The Nation Lumbers Toward a 2nd Civil War

Gov. Sitt at Walmart

As the Nation Lumbers Toward a 2^nd Civil War,  Oklahoma shows signs of political awareness

At a loss to find plausible reasons for reasonable people to vote for him, Trump’s handlers fall back on a law-and-order card and send federal troops into flashpoint cities to quell sustained protests against suppression of minorities and those who seek a new agenda. The first of these incursions erupts in Portland after 100 days of protesting the death of George Floyd and has centered on federal buildings. The city’s elected leaders and local US senators and representatives call for a withdrawal of federal involvement, even halting involvement by local law enforcement forces. The situation is worsened by Trump’s troops as he threatens to send them to other cities. Should the city and state police be ordered to repel the federal troops, we will have a civil war.

Meanwhile, in Radio-Free Oklahoma, the state’s “let’s-get-the-economy-going-again” governor, Kevin Stitt, has exhibited a cavalier attitude toward Covid-19, refusing to require masks and refusing to wear one. But he’s descended to his moment of fame: he’s now the nation’s first governor to contract Covid-19.  In announcing that he was infected, Stitt was quick to say he could not have gotten it at Trump’s dud, Tulsa rally. But he was later photographed at a Tulsa Walmart, sans mask, four days before he complained of “aching.”  (Strangely similar to Trump’s dismissal of the pandemic as “sniffles.” And we have not heard any updates on Stitt’s “aches.”) A Tulsa restaurant Stitt patronized several days prior to his announcement of contracting Covid-19 has closed with a Facebook apology to the public.

Stitt’s administrative performance was cast last year when he appointed a lawyer to head the state health department who calculated he could convince a state senate oversight committee to change his job’s requirements and drop any demand for medical credentials. The speculation failed, fueled by a $2 million contract for useless hydroxychloroquine medications promoted by Trump last March. Stitt then purged a deputy health department head who bravely advocated increased testing to track Covid-19 outbreaks. Since appointment of a new, safe health department head recruited from the Oklahoma Air National Guard, the official state health department site touts Oklahoma as 41^st among the states in Covid-19 cases. That twisted statistic fails to indicate the state’s relative population or the rapid acceleration of infections that puts it in the top 18 and in the “Red States” where the disease is rampant and out-of-control. Oklahoma is now 2^nd in acceleration rates.

Meanwhile, we sleepy Okies wander like zombies into our Dollar General stores without masks, still “panic shopping” for toilet paper, BBQ charcoal and Ding-Dongs; getting ready for the 2^nd wave of a disease we do not yet understand. Our state is ranked 45^th in education, 43^rd in health, 35^th in economic well-being, and we have the nation’s highest unemployment stat at 14.8 percent.

We Okies remain steadfastly ignorant but proud.

But there may be a silver lining: by a slender 6,000 margin, Oklahoma became the 37^th state to adopt Obama Care, carried by huge turnouts in Tulsa and Oklahoma City – against Trump’s clueless rubes in 75 of the state’s 77 counties. 

As we drift toward the November elections, we are informed that Trump may not accept the results. His handlers have already foreseen his end in the dismal polls. All the elements for violent change of power are in motion. Oklahoma bobs like a cork in a ​stormy ocean.

Bo McCarver

Reporting from Greater Wapanucka

July 20, 2020