Weekly News Headlines And Commentary – Week of February 24, 2025
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This week (and last, since I wasn’t able to post last week due to a farm emergency) there are a number of new posts to the blog. Most of these are about legislation since we’re quickly reaching the date (3.6.25) for bills to switch houses (from House to Senate or vice-versa).
This is the most infuriating situation. Citing “political drama”, Governor Stitt fired three members of the State School Board on February 12th. The “political drama” apparently had to do with an agenda item on the previous week’s State School Board agenda wherein the Board would vote to find a way to count the number of ILLEGAL immigrants in Oklahoma classrooms. There is definitely some “political drama” here if not “political intrigue” and I hope to expose all that in upcoming weeks. This all stems from a very influential man in Oklahoma politics who has an R after his name, who believes illegal immigration is essentially fine and works deals with elected officials to create policies – written or not – that protect them in this state. The saddest part here is that these three board members were doing Yeoman’s work ridding Oklahoma public education of school employees that sexually abuse students. Our governor is – AGAIN – completely wrong. Read the blog for information on who was selected to replace the three removed members. None have any educational experience whatsoever, so, there’s that.
Dumping Human Waste On Farmland Must Stop
Unfortunately, we’ve lost several lambs on the farm this winter season, so I used them as the backdrop to talk about the horror show that is spreading human waste on cropland in Oklahoma. This is as bad as it sounds and now the EPA and other organizations, have shown that this material contains ‘forever chemicals’, cancer-causing molecules cause PFAS. Unfortunately, an excellent bill to stop the practice, written by new Representative Jim Shaw (from Lincoln County where this has been done regularly for many, many years) has been denied a hearing in Committee this year. This will not just hurt farmers and ranchers who use the stuff, but PFAS and other chemicals have been shown to migrate from where they were dumped and into water sources, effecting neighboring farmsteads as well. Please read the blog to find out more about the practice and why you should want this stopped even if you live in a city.
This article was published in The Federalist under the headline; “Your ‘Farm Fresh’ Produce Might Be Fertilized With Forever Chemicals And Human Waste“.
Jason Murphy Divulges The ‘Scam’ That Runs The Oklahoma Legislature
Former Representative, Jason Murphy knows a lot about the legislature, having served there a full 12 year term. Today, he is making the most of that knowledge by writing a Substack called, “The Oklahoma State Capitol“. He joined Michael and I on the podcast last week to talk about how the legislative process – at least the way its been run in recent history – is simply a shell game to keep the citizenry appeased and the lobbyists/big business interests that run the state, happy. You’ll want to read the blog to see who all these interests are so you can keep your eye out for them.
We’ve had Robert on the show before and his descriptions of what happened to him during his campaign for SD15. It was eye-opening. Here, he gives us some updates on his current case. This blog is SUPER IMPORTANT to read because I’ve embedded Robert’s Supreme Court documents. These documents include photographs and specific instances of the Oklahoma State Election Board irregularities over which Robert took them to court. These are MORE than eye-opening. It shows that there are real concerns with our State Election Board and the processes that govern election law in Oklahoma – and this knowledge is important to EVERY Oklahoman.
This last week, Senator Lankford has hit social media hard to capitalize on the Elon Musk/DOGE efforts at right-sizing government. Over and over again he’d Tweet (X) out a message about how government is ‘fumbling’ (a take on his 5th Federal Fumbles, just out) with spending. Unfortunately, it hit me as being pretty disingenuous because he’s never seen a budget he didn’t like. After Tweeting back at him a couple times, I decided to stop and actually write a piece on his voting record and why Lankford needs to leave DC and find a new job. In order to be fair, I went to the VOTE SMART website and looked through every one of the votes they had posted there. While some of his votes are quite good, all but one time, he’s voted for the budget and for continuing appropriations. Check out the article. Lankford may be one of your very favorite people, but at least read this knowing that I’ve been fair. If you’ve never seen his voting record, it might be pretty interesting….
This Week At The Capitol, Legislators Dick Lowe and Danny Sterling UNprotect Students With HB1937
This is a SUPER IMPORTANT article because HB1937 is still alive. Contact your Representative immediately and tell them that this must be a NO vote if it’s brought to the floor. This bill basically undoes the good legislation former Rep. Sherrie Conley had passed before she left the House that prevents public school employees from communicating with a student without the knowlege of a parent. Unfortunately, perennial public school employees Lowe and Sterling, felt that this created an undue burden for public school employees and created a bill to allow parents to ‘opt out’ of the law’s requirement. This is a really bad idea and if you’re not quite sure how, please read the piece where Michael, Mary from V1SUT and I spell it out clearly.
The New World Order Needs Compliant Kids, So Government Schools Educate Them To Be Compliant
We’ve talked about this fact many times on the podcast – the fact that we all seem to think that public schools were created to educate children – but they’re not. Here, Julianne Romanello, Michael and I talk about what public schools actually do and what the educational trend will be for students over time if we don’t STOP it now.
If bills were not assigned to a Committee for the upcoming week (2.24), they will not get a hearing in the Oklahoma legislature this year. NONE of new Representative Jim Shaw’s bills received a hearing in a committee. Why? I make the case that Shaw’s defeat of Kevin Wallace (former House Appropriations Chair) is at the epicenter of this situation in which citizens of HD32 will be taxed without representation during the 2025 legislative session. This is unforgivable. Personal pettiness should NEVER stand in the way of the democratic process in America and certainly not in a ‘red state’ like Oklahoma.
LEGISLATION
So much legislation has been passed through Committees this session, with more coming up this week. The cell phone bill is still in play (Usurping Local Control – Cell Phone Restrictions In Oklahoma – NO on SB1389 and HB1276). Please read the article to find out the many reasons this is a BAD bill that needs to be voted down by the House and Senate both.
To be honest, with the new two-tiered committee structure in the House, it’s been hard to follow bills. I’ve been hoping that different groups following bills would let me know what’s out there and what needs to be followed, but I think the system is doing it’s job and making it hard for people to follow the legislation they want to see stopped or followed.
OKLAHOMA SUBSTACK AUTHORS
Don’t forget to check out our Substack authors this week!
The Oklahoma State Capitol by Jason Murphy
The Sooner Sentinel by Marven Goodman
V1SUT Vantage by ‘Mary’
LOCAL AND NATIONAL MEDIA
Survey: Homeschooled Adults Are More Religious And Less Anxious
House lawmakers reject communism education bill, advance new scholarship requirements
African prosperity activist says “the west is committing suicide.” Speaking to the packed auditorium at ARC, the Senegalese entrepreneur, said that the west is currently “committing suicide” by limiting the use of emergy sources like oil, coal, and gas.
Voting by mail? Oklahoma bill would require voters to give reason for absentee ballots
Traffic ticket scheme was netting millions for Oklahoma DA’s office – how much of this is going on in every county, we just haven’t found out about it yet?