempt to victimize others then claim THEY are the victims when it doesn't go well.  It is endemic among conservatives.

Trump-Loving Racist Craig Cobb Repeatedly Calls Nightline Anchor Byron Pitts N-Word During Interview

While recently doing a story about known White Supremacist Craig Cobb, ABC producer Jasmine Brown and anchor Byron Pitts were subject to hateful tirades and now the story has been brought to life through a produced video by timesXtwo.

 “He is very much in love with Donald Trump,” adds Brown. She continues to describe a line of Cobb’s saying, “I would almost rather talk to a Jew, because then at least they would be intelligent.”

The final closing of the book on the attempted white supremacist takeover by Craig Cobb in the tiny town of Leith, North Dakota took place last week, just as TPT was running the documentary of the takeover on public television. 

It is worth watching the independent documentary Welcome to Leith here.

From KVRR:

North Dakota Officials Close Craig Cobb Investigation

BISMARCK, N.D. - State officials have closed their investigation into ten human rights complaints filed by white supremacist Craig Cobb.

Cobb alleged discrimination because of his white supremacy religious views.

The Department of Labor and Human Rights rejected all of the complaints, including one Cobb filed against Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem, who's running for governor.

Cobb and one of his crazy side-kicks, an Ichabod Crane lookalike named Kynan Dutton, were arrested and spent some time in jail for terrorizing the town of Leith before making a plea deal.

Had Cobb and his confederates been smarter and had more money, they might have pulled off their town takeover.  This kind of neo-Nazi intimidation is not a smart way to try to take over a town; you can count on push back.  Meet your not-so-friendly neighborly Trump supporters, and those with whom they choose to associate under the 1A..