Oklahoma Politics: The People May Have Spoken, but the Bureaucrats are Still in Charge

Chelsea Church has worked at the Oklahoma State Board of Pharmacy since 2012. She took over as executive director last year after the previous director died. According to OKC's daily paper, The Oklahoman, tomorrow, during a special meeting of the board, the odds are pretty solid she'll be fired.

Well hey, that is what goes down when you are foolish enough to offer someone a bribe via a phone text. Indeed, it would seem, despite overwhelming historical evidence, there are still those in the government and elsewhere who think, no matter what they write, their texts, emails, and other social media posts will never become public knowledge, or cause them professional harm.

When they're inevitably brought down by their rank hubris, or naivete the only truly intelligent response to their actions comes from the eminent sociologist, Bugs Bunny. He refers to such persons this way, "What a dope, what an Ultra-Maroon."

Church's troubles began almost immediately after Oklahoma voters stunned not only her, but evangelicals, right wing corporate types, and big pharma by overwhelmingly passing State Question 788. That happened on June 26th of this year, making the legal sale and possession of marijuana for medical purposes a reality. The victory came despite an avalanche of crazed lies aired on TV stations across the state which told the public things like, You and your kids will be exposed to dope heads smoking marijuana openly at the local McDonald's.

According to today's story by Dale Denwalt, her sordid little tale began on July 7th. That's when an attorney working for the Oklahoma Department of Health--the people who are adopting rules and regulations regarding implementation of the bill--sent Ms Church a text. The lawyer, Julie Ezell, says she was "joking," when she told Church, I should quit and come to work for the Board of Pharmacy.

The Executive Director seized on the joke and responded with, "PLEASE!!!!" Then she added, "You get me a pharmacist in (a marijuana) dispensary and then come to our office. I guarantee I can do more than u have now." For whimsey's sake she added a winking emoji with its tongue sticking out.

Just to make sure Ezell understood the offer was genuine Church later texted, "If this settles down I would honestly love to talk to you about OSBP. We have statutory authority for an attorney and I think u would be a great fit. U tell me what it would take for u to jump ship and we need to talk!!!!"

Then, as actor Mac Brown once said in a movie, came the weird part. Despite the generous offer of a better job in exchange for her help, Ezell told the health department rubes that making a regulation requiring every dispensary to have a pharmacist on duty was so nuts it guaranteed a multitude of future law suits. She was ignored and the reg was put in place. Within 48 hours the department was hit with two court actions challenging not just the new rule, but the entire process, because the sessions had been held in secret, violating the state's open meeting law.

And no, it doesn't stop there. Ezell has problems of her own on the electronic front. When the public found out exactly how much the Department of Health was fouling up the intent of SQ788 they went a little, should we say, ape shit. In the midst of the outcry Ezell claimed she was starting to get threatening emails from supporters of the measure.

It turned out the threatening emails came from a fake online account Ms. Ezell established a few days earlier. She had, in fact, sent them to herself, thereby committing a felony after she quite publicly contacted the police about them. The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation is claiming she did it in order to get attention and sympathy.

What it got her was criminal charges--which she is now trying to wiggle out of by having her attorney tell everyone who will listen she is cooperating fully with the authorities as they pursue the bribery case against, Chelsea Church.

In the mean time, just two days away from SQ788's enactment date, the state Attorney General has told the Department of Health it completely over stepped its authority on several of the draconian restrictions it established, including the whole pharmacist in the dispensary thing. The department big-wigs are now--sans Julie Ezell, who has resigned--"reconsidering," their decisions.

Right.

Ladies and gentlemen, no matter how sick you are, don't plant that new garden of botanics just yet. The people may have spoken, but the bureaucrats are still in charge.


sic vita est


7-24-18