U.S. versus The World

I try to focus OkiePundit on matters related to Oklahoma but it is undeniable that we are not isolated, that what happens in Bali or Buenos Aires also often affects Oklahomans. It's with this global scope in mind that I want to draw your attention to just how out of step our foreign policy is with that of most other countries. I wouldn't argue that the U.S. needs to compromise our principles or allow others to determine a foreign policy for us that is not in our best interests. But I would argue that a principle-centered foreign policy would be in our best interest and that such a standard often eludes us.

The examples below illustrate the isolationist voting of the United States on important selected issues over a two-decade period at the United Nations:

U.S. Voting Record

Ending the US embargo against Cuba 155 countries voted Yes 2 countries voted No
Abolition of land mines treaty 133 countries voted Yes Only the U.S, voted NO
UN Convention on rights of children 180 countries voted YES Only the U.S. and Somalia voted NO
Condemnation of Israel for human rights abuse 121 countries voted YES Only the US voted NO

Can so many other nations be wrong? Why do we so often find ourselves totally alone in our stance? What does this tell us?

Brad Henry a bi-partisan leader?

Brad Henry is talking bi-partisanship and his transition team tends to confirm his desire to be a governor for ALL of Oklahoma. There are a lot of Republicans on that transition team. Even Governor Keating's former chief-of-staff, Ken Lackey, is on the team. That's a good start. Let's hope it's not window-dressing.

Robert Butkin is weilding big influence with Governor-elect Henry - that's good news for anyone interested in honest, crony-free government. Butkin, widely respected by Democrats, Republicans and independents, is said to be in charge of vetting cabinet postings. Let's hope he searches out the best candidates for the cabinet. Invariably, the best candidates are those who don't put themselves forward for the posts. The really good ones have to be sought out and asked in the name of public service.

If they want it so much to ask for it or demand it, please don't give it to them Mr. Henry.

Henry Cabinet?

Among the names being tossed around for Governor-elect Brad Henry's cabinet include former Tulsa mayor Rodger Randle, or Senate staff director Connie Irby as Henry's pick for Secretary of Commerce. Former state senator Brooks Douglas for Secretary of Tourism. Former state senator Paul Muegge for Secretary of Agriculture. Former Keating chief-of-staff Ken Lackey as Henry's chief-of-staff. Former OU football coach Barry Switzer can have any slot he wants.

Black Friday and Divorce Court

Did you go shopping on Black Friday? I was determined to avoid the insanity at the shopping malls on this, the busiest shopping day of the year. I did, for reasons I won't go into, did end up having to go to an electronics store in search of an emergency item. The store, of course, didn't have what I needed. But then I spotted a couple of CDs on sale. I picked them up and headed for the checkout area where I spotted a long line with a befuddled-looking teenage cashier trying to cope with the job. I laid the CDs down and left the building. Argh! The traffic was bad but the drivers were worse. The lack of civility in society is a peeve of mine and so being exposed to rude drivers tends to shorten my life with toxins pumped into my system. I try to be Buddha-like and go with the flow but when jerks in autos do their jerk things I just want to strangle them. But all I succeed in doing is making myself upset because roadways are not conducive to chasing down jerks and strangling them.

That's why I keep an Enya cassette tape handy for calming on days like Black Friday. So today, as I idled in line watching jerks speed down a closed lane and nose into line ahead of those of us who get in lines I was glad I had Enya there with me. Oh, happy holidays.

Then I stopped in SuperCuts for a haircut. I was third in line and there was nothing to read while I waited. The women who were cutting hair had a TV blaring with a program I later learned was called Divorce Court. A series of the most irritating, inarticulate people were screaming and crying on this horrid show. The "judge" hearing their cases was almost as irritating as the fools that had placed themselves on national television to air their most embarrassing problems. I couldn't shut it out, the TV was turned up high. The women in the shop were eating it up. The men who were waiting were rolling their eyes or tightening their jaws. I contemplated leaving without my haircut but I stuck this one out. I vowed that next time I'd bring my portable cassette player and Enya cassette with me to the barbershop.

