February 5, 2020 Issue, Page 3 of 10

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Page 4 The Elk City News, Elk City, Oklahoma Wednesday, February 5, 2020 Legislature should follow AG Hunter’s Opinion Page “ElkCituNews lead, lower boom on barriers to entry Serving Western Oklahoma since 1901 By Mike Davis who live here by accident wanting to move into Okla- enough to compete with Recently, the Attorney of birth - could sell liquor. homa must have a license newcomers. They may have Preparing for 57th General helped remove an Outsiders who recognize a from a state with similar li- believed Sooners required obstacle to the expansion of need and might seek to help censing requirements (few more consumer protection Legislature legitimate liquor store com- Oklahomans by providing a states. match Oklahoma’s than residents of other states petition - opining that Okla- service were out of luck. onerous standards) and (though licensing actually By Rep. Todd Russ homa’s five-year residency Excluding out-of-state en- FIVE years of experience. does very little to protect The 2020 legislative session starts Feb. 3, when lawmak- requirement to own a liquor trepreneurs and profession- Cosmetologists contem- consumers). These laws ers will hold a joint session of the House and Senate to store likely runs afoul of the als is something of a grand plating moving to Oklahoma were mostly passed well listen to Gov. Stitt’s second State of the State address. U.S, Constitution. tradition in Oklahoma. At- who went to school in a state before any current legisla- The governor will outline his budget proposal for Fiscal This is a small victory. torneys who pass the bar without a licensing board tive members took office, ‘Year 2021 and his priorities for the coming year. However, However, consumers win exam in another state are are out of luck completely. but that does not explain it will be up to the Legislature to craft the final state appro- when they have more op- only deemed competent to Oklahoma will not accept whyso little has been done priations bill to fund state agency programs and services tions. Licensing makes it work in Oklahoma if they training reported directly to repeal them. Oklahomans and to pass legislation to be considered by the governor for harder for new competitors have practiced law continu- from a cosmetology school do not need extra paternal- his signature to become law. to enter a market. Oklaho- ously for FIVE of the last outside the state - only from ism or protectionism. We This year, we anticipate a flat budget year after two years ma’s liquor licensees were seven years. Those who pass another licensing agency. can recognize and seize en- of significant revenue growth. We still expect to have a re- effectively insulated from Oklahoma’s bar and have Not only does Oklahoma’s trepreneurial opportunity as cord high $8.3 billion to appropriate, but this is only slight- all out-of-state competition. NO experience are full at- well as anyone else. And we legislature evidently believe ly above the $8.1 billion appropriated last year. So agency Who would move across our cosmetologists are un- are perfectly capable of us- torneys as soon as they are budgets are expected to stay relatively unchanged. We will state lines to fill a market op- sworn in. able to compete, it must also ing the internet to check a continue, however, to make education, health care, public portunity, and then wait five Polygraph Examiners are see our cosmetology schools practitioner’s reputation. It’s safety and transportation priorities. We also plan to again years before actually getting granted reciprocity if they as somehow lesser than their time the laws of the state re- save money as is prudent in a slowing economy. This will to work and earn income are from a state with equiva- out-of-state rivals. flect this reality. help us be able to continue services in the case of a future from it? Almost no one. The lent licensing requirements, We should be embarrassed Mike Davis is a Research downturn. true goal of the law seems to but only IF they have first by this. Legislatures of Fellow at 1889 Institute. House members this year filed 1,361 bills and 20 resolu- have been to make sure only practiced there for TWO old appear to have thought He can be reached at tions to be considered during the legislative process. This “True Oklahomans” - those years. Funeral Directors Oklahomans were not bright mdavis@ 1889institute.org. is in addition to 1,547 measures allowed to be carried over from the first session of the 57th Legislature. Generally, only about 400 measures make it all the way through the Maneuvering hell for our advantage process and are signed into law by the governor each year. By Robert C. Koehler logical hell? come enough? Are we at the question the