Here are excerpts from recent editorials in Oklahoma newspapers:
The Lawton Constitution, Sept. 25, 2016
Diversify: Group needed to look at opportunities
Perhaps now would be a good time for Lawton’s deep thinkers to come together to look at ideas for ways to diversify our private-sector economy. What incentives need to be expanded and what roadblocks need to be removed to bring new investment, jobs and wealth to our community?
What makes people looking for a better life - escaping high taxes, traffic congestion, long commutes and regulations - want to move to Dallas, San Antonio and other growing cities? Those cities have some of the same problems - street maintenance, drainage problems, education challenges, etc. - yet they are building and expanding.
Are there some best practices that can be reviewed and implemented that would bring more people to fill the city’s vacant housing and commercial property? What is it going to take to get people to want to move to Lawton?
The federal fiscal year begins in a few days. A new president will take office in about four months. That could be significant and Lawton has to be ready. At least one candidate wants to bring jobs back from overseas.
Military budget sequestration is still the law and may take on new meaning under a new administration. Fortunately, U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe and the rest of the congressional delegation have been able to expand military assets, but the trend is cloudy as the Army and Air Force look for ways to save money, to do more with less.
Lawton’s future is in expanding the private sector. Unfortunately, banks, financial services, petroleum and coal companies, employers, savers, health care providers, etc., have been battered and beaten up over the last eight years while government jobs, regulations and executive orders have grown. Big Brother has become more involved in our lives, it would seem, than he was eight years ago. That may or may not change after this election cycle.
Meanwhile, local and state governments are about to complete the first quarter of operations and all seem to want more money from their constituencies. If the community were growing, the tax impact would be hardly noticeable.
Education is going full bore providing the basics and advanced studies for future employees, and Great Plains Technology Center’s business incubator is under construction. It will assist entrepreneurs of the next generation who are willing to take the risks if the rewards are sufficient. Are they? Do they need to change?
Meanwhile, retailers are anticipating a good Christmas season, yet the killings, rioting and chaos in other cities are troubling. While instant communications are keeping us informed, it is fanning discontent and attracting rioters as well. One report indicated 70 percent of those arrested in disturbances in Charlotte, N.C., last week had out-of-state IDs.
More than ever, we certainly need peace on Earth and good will toward men.
Maybe Lawton’s deep thinkers could look at every major business/government entity from agriculture to aviation, education, financial services, health care, hospitality, manufacturing and transportation. Are there businesses or new services or research opportunities in those entities that might add or supplement existing businesses in Lawton?
The future is more uncertain than ever, but maybe some serious analysis, review and brainstorming by community leaders might produce more private-sector investment and jobs ideas for our community.
___
The Oklahoman, Sept. 22, 2016
Inhofe, Boxer show that politicians can disagree but still get along
Amid the din of this polarizing presidential campaign, the U.S. Senate approved a giant piece of legislation last week written by two members whose worldviews couldn’t be more different. Yes, compromise and comity are possible on Capitol Hill.
Sens. Jim Inhofe, R-Tulsa, and Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., co-wrote the Water Resources Development Act, which the Senate approved 95-3. It’s a $10 billion piece of legislation, several years in the making, that authorizes funding for water-related projects nationwide. Oklahoma entities such as the Port of Muskogee and Port of Catoosa will benefit; an amendment also clears the way for a historic water rights agreement involving the Chickasaw and Choctaw tribes, the state and Oklahoma City.
Inhofe is wrapping up his time as chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Boxer is the highest-ranking Democrat on the committee. One is perhaps the most conservative member of the Senate; the other one of its most liberal members. They disagree regularly on any variety of issues.
But they have also found ways to work together on major pieces of legislation. One example is the five-year transportation funding bill signed by the president in December. Another is a bill approved with bipartisan support in June that constituted the first overhaul of the Toxic Substances Control Act since it became law 40 years ago.
That sort of heavy lifting requires some teamwork.
“People wonder how can we possibly bridge the divide,” Boxer told Matthew Daly of The Associated Press. “And it is a fact that on certain issues we can’t. There is a lesson there.”
Boxer said she and Inhofe have never taken personally their differences of opinion. Instead, they have agreed to disagree, and remained respectful of each other.
It’s reminiscent of former Sen. Tom Coburn’s relationship with President Barack Obama. Coburn is a staunch conservative, Obama a liberal of the first order. Yet the two became friends as freshmen senators in 2005 and remained so after Obama won election to the White House.
As senators, the two collaborated on some meaningful legislation - they co-sponsored a bill ensuring strict oversight of government aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina, and went together on a bill requiring all government grants and contracts to be included in an internet database.
Coburn famously hugged Obama after the president’s first State of the Union address in 2009, which produced a fair bit of criticism from constituents. “But you need to separate the difference in political philosophy versus friendship,” Coburn told The Oklahoman’s Chris Casteel later. “How better to influence somebody than love them?”
Inhofe and Boxer may not love each other. But after spending many years as leaders of an important Senate committee, they have grown to respect each other even when they diverge on major issues, as they do, for example on climate change. Inhofe has called man-made global warming a hoax; Boxer sees it as the planet’s most pressing challenge.
Speaking recently in the Senate about their relationship, Boxer said simply that she and Inhofe have come to accept the other’s opinions. “Where we can work together, we find the sweet spot, and we have done it several times,” she said.
In other words, it’s possible - even in Washington - to disagree without being disagreeable. More elected officials should take note.
___
The Journal Record, Sept. 26, 2016
A cheaper option than prison
State Question 780 is a 138-page document that most won’t bother to read, but the ballot title summarizes the proposal sufficiently: The measure amends statutes to reform criminal sentences for certain property and drug offenses. It makes certain property offenses misdemeanors. It makes simple drug possession a misdemeanor. Property offenses where the value of the property is $1,000 or more remain felonies, and the distribution, possession with intent to distribute, transportation with intent to distribute, manufacture, or trafficking of drugs remain felonies.
The threshold for felony theft in Oklahoma now sits at a meager $500 and there hasn’t been much reticence toward raising the amount. A misdemeanor can still carry a punishment of up to one year in a county jail plus a fine in addition to restitution. That’s a lot more than the proverbial wrist slap if a criminal gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar, and the change reflects inflation. It’s time for the update.
The drug law changes have raised more ire, mostly from prosecutors who point out that not all drugs are created equal and that drug court only works when there’s the threat of a long sentence to persuade the user to give treatment a shot.
Attorney General Scott Pruitt argued to the state Supreme Court that the ballot title was misleading. Pruitt contends that simple possession of drugs such as marijuana is already a misdemeanor and that SQ 780 really seeks to downgrade the penalty for cases where the penalty is enhanced because the perpetrator had heroin near a school or a parent kept methamphetamine near a child younger than 12. The court ruled against Pruitt.
Possession with intent to distribute would remain a felony under SQ 780, so if that person with the heroin in his pocket had designs on selling it at the school rather than walking by the building on his way home, the punishment is still prison time. A meth-addicted mother should be in drug court, not contributing to the women’s prison overflow.
Treatment is cheaper than prison by a wide margin and statistically has much better outcomes. Locking up drug users for long stays in the penitentiary has accomplished nothing but crowded prisons and a lot of taxpayer expense. State Question 780 takes the lessons learned from the past 30 years and adjusts the system to a less expensive, more humane, more successful system and we encourage Oklahomans to vote yes.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.