Wednesday, June 16, 2021

Texas grid fried; Abbott roasted


The trouble began Monday afternoon.


As with the gun carnage on Austin's Sixth Street, reaction was quick ... and relentless.


Indeed it was.


“Dang those frozen wind turbines ...” tweeted Laura Beil.  Meanwhile, Jennifer Hiller is “Just over here shouting at my kids to close the door already so we don’t cause the Texas grid to collapse.”  “Republican leadership in Texas is doing well, unless you like electricity,” posted Mark Jacob.


Some were nicer -- and more policy-oriented -- about it.


Some elevated their snark.


Some were just blunt.


Some spread the recriminations to Ted Cruz and Ken Paxton.


So what was Greg Abbott's response to this epic failure?  Why, he signed the critical race theory outlaw bill into law, invited Trump to join him at the southern border at the end of June to demagogue the border wall, and followed Steve Bannon's -- and several other scam artists' -- lead in soliciting public donations to fund its construction.

It was just Sunday night when John Oliver pointed out that Texas inmates were cooking in the state's prisons because the TDCJ won't provide air-conditioning.


Now we are all going to do so (unless you can afford your own generator), especially those who couldn't pay their electric bill previously.


I have to believe that at some point all of the corporations and all of the conservatives moving to Texas from elsewhere are going to start reconsidering the wisdom of that, as Mayor Adler observed above.  Low taxes aren't all there is to living.

Before this post runs too long, I'll hold the other Lege business -- Texas Dems in Washington meeting with Pelosi and the Lone Star delegation to receive their heroes' welcome for stopping SB7, and entreating their DC counterparts to stop the steal, to appropriate a phrase, by passing legislation that will block suppression efforts better than another walkout.  And also Texas Monthly's "Best" and "Worst", Mark Jones' ideological ranking, and a few more things having to do with Juneteenth, and environmental, and whatever fresh hell may pop between now and tomorrow and Friday.

Here are a few calm-me-downs.

Monday, June 14, 2021

The Updates Wrangle from Far Left Texas


I promised this on Friday so before I get way behind again ...
First however is the news from Austin regarding the shooting on Sixth Street.


Reaction has been swift.


Especially the reactions associated with defunding the Austin PD.


It's the same in San Antonio.


And everywhere else.


The state's capital is far from the only Texas city plagued with gun violence.  This was Houston over the weekend.


And Grits for Breakfast wonders what will happen to all those old convictions for unlicensed carrying of a weapon.

Governor Strangelove had to quickly come up with yet another diversion from failed Lege policies, and his choice was ...


You got it straight.


Braddock with the win.


Abbott is not one to let the grass grow under his wheelchair.  Part of his re-election strategy is to set the agenda and have others react to him; he never responds to what happened yesterday or last week, and rarely if ever to his critics.  This is his definition of "leadership".

Case in point: the swelling national backlash over critical race theory.


The whitewashing has been going on for almost two centuries.


Shell Seas with the less-than-280-character executive summary.


Abbott and the Lege have an unfinished piece of business: the voting suppression bill due in the first special session.  More skeezy details have leaked about SB7 in the just-concluded regular.


Accolades are still pouring in for the brave Donkey blockers.


And Beto's Texas tour brought him to the Bayou City yesterday, where he fired up the troops for the coming rematch.


Political watchers of the "expert" variety seem skeptical that Tex Dems will be able to reach their 'two million new registered voters' goal, along with the usual pessimism regarding their biannual electoral prospects.

More Texas 2022 election developments:


I should give a COVID update since I haven't in a long while.


Texas Republicans (like Louie Gohmert, Space Cadet and Ken Paxton, Thug) behaving badly and some environmental news still to come this week.  Here's the soothers.

Thursday, June 10, 2021

Lone Star Social Justice Round-up


It's on us to enforce it.  And we will.


(More PRIDE at the end.  Criminal justice and women's rights posts along with racial, healthcare, and other inequality-related social justice items follow.)

Congress isn't going to help, and certainly if you were still under the impression that the Texas Legislature or any of our elected leaders, Republican or Democrat, were capable of making the changes we so desperately need ... you can stop thinking that now.

Greg Abbott and his fellow Neanderthals under the Pink Dome want your children to learn the most whitewashed version of Texas history they can paint.


Yes, it's true: the Constitution of the Republic of Texas enshrined slavery, banned the manumission of those enslaved, and barred Black people and Native Americans from citizenship.  One could not work any harder to make the 1619 Project's argument for them.  Congratulations, gentlemen; I look forward to this law's fate in the courts.

Let's be sure that we don't let our old Democratic friends off the hook here, either.


You might be familiar with J.R. Behrman, his writing having appeared in these pages a few times under the nom de plume "Open Source Dem".  During my days as an active Harris County Democrat, I served with him on the Harris County Ballot Board, verifying signatures on mailed ballots, and he served SD-13 on the SDEC for a period of time about ten years ago.  We also worked together on the Progressive Populist Caucus beginning in 2006, with David Van Os' run for Texas AG against Abbott, alongside Stan Merriman and others.  My defection to the Texas Greens made our friendship one of many casualties, but I knew John to be an antagonist to the establishment (read: neoliberals) and while he voiced discomfort working with Black people and women in quiet conversation then -- an acknowledgement I found self-effacing at the time he made it -- here, in his dotage, he has let his worst instincts get the better of him.

Behrman is a sample of a certain generation of white man who simply cannot overcome their ingrained biases, no matter how hard he may try.  I'd like to feel sorry for him, but as a Rice-educated economist, he's very much smart enough to have known better and done better.  Enjoy your retirement from politics, John.

Moving on ...


Women will fight back against the encroachment of their liberties.  And they will fight on behalf of others when threatened.


D Magazine was first to report on Lake Highlands HS valedictorian Paxton Smith and her amazing pro-reproductive rights graduation speech.  In addition to all the other harm they have done, the Lege would rather fund dubious anti-choice programs than Medicaid.


In terms of police behaving badly over the past couple of weeks, the news has been heavy and lousy.


This scandal follows the one last month of the the deputy constable in the same precinct (Pct. 1, led by chief constable Alan Rosen, Democrat) who killed himself after a standoff with police in which he confessed to sexually abusing several minors.

Houston cops -- and their friends -- have been having a really bad month.  Poor them.


Facts have never influenced Abbott and the Lege, however.


To say that Austin's city government and Travis County in particular has taken a turn to the right is becoming an understatement.


And to conclude this CJ update, some news from the courtroom and the penal system.


Protests and anniversaries:


Wrapping it up with some more Pride.


Some updates on everything I've already blogged about this week coming tomorrow.