Texas

Texas And Florida Governors Are Promoting Mass Death By Reckless Policy On Vaccine Mandates!

The second and third largest states in population, with about 50 million people, are Texas and Florida.

Their Republican governors, Greg Abbott and Ron DeSantis, have demonstrated they are totally reckless in their attack on vaccine mandates, including dictating not only to school boards, but also all private businesses.

Both governors are promoting mass death, with 68,000 deaths and counting in Texas, and 56,000 deaths and counting in Florida.

So about one out of every six deaths is in those two states alone, as the COVID 19 Pandemic has killed about 700,000 Americans and counting.

And people of color are even more often the victims, and both governors have no concern, as they both work to be potential Republican Presidential candidates in 2024.

Both Abbott and DeSantis will go down in history as two of the absolutely worse governors in American history, and not just on vaccine mandates, but on so many other issues, including racism, women’s rights including abortion, and refusal to have serious attempts to promote gun regulations.

Additionally, both states are trying to deny people of color, poor people, young people, and the elderly the right to vote!

Texas Has Become The Pariah On So Many Issues!

The state of Texas has become a pariah on so many issues.

Its decision to ban all abortions after six weeks, and allow citizens to sue and win a bounty of $10,000 against anyone who helps a woman gain an abortion is outrageous!

Its decision to create the most stringent limitations on voting rights, designed to prevent people of color, the young, the disabled, and urban centers from access to voting with reasonable rules is also outrageous!

Its plans to gerrymander the state in such a way as to make fair elections impossible in the future is also outrageous!

Its refusal to allow masking to be required to protect children and staff in public schools is also outrageous!

Its allowance for open carry of firearms is a danger to everyone, and mass killings will increase, and is also outrageous.

The state has right wing elements that have spoken about secession and treason, and is very willing to do everything possible to promote white supremacy in a state that is more than ever a state in which people of color, particularly Hispanic and Latino, but also Asian American and African American, are being treated in a discriminatory manner!

Texas was one of the most horrific racist states before the Civil Rights Movement, and now it is reverting to extremism that is shocking and detrimental to the people of the second largest populated state, and the courts seem unwilling to do anything about it!

Texas should face boycotts, court cases, and other moves to hold the right wing extremist legislature and Governor Greg Abbott to accountability, as this is not a situation that can be overlooked, as the danger is that this cancer might spread to other states!

Afghanistan Crisis May Harm Joe Biden’s Agenda In Congress, And His Public Opinion Support

The Afghanistan Crisis over evacuations may harm Joe Biden’s Agenda in Congress.

After accomplishing so much in his first seven months in office, there are Democrats now who are alienated from Biden, on the issue of infrastructure, with moderates and progressives with different views on timing of the Bipartisan Infrastructure bill, which has gained Republican support, and the Human Infrastructure bill, with no Republican support.

The issue of Voting Rights legislation is also in trouble, as Arizona, Texas, Georgia, Florida, and other states are setting up voting barriers for future elections.

Afghanistan, and the way Joe Biden has dealt with it, has also made some Democrats highly critical of the failure of the Biden Administration to plan removal of Americans and Afghans who helped the war effort on a timely basis, rather than the total chaos and anarchy now occurring at Kabul Airport.

Joe Biden’s public opinion support on his Presidency and on Afghanistan policy has been high, but now there is danger of that support collapsing.

And there are Republicans and right wing talk show hosts who are calling for Joe Biden to resign, or that he should be impeached, although there is no chance of any success on impeachment or conviction, and clearly, no possibility of resignation.

But the situation in Afghanistan muddies the waters dramatically!

56th Anniversary Of Voting Rights Act, Now A Major Crisis Of American Democracy!

On this day in 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, supported by Democrats, but also a substantial number of Republicans, who understood that voting rights were the central human right in a nation that was a democracy.

It was a reaction against the denial in the former Confederates states of the South to enforce the 15th Amendment of 1870, which gave men of color the right to vote after the Civil War.

Now, America is again in a crisis, as the Supreme Court cut back enforcement of the Voting Rights Act in 2013, in Shelby County V. Holder, and many Republican states are now claiming voter fraud in 2020, when it did not exist, and are passing all kinds of restrictions to prevent minority voters, young voters, and poor people from their constitutional right to vote.