Dogfighting in Creek County

The day before Thankgiving, in Creek County, county sheriff deputies arrested four "people" for engaging in dogfighting. The deputies took possession of 53 dogs, many of them in terrible condition. According to the Sapulpa Herald there were three dogfighting arenas west of Sapulpa, one inside a barn. "The indoor arena's sideboards were caked with blood," said Creek County investigator Cpl. Terry Burton. "What we found was just disgusting, just disgusting," he said. "To think there were people who would put two dogs together to fight is just disgusting."

The deputies also found drugs and firearms on the property. Humane groups and law enforcement officers have tied dogfighting and cockfighting to drugs and other crimes but this may be the most recent confirmation of the claim. According to the Oklahoman, those arrested were James Fiarris, 55, Jamme A. Fiarris, 54, both of Sapulpa, Roger M. Scott, 50, of Tulsa, and Steven King, also know as "DJ Spinmaster," of Broken Arrow. Scott reportedly works for the City of Tulsa and had driven to the areanas in a city truck.
An investigator said fights were held on Sundays at the areanas and that at least 30 vehicles were seen to be parked there.

Let's thank the Creek County Sheriff's office and detective Cpl. Terry Burton for investigating and arresting those alledged to be involved in this most barbaric of cruelties. Let's also urge maximum prosecution. Thank you calls should go to:

Creek County Sheriff's Office
P.O. Box 927
Sapulpa, Oklahoma 74067

Phone: (918) 224-4964

Brad Henry's Transition Team

Governor-Elect Henry announced his transition team on Friday and everyone is scratching their heads to understand why there are so many academics on the lightweight, but bi-partisan team. Not that there's anything wrong with university professors and administrators but where are his cronies? There's a lot of term-limited State Senators fresh out of jobs and wanting to know where their cushy jobs are. The most likely scenario is that the real powers are behind the scene and the transition team will not be selecting a cabinet for the Governor-elect. None of the expected cabinet members are on the transition team. Senators Dave Herbert, Kelly Haney, Brooks Douglas, etc are not on the transition team. Dave Herbert and Kelly Haney would be good choices but lets hope Brad Henry does not load his agencies with friends and cronies from the State Senate. That would be an early kiss of death for his administration.

Another kiss of death to success is a Governor that surrounds himself with young neophytes in the Governor's office. It's cursed many a Governor and is hard to recover from. The Governor-elect would be wise to hire just a few pragmatic and experienced Oklahomans rather than a bevy of fresh recruits from the Young Democrats. Hopefully he won't make the mistake of hiring out-of-state political hacks for chief-of-staff (like Lt Gov Mary Fallin has). If the Lt Governor wants to ever become Governor she needs to stop hiring chiefs-of-staff who insult and irritate her allies and constituents.

Oklahoma's Tax Credits for Child Care program a failure

Quoting a report by the National Women's Law Center report the Washington Post points out in a November 18th article that the tax-credit system launched by nearly two dozen states, including Oklahoma, to boost corporate investment in child care has been a failure. The Post says that some public money was diverted from child-care programs, according to a report by the National Women's Law Center.

In the report, "The Little Engine That Hasn't: The Poor Performance of Employer Tax Credits for Child Care," researchers reviewed employer tax-credit use in 20 states and found that in 16 of them five or fewer corporations had ever applied for the credits. In five states -- Arkansas, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia -- not a single corporation had claimed the credits.

