Sunday, November 21, 2021

Sunday Friendsgiving Funnies

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Friday, November 19, 2021

COPout26


I have been surly this week, as you may have noticed, and the pending demise of all Terran species by our hand is the biggest reason.

Oh, I won't live to see it.  But your children, grandchildren, great grands, and my nieces and nephews and their children surely will.  And it's going to be bad, and it's coming sooner than anyone thinks.


More on down the post on who's to blame (basically all of us) and what can be done at this point (pick your poison).  We've been building to this moment all my life and long before, essentially ever since we started burning coal and then petroleum to light and heat our homes, then our offices, and move ourselves and our commerce around.


But the people we elected to be watchdogs took payoffs to look the other way while the wealthy got ever more greedy.  Thus it has always been with capitalism, sadly.


In case you missed it:


Here's a good question: which oil company do you think is the worst?


"Exxon tells 5th Circuit that SCOTUS ruling voids $14 million award from pollution violations at Texas facility"

"Toyota Named Third Most Obstructive Company Towards Climate Change After ExxonMobil, Chevron"

I spared Royal Dutch Kuffner (wait; I can't call him that anymore.  From now on he's just plain old Shelly) as much grief as I could.  His company, after all, talks like it's trying to do the right thing.  In the words of Master Jedi Yoda; "Do or do not. There is no 'try' ".

And we are all well aware that Texas isn't going to be the leader in this effort.  Quite the opposite.



"Oil production at Permian Basin set to hit new record"

Methane leaking from old wells.  Plastics filling the oceans.  Micro-pieces of plastic in our bodies. PFAS in our drinking water.  Mountains of "fast fashion" piled high in the Chilean desert.  Big banks like Chase funding pipeline projects like Line 3 in the face of the most civil of disobedience.  The slow death of the planet, and us, is everywhere you look.

No wonder people are suffering from 'climate depression' and quitting their shitty minimum wage jobs.

With a couple of local takes ...

Hope Osborn at Texas 2036 looks ahead to the day when Texas is no longer reliant on oil and gas taxes to fund public schools.  (Might be pretty far down the list of things to worry about, since public schools, and/or the roads to get to them, will be flooded in a few years.  I'm guessing home schooling gets to be a bigger thing as more Republicans clamor for their tax cuts, too.)  David Collins seems to be feeling a little down, having been affected by the AstroworldFest tragedy and Glasgow.  Socratic Gadfly blogged about the latest in Texas-New Mexico water rights issues and other environment and climate news, and his thoughts on Glasgow COP26 were ... well, about as angry as mine.

It's time -- waaaay past time -- to rethink everything.


I'm also going to start voting like the people I love's lives depend on it.  And not like Barack Obama meant it, either.

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Thursday, November 18, 2021

The Thursday Credible Wrangle


Already this morning there's a Democrat preparing to challenge Jesus Shot Sid, but that's not relevant to me.  (I'm hoping Kenneth Kendrick is getting ready to launch his bid as a Green again.)  I'd like to know what Svitek's definition of 'credible' is.  Specifically how close it comes to Kuffner's, and whether it is dictated by the state's top oligarch, Evan Smith, Svitek's boss at the TexTrib).

Restating the obvious: I have less than zero interest in letting people like the afore-mentioned make the rules by which our governor, etc. are selected.  Call them what you will -- I prefer lickspittles, sometimes starfuckers -- by any definition they are limiting our choices to red pill or blue pill.  And it doesn't take a brain scientist or a rocket surgeon to look around and see where that has gotten us, and not just here in Deep In The Hearta.  These gatekeepers don't want to share, don't want competition for their affections, and damn sure don't want the great unwashed masses having any say-so.  So if you got the money, they got the time.  And if you don't, then heet de rhoad, Jack.

Listen up, bitches: either stop pretending and put the richest MFer in charge, somebody like Elon Musk or Kelcey Warren, or think about what a neo-Bastille Day might look like once the commoners' patience has red-lined.

Don't take it personally.  Strictly business.  The peoples' business.  Oh, and word to Svitek: your spreadsheet is woefully out of date.  Get your assistant on that toot sweet.


Another symptom of the insider establishment thumb on the scale.  I'm guessing Davis -- still feeling the sting from losing to Abbott in 2014 and Chip Roy in 2020 -- is just trying to get back in somebody's good graces.  As long as 'somebody' isn't a woman or outside the halls of power.


No more oligarchs, plutocrats, sycophants, party hacks, Republicans too embarrased to run as Rs, or anybody else in it for the money or the intoxication of authority.  Of the people, by the people, and for the people.  Or hit the reset button and start all over.

Moving on.


Incredible. I need to get offline.

Houston geologist, historian, musician, and author Dan Worrall will speak about the long distance trade routes among the Indigenous peoples through Texas and beyond.

The talk, titled “The Late Archaic Lower Brazos Culture and the Nature of Long Distance Exchange Networks”, is sponsored by the Houston Archeological Society.

Worrall will speak at the monthly (in person and virtual) meeting of the society on Thursday, Nov. 18, at 7:00 p.m. He will bring a collection of artifacts from a site in west Fort Bend County for show and tell.

According to Worrall, people of the Late Archaic Lower Brazos Culture (4,000-2,000 years ago) lived along the lower parts of the Brazos and Colorado Rivers extending to the coast. Their territory was approximately equivalent to that of the Coco/Karankawa of the early Historic Period (500 years ago).

The meeting takes place at the Trini Mendenhall Community Center, 1414 Wirt Road in Houston, starting at 6:30 p.m. The program begins at 7. Here is more information about the talk.

The meeting will be offered virtually via Zoom and YouTube Livestream. The YouTube Livestream link is https://youtu.be/xfCvhInhBp4.

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