Snow's $168,000 Salary Not Enough to Stay at the White House

We'd like to extend best wishes to White House Press Secretary Tony Snow. Snow, who has announced his resignation on Sept. 14, is fighting cancer, so we can't blame him for resigning. We'd resign too under the circumstances.

In any case, we wish him well as he battles the disease.

That said, we do question one aspect of his explanation for leaving the White House: money. NBC reported today that Snow cited family finances as his reason for resigning. Here's part of the NBC story:

"If I had the dough I'd stay 'til the bitter end,” Snow told NBC News. As an assistant to the President, Snow earns the highest-level salary among White House officials at $168,000 a year.

Pardon our innocence, but is $168,000 really such a paltry salary? Maybe we're just used to paltry Oklahoma salaries, but it seems as if Snow and his family could get by on $168,000, even in Washington, D.C.

New Police Chief is Old Police Chief

Tulsa Mayor Kathy Taylor has named former Tulsa Police Chief Ron Palmer as the new Tulsa police chief.

Palmer served as TPD chief from 1992 to 2002. He told the Tulsa World that he plans to serve for two or three years.

Palmer's selection was well received by several officials quoted in the World. But Tulsa Councilor Jack Henderson was critical of the TPD's race relations under Palmer's administration. Henderson walked out of the meeting where Palmer's appointment was announced, the World reported.

Sooner Pride: We're #48 in Income

Hey Sooners—it's time to celebrate. Census figures released this week show that in 2006 Oklahoma ranked 48th in median household income.

That's right, cowboys and cowgirls, we come in just behind Alabama and just ahead of our neighbors in Arkansas, West Virginia, and poor (and we mean it literally) Mississippi.

Median income in 2006 was a whopping $38,770 in the Sooner state. (Poor Mississippi was way down at $34,473.)

On the bright side, the figures show that Oklahoma income was up 1.5 percent from 2005, so at least the trend is in the right direction.

Some other comparisons: Our friends in the Lone Star state do much better, coming in at number 32 in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. In Texas the median household income was $44,922.

Oklahoma was also well below Kansas, which came in at number 29 with a median income of $45,478. Even New Mexico outranked our state, coming in at number 42 with a median income of $40,629.

After all these depressing statistics, all we can say is, "Thank goodness for Mississippi!"

Craig's Troubles May Sink His Senate Career

Our nomination for Headline of the Day:

New poll shows most Idahoans want Craig to resign

Some Republican senators are also calling on Craig to step down. Meanwhile, a few bloggers are asking this interesting question: Where are the calls for Louisiana Sen. David Vitter to resign?

After all, Vitter has admitted to a sexual relationship with a DC prostitute, hardly behavior that brings glory to the U.S. Senate or the Louisiana Republican Party.

If Craig goes, shouldn't Vitter go too?

Pain, Healing and Hokie Football

AltTulsa doesn't usually have much to say about college sports—there are plenty of other writers and bloggers who cover athletics in all its glory. But we did see a washingtonpost.com column that caught our attention and made us think about sports and their impact on "real life."

Writing this week, the Post's Dan Steinberg noted a recent onslaught of "redemption-through-football" stories in the press. Steinberg cited examples from the Salt Lake Tribune, the Baltimore Sun, the Savannah Morning Sun, ESPN.com, and more.

Today's USA Today continues the trend, with a front-page box that read, "For Hokies, it's time to cheer."

Enough all ready, Steinberg says. "Why do we have to wring some sort of grandiose tales of societal healing out of sporting events?" Steinberg asks. "In what way does football provide comfort to the people who actually need to be comforted; say, the victims' parents?"

Good questions. Like Steinberg, we wonder how football came to be seen as the redemptive force in campus life. Like Steinberg, we think that healing and normalcy would come from any number of campus activities and events, including history class or breakfast at the school cafeteria.

Steinberg's conclusion: "Root for the parents whose kids died. Leave football games out of it."

The Bush Legacy: More Government Secrets, Less Transparency

One of the principles the AT team holds near and dear is open government. We believe that local, state and federal officials work for the American people. Whenever possible, officials should be open and accountable to the general public and not hide their actions behind a veil of secrecy.

We were reminded of this principle yesterday by a Richard Reeves column published in the Tulsa World. Reeves examined the Bush Administration's attitude toward open government and found it lacking.

Government secrecy, Reeves argues, "will be the most damaging legacy of these Bush years." Bush, like former President Richard Nixon, wants to govern in secret. Moreover, Reeves writes, Bush "refuses to accept that either Congress or the courts is an equal branch of government and wants almost all its actions classified under 'executive privilege.'"

