Yearly Archives: 2010

Barbecue contests for charity announced

Back Alley Blues and BBQ, opening next spring, has a unique plan for its menu that brings the community and charitable giving together.  Back Alley’s “Side Search” is a three-month series of monthly cook-offs where the community members  will provide their best recipes for pre-determined side dishes to be selected for the restaurant’s menu.

The entry fee for the event will be a $5 donation that goes toward The
American Heart Association in memorial of Marcus Takach, who passed away
from unforeseen heart problems during the Route 66 Half-Marathon in
November.

“It’s all about community,” the restaurant’s ownership announced.
 
The food menu of Back Alley will consist of a Memphis-style, dry rub barbecue and traditional southern sides, but the musical offerings of Back Alley are equally as rare to Tulsa.
 
“Back Alley exists to celebrate Tulsa’s rich blues history,” the announcement said. “We have great blues talent—and following — in our city but no real, reliable venue to showcase it.”
 
The Side Searches will feature live, local blues music in addition to the food competition. Bands for the first round, which will be on January 22, include Danny Buck, Scott Ellison and more.
 
 The cook-offs will be judged equally by a panel of local celebrity judges, the audience, and Ewing.
 
The first Side Search, which will be for a great beans recipe, will take place January 22 at the VFW. The tasting section of the event will take place from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., but the music will continue until midnight.
 
The next Side Search will be for coleslaw in February, and then cobbler in March. 

Government Spending Cuts or Apocalyptic Pain

A "Fox News Sunday" interview with Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn is the national buzz with his candid comments that, "Apocalyptic pain" from an out-of-control debt could cause 18 percent unemployment and a massive contraction in the economy that would destroy the middle class within the next few years.

Coburn (R-Okla.), who recently issued a report on government waste warned that the U.S. only has about three or four years to get its fiscal house in order or it could find itself facing austerity measures seen in Greece, Ireland, Spain, Portugal and earlier in Japan.

"The history of republics is they average 200 years of life. And they all fail in the history over fiscal matters. They rot from within before they collapse or are attacked," Coburn said.

"The problem that faces our country today, the last 30 years we have lived off the future, and the bill is coming due," he added.

The senator said he’s not trying to scare anyone, but eliminating waste in the federal government’s ledgers is imperative not just to prevent default but a massive implosion that he defined in catastrophic terms.

"I think you’ll see a 15 to 18 percent unemployment rate. I think you will see an 8 to 9 percent decline in GDP. I think you’ll see the middle class just destroyed if we don’t do this. And the people that it will harm the most will be the poorest of the poor, because we’ll print money to try to debase our currency and get out of it and what you will see is hyperinflation," Coburn said.

"If we didn’t take some pain now, we’re going to experience apocalyptic pain, and it’s going to be out of our control. The idea should be that we control it," he said.

Coburn said he can come up with $350 billion off the top of his head in inefficiency and waste that could be eliminated without impacting anyone in a practical sense. He noted $50 billion in programs that are duplicative and $100 billion in Medicare and Medicaid fraud that was not addressed in the health care law.

"We have 267 job training programs across 39 different agencies. Why do we have 267 of them? We have 105 programs to encourage people to go into science and technology, engineering and math. That’s 105 sets of bureaucrats. None of them have metrics on it," he said.

"The Pentagon can’t even audit its own books. It doesn’t even know where its money is going. And we refuse to have the tough forces go on the Pentagon so that at least they are efficient with the money they’re spending," Coburn added.

Coburn acknowledged that most of the cuts he is currently proposing are discretionary spending, which is only a fraction of the budget. Still, he said, a couple hundred billion dollars of the nearly $1 trillion in stimulus spending could be cut without hurting a fragile recovery.

The senator, who was also a member of President Obama’s deficit commission that deadlocked earlier this month on recommendations for Congress to reduce its debt, added that structural changes need to be made to the way government works.

"The very fact that we have $1.1 trillion in tax expenditures every year that directs capital in a way that the government says it should be directed rather than the way it should be directed based on markets, tells us that we have a terrible tax system," Coburn said.

"I don’t care if you’re rich or poor, liberal or conservative. If we don’t fix the problems in front of us, everybody is going to pay a significant price," he said.

To read more of the Fox News story online, click here.

 

Oklahoma’s Kalyn Free closes INDN’s List, saying ‘Yakoke’ (Thank you)

 Kalyn Free, a
prominent progressive/liberal activist and member of the Choctaw Nation,
announced in a recent letter to friends and supporters that she is
closing INDN’s List, a group dedicated to the recruitment, election and
support of Native Americans to political office.  INDN stands for
“Indigenous Democratic Network.”

