The Inhofe Factor

by Pa Rock
Road Warrior

For the longest time I have wondered how mental midgets like Jeff Sessions, Jim DeMint, and James Inhofe manage to impress enough people to get elected to the United States Senate. The jury may still out on Sessions and DeMint (although I have my own ideas), but after the day I've had in Oklahoma I know exactly what dynamic sends Inhofe to Washington: his constituency, or at least a majority of it, is dumber than he is!

Consider the evidence:

Tornado Alley runs roughly from Texas, northwesterly through Oklahoma City, Tulsa, and on into southwest Missouri. Tornadoes happen along Interstate 40 and the Will Rogers Turnpike - they happen! So why do so many people residing along Tornado Alley live in mobile homes and trailer parks? I credit that abysmal judgement to the Inhofe effect - just as the senator believes that global warming is a myth, his constituents think that the tornadoes will never rip their world apart.

Magical thinking, anyone?

Ihhofe has been stripping his gears this past week trying to make sure that liability limits aren't raised on his masters - the big oil companies. Just because BP is well on its way to killing off the entire Gulf of Mexico doesn't mean they should have to pay to clean it up, does it?

Oklahoma logic?

Today I had a blowout on the Interstate thirty miles east of Okalhoma City. My son, Tim, managed to arrange a Sunday tow (via cell phone and the Internet from Kansas City) to the Pep Boys in Edmond, Oklahoma. I arrived at Pep Boys at around two p.m., and the nice young man who waited on me assured me that he would have two new tires on the truck in thirty minutes. and it would be ready to roll on toward Amarillo.

I stepped next door for lunch (chicken livers and mashed potatoes), and came back thirty minutes later to find the pickup jacked up with the shredded tire still on it. About that time the guy who had been waiting on me told a coworker that he was going home for "awhile." They both smiled. When he returned from his afternooner an hour later, my truck was still up on the jack. Not too long after that the ruined tire was taken off. That was progress.

Each time I stepped out of the office to check and see if there was any more progress, I was told that it was "almost" finished - when obviously nothing was happening. I finally managed to get back on the road just before the place closed at six p.m. (They must have gotten tired of working other people in ahead of me!)

The peppy boys sent me off with a set of bad directions back to the Interstate. I eventually gave up and asked a highway patrolman who was sitting in a hospital lounge watching television. He coughed up more bad directions. Feeling like I was in a never-ending episode of The Twilight Zone, I drove around aimlessly for twenty more minutes until a couple of Hispanic lads at a convenience store gave me the straight scoop on how to get the hell out of Oklahoma, a skill they probably learned through necessity!

Tonight I am in Elk City. I should hit the Texas state line in time for breakfast tomorrow.

Oklahoma ain't OK, but, even so, it deserves better than James Mountain Inhofe!