Category: Politics

Shortly after I all but anointed Jon Huntsman Jr. as the Great White Hope of the 2012 Republican presidential crop, up pops our own Texas Gov. Good Hair Perry everywhere lookin’ as if he is going to put his dung-covered cowboy boots in the race.

That’s right, Rick did it all because of me. He said: “I’m gonna get that s**t-bird reporter who suggested to my press guy during a visit to Fort Hood that I get photographed riding on a tank like Mike Dukakis.”

News has been mixed to say the least at Perry feeling out the GOP nomination trail.

“The field is already pretty full,” said Texas Mr. Republican Sen. John Cornyn. He praised Perry’s abilities, yadda, yadda, yadda, but he said he’d leave it up to Perry as to whether he should run.

I mean, read the whole thing in the Houston Chronicle, but the gist is that it doesn’t sound like Big Bad John is all in for Good Hair.

The man who was the de facto head of the Republican Party awhile back, Rush Limburger, wants Perry to run. That endorsement should be enough to make any sane man or woman stop and say: “Whoa, pardner!”

Of course, a lot of the Texas media want to go hit the national campaign trail even though they may be riding buses instead of flying on big old jet airliners.

Perry is beginning to look like one of those, albeit washed-up, television evangelists what with his all of a sudden turning on of religiosity. But Rick is the same old Rick he’s been since, at least he was, lieutenant governor. He is a slick Willie. Maybe he doesn’t cheat on his wife or text his private parts to young women but some of the things Perry has done — Google Rick Perry — make him more fit as a used car salesman (sorry, I didn’t mean to insult used car salesmen) than as governor and certainly as president. They shoot coyotes don’t they?

Perry might end up as the bookend to a Jon Huntsman Jr. ticket that I spoke of yesterday or whomever else might end up wearing the GOP throne. Let’s hope that will be the contribution Rick Perry makes to the national Republican effort, one as a VP candidate. Then, let’s hope and make an effort to ensure he and whomever he pairs with loses the race. And if the Republicans win and Rick Perry ends up vice president, maybe some prayers will be in order for that president’s continuing health.

The Texas Legislature is getting down “M.C. Hammer” style as they open a new Special Session after the Regular Session ended. That first session was one in which Gov. Good Hair made sure he had bills covering all his political bases locked and loaded. Taking sonograms of fetuses before abortions was an emergency for legislators. The emergency of school funding in shambles was not.

Hammer’s 1990 song “U Can’t Touch This”came to mind because one of the bills that may be laid out for the Lege in the Special Session would prevent airport security people from grabbing people below the waist. Yes, the U Can’t Touch This Bill may rise from the legislative grave. I speak of the bill that would “create a misdemeanor offense for government employees who touch a person’s anus, breasts, genitals or body in an “offensive or provocative” manner before granting admittance to a public facility,” according to the The Texas Tribune.

The bill succumbed in what seemed like a sensible death in the Texas Senate after the federal government threatened to close Texas airports had the bill passed. Had such a restriction been passed for police, as they were about to search a suspect on the side of the road or in a law enforcement office or jail, I’m sure the bill would have dropped faster than one of my cell phone calls.

Offensive as it seems for Transportation Security Administration workers or those private security personnel who handle the same duties at certain other airports to search an old lady or a baby or even an airline pilot, no one seemed to really mind it so much after those planes hit the World Trade Center, The Pentagon and that field in Pennsylvania on 9/11/01.

I have never been frisked by a TSA person even though I’ve had my disagreements with some. Last week when I traveled to and from Kansas City I had a lengthy jaunt through the X-ray machines what with a CPAP and two computers. I ended up using eight containers to put all my stuff in before they went through the machines, leaving my shoes for last. The Kansas City airport (MCI) has its security operated by a private contractor. I don’t know why, but they seemed exceptionally nice during this visit. The lady checking the IDs was just as sweet as she could be.

These bills to prohibit “groping” by airport security are among the most ridiculous examples of Puritanism that can be found since Puritanism was cool. Such proposals make its Tea Party proponents seem like they might easily coexist with theTaliban.

So, my suggestion, and I think it one worthy of consideration, is to send all of these Dark Ages Americans to the mountains between Pakistan and Afghanistan and let them bear witness as missionaries to the Taliban. Who knows what either side might find. Just one thing to remember, no back slapping the Talilban and no crotch-grabbing the Tea Partiers.