More on Senator Frank Shurden

A couple of years ago when Senator Shurden was doing everything he could to stop the people of Oklahoma from having a chance to vote on cockfighting he came up with the brilliant idea of Legislation (HB 1375) that would stop the anti-cockfighting group from bypassing the Legislature and going straight to the people. Shurden would have the Legislature put a vote on the ballot that would change the Oklahoma Constitution to require double the number of signatures required on initiative petitions if the issue had something to do with animals. If the people passed his ballot initiative he figured the anti-cockfighters would never be able to reach such a high requirement. Instead of about 70,000 signatures they would have to get about 150,000. Shurden thought this would be a way to get the hunters and fishermen to siddle up to his cockfighter buddies. They could pitch it as a measure to stop the "animal rights" people from targeting the hunters and fishermen after they dispatched the cockfighters. Shurden succeeded in getting our Legislature to go along with this crafty but undemocratic idea to establish an unequal system for voter initiatives.

But Shurden was counting on the cockfighting initiative that was currently underway to be killed in the courts by the cockfighter's attorney. Well, he bet wrong and Shurden's bill (SQ 698) AND the anti-cockfighting vote (SQ 687) showed up on the same ballot in November 2002. SQ 687 was on the ballot because over 100,000 Oklahomans signed an initiative petition within a three-month period to get it to a vote. Shurden's bill was on the ballot because he had enough fellow Legislators backward enough to buy in or trade votes in backroom deals. When the two state questions appeared on the ballot this month, Senator Shurden and his ilk were roundly defeated on both statewide votes.

Now it is instructive to return to Senator Shurden's statements of just over a year ago when he was attacking State Representative Russ Roach for trying to stop Shurden's bill to put the two-tier initiative petition idea on the ballot. According to the Oklahoma Rifle Association "The Henryetta legislator challenged Rep. Roach to "trust the people" on HB 1375, pointing out that the measure would put the question to a statewide vote. 'I don't understand why Rep Roach is afraid to trust the people on this question-Let's put the bull aside and let the people decide," said Sen. Shurden."

Fast forward to November 2002. The people have decided, Senator Shurden. They have spoken in no uncertain terms. Cockfighting was overwhelming defeated and your attempt to keep animal-related issues off the ballot has been soundly defeated. Now lets see who trusts the people.

A Majestic Symbol of Progress for Oklahoma

Today, 16,000 people watched the dedication of the 155-foot-tall dome that finally completed the 85-year-old Oklahoma Capitol building. Anyone who has visited the pre-dome Capitol and seen the new domed Capitol can appreciate what a difference there is. The dome gives the seat of our state government a majesty that can serve to raise our expectations of what our state can be. We owe our appreciation to Governor Frank Keating for leading the effort to raise the private money to fund the dome. We also owe appreciation to all the donors that made it a reality. All but $1.8 million of the $21 million cost came from private citizens and corporations. For decades our Legislature didn't have the backbone or vision to fund the completion of the Capitol. So, again, someone else had to do what the Legislature should have done.

We can't blame the decades of waiting entirely on the Legislature however. There's been a plentiful supply of crabby, vision-less citizens that frothed at the mouth every time someone talked of finishing the Capitol with a dome. It's these vociferous nay-sayers that Legislators run from. I was having a conversation with one such woman recently when the topic of the Capitol building came up. She suddenly launched into an epitaph-laden explosion of spitting emotion over the use of tax monies to build a dome. How dare the Governor spend money on "his dome" instead of on schools. She wasn't interested in the facts about private funding I tried to tell her about. She cared nothing about the kind of symbolism that lifts a people to a higher level, gives them a point on which to hang their pride, and shows the world that we are proud of who we are.

The Dome is that.

State Agriculture Commissioner Helping Cockfighters to Thwart Citizens' Will

This cockfighting war in Oklahoma just keeps getting more and more bizarre. The Daily Oklahoman reports today that Dennis Howard, the Commissioner of Agriculture in Oklahoma, announced he was considering becoming involved in the cockfighters attempt to weaken the anti-cockfighting law that was overwhelmingly passed by the electorate last week. According to the article, Howard is considering using the legal staff at the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture to try to help the cockfighters overturn the new law by joining in the effort to get a Little Dixie judge to declare the law unconstitutional. A few days after the law passed in a statewide vote cockfighters succeeded in getting District Judge Willard Driesel of Idabel to issue an injunction against enforcement of the ban pending consideration of whether it was unconstitutional. Some have speculated that cockfighters are taking this action in far southeast Oklahoma where their base is strongest in an effort to remove the contest from media view as much as possible.

