In October
of 1983 I was 15 watching my favorite channel 23 KOKI, a local UHF station
which is the Fox affiliate today.
A commercial aired for the Allen Ranch Halloween hayride called the Trail
of Fear held nightly in October.
The Allen Ranch is south of Bixby or as those of us northeast of Tulsa
might call it – way the hell out there.
The commercial was as cheesy and low budget as any local
commercial. It had still shots of the
Halloween hayride and a band performing in the covered arena at the ranch all
narrated by some guy in a deep “scary” voice.
I wanted to go! My folks were kind enough to take me as I could not legally drive yet. We went out there on a Thursday or Friday night,
I think. It was dark by the time we got
there. Jack o’ lanterns illuminated the darkness and a smell of wood
smoke filled in the air. Men in cowboy
hats and dusters presided over the hayride as tractors hauling wooden trailers carried
the “thrill seekers” around the large ranch.
As the hayride began one of the cowboys would shoot off a gun. I guess they were blanks.
The Trail of
Fear had a western theme as the trail took us past a western ghost town façade. A butcher in bloody smocks pretended to throw
what appeared to be dead animal flesh at us.
A spider web made of rope fell from some trees slightly above our heads
and we would be “chased” by cowboys on horseback shooting guns in the air. It was a cheesy, country-western Halloween. For me it was magic.After the
ride I stopped by the arena where bands would play. There were pictures of John Wayne and western
scenes on the partial walls of the arena. The Allen Ranch hosted cowboy cookouts during the summer. I bought a
Trail of Fear t-shirt which I have to this day.
I went back
several times over the years. Sometimes
I planned on going, but it never worked out.
But every time I went back it was as enjoyable as the first time. In 1987 or 1989, I went alone one evening. I
remember being on the hayride and seeing the cowboys on horseback chasing towards
us. Behind them were trees that had
already shed their leaves. Everything was
illuminated by the moon that shone between thin clouds. As I saw this, I played the Fleetwood Mac song, “Tell Me Lies” in my head. It had been on the charts then.
My last time
at the Trail was on Halloween night 1995. I came with my best friend from high school days. We had watched the Cleveland Indians and Atlanta Braves in the final game of the World
Series. I wanted Cleveland to win,
Richard being a bit of a jerk, rooted for the Braves just to spite me. Well, the Braves won. That was a shame. We then got in the car and headed down Memorial boulevard way the
hell out there to Bixby to get in on the last ride of the Trail of Fear at the
Allen Ranch. Halloween night was always the final night. We stood in line for almost two hours. When we finally boarded the wooden trailer,
we were ready to get on with it. Along the
hayride a man in a ski mask ran up behind us with a chainsaw blaring. I shouted at him, “I RENOUCE YOU IN THE NAME
OF JESUS!” Richard and I laughed about
that for the remainder of the ride. I
don’t even remember much of anything else; we thought that encounter was so
funny.
In 1996 my
life changed a bit as I was selected for an internship with The Leadership
Institute in Washington. L.I. is an
organization that trains young conservatives for careers in public policy. I left for Washington in September and would
stay in the Washington area for the next four years. Not wanting to become a Washington swamp
creature, I headed back home to Oklahoma in the Spring of 2001. The following Halloween I was ready to go
back to the Allen Ranch for some more fun, hokey, horror. I
hadn’t seen anything in the media about the hayride so out of curiosity I
called the Allen Ranch and was told by a woman on the phone, “Oh, we don’t do
that anymore. Not after we got
sued.” Sued? Why?
It turned out that the last night I was at the Allen Ranch in 1995 a
woman named Carol Weaver claimed she got hurt while on the hayride. Carol J. Weaver vs. The Allen Ranch CJ-1996-4697
was filed in Tulsa County about a year after the incident. Carol was asking for six figures, and she was
not just suing the ranch, but the family members who own it. I’ve seen the file, it’s thick. Lots of pleadings were stuck in that file in a case that lasted for several years. I
won’t go into detail about that case just in case Carol is still
around and reads this in a bad mood. But
I will write this - and that kids are why we can’t have nice things.
The Allen Ranch is still around as a cattle ranch although it steers (pardon the pun) clear of public events. There is a saddle shop on the property which
is the only place the public can visit the ranch. The magic of those hayrides never went away
for me. There are some things you
experience in youth that stay a part of you like a mental heirloom. The Allen Ranch Trail of Fear was such a
memory that I will always cherish. Thank you for
reading this and letting me share it with you.
This is the second part of my two part series on The People Who Ended Roe.
Phyllis Schlafly speaking before Eagle Forum an organization she founded in 1972
Phyllis Schlafly was a wife, a mother, attorney, activist and author. She was born Phyllis Stewart in Saint Louis, Missouri in 1924. Her father was a machinist and mother a librarian. They struggled economically during The Great Depression, but found a way pay for their daughters education in Catholic school. Phyllis had one sister.
In 1944 she graduated with a Bachelor of Arts from Washington University in Saint Louis. The following year she received a Masters from Radcliffe Women's College in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
After college Phyllis Stewart went to work for the American Enterprise Institute think tank in Washington, D.C. and she campaigned for Claude Blackwell who was elected to Congress from Saint Louis in the Republican sweep of 1946. Congressman Blackwell would lose his seat to the Democrat whom he had defeated two years later. She would herself run for congress in 1970 but, lost to the incumbent Democrat.
In 1949 she married John Fred Schlafly Jr. a Saint Louis attorney who came from a wealthy family in the city. They were both strong Roman Catholics that saw the fight against Communism as a holy crusade. In their 44 year marriage, he died in 1993, they had six children.
In 1964 she penned her first book A Choice Not An Echo in which she made her case for the nomination and election of Arizona Republican Senator Barry Goldwater.
In 1972 Mrs. Schlafly founded Eagle Forum to fight the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) in which ratification was well underway. 28 states having already ratified the ERA. Ten more states were needed and the ERA would have been a new amendment to the Constitution. The Equal Right Amendment (ERA) would bar any distinctions in law between men and women. Originally, it enjoyed wide bi-partisan support. It was Mrs. Schlafly's Eagle Forum that argued women could lose their advantages in court proceedings such as in child custody cases and that the ERA would mandate women register for the draft. The deadline for ratification was 1982. Due to Eagle Forum's efforts several states that had ratified the ERA un-ratified it making it impossible to reach the deadline for ratification in 1982.
