Super Tuesday, Southern Style

The southern states are poised to dominate the early 2016 campaign schedule for the Presidential hopefuls.  Arkansas just joined Oklahoma, Texas, Virginia, & Tennessee for a March 1st Super Tuesday blitz.

 Louisiana will follow on March 5th. Yes, that's a Saturday event, but the former French colony has some rich traditions like that.

  The twin states of Alabama & Mississippi will go to the polls on Tuesday, March 8th. They tend to coordinate their presidential primaries. These 2 gulf states were a part of the original Super Tuesday which was designed by several southern Democrat legislatures prior to the 1988 campaign cycle. The idea was to give a big boost to a southern conservative Democrat early enough to boost his fundraising and 'electability' status, because Northeast liberals had been dominating Democrat presidential politics.

Will House Ethics Committee Investigate Mark McBride Allegations?

  KOKH-Fox25 and Raw Story are standing by their news story of Rep. Mark McBride's alleged threats to put a former employee in jail and keep putting him back in prison. The only reason included for the threat was McBride's believe that the man defamed his business.

Patrick McGuigan: Oklahoma's Dean Of Journalism

  Perhaps the journalistic calling has no more devout Oklahoma practitioner than Patrick McGuigan. The man has known the heights of his achievements and the despair of separation from a means of communicating with the fellow Oklahomans he loves and serves. Making a living in journalism can be difficult.
 This Spring, 'professor' McGuigan was inducted into the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame.
 To honor Patrick McGuigan, I decided to call your attention to the core passion that drives him.
With his indulgence, here is his message to Oklahoma and his fellow journalists; delivered at his induction:

Scott Walker Is The Oklahoma Frontrunner

Not so fast...

  Yesterday we announced that SoonerPoll has declared Ben Carson  the winner of the SRLC Straw Poll. That poll depended upon the respondents who attended the SRLC 2015 event, in Oklahoma City.

  While 75% of the respondents were Oklahomans, there were plenty of Texans and Arkansans. 19 other states were also present. I was premature to assume that Carson was also the Oklahoma frontrunner. Jamison Faught of the Muskogee Politico was the first to report a surprising internal factoid.

SRLC: Day 3 - SoonerPoll Declares Ben Carson As The Frontrunner

The People Speak...

The first straw poll of the 2016 GOP Presidential contest was held at the Oklahoma City event. SoonerPoll conducted the event in a very well-executed and convenient manner. After about 1000 conference participants had spoken, the final presentation was revealed at the Cox Convention Center.

SRLC: Day Two Review

Adapting to forces in Washington

No one was more respected than Raphael Cruz

The day started with uncertainty and continued into adaptation by a great conference team and the forward-thinking OKGOP leadership.

SRLC: Day One Review

  The long-awaited national event has finally arrived.

Scott Walker gets the first slot at the conference

 Downtown Oklahoma City has been transformed into a political conclave. The Southern Republican Leadership Conference features nearly all the leading Republican candidates in the upcoming presidential primaries and caucuses.

Bus Crimes In Politics

  Democrats don't 'throw each other under the bus'. That's only the spineless tactic of fearful Republicans who pray that one day the liberal media will actually love them.

  When a college-age kid finally grows up and becomes a conservative grassroots leader, why is it that entrenched political operatives feel he needs to be treated like a leper?

RNC Snubs South Central In Debate Schedule

RNC Announces 9 Primary Debates

RNC Chairman, Reince Priebus, announced 9 debate plans

From the RNC Website:

"...the RNC announced that it has sanctioned nine debates from August 2015 through March 1, 2016. RNC Chairman Reince Priebus presented a clear vision for the debate process, including the dates, locations and sponsors. 

  The RNC previously appointed a standing committee for presidential primary debates to sanction debates on behalf of the RNC. The committee chose to limit the number of debates, spread the debates across the country by sanctioning no more than one debate per state..."

