By Michael Woyton
There are so many things right now that can raise one’s ire that it’s difficult to separate the chaff from the wheat and decide what to write about.
What about the woman-owned bakery in Flower Mound, Texas — I had to Google Maps it, too — that sold out of its sugar cookies featuring the image of vice presidential candidate Tim Walz but received death threats because she dared to bake and sell the confection?
And then there’s Melania Trump, who is hawking a memoir soon to be out, who has published a video in which she is unequivocally in favor of abortion rights, unlike her husband and his VP running mate? One thinks there’s more to that story.
There are also recently FOIA’d internal emails from Springfield, Ohio, that show how Trump/Vance’s lies about Haitian immigrants have affected the city.
But since I led with a reference from the Bible — chaff v. wheat — let’s chat about Oklahoma.
I sure that Oklahoma grows wheat there, but the subject today is chaff or, more specifically, grift.
On Monday, the Oklahoma Department of Education and conservative Superintendent Ryan Walters opened bids to supply state schools with 55,000 Bibles, The Oklahoman reported.
The specifications vendors were required to meet were oddly, well, specific. The Bibles had to be the King James Version, containing both the Old and New Testaments. Additionally, to be acceptable, the Bibles had to include copies of the Declaration of Independence, United States Constitution and Bill of Rights and the Pledge of Allegiance. The books also had to be bound in leather or material like leather.
According to The Oklahoman, there are two such Bibles on the market that fits all specifications: Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the U.S.A. Bible” that former president and convicted felon Donald Trump is hawking online for $60 and a $90 “We The People Bible” which is also endorsed by Trump.
Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice Executive Director Colleen McCarty is quoted by The Oklahoman as saying the request for proposal seems fair on its face, “but with additional scrutiny, we can see there are very few Bibles on the market that would meet these criteria, and all of them have been endorsed by President Donald Trump.”
A quick use of a calculator finds that if the Greenwood/Trump Bible is sold to the state of Oklahoma a not insignificant part of $3.3 million could be on its way to the presidential candidate.
Nice, huh?
Even nicer knowing that the King James Bible is available online for free — as long as the Oklahoma public schools can still afford an internet connection.
There already is a lawsuit over putting Bibles in OK schools, filed when the scheme was first announced back in July, according to reporting from KOCO News.
It not yet known if the latest information about the RFP will inspire other litigation over Oklahoma’s giving tax dollars to a presidential candidate.
And to wrap up, let’s turn to the online version of the King James Bible — it’s free, you know — and read Mark 13:22:
Lead art: Photo by Michael Woyton
On Second Thought 
and what my idiot Okie neighbors don’t seem to understand is that the minute they begin adding things to the Bible, they are desecrating the book they believe is holy. Poor idiots just don’t get it.
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