[Announce] Dear Mayor Mick Cornett

[Robert Waldrop]

I have sent the email below to our Mayor. Please join me in a prayer to St. John the Baptist to bless this seed of truth.  RMW

Dear Mayor Cornett,

It is said that during a Roman Triumph, a slave was assigned to ride in the chariot with the victorious general, and continually whisper in his ear, "Remember, you are only mortal."

So at this moment of your triumph, here are some things I want to whisper in your ear.

Some things that I think bode ill for the future of Oklahoma City were continually illuminated in the recent MAPS for Millionaires campaign.

1.  Denial.  I was astonished to hear that you denied that hunger was a problem in Oklahoma City, when asked about that by a reporter from a Seattle newspaper.  Mayor, you need to get out more.  You should follow my friend Marcus Evans and me around some time.  Since 1999, we and a few others have been delivering food to people in need who don't have transportation to get to a regular food distribution site. . . to the tune of several tens of thousands of pounds of food every year. 

2.  Demonization of your opponents.  I am proud to be one of "those kind of people", as you and others often described those opposed to the MAPS for Millionaires welfare check handout to some of the richest families in the state.  Frugal?  Yes I am.  Conservative?  Amazingly so, more so than you are, despite your many claims to being the "most conservative mayor in America".  It speaks very poorly of who you are as a person and as our mayor that you found it necessary to demonize your opponents in this way.  I guess you feel the end justifies the means, which is always a temptation for politicians.

3.  Class warfare.  The map in the Sunday Oklahoman showing the election results was very illuminating.  I know many of the neighborhoods colored bright orange indicating the lowest "yes" votes.  We deliver food there all the time.  They knew exactly what this was about -- you are taking from the poor and working classes and giving lavishly to the gluttonous rich.  Any claims to the contrary are merely discussions of the naked emperor's clothes.  Tell them to your rich friends, I'm sure they'll be impressed.  But don't try it with anyone making the minimum wage.

This isn't the first time this has happened.

Oklahoma City has a long history of class warfare against the poor.  Let us recall one example --  the ethnic cleansing of the Deep Deuce via a racist "due process riot" using the subterfuge of "redevelopment".  I've spoken with people who have been forced to move as many as three times in their life by Oklahoma City, and all of them said to me, "Each time we ended up worse off than before."  

Therefore, as a Christian, I feel it is my duty to warn you that God sees all of this.  

+ God was watching every time the Oklahoma City council has slashed bus service while lavishing money on golf courses.  

+ God is watching as you delay -- for years!  while gasoline prices move steadily towards $4 and $5/gallon!! -- improvements to the transit system that would help the working poor so you can build a fancy downtown playground.  God will see every abortion that happens because of the increased economic desperation of low income households who can't get to work without a car and expensive gasoline because there is no bus service that goes where they need to go.  God will know whose hands are stained with the blood of those innocent babies whose lives are cut short before birth so we could become a "Big League City."

+ God will see every penny you take from the widows and the fatherless for your sales tax that you will spend building luxury accommodations for the mega rich.  He will see every bite of food they cannot buy because they pay your tax.   Those who have the least in Oklahoma City will have even less thanks to your tax.  You may deny it, but God sees it happening.

+ God was watching as Oklahoma City let conditions deteriorate and crime increase in the Walnut Grove and Riverside neighborhoods, in order to drive down property values and make people less inclined to oppose ODOT and Oklahoma City's preferred route for the I-40 Crosstown Freeway relocation project.  It's not an accident that crack houses were allowed to proliferate in those areas just before announcement of the ODOT/OKC route selection. 

+ God was watching as ODOT broke its promise to the people of the Riverside neighborhood and Oklahoma City did absolutely nothing to protect the people of the Riverside neighborhood from ODOT's treachery.

+ God sees your plan to drive out the rest of the poor from the Riverside neighborhood so it can be gentrified.

+ God is watching as Oklahoma City uses its regulatory powers to suppress economic entrepreneurship among the poor and keep low income people from repairing their homes.

+ God sees how the government takes money from the poor inner city areas to be spent on the wealthy suburbs.  

+ God sees every time that Oklahoma City takes land from the poor and gives it to the rich.

+ God is watching when Oklahoma City uses community block development grants as corporate welfare.  

+ God hears your denials of the reality of poverty in Oklahoma City.  Tell yourself whatever lies you want to ease your conscience, but the reality is that Oklahoma City is grinding the face of the poor into the dust in its quest to be a Big League City.

In the battle between God and the demonic forces which prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls, there is no neutrality.  You are either for God and His Kingdom, or you do the work of demons.  

And if there is anything that is clear from the Holy Bible, God is not on the side of the rich, the powerful, and the arrogant.  

But you, Mick Cornett, Mayor of Oklahoma City, have publicly taken your stand with the rich and the powerful and the arrogant. Your solution to poverty is apparently "Steal what little they have, kill their kids in abortuaries,  and then leave them behind for the wolves to devour."  

How can I say this?  I judge your works, and the consequences of those works, and do not listen to your words.  With politicians, this is the only way to make a moral judgment.  

So in the battle between good and evil, I have to ask -- whose side are you on anyway?  

The fact of this matter is simple.  In the end, you will not be judged by what you did for the rich and powerful. Jesus Christ is going to look at you and judge you by the standards detailed in the 25th chapter of the Gospel of St. Matthew.  

Did you feed the hungry, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless, and visit those in jail?  

Or did you drive the poor from their homes "for economic redevelopment purposes"?  

Did you take the money of the poor to build lavish palaces for the rich?  (Herod did that in an earlier time.)  

Did you take money from poor neighborhoods and give it as bribes to a big corporation?

Did you demonize those who object to your lavish excess for political purposes?

"Those who shut their ears to the cry of the poor will themselves also call and not be heard.  (Prov. 21:13)

"Those who oppress the poor blaspheme their Maker, but the one who is kind to the needy glorifies God.  (Prov. 14:31)

"Woe to those who enact unjust statutes and who write oppressive decrees, depriving the needy of judgment and robbing my people's poor of their rights, making widows their plunder, and the fatherless their prey! " Isaiah 10:1-2

Bob Waldrop
Oscar Romero Catholic Worker House in Oklahoma City
www.justpeace.org
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