In the letter, provided to CapitolBeatOK, Ms. Free wrote: “In 2005, many
of you joined in my dream and vision of building an organization to
recruit, train, support and elect American Indians to public office
across America. Some of you volunteered countless hours, some gave
thousands of dollars and others the proverbial widow’s mite, some shared
your expertise at our INDN Campaign Camps, one made a quilt while
others generously bid on it, and hundreds of you sent encouraging words
of inspiration and prayed for our candidates and staff.”

Free continued, “As we say goodbye to another year, we also say goodbye
to INDN’s List. I am deeply saddened to tell you that INDN’s List is
closing our doors. In 2009 and 2010, I personally financially supported
INDN’s List and paid most of our overhead and salaries.

“Regrettably, we have simply been unable to expand our donor base beyond
a handful of visionary tribes, unions and individuals. And, the tribes
who supported us in our first four years just did not come through these
last two years.”

Over the past years, Free said, “INDN’s List has achieved tremendous
success. We helped American Indians win 63 elections. Prior to this
election cycle, we won 70% of our races. We helped an American Indian
woman win statewide office in Montana, helped Indians win office in
several chambers where they had never served, helped bring more Indians
into office than at any point in history and were instrumental in
holding caucuses on reservations for the first time in a presidential
primary in Nevada.

“Equally as important, INDN’s List trained hundreds of volunteers, staff
and candidates and cast a bright spotlight on the dearth of Indians
serving in public office. I have always said, ‘Little Indian boys and
girls cannot be what they cannot see.’ I am most proud that INDN’s List
played a role in giving future generations of Indian children concrete
examples of what they can be.

“The Republican onslaught took out so many of our excellent office
holders and candidates. Sadly, INDN’s List will not be around to help
Indians regain the ground we have lost. Even with our major losses,
Indians are more represented today than we were six years ago.”

Free worked at the U.S. Department of Justice in the Indian Resources
Section, and supervised litigation throughout “Indian Country.” Notable
cases included a joint filing between the U.S. government and two tribes
in Washington state. She also litigated in a case involving safe
drinking water on Sac & Fox lands in Oklahoma.

After her service in Washington, D.C., Free was the first woman in
history elected as District Attorney for Pittsburg and Haskell counties
in southeastern Oklahoma. She ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 2002,
and this year was supportive of state Sen. Jim Wilson’s primary
challenge to U.S. Rep. Dan Boren in the second congressional district.

In her letter announcing closure of INDN’s List, Free thanked a wide range of supporters of the group, including:

“Governor Howard Dean * Congressman Mike Honda * Senator Al Franken *
Senator Michael Brown * Chairman Gus Franks * Vice Chairman Glynn Crooks
* Chairman Robert Martin * Councilwoman Mary Ann Andreas * Chief Jim
Gray * Chairman Ron Allen * Councilman Bill John Baker * Councilwoman
Cara Cowan Watts

Jim Adelman * Sam Alexander * Sandra Beasley * Richard Bell * Lorene
Bishop * Carma Lee Brock * Steve Bruner * Jessa Bush * Lori Cain * Anne
Caprara * Rob Capriccioso * Lawrence Crooks * Brian Daffron * Ada Deer *
Lindsay Earls * Tom Farris * Susan Filbert * Peggy Flanagan * Jim and
Sally Frasier * Andy Frye * John Gaines * Todd Goodman * Lisa Gover *
Louis Gray * Faye Hadley * Dennis Hall * Willie Hardacker * LaDonna
Harris * Laura Harris * David Harrison * Joan and Ken Hilterbrand *
Robert Holden * Adam Holmes * Gordon Holmes * Representative Chuck and
Stephanie Hoskin * Megan Hull * Patricia Ireland * Somelea Jackson *
John Jameson * Marlene Jones * Dana Jim * Woody Kaplan * Micah
Kordsmeier * George Krumme * Celinda Lake * Frank Lamere * Barbara Lee *
Bob Lemon * Representative Al McAffrey * Jason McCarty * Luckie
McClintock * Tammy McCullar * Dorthy McGill * Theresa McMillan * Brad
Miller * David Ocamb * Dave Parker * Jodi Rave * Bill and Rose Ann
Risenhoover * Joan Rogin * Susan Rowe * Courtney Ruark * Laura Sanders *
Charles Siegel * Marty Smith * Dane Strother * Ronda Talley * Andy
Tobias * Mark Trahant * Frosty Troy * Jennifer Vanderheide * Merv
Wampold * Mary Beth Williams * Vickie Winpisinger * Sherilyn Wright *
Forest County Potawatomi * Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community * San
Manuel Band of Mission Indians * Muckleshoot Indian Tribe * Tulalip
Tribes * Chickasaw Nation * Cherokee Nation * IBEW * NEA * UAPP * TWU *
USW * IBT * SEIU * AFL-CIO * Democracy for America * EMILY’s List *
Native American Times * Indian Country Today * 21st Century Democrats *
Wellstone Action.”

