Friday, December 31, 2021

Wrangling 2021


I suppose the best we can say about the year ending today is that we lived through it, if only because so many who should have did not.


If the Texas Progressive Alliance had selected a Texan of the Year for 2021, my vote would have gone to Dr. Peter Hotez.


InnovationMap had Houston's top three COVID research stories.  I hope the 'rona and its latest mutation is not the most important story next year.  The climate crisis should be.  Maybe it will.


SocraticGadfly noted that Ronny Jackson and other Texas wingnut Congresscritters want to fight the effects of climate change, but only when it affects cops, and without admitting that the likes of Winter Storm Uri are connected.  The Concho Valley Homepage reported that the USGS recorded one of the largest earthquakes ever in the Permian Basin last Monday.  And Earth911 offers ten green living New Year's resolutions.


Texas will be changing enormously in the years to come.  All of us -- wherever we fall on the political spectrum -- are hoping the changes favor our points of view.


But the San Antonio Current quotes a recent report that advises liberty lovers to move somewhere else, ranking Texas 49th in personal freedoms.

Whatever the evolving demographics portend for the Lone Star State, we'll still have to deal with those who are stuck on stupid.  COVID isn't going to kill 'em all.


I'll be surprised if this remark does not cost Chairman Padron his job.


Still think they're both losers.

Here's a few criminal and social justice updates.


Mark Pitcavage presents some random facts about white supremacist tattoos.  Mandy Giles is now blogging at Parents of Trans Youth.  And as promised, some lists.

The Texas Observer submits its ten best longform reads of the year.  Politico collected the worst predictions of 2021.  The San Antonio Express News had all the spooky and strange things.  And Texas Freedom Network rounded up the ten best and worst from the Lege.

A few political items, and the soothers to close out the year.

Kuff covered a couple more redistricting lawsuits; a new one filed by Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer over CD35, and an earlier one filed by a state prison inmate objecting to the practice of counting inmates where they are incarcerated rather than where they live.   IPR opened a time capsule:

Prohibitionist Andrew Jackson Houston, son of the legendary Sam Houston, the hero of San Jacinto and first president of the Lone Star Republic, died in a Baltimore hospital on June 26, 1941.

Two months before his death, the 87-year-old Houston had been appointed to the U.S. Senate by Gov. “Pappy” O’Daniel to fill a vacancy created by the death of Democratic Sen. Morris Sheppard, who died of a brain hemorrhage on April 9.

Houston, who authored several books on Texas history and taught military science at St. Mary’s University on Trinity Bay, had been the Prohibition Party’s candidate for governor of Texas on two occasions. He also briefly challenged popular 1908 nominee Eugene W. Chafin for the dry party’s presidential nomination in 1912 -- the same year Roosevelt himself had snorted and thundered against the two-party establishment on his newly-formed Bull Moose ticket.

Houston was a Democrat at the time of his surprise Senate appointment on April 21, 1941.


Reform Austin introduced us to some school librarians who are fed up with and fighting back against book bans.  And Susan Hays and nonsequiteuse eulogized Sarah Weddington.

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Monday, December 27, 2021

The Between Holidays Wrangle from Far Left Texas


As we come to the end of another calendar I'll collect some listicles of noteworthy people and events from the past 12 months in a year-end Wrangle.  Today I'm playing ketchup.


As stated before, I favor mask requirements by public and private orgs but not vax mandates.


Moving on to the political happenings before and after the Yule.


Ted Cruz doesn't just want to be the '24 GOP nominee, he expects to be.


We'll see what we can do about that.

Here's a few news items about Lone Star Republicans and Democrats who definitely made Santa's 'naughty' list.


And some on the 'nice' list.


Which provides the segue to the social and criminal justice updates.


Background, ICYMI:


The other environmental headlines.


Influential Texans who departed us over the weekend.


US Rep. Colin Allred:

Texas was home to Sarah Weddington who argued Roe, which no longer exists here. A Texan, LBJ, enshrined voting rights but we're now the hardest state in the country to vote. Our history provides hope for our future. We must keep fighting for a better Texas.


And the calm-me-downs to close today.

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Sunday, December 26, 2021

Sunday 'Christmas Returns' Funnies

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Tuesday, December 21, 2021

Another Wrangle Before Christmas


Don't forget the tamales on Taco Tuesday.

A few items to update from yesterday:


Some 'old business' I'm behind on.


One piece of new business, from the border.


And if you really want to know what lies Trump fed his rain-soaked lackeys in Houston and Dallas over the weekend, there you go.


And the criminal and social justice developments, not all of them bad.


I was impressed that what might have been -- in an earlier time -- the lede regarding the Chron's new publisher was buried.

Meyer and her wife, Melissa Macri, plan to move to the Houston area from Miami in the coming months.


Unfortunately that's it for the good news.


And to segue to the soothers: Higher education at last.


Ending today with notable Texans who left us recently.

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