Members of the Oklahoma Legislature listen to Governor Kevin Stitt deliver the State of the State address on the House floor of the state Capitol on February 3, 2025. (Photo by Kyle Phillips/For Oklahoma Voice)
It’s that scary time of year again.
This is the session ahead of the legislative session where lawmakers will unveil their big plans to make Oklahoma great again.
At least in their opinion.
For those of us living in reality, this is what I call political stupidity season. Because these are painful times for lawmakers to come up with ideas that are actually ridiculous and designed to make our country more dangerous, take away our freedoms, or allow the government to intrude more into our lives. And it’s all hidden under the guise that we need it – because why wouldn’t we know what’s good for us?
Every year, some bills make me laugh, while others make me question the common sense of those we send to represent us in statehouses. But some in this group are feeling worse than usual as MPs try to pad their resumes by scoring cheap political points ahead of this year’s election.
For example, who among us wants to turn Oklahoma into Florida by creating lakes and ponds infested with alligators and carnivorous reptiles?
Because that’s exactly what’s going to happen We work hard to advance Senate Bill 2087A frivolous proposal would remove licensing requirements for those who want to raise captive crocodile eggs. Currently, in order to keep an alligator, pet owners must obtain a permit and written permission from the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation, as they should.
We all know well-meaning pet owners who believe they can care for an exotic animal until their living circumstances change or the animal becomes too big or no longer a cute baby.
Releasing unwanted pets into the environment is one way to spread invasive species. Such a law would require people to release alligators into local waterways. By the way, alligators lay 30 eggs every time they mate.
Soon some of our lakes and rivers will no longer be safe for swimming.
But I guess this explains why we might need a tax-free holiday to buy guns: alligator protection.
Senate Bill 1278 bizarrely proposes creating a sales tax holiday for gun owners every July. In the face of the threats of mass shootings and domestic violence, what does it say about our priorities that we are considering tax breaks for gun owners when we are not doing the same for Oklahomans who need to buy school, baby and menstrual products?
Then our Republican legislators convinced Someone injected on purpose or releasing chemicals into our airspace “with the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather or sunlight intensity.”
Last time I checked, our legislators are not supposed to be conspiracy theorists. These measure seems to be embracing the debunked ‘Chemtrails’ Conspiracy Theory Believers among them believe that the normal traces of condensation naturally left by airplanes in the atmosphere are actually chemical agents designed to interfere with the sun, the weather, or as a nefarious way to psychologically manipulate us.
Good Lord.
This appears to be primarily about artificial rainfall, adding tiny particles to the atmosphere in the hope of stimulating rainfall during severe droughts. Although The benefits of this technology have not yet been proven In 80 years, as far as I’m concerned, if we were in the middle of a terrible drought and farmers and ranchers wanted to try to produce rainwater on their own land to provide them with more power.
What are we going to do, arrest Mother Nature for disturbing the rapids? Investigating whether our western governors are flying over our states to avoid massive snowstorms and heat waves?
There are also lawmakers who somehow feel justified in the state agency responsible for enforcing liquor laws being assigned to license strippers. I can think of far fewer things, on an overall factor scale, than men judging women for their decisions to dance in clubs.
Why shouldn’t 18-year-olds be allowed to take off their clothes if they want to? In our state, you are an adult when you are 18 years of age or older.
Supporters of the measure say its purpose is to prevent human trafficking and forcing women into unnecessary sex work, but I think this could easily go awry if we let stuffy and uptight legislators do whatever they want.
Then don’t get me started House Joint Resolution 1040seeking to once again ban Sharia law in the state.
Oklahoma doesn’t have Sharia law as much as Republicans who want to spread scaremongering would like.
In 2010, voters attempted to ban Sharia law. A federal judge found the plan unconstitutional and said Oklahoma could not do so. The state must pay the plaintiff’s attorney fees.
That should be the end of it, but 16 years later, do we want to try again? Isn’t this the definition of madness? This is a huge waste of our precious time and resources.
Let us also not forget Lots of stupid bills Documents filed last year are still valid. They include dual criminalizing shopping cart theft, giving law enforcement powers to storm chasers and sending homeless people on one-way trips to other states.
One thing that’s different, and scarier, as time goes on: It’s increasingly unlikely that we’ll know which bills will pass early and which will happily advance through our Republican leadership.
We can only hope that legislators remember what they are actually supposed to do and not get caught up in delusions of alligators, strip clubs, and conspiracy theories.
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