Yesterday’s devastating tornado (our condolences to the victim’s families) outbreak began just before the Bricktown Rotary program, scheduled for 5:30.  Obviously the wailing tornado sirens put an end to the much anticipated discussion about how legislative leaders should be chosen in the future.

Despite the cancellation, we discovered one important item: State Sen. Brian Bingman of Sapulpa, the member hand-picked by outgoing senate leader Glenn Coffee to be his successor, had earlier declined to attend, citing a scheduling conflict.

As we’ve reported before, Bingman shares Coffee’s penchant for high-profile screw-ups.  Bingman and Coffee’s bumbling miscalculation on Day 1 of the legislative session stopped Bingman’s Pro Tempore opportunity in its tracks.  Most insiders say without backroom dealing and arm-twisting, the hapless Bingman would have no chance to be senate leader.  Privately, the man some are calling “Bungleman” has few leadership qualities, including losing bills in his own committee and even earlier this session on the floor of the Senate.

Thus we weren’t surprised to learn that Bingman had ducked out of a public discussion about why transparency should replace cronyism.  Unfortunately, the system that produced a colossal disappointment like Glenn Coffee is grinding away to produce yet another embarrassment for state Republicans.  We’re sorry the meeting was cancelled, but Sen. Bingman’s duck and cover routine speaks volumes about why those who believe in the party of Ronald Reagan need to do everything possible to stop it from continuing to be more like the party of Ronald McDonald.

Related:

This is a Great Idea!

Oklahoma City’s Bricktown Rotary Club is attempting to shed some light into the legislative process, especially the part that deals with picking legislative leadership.

We received this press release about their meeting tonight to discuss whether or not legislative leadership should continue to be selected behind closed doors.  You will recall that the current senate leader, Glen Coffee, has stumbled through his term, bouncing from one controversy to the next.  In February, Coffee failed to get his handpicked choice for his successor, State Sen. Brian Bingman, R-Sapulpa, elected as the next senate boss, in part due to Bingman’s own contrivance.  One wonders if the process were more visible if the quality of leader might just be kicked up a notch or two.

All the major candidates to succeed Coffee have been invited.  It will be interesting to see who comes to face the music.  The Bricktown Rotary Club meets tonight at 5:30 at the Bricktown Brewery in downtown Oklahoma City.  The public and press (fat chance) are invited.

Developing………

Filing for the Oklahoma 2010 elections is just a few weeks away. With the entire House of Representatives, half the State Senate, judicial contests, state questions, most statewide elective offices and many federal seats up for grabs, there will be thousands of opportunities to meet the candidates over the next few months.

Why not help OKPNS help the voters to meet the candidates up close and personal!

We’re gearing up for the elections by offering you a chance to inform others through the video or audio recordings you capture on your phone or video recorder. If you are attending one of the many candidate forums or speeches this year, and you record breaking news, send it to OKPNS. We’ll post it, and you’ll be helping fellow Oklahomans truly get to meet the candidates without all the spin and advertising gloss.

State Rep. Gus Blackwell released a video and press release yesterday saying he was “appalled” by a legislative measure sponsored by fellow Republican John Trebilcock that is primarily designed to reduce the number of pain-management treatment providers in rural Oklahoma. His reaction comes two days after conservative blogger Christopher Arps’ post in the Examiner.com titled, “Dear patients: I’m from the government, and I’m here to hurt you!”

It’s hard to imagine a bill worse than the one that killed Sen. Brian Bingman’s chances to succeed Glenn Coffee as senate leader. But the chatter (and laughter) is starting to build about SB 1133, a bill that rolls back the scope of practice for Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists.

CRNA’s provide the bulk of pain management to rural Oklahomans. CRNA’s are supervised by doctors, and are primarily responsible for pain relief and anesthesia delivery in the 57 counties where no anesthesiologists practice. So is there a problem with CRNA’s? Patient advocates say no: in fact, they point to the fact that no CRNA’s are in trouble with their boards. They don’t want to practice medicine or expand their scope of practice the way optometrists and chiropractors have been doing for the past decade. Read more…

Blackwell further states in the release that he believes the legislation is designed to fix a problem that doesn’t exist.

“For much of the past decade, organized medicine has been telling us the greatest threat to Oklahoma’s patients is expansion of surgical privileges by non-surgeons. They’ve bought ads, issued press releases, raised campaign funds and sounded the alarm bell. Now they suddenly whirl and attack medical providers, CRNAs that legally and safely operate entirely within their scope of practice. This is madness, and I suspect it’s organized and orchestrated for profit or payback.”

Rep. Blackwell says the bill’s hypocrisy is evident with only a cursory examination.