Free wrote, “The past six years have been extremely challenging and
deeply rewarding. I will always cherish the memories of watching Claudia
Kauffman take her oath of office to become the only Indian woman
serving in the Washington Senate, and Al McAffrey become the first
openly gay man elected to the Oklahoma House, and Chuck Hoskin be the
standard bearer for Indian Country both in Oklahoma and across the
nation, and helping elect Denise Juneau as the first Indian woman to
hold statewide office in Montana and Barbara McIlvaine Smith as the
first Indian in the Pennsylvania House.

“My dream of seeing the first Indian woman in Congress, an Indian
Governor and ultimately an Indian President lives on. They are all out
there, somewhere. And maybe, just maybe, INDN’s List has helped show
them the way.”

Free ended her note to supporters with the Choctaw expression

“Yakoke,” meaning “Thank you.”

A local national view

As the Federal Government breaks specific limitations of authority outlined within the Constitution and spends to the point of endangering the currency, it falls to the states and our individual families to decide the future.

In mass November 2, 2010 Americans sent to Washington stark repudiation of Socialist governance.  Maybe these patriots will stand without equivocation and return the Federal Government to its Constitutional role, but on the issue of the limitation of free speech embodied by so-called “Net Neutrality,” both Congress and the Courts opposed it, but the Federal Communications Commission did it anyway.  Consequently, individual liberty in America is under attack – again.  It’s time to talk.

Years ago at an international policy conference featuring Georgia Anne Geyer at the University of Tulsa, I had an opportunity to speak at length with an economist from the European Union.  One of his favorite points was that Europeans were amused that Americans thought of their national economy as one system.  He asserted that it was at least three economies if not more.

Of course there has been global commerce since mankind learned how to build boats and camels found useful for hauling stuff, but that is not economy.  That’s simply commerce.  I suggest there are more like eight American economies (two each on the ease and west coast, the gulf coast, the Great Lakes, mid-central, and western), but other students of economics may disagree.  Regardless of how many, these economic regions are separate economic communities and they vary greatly in their current economic health.  All economy is regional.

Oklahoma is not besieged with over-priced housing or massive foreclosures.  Experienced with oil industry boom and bust cycles and without a large criminal class demanding other people’s property they can not afford, Oklahoma is much better equipped to recover our economic growth despite unfunded pensions and other state government based financial liabilities.

The question becomes; what responsibility do Oklahomans shoulder for the lack of fiscal maturity if not lack of sanity in California or New York?  The short answer is not a dang dime, but the tyranny of bi-coastal congestion promoted by media propagandists in behalf of socialism and crony capitalism might propel us there and threaten all our forefathers fought and died to build.  

Here is a thought for a new Amendment to the United States Constitution:  Any state that declares or is declared insolvent must, before receiving Federal bailout funds, revert to its original controlling document.  Thus removing all other legislation, an insolvent state would have a fighting chance to balance their own budgets.  Let them add back what they can afford after such a default if necessary.  Only services and obligations outlined within a state’s constitution would continue at the “reboot” and, in emergency, be supported by out-of-state taxpayer money. 

More fundamental conversations expected around many Christmas dinner tables this year will focus on the recent Federal Court decision that Obamacare is unconstitutional on its face.  The Commerce Clause of the Constitution addresses “interstate” commerce not individual commerce.  While government can require insurance to drive on public highways, that is totally different from requiring someone not utilizing public facilities or services to purchase a product or be penalized. 

The bottom line is that if the Supreme Court allows Obamacare, then America is no longer a nation of free citizens.

President Barack Hussein Obama Jr. is an anti-colonialist as he outlined in “Dreams from My Father.”  As Dinesh D’Souza details in his book “The Roots of Obama’s Rage,” Barack Obama Sr. was a Luo tribesman who grew up in Kenya and studied at Harvard and abandoned his own two year-old son to pursue Marxist revolution in Kenya.  He was a polygamist, a regular drunk driver (killing others, causing his own legs to be amputated due to injury and, in 1982 killing himself) who believed “we need to eliminate power structures that have been built through excessive accumulation” proposing that the state confiscate private land and raise taxes with no upper limit saying further, “theoretically there is nothing that can stop the government from taxing 100% of income so long as the people get benefits from the government commensurate with their income which is taxed.”