While the Moral Majority appealed to conservative Protestants, Eagle Forum appealed to a broader constituency from Roman Catholics to Mormons as well as Protestants.
In 1978 Mrs. Schlafly received her law degree from Washington University.
In 2016 Mrs. Schlafly, then 92, endorsed Donald Trump for the Republican nomination. This caused a revolt among the board at Eagle Forum and she was ousted as head of the group she founded and lead for 44 years. She died at her home in September of that year. Candidate Donald Trump attended her funeral Mass.
Eagle Forum, like Rev. Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority, were grass roots organizations that focused on social issues and national defense. Both organizations were opposed to abortion and feminism as well as the gay movement. Both groups saw these social changes as a threat to western Christian civilization.
Her contribution to the Pro-Life cause was similar to that of Rev. Jerry Falwell in that both were culture warriors fighting on a variety of fronts including the Right to Life of the unborn. It was their combined efforts along with their supporters throughout the nation that captured (in the words of pro-abortion advocates) the Republican party making it a Pro-Life party.
President Ronald Wilson Reagan
"I've noticed that everyone who supports abortion has already been born."
- Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States from 1981 to 1989. His election in 1980 was the culmination of work by social conservatives who seized the Republican party and changed it from being a party of the well-to-do, of which in all honesty Ronald Reagan was a member, to the party of middle class conservative Americans. As President Mr. Reagan's contribution to the Right to Life movement was limited. He did appoint Justice William Rehnquist, the dissenter in the 1973 Roe. v. Wade decision as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in 1986 and he appointed Antonin Scalia to the high court that same year. He also instituted in 1985 what is known as The Mexico City Policy (named for Mexico City after a United Nations Conference held there on population) which had been the policy of the federal government not to fund abortion related activities regarding foreign aid packages.
Symbolically, his presidency was enormous. He was the first openly Pro-Life president of the United States. He was also the first occupant of the Oval Office to call in to the March for Life rally held on the National Mall. He did not shy away from proclaiming the humanity of the unborn. He once said, "I've noticed that everyone who supports abortion has already been born." Because of his stance every Republican president who followed him would follow his Pro-Life position and in the long term that would prove decisive. President Reagan died in California, the state he once served as governor, in June of 2004. He was 93.
Dr. Alveda King
Dr. Alveda King was born in 1951 in a segregated Atlanta, Georgia. Her uncle was the civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Her father was a younger brother of Dr. King. According to Alveda, her mother wanted an abortion, but her mother's father convinced her not to have an abortion allowing Alveda to come into this world. Alveda's early life would not be without pain. In 1963 the family was living in Alabama and her father had taken a leadership position in the civil rights movement. For his association the family home was bombed. 1969 when she was 18 her father drowned in the family swimming pool under suspicious circumstances.
She went on to receive a Masters in business management from Central Michigan University and an Honorary Doctorate from Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire. Her actual doctorate comes from Aidan University in Jacksonville, Florida, a degree in applied theology.
In 1978 she was elected as a Democrat to represent part of Fulton,County in the Georgia state house. She served in that position through 1982. She would run for congress in 1984, but ran afoul of the black political establishment and was unsuccessful in her bid. That same year she supported Rev. Jesse Jackson's presidential campaign.
In the years to follow Dr. Alveda King had a change of heart becoming a Republican and in 2012 supporting fellow Georgian Herman Cain in his bid for the White House. In 2016 she supported Donald Trump.
She claims to have had two abortions before her own religious conversion in 1983. She has described abortion as "womb lynching" and accusing Planned Parenthood of profiting from "aborted black babies." Interesting to note, Planned Parenthood clinics always appear in the poorest of American communities and always in black communities. Today she is director of Civil Rights for the Unborn and the African American outreach for the Catholic group Priests for Life. In 1996 she even dared to criticize her aunt Coretta Scott King for her support of abortion.
Alveda King's life is a testimony for civil rights for minorities and the Right to Life of the unborn.
Norma McCorvey in a Pro-Life television commercial
In part one of my essay I mentioned that Dr. Bernard Nathanson was an important defector from the pro-abortion to Pro-Life cause. And then added that he was not the most important defector. She would be revealed in part two of this series. Norma McCorvey, known to the nation as Jane Roe in Roe v. Wade was the plaintiff in the 1969 Texas case against Dallas County District Attorney Henry Wade. It should be noted for the record that Henry Wade was a registered Democrat and was defending the Texas law prohibiting abortion in the state. Norma became pregnant with her third child and wanted an abortion. Abortion advocate attorneys Sarah Weddington and Linda Coffee seized on McCorvey's situation to advance the abortion cause. This case could be litigated all the way to the United States Supreme Court in 1972 and the decision would be released on January 22, 1973.
She was born Norma Leah Nelson in September 1947 in Louisiana to a dysfunctional family. Her father left when she was 13. Her mother was a violent alcoholic. When she was just ten years old she robbed a cash register at a gas station and ran away from home winding up in Oklahoma City with another girl before she was returned home. She was declared a ward of the state and sent to at least two reform schools. She later had to live with a cousin who she alleges raped her. She met and married her husband Woody McCorvey in 1963 when she was 16. The couple eventually divorced. Like her mother Norma had a substance abuse problem with drinking including drugs. When Norma was pregnant with her third child, the one she wanted to abort, she wound up giving birth to her daughter because she could not legally obtain an abortion in Texas. Her situation was the subject of her case against the Dallas County District Attorney. Her third child was given up by McCorvey for adoption. Years later her daughter would reveal that she felt betrayed by her mother for not wanting her.
Norma McCorvey would publish her autobiography in 1994 titled I am Roe. She would meet a pastor Flip Benham who was the national director of Operation Rescue that was founded by Randall Terry. Norma apparently had a change of heart and decided to be baptized by this pastor in 1995. From that point on Norma McCorvey would publically regret her support of abortion. In 1998 she was baptized into the Catholic Church. One of the participants at her baptism was Father Frank Pavone of Priests for Life. Father Pavone was recently removed by the Vatican for remarks he made to an abortion supporter.