The Bush policies are so convoluted that even officials at the National Highway Safety Administration "are no longer allowed to provide information to reporters except on a background basis," which means they can't be named or quoted, shutting off an important source of official safety information.

How does this serve the public?

Reeves also points out that the administration is "reclassifying formerly public information," effectively dismantling the Freedom of Information Act that has allowed citizens access to government records since the Johnson Administration.

Kudos to columnist Richard Reeves for highlighting these anti-democratic policies and to the Tulsa World for publishing Reeves' column.

A final Reeves quote: "What we don't know or find out too late will hurt us." Amen, Brother!

Hysteria & Justice: How the Right Got it Wrong

CNN's Lou Dobbs and a host of right-wing pundits and bloggers made headlines a few months ago when they charged the Federal government with wrongly prosecuting two Border Patrol agents for shooting a Mexican drug dealer.

It's outrageous, the wingers screamed. The Feds had betrayed their own men—not to mention their nation—to protect an illegal alien (read: Mexican).

Colorado Congress Tom Tancredo was furious. So was California Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, who referred to the officers' sentencing "a day of infamy and disgrace."

Only one minor problem: The wing-nut story was wrong. Neither Dobbs nor the other outraged "patriots" bothered to check the facts or consider the evidence against the agents.

We know all this thanks to a detailed Texas Monthly investigation of the case published in the magazine's September issue. Reporter Pamela Colloff discovered that the evidence against the agents was abundant and convincing and the right-wing coverage of the case ignored or omitted important facts in the shooting and its cover-up.

For instance: The agents failed to arrest the suspect when they had the chance. When he fled, both opened fire, wounding the suspect from behind. They failed to report the shooting as required. They covered up the incident, never mentioning the shooting to fellow agents. When the shooting was discovered, the agents claimed the suspect had something shiny in his left hand, a gun perhaps. The suspect had no gun. The suspect was right-handed. One of the agents picked up his spent shell casings for "no reason," he told investigators.

Based on these facts (and more), the magazine asks, "Why are [the agents] being celebrated as heroes?"

Why indeed? Because Dobbs and his hysterical buddies pumped up a dramatic story of justice gone wrong—the facts be damned.

As Colloff also documents, the right has demonized Johnny Sutton, the U.S. attorney who brought the case, even though he's a hard-nosed conservative whose office leads the nation in drug and immigration enforcement.

Sutton has received death threats. Conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly has called for Sutton's dismissal. The Minutemen have condemned him and called for Sutton's "deportation."

The facts make all these folks look foolish. As Sutton told the magazine:

All people have heard is that two American heroes are in prison for doing their job. If those were the facts, I'd be furious too. But the evidence is overwhelming that these guys committed a very serious crime.

For Dobbs and company, the facts don't really matter. They've got hysteria to sell.

Rep. Emanuel Wins 'Quote of the Day'

Illinois Rep. Rahm Emanuel, reacting today to the resignation of the Attorney General:

Alberto Gonzales is the first Attorney General who thought the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth were three different things.

Zing!

Alberto Gonzales Is Out at Justice

Embattled Attorney Justice Alberto Gonzales is resigning. That's the word this Monday morning from Washington.

A long-time ally of President Bush from his days in Texas, Gonzales revealed himself as a political operator in Washington. His tenure at the Department of Justice was marked by a series of missteps and scandals, including a controversial warrantless wiretapping program and the apparently political firing of eight U.S. attorneys.

As regular AT readers will know, we have criticized the AG for many months now. In our view, Gonzales was one of the president's least effective and most polarizing cabinet members, more interested in promoting a Republican political agenda than serving the American public.

AT Update: Movies, Music & More

AltTulsa tries its best to keep up on a wide variety of ideas and activities, including things political, literary and cultural. Here's an update on some of the things we have been following this month.

First, a movie update. We trekked over to the Circle Cinema last night for the Oklahoma opening of Four Sheets to the Wind, a film directed by Sterlin Harjo. Harjo, a Tulsan, introduced the film and answered questions about it at the end of the screening.

We enjoyed Harjo's movie. It's a clear-eyed and sometimes funny exploration of a contemporary Oklahoma Indian fashot in and amily round Holdenville and Tulsa. It's also a sensitive work, perhaps too sensitive to appeal to the blockbuster mentality of the mall megaplex movie crowd.

The film will play again tonight and on Sunday at the Circle. We recommend Four Sheets to the Wind as an original and memorable movie, enhanced by its fine casting and acting.

