Election Night WTH? Moment

At our watch party, my supporters and I were glued to the television awaiting each change in the polling numbers. We had two televisions going in different rooms; one on KJRH Channel 2 and the other on KOTV Channel 6. At one point, around 8:15 in the evening, KOTV locked up with about 55% of the vote counted. Same for KJRH.

We went to the radio in my office and tuned into KRMG, on which Michael Bates and Dan Potter were commenting on the election. They were reporting me with 37% of the vote, with a chance to still win the race if the numbers that the TV stations were reporting didn't include west, east and north Tulsa. Suddenly, you could hear Dan Potter seem a little perplexed as my percentage dropped to 30%. It was about this time that we thought, that's it, we've lost. Within five minutes, KRMG had called the race for Bartlett and I called Dewey to concede just after that.

Wednesday night, my wife and I decided to watch Tuesday's episode of America's Got Talent, which she had recorded on our DVR. While watching the show, the numbers from the previous night's election were scrolling along the bottom of the screen. I was suddenly struck by an odd feeling about one of the sets of figures. I provide a screen capture of those numbers below.

As you can see, it shows that with 54% of the vote in,

I was receiving 6,665 votes to Bartlett's 9,072. I officially received a total of 7,004 votes on the night. That would mean, that in the remaining 46% of the precincts, I would only receive another 339 votes, to Bartlett's more than 3,000! I stopped dead in my tracks and paused the DVR. "In what part of the city would I only get less than 10% of the vote," I asked?

KJRH stayed locked in at 55% for some time after this was reported. Then it jumped to 69%. I froze the picture and took a second screen capture. (See below).

As you can see, I dropped from 37% of the vote, to 31%. That isn't too unbelievable with the passage of an additional 14 percent of returns coming in. But check out the vote totals.

I went from 6,665 votes with 54% reporting, to 5,269 votes with 69% reporting. That is a DROP of 1,396 votes!

I will be contacting KJRH to see if anyone can explain to me what happened. Stay tuned for breaking developments.

Bartlett Finds Republican Supporters

I'm very happy that Dewey Bartlett, Jr. has found some Republican support for this candidacy for mayor. I was getting a little worried for him.

At a press conference called Tuesday night, Bartlett, Jr. announced the support of Todd Hiett, Fred Jordan, Mike Mazzei, Brian Bingman, Dan Sullivan, Ron Peters, Terry Simonson and Don Burdick.

This "unprecedented" action, which happens all the time, deserves very little time, but it does deserve a quick analysis. So let's take a look at who stood by him.

• Four of the endorsers, Hiett, Jordan, Mazzei and Bingman don't even live in Tulsa and can't vote for Dewey.
• Sullivan and Peters are the two Mid-Town Tulsa state reps. It would be political suicide to not support the candidate from Dewey's source of votes.
• Former county chairman Terry Simonson now works for the County Commissioners. I'm out there calling for the voters not to renew the Vision 2025 tax when it comes back up for a vote. Vision 2025 is a county tax, so no surprise there.
• Then there's Don Burdick (aka Little Donny Downtown), a man who lives downtown, moved Republican headquarters downtown for two years and moved the Tulsa Republican Men's Club to the Summit Club downtown.

Throw in that Mazzei represents Bixby, Jordan represents Jenks and Bingman represents Sapulpa, and you get a pretty good idea who they think will support the regionalism that helps the suburbs to the detriment of Tulsa.

There is statewide conservative group that gives Republican legislators ratings on their voting records. To give you some perspective, Owasso State Senator Randy Brogdon scored a 90 rating from this past session. Mazzei scored a 32, while Bingman and Peters rated a much more impressive 40!

But all in all, it's good Dewey has found some friends.

Burying Great Plains

The Tulsa World buried my campaign’ press released story about Dewey Bartlett's enthusiastic vote, while a member of the Airport Board, for Kathy Taylor's $7.1 million giveaway of Tulsan's property taxes to Bank of Oklahoma.

The settlement, voted on in a "Emergency Meeting" on June 26, 2008, was payment of the principal in full for the debt the Airport Board owed to Tulsa Industrial Authority, which in turn owed the money to BOk. The City of Tulsa was in no way a party to that lawsuit, but the mayor chose to make Tulsa a defendant so that she could legally dip into Tulsa's sinking fund, which is paid for by city property taxes.

