Author: Dick

Our Texas Department of Transportation, the federal government, the combination of the two or someone is out there lost in the Field of Dreams. You know, “If you build it … “

A bit ago I was driving down the I-10 East access road in Beaumont between Martin Luther King and Magnolia. Now this area is kind of old, and in some place run down, while in other places hookers ply their trade on the streets. That’s not to say the whole area is bad. Now one thing this area has in common with a lot of our fair city is the lack of sidewalks. Many areas here are not so pedestrian friendly.

So had I not been watching our local KFDM Channel 6 News a couple of weeks ago I would have been plumb bumfuzzled (slang: baffled)at seeing a bunch of Hispanic guys in fluorescent vests this afternoon doing prep work to install wheelchair curb ramps in these areas along the I-10 access road. This is, to remind you, an area where the probability of sidewalks being built and attached to those ramps is on a par with a Blue Norther in Hades.

Channel 6 Reporter Ashley Gaston aptly labeled “the on-ramps to nowhere” which are being built all over town. Ashley interviewed a fellow in a wheelchair who was understandably indignant that his wife had to push him around to where he needed to go in a certain spot. The same spot where a curb ramp without a sidewalk had been built.

Local TxDOT spokesman Marc Shepherd told Channel 6 that the federal government had all of this money and the state had to spend it on curb ramps. You know, if they’ve got the money honey we’ve got the time — to spend it. The figure for building these ramps to nowhere that was quoted in the story was $1.4 million to build 600 such structures in our so-called “Golden Triangle” of Beaumont, Port Arthur and Orange area. However, I added up the bucks on the state transportation department’s “Project Tracker” and found a total of well more than $5 million. Now I must point out here that I am neither a mathematician nor a highway engineer (Thank heavens for small favors). So I might not be reading the money portion of the state’s On-Ramp to Nowhere Project correctly. If you are a retired engineer and have time to figure it out, then click here. Just don’t e-mail me and tell me what you figured out, okay? Thanks.

Now I suppose someday the money might come along which will connect all those curb ramps to sidewalks. Of course, it is likely in the realm of Murphy’s Law and government that the sidewalks and ramps will somehow not match up and end up costing millions more than was anticipated. Oh but it is the thought that counts, eh?

The big hoo hah on The Hill — that’s the one in Washington not the one Jack and Jill went up — is over the “stimulus package” being batted around by Congress. Stimulus package sounds dirty doesn’t it? Or it sounds like a package full of those little ol’ truck driving pills if you know what I mean.

But here is the problem with the $825 gazillion stimulus package: everybody and their chihuahua has a different vision as to what needs to be in the bill to stimulate the economy.

Al Gore — who as you all know invented the Internet (Gee Dubya Bush invented the Internets) — says some of that money should go to stave off global warming by abandoning this planet and moving the Earth’s people to Uranus.

House minority leader John Boehner, R-Toe Jam, Ohio, believes the money should be given to the top 5 percent of the nation’s wealthiest and spread among the Fortune 500. Oh and a 95 percent tax cut for the wealthiest would also be nice.

Down here in Southeast Texas there is a considerable difference of opinion as well over where the $825 megatillions should be parsed. Members of the rice industry say they need at least $825 billion. The refineries say they also need $825 billion. The local banks and credit unions expect to need exactly $825 billion. The hospitals say their figures show that they will just get by if only they can get $825 billion. The area’s thriving trial law industry said they need a boost of only $824.99 billion.

And what about the rest of the country?

Good point.

So we shall see how it goes and who gets the big prize. I could use a bailout myself. How much you ask? Oh, say $825 billion.

It seems you can’t turn on the television these days without seeing Illinois Gov.-Waiting-to-be-Canned Rod Blagojevich. What’s more, you can’t see Blago without his drawing upon a comparison with himself and some historic, sainted figure such as Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Nelson Mandela and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Of course, while he is out mugging for Larry King and The View — who’s next Al Jazeera? — the Illinois State Senate is deciding whether to throw Gov. Awesome Hair out on his keister. Note: Gov. Awesome Hair should not be confused with Texas Gov. Good Hair Rick Perry.

Should Rodney Boy somehow manage to ONLY find himself out of work and not in a federal prison for trying to sell President Obama’s Senate seat then perhaps Blagojevich might have a new career on the small screen. Just think about it. He’s got all that hair. He’s outrageous. He has an ego that probably only Bill O’Reilly or Rush Limbaugh could match. Perhaps he could stage a massive chair fight with Jerry Springer. Jumpin’ Julie in July! Is this a great country or what?

Four months have passed since I signed on to Twitter and I have six posts under my belt. Amazing productivity? You betcha Sarah Palin.

