Is the House of the People of Oklahoma Going to Do the Right Thing?
The House of Representatives is intended to be close to the people and vulnerable should they not follow the general will of the populace. The two year terms and smaller districts make it vastly easier to take one of them down if they have a bad voting record. For this reason the Constitution of the State of Oklahoma says the purse strings are kept in the House, with all revenue raising bills originating in the House.
This is going to be a major factor in the negotiations for a special session, Mary Fallin knows better than to schedule a special session without having an agreement in advance and it appears that House leadership has executed a hard U turn from the tax and spend policy of the 2017 Legislative session. Last week the McCarville Report (may his corrupt RINO butt rot in hell) jumped the gun claiming that a deal was in for Mary Fallin's billion dollar tax increase plan but a letter sent out this week by Doerflinger said otherwise and inside sources are saying that House leadership has had their come to Jesus moment and is going to hold the line on new taxes and tax increases.
Given that the majority of Republican House members earned extremely low scores both on the Sooner Tea Party RINO Index and the OCPAC Conservative Index, with House leadership being at the rock bottom of both indexes, it appears that House leadership understands that they are facing an election year in an unenviable position.
Oklahoma does have a tax problem as special interests have carved out vast swaths of tax dollars thanks to campaign donations, especially in the oil and gas industry that enjoys a tax rate 3.5 times lower than surrounding states. But the major reason Oklahoma is starved for cash is that it has adopted a socialist approach to setting priorities, favoring taking care of people's health care and dental care instead of these families paying for their own care. Of course this wasn't done because 149 legislators are just good hearted old boys; it was a result of millions of dollars in campaign contribution from the medical industry. Working folks wouldn't and couldn't stand the inflated prices being charged but if Sooner Care and Medicaid is footing the bill, well lets pad those bills!
Gubernatorial candidate Gary Richardson is the lone voice in the wilderness calling for audits of all state agencies and higher education. Meanwhile Lt. Governor Todd Lamb, AKA Mary's Little Lamb, is refusing to step up to a call that he take charge of the Senate as he is Constitutionally able to do and stop any attempts to jack up tax rates or make new tax revenue sources.
For our part, the Sooner Tea Party has set up 149 individual Facebook pages, one for each House and Senate district, and is in the process of posting the 2017 RINO Index score for each politician along with their contact info and a detailed explanation of the bad votes they cast in 2017.
That is a massive project and volunteers are needed. The work can be done from your home on your own computer and you can manage a district page anonymously or you can use your own Facebook profile and let the rascal know who is watching them closely.
There will be an extension added to the 2017 RINO Index if we have a special session. There might be a system set in place where good votes in the special session erase bad votes in the Spring 2017 legislative session, providing an incentive to prevent this massive tax increase and to force the audit of all state agencies.
Regardless it appears that the House leadership is going to do the right thing and act as a brake on out of control taxation. Mary Fallin might have already cut a deal with the Democrats led by Scott Inman but there simply aren't enough Democrats if the Republicans follow the Party Platform and their constituent wishes.
