State Sen. Steve Russell, the Oklahoma City Republican, in December proposed the idea of keeping his state out of the Matthew Shepard Act. Yesterday, enough of his colleagues joined him in affirming such legislation, giving state law enforcement the right not to turn over files to federal authorities: “Under the new provisions of Senate Bill 1965, reports that were collected during investigations of possible hate crime that did not end in a conviction would be destroyed or kept by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. Russell said the bill is meant to prevent the federal law enforcement officials from taking over a case and applying different standards when local law enforcement has already investigated a case. Only a few senators questioned Russell about the contents of his proposed amendment. The measure passed 39-6 and now heads to the House for consideration. Russell said his bill is meant to protect speech of all kinds. ‘We just don’t want the pendulum to swing too far the other way,’ he said. ‘This protects people to do or say whatever they want, as long as it complies with local ordinances.'” And if police and district attorneys don’t work with the FBI on hate crimes cases? They could be facing their own federal charges: obstruction of justice. Rock, meet stupid place. The bill now heads to the House. [Oklahoman]
And Now Oklahoma Is Making Good On a Promise to Exempt Itself From Federal Hate Crimes Law
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missanthrope
We went over this nullification business in 1832 and it won’t work again. Nice try at striving always out do yourself in embarrassment Oklahoma.
Michelle
Really Oklahoma really? Seriously how does trying to exempt yourself from something that would protect your own citizens make any sense? Yes most of us do believe in free speech, but even that has to have protective limits.
Joey
See..this is what happens from Inbreeding. The mentality from that State is soooo diluted, they think they have imunity from Federal Laws. Sweets in OK, I do believe that as a State of the U.S., you are IN Federal jurisdiction…Assholes. They just don’t want to have to recognize the Gays, but hopefully it will be some disabled person or an elderly person who comes up against the lack of hate crimes legislation and sues the living fuck out of that already shitty state.
Isn’t that domestic terrorist/used-douche-water Sally Kern from there? Explains it all…
terrwill
Beyond pathetic how these reprehensive elected officials grovel at the filthy feet of the extreme rightwing lunatics. Who despite all the vile garbage they spew. Are a very small percentage of the voters.
Tim Gill: Can ya please target Senator Scumbag Russell?????
Ex-Southerner
Ahh, Oklahoma. Along with Arkansas and Kansas and Mississippi and Kentucky and Tennessee and Texas and West Virginia and Virginia and South Carolina and Alabama, you give people with IQs above 50 someone to look down on and laugh at for their sheer stupidity. And you give anyone with a passing familiarity with the US Constitution someone to pity for the sheer idiocy of your elected representatives.
Jesus God. Won’t someone just NUKE these states out of our misery? If you’re LGBTQ and still live in these shitholes, just GET OUT NOW. These inbred dumbfucks will NEVER be reasoned with. They’re too dumb. Let’s send our porkfat rendering plants and sewage treatment facilities to these states; hell, these industries would represent an environmental improvement to these places (if you’ve ever driven through downtown Birmingham in summer, you know I’m right).
terrwill
Maybe the Civil War wasn’t such a bad idea after all (course now we’d have to add some of the square states…….)
Devon
Can we just evacuate the state’s gay population(can’t be too hard. there’s what, four of them down there?) and just nuke that worthless shithole into oblivion?
Klarth
@Devon:
Wouldn’t that be nice?
Thing is, I remember having a conversation like this with some people once, and it was pointed out, that say, transporting us to England or some place would totally fuck the economy there, b/c it would put a strain on resources. This is why people get mad about illegal immigration (well, one reason, anyway).
And anyway, there’s got to be more than 4. I know of at least one personally, and I don’t get around much.
Ultimately, it’s not like removing an ethnicity or race from an area. If all the existing Oklahoman gays GTFO’d, where would that leave the ones born after that? This is why we have to leave the world in better shape than we found it. It’s really hard to do, but it solves nothing to bail on future generations. Do we want them to go through what we dod, or worse?
tjr101
This is one instance which I support secession. Let these shit hole states go their own way. They are of little value to the rest of the nation and it will help reduce the deficit.
I’m tired of my tax dollars going to backassward states.
Klarth
@tjr101:
I get that, but this is not a good thing. It’s not like we’re carrying these states? I’m sure there are few states that are literal money pits like you describe with no resources and nothing but tax drain.
Furthermore, there are people in there. And some of them are gay. If OK secedes, and the rest of the US has rights, what, queer OKers will have to try to cross the border and seek asylum? Because without what protections we have under Federal Law, gone, it would be a field day on anyone different.
How can you wish that on anyone? Giving up in the red states is not the answer. Overruling them with majority-supported justice is.
Rainfish
PLEASE DON’T NUKE US, WE LIVE IN OKLAHOMA’S EVIL TWIN STATE!!!
———
My spouse and I were married on September 13, 2004 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. We have been together for more than thirty years. When we arrived back home in Kansas, the sky did not fall; dairy cows did not stop producing milk, and gravity was still intact — although common sense and common decency seemed to have left our segment of the planet under the seemingly endless Kansas prairie sky. Yes, we got the expected “Welcome Back Home to the Good ol’ USA!” reception alright to which we’ve sadly grown accustomed as Gay and Lesbian Americans.
For months, the vile malevolent specter of our very own local home-grown Kansas State Anti-Equality “Heterosexuals Only” so-called Marriage Amendment hung over our heads like the shadowy silhouette of a cowardly mugger ready to strike in ambush from a dark alley. Finally, in early April 2005, a Kansas lynch-mob, drunk with power and prejudice, at last had their little necktie party and strung up our Bill of Rights in the public square of totalitarianism. Apparently, American neo-fascists aren’t satisfied with just being the insufferable bully on the international block, they must also have their pound of flesh at home too.
So what is so surprising about this scenario? Obviously there is not enough conflict in the world, so malicious malcontents in Kansas, as well as throughout most of the US, feel the need to stir up the flames of division even more. All of this brings to mind my saddest and most sustained observation concerning the United States in general. It is in regard to her citizenry’s constantly evolving contempt for other Americans. Overall, it is Mankind’s greatest single flaw too. But in the USA it is the perversion of Christian fellowship and tolerance that is being twisted into a pseudo-religious/right-wing political dogma of dissimulation and group-hate which will be the next great stain on America.
Political gay-bashing and religion-based bigotry has quickly become this new century’s equivalent of racism, gender inequality and ethnic strife. Fanatical homophobia has been effortlessly revived and poisonously retooled from the last century’s panoply of prejudices so eagerly embraced in these perpetually un-United States. Once again, the drama is much the same — only the characters on the stage are played by different actors.
…(EXCERPTED FROM MY “We Are Married….Let No On Put Asunder” ARTICLE — PARTS OF WHICH WERE PUBLISHED IN THE KANSAS CITY STAR NEWSPAPER)
http://rainfish2000.blogspot.com/
trickstertara
This doesn’t surprise me. Many states have attempted to work their way around federal law when it suited them. How many states have pissed and moaned and attempted to work their way around the Hate Crimes Statistic Act of 1990 (signed — not vetoed — by Bush I)? There have been years where Alabama has reported *no hate crimes* — that’s zero for an entire year. in Alabama. Not buying it and I’m sure no one else did either, but they got away with it.