Second, a musical update. We blogged a few days ago about the new CD by Kelly Willis, an alt-country singer-songwriter that we enjoy. So we were pleased to hear Ms. Willis on NPR's Weekend Edition this morning, singing and chatting with host Scott Simon.

Her radio appearance was enough to inspire us once again to plug this under appreciated singer. You're unlikely to hear her on the radio, but Kelly Willis is a special musical talent.

Finally, we hear that Tulsa will host next year's meeting of the National Preservation Conference, billed as "the premier educational gathering for historical preservation in the United States."

In a city that has lost many of its historic buildings, this meeting may be a good way to raise awareness about historic preservation in and around Tulsa. Check this space for more updates on this "Preservation in Progress" conference.

Eat Local at New Brookside Restaurant

The AT team believes in local shopping and local eating. That's why we are pleased to put in a good word for The Local Table, a new Brookside restaurant that follows the "keep in local" creed.

The restaurant, operated by Tuck and Kate Curren, uses seasonal, locally grown produce to prepare a range of daily selections. The restaurant buys from local sources, including Nyuka Farms, an agricultural enterprise we have promoted before on this site.

We also want to plug the Curren's neighborhood dining philosophy. Kate Curren told the Tulsa World that she wants the restaurant to be a family friendly, price-conscious place for everyday dining, not just special occasions.

The Local Table is located at 4329 S. Peoria, at the other end of the shopping center where the Curren's other restaurant, Biga, is located.

Yet Another Reason to Vote Against Inhofe

Former Tulsa mayor Jim Inhofe, as quoted this week in the Tulsa World:

I am consistently ranked as the single-most conservative member of the United States Senate….

Sen. Inhofe's Rumor Mongering: How Low Will He Go?

Tulsa's very own font of misinformation and right-wing crazy talk, Sen. Jim Inhofe, is at it again. Speaking in Broken Arrow this week, the former Tulsa mayor couldn't resist passing along the latest anti-Hillary Clinton rumor.

According to Inhofe, Sen. Clinton has sent a her "hit squad" after her Democratic rival, Illinois Sen. Barak Obama. Clinton's supposed agents have accused Obama, in Inhofe's words, "of being a Muslim, and smoking and all of this stuff."

These kinds of rumors feed the talk-radio crowd, even (or especially) when they aren't true. These particular Obama stories, in fact, can be traced not to Hillary Clinton or her campaign but to an Internet-based "urban legend" that we've received at least three times. It's filled with anti-Obama smears and looks to be the work of right-wing paranoia, not Sen. Clinton or anyone on her staff.

But leave it to Inhofe to repeat such nonsense with a straight face—and a total lack of evidence.

Iranian-American Scholar Released on Bail

AT is pleased to report the release this week of Iranian-American scholar Haleh Esfandiari, 67, who had been jailed by Iranian authorities for alleged anti-government activities.

Ms. Esfandiari, the director of the Middle East program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, still faces a high bail and other obstacles before she can leave Tehran.

Regular readers of AT may remember an earlier post on Ms. Esfandiari's incarceration, in which we noted that she was one of four scholars jailed recently by the Iranians.

In a photograph published in the New York Times, Ms. Esfandiari looked tired and thin. She had been held in solitary confinement for more than 100 days.

As a matter of principle, we at AT believe in intellectual freedom and the right of scholars, writers, artists and other citizens to express their political views without state harassment or interference.

Circle Cinema Presents Harjo's 'Four Sheets'

Tulsan Sterlin Harjo's first feature film, Four Sheets to the Wind, will make its Oklahoma premiere on Friday night at Tulsa's Circle Cinema.

Set in Oklahoma, the movie tells a contemporary Native American story.

The film was developed with the Sundance Institute's Filmmaker's Lab and has been playing on the film festival circuit this year. Four Sheets will be shown at 9 p.m. both Friday and Saturday. Harjo will be on hand Friday night to talk about his film.

From what we've heard, Four Sheets is a crowd-pleaser. Check this film out—we don't get too many Native American film premieres in T-town.

Falling Hopes for Democracy in Iraq

It wasn't so long ago that President Bush was talking about bringing democracy to Iraq. Indeed, he and his Neocon advisers were talking about democracy breaking out all over the Middle East, lead by the triumphant Iraqi example.

Not any more. As we all now know, the president and his advisers were hopelessly naive. This week, even Bush criticized the lack of political progress in Baghdad. What started as a dream of a democratic Iraq has been continually scaled back, even by the president and his supporters.

Here's the latest reality check, courtesy of CNN.com:

Nightmarish political realities in Baghdad are prompting American officials to curb their vision for democracy in Iraq. Instead, the officials now say they are willing to settle for a government that functions and can bring security.