Dennis Howard was an early opponent of the anti-cockfighting campaign. According to the Tulsa World, Howard, a state employee, traveled to cockfighter meetings in 1999 to advise them on how to stop the Oklahoma Coalition Against Cockfighting's initiative petition drive. In an October 10, 1999 Tulsa World article Dennis Howard was quoted as saying:

"I gave them a lesson in Politics 101," Dennis Howard said, describing his presentation to cockfighters at the Oklahoma Gamefowl Breeders Association's annual meeting in McAlester. "I told them, `You need to pick an election date when you can win.' "

The World said that Howard advised the cockfighters to do everything they could to challenge the signature process and postpone the cockfighting measure to an election date other than the presidential election of 2000. Howard said that the bigger the election turnout by voters the worse their chances of winning were.

After the cockfighters failed in their attempt to have enough signatures disqualified from the initiative petition Howard put his state agency to work to assist the cockfighters. In a letter on state stationery dated September 7, 2000, and widely used by the cockfighters, Burke L. Healey, DVM and director of Howard's Animal Industry Services Division said:

"The gamefowl industry is significant to Oklahoma's economy. There are millions of dollars pumped into the state through the retail sales of gamefowl out of our state to other states and other countries... Understand that I promote agriculture commerce and the gamefowl industry is a large part of our economy. I truely hope it will continue in the future."

During the cockfighter's campaign to defeat State Question 687 (that banned cockfighting) they sited estimates from Howard's Department of Agriculture that the "gamefowl" (cockfighting) industry "pumps $105 million into Oklahoma". Proponents of SQ 687 demanded the substantiating data for the supposed Agriculture study but the Department of Agriculture was not forthcoming. The state's media were also unable to obtain any information to support the Department of Agriculture's reported figures.

The cockfighters took the Ag chief's advice and through court challenges were able to delay the vote until November 2002. The people of Oklahoma finally got their chance to tell the politicians what they wanted. By a margin of well over 100,000 votes Oklahomans let Dennis Howard and the Legislature know that they wanted cockfighting banned and they wanted it to be a felony to engage in cockfighting. After three-years of support of the secretive cockfighter/gambling network Howard is trying to step in in the guise of an objective state official.

Citizens may rightly be asking if Dennis Howard (e-mail at: dennis.howard@gov.state.ok.us) has used state funds to support the much-disdained cockfighters' association in their efforts to keep Oklahomans from voting on the controversial issue and to distribute misleading information designed to support the cockfighting side. The media should now be asking why Howard wants to use the state's resources to try to overturn a resounding vote of the people to ban this third-world bloodsport in Oklahoma. Perhaps its time for the State Auditor and Inspector to look into whether Howard has inappropriately utilized state resources?

Thanks to J. Casey for contributing the above.

Partisans Take Over TV

I can't stand to turn on any of the news programs because all they talk about is what the President and Republicans did right and what the Democrats did wrong and who is in control. Party politics are the bane of democracy. There is hope however. More and more Americans are becoming independents and are voting for individuals and their stands on issues rather than for parties. This is generally good news. I qualify my statement with Gary Richardson in mind.

Jesse Ventura turned out better than I anticipated. It was refreshing to hear him say things that other politicians are too dishonest to say. It was great to see him walk out of the memorial service for Senator Wellstone when some of the Democrats turned it into a crass political rally. The Democrats paid for their base behavior when a Republican won the Senate race in Minnesota.

Now the Republican right controls the presidency, the Senate and the House. We will pay for this I'm sure.

Anyone want to guess how much we paid to get Russia, China and France to sign on to the United Nations' resolution on Iraq? I would guess a minimum of $10 billion - most of it to Russia.

Who's in the Cabinet?