1. Fox News     August 2015     Ohio	2. CNN     September 2015     California	3. CNBC     October 2015     Colorado
4. Fox Business     November 2015     Wisconsin	5. CNN     December 2015     Nevada	6. Fox News     January 2016     Iowa
7. ABC News     February 2016     New Hampshire	8. CBS News     February 2016     South Carolina	9. NBC/Telemundo     February 2016      Florida

  What remains both puzzling and irritating, is the rewarding of an untimely debate to the most egregious violator of RNC rules. Florida violated the RNC requirements in 2012 by awarding all of their delegates to a candidate who clearly did not receive the majority of the vote.
The RNC did make threats, in case RNC rules are violated...

Presidential Forums: A Growing Cottage Industry

How New Forums Effect Campaigns

 Several politically-minded businessmen are becoming shrewd entrepreneurs. Nothing in politics matches the drama of a split convention, and nothing terrifies a national party more than that prospect.

  The 1968 Democrat National Convention was about as ugly and exciting as they come; or came.

  There will probably never be such a spectacle again, if a major party can avoid it.

  But the specter of debates now replaces some of that magic. The problem is that you can't make money off a debate.

  So now we have events put on by both state parties and upstart event management companies. The Iowa Straw Poll was one of the first such events. The Iowa GOP makes a bunch of money off that event, at the Iowa State Fair.

2011 Iowa Straw Poll

  Last week we had a New Hampshire event. This weekend we just had a South Carolina event, and in 2 weeks, the Big Southern Republican Leadership Conference comes to Oklahoma.

  When does a market become too saturated? At what point does a candidate reach his quota, and opt for other ways of connecting with voters and contributors?

Earthquake Week In Oklahoma

What is going on, under our houses? 

  Over the past 7 days, 1/8 of all the world's significant tremors were in the central Oklahoma region.

  Precisely, 40 of the 318 quakes of 2.5 or more on the USGS Richter scale were within 100 miles of Enid, Oklahoma.

  Despite the uncertainty and risks, the Oklahoma legislature wants to ban any counties or municipalities from curtailing risky geological activities.

Rep. Jason Murphey, of Guthrie, OK

Shut 'r Down! NSA Ruled 'Out Of Line'

The NSA Lacked Authorization

  The federal courts have rebuked the Bush and Obama administrations of exceeding the authorization given them in collecting communications data.

  The behavior of the NSA has come under fire since Director James Clapper testified to congress in a grossly deceptive manner.

  That blatant deception motivated Edward Snowden to 'blow the whistle' in a radical move which has led to his asylum in Moscow, ever since.

Oklahoma Voters Need To Stop Civil Forfeiture Crimes Of Police

Government Stomps On Constitution

According to a recent Washington Post article, Desert Snow; a Guthrie, OKlahoma based company who provides law enforcement training, probably could be charged with racketeering and conspiracy to commit theft.

The Washington Post report goes on to say;

"Behind the rise in seizures is a little-known cottage industry of private police-training firms that teach the techniques of “highway interdiction” to departments across the country.

One of those firms created a private intelligence network known as Black Asphalt Electronic Networking & Notification System that enabled police nationwide to share detailed reports about American motorists — criminals and the innocent alike — including their Social Security numbers, addresses and identifying tattoos, as well as hunches about which drivers to stop.

Many of the reports have been funneled to federal agencies and fusion centers as part of the government’s burgeoning law enforcement intelligence systems — despite warnings from state and federal authorities that the information could violate privacy and constitutional protections.

A thriving subculture of road officers on the network now competes to see who can seize the most cash and contraband, describing their exploits in the network’s chat rooms and sharing “trophy shots” of money and drugs. Some police advocate highway interdiction as a way of raising revenue for cash-strapped municipalities.

'All of our home towns are sitting on a tax-liberating gold mine,' Deputy Ron Hain of Kane County, Ill., wrote in a self-published book under a pseudonym. Hain is a marketing specialist for Desert Snow, a leading interdiction training firm based in Guthrie, Okla., whose founders also created Black Asphalt.

Hain’s book calls for 'turning our police forces into present-day Robin Hoods.'

