Search this site
Matching entries from BatesLine
2023 Tulsa sales tax & bond issues
City of Tulsa residents will vote on a new sales tax on August 8, 2023. Why are city officials pushing for a new tax more than two years before the current tax expires? Click to read ballot language, ballot resolutions, and lists of "specific" projects.
Resources on believers' baptism
A rain-filled mikveh (ritual immersion pool) at Korazim National Park, Israel. Photo © 2023 by Michael D. Bates, all rights reserved. Here are a couple of useful resources that I recently encountered, one very old, one new, in support of the view that Christian baptism is for those only...
Oklahoma Primary 2022: Tulsa area county & legislative races
More short takes on races for county offices, Tulsa area legislative seats, and judicial races. There isn't a primary in two of the Tulsa County races up this year: County Treasurer John Fothergill did not draw an opponent at all, and District 1 County Commissoner Stan Sallee is unopposed for...
HB 1775 and Critical Race Theory
The substance of HB 1775 occupies a mere page and a third, 282 words by my count. So why should mainstream media mischaracterize the bill, when they could easily quote the entire text?
How did the Unassigned Lands become unassigned?
This past April 22, 2020, was the 131st anniversary of the land run that opened the central part of today's State of Oklahoma to homesteading by non-Indian settlers. These were lands owned by the U. S. Government and not assigned to any organized territory nor to any Indian nation or...
Independence Day 2020: Are flags in churches idolatry?
If you're on Twitter you might have concluded that July 4th was Hipster-Pastors-Complaining-About-Flags-in-Churches Day.
Time for protesters to run for office; time for Tulsa leaders to read the Riot Act
A young friend of mine was incensed at the attitude of older folks about the incident on the North Detroit overpass of Interstate 244. "The point of a protest is this: How does it feel to be powerless?" So it was fine, in the eyes of this homeschooled, Christian young...
Tulsa Retail Market Study and Strategy
Bookmarked for further reading: The City of Tulsa commissioned Place Dynamics of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to do a study of Tulsa's retail health and to identify strategies for improvement. The 245-page Tulsa Retail Market Study and Strategy report is now online. From the city website: The City of Tulsa relies on...
A bidding prayer for Christmas, A. D. 2018
Edited from the version originally published on December 25, 2012 Merry Christmas to anyone who happens by BatesLine today. As a Holland Hall high school student, I attended and sang in the annual service of Christmas lessons and carols at Trinity Episcopal Church, modeled after the annual Christmas Eve service...
Tulsa City Council District 4: No endorsement
"I shall show my contempt by going down to the polling booth, taking my form, crossing both their names out and writing 'GET KNOTTED' in." -- Tony Hancock, Hancock's Half Hour, "The Election Candidate" I share The Lad's sentiments about many of the races on the August 28, 2018, runoff...
A bidding prayer for Christmas, A. D. 2017
Edited from the version originally published on December 25, 2012 Merry Christmas to anyone who happens by BatesLine today. As a Holland Hall high school student, I attended and sang in the annual service of Christmas lessons and carols at Trinity Episcopal Church, modeled after the annual Christmas Eve service...
Battle of Beersheba: 100 years
I'll get back to the charter amendment proposals in a couple of days, but we have some historical commemorations that deserve our attention. There's the big one -- the semimillenial celebration of Luther's 95 Theses and the commencement of the Protestant Reformation -- but 100 years ago today there...
Jerry Lewis and Oral Roberts
On the occasion of the death of Jerry Lewis, Harry Shearer has posted his contemporaneous feature story about the 1976 Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. That was the year that, during a live appearance by Frank Sinatra, Lewis was reunited with his old partner in...
Trump's religious freedom executive order: "A sop"
But Trump is Cyrus or Constantine or something.... Yahoo News: Trump's executive order disappoints religious conservatives "The executive order on the whole looks to accomplish very little of substance, against the backdrop of a lot of show," said John Inazu, a professor of law and religion at Washington University in...
<em>The Man Who Was Thursday</em>, read by Geoffrey Palmer
"Are you the new recruit?" asked a heavy voice. And in some strange way, though there was not the shadow of a shape in the gloom, Syme knew two things: first, that it came from a man of massive stature; and second, that the man had his back to...
Fred Thompson, RIP
Tribute image posted on Facebook by National Review I was sad to hear of the passing, on Sunday, of actor, lawyer, and former U. S. Senator Fred Thompson, who was felled by lymphoma at the age of 73. My condolences to his family and friends, with my thanks for...
A bidding prayer for Christmas, A.D. 2014
Edited from the version originally published on December 25, 2012 Merry Christmas to anyone who happens by BatesLine today. As a Holland Hall high school student, I attended and sang in the annual service of Christmas lessons and carols at Trinity Episcopal Church, modeled after the annual Christmas Eve service...
Election day 2014 in Florida -- and the aftermath
It was a good day, a better day that anyone expected, a real wave election. The reaction of my local liberal friends on Facebook reveal their contempt for the state where they live, their bigoted opinions of conservatives, and their disconnect from political reality. One wrote a very apt "chin-up"...
Roscoe Turner, RIP
Services for Roscoe Turner will be held at First Baptist Church, 4th & Cincinnati in downtown Tulsa, Monday, January 27, 2014, at 11:00 a.m., with interment at Rose Hill Cemetery. Visitation will be held at Moore's Memory Chapel, 1403 S. Peoria, from 10:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., Saturday, January 25,...
A bidding prayer for Christmas, A. D. 2013
Edited from the version originally published on December 25, 2012 Merry Christmas to anyone who happens by BatesLine today. As a Holland Hall high school student, I attended and sang in the annual service of Christmas lessons and carols at Trinity Episcopal Church, modeled after the annual Christmas Eve service...
Feed Subscription
If you use an RSS reader, you can subscribe to a feed of all future entries matching 'Chris Trail'. [What is this?]
