More, just a couple of days ago, here. Ted showed too much of his ass this past week.
* * *
Nick Anderson, who founded Counterpoint, was interviewed by Houstonia Magazine about his cartooning career post-newspapers: "(A)rtists from all political leanings are providing takes on today’s biggest headlines as contributors. Of the 18 satirists, ten -- like Anderson -- saw their jobs cut. It’s too soon to know if Counterpoint will hit it big (at the moment it has more than 170,000 subscribers), but if it does this could be a way to ensure that his art form doesn’t just die out."
It's going to take more than the incompetence, hubris, and by now-normalized sociopathy from Texas Republicans to make this happen beyond the meteorological. Sorry, Michelle.
There's been so much calamity over the past week that my efforts to document it via Tweet feed collapsed. I don't think that Katrina -- or even COVID-19 -- will match the Presidents Day Frozepocalypse in historical ramifications. (There's always the next disaster.) All of us suffered in large measure, if not quite equally. When the power goes out for days, and then the water has to be boiled for several more days -- affecting everyone, including the wealthiest among us -- then I'm reminded of the hardscrabble lives of my ancestors just a couple of generations back. Shivering under blankets by the fire, shitting into a hole in the ground, eating cold food. Never mind the summers without a/c.
(Digression: Mine was the first generation of Dorrells not born on the farm. Not the first that was college-educated; that distinction belongs to my mother's side of the family and my great aunt, who earned her doctorate in the 1930's.)
Rather than try to catch up, here's some of the highlights.
CancunTed (pronounce that in a couple of ways) decided his act of contrition needed to be performed on Fox News.
I’m making sure we do everything we can to get the power turned on in Texas and to make sure this never happens again. pic.twitter.com/aSrrZuFjNl
John Cornyn, Ken Paxton, and Dan Patrick seemed to understand that saying or doing anything might not be the wisest course, and they hunkered down somewhere. Not former governor and Trump energy secretary Rick Perry, though.
This is the CEO of Infuse Energy, a mid-size retail provider in Texas. As a company with tens of thousands of customers suffering, our official statement to @GovernorPerry, with all due respect, is to shut your damn mouth.
Bullying and mocking these jerks on social media is fun, but have you tried taking real action?
Local state Sen. Kelly @KHancock4TX and state Rep. @GoldmanCraig chair two of the three committees that will oversee power grid reform. Be sure to let your lawmakers know what you’d like to see and whether you’d pay more for it. #txlegepic.twitter.com/8heHLlwgWd
Beto and the Castros are also helping out, but so far not running for anything. I'll be voting Green everywhere I can, and that includes Delilah for Texas. David Collins has the interview.
Why do I want to run for governor? (A thread) I've lived in TX my entire life and I have seen some amazing, wonderful things. I have been in awe, inspired and fulfilled by our state, our people, our comraderie. Lately though, it seems like who we are and what defines us has less
And among other Texas cities, San Antonio is holding municipal elections this year and has a Green standing for mayor.
Pls RT
ATTN: SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS 🌻@DiazForMayor is running for Mayor as a Green Party candidate. No corporate & lobbyist💰
He supports living wage, affordable🏡, CJ reform, etc.
Pls follow & consider contributing to his campaign using the link below.https://t.co/eliBVtz9kK
— 🌻⏳AllDemsRCorruptVoteGreenAnd3rdPartyOnly🌻😷 (@1Kitty6) February 18, 2021
And here's the TPA wrangle, unsorted.
Socratic Gadfly, for Lincoln's Birthday and Black History Month, looked critically at two new history books that try to make Lincoln into St. Abraham of Lincoln in one particular area. Kuff considered the possibility of appellate court redistricting in this legislative session. Rick Casey at the San Antonio Report connected the Capitol insurrection and the Republican push for voting restrictions to the Big Lie of voter fraud. The Great God Pan Is Dead brought us a little D.H. Lawrence. Paradise in Hell let us in on the secret of the most affordable city in America. And Andrea Zelinski, now writing for Texas Monthly, tried to make sense of Texas secessionists.
Closing out the week with some laughs.
It's all apparently a misunderstanding. When the Texans announced they were shedding JJ Watt's contract, ERCOT heard that "Texans need to shed watts."
"We built these fake outhouses around the set of Lonesome Dove, and [Robert] Duvall would take a crap in them because he was in character."
----- Cary White, production designer for "Lonesome Dove," the TV miniseries, re: how Robert Duvall maintained his edge while filming pic.twitter.com/U1iWnlOocQ