Of course President Obama claims he is not an ideologue, but he lied about most everything during the campaign and, more to the point from his background, in Obama’s world “ideologues” are the ones with lit fire bombs in their hands.

International Financier George Soros caused the economic collapse of four national economies and America (the big prize) is fifth on his list.  From the preponderance of public evidence, Soros’ non-profit organizations seek to end American sovereignty.  Soros has claimed to be god and says he loves the feeling.  He is the primary funding source for the majority of leftist/socialist/communist efforts in America over the last decade significantly including media.  He is the money behind the coup d’état executed by the Democrat Socialist Party (formerly the Democratic Party) figure-headed by now-President Obama.

Before the reader jumps to a conclusion that this writer is a conspiracy nut, know that for the last seven years I worked as a private employee for county government.  A writer and public information manager during that time, the obvious I can not ignore – while Congress may not read the bills they are passing, some son-of-a-gun with my skill sets authored each bill.  The primary think-tank generating written material for President Obama’s administration is the Center for American Progress; a George Soros funded and influenced organization.

Maybe our newly elected Congress can right this ship of state, but it is sinking at the moment.  Again, it falls to each state to look after its own and to each family and then to each individual.  To quote a television theme song: “What ya going to do when they come for you?”

As for me and my house, our position is direct:  “We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness (which we interpret as personal property) – That to secure these Rights, governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.” The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776

My entire life, I believed all responsible American leaders stood strong in support of those concepts, but in public hearings before the U.S. Senate now-confirmed Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan refused to acknowledge to Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn that citizens had any rights before and or surpassing government degree.  Her appointment by President Obama is significantly revealing and one root of growing government distrust.

This 2011 New Year Holiday consider the facts facing our future, talk with family and decide if our current Administration or, even greater, the form of Government has become destructive of Liberty.  This is not a “game changing” consideration.  The game was changed by George Soros and his minions including Barack Hussein Obama.  The question is what are we going to do about it?  

It’s a conversation starter we are overdue to engage don’t you think?


About the author:
An individualist, David Arnett has long argued that government is incompetent if not corrupt at the Federal level, put his life on the line to fight corruption on the state level and questioned almost every “authority” in Tulsa at some point.  Passionately belligerent in the demand for equal treatment under the law, Arnett fought for racial integration of Tulsa Public Schools and equal rights as youth liaison to the Tulsa Community Relations Commission before he graduated from high school.  Arnett is an equal opportunity aggravator.

You are encouraged listen and welcome to call-in between 4 and 6 pm each Saturday on The David Arnett Show on AM 740 and FM 102.3 news talk KRMG to discuss this story and others.  You may also register free on Tulsa Today and comment below.  E-mail of news tips are welcome to editor@tulsatoday.com or by using the contact form on this site.

Merry Christmas

“Yes, God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life.  For God sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world, but so that through him the world might be saved.  No one who believes in him will be condemned; but whoever refused to believe is condemned already because he has refused to believe in the name of God’s only Son.”     John 3:16-18, The Jerusalem Bible

“The angel of the Lord appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone round them.  They were terrified, but the angel said, ‘Do not be afraid.  Listen, I bring you news of great joy, a joy to be shared by the whole people.  Today in the town of David a savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.  And here is a sign for you:  you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.’  And suddenly with the angel there was a great throng of the heavenly host, praising God and singing: ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and peace to men who enjoy his favor.’”    Luke 2:9-14, The Jerusalem Bible

Christians are being persecuted in deadly ways worldwide.  Even in the United States of America which is established on a foundation of faith in God, fundamental secularists are attacking from coast to coast – in Tulsa, Oklahoma most recently by misuse of the Christmas name in parade promotions.

That controversy can be revisited by clicking here, but the issue arose from a small committee that first substituted the name “Holiday” for “Christmas” at the last moment in 2009, then solicited participation and funding under the name “Christmas Parade” then filed for a parade permit in 2010 again with the name “Holiday.”  Thus ends a seventy-year tradition of a Christmas Parade in downtown Tulsa.

Citizens protested in 2009 and again in 2010, but the daily newspaper true to form featured the dispute as U. S. Senator Jim Inhofe refusing to participate because of the name change.  That was an egregious omission of multiple disputing parties and mischaracterization for purely political purpose.

Next year Tulsa is expected to hold several December parades with downtown to lose exclusivity because a small committee of unelected worshipers of political correctness thought it best.  Advance plans on next year’s parades will be featured in coming stories here on Tulsa Today.

My final thought on this issue, “May God bless each as He sees fit.”