The Texafication of the USA

[rainbow4321]

And it is not in a good way....


http://www.texasobserver.org/showArticle.asp?ArticleID=1829


Driving north of Austin toward Dallas during the early days of my work on the Observer, suddenly I had one of those counterintuitive ideas that chill your brain. Could it be, I thought, that instead of what we’re working for—Texas growing into a more just, less racist place—the opposite will happen? The United States will become just like greedy, reactionary, racist, poverty-blighted, religion-ridden Texas? It was one of the clichés among us on the Observer that we were dragging our state, kicking and screaming, into the 20th century. But lo and behold, as of November 2nd this year, Texas has dragged the United States back into the 19th.
<snip>

When we started out, the major oil companies ruled the politics and politicians of the state. The Texas Railroad Commission served as the production regulator for the international oil cartel. Today the president from Texas and his vice-president from Halliburton and Brown & Root rule the United States, gutting renewable energy projects while promoting coal power and reviving nuclear power, and, as if in our names, waging an illegal war of aggression against 25 million Iraqis 6,000 miles away, half of them aged 14 years or under, to get control of their oil and join the Bushes’ special ally, Saudi Arabia, in fixing the prices for the same international oil cartel.

<snip>

Those days in politics, as Lyndon Johnson once said to me in the White House about Brown & Root, “It was all cash.” The legislature and the governor’s mansion were servants’ quarters for the corporations and the multimillionaires. Only about 30 rebels in the House of 150 members and a few in the Senate actively, if hopelessly, defended the public interest. In 2004, for the first time, the spending in the race for U.S. president broke a billion dollars, and total federal election spending for the year—most of it, of course, money from the rich and the corporations—fell just shy of four billion dollars. As I asked “What Corrupted Texas?” in Harper’s Magazine in 1957, so now we must ask “What Corrupted the United States?” Big corporations and big money corrupted Texas then and big corporations and big money have corrupted the United States now.

[stevietheman]

1. It seems to me that the real solution to our problems...

is to jettison Texas. Force them to secede. After all, if you think about it, it's where most of our country's problems come from.

[LSparkle]

3. Heck, they used to be their own Republic

and they're probably finding it hard to be just one of 50 states anyway. Bon voyage, anes!

[ashling]

4. It seems to me

that a true progressive could try to work for a truly inclusive than the knee jerk exclusionary "us against them solution you espouse."
Your reaction is no less simplistic and short sighted than the crowd we are both fighting against.

[stevietheman]

7. If you took my suggestion seriously, then...

well, you know... how could anyone be serious with a suggestion like what I made?

However, I wouldn't shed any tears if Texas itself decides to pull out. That would be so much like withdrawing a 12 inch schlong from the country's ass, where (do I need mention) there has been no lube.

[McKenzie]

2. "If I owned Hell and Texas,

I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas." - General Sherman

[BlueMole]

5. Sherman was right

We should give Texas back to Mexico. Heh Heh

[winston61]

8. look at the demographics- hoo boy!

It won't be necessary to give Texas back to Mexico. If the Hispanic population continues to grow at present rate, in about 25 years the majority population in great lone star state will be of Mexican descent. When I remind Bubba of this, his just about swallows his Copenhagen. But the truth is that Texas is the National Laboratory for Bad Government. If they tried in Texas and it turned to shit, you can bet it won't be long till the rest of the country has it shoved down their throat.

[bpcmxr]

6. Great article.

Thanks for posting!

[teryang]

9. Will happen??????? n/t

[frustrated_lefty]

10. Screw the red states

let them suffer their own demise. You bought it, live with it. Fuck them.