After yesterday's latest Danborenocentric view of the universe, a friend asked me, "How does Oklahoma keep picking such crappy leaders?" He was referring not just to Boren but also to Inhofe, Coburn, and Sally Kern. We seem to have more than our fair share of stupidity-bigotry eruptions.

I told him that I don't think it's as much of a voter failure as it is a massive media failure. Most of it leads back to The Oklahoman and its coverage over the past 30 years under E.L. Gaylord. His father, E.K. Gaylord, was actually a newspaperman. E.K. had definite political leanings, but reporting the news still came first. Not so with E.L., who quite openly and proudly declared his intent to use the newspaper to promote his extreme right-wing political beliefs. Under E.L. Gaylord, pushing the right-wing agenda was the first and main purpose of the "newspaper." Reporting the news came in second on a good day, but usually somewhere around fourth. It's extensively documented, and resulted in the famous 1999 article in which the Columbia Journalism Review declared The Oklahoman to be The Worst Newspaper In America.

E.L. died a few years ago, and the paper has improved slightly, but not much in its politics. The old rules still apply: the paper extensively covers "good" things that Republicans do and "bad" things that Democrats do, but never the other way around unless it absolutely, positively cannot be avoided, and even then, it's minimized. For better or worse, the Oklahoma City television stations follow this model, probably to avoid the 150 shrieking harpies who'd call the stations 24/7 if they tried to report real news to their market that's actually more than 4000 times larger.

Take today, for example. When Jim Inhofe does something profoundly stupid, like pay big money to air a re-election commercial touting his many "fact-finding" trips on the taxpayer dime that have not changed one single sentence of Inhofe's pre-ordained right-wing policy, one that also says Inhofe believes Iraq is in Africa, it simply gets no coverage in The Oklahoman.

What does get into the paper? As the campaign for State Senator Andrew Rice, Inhofe's main challenger, points out, it's "nearly half a page of letters attacking Andrew Rice and dismissing the energy crunch that most Oklahomans are feeling."

All this in response to Rice's letter last week saying that we need real leadership to decrease our dependence on oil and develop alternative energies, which would benefit Oklahoma in a multitude of ways.

One of the letters garnered the headline, "Rice dangerous." The gentleman who wrote the letter asked, "Does it not make sense that the God who created the universe can take care of His creation? It's hard to believe that anyone wouldn't want to drill for America's oil."

Another, with the header "Rice lacks sense," was apparently shocked when Andrew stated that drilling in ANWR won't break our dependence on foreign oil.

I should point out here that the campaign is polite enough not to mention that the source for this gentleman's outrage is a column by Cal Thomas, who is kind of like Robert Novak without as much credibility or charm. Thomas is the kind of opinion writer the Oklahoman this is relevant and on the cutting edge. (Update: For an example, see this article deconstructing Thomas's recent column in which he appointed himself God and decides, based on his own beliefs, that Barack Obama is not a Christian.) Continuing:

Like Inhofe, this gentleman seems to be looking to point fingers of blame rather than find real solutions; he wrote, "Voters should learn who's to blame for this crisis. Which political party has blocked all attempts to address the problem in a practical, short-term way? The Democrats! It's not about one individual. It's about philosophy. Americans aren't ready to throw in the towel."

Andrew Rice is pushing for a more responsible energy future for our country, one that will lead the way toward a new energy economy worldwide. Reducing our dependence on oil is not defeatist—it's hopeful. Sen. Rice is looking out for our future and working to alleviate the energy crisis of today with sensible solutions, not easy and shallow promises that will bring no real relief. The economic opportunities that lie before us with creating new energy solutions are tremendous, and blocking them in the interests of maintaining the status quo is the real defeatist attitude.

So who's more dangerous—Oklahoma's senior Senator, who blocks good legislation and pushes more drilling to keep the special-interest oil money flowing into his pocket, or Andrew Rice, who's seeking to create responsible energy policies to protect our future?

As of three months ago, Inhofe's lobby-fed and oil-fed campaign purse was significantly larger than Rice's, even though Rice is one of the best funded and most energizing candidates against Inhofe since he pushed his way into office in 1994 by preaching hatred against everyone not like Inhofe. If you want to take Inhofe off the national teat and airwaves and put sane people (who know where Iraq is) back in control of our national policy, donate to Andrew Rice and make the baby Inhofe cry.