"And for me, it's leaving time"

I have a grandly dramatic vision of myself stalking through the canyons of the Big Apple in the rain and cold, dreaming about driving with the soft night air of East Texas rushing on my face while Willie Nelson sings softly on the radio, or about blasting through the Panhandle under a fierce sun and pale blue sky….I’ll remember, I’ll remember…sunsets, rivers, hills, plains, the Gulf, woods, a thousand beers in a thousand joints, and sunshine and laughter. And people. Mostly I’ll remember people.

There is one thing, an important thing, I have to tell you before I go. What I’m going to tell you is more than a fact. It is a Truth. I have spent six years checking it out, and I know it to be true. The people who subscribe to The Texas Observer are good people. In fact, you’re the best people in this state. I don’t care if you think that’s pretentious or sentimental—it’s just true.

If I got to naming you, I would never stop, so I won’t. But please believe me that all of you whom I know and many of you whom I know only by letter are in my mind as I write this—even if I do forget your names half the time. Always excepting, of course, the turkey who sends me hate mail after my annual gun-control editorial. Turkey, turkey, turkey.

I wanted to call this “The Long Goodbye” but Kaye won’t let me. She wanted to call it “Ivins Indulges in Horrible Fit of Sentimentality.”

I love you. Good-bye my friends.

The closing paragraphs of Molly’s goodbye column to Texas Observer readers published June 18, 1976, as she left to join The New York Times.

Barack's poster, Hillary's arms, and Abe's conservative agenda

Another drive-by

Too busy still to put my own thoughts up so here's some of the reading I'm liking:

-- Vince (and other of my Texblog brethren and sisteren) say that giving Tom Craddick any more power this session is a bad idea. But a comment to Vince's post suggests it would be the better of two evils. Update (5 p.m.): The resolution is defeated, handing Speaker Craddick a loss.

-- Here's your Libby trial update from Marcy Wheeler and Jeralyn Merritt, courtesy Steve Gilliard and Easter Lemming (the Warren Zevon link is icing).

-- Vista's here. This crap by Bill Gates -- planned obsolescence promoted on the Daily Show -- really makes me want to go buy a Mac. Dwight has, as he always does, the best tips on how to make the switch. I'll wait until the last possible moment, i.e., if one of my computers needs replacing or MS stops updating XP. Hopefully that moment will be a few years from now.

-- Some local news: a good article on the state's programs to support families is here, with a cool quiz. I scored a 70. The Auto Show is in town and it's much greener than in the past; this is still one of the best diversions that comes to Houston. I particularly want to go examine the new crossovers -- I drive an Equinox but am lustily eyeing the new Nissan Rogue. The Chronic also has the news that electricity deregulation has failed Texans. This article is about ten days old but provides an update on Jim Turner, who may yet have some political ambitions. And j-a-x has some of the best skyline photos I have seen.

Out of Iraq: photos from yesterday

Washington:

San Francisco:



Seattle:



Sarasota:



Austin:



Houston:

Sunday Funnies

Cold, wet bloggerhea

-- Shelia Jackson Lee is hosting "Iraq War Summit: What Next?" today in downtown Houston. The conference will be followed by a silent march.

-- the Discovery Channel scoops CNN relative to an old story: that TWA 800 was brought down by a missle and not a spark in the gas tank. I've always thought that the biggest argument against any conspiracy theory is preventing someone from talking to Mike Wallace (or writing an expose') years later. Keeping hundreds of military personnel quiet -- after retirement -- ten years after seems far-fetched to me. Yet Kristina Borjesson wrote that book almost five years ago.

See, this isn't about a plane crash; it's about a coverup by the corporate media.

Ted Kennedy asks his Republican colleagues: "What is it about working men and women that you find so offensive?" Watch it:



This would be an excellent question to ask our two miserable excuses for Senators from Texas, who have been filibustering the minimum wage bill.

-- Molly Ivins has been hospitalized in her continuing struggle against breast cancer. My family, as some may recall, is going through the same thing at the moment. My advice to Molly fans: say a little prayer (or whatever you say in this circumstance).

-- the Scooter Libby/CIA leak trail has been diligently live-blogged and summarized by Jane and Christy at firedoglake. Here's the two most recent entries. The end of the week's two revelations were: a) Scooter being thrown under the bus by Cathie Martin, former Cheney spokeswoman (and current deputy communications director for the president) ; and b) Karl Rove and Dan Bartlett have been subpoened to testify.

-- The Iraq escalation will 'work' this time, according to the president, because he "told them it had to."

Really.

It's not even clear who he is referring to when he says "them". Is it the generals? the Iraqis? I no longer believe it's alcoholism affecting his thinking. The president is just plain delusional.