2018 Oklahoma governor primary: Process of elimination

Can you tell I'm not excited about the race to succeed Mary Fallin? It's taken a long time to make up my mind, and it's still not as firm a decision as I'd like. As with many of the judical races, my current inclination to vote for Dan Fisher in the Republican primary for Oklahoma governor is more by process of elimination than enthusiasm.

So let me walk you through that process step-by-step, in order of elimination.

Mick Cornett:

A reader emailed to ask why I was not supporting Cornett, since her OKC relatives raved about him and he balanced 14 city budgets. I called her attention to Mick Cornett's evasive interview with Pat Campbell back in January, and the article I wrote about it at the time.

Oklahoma City's government is different than Tulsa's. The Mayor is just a citywide city councilor, one of nine votes. The Chief Executive Officer of OKC's city government is the city manager, hired by the council and responsible for running all the city departments.

By touting OKC's balanced budgets in his ads, Cornett is hoping that voters are ignorant of Oklahoma's constitutional requirement to balance the budget every year, which is binding on the state and on each county and city and school district in the state. So it's nothing special to balance a budget -- it's the law -- and even then, credit belongs to the city manager and the city finance department for making it happen. He's insulting your intelligence by using balanced budgets as a selling point.

Cornett's interview (and his refusal to do any since, or even to answer a simple questionnaire) reveals him to be weak, cowardly, and indecisive. We need leadership from the next governor, something we haven't had since 2002.

Gary Richardson:

Speaking of 2002, that's when Gary Richardson lost my vote. Rather than compete in the Republican primary to succeed his old law partner, he ran as an independent, splitting the right-of-center vote and allowing Democrat Brad Henry to win with a narrow 7,000-vote plurality over Republican nominee Steve Largent. Had the had the courage to run against Largent in the Republican primary, Richardson might well have prevailed; Largent had never faced a tough election, and he won the primary with 87% of the vote. (Mary Fallin also chickened out, running for a third term as Lt. Governor instead.) Even if Largent had prevailed over Richardson in a primary, Largent would have been a better candidate for the challenge and better prepared to defeat Henry. Richardson's decision to run as an independent looked more like a spoiler move than a serious effort to win.

Richardson's run and Henry's victory opened the door for a lottery, which, under federal law, allowed the tribes to offer Class III gaming for the first time. Great for the tribes and their business partners, not so great for Oklahoma families damaged by gambling addictions or the non-tribal businesses that have to compete against the casinos for local entertainment dollars or against tribal enterprises capitalized by casino winnings.

I'm sure Richardson is on to something with his main issue, auditing the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority. But it's too narrow a focus, and he's had 16 years to think of some new issues. All of Oklahoma's quasi-governmental trusts, authorities, boards, and commissions need investigation and to be brought back under public control.

Gary Jones:

At the start of this race, I thought I would end up supporting State Auditor Gary Jones for Governor. I met him during his first run back in 2002, endorsed him in each of his elections, worked with him during his time as GOP state chairman. I knew that he would be able to ferret out state government waste.

I also knew that Jones's blunt manner could be abrasive and off-putting, and he might have trouble making the allies he would need to do something about whatever waste he identified. Governor of Oklahoma is a constitutionally weak office, and he can't accomplish anything without building alliances and support in the legislature and the other executive departments.

During this years' budget hullaballoo, Jones thought he was being politically courageous and innovative in reaching across the aisle, standing with Democrats to announce a plan to increase taxes. There he was, like Charlie Brown lining up to kick the football, thinking he had successfully appeased the teachers and would avert a messy walkout. Then Lucy pulled the ball away, as she always does. Despite the biggest tax increase in state history and a massive salary increase for teachers, they still walked out and demanded more, more, more.

You might think a smart man like Gary Jones would learn his lesson and say never again, but instead he directed his anger at the conservative Republicans who warned that this would happen and who had been trying to find a solution to fund teacher salaries without raising taxes. While the Platform Caucus were thinking outside the box, looking at ways to change the laws to allow money to flow where it is most needed, Jones followed the path of least resistance to tax increases.

Gary Jones's heated discussion with Pat Campbell on the April 11 program encapsulates all that I've written above, all of Jones's flaws in one podcast. He thought he made a brilliant move, but he got played, and he doesn't seem to realize it. Governor Jones would give up tax increases now for reform never. He would inherit the title that was given to moderate Republicans in Congress: "tax collectors for the welfare state." He would be driven by the tax-eaters to continue to dig the state into a deeper fiscal hole, in the interests of "bipartisanship" and "progress." No thanks. Not the leadership we need. Gary Jones shouldn't be governor, but the next governor should hire him as budget director.

Do I sound disappointed? I am.

Kevin Stitt:

A friend recently gave me a strong sales pitch in support of Stitt. He regarded Stitt's lack of experience, or even interest, in state politics as an asset, and thought Stitt would be excellent as a recruiter bringing businesses and jobs to Oklahoma.