sanity of trying I will keep you posted on specific pieces of legislation When the mainstream me- Maybe there was a time point where, as endless war to maneuver hell for your as the session progresses. This year, I will again serve as dia writes about war, even when war could be seen as consumes ever larger seg- own advantage. the chair of the House Appropriations and Budget Sub- critically, the image that of- rational and contained. Af- ments of Planet Earth, it’s One way that hell comes committee for Transportation. I also serve on the overall ten comes to mind for me is ter all, the major wars of the now time to declare that it’s House Appropriations and Budget Committee, the House back home is via veterans’ an infant wrapped in plastic. 20th century were neatly out of control and stop writ- suicides, which continue at and Senate Joint Committee on Appropriations and Budget That infant is naked reality, distinguished by Roman nu- ing about war in the same a rate of about 20 per day. and the House Common Education Committee. ak.a., the present moment, merals. Peace prevailed for terms used by those who Thank you for giving me the opportunity to represent More and more people study- suffocating and screaming the rest of the century, right? wage it? War is not a chess you at the Capitol. God bless you and God bless Oklaho- for its life; the plastic smoth- In point of fact, war be- game. Whatever strategy ing the matter are clutching ma! If I can ever help you in any way, please contact me at ering it are the journalistic gets nothing but war, a real- it employs involves killing hold of the term “moral in- Todd.Russ @okhouse.gov or by phone at (405) 557-7312. euphemisms by which mur- ity that’s getting harder and people, mostly civilians, and jury” to describe the cause. der and terrorism turn into harder not to acknowledge we should at least begin ac- Moral injury means a dam- abstract acts of national ne- here in the 21st century. But knowledging that the ramifi- aged conscience, a pierced Saudi oil attack cessity. the language of war — “re- cations of doing so are never sense of self, often due Thus, the recent news that leasing munitions,” let us strategically contained. simply to following orders underscores the United States clobbered say, rather than blowing the war-tom Afghanistan with arms and legs off children Back to Afghanistan and and helping inflict hell on a dehumanized enemy. In- the fact that we bombed this By Michael James Barton a record number of bombs — lets the game proceed, ravaged country more heav- deed, waging war requires When drones struck Saudi Arabia’s oil processing facili and missiles in 2019 came at least beyond the national ily last year than we have dehumanizing fellow human ties in September, 6 percent of global oil production went to us via Stars and Stripes in borders and national con- since we started keeping beings. We couldn’t have re- offline overnight. language protecting all con- sciousness. If something count, which was in 2006. The intent was clear: create a massive disruption in the} leased 7,423 munitions last cerned from raw awareness awful happens on the home Why? We’ve been pummel- global oil market, sending prices soaring and leaving the and flying shrapnel: front, the reporting’s a bit ing Afghanistan since 2001. year on people we valued. United States and its allies reeling. American aircraft released different, of course. The Luke Mogelson, writing But a dehumanized enemy What happened next -- or rather what didn’t -- was no les: 7,423 munitions in the coun- events of Sept. 11, 2001, for last year in The New Yorker, can suddenly rehumanize shocking. As recently as a decade or so ago, knocking out 5.7 million] try in 2019, according to instance, were covered for pointed out: herself in a veteran’s con- barrels a day of Saudi crude production would indeed have} figures published Monday what they were, not from In 2003, Secretary of De- science, As Tyler Boudreau roiled oil markets for months, if not years. by US. Air Forces Central al-Qaeda’s strategic point of fense Donald Rumsfeld has pointed out: “Moral in- None of that happened. After the airstrike, global oil prices Command. Coalition air- view. Compare that, let us declared, ‘We clearly have jury by definition includes quickly rose -- but by only 15 percent. And within a week, craft flew nearly 8,800 sor- say, to the shock-and-awe moved from major combat the memories of those who they were back to pre-strike levels. There were no devastat- ties during the period, over a bombing of Iraq a year and activity to a period of stabil- have been harmed.” ing gas lines in the United States and no escalation of con- quarter of which carried out a half later. ity.’ Since then, more than a The dehumanization pro- flict in the Persian Gulf. strikes. Here, for instance, was hundred and fifty thousand cess of war comes home in Most Americans did not even notice. Why not? What has The tally surpasses the CNN reporting on March people have been killed in other ways as well. Domes- changed to make an attack on this scale almost a non-event previous record set last year 22, 2003, shortly after the Afghanistan, and about sev- tic mass murders — which in the global energy market? when 7,362 munitions were invasion was underway. We en hundred and fifty thou- America’s energy boom. are growing ever more released and comes amid were in the process of kill- sand Americans have served In 2018, the United States became the world’s largest pro- commonplace here in the ongoing discussion between ing 6,000 people in the ini- there. The U.S. has spent ducer of crude oil for the first time since 1973. While the at- American and Taliban offi- tial bombing campaign, but about eight hundred billion greatest country on Earth tack compromised Saudi oil, America’s oil and gas resource: cials aimed at ending Amer- the U.S. strategic (and hu- dollars on military opera- — borrow the morality of were unaffected and available to cushion the impact of the} attack on the global market. ica’s longest war. manitarian!) viewpoint was tions and on a multitude of war. The killer, avenging Domestic energy development may have just averted aj Talks between the two the prime focus of the cov- economic, governance, edu- whatever grievance haunts war. This massive geopolitical tilt in favor of the United} sides continued for most of erage: cation, health, gender-equal- him, employs the “principle States and its allies is thanks to fracking -- a drilling tech 2019 as American bombs Rumsfeld said that the ity, and counter-narcotics of social substitutability” to nique that breaks up underground rock formations to free oil were dropped. strike had taken place ‘on a initiatives. Today, most Af- kill people he doesn’t know, and gas. This is, basically, the lan- scale that indicates to Iraqis’ ghans live in poverty, cor- because for whatever reason Soon, Texas alone could produce more oil than Iraq or Iran guage of gamers. I bring it that Saddam and his leader- ruption is endemic, literacy they stand for the enemy he -- two countries whose oil assets have weighed heavily on up not to criticize a single ship were finished. He add- and life-expectancy rates has chosen to punish. our foreign policy deliberations for decades. story but to throw a wild ed that the allies would work rank among the lowest in the And 18 years on, we're At the same time, we're importing less and less energy. question into the wind: to search for, capture, and world, approximately a third Since 2008, our net energy imports have dropped 95 percent. What if the media suddenly bombing Afghanistan more drive out terrorists who had of girls become child brides, But what about the next unforeseen attack, embargo, quo- denied war its free moral found safe harbor in Iraq, as and no country exports more savagely than ever, We've ta, sanction, or natural disaster? There are a few things we pass? What if acts of mili- well as to deliver humanitar- illicit opium. The Taliban already destroyed the coun- can do to make sure that we will be ready for even worse to tary mayhem were not dis- ian relief to the Iraqi people. control or contest more than try, but we can’t stop trying come. First, we can stop blocking the wealth of energy lying cussed as chess moves in a Perhaps the media can’t half the country. to save it. off our own coastline. Offshore territories hold roughly 90 Robert Koehler, syndi- global game of competing be blamed because things There’s more going on billion barrels of oil and 328 trillion cubic feet of gas. Right now, government bureaucrats prohibit energy exploration in didn’t work out the way here than strategic failure. cated by PeaceVoice, is an national interests but sheerly nearly 94 percent of those areas. for what they were: acts of the pols said they would, War is hell in all directions, award-winning Chicago Second, both state and federal regulators can use a com- slaughter, blood and psycho- but when does enough be- and perhaps it’s time to journalist and editor. mon-sense approach for oil and gas pipeline approvals. By funneling affordable energy to American consumers, pipe- lines make us less reliant on foreign sources. Unfortunately, terrorists are more likely to redouble their Have something to share? Send your letter to destructive efforts than to abandon them. With policies that encourage more energy production at home, we can weather the storm and avoid crippling gas lines. [email protected] Michael James Barton is the founder of Hyatt Solutions and previously served as the deputy director of Middle East policy at the Pentagon.