Search this site
Matching entries from BatesLine
BatesLine at City Elders: Further reading
Video, with links to further reading, of my talk on the recent school board elections, the Democratic candidates who won despite higher Republican turnout, the connections of the donors who made their campaigns possible, and the challenges of bypassing the media to get your message to "normie" voters.
Covering tracks: Kevin Hern and the Republican Main Street Partnership
Grassroots activists who support Kevin Hern for Oklahoma's 1st Congressional Candidate say they've been told by the candidate and his campaign that he never accepted the endorsement of the crony-capitalist, open-borders Republican Main Street Partnership or donations from the organization's affiliated Republican Mainstreet Partnership PAC. (Note the subtle difference --...
Coburn, Cruz endorse Kevin Stitt
Two conservative stalwarts, former Oklahoma U. S. Senator Tom Coburn and Texas Senator Ted Cruz, have both endorsed Kevin Stitt in the runoff for the 2018 Republican nomination for Oklahoma governor. Coburn's Tuesday statement endorsing Stitt also included some sharp criticism for Mick Cornett's campaign tactics, refuting Cornett's attacks on...
Look for the Chamber label -- then vote for someone else
It may seem counter-intuitive, but if you're a conservative, the Chamber of Commerce is not your friend. Not the U. S. Chamber of Commerce, not the Oklahoma State Chamber of Commerce, not the Tulsa Regional Chamber. If you're a conservative voting in the Republican primary, look to see whom the Chambers are supporting, then give your vote to some other candidate. If the Chambers are attacking a Republican candidate, she's probably worthy of your enthusiastic backing.
Voting for image, not understanding
There's a thought-provoking story from last week's local elections in Houston: An elderly, white, conservative man won a non-partisan race for a six-year-term on the board of Houston Community College, defeating a four-term African-American incumbent in a heavily African-American district. The victorious candidate, Dave Wilson, used stock photos of African-Americans...
Bill Christiansen for Tulsa Mayor
Another day, another mendacious attack mailer from Dewey Bartlett Jr. If I had known there were enough Tulsans who objected to rising city budgets, county tax initiatives, the City Hall move, the Great Plains Airlines bailout, and accepting Federal stimulus money to justify a mail piece targeting those concerns, I...
Kathy Taylor confronted over voter fraud
It was disheartening to read that someone I backed for City Council has bought Kathy Taylor's self-serving spin on the Great Plains Airlines bailout. The airport was never at risk. The collateral for the Great Plains Airlines loan was a small piece of the apron on the Air Force Plant...
Kathy Taylor's runoff problem
Runoff was one of the topics mentioned in Tulsa mayoral candidate Bill Christiansen's press conference on Wednesday, May 29, 2013, about the questionable ethics of his principal opponents, former mayor Kathy Taylor and incumbent mayor Dewey Bartlett Jr. The runoff under discussion isn't the election that will be held in...
Vision2: A distraction from bigger issues
I was out of town, but last Friday, the Tulsa Republican Club had as its speaker a proponent of the Vision2 corporate welfare and pork barrel tax package. At its October meeting, the Tulsa Republican Club will hear from an opponent of the Vision2 package. A glance through my email...
Thoughts on the censure of Perry and Smaligo
I've been told that my name has been mentioned in connection with the decision of the Tulsa County Republican Party County Committee to censure County Commissioners John Smaligo and Fred Perry for their vote to put the Vision2 sales tax on the ballot for November. For the moment, a few...
Tulsa County GOP opposes Vision2, censures Smaligo, Perry
TULSA COUNTY REPUBLICAN PARTY PRESS RELEASE Members of the Tulsa County Republican Party County Committee met on Saturday, August 18, 2012 and adopted a resolution calling for the defeat of the Vision2 county sales tax propositions on the November ballot and opposing any use of Vision 2025 funds to...
Vision2: Tulsa better off going it alone
A possible response to my earlier entry, Vision2 share vs. Tulsa County municipality population, is that it doesn't count the money in Proposition 1 to improve city-owned facilities and to provide "equipment and fixtures and other capital improvements" for businesses in the "Airport Industrial Complex" as part of Tulsa's share....
Tulsa County Commissioners put Vision2 (ObamaVision) on November ballot
The Tulsa County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously Monday morning, to the disappointment of many and the surprise of none, to put a 13-year sales tax extension on the ballot this coming November, more than four years before the tax is scheduled to expire. The package is being called Vision2...
The anthropomorphization of the GOP
This post has been percolating in my brain for a couple of months, and the topic for even longer, but other business has prevented its completion until now. As I read conservative blogs, I see a great deal of understandable frustration with different aspects of Republican Party politics: The National...
Mitt Romney and the Republican predilection for executive deference
There's a theory being circulated among conservative bloggers and Tea Party activists that we shouldn't worry about the likelihood of bailout-backing, mandate-loving, flip-flopping Mitt Romney winning the nomination. Anyone can beat Obama, the theory goes -- even with Romney unable to run against Obama on Obamacare -- and if we...
George Kaiser and tax avoidance
Last week the Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group published a detailed history of George Kaiser's fortune, a fortune built with care to avoid paying taxes, according to the story's author, Bill Allison. Allison co-authored The Cheating of America, a 2001 book on "wealthy individuals and powerful corporations avoid taxes." The article...
Huntsman hires consultants with Inhofe ties
Former Utah Gov. and Obama Administration Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman has hired two campaign consultants with ties to Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe to handle the candidate's video and digital presence. Ryan Cassin is Huntsman's digital strategist, according to a CNN story about the Huntsman campaign website. Cassin served as...
Airman museum looking for memories, money
During one of my recent trips to San Antonio's Lackland AFB, on a lunch break, I visited the US Air Force Airman Heritage Museum. It's a modest facility with a monumental plans to preserve and display the history of the Air Force's enlisted men and women and the basic military...
How to be the wave -- and wash Dan Boren out of Congress
In the previous entry, I mentioned that there are congressional districts that could be competitive for conservative Republicans, districts which have voted for Republicans in the past, where the GOP challenger is a credible community leader. But they will only be competitive if volunteers show up to get the message...
Democrats in key congressional races, part 2
Robert Dold Cedric Richmond Lisa Murkowski Barbara Boxer Michael Bennet Alexi Giannoulias Robin Carnahan Paul Hodes Lee Fisher Joe Sestak Harry Reid Scott McAdams Kendrick Meek Charlie Crist Jack Conway Patty Murray Russ Feingold Richard Blumenthal Joe Manchin Chris Coons Ron Wyden Kirsten Gillibrand Mike McMahon Scott Murphy Bill Owens...
Feed Subscription
If you use an RSS reader, you can subscribe to a feed of all future entries matching 'bailout'. [What is this?]