The problem is that I just haven’t figured a way to work Twitter into my life which is already filled with assorted technotivity (technical activity) such as this thing (EFD), Facebook, using a computer at work, other applications on my personal computer, my phone which doubles as a camera and camcorder, not to mention I have another blog sitting below this one on my Blogger profile just waiting for me to do something with it. I feel like I need to reboot my life.

I get what Twitter is. It is a microblog that allows communication within 140 words or less at a time. It was used quite extensively during the recent presidential inauguration. Every newspaper worth its salt and quite a few not worth a pepper had some local person Twittering from the Inauguration back to the home planet.

The trouble is, I just don’t know where Twitter might fit into MY life. And my pondering is all the more exasperating by learning that Twitter, the current big thing, isn’t making any money. What? Not making any money? Hell’s bells, even I make money. Not much money, but some.

The Motley Fool points, however, to Twitter being an emerging platform which could wind up in the money like Google and eBay. Maybe that’s the fact, perhaps Twitter is meant to be the latest Techno crack addiction, like the Crack Berry. Poor old Barack, our BlackBerry jonesin’ president, can’t even give it up. Part of my reticence toward Twitter could be that I am afraid that if I start obsessive use of Twitter, the powers that be will start charging for it and I will have to shell out bucks for it.

Until I figure out what if anything I can do with Twitter, it will just have to remain a dormant non-obsession in my once simple world now overrun with all types of technocrap. Tweet. Tweet.

Lou Dobbs and U.S. Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas.

Two peas in a right-wing pod.

My mind is turning over at the moment the thought of whether I should unsubscribe to e-mail from the person who “represents” me in the U.S. House. That would be Ted Poe from the Houston area. I use the quotation marks because Poe represents me in Congress only by virtue of the fact he was elected — with no help from me — and that his being in the House is a matter of Constitutional fact. However, in the use of the word “represent” in which one speaks on my behalf, Poe certainly does not fill that bill.

Nonetheless, I continue to receive e-mail from him because I want to see what kind of claptrap he is up to and to take the opportunity to criticize him for his shortcomings. After all he does “represent” me in Congress.

Poe notes with pride in his message that he has been anointed as “Deputy Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee Crime Subcommittee.” That means he is the number two Republican member of the subcommittee which he says handles most legislation on border security and victims’ rights. The border, of course, is a big thing with Poe. The former judge who came up with all kinds of ways in sentencing criminals which would get his name in the media was one of the cheerleaders for having the two convicted border patrol agents released from prison. GW Bush commuted those criminals’ sentences before he left office Tuesday. Strike one blow for law and order!

During his campaign to free border agent-convicted criminals Ramos and Compean, Poe spent an inordinate amount of time on right-wing talk shows such as that of CNN’s Lou Dobbs and any other nut job Poe could get his mug on. It’s so nice to know Poe can represent the people of El Paso, almost 800 miles away from his own district, so well while his own constituents need assistance for little things like FEMA housing and help with veterans benefits.

Poe also predicts the end of mankind as we know it if President Obama goes ahead with his plans to close the detention facility for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay. The last president and his evil puppet-master Dick Cheney had that facility used because it wasn’t on U.S. soil, thus thinking we wouldn’t have to give prisoners such niceties as human rights, we could torture them and we could ensure they have fair trials in which they would end up guilty and executed. Here is what Poe says about Gitmo:

“I have toured prisons all around the world and I have personally visited the Guantanamo Bay facility. I can assure you this facility is more than acceptable to house terrorist suspects. In my opinion, it is far too nice for the ‘worst-of-the-worst’.”

What kind of facility would you suggest for terror suspects Judge? Should they be hung outside in frozen weather on meat hooks? Should they be beaten every day? Should they be put in a dingy little room 24/7 and be forced to listen to recordings of your speeches?

Poe has introduced legislation which would prevent suspected terrorists from being imprisoned in the U.S. Hmmm. It seemed U.S. federal prisons were good enough to hold the likes of domestic terrorist monsters such as Timothy McVeigh and Ted Kaczynski as well as Islamist terrorist Omar Abdel-Rahman, the so-called “Blind Sheikh who was convicted of the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993.

I would be willing to bet given the political climate right now that Poe’s “big time” stature as being a 2nd-in-command on the minority side on a congressional subcommittee might not be enough to guarantee passage of such a bill with a predominantly Democratic House, Senate and not to mention a Democratic president who has a mandate to shut down the Gitmo prison. I could be wrong though.

In the meantime, I guess I will humor Poe by continue receiving his e-mails until they just get too damn silly for me to read without upchucking.