Sovereignty, Secession, and the Nutty Right Wing

Many right-wingers rightfully ridiculed some celebrities on the left who threatened to move out of the United States if George W. Bush was elected President in 2000. But now, many righty politicians are doing things that are even more bizarre. Upset with the Democratic administration's policies, these nutty politicians are threatening to take their ball and go home. Last month, Texas Governor Rick Perry threw support behind HCR 50, a resolution in the Texas House of Representatives that asserts the state's sovereignty. (He also uses the oft-used, but false analogy of how to boil a frog).



Now, last Wednesday, the Oklahoma Senate has passed HCR 1028, a similar resolution to the one in Texas. How the Senate passes a resolution of the House seems odd to me. In any case, the verbiage of the resolution states that the Sooner State is "claiming sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over certain powers; serving notice to the federal government to cease and desist certain mandates; providing that certain federal legislation be prohibited or repealed; and directing distribution.”

The resolution, also passed the Oklahoma House 73-22 on May 4th. It does not require a signature from the Governor.

Kurt Hochenauer, creator of the political blog Okie Funk: Notes From The Outback, has a good analysis on his site. He correctly notes that if Oklahoma were to secede from the United States, it would lead to military confrontation, widespread poverty, and a mass exodus from the state. I would add that if Oklahoma wants to leave the US, it had better make doggone sure that Texas goes with it, otherwise it will be a landlocked nation surrounded by the U.S.

Hochenauer also has posted an audio clip from Montel Williams' radio program where he interviews Charles Key, the Oklahoma City Republican Representative who introduced the resolution in the House. Williams calls Key on the fact that Oklahoma pays $19-Billion in federal taxes, but receives $28 billion in federal funding per year. So Oklahoma, good luck with that.

I don't think that either state will actually secede over this, any more than Alec Baldwin left the US over the Bush presidency. But it does demonstrate the lack of rational thinking within the minds of some elected officials in red-state America.

A Scofflaw in Texas!

This is a photo I took last week of a Lexus driving east on Richmond Avenue in Houston. It drew my attention, as it was a European-style plate, but had a Texas flag on it. Now I know that Texas allows its drivers to order a wide variety of custom plates on myplates.com, but I have never seen one of these.

Well, as it turns out, a quick Google search yielded the site this was obviously purchased from. What is interesting is that these are novelty plates only, and are not to be used in place of the state-sanctioned plates. In fact, the site that manufactures these has a warning about this on one of their pages, seen here.




So, obviously we have a case of someone thinking they are above the law. But the way I see people driving in Houston, I doubt that is an infrequent feeling amongst the motorists there.

Even Sweeter in Sugar Land

The Associated Press is reporting that 5,000 gallons of sticky, sweet molasses spilled from a tanker truck on to Texas Highway 6 at the Southwest Freeway (US 59) in Sugar Land yesterday afternoon. What could be a more perfect place for molasses to spill than a place named for sugar?

This particular intersection is one I have been through countless times. In fact, below is a photo of the intersection that I posted a while back on this very blog. I used to frequent a coffee shop at the corner to make use of their wi-fi connections while visiting my parents in nearby Houston. Sadly, The Coffee Groundz closed this location. I guess they, like many small businesses, just couldn't make a go of it.


Intersection of Texas Highway 6 and US 59 Southwest Freeway in Sugar Land

The Ongoing I-69 Project

The ongoing project to extend Interstate Highway 69 south from Indianapolis to the Texas-Mexico border continues to move along slower than rush hour traffic. The plan has been surrounded by a number of controversies, with people fighting against it for anti-NAFTA reasons to conspiracy theories to environmental opposition. In Texas, the project is the Trans-Texas Corridor, and will run southwestward from Texarkana to an eventual triple fork running to the towns of Laredo, McAllen, and Brownsville, all on the Rio Grande and the Mexican border.

The Houston Chronicle reports today that TxDOT has changed plans to route the highway through rural areas to the north and west of Houston, instead using existing US 59 (the Southwest and Eastex Freeways), the 610 Look (West Loop and North Loop), or the Grand Parkway (Texas 99). Through most of the state, US 59 will become the new I-69, and while much upgrading is needed, a lot of this highway is already up to Interstate standards, particularly in the Houston area.

However, running the new "I" either straight through on US 59, or worse, putting it on 610 (the busiest highway in Texas, and possibly the U.S.) seems to me to be a bad idea. If this gets Grand Parkway completed, it will be a much better routing, in my opinion, although the new road will quickly become as developed and congested as the others. Still, it is far enough on the outskirts of the city to avoid running the Mexico to Canada traffic into the Bayou City's rush hours.

I-69 already exists from Indianapolis to the Canadian border in Michigan, and upon completion, this will be a major trade route from Mexico to the markets in Canada such as Toronto, Montreal, London, and other major cities. For more on I-69, check out the following links:

I-69 Article on Wikipedia

Keep Texas Moving

Snopes debunks a sexy I-69 myth

Houston Chronicle article about the routing of the highway

Moo!

A white Texas Longhorn wonders what is going on.

On Sunday, I took a drive from Houston, Texas to Bryan, Texas for a lunch with about 14 other family members. Along the way there, I noticed this beautiful animal standing in a pasture beside Texas Highway 6 just north of the town of Hempstead. As we had a rendezvous time with the others, I made a mental note of where he was so that I could return on the way back to Houston to get his picture.

So on the way back, I found him still grazing, and pulled over to the side of the highway. My sister got out and started calling loudly to him, "Hey! Hey bully!", so when he looked up to see what all the commotion was, I got a few pictures. Given that a longhorn steer this size could be dangerous, we didn't stray too far from the car.

One thing I noticed is that his head seems disproportionately small when compared to his massive body. Perhaps he is still young, but those are a fine set of horns on this big boy!