The Daily Oklahoman today says that State Senator Dave Herbert and Senator Brooks Douglass are rumored to be in the running for the state Secretary of Commerce slot on Gov-elect Henry's cabinet. A radio station in Oklahoma City also said Steve Largent was under consideration as Commerce Secretary. Let's hope Brad Henry chooses wisely and does not surround himself with neophytes and political hacks. Many a governor has injured his standing because he did not seek out relevant experience for these jobs. Many a well-meaning and well-scrubbed 20 or 30-something political groupie have led their governor into a political morass. Just because one has been a state senator does not mean he/she has the relevant experience to manage a large state agency. Former Senator Brooks Douglas would be a poor choice for any position of responsibility in the Henry Cabinet or at any state agency. The Senator has a reputation at the Capitol for irresponsibility and a penchant for skipping important meetings at a whim. Largent would be a dramatic demonstration of inclusiveness by the Governor-elect.

I sense that someone is writing a $500,000 check


Sunday night I was skimming the cable channels when I happened across TBN, the Trinity Broadcasting Network, a Christian TV network. An attractive woman was gesticulating wildly at the camera and telling me that she knew I had $84 ready to give to the Lord and all I had to do was walk to the phone and call. Her style was mesmerizing. She rocked forwards and backwards into the camera lens, her long-nailed fingers wrapped around a large mike. Her arms moved with the smooth flow and rhythm of a Balinese dancer. Tall, thin and blond she was unlike any TV evangelist I had ever seen. Words flowed from between her lips in a non-stop stream begging me to give to the Lord via TBN. She promised that I'd realize a ten-fold increase as a result of my giving. In the background a couple of young men, one black, one white, mouthed inaudible words - of praise I assume.

Then I noticed another lady in the background. She had the biggest hair I've ever seen on a head. To know what that means you've got to know that I've been to a Jehovah's Witnesses convention AND to an Andy Williams performance. This lady still had the biggest hair I've ever seen. And more dark eye shadow than Tammy Faye Baker. I'd seen her on TV before. I think she is a co-founder of TBN. Five minutes of this was interesting but I moved on to other things.

A half-hour later I surf back to TBN and the tall blonde is still going non-stop. She's telling me that she senses that someone listening is going to give $500,000 today. Well now I'm sure she's not talking to me. Wait! Now she says she senses someone who is going to give $5,000. She's headed downmarket. I switch it off before we make a connection. This is dangerous stuff. She's good.

Brad Henry's Picks and State Chamber woes

The Capitol is abuzz with rumors of who will be in Governor-Elect Henry's cabinet. The most often heard version is that Senators Kelly Haney, Dave Herbert, and Brooks Douglas will be on the cabinet. Some say that Kelly Haney, who ran against Brad Henry for the Democrat nomination for Governor, will be Secretary of Commerce. Given Haney's experience in financing that would be a good move. Haney impressed many with his positive campaign.

The State Chamber is running scared. It was no secret that the State Chamber was close to Largent and fearful of trial lawyer-supported Henry. The State Chamber was a leader in the successful effort to bring Right-to-Work to Oklahoma earlier this year. The unions, which supported Henry, have it out for the State Chamber now and are expecting Henry to put the State Chamber in the doghouse. Relations between the State Chamber and Legislative Democrats was already so bad that most Democrat candidates refused to respond to the Chambers' voter surveys this fall.

Frank Shurden, Cockfighters and Castration

Just two days after the people of Oklahoma overwhelmingly passed a ballot measure to ban cockfighting Senator Frank Shurden Democrat of Henryetta told the Daily Oklahoman that he would introduce legislation next session to weaken the law the citizenry passed. Shurden said his objective was to reduce the penalties for the new law from a felony to a misdemeanor with no chance of jail time for cockfighters. Shurden was reported to have stated, erroneously, that the new law would make it illegal just to own gamefowl. Voters on Tuesday passed the question, 565,967 votes, or 56.2 percent, to 441,220, or 43.8 percent. A hefty margin in light of a campaign of disinformation by cockfighters whose advertising had tried to convince voters that the cockfighting ban would threaten hunting, rodeos and even raising chickens.

