As oil and banking mogul George Kaiser explained a few weeks ago, one of the main reasons Oklahoma finds itself in a seemingly endless budget crisis is that our elected officials refuse to reasonably and responsibly tax our state's most valuable resource - hydrocarbons. It's a point we've been making at the TLO Home Office since 2014.
Although there was a popular push to raise the gross production tax to the same rates as other energy-producing states, our greedy, profit-driven Oil Industry Overlords and the legislative loyalists they control successfully defeated the effort, only agreeing to an increased tax on depleted wells that were drilled between 2011 - 2015. Basically, they agreed to a one-time revenue source increase that does nothing to address or avoid future revenue crisis.
In a perfect world, our local media would be all over this. Surprisingly, some actually are. Oklahoma Watch connected the dots and reported that Oklahoma lawmakers received $683,000 in campaign donations from the energy industry from 2015 - 2017. That's $682,950 more than they received from the blog industry. Oklahoma Watch also documented how the energy uses its power and influence to intimidate lawmakers by threatening to back other candidates in local elections. You can read the entire report here.
Naturally, the Oklahoman hasn't mentioned the report in the paper or on NewsOK.com. They also haven't investigated the power and control that one industry has on the people's government. Instead, they simple explain why we should be grateful...
This is one reason Oklahomans are grateful for the oil and gas industry
THE oil and gas industry in Oklahoma has been getting knocked around pretty good at the state Capitol. In calling for the industry to pay a higher gross production tax rate, the House Democratic leader, in particular, regularly pilloried oil and gas as “the wealthiest” and “the most powerful” industry “in the history of the world.”
It's an effort to depict the industry as greedy and uncaring, one that looks out only for itself at all costs. This narrative is a favorite of liberals across the country, many of whom dream of windmills and solar panels supplying all the nation's energy, and who demonize fossil fuels as “dirty” and the industry as harmful to the environment.