Norma would participate in Pro-Life media ads as the Jane Roe in the 1973 Roe. v. Wade decision. She would publically renounce her support for abortion. Close to death in 2017 she allegedly made a death bed confession that she hadn't cared one way or another about abortion she merely wanted financial support from what ever side was willing to provide it.
Norma McCorvey life was that of a sketchy character. Was she telling the truth at the end? It doesn't matter for us, but it does matter for Norma's soul. When the poster lady for abortion publically jumped off the abortion poster that proved a moral victory for the Right to Life movement.
Norma McCorvey died of kidney failure in Texas in February 2017. She was 69.
Donald J. Trump the 45th President of the United States
On October 12, 2016 Holy Family Cathedral had their Wednesdays at the Cathedral night. This was a weekly event at the cathedral which is the seat of the Diocese of Tulsa and Eastern Oklahoma. The choice of Wednesday evening was probably a copy of Protestant churches that meet on Wednesday nights. Tulsa being the buckle of the Bible Belt.
This particular evening we met at The Garden of Peace which is a lot owned by the Diocese used by Pro-Life protestors because it was located directly across the street from Reproductive Services the abortion clinic in Tulsa. Several days prior The Washington Post revealed audio from Donald Trump from several years earlier bantering with Access Hollywood television show host Billy Bush about how he [Donald Trump] would grab women by their privates. At this point Donald Trump's presidential bid seemed over. Hillary Clinton was almost assured victory just three weeks away and the Right to Life movement was as far from repealing Roe as Nellie Gray was when she organized the first March for Life in her Washington townhouse in the autumn of 1973.
But then a miracle happened. She didn't win. Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey revealed on Halloween that he needed to investigate documents she had as Secretary of State which had been found on the laptop computer of her aide Huma Abedin's estranged husband former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner. Mr. Weiner was under investigation at the time for sending sexual materials to a minor. This proved very bad for Hillary whom voters already distrusted.
Donald Trump used to say, "Politicians are all talk and no action." As president he kept his promise to Pro-Life voters and appointed three judges to the Supreme Court. He accepted the recommendations provided him from the Washington based Federalist Society for posts on the federal bench. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky also deserves credit as he would not allow the filibuster rule in the senate when it came to presidential appointments to the judicial bench. The filibuster is a senate rule that allows one or more senators to talk for days on end suspending senate business and requiring 60 senators to cut off debate. He also would not allow Barack Obama's nomination of Merrick Garland to proceed in 2016 upon the death of Justice Antonin Scalia.
As president Donald Trump appointed Neil M. Gorsuch of Colorado in 2017 to succeed Antonin Scalia. Brett M. Kavanaugh of Washington D.C. in 2018 to replace Anthony Kennedy and Amy Coney Barrett of Indiana in 2020 to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg who had recently died. By 2021 the case of Thomas E. Dobbs (the Mississippi State Health Director) v. Jackson [Mississippi] Women's Health Organization came before the Supreme Court. In June of 2022 the high court announced in a 6 to 3 ruling that Roe v. Wade and the 1992 case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which I have not addressed in this article, were null and void!
Today, Reproductive Services in Tulsa is closed due to Oklahoma state law. Of course with the repeal of Roe the decision to allow or prohibit abortion is a matter taken up by the states.
The work of the Right to Life movement goes on but the tide has moved to their favor.
This is a two
part series on the people who overturned Roe v. Wade. Today, January
22nd would be the 50th Anniversary of the Roe v.
Wade decision, the Texas case that made it to the United States Supreme Court mandating abortion on demand. Today the abortion lobby would be holding
celebrations from Hollywood to Washington, D.C. thanking
their dark lord Lucifer for 50 years of child sacrifice on demand. But for them, due to the 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Organization, it was not to be. This essay about the people who came from everyday walks of life and stepped out of the safety of anonymity to take a stand against the evil of our time. This essay is about the leaders of the Right to Life movement. And while it is about their leadership that is highlighted all their efforts would be for not had it not been for the thousands of Right to Life activists across America. From the people who run the crisis pregnancy centers to the donors who make the movement possible, to the side walk counselors and participants in the annual March for Life. This article is about you as much as it is about the people mentioned in this two part series.
Nellie Gray addressing the march she founded
Nellie Gray
began what we know as The Right to Life (Pro-Life) movement with the
March for Life. She was born in west Texas in 1924. During World War II
Nellie Gray joined the military at age 20 serving in the Woman's Army
Corps. After the war she went on to pursue her education at
Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. And after graduating
from Georgetown she became a civil servant in the federal government
for nearly three decades. A convert to Catholicism Ms. Gray was
appalled by the 1973 Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade, which
originated from her home state of Texas. Ms. Gray decided to
organize a Right to Life March for the following year and leave
behind her government career. From 1974 to 2022 people in the
millions descended on Washington D.C. around January 22to hold a rally in the National Mall and then march up
Constitution Avenue and over to the Supreme Court building. The
rally started by Ms. Gray became the annual event for the Right to Life
movement and an opportunity for activists to stay focused on one day
overturning the Roe decision no matter how long it would take. Ms.
Gray would not live to see that day, at least in this life. She died in 2012 at the age of 88.
Joe Scheidler in front of the U.S. Supreme Court
Another
crusader whose life was changed by the infamous Supreme Court
decision was Joseph M. Scheidler who left behind his career in public
relations after the Roe decision to devote himself full time to the
Right to Life movement. It was Joe Scheidler who began in the Chicagoe area what is known
today as Sidewalk Counseling. In Sidewalk
Counseling Mr. Sheidler would approach women going into an abortion
clinic in an attempt to talk them out of their decision. If the
women was joined by a man he would call the man “Dad” as in “Hey
Dad.” He would then would show pictures of babies in the womb at three
months, six months, etc. Mr. Scheidler's methods found himself at
odds with more established Pro-Life organizations who did not like
his direct tactics. He went his own way in the movement when
he founded the Pro-Life Action League in 1980.
Mr. Scheidler
and his Pro-Life Action League had to endure years of litigation
brought on by the National Organization of Women (NOW) for his work
as a side walk counselor and Pro-Life activist beginning in 1986 and
lasting until 2014. After a number of court defeats NOWs
reluctance to give up the legal harassment of Mr. Scheidler forced
them to pay the final court costs of his Pro-Life Action League in 2014.