“Not one patient advocate group has come forward asking for this bill. In fact, the patient advocates I’ve talked to are puzzled about why organized medicine has walked away from what they’ve been saying for years is the central threat to patient safety: dangerous expansion of scope of practice by untrained medical professionals.”

Blackwell’s last line is priceless and should be a wake up call for all Oklahomans:

“Now they attack CRNAs: Does that mean they’ve been lying to us for much of the past decade about the primary threat to patients on Oklahoma? Are they lying now? Regardless, this laughable bill and the rogue’s gallery of characters pushing for it guarantee one thing: Jay Leno, David Letterman and Jon Stewart won’t soon run out of material with which to mock Oklahoma anytime soon I’m sad to say.”

Related:

NewsOK.com: Pain management bill draws debate in Oklahoma House

Your Vote Counts: “Debating Health Care in Oklahoma”

Rep. John “kissing bandit” Trebilcock

“When I told Mr. Trebilcock that I smelled a strong odor of alcohol coming from him, he replied that he had just kissed a girl that had been drinking and that is why he smelled like he had been drinking,” the arresting officer wrote in the report.” (Tulsa World 4-2-07)

Examiner.com:

It’s hard to imagine a bill worse than the one that killed Sen. Brian Bingman’s chances to succeed Glenn Coffee as senate leader. But the chatter (and laughter) is starting to build about SB 1133, a bill that rolls back the scope of practice for Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist. Read more…

I have previously written about some state’s rights initiatives which will be considered by the Oklahoma Legislature in an attempt to counter some recent expansive actions of the federal government.

Proponents of this legislation point to the Tenth Amendment of the United States Constitution which states that power not specifically given to the federal government by the Constitution shall be maintained within the states. This is an especially important component of our governance structure as we have a much greater opportunity to have our voices heard when the power of government is placed at the most localized level possible.

One of these state’s rights initiatives is House Joint Resolution 1054 authored by Representative Mike Ritze and Senator Randy Brogdon — and co-authored by several Legislators, including myself. The concept behind HJR 1054 was successfully introduced into the Arizona Legislature last year in response to the federal government’s attempt to expand its role in the health care industry. HJR 1054 would allow Oklahomans to vote on placing a new section into the Oklahoma Constitution. If approved by Oklahoma voters, the new provision would state that laws “shall not compel, directly or indirectly, any person, employer or health care provider to participate in any health care system.” Read more…

Examiner.com:

As the Oklahoma Political News Service reported in late January, Sen. Bingman was given the task of carrying SB 2298, as a political payback bill. But the unintended consequences made it in effect a pro-drug dealer bill that embattled senate leader Glenn Coffee desperately needed to get the official senate albatross, Fred Morgan, out of the building. Capitol insiders say the drug bill revelation and our previous reports last fall of Sen. Coffee’s emotional meltdown contributed to the derailment of Sen. Bingman’s bid on the first day of the legislature.

While the capitol press corps ignored the story, the Bingman defeat nonetheless leaked out through other media reports, with Oklahoma City’s News9 once again scooping the capitol gang. Two days after his Monday defeat, and with his long-term chances to succeed Coffee fading into the sunset, one observer says an obviously freaked-out Bingman, carrying a copy of the OKPNS story, shuttled back and forth feverishly to get leadership to quietly re-assigned the bill, ironically, to Sen. Anthony Sykes’ committee, which would have ensured a quiet death to this colossally-bad idea.

However, last week Bingman sought to put even more distance between himself and this controversy, withdrawing as author on February 8th. Then on Thursday the 11th, the bill was pulled from Sykes’ committee and re-assigned to the Judiciary Committee, so the Coffee-Bingman payback bill continues to attempt to find new life in the political equivalent of a witness protection program. Read more…

Sources say a deal to plug the holes in the Oklahoma FY 2010 budget using ‘Rainy Day’ funds and federal stimulus monies is imminent.   Our sources say early morning caucus meetings for both houses will take place early Wednesday morning, with an announcement of the deal following soon after.

Developing…..

Related:

NewsOK.com: (2/17/10) Gov. Henry says Oklahoma budget deal is near

Over the weekend, “blogger” Mike McCarville continued his unhealthy man crush on our editor and OKPNS. What else can you say? Three posts about our editor in one week recently, with one even coming at 11:44 pm!

In a rare original article – not his usual cut and paste job – McCarville compares his “blog’s” daily visitors with OKPNS’ companion site the Oklahoma Political News Service’s Legislator’s blog. Congratulations Mike! Yes, you have more visitor’s than our secondary blog that is updated whenever a legislator decides to post a piece.

Related:

Video: OKPNS & McCarville: “Both Good @ Covering What’s Going On @ The State Capitol”

Sad. Blogger Has Public Breakdown Over “Constant Needling”