Cash seizures can be made under state or federal civil law. One of the primary ways police departments are able to seize money and share in the proceeds at the federal level is through a long-standing Justice Department civil asset forfeiture program known as Equitable Sharing. Asset forfeiture is an extraordinarily powerful law enforcement tool that allows the government to take cash and property without pressing criminal charges and then requires the owners to prove their possessions were legally acquired.'"

This asset forfeiture law of 2004  needs to be struck down as unconstitutional .

Due Process Of Law

The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides:

• [N]or shall any person . . . be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law . . . .

Section One of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides:

• [N]or shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law . . 

U.S. Civil rights include:

• An unbiased tribunal.
• Notice of the proposed action and the grounds asserted for it.
• Opportunity to present reasons why the proposed action should not be taken.
• The right to present evidence, including the right to call witnesses.
• The right to know opposing evidence.
• The right to cross-examine adverse witnesses.
• A decision based exclusively on the evidence presented.
• Opportunity to be represented by counsel.
• Requirement that the tribunal prepare a record of the evidence presented.
• Requirement that the tribunal prepare written findings of fact and reasons for its decision.

David Van Risseghem

  The Oklahoma legislature, or even the voters; need to institute a state law, codifying this civil forfeiture abuse as the crime it truly is. This would empower the Oklahoma Attorney General to fight this abuse all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

How Am I Vulnerable?

Any cash you carry can be seized and kept without any constitutional due process. It is up to you to prove to the uniformed thieves that the money is legitimately yours and that you did not acquire it through any illegal means.
Even cash and goods on your property are at risk. The government wants all citizens to use the banks for everything. That way they can monitor all our business through banking records.

xx

Thousands Of Oklahomans Arrested For Getting Sick

The state's two biggest mental health facilities are two county jails in Tulsa and Oklahoma City

  Oklahoma's lawmakers have forced county and municipal law enforcement to incarcerate massive numbers of sickly Oklahomans on charges such as disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace, and public intoxication.

  In reality, those makeshift criminals are simply our mentally ill neighbors, relatives, and coworkers.

The interior of a 21st-century Oklahoma hospital for mental health

  When the legislature in 2000, closed the massive state hospital in Vinita (Eastern State Hospital), they saved the state a massive amount of money. But they also boarded up a 2600-bed capacity. They promised to replace the mental health hospital with a vast network of local treatment centers in several strategic locations around the state. But only a handful of state-run facilities were ever opened.

Sooner Politics Launches Online Magazine

Sooner Politics and Feedly develop online magazine format

  Sooner Politics has responded to the need of our readers to easily navigate through the publications on small mobile devices. Tablets and phones are becoming too prevalent to be ignored. Even more specific support for mobile devices will be announced, soon.

  Feedly has graciously allowed our readers to use their free mobile and desktop services specifically for reading Sooner Politics' large library of periodical content.

  The process just takes a few easy steps and you can then get all our aggregate columnists' latest posts on every one of your devices.

Let's now begin the 3 easy steps:

fig. 1 fig. 2 fig. 3

1. Download this small file: SoonerPolitics.opml. It is the customization data to easily load SoonerPolitics Magazine into your free feedly account.
2. On your computer, go to Feedly.com and click the button to "IMPORT OPML". (fig. 1)  A pop up window will ask you to register using a Google+ or Facebook acct. (fig. 2) It's free and they don't ask for a bunch of personal info. We recommend using your Facebook or Google+ account if you have one. It's just one less password to remember. Feedly also allows you to share your favorite articles via social media if you set up an account using your social media connection.
3. Next, you will be asked to upload that "SoonerPolitics.opml" file that you just downloaded. (fig. 3) Choose the correct file and then click the "Import" button

fig. 4

  Your online SoonerPolitics.org magazine is now loaded and readable.  You can change your magazine layout and color themes to your own liking. Font size, formatting, and other tweaks can be found in the left column bottom control panel. (fig. 4)

fig. 5

  Load the mobile apps at iTunes (iphone, iPad), Google Play(tablet, phone), and Kindle. Just log in with your same account info when you open your mobile apps. Everything will be preloaded. (fig. 5)

David Van Risseghem