Eight Feet Deep

Texas Gov. Rick Perry fends off questions as to his sanity.

Texas Gov. Rick “I’ve Got Hair” Perry may have produced the most notable noise for yesterday’s so-called “TEA Parties.” Perry told a crowd in Austin — frightened that proposed tax increases on the richest Americans might somehow prevent them from owning AK-47s — that Texas could secede if it wanted to.

“Texas is a unique place. When we came into the union in 1845, one of the issues was that we would be able to leave if we decided to do that,” Perry said. “My hope is that America and Washington in particular pays attention. We’ve got a great union. There’s absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, who knows what may come of that.”

Unfortunately for the dumb-as-a-box-of-rocks demagogue imitating a Texas governor, he was wrong about the state’s ability to leave the union. Oh well, I mean my state could leave the union as it did in 1861 during a war in which somewhere near 620,000 of our countrymen were killed. But if you’ve ever even touched a U.S. history book you might know how secession worked out for Texas and the rest of the remaining confederate states.

As Houston Chronicle writer R.G.Ratcliffe pointed out yesterday and something I wish more media types would have taken note of, Texas has the ability due to its admission deal with the U.S. to divide itself into five separate states, not to secede from the union.

Oops! But why let something strikingly erroneous, not to mention seditious, interfere when Perry is clearly playing to a crowd that includes racists and his like-minded reprobates when he he appears to be in for the political fight for his life in the governor’s race with U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey “Sis Boom Bah” Hutchison?

Now as I previously mentioned, Perry’s speech may not have overtly urged the overthrow of the U.S. government but it planted a very potent seed which could germinate in the minds of many of the lamebrains who cheered the governor on during his speech Wednesday. Maybe it’s just me but when the governor of the nation’s second largest state in both population and area advocates toppling the U.S. government, wouldn’t that send some kind of negative signal to the men and women who are fighting for their country (including Texas) in places the last administration sent us such as Afghanistan and Iraq? What about young Texas soldiers? What are they supposed to think?

I guess the fact that Perry said what he said in Texas instead of on an overseas stage makes his language okay with his fellow Republicans unlike when Texan Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks said her group was ashamed George W. Bush was from Texas. Those utterances, of course, prompted outrage by the likes of Sean Hannity leaving the Dixie Chicks facing a McCarthy-era-like blacklist and boycott for awhile. How soon we forget, huh?

Well it doesn’t matter when it comes to Republican politics which is what all of this — TEA Day, Rick Perry’s Dixie Chicks moment and the rest of the crap that goes with it — is. I guess the truth and fair play has no part when a segment of society is given a bill of goods such as those who felt they had to protest the “heavy-hand” of the federal government. The only alternative is for the ultra right wing of the Republican party to grow more angry and alienated from the GOP.

Although I am a native Texan — and still proud to be one despite foolish statements such as that by Gov. Good Hair — I am foremost an American. I served my country once and even though I am arthritic and falling apart after five decades, I would do it again if I had to do so.

 
Army photo by Sgt. Christopher T. Sneed.

For those who are protesting taxes and government spending today here is a little reminder of what your tax dollars buy, courtesy of Combat Outpost Narizah, Afghanistan.

Several conservative groups are trying to pretend that tomorrow’s so-called “Tea Parties” to protest government spending is some big earth-shattering movement. But don’t be surprised if the only ones who see it that way after it is all said and done is Fox News.

Once the cameras go away and the politicians leave after their little speeches it would not be surprising to see that the tea parties had zero effect on government, our way of life or anything else of substance.

As many of you realize, the pitiful right-wingers are at their nitwit’s end. They can’t do anything to get a break. Even when they jump up and down and get all “24”ish and say the military is too slow to shoot the pirates who were holding the kidnapped American merchant captain, along comes SEAL snipers and simultaneously take out three pirates while safely rescuing the captain. Thus, the military and, subsequently President Obama, steals the right’s thunder (once again).

The right has long led the nation’s silliness factor when it comes to politics or anything else practically. (Remember “Freedom Fries?”) The tea party is just more of the same old same old coming from the silly wing of the Republican Party.

It amazes me how people in business get away with outright rudeness these days. Here is a forinstance (yes I am aware how I spelled “forinstance” — I’m not in business here, I can afford to be rude). As part of my job I called a business today which does tax returns to get some information. Now I realize this is the busiest time of the year for such businesses. But the fact is, I get this same information from the business every couple of months, plus my deadline for passing along this information is Thursday and the information I seek — when I ask the person I normally deal with — takes only five seconds to confirm.

But the person I normally deal with couldn’t talk until next week, or so said the receptionist. She finally put me on the phone with her boss who barely heard three words out of my mouth before slamming the phone down on me.

I realize these people are busy, but I am not calling for frivolous reasons plus I do so every two months and not to mention the fact these people have agreed to provide us with the specific information we are looking for.

I put such experiences in the context of the work I used to do as a newspaper reporter. It was similar in ways to the part-time work I do now in that it can be telephone-intensive. Also, regardless of one’s schedule sometimes, the caller’s deadline is not going to go away nor can it wait.

Personally, I didn’t like getting calls when I was on deadline either. And especially was that the case with some of the callers I got such as those who had long-winded stories about how some government officials and a secret cabal of multimillionaire merchants were conspiring against them. But sometimes I just had to sit there and take it and slap myself silly to keep me from shouting obscenities at the person on the other end of the line. Why would I do that? Well, it’s called business. It’s called human decency.

There really isn’t a lot of sense in being rude no matter how much you want to be. It might make you feel better temporarily, but in the end what does it really accomplish? You pig-headed, pea-brained hyena.

Tomorrow is my annual family reunion. Since it is being held at my brother’s place in Brenham, Texas, (Yes home of Blue Bell ice cream), I decided to skip getting up ultra early for a three-hour drive and stay in a motel about halfway, alongside I-45 in Conroe, just 40 miles or so north of Houston.

I’m staying at a Motel 6 and I’m not ashamed to say it. I am not ashamed to say I only payed $38 for a simple, clean room. But my stay has started on a rocky start. I was in the vending room about 30 minutes ago and slipped on a slick spot. I managed to stay upright but could feel a sharp pain shoot through my left hamstring. Now my hammie and left butt cheek just kind of hurts, as does my back and foot and probably as time goes on, my whole body. That wasn’t what I needed. I hope things will be better in the morning. Sometimes they are.

Happy Easter from Butt-Busting, Texas.