He wrote books on how to close
abortion clinics, instructional videos on how to side walk counsel
women. In 2021 Mr. Sheidler died at age 93, one year before the Dobbs
decision overturning Roe.
Randall Terry at a press conference on C-Span
Joe Sheidler
created side walk counseling as a way to save the unborn.
Randall Terry took the Pro-Life movement from the sidewalk to the
front door of the abortion clinic and crossed a line many in the
movement were unwilling to follow. His Operation Rescue took the
Pro-Life movement into civil disobedience which proved to be a
turning point in the fight against abortion.
Beginning in
the mid-1980s Mr. Terry's Operation Rescue began staging sit-ins in
front of abortion clinics across the nation. These acts of
civil disobedience not only lead to Mr. Terry's arrest as well as the arrest of
his supporters, they aslo gained a great deal of press. Before Operation
Rescue the abortion issue would be talked about at election time,
perhaps mentioned by the press every January 22 as the anniversary of
Roe v. Wade along with the March for Life. Abortion had become
a part of American society because it out of sight and out of mind. Mass
arrests in front of abortion clinics would change that.
Not everyone
on the side of Life was in agreement. Reverend Charles Stanley of
the First Baptist Church in Atlanta was a critic of Operation
Rescue's tactics stating that he was unwilling to break the law in
defense of the unborn. Randall Terrys rebuttal to that was if
everyone thought like Rev. Stanley everyone would be Catholic and
America would be British. In later years Terry would himself
join the Catholic Church. Randall Terry's work on behalf of
the unborn even came home with him in that he and his wife adopted
several kids whose mothers had planned on having an abortion. Mr.
Terry would leave Operation Rescue to pursue other endeavors for the
Right to Life and the broader culture war. In 2012 he ran as a
Democrat for president to challenge that party's stance on
abortion. He won several counties in Oklahoma over incumbent
President Obama in the primary.
Rev. Falwell at a rally in the 1980s
Reverend Jerry
Falwell was born in Lynchburg, Virginia in 1933. He came from a
non-religious, dysfunctional home. He got religion in his teens when
he met his future wife. They had three children. One went on to
lead Thomas Road Baptist Church and another Liberty University both
founded by Falwell.
Like most of
his fellow religious politics was not something of interest to Rev.
Falwell. Politics was worldly stuff the people of God should avoid. The cultural changes of the 1960s that included the sexual revolution
brought about by the birth control pill and the Roe v. Wade decision
in 1973, along with the violent protests against the war in Vietnam
were alarming to conservative Christians. The 1976 election of
evangelical Christian Jimmy Carter was comforting to many evangelical
Protestants. But in time many would turn against the man they
considered one of their own. Jerry Falwell founded The Moral Majority
which became the largest political organizations of evangelical
Christians in the nation. In 1980 it would deliver two thirds of white
evangelical voters to President Carter's Republican challenger former
California Governor Ronald Reagan. The Moral Majority was an
important faction in the Reagan coalition of the 1980s. It was essential to brining Protestants into the cultural war on behalf of
the Right to Life and it inspired other groups that would follow
such as The Christian Coalition. Reverend Falwell died in 2007 of a
heart attack. He was 73.
Dr. Nathanson in his video The Silent Scream.
Dr. Bernard Nathanson was a prominent defector from the abortion movement, but not the mostprominent defector. She appears in part two of this essay. Dr. Nathanson's career would be like that of Saul of Tarsus and we know the rest of that story. Born in New York City in 1926 his father was an obstetrician/gynecologist. This was the career he would pursue as an adult. He received his undergraduate degree from Cornell University at later received his medical degree from McGill University in Montreal, Canada in 1949. He became a licensed medical doctor in New York state in 1952. In 1960 he was a board certified obstetrician/gynecologist. Dr. Nathanson was a pioneer for "abortion rights" becoming a founding member of the Center for Reproductive and Sexual Health or "CRASH." He had performed many abortions in his career including one on a woman he himself had impregnated. Dr. Nathanson was one of the founding members of the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws which became the current National Abortion Rights Action League or NARAL Pro-Choice America. His and their intention was to legalize abortion.
This brings me to a series I enjoyed as a young man back in the 1980s called Connections hosted by James Burke. The ten part series, from the British Broadcasting Company or BBC, was about how technology changed the world. And while the Connections series did not cover the invention of the ultrasound, this device used to view an unborn child in its mother's womb, this technology did change the heart of Dr. Bernard Nathanson. It was due to an ultrasound that Dr. Nathanson would see an abortion in real time. In it he could see the unborn baby open its mouth in pain as the surgical abortion took its life. This was the reason he called his 1984 video The Silent Scream. The opening of the video is an introduction from Oscar winning actor Charlton Heston who talked about open heart surgery how those surgeries take place on a regular basis without controversy. Mr. Heston goes on to explain that what the viewer is about to see is not without controversy because the viewer is about to see the taking of an innocent human life. For the record, Charlton Heston's introduction was magnificent, but then again that man could read out of an instruction manual and it would have the same effect.
Dr. Nathanson would write his autobiography in 1996 titled Hand of God in which he wrote about his involvement in the legalization of abortion and how he came to regret what he had done. While he was raised as a Jew he had become an atheist even after his change of heart on abortion. This proves that you don't need a God, a church, or dogma to know that killing an innocent life is wrong. Eventually Dr. Nathanson would become a Roman Catholic in December of 1996. He was baptized by John Cardinal O'Connor of New York City. A acquaintance of mine attended his baptism. He died in 2011 at the age of 84.
Dean Obeidallah is a Muslim, Left-Wing New York City radio talk show host on Sirrus Progress Channel 127. He first came into notoriety in 2013 when he was on a year end (December 31) discussion on the MSNBC Melissa Harris Perry show. A photo of 2012 Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney with his family was shown including a black baby that one of his kids had adopted. Dean Obeidallah quipped that this black toddler is an example of tokenism in the Republican party. Melissa Harris Perry later made a tearful apology for that segment as it was insensitive. Dean Obeidallah also had to retract his tasteless statement regarding the Romney baby. In time Melissa Harris Perry proved too guano crazy for even MSNBC, and her show was cancelled.