So who is this State Senator with so little regard for the voters of Oklahoma? He's the same Senator who tried every trick in the book to keep the vote on cockfighting off the ballot and then when those efforts failed, to put another question on the ballot to double the number of voters' needed to get any animal-related issue on the state ballot. The citizens of Oklahoma roundly defeated that attempt at creating two classes of voters when they defeated SQ 698 this week also. Among many others, the Daily Oklahoman and the Tulsa World had voiced their opposition to Shurden's attempt to make animal-related initiative petitions nearly impossible to get on a ballot. The Daily Oklahoman called the measure "the cockfighters' revenge" because it was introduced by Senator Shurden in an attempt to keep the cockfighting vote off the ballot. The Daily Oklahoman, a very conservative newspaper, had this to say about Shurden's bill:

Last spring the Legislature, not in one of its finest moments, placed the measure on the Nov. 5 ballot at the behest of Sen. Frank Shurden. The Henryetta Democrat was highly critical of the anti-cockfighting petition that circulated statewide, as an effort to outlaw cockfighting once and for all.

Shurden is also the Senator that introduced legislation last session to chemically castrate first offense rapists and sex offenders. When Governor Keating vetoed the bill because it clearly was a potential violation of the U.S. Constitution's 8th Amendment against cruel and unusual punishment Shurden called the Governor a "liar" and an "arrogant smart aleck". Keating responded:

"What would you do if Frank Shurden came up to you and said, 'Are you going to sign my castration bill?' You'd probably laugh and say, 'Oh sure, I'll sign your castration bill.' I mean it was considered by most (as) silly season then and it's silly season now," To have a castration law that could apply to a person who is found innocent years later "is reckless and not progressive criminal justice policy," the governor said.

Shurden had tried for several years to pass a castration bill but they had never reached the House floor until the 2002 Legislature finally passed his bill.

So, the question to Henryetta, Oklahoma is this: is Frank Shurden representative of Henryetta? I hope not.

America's Most Liberal Newspaper Right Here in River City?

The "Friends of Jim Inhofe" took out a full-page ad in the Tulsa World today to run a copy of the Daily Oklahoman's editorial endorsing Jim Inhofe for US Senate. The Tulsa World, endorsed former Governor David Walters for the Senate race. The Jim Inhofe ad reproduces the Daily Oklahoman editorial and takes a swipe at the Tulsa World by calling it "one of the most liberal newspapers in America" and refering to the Daily Oklahoman as "the largest newspaper in Oklahoma". Amazing that the World would even run such an ad, but it's admirable. It's something I cannot see the Daily Oklahoman doing.

Perhaps if you were a rightwing conservative like Jim Inhofe and his friends, and viewing the world from that extreme vantage point, you could call the Tulsa World "one of the most liberal newspapers in America". But not if you are a reasonable person. A look at the list of candidates that the World endorsed would put the lie to the Jim Inhofe ad. The World endorsed almost equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans this election cycle. They endorsed Republican Steve Largent for Governor, Democrat David Walters for US Senate, Republican John Sullivan for Congress, and Democrat Ed Edmondson for Attorney General. The Daily Oklahoman, in contrast, endorses Republicans straight down the line. Now tell me who is predictable? Who is more balanced?

Since being called "America's Worst Newspaper" by the Columbia Review of Journalism a couple of years ago, the Daily Oklahoman does seem to have improved a bit. They were ruthless in their attacks on Oklahoma Coalition Against Cockfighting founder Janet Halliburton a couple of years ago but the DO has since called for the banning of cockfighting and the defeat of SQ 698, the cockfighters attempt to change our constitution to their benefit. That editorial position could not have been expected a few years ago.

The Tulsa World, while still maintaining a moderate editorial position, does seem to have become a little more conservative lately. Let's hope for more pragmatic, independent moderation from both paper's editorial boards. Let's hope Jim Inhofe comes to moderation soon.

