Dang, I missed it. And I reeeeeeally need me some rattlesnake, too :(

Why didn't one of you remind me?  You know I'm bad about remembering dates.  Two weeks ago was the Sweetwater Jaycees 56th annual Rattlesnake Roundup.  And for the 56th consecutive year I missed it.  DOH!

 

This is a Western Diamondback rattlesnake.  This is what the mean, nasty little bastards look like. 

  

And people really do go out and "round them up".  But not me.  I don't have the requisite rattlesnake tattoo or the decided bravery / lack of good sense it demands.

Sweetwater is just west of Abilene, TX, which is quite a ways west of Foat Wuth, which is just 30 miles west of Dallas.  It's in West Texas, an area my dad always said he would be happy to give back to the Indians if they would take it.  It's sparsely populated, and yes, rattlesnakes really do outnumber people there by a wide margin.

For me West Texas is a love / hate sort of place.  I went to college there (in Lubbock) and had a great time, probably due to the fact that it was 363 miles away (or as my Yankee friends might say, "4 states over") from my parents. 

 

On the negative side, they have some killer dust storms there.  Today the fancy-pants meteorologists call them "haboobs".  We always just called them dust storms 'cause we giggled when we said "haboobs".

And there are lots of rattlesnakes out there.  I cringe now thinking about all the times I went backpacking and rock climbing in Palo Duro Canyon; I was probably within easy striking distance for some of the little bastards, but never realized it at the time.  Ignorance really IS bliss.  :)

Now I read there is a big controversy regarding how the rattlesnake roundup-ers round up their rattlers.  It was apparently common for them to pump gasoline fumes into the little underground dens where the reptiles resided, which brought them to the surface and easy capture. 

Now the PETA folks say that's cruel and unusual punishment and want it stopped.  I say getting bitten by a 5' long rattlesnake is cruel and unusual, too, so go protest THAT! 

I hardly think killing off a few thousand rattlesnakes is going to put them on the endangered list.  It would be like saying putting out a few thousand rat traps is going to eradicate all the rats in NYC.  Ha....NOT!

As you might imagine, the state licensed rattlesnake catchers are incensed.  (So if Gov Rick "Pretty Boy" Perry is so against government regulation, why do rattlesnake catchers have to be licensed?)  

*sigh*  I dunno.  I'll let the scientist-types decide this one.  I'm gonna try and not think about it and instead go have me some fried rattlesnake for dinner.  What's that?  We're fresh out of rattlesnake?  OK then, I'll just have chicken.  :)

S

He 'da man....

....that would be Willard Mitt Romney, according to the voters in last night's Iowa caucus.  He nosed out Rick Santorum, who is vying with Michele Bachman to come across as the rightest of the right wingers.  She crashed and burned, leaving her free to go home and have a Tea Party.  Good 'ol Ron Paul still makes good sense now and then, in between lapses into mild insanity, and did well in Iowa, too.  And thankfully Iowans saw Newt "I'm different now, trust me" Gingrich as what he is, a hypocrite of the highest order, and Rick "look at my cool hair" Perry as simply a doofus.


Willard...er...Mitt should do well in New Hampshire, while Rick will feel right at home in South Carolina.  Ron has fringe appeal everywhere.  Of those, who is actually electable?  I'm guessing Willard Mitt. (Doh....I hate it when I do that!)  His past is liberal enough to be able to appeal to middle-of-the-roaders, and of course he has Wall Street money in his corner.  His buddies there are already salivating over their soon-to-be-swelled-even-more bonuses. Dom Perigone anyone?


Here's what concerns me:  If Republicans keep their majority in the House of Representatives and can gain control of the Senate (heaven forbid gaining a veto-proof 60 votes), AND see their nominee (Mitt?) win the White House, it will be seen as a mandate for the kind of hands-off / business-as-usual governing that gave us the economic debacle of '08.  The rich will get richer, while you and I....well, you know how that turned out.  Even with partisan politics being as rancorous as they are today, I think we need to split power between the parties.  The gridlock would be hell, but IMHO giving EITHER party a blank check to run the country as they saw fit would be even more disastrous.  What's so wrong with compromise?


What say you?


S

Rudderless

Now for my expert opinion on this year's crop of Presidential candidates:  They suck.  We're screwed.  Now back to you in the studio....


Oh, OK.  Details....Mitt Romney is one of "them", the hedge fund/speculator/big money crowd that I generically call "The Bankers".  That's his background, those are his financial backers, and that's who he'll fall in line with if he's elected.   He likes to point out that in his former stint at Bains Capital he created a lot of jobs, but there's ample evidence his stable of companies were net job losers.  Sorry Mitt, but we've given The Bankers free reign before, and look where that got us.  No thanks.


Newt Gingrich....narcissist, hypocrite, dangerously smart, totally shameless.  He, probably more than anyone else in Congress back in the 90's when he was Speaker of the House, empowered The Bankers to run crazy.  He's not even well thought of in his own party.  Remember the attempted coup by a sizable number of his fellow Republicans to oust him as Speaker?  He tells us he's "reformed" and we can trust him to lead us out of the economic mess we're in.  Hell, he couldn't even pay his own Tiffany's bill without collecting $1.6M from Freddie Mac for "consulting".  *wink*  Umm....no.


Ron Paul....the only one of the bunch I respect.  He'll take a stand on an issue, regardless of how unpopular, and stick with it, the polls be damned.  I admire that.  I even like some of his positions.  Most, however, are way out there.   Not electable at all.


Rick Perry....where do I start?  Smartly dressed, great hair, dumber than a box of rocks.  He wants to bring the hammer down on "those Pakastani countries".  Huh?