Dean Obeidallah updates Karl Marx for the 21st Century. He talks almost daily about a racial struggle for political power of black and brown people and "our white allies" against "white supremacy." It's no longer a political struggle between the working class and the rich as in Marx's writings. He says that slavery is not America's original sin, but what he refers to as "White Supremacy," which is a catch all bogeyman that can mean whatever he and his fellow Jacobins want it to mean. Let me state exactly what he means by "White Supremacy" Western Civilization and its Judeo Christian roots. Dean O wants to attack the core of this nation, for one he's a Muslim and Islam and Western Civilization do not mix. Part of our roots are in the U.S. Constitution which has always been a bane to the Far-Left because it restrains their appetite for raw power. You cannot have wealth confiscation, gun confiscation, censorship and a curb on religion, especially Christianity, under the U.S. Constitution. If you can attack it and our heritage as White Supremacy you can get the revolutionary change you crave. One of those freedoms in the Constitution is the freedom of speech.
If you who are reading this not "right wing" or white or all that political, I ask you this: does talk of a political/racial struggle of black and brown people and our white allies sound very American to you? During the civil rights struggle of the 1950s and 1960s the message was about inclusion of black and brown people as full participants in American life. Dean O talks about these things as a matter of conquest, but then he's just being a good Muslim.
If you judge this as a hit piece against a Muslim Lefty, let me point out some thing: I listen to Dean's show only because I want to know what the enemy is up to and his show is about what the enemy is up to. Plus, at the same time Dean O's show airs on Progress 127, on the Patriot 125 Mark Levin is on and I can't listen to him, he's too shrill. I call him the barking Yorkie. "Yip! Yip! Yip!" Nobody is that angry all the damned time. Sean Hannity, is in my view, a dumb hack. I mention I will be defending Fox News host Tucker Carlson who was kind enough to endorse my book The War on Smokers and the Rise of the Nanny State back in 2009 and he permitted me to write some columns for The Daily Caller as well has having me on Fox and Friends in January of 2013. I am writing this column to inform readers of the true authoritarian nature of the Far-Left not to solely defend Tucker Carlson. So if you still want to keep reading this, you will learn something about the Far-Left. Be warned, they are serious in their intentions as you will read below.
Dean Obedeliah talks about a struggle for power against white supremacy with black and brown people and "our white allies."
Good thing radio isn't visual, right DeanO?
On Friday, April 9th, Dean O revealed his and the radical Left's true agenda. He talked openly about his belief that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) should have the legal authority to silence some speech. As an example he erroneously stated that Antonin Scalia gave right wing think tanks what they wanted in the 2008 Washington D.C. vs. Heller Supreme Court case, which reaffirmed the right of private citizens to own arms. I state erroneously because since the founding of the republic in 1789 and the ratification of the Constitution in 1791, Americans have always had the right to bear arms outside a well regulated militia. Only in the 20th and 21st centuries in outliers like Chicago, New York, and Washington D.C. has that right been infringed. Antonin Scalia, a true originalist on the high court, knew the Founders intended for ordinary citizens to have the right to own firearms. Dean O said that progressives, liberals, should be able to change the law so as to remove people like Tucker Carlson from speaking. He stated that when people like Tucker say things that may be interpreted by his ilk to be racist or medically controversial, he should be censured from the airwaves. He then went on to explain what he will tolerate. He said that when right wingers say President Biden will raise their taxes, he's okay with their statements even though he deems them lies. He, Dean O, will discern what others may be and my not be allowed to say.
On this same day, April 9th, he took a call from a woman in the Los Angeles area who asked Dean how great it would have been had the FCC had the power to silence Rush Limbaugh when he was starting out. Interestingly enough that desire to silence Rush Limbaugh was expressed by Los Angeles attorney Gloria Allred in a 1991 CBS News 60 Minutes profile of Rush Limbaugh.
On February 4th, Dean O had a conversation with Angelo Carusone of the left wing Media Matters for America group, which is on Jihad against Fox News. Dean O discussed in front of his Allah and everyone his and Media Matters desire to silence Fox News through public pressure and litigation. Dean O mentioned that he does writing for Fox's competitors CNN and MSNBC. Dean Obeidallah has stated on his show how he is a true defender of the First Amendment. And yet, given his April 9th show, he sounds more like a used car salesman named "Honest Dean O." I have listened to a LOT of right wing talk radio over the years. And I mean a lot. In all those broadcast hours, which may comprise thousands of hours, I have never heard a right wing talk show host discuss the need to legally censor anyone on the Left. Nor have I ever heard discussion of economic boycotts against those on the Left.
Dean O and Media Matters openly discuss on February 4th getting Fox News off cable and satellite carriers through public pressure and litigation.
Dean Obeidallah cites Tucker Carlson's espousal of "a replacement theory" as his reason for wanting Tucker Carlson censored. Tucker Carlson has stated on his FOX News show that the Left, via the Biden Administration, is encouraging poor people from Central America to enter the United States southern border as future replacements for American citizens and these replacements would comprise a huge voting block that should keep the Democrat party in power. The reason these immigrants can be a long term benefit to the Democrats is that they are poor, and the Democrats are the party of free stuff. Dean O, who is obsessed with Tucker Carlson, falsely claims this is racist commentary when in fact tens of millions of new immigrants from desperately poor countries are a potential gold mine of future Democrat voters. Dean O wants Tucker removed, via the FCC, for saying these things.
Of course, the real reason Dean O and the Left hate Tucker Carlson is Tucker delivers punishment nightly to the Left. And if Tucker coughs more people will hear that lone cough than ever know the name of Dean Obeidallah. I am actually doing this small media figure a favor by writing about him. But I must write about him because he is the underbelly of the Left, which is not Liberal but authoritarian.
After the January 6th riot by Trump supporters at the Capitol, Dean Obeidallah said that Trump flags are no different from the ISIS flags of the terrorist Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. When you compare Trump supporters to terrorists like ISIS, you are advocating violence against them. He refers to former President Trump as Donald Bin Laden.
When you compare Trump supporters to terrorists like ISIS, you are advocating violence against them.
