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Last night the voters of the Great Northwest Oklahoma Region selected a republican nominee for senate district 27. The results held many surprises, especially when the internals are properly analyzed.
Travis Templin was the newcomer to elective politics and his message was a combination of Carolyn McLarty's stalwart GOP platform principles and a common sense awareness of the stagnancy in public education support. McLarty & Templin combined for a majority of the votes. But neither of them are celebrating a win. The only candidate with a resume in elective office was Casey Murdock. He largely ran against his own record, but his massive war chest and experienced political machine combined for just enough to claim the win when the last 15% of the votes were tabulated. When the issue of state budgets were debated, both McLarty & Templin were adamant about the urgent need for rigorous performance audits and other oversight duties. That seems to be resounding well for any state elective office. |
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When we combine the scandalous actions in the Department of Health, and the alarming rate of growth in all the agencies, the Commission on Legislative Audits could not have convened at a better time.
- Fiscal conservatives will want a reliable and thorough Performance Audits before any agency budget increases are approved.
- Line Item budgeting of crucial state services and projects will become a necessity . Currently the only way a legislator can assure that prioritized services are continued is to throw enough money at an agency so they have no excuse not to operate the valued services.
- Voters will not support a change in the threshold support needed to pass tax increases. They seem to be demanding that the legislature actually follow the language of SQ 640, by presenting the tax question to the electorate, where only 50%+1 are needed to pass a revenue increase.
- In 1990 they wanted bingo and they got David Walters in office for that reason.
- In 2002 they wanted casino gaming and they made sure Brad Henry got elected.
