Oklahoma

From Left Space

Oklahoma, the Sooner State, became a state on Nov. 16, 1907. Much of the Oklahoma Territory had been set aside as Reservations for Native Americans displaced by European settlement further east. Rich in oil, natural gas and other minerals, Oklahoma is also a productive agricultural state.

[edit] Politics in Oklahoma

According to the National Conferene of State Legislatures, in 2009 the Oklahoma State legislature comes in almost last in gender parity among state legislatures. Only 11.4% of Oklahoma state legislators are women. To get lower than that you have to go to South Carolina, where pnly 10% of state legislators are women. To get a lower figure you have to go to either the American Samoa Legislature or the Virgin Islands Legislature. Compare the Oklahoma State Legislature with the Colorado State Legislature, which is 39% female.

[edit] Democratic Party

@OkDemocrats on Twitter

[edit] Defeated Working Class

Although once fertile political territiory for Prairie Populism, Oklahoma has become just another segment in the southern Bible Bible. Majorities in the state have voted Republican in every presidential election since 1964, although the 1976 Carter-Ford race was close. In 2004, George W. Bush carried every county in the state. The majority of working Oklahomans are politically disempowered and unable to assert their own basic economic interests. In late June 2006 the effort to raise sufficient numbers of petition signatures to place an initiative measure on the ballot to raise the Oklahoma state minimum wage from the Federal minumum of $5.15 an hour to 6.15$ an hour failed. The group Raise Oklahoma was only able to gather 117,101 of the 150,000 signatures that it had sought. California, Oregon, Washignton, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, New Yoprk, Maine, Massachusets, Vermont, Rhode Island, Delaware, Connecticutt, New Jersey and even Florida all have state minimum wages higher than the Federal minimum. Unlike the working people in those states, the working people of Oklahoma lack what it takes to be demand to be treated decently. Bible Belt conservatism is so corrosive that renders even Oklahomans slavish.

[edit] Oklahoma Congressional Delegation

Senate
- Senior Senator: Tom Coburn (R)
- Junior Senator: James Inhofe (R)

House of Representatives
- OK-01 Rep.: John Sullivan (R)
- OK-02 Rep.: Dan Boren (D)
- OK-03 Rep.: Frank D. Lucas (R)
- OK-04 Rep.: Tom Cole (R)
- OK-05 Rep.: Ernest Istook (R)

[edit] Oklahoma State Government

Executive Branch
- Governor: Brad Henry (D)
- Lt. Governor: Mary Fallin (R)
- Secretary of State: M. Susan Savage (D)
- Treasurer: Robert Butkin (D)
- Attorney General: W.A. Drew Edmondson (D)
- State Auditor and Inspector: Jeff A. McMahan ( )

Legislative Branch
- Oklahoma State Legislature

Judicial Branch
- Oklahoma Judicial Branch

Ohio Constitution
- Oklahoma Constitution

[edit] Oklahoma County Government

Oklahoma Counties (National Association of Counties)
List of Counties (State of Oklahoma)
County Maps (State of Oklahoma, Department of Transportation)
Interactive Oklahoma County Map (U.S. Census Bureau)
Oklahoma Counties

[edit] Law Enforcement Issues

An estimated 85% of the inmates of Oklahoma's prisons are there because of alcohol and other drug abuse problems. Imprisoning an inmate for for one year in a minimum-security incarceration costs an estimated $16,126. Tom Blakely. "Straight Shooters." The Norman Transcript. December 2, 2005.