On Tuesday, April 26th, Dean said something in the first hour of his show that was a new low even for him, and he must own it. He said the January 6th riot on the U.S. Capitol, by supporters of President Trump, was worse than the attacks of September 11, 2001! Symbolically at least - he said. He added, that more people died on September 11th. How white of him. Of course as a Muslim he probably would want white, Christian Trump supporters to be worse than his fellow Muslims who carried out the September 11, 2001 attacks. And yes Dean, there were more deaths on 9/11, almost 3,000 more.
Everything you need to know about Dean Obeidallah can be summed up in a phone conversation he had on Monday, April12th in the first hour of his show. That day there had been protests in Minnesota over a weekend accidental shooting by police of a 20 years-old black man named Duante Wright, who tried to flee from his arrest for an outstanding warrant. The police officer attempting to arrest him pulled out her gun instead of her taser. A black man called into Dean Obeidallah's show from Philadelphia complaining about how black men, to use the callers words, "Do stupid shit everyday." The caller went on for about a minute longer to complain about how young black men, in the callers community, wake up everyday and think about, "What stupid shit they can do today?" Dean Obeidallah cut the black caller off and denounced him as, are you ready for this, " White Supremacist." Yes, if you are black and you call the Dean O show with legitimate complaints about your own community, Dean O will angrily hang up on you and you will somehow become a White Supremacist. It must be magic.
A couple of final notes: Dean Obeidallah's bio states that he has worked as a comedian. I've listened to him for the greater part of a year. He's never said anything funny. And I mean that. A reaction to humor is involuntary and if you have to ask yourself, "Am I allowed to laugh at this?" then it's highly likely that something funny was said. I've never heard Dean O say anything funny. Perhaps that's why he's now a talk radio host and not touring as a comedian.
State Question 814 needs to pass! Twenty years ago voters were asked to approve the creation of a state fund to handle proceeds from the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between the tobacco companies and 46 states. Oklahoma was one of the 46 states. Voters did approve the question and the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust (TSET) was born. After 20 years it's time to have another look at TSET.
Why?
Because TSET, which was crafted by the state's political class in 2000, is a Boondoggle, a waste, a Big Smoked Pig! You have seen TSET's handy work while driving down the highway. Those billboards telling you that water hydrates! That's TSET. When you see or hear those commercials telling you that you should move around more, or that secondhand smoke is awful! Worse than COVID! That's TSET.
A TSET billboard
But that's not all of what TSET does, of its almost 2 Billions in the bank TSET also funds bike paths, it gives monies to municipalities if those municipalities ban tobacco on city properties. TSET has funded programming on the Oklahoma Educational Television Authority (OETA) public television. In 2015 TSET even funded a thirty minute documentary which aired on OETA in January about how great TSET is.
So what does TSET not fund? Healthcare! Yes, healthcare! You see, the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement was created because 46 states, including Oklahoma, sued the large tobacco companies because the states were taking care of people who had become ill from smoking. The money generated from that 1998 MSA was supposed to reimburse the states for their costs in caring for people with smoking related illnesses. TSET should pay for healthcare right now, but it doesn't. But there's a solution if you vote for State Question 814.
State Question 814 reads:
This measure seeks to amend Article 10, Section 40 of the Oklahoma Constitution (Section 40), which directs proceeds from the State's settlements with or judgments against tobacco companies. Currently, Section 40 directs 75% of proceeds to the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust Fund (TSET Fund), where earnings may only be used for tobacco prevention programs, cancer research, and other such programs to maintain or improve the health of Oklahomans. Meanwhile, the remaining 25% of proceeds are directed to a separate fund for the Legislature (Legislative Fund). The Legislature can also direct some of that 25% to the Attorney General.
This measure amends Section 40 to reduce the percentage of proceeds that go into the TSET Fund from 75% to 25%. As a result, the remaining 75% will go to the Legislative Fund and the Legislature may continue to direct a portion to the Attorney General. The measure would also restrict the use of the Legislative Fund. Section 40 currently states only that the Legislative Fund is subject to legislative appropriation. If this measure passes, money from the Legislative Fund must be used to get federal matching funds for Oklahoma's Medicaid Program.
Earlier this year, voters approved an expansion of Medicaid. The state is now on the hook for hundreds of millions because more people will be able to take advantage of Medicaid. Where are we going to get the funds to pay for it? One place needs to be TSET.
Please vote YES on S.Q. 814 because right now TSET pays for this:
At
four o'clock on a pleasant Saturday afternoon in January, I visited
the beautiful St. John's Episcopal Church in midtown Tulsa to hear
Rev. Robert W. Lee IV tell us why he is ashamed to be related to his
great uncle Robert E. Lee. Because he's ashamed, why didn't he just
stay at home in North Carolina?
His
lecture on historical wrongs was delivered in a church which is part
of a Church founded by a king who wanted to divorce his wife so that
he could marry his mistress, whom he later executed. In so doing,
this king seized Church properties and killed priests. I took many
notes during his talk so you can know his views, and I shall tell you
mine.
He
talked about when he was growing up, he was proud of being being a
descendant of Robert E. Lee. He had a Confederate battle flag in his
room. He also had a religious inclination and decided he wanted to
enter the ministry. Along the way, a black woman he knew told him
his having a Confederate battle flag was not conducive to the
Christian life. "I needed to change so that I could change
others." He later became the pastor of a United Church of
Christ church in North Carolina. It was after the 2017 events in
Charlottesville, Virginia where a riot broke out between white
nationalists (neo-Nazis) and ANTIFA (anti-Fascists, who are
Communists or anarchists) over a statue of General Robert E. Lee,
that Rev. Lee decided to speak out. He was given the opportunity to
do so at the MTV (Music Television) awards while wearing his clerical
garb. He used the event to denounce "white supremacy and a
society built on white supremacy" symbolized by his great uncle.
For his appearance on MTV, he was fired by his church, which was
remarkable because the United Church of Christ is very liberal in its
theological/political leanings. He continued his crusade by going on
the televison show The View and later National Public Radio. "The
Gospel calls me [because] of my name and my privilege." He
compared himself to Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Nat Turner, the
19th century slave turned pastor in Virginia who led a four-days
slave rebellion in Southampton County, Virginia in 1831, killing
about 60 white men, women, and children. Rev. Lee did not elaborate
about who Nat Turner was or what he did.