The World hates to report on anything regarding Great Plains Airlines, so they buried the story. But hey, at least they covered it! We have been unable to find any record that the World reported on the emergency meeting, or Bartlett's vote. Here is the full text from Sunday's story:

Medlock questions Bartlett: Republican mayoral candidate Chris Medlock is questioning why fellow GOP mayoral opponent Dewey Bartlett Jr., as a Tulsa Airports Improvement Trust member, voted for Mayor Kathy Taylor's $7.1 million lawsuit settlement regarding Great Plains Airlines.

"Dewey Bartlett is claiming to be a conservative Republican," Medlock said in a pres

s release, "but he supported a Democrat mayor in one of the single biggest giveaways of taxpayer money in this city's history. Bartlett needs to explain his wasteful actions to the voters.

"This was $7.1 million of city property taxes that Tulsa didn't owe," Medlock said, "but which Kathy Taylor paid in full, to the Bank of Oklahoma."

Taylor, whom Bartlett endorsed, appointed him to TAIT. He just resigned from the board to run for mayor.

Bartlett called Medlock's press release "political rhetoric" and declined to comment further.

Let’s see if we have this straight. Dewey Bartlett is saying that a Republican opponent asking why he joined a Democrat mayor is giving away millions of taxpayer dollars is “political rhetoric?" How interesting.

He isn’t denying that he voted for the proposal as we havevideo of him doing just that on YouTube. He isn’t denying that he praised the mayor for her actions, because the video tape clearly shows he did!

So rather than just answering the question and addressing why he did it, he chose to listen to his campaign handlers and came back with the classic “non-responsive response.”

Dewey Bartlett (R) was named to the Airport Board by Kathy Taylor (D). Kathy Taylor thennames former airport Marketing Director Mary Smith (R) to the Airport Board to replace Carl Clay (R) who was an outspoken critic of the Great Plains/BOk settlement. Mary Smith was part of the team that sold Great Plains Airlines to the public, when they went after and secured $30 million in state tax credits. Mary Smith is now Bartlett's Campaign Treasurer!

Please understand, that what Dewey did was to help the current Democrat mayor (Kathy Taylor) brush under the table the single biggest scandal of the previous Democrat mayor (Susan Savage). The Bartlett campaign team made up two-fifths of the vote that needlessly gave away our property taxes to the tune of $28 for every man, woman and child in the city, and he won't even respond to the Tulsa World, who will do everything to put his response in the most positive of lights? Don't you think it's time for KRMG and KFAQ to invite Bartlett back on the air to respond to this action in this giveaway, as well as his support of Kathy Taylor's re-election before the Republicans had selected a candidate?

Don’t we expect more candor from someone who wants to be our next mayor? If he won't answer for his actions as a mayoral appointee, how can we trust that he'll answer for his actions as our mayor?

Separating Oneself From the Pack

With nineteen candidates declaring for the Mayor's race, it's going to be harder and harder to get the kind of attention that can separate one candidate from the others.

The funny thing is, I kept thinking I was getting into the race quite late. We purposely chose to announce late, to make sure I wasn't jumping into a crowded field. Who knew that by announcing my intentions to run a full week before the end of filing, that I would end up being the second of eleven candidates. That's right, nine candidates filed in the last week.

Oh well...can't imagine there being another nine Urban Tulsa Weekly profiles, so I guess I didn't wait too long.

Many thanks to UTW writer Mike Easterling, who very faithfully and accurately recreated our hour long conversation. I think it does a very good job of capturing why I am running and I hope you'll take a few minutes to read it.

Everyman's Candidate?

Dewey Liked Rudy 2000 Times!

With all of the controversy about Dewey Bartlett, Jr endorsing Democrat Kathy Taylor before the Republicans chose a candidate to run against her, it is refreshing to find that Mr. Bartlett also endorses Republicans. In 2007, he gave a $2,000 donation to pro-choice presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani.

While I greatly respect what Mayor Giuliani did in liberal New York City as a mayor, I and many Tulsans were less than enthusiastic about having him as our president.

