FYI, thanks for staying great
FYI, the touring bass player for Jeff the Brotherhood is an Oklahoma City native, returning with them to play the Opolis in Norman on July 24th. Chet Jameson and his family lived in Edgemere Park until he was 3, and he was reared just outside Nashville, in Columbia, Tennessee. His maternal grandparents live in Edmond. Chet’s grandfather, Bob Mathews, graduated high school as a Norman Tiger. My conclusion stands that there’s almost always an Oklahoma connection if you look a little.
Addendum: I travel back and forth between Oklahoma and Tennessee frequently and depend heavily on Oklahoma Gazette to keep me in the loop on all things OKC, with my primary interest being live music. You’ve remained the same great newsprint jewel you were when I moved east in 1989, the precise day that Barry Switzer announced he was moving on as well. It was a quasi-full- circle experience, then, to read about the Senior Follies in the Gazette when I was “home” a couple of weeks ago, take my parents to enjoy a Folly-filled afternoon and discover that Barry Switzer was the King of the Senior Follies. Y’all have a great day.
— Kim Jameson
Nashville
Companies can operate cleanly
After years of careful work and a Supreme Court ruling affirming its right to address unchecked carbon pollution, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released new safeguards to protect Oklahomans. Power plants are responsible for 40 percent of America’s carbon pollution, linked to other forms of air pollution that trigger asthma attack and heart attacks and can cause premature death. This pollution threatens our prosperity and our children’s future. Oklahoma Gas & Electric (OG&E) still runs outdated and dirty coal plants. The company has fought to keep these plants running, but the U.S. Supreme Court recently upheld a federal clean air plan that directs OG&E to clean up its plants.
It’s time for OG&E to stop stalling and do the right, legal thing. It’s time for OG&E to move beyond coal and double down on Oklahoma clean energy.
— Donna Clifford-Jones
Norman
Learn more about ALEC
In David Ocamb’s commentary (“Who’s on our planet’s side?” June 25, Gazette), he mentioned American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) as a leading component in bad legislation here in Oklahoma. ALEC is an organization that brings together corporation and industry coalition sponsors with the legislative members to, in part, trade campaign contributions for pro-business written legislation. Not surprisingly, we have a lot of ALEC legislation introduced and passed here. According to a report from the ALEC annual meeting, 70 of our legislators are members. Of the 36 members named, all are Republicans.
Ocamb urges us to hold our elected officials accountable this election year. We will need to do that by voting. I suggest that you check this link to see if your legislator is a member: sourcewatch.org/ index.php/Oklahoma_ALEC_Politicians.
— Chadwick Cox
Norman
This article appears in Jul 2-8, 2014.