He
said he's ashamed of Robert E. Lee because he chose to fight for
slavery by fighting for the South. As for his legacy he said, "The
South lost the war but won in the history books." He went on to
say, for example, "Texas history books are inherently racist."
As
for the 1921 race war in Tulsa, Rev. Lee did not hesitate to lecture,
"It's the elephant in the room," saying Tulsans are shying
away from what happened. Since he doesn't live in Tulsa, he really
knows nothing about what is being done to address the events of 1921
in which white mobs, agitated by the local newspapers' reportage that
a black man was accused of assaulting a white woman in an elevator,
descended on the black neighborhood leveling several blocks of homes
and businesses, killing many. The actual numbers are not known. "We
have to seek atonement and amends," he said.
Atonement
and amends were the themes of Rev. Lee's talk. White people are bad,
and they need to get out their sackcloths and ashes. He also said we needed to have "dialogue" about these things.
There
were questions submitted in writing, some of which were read aloud by
the Rev. Samuel Colley-Toothaker of St. John's, who said he didn't
want to take questions from the floor due to time....Okay.
One
question was about Colin Kapernick, the former San Fransciso 49ers
football player who knelt during the singing of the national anthem.
"You're telling him to stand is assimilation," said Rev.
Lee. He went on to lament that black athletes labor for the benefit
of white sports teams' owners.
One
of the questions read aloud was would Rev. Lee name any of his sons
Robert? He said no. "We value what we name." He said he
doesn't value being related to Robert E. Lee.
He
admitted that if he could have dinner with one historical figure, it
would be his famous uncle, to whom he referred as "a man's man
in the 19th century." Perhaps he would have a different
prespective had they dined together?
A
question came up about the Black Lives Matter movement. Did he
believe this to be true or should it be "All Lives Matter?"
He said as a Christian, all lives matter, but black people are so
put upon by our racist society that they must take precedence.
All
things considered, his talk was elitist and condescending. He was
saying to those wealthy, white midtowners that they, and they alone,
can improve the lives of black people. I saw three black people in
the church that day. "To those of us with power and privilege,"
he said to the august gathering, "I look around and see
opulence." He left us with the idea that black people can't do
it on their own. They are weak victims of life in America who cannot
help themselves and to suggest otherwise is cruel and racist.
After
Rev. Lee's lecture in the church there was a reception in the hall
next to the sanctuary. Rev. Lee met an older man who mentioned that
General Lee had the total loyality of his soldiers. Rev. Lee
admitted, "He did command respect, I'll tell you that."
Then
I asked him a couple of questions. Because he mentioned being
inspired by the women's march which, is an abortion march, I asked
him his abortion position. He said, "I'm pro-choice; we
shouldn't govern women's bodies." I asked him how he could have
that position as a clergyman because science has indisputably
established the baby in the womb is a human life. He told me he
didn't think the abortion topic was germane to his talk and he didn't
want to talk to me about that.
My
second question concerned his position on statues and "white
supremacy." I mentioned students at Tufts University in
Massachusetts are trying to remove a statue of Thomas Jefferson for
the same reasons as taking down Confederate statues i.e. slavery and
"white supremacy." He said, "If Tufts sees it [Thomas
Jefferson] as a symbol of white supremacy, then take it down."
He then dismissed my argument saying he rejects the slippery slope
argument even though he just admitted he would have the Jefferson
statue removed. At this point, Rev. Lee was done with me and said he
didn't want to talk to me anymore. So much for his call for
dialogue.
Reverend
Robert W. Lee IV is in my book a bad actor. He's kind of like Joel
Osteen in that both are "reverends;" both are good talkers,
and both use their positions and abilities to promote their private
agendas. Osteen uses flowery inspriational "pep talks" to
get money and Rob Lee uses guilt to get notoriety and power for his
agenda. And both men do not promote the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Milo Yiannopoulos, the British writer and critic of Islam who thrives on controversy (pronounced CON-Trev-esy in British) is coming to Tulsa! At least he wants to speak here if he can. The University of Tulsa, a private school, flat out said NO. Tulsa Community College (TCC), a public institution, was then approached by Milo but they have set their own conditons. According to Milo, TCC has set a list of conditions that are impossible to follow. He told KRMG radio on April 11, 2019 that TCC demands Milo provide them a copy of his speech before the talk, not hire private security for the event, 400 seats in the auditorium could not be sold for the talk, TCC would allow Milo to speak on a Wednesday between 2 and 4 pm. And TCC could cancel the event at any time prior to the event and keep all the money! TCC was much more accomidating to a pro-Islamic talk given in November of 2015. I attended that lecture on a Sunday afternoon. Below is what I observed. I heard he sang a good song
I heard he had a style
And so I came to see him
to listen for a while
- Roberta Flack,
"Killing Me Softy with His Song,"
as modified by “with Islam”
by Theodore King
Sunday, November 15, the Islamic Society of Tulsa, along with the Jewish Federation of Tulsa, Boston Avenue United Methodist Church, Phillips Seminary in Bartlesville and other organizations, sponsored a two-hour event at Tulsa Community College's south Tulsa campus which they billed as an, “Educational Program” and titled: “Should we fear Islam?" Because the Islamic Society was one of the events sponsors' the answer to the question was predetermined. Imagine the Southern Baptist Convention sponsoring a talk titled: "Is Jesus the Messiah?" or Focus on the Family sponsoring one titled: "Is the Nuclear Family Good for Society?" Author and attorney Hannibal B. Johnson was the moderator for the event. He set a condescending tone for the event by quoting from the song “Carefully Taught” from Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific:
You've got to be taught To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught From year to year,
It's got to be drummed In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught.
For most of my life
Columbus Day was a day you couldn't get mail and the banks were
closed. I once asked my dad why we have Columbus Day, he said it was
an Italian thing. We aren't Italian, we aren't even in the Knights
of Columbus. So I was indifferent to Columbus Day.
