In my first run I successfully worked to send the corrupt Van Hooser packing and was putting only a half-assed effort into unseating the equally corrupt Tammy Wilson; I did manage to pull her teeth, so there's that. This time around I did basically the same thing as last time (canvassed Ward 5 in person, took notes from issues people brought up to me that Wilson neglected her entire 8 year tenure, etc), endorsed a mayoral candidate but in this area that contributes to Oklahoma's reputation as "Little Dixie", I did something I knew was to my disadvantage in that context and it caused me to lose 1/3 of my base: while canvassing for myself, I added the campaign literature of the mayoral candidate I endorsed: Milton Mitchell.
I live just a half block away from a neighbor who proudly flies the Confederate battle flag, and Milton Mitchell is black. Yep--I saw that loss of my base coming a mile away, but I didn't know how much of my base consisted of racists. In the autopsy, I can now put a number on it.
Racists weren't the only bigots in play, though--the election eve issue of the Enid Eagle newspaper brought out the misogynists, and when I post an image of the dog-whistle article the Eagle published, I'll go through the analyses of how I arrived at this conclusion, so please stand by--future edits are to come. Oh, I know Wilson's not male but she was an ample palm-greaser, and exceptions are made for palm greasers...something I'll never be...but I'm well aware of the threat that any reformer would be to the grift gang.
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Okay, here's a pic of the dog-whistle article that the paper ran the day before the election. I don't have to tell people who took Journalism 101 what's wrong with this. First problem is that this is on the front page instead of the editorial page, because the structure of the article is an opinion...I conclude that on the basis of what I'll have to explain to the lay person as follows:
Journalism 101 instruction teaches that the difference between a news article and an editorial is the expressed bias of how it's written, even down to the necessity of putting the names of the candidates in alphabetical order because any other order reflects opinion. These candidate listings are not in alphabetical order--not for the mayoral list, not for the Ward 5 list either. The order in which the candidates are addressed is an expression of the paper's editorial opinion if not outright endorsement without coming right out and saying so.
Now--what opinion/endorsement(s) are being tacitly dogwhistled here? If you're not a member of the target demographic, you won't know and that's why it's called a dog whistle. Only the dogs will catch the meaning.
Students who were paying attention in the Journalism 101 class will have already picked up on the one thing that the mayoral list of candidates and the Ward 5 list of candidates have in common, and it's a thing that has the genteel southern courtesy manners completely backwards. You know, the one that mandates "ladies first". Ahhhhh, you see it now, don't you. Ladies last. A peer journalist will have already gotten the indelible impression that the Enid newspaper is run by misogynists right off the bat. Note ye also that the candidates at the top of both lists are the ones that won.
The misogynists in Ward 5 were of the opinion that a woman had no business delving into the man's work of the Kaw Pipeline Project, and don't tell me I'm wrong because when I first moved to Enid in the year 2000 I applied for temp work at an Enid job shop, submitted my resumé with an all-industrial background and those forkers sent me on a job assignment to a stinkin' day care center.
Well, those who have been following the news already know that Amazon canceled plans for building a junior headquarters facility in Manhattan, and just picture the employment possibilities if the Enid Chamber of Commerce, MAPC, and the Commission could successfully woo that company over all other competition to set up shop in the roadway/railway advantageous Enid Oklahoma...next question would be, would they hire the racist misogynists that dominate the majority of the population?
I don't think so.
P.S.-- this has been so educational that I'm gonna announce right now that I'm gonna run again. Nobody should run unopposed, after all, and Enid's ruling elite know better than anyone that ***I*** am the one to beat.
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Update February 15: the local rag printed the turnout numbers and breakdown by precinct only for the mayoral race. Previous election cycle turnout: 5,157; this election cycle: 3,600. Last election cycle I had support outside of Ward 5, hence working against Van Hooser proved productive; in both election cycles in Ward 5, it's the machine that turned out. In both campaigns, I encountered constituents who despaired of any change regardless who got elected, so I presume those are also the voters who stayed home.
There are 2 major Ward 5 constituencies--the diverse inner city Ward 5 and the ruling elite machine in Ward 5's suburbia. Both the previous commissioner and the current commissioner are members of that machine and we expect that the inner city Ward 5 will continue to be ignored by the ruling Ward 5 elite machine. I've said all along that turnout was key to throwing off that tyranny but the despair runs deep; it's the way things have been here for decades. And now with my campaign data in regarding whether or not the majority of who turned out is racist, we may now conclude, based on the data, that they're racists. And so it goes, business as usual, with those who love Enid because it's a bigot haven and making excuses for why economic development doesn't get off of the TIFF dime for call centers and interfering with what's supposed to be an open market commercially. The bond skimming will continue to be committed by these parasites.
And I will continue to be the machine's Enemy Number One because if I win, all that changes. They won't stand for it. But machinery tends to have power sources and weak spots, and I still aim to find where those are, and yank 'em. The tongue lashings will continue until morality improves.
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