Santorum, Bachmann, that guy from Utah....not even on the radar.


Which leaves us Barack Obama.  An incredible orator, a graduate of the Jimmy Carter School of Leadership, totally ineffective.  He's much too liberal to be able to work with any Republican (as much their fault as his), and even a sizable number of Democrats keep their distance from him.  Click here to see what commentator Chris Matthews, a "liberal's liberal", has to say about him.  Can you imagine how ineffective he'll be in a second term as a lame duck?  Ouch!  Why is it an incumbent President gets an automatic pass by his own party to run unopposed?


Where are the LEADERS?


That's why today I'm announcing....  :)


S

The REAL Rick Perry

Now that Texas' Governor Rick Perry has announced his candidacy for president I'm sure the airwaves will be inundated with misinformed 30-second sound bites about our esteemed governor.  Let me tell you a few things you're probably not going to hear about Mr. Perry from his supporters.


First and foremost he's an opportunist.  He is quick to jump on what the prevailing poll sentiment says is currently popular....until the poll numbers change next week.  He's masterfully played up his reputation for fiscal conservatism to the Tea Party-ers, although his 10-year record as governor doesn't match his rhetoric.  When he became governor in 2000 Texas state debt was just over $13B ($16B in 2011 dollars allowing for inflation).  Today it's over $35B.  Ouch!


He'll tell you that under his leadership Texas' economy has thrived, and that 40% +/- of all jobs created in the US in the past several years have been in Texas.  True, BUT he doesn't tell you that the vast majority of those jobs are low-paying with few if any benefits.


So why have we thrived?  We're sitting on an ocean of oil and natural gas, and with crude prices around $100 a barrel, it would be hard NOT to thrive.  Remember NAFTA....the North American Free Trade Agreement?  It opened up a torrent of cheap imports from south of the Rio Grande border, and those imports are shipped straight up the middle of Texas to points north, which means jobs.  It's simple geography.  (And remember, NAFTA predated Rick Perry's governorship by a decade.)  Rick Perry has simply been at the right place at the right time.  


Remember all the fuss over the abuse of Eminent Domain, the legal tool used to take people's property if it's for the "public good" (such as for a school)?  Perry gets really bent-out-of-shape over that one....never mind that he once proposed the Trans-Texas Corridor, a half-mile-wide strip of confiscated land all the way from Mexico to Oklahoma and beyond that was going to be developed for highway/rail/data transmission, the rights to do so sold to a private (and foreign at that) FOR-PROFIT group.  Seems he overstepped his bounds on that one and was slapped down by the people when they found out about it.


Perry likes to tell the story of how he got in Barack Obama's face saying, "if you can't police our borders, WE can" (or something close).  Lots of talk, very little action.  Why?  Cheap labor fuels all those new low-paying jobs he's so proud of.  Business interests bluster a lot, but deep down they LOVE all that cheap labor.  REAL immigration reform isn't going to happen if Perry is elected president.  (Sorry Tea Party.)


His supporters will point out that he'll be a powerful national candidate because he's a prodigious fund-raiser.  Or to put it another way, he's never met a PAC (political action committee) he didn't like.  (See "Trans-Texas Corridor" above.)  He once proposed that it be mandatory that all little girls be vaccinated against PVM (a virus linked to cervical cancer).  Conservatives objected loudly about the intrusion on people's parental rights and he backed down.  Oh....and it was discovered that Perry's former Chief-of-Staff was then actively lobbying for his new employer Merck (pharmaceutical), the ONLY maker of an approved PVM vaccine at the time. *cha-ching*


He is a master practitioner of patronage, too.  After 10 years in office he has packed every department, commission, committee, college Board of Regents....even 6 of our 9 Supreme Court justices.  The size of our state government has grown MUCH faster than our increase in population would suggest it should.  So much for "smaller government".   (I guess the Tea Party missed that.)


So don't we here in Texas love him?  I mean, we've elected him governor 3 times.  Um...news flash:  Anyone running for statewide office in Texas with an "R" beside their name is pretty much a shoe-in.


So should you vote for him?  I dunno.  That's your choice.  He's a snake, a worm, a liar, or as those types are commonly  called today, a "politician".  Is he any better or worse than any of the rest?  Probably not.  But if you do vote for him, don't expect him to be a pure ideological standard bearer adoring supporters can rally around.  Best case he might be the least objectionable.  Worst case....?  Just go in with your eyes wide open, and don't turn your back on him.


On a positive note, he does have that most essential presidential qualification of all:  good hair.  ;)


S

"There's one born every minute" according to TX Governor Rick Perry

It worked for PT Barnum, and Texas Governor Rick Perry is hoping it will work for him, too.  Specifically, he's been the driving force behind a Christian revival scheduled for Houston's Reliant Stadium in August.  This is the same Rick Perry who DEFINITELY WILL NOT run for president....oh, wait, probably won't run for president....OK, he'll now consider running for president.  


I've never seen a more blatant, shameless, fishing-for-votes ploy. If he can pack the place and get 'em to crying like babies, then he'll be the darling of the evangelical right.  And he'll ride that pony all the way to the primaries next spring.  


Lemme fill you in on Governor Rick Perry:  He's a SNAKE!  He'll kiss your baby, steal your wallet, and feel up your wife at the same time, all while smiling and telling you what you want to hear.  He's been governor for the past 11 years, with 4 more on the way, only because Texas is a heavily Republican state.  Heck, that Weiner fella from NY could be elected governor of Texas if he'd put a "R" beside his name.


Now I'm all for Christians.  I are one.  But I wouldn't go to that revival for fear of being struck by lightning.  Or having my wife felt up.  (He's already picked my pocket.)  


Trust me...find someone else to vote for.


S