Four years ago I applied
for a job with a pseudo government agency. I was applying for a job
for, which I was qualified, and for which my would be employers were
desparate. Because this was a pseudo government agency there were
many requirements I had to fullfill. I jumped through the hoops. My
interview went well with the lady who does the hiring and I was even
given the chance to meet some of the people that I would be working
with in my new job. Then a fat woman from Human Resources entered
the office with some more paperwork for me to sign, this is a pseudo
government agency after all. She was dating a form and asked, “What
day is it?” I resonded, “It's October 12, Columbus Day.” She
looked at me over her reading glasses with a smirk on her face as if
I were her next eclair and said, “Don't you mean Indiginous
People's Day?”
“No, I mean Columbus
Day. Has been Columbus Day for all my life,” I responded. My
interview was soon over, I left the office and went home. A week
passed and I heard nothing. This seemed odd as they were “desparate”
to fill that post. Well, they weren't THAT desparate as it turned
out and I did not get that job. I can't prove it, but I think the
fat woman from HR held it against me for having the temerity to say
the truth, it was Columbus Day!
Christopher Columubs has
taken a beating in the past 26 years since the 500th
anniversary of his arrival in 1992. Cities across America, run by
liberals, have ditched Columbus Day for “Native American Day” or
“Indiginous People's Day.” Two years agp in Tulsa Mayor G.T.
Bynum, who comes from one of the city's wealthy, ruling families as a
LaFortune, decided to force Columbus to share his seat with the
Indians by renaming the holiday - Columbus/Native American Day. And
last year the Republican controlled legislature here did the same
thing with the new governor's blessing.
I reached out to the
Knights of Columbus at their headquarters in New Haven, Connecticut
asking that they take a stand against this slow erasure of their
namesake from history. I never heard back from them. I also reached
out to the local chapter at Holy Family Cathedral in Tulsa. They
don't care and apparently neither does their home office in New
Haven. The Knights of Columbus do a lot of good work and are
generally a good bunch of guys, but on this pivitol front in the
culture war they are USELESS. Glad I'm not a member. They're
probably glad they don't have me either.
Christopher Columbus was
probably not the first person to discover the new world, but he was
the first person to take back news to a European power (Spain) that
he had found new real estate. It is believed Ireland's Saint Brendan
in the sixth century made the first discovery. In 1976 and 77 a
group of explorers proved that Brendan may have made it to Iceland
from Ireland and then on to Nova Scotia, Canada. They used a replica
of the leather bound sail boat used by St. Brendan and his monks in
the sixth century. This proves an old line about the Irish. God
gave them drink to slow them down so they wouldn't conquer the world.
The Irish are a clever lot. The Vikings likely discovered America
after the Irish had beat them to it.
Three years ago, on
Columbus Day, a local radio talk show host in Tulsa had an interview
with a local writer about a recent news story unrelated to Columbus
Day. At the end of the interview the host asked his guest, who is
very liberal, if he was celebrating Columbus Day or Native American
Day. The writer predictably responded, “As for me and my house,
it's Native American Day.” It was appropriate for this liberal
writer to paraphrase the Book of Joshua, he is also Jewish. Because
Christopher Columbus arrived in the new world in 1492 and
successfully brough back to the old world of Europe news of his real
estate discovery, the ancestors of that writer were able to leave
Europe and find safety in the new world. His immediate family was
able to avoid numerous pogroms against his people and the final
solution of the Third Reich. This historical perspective has likely
elluded that writer but he's a fool anyway.
This leads to a broader
point, because of Columbus millions from around the world were able
to make a new life here in the Americas. Our ancestors were able to
make a fresh start in a new land and avoid the horrors of poverty and
persecution in the old.My own ancestors in Ireland had the option
of coming to America after the British government allowed the
systematic starvation of the Irish people when the potato crops
failed in the 1840s. Today, the ignorantly educated talk of “white
supremacy, patricary” and “white privelage.” Columbus is to
those people the devil. And yet many of these ignorantly, educated
are whites who come from the safety and security of America that
their forefathers established. Self-loathing is a psycological
disorder and should be recognized as such.
What about the American
Indians? How did they fare after the arrival of the white man? Not
well, this is a fact of history and not something to be proud. This
clash of civilizations was going to happen at some point. Whether
anyone wants to admidt it or not, Europeans came from an advanced
civilization and they were going to prevail because of their use of
technology. The other factor was the disunity between native tribes.
In other words, divide and conquer. With this conquest came a new
Christian civilization. When Spain's Hernan Cortes arrived in Mexico
some 27 years after Columbus' discovery, he found a well developed
civilization that practiced human sacrifice on a daily basis. A
practice that he and his men, known as Conquistadors, put to an end.
The vilification of
Columbus has a sinister motive. He was the man who made European
immigration to the new world possible; discredit him and you can
discredit all white people living in the Americas. Make them out to
be interlopers. Frequently, we read or hear commentators
disparagingly refer to "white men" and "old white
guys" as if some sort of cancer. Desparaging comments that
would not be allowed for any other ethnic group.
There is also the agenda
by cultural Marxists to discredit the American founding. Recently,
at my father's alma mater Notre Dame a tapestry of Christopher
Columbus was covered up because the school administration decided he had to be hidden from history. Take one string on a tapestry and pull on it the
rest will come apart. At Tufts Universtiy in Massachusetts there is a movement underway to remove a statue to Thomas Jefferson because he
owned slaves. The real
reason for wanting him removed was his work creating the
Consttitution of the United States. Cultural
Marxists are working within our institutions to undermine our nation. Marxism
will never succeed in this country as long as we have our
Constitution. Get rid of that and you've created a void, a void to be
filled by evil men and women.
Cultural
Marxists operating in our universities and in institutions are a greater long-term threat to our way of life than Al
Queda or members of The Islamic State. Their tactics are different,
but their goal is the same, destroy America.
In his landmark 1969
documentary on western art titled Civilization Lord Kenneth Clark
ended his 13 part series with a warning: "It is lack of confidence,
more than anything else, that kills a civilization. We can destroy
ourselves by cynicism and dissolution just as effectively as by
bombs."
Christopher Columbus is a
part of our heritage and we must honor him. As for his detractors it
is important to note that history is almost never prestine because it
deals with complex beings called humans. The world is a better place
because Columbus made his succesful voyage.