It's getting deep

As we wind up to the day of election the campaign ads are getting more negative. Jim Inhofe has a new one out that features a Bill Clinton lookalike that is pictured teaching a David Walters lookalike how to lie. It's pretty outrageous and childish - but it probably works with the nitwit portion of the audience. And Jim Inhofe is a devout Christian? Hey, I'm not surprised.

The cockfighters are beyond bad, they have begun to lie to the public with newspaper inserts that claim on the one hand that SQ 687 won't really ban cockfighting but on the otherhand it is somehow threatening hunting and fishing. Come on guys, you can't have it both ways. But of course, your strategy is to so confuse the public that they won't know what they are voting for or against. That's your only hope.

Cockfighter TV Ads

I just saw the first pro-cockfighting TV commercial! Of course the huckster in the ad doesn't even mention cockfighting - he says State Question 687 is really a ploy by "California radicals" to attack hunting, fishing and rodeos. Why are these miscreants lying like that? Because they have no case. The Oklahoma Gamefowl Breeders (cockfighters) strategy is to try to confuse the voters and hope the confusion will go their way in the election. Their strategy and tactics are an insult to Oklahomans. We aren't nearly as stupid as they treat us. Can we have a lottery on who gets to personally kick these idiots out of Oklahoma all the way to Louisiana?

Vacuum Cleaner Huckster

Ouch! The Claremore Progress newspaper doesn't mince words when evaluating candidate Gary Richardson:

Independent Gary Richardson is straight out of the good ol’ boys club, exhibiting the salesmanship of a vacuum cleaner huckster. If he weren’t such a successful lawyer, he would probably be a tent revival preacher performing miracles and leading repentant sinners away from perdition.

When the election is over, Richardson will return to his lucrative law practice in Tulsa and will continue to pay tolls when driving the Turner Turnpike to Oklahoma City.

They go on to endorse Steve Largent.

Oklahoman Victim in Moscow

Very sadly, an Oklahoman was the American hostage killed in the Moscow theatre when Russian troops tried to rescue hostages held by Chechens. The family of Sandy Booker was notified this morning that his body was identified as one of the more than 100 killed in the siege. The Daily Oklahoman reports that Sandy Booker had gone to Moscow to see his Russian-Kazakh fiance and her child and was in the theatre when Chechen terrorists took it over and demanded that Russian troops leave the breakaway region of Chechnya. Wire reports indicate most of the hostages died from a powerful mysterious gas used during Saturday morning's raid of the theater. Russian troops have been criticized for using a gas that they refused to identify to doctors who needed to treat the hostages felled by the gas.

Mr. Booker worked for 18 years as an electrician at the General Motors Plant in Oklahoma City. The Daily Oklahoman reports that workers at the Oklahoma City plant continued Monday to wear red, white and blue ribbons in support of Sandy Booker and his family.

118 innocent hostages died in the tragedy. 50 of 54 terrorists were killed by the Russian troops. The Russian troops may or may not be found to have made serious errors in their attempt to end the hostage situation but the Chechen terrorists who organized and instigated the hostage taking are the ones who bear direct responsibility for the heinous crime against innocent people. If they were planning on world sympathy for their cause they failed miserably.

My heart goes out to the family of Sandy Booker and to all the others who lost loved ones in this senseless crime.

What's going on?

Yulia Latynina, a Russian journalist, has an interesting viewpoint on how the Moscow tragedy fits into a bigger picture:

President Vladimir Putin kept his word and wasted the terrorists. Not in the outhouse as promised, it's true, but in the orchestra pit. The West expressed its support. The reason for this support was the West's unexpected discovery that it is waging a third world war against Islamic extremism. In that war, just as in World War II, wild and rather uncivilized Russia turns out to be an ally. I have no intention of indiscriminately knocking Islam, but for some reason we haven't seen Shintoist terrorists. The snipers captured in Washington had accepted Islam, not Buddhism.