Mary Fallin disparages following the Constitution as "the easy way out!"

Although Republican gubernatorial candidate Mary Fallin refuses to do a televised debate with her opponents, there are video and audio clips of joint appearances and candidate forums at which she, Randy Brogdon, and the other two GOP candidates discussed issues. Here's a clip from a Comanche County Republican meeting. The question from the audience was, "Will you be tough enough to deal with what we've got to deal with in Washington?"

In this context, Brogdon brought up Fallin's vote for the bailout (Troubled Assets Relief Program), and Fallin defended her vote in favor: "Until you've been there and you've been in the situation and you understand the details and the facts...." She went on to describe the dire warnings of financial system collapse from Fed chairman Ben Bernanke and Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulsen that persuaded her to vote for TARP. But then Fallin expressed shock and dismay at the outcome:

Now, did they do what they said they were going to do with the money that was used for TARP, the Troubled Asset Relief Fund? No! And we were all disgusted about that.

But Fallin gave no indication in her response that in the future she'll be more skeptical when business leaders come to her, hat in hand, asking her to use our tax dollars to pay for their poor judgment.

We did the best we could with the information that we had at the time, but we can't help what they did and didn't keep their words after the face.

In his rebuttal, Brogdon brought the issue back to the original question: "Are you going to be tough?" He noted that spoke in opposition to the bailout vote at the time, and he would not have voted for it because it was unconstitutional. Fallin can be heard butting in to say, "That's the easy way out." The audience expressed its disapproval.

It takes toughness to stand firm on the principles of constitutionally limited government and free markets when lobbyists and campaign contributors are either telling you that the sky is falling and the only cure is to give them tax dollars. Fallin may be tough enough, as she claims to be, to resist left-wing lobbyists, but it appears she is not tough enough to resist self-serving panic-mongering from corporate interests who want welfare to cushion them from the consequences of their bad decisions.

I can forgive a vote for TARP, but it would be easier to forgive with an acknowledgment that it was a bad decision, with a promise to exercise greater skepticism, and with a renewed commitment to let the Constitution control her decisions.

MORE: In Part 1, Fallin gave a roundabout (and somewhat patronizing) answer to a question about potential conflicts of interest involving her lobbyist daughter. In response to a question about keeping jobs from leaving Oklahoma for Texas, Brogdon says, "It's time for politicians to stop faking you out that politicians can create jobs." Brogdon called for challenging the status quo and an end to the use of targeted tax credits to stimulate economic development, which he called "corporate welfare... legal plunder... immoral." Subsidies, he said, are bankrupting our nation and our state. Instead, reform should work generally to reduce the costs government imposes on job creation.