It does indicate one thing that seems clear. While stating that he is pro-life, Bartlett sure does support a lot of pro-abortion candidates.

Calling a Press Conference

Press Conference

Tulsa, Oklahoma [Tuesday, July 07, 2009]--Former Tulsa city councilor and radio talk show host Chris Medlock will hold a press conference on Wednesday, to announce his intentions regarding the upcoming Tulsa mayoral race.

Time: Wednesday, July 8, 2009 at 10:00 AM

Location: Tulsa Press Club
415 S. Boston Avenue (Lobby)

Medlock will make a brief statement and then take questions from the press.

###

Is Bill Christiansen Out of the Mayor's Race?

I just got a confirmation from a second reliable source that District 8 Tulsa city councilor Bill Christiansen will not be entering the race for mayor. If this proves true, it is likely that the detailed polling that he conducted over the weekend didn't come back as very promising to his chances.

Stay tuned for more specifics.

Bartlett Evades Campbell's Question About Mayor

Dewey Bartlett is now running for mayor of the City of Tulsa. As such, he made an appearance on 1170 KFAQ's Pat Campbell Show on Monday. Bartlett promised Campbell that unlike Kathy Taylor, if elected he would come on Campbell's show and answer tough questions. I have a suggestion for a follow up question Campbell can ask Bartlett the next time he's on his show.

Here is an exchange that occurred between Campbell and Bartlett from the twenty minute interview. To hear the audio, click here.

Campbell: Now during your announcement the other day, you mentioned—and I want you to explain this too—if Kathy Taylor had not dropped out of the race, you wouldn’t have thrown your hat into the ring. Now why is that? Is that because she had such deep pockets, or was it because you were satisfied with the job she was doing?

Bartlett: Well…she…I think the main reason was that she has a strong support in the community. I think her election was pretty much a done deal. And I think….

Campbell: If she had run for re-election?

Bartlett: If she had run for re-election…yes. And I think it would have been very, very difficult for anybody to have a good campaign against her. She has extremely deep pockets and exhibited that in the first time that she ran for office. So I…anyway…that was the reason.

Now compare Bartlett's statement on KFAQ with the quote from Mayor Taylor's re-election campaign web site, which just hours after Bartlett's appearance on The Pat Campbell Show, has been pulled from www.taylorfortulsa.com. The link to the page is still on Michael Bates' story on Bartlett on his Batesline.com, but it now leads to an "error page." Click on the photo above to see Bartlett's glowing endorsement of Taylor, which I captured before his KFAQ performance.

Bartlett says,

"Tulsa has always had a history of great leadership from the business community. Kathy's tireless, visionary style is yet another example of non-partisan leadership that focuses on the future of Tulsa. I am proud to support her re-election efforts." Dewey Bartlett Jr., President Keener Oil and Gas Company

Can we infer from the fact that this page has been pulled from Kathy Taylor's campaign site that Dewey is no longer proud of his support for her re-election? Can we infer that Kathy Taylor is okay with his change of heart?

But the most important question now that Bartlett is announced for mayor, why is he trying convince conservative voters that he would've run against Kathy Taylor, as a republican, if she didn't have such deep pockets, when it is clear that he so enthusiastically supported her re-election?

I'll leave that for you to decide.

Are Dewey's and Kathy's Campaigns One and the Same?

Silly question that title, right?

Well Bartlett is praising Taylor and saying he hopes to continue to run things as she has done. But the same campaign? Get serious!

Well, take a look at the composite photo I created of yard signs from the two campaigns. Taylor's and Bartlett's signs are different color schemes, but check out the little graphical element in the upper-left corner. Pretty much the exact same thing!

Earth shattering? No. Intriguing? I think so.

So did Mayor Taylor merely hand over the baton?

New Show: TCMS for June 16, 2009

NEW SHOW: The latest installment of The Chris Medlock Show is in the can and ready for listening. Chris spends the entire show discussing the upcoming mayor's race in the City of Tulsa, including where he is on whether or not he'll run. Also discussed is who is officially in, who is out and who still has not made up their mind.

To download, click here.

Or listen directly using the app below: