Continuing the interview.

We pickup right where we left off earlier this week

Question 4: What is your position on gay marriage?
Answer: This is a tougher one for me to answer.  Mostly because it goes against a lot of the people within my party.  I  still believe in the Christian morals that I was taught when I was young.  I believe in God, and in Christ, but I feel that a person's sexual orientation should be completely between his or herself, their partner and God, and is absolutely none of my business as long as it is not directly affecting me or my family.  Some may say I'm going against the social conservative majority on this position, but I really do not have a problem with a gay couple marrying each other.  Some may argue that allowing homosexuals to marry taints the sanctity of marriage.  I think America losses it's hold on the "sanctity" when 50% or more of heterosexual marriages end up in divorce.  I feel the same way when it comes to gay couples adopting.  As long as they pass the same rigorous background check, and prove that they can provide a safe and loving home that any heterosexual couple should pass, nobody should stop them from becoming parents.

Question 5: With the recent budget crisis that is effecting almost every state, including our own, what plan would you suggest for the state legislatures of Oklahoma?
Answer: Budget cuts, just to make it nice and simple.  Of course it is very hard to cut the funding of state projects and offices that affect many Oklahoma workers.  Its even harder not to sound cold and callous when basically you are handing the pink slips to hard working people.  But in hard times come hard decisions.  We need to assure the people of Oklahoma that we want to keep our state from critical mass that states like California, New York, and New Jersey are facing right now.  We must educate and persuade the public that though this will be difficult at first, it truly is for the best, and also that it is not permanent.  Our nation and state will recover, and additional funding will return with it.  But we must be reasonable, and accept that we cannot spend our way into a hole that generations to come will be paying off.

Question 6: How about the talks of tax cuts within the state?  Do you feel Oklahoma should cut taxes across the board?
Answer: At this point I don't feel comfortable making hasty tax cuts.  Though I do agree with much of the Tea Party's goals of bringing taxes and spending to a logical and stable course, I believe that Oklahoma's current tax rate is quite reasonable.  Sure we have a state income tax (which is not nearly as bad as most of the states with state income tax), but you must also look at our other tax rates that are quite low.  You can google state tax rankings and you'll find Oklahoma is far from the highest in almost every category.  So I do not feel a tax cut at this time would truly be in the best interest for Oklahoma.

That concludes today's questions.  We'll try to continue this interview tomorrow, when we'll ask Mr. Rogers on his take on foreign and energy policies.