I was tired, didn't feel like debating the point, but that is absolutely not what Oklahoma needs. Successful states grow their own businesses. They have laws that allow people with ideas and energy the freedom to build a company and enjoy the fruits of their success. The governor needs to focus inward on simplifying and streamlining state government and eliminating barriers to economic growth, and leave the rest to the private sector.

(That includes protecting our state's educational freedom and promoting Oklahoma as a destination to homeschoolers frustrated with their home states' restrictions; parents who are entrepreneurial and intentional about their children's education are often entrepreneurial in the business sense as well. We could grow our population and our economy.)

Stitt's failure to vote didn't impress me either. In our system, the citizens are the rulers. We exercise that rule by voting for those who will write, execute, and enforce our laws. As sovereign electors, we are responsible before God to exercise our franchise and to do so with wisdom. When you exercise your God-given responsibility and opportunity to cast a prudent vote for a wise official, you love your neighbor. When you neglect that responsibility to pursue your own selfish interests, well....

Stitt sends his kids to a good classical Christian school in Tulsa, Regent, which I applaud, but he ought to have taken the same good sense that led him to enroll his children there and used it to influence his fellow citizens as they (and he) cast their votes for state officials.

(One more thing that indicates Kevin Stitt is not ready for political prime time -- Stitt's nervous giggle fit when Pat Campbell asked him if he would vote to repeal HB1010XX, the tax increase, was followed by a platitude about looking to the future, not the past.)

Watch this space: At this point I'm about to slide off the chair with exhaustion, but I hope to complete this with a discussion of Lamb and Fisher sometime Saturday night. In the meantime, go read the gubernatorial candidate responses to the Muskogee Politico questionnaire. That link will take you to the first response, from Gary Jones, and it has links to the rest, including Mick Cornett's non-answers.

CONTINUING WHERE I LEFT OFF:

Todd Lamb:

From his own description of the times he's shown political courage, it seems like Todd Lamb left his courage at the capitol coat check in January 2011 and only picked it up again when it was time for him to run for governor. (He mentions one tie-breaking vote as Lt. Governor in his role as President of the State Senate, but I don't think it took too much courage to join half of the State Senate in not raising taxes on the oil industry.) Some friends believe that he is the most electable conservative, and his stated preference for growing local small businesses over special tax deals to relocate big businesses is welcome. I'm just wondering where his leadership and initiative was hiding when we needed it these last eight years.

Dan Fisher:

Fisher was a consistent conservative during his four years in the state house. He was quick to state his opposition to the tax increases and his willingness to repeal them. I like nearly all of his answers to Muskogee Politico's questionnaire, and his legislative record suggests that he'll be true to the positions he stakes out. Fisher wants to decentralize education and move back to local control. He understands the problem of funding "silos" -- laws that hinder moving our tax dollars where they're most needed and will work to eliminate them. I especially agree with his answer on economic development:

The state should not hurt our homegrown businesses by using their tax dollars against them to pick winners and losers. I will veto unfair "economic development" schemes in favor of creating a truly free market that will entice investment from all over America. Additionally, I will be an ambassador to herald the news that OK does not penalize businesses with burdensome taxes and regulations.

My main beef with Fisher is his stand on abortion legislation, and this has been my greatest reluctance in supporting him. I agree with his end goal: Abolish abortion except when necessary to save the mother's life. I disagree with the implicit and explicit dismissal coming from Fisher and his supporters of the incremental gains made by the pro-life movement in the quarter century since the Casey decision. I object to the implicit and explicit denigration of pro-life activists and pro-life legislators, whose measures have saved lives. Apart from the substance of the issue, kicking potential allies in the teeth is a bad political move.

Fisher and friends seem to believe that Oklahoma can pretend that Roe v. Wade doesn't exist just like California pretends that Federal immigration laws don't exist and Colorado pretends that Federal marijuana laws don't exist. In the latter cases however, states are declining to cooperate with and assist federal prosecutors. In the case of abortion abolition, however, Oklahoma would be enforcing a law that the feds have said is unconstitutional. Perhaps the Trump Administration would decline to act, but it's easy to imagine a future pro-abortion administration sending in the National Guard, a la Little Rock, to ensure that abortionists and their customers would not be hindered by local law enforcement from killing children.

I understand that the only way to overturn Roe v. Wade is for the Supreme Court to revisit it. I understand that some state will have to pass an abolition law and attempt to enforce it before the Supreme Court will get involved. As things currently stand, our State Supreme Court would invalidate the bill as unconstitutional before it even gets to the U. S. Supreme Court. (Tony Lauinger of Oklahomans for Life understands this problem and is pushing for reforms to the way State Supreme Court justices are chosen.)

Even if we passed a law and got it to the US Supreme Court, do you believe the current bunch, headed by John "Obamacare is a tax" Roberts would use the occasion to overturn the Roe v. Wade precident? Or is it more likely that the socially liberal majority on the court would use the occasion to overturn the gains resulting from Casey?

Despite that, I agree with Fisher much more than I disagree. That and his record of being true to his word makes Dan Fisher my pick.

MORE:

Muskogee Politico observed many of the same issues with the big six candidates, but cam e to a different conclusion.