Shannon has now thrown down the challenge to candidate, congressman and former church-camp worker James Lankford. Which candidate can be the holiest? Lankford will remind us of his godliness, but he will have to fight fire with fire and get out ahead of Shannon’s background cross.

So what might work? Lankford could go out to the state Capitol and do some TV ads in front of that big Ten Commandments tablet. A campaign commercial like that would be tough to outdo in Oklahoma, unless Shannon includes a bit of trick photography and includes a halo over his head in his next commercial. The next few months will be interesting enough to insult some Oklahoma voters’ intelligence, but only a small minority.

No matter who is elected, he will join other Republican extremists in their efforts to make sure that President Obama fails, that nothing gets done in Washington, that the healthcare plan must fail, that Medicare must be cut and that the way Social Security increases are calculated must be changed — to lower them — all this while filling his own pockets as he stays in office for 20 to 30 years or retires to stay in Washington as an influence peddler, or until he dies.

— Merle Wright
Oklahoma City

Mixed messages
After reading the article “What is Love?” in Oklahoma Gazette (Feb. 12 cover story), I concluded that Tim Farley did not find love “…in an unexpected place.” In fact, what he found is much more accurately described by an honest dancer, Jada, as “lust,” a definition more accurate. This article is reckless in its treatment of women and still leaves unanswered the question posed in the title.

Isn’t it ironic that, in the same edition, there is a commentary with the title “What about the women?”

The Gazette’s article reinforces the fact that our society tries to have it both ways. I have always found it laughable that our media tells us to exploit each other and then, in another sound bite, treat one another with respect. It is insane. Fish or cut bait. Either treat each other with respect or remove all the restrictions to exploitation.

I felt sorry for chief of staff of the Air Force, General Mark Welsh, when Congress asked him why there was rape in the military. He explained that the military had to undo the damage done by the culture. Although that argument did not sit well with some Congresswomen, it is a fact of life for all organizations. Realistic journalism

would have explored in depth the exploitation that works both ways. Gazette, if you want to do an article on “adult” entertainment, that is one thing. But please don’t drag a noble word like “love” through the mud. I spent 30 years supporting the opportunities and rights of women in the military and have attempted to raise a family using that word, “love.”

— Pat Rupel
Edmond

Correction: Jerry, the son of Oklahoma AIDS Care Fund Inc. founders Barbara and Jackie Cooper, died in 1989, not in 1990.

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