Texas, Georgia, Florida and Arizona, and their crooked, corrupt governors and state legislatures are trying to fix the results of future elections, by making it impossible or extremely difficult for people to vote, and Texas has seen the Democrats in the state legislature for the past month and more, leaving the state and coming to Washington, DC to promote a restoration of the Voting Rights Act.

These Texas Democrats face arrest and possible imprisonment, which should not be permitted, and instead, Texas Governor Greg Abbott and the right wingers in his state and others, should face prosecution for what they are attempting to perpetrate.

H R 1–For the People Act, and H R 4–John Lewis Voting Rights Act, need to be passed into law now!

Texas State Legislature Has Gone Totally Bonkers On So Many Issues!

Texas has a long history of racism against African Americans and Latino Americans, but the state has gone way beyond those reprehensible examples of prejudice and hatred.

Now they are making it ever more difficult for people of color to be able to vote in future elections.

They have also made abortion practically impossible with their newly enacted laws that prevent a woman after six weeks, long before most would even know they are pregnant, from being able to have an abortion, and already, the number of abortion providers has been restricted in recent years.

Also, all restriction on guns are coming to an end, which alarms law enforcement professionals.

And the state is making it clear that teachers of the social sciences are not permitted to teach about the true history of America and of Texas, the realities of slavery, Jim Crow segregation, and about the extermination of native Americans, and other unpleasant truths, what the opponents call “critical race theory”. Instead, only a patriotic version of history is to be taught, which will hamstring teachers, and yet will not, necessarily, prevent students from learning the truth elsewhere, and wish to discuss it in classes.

As an historian and political scientist for a half century, if this author and blogger were much younger, he would be unable to “practice his craft”, teach truth and facts, and this is totally outrageous!

Lawsuits on all of these issues are essential, as Texas is undermining the rule of law in so many ways!

The Republican-Right Wing Attempt To Distort Historical Truth And Facts

For anyone who teaches American history in the public schools and in colleges and universities, the warning is out, that Republican and Right Wing propagandists are working to prevent the teaching of historical truth and facts.

In Texas, and developing in other Republican controlled states, teachers are being informed that they may NOT teach the reality of American history, which has been covered up for too long, but in recent years, has been dredged out of secrecy or lack of research.

One can love America, and yet admit that there has been a lack of historical reality of the mistreatment of native Americans, African Americans, Latino Americans, Asian Americans, immigrants, Jews, and women as part of the discussion of our past.

Students need to learn and know the entire truth, in order for the nation to move ahead and overcome the racism, nativism, misogyny, antisemitism that were and are, sadly, part of the history of America.

How can we overcome the widespread prejudices, biases, and narrow mindedness still present in America, if we continue to promote a distorted view of reality?

The historical profession needs to engage in lobbying and other activities to insure that we do not have propaganda and lies being perpetuated in the future, as ignorance and naivete about our past can only undermine progress and change in the future!

The 2020 US Census Has Surprises, As Announced Today

It is ironic that this author wrote about the 2020 Census yesterday, not aware that precise information would be given out today, Monday.

And there are a few surprises.

The total population of the US is over 331 million people, up from about 309 million in 2010.

Texas will gain only two seats, not three, and Florida will gain one seat, not two.

Colorado, North Carolina, Oregon and Montana will gain one seat each.

Arizona, thought to be likely to gain a seat, will not do so.

New York loses one seat, but only because of a shortage of population by the small total of 89 people!

Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Illinois, California, and West Virginia will lose one seat for each state, with California losing representation for the first time ever!

Minnesota and Rhode Island, expected to lose one seat each, avoided such a loss.

So now, with Montana gaining a seat, there will only be 6 states with one statewide House member—Alaska, Delaware, Vermont, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming.

This is the second slowest population growth in US history, after the 1930s.

And the trend of the South and West gaining at the expense of the Northeast and Midwest continues as it has for many decades.

When Census Figures Come Out Later This Year, It Will Affect Multiple States

The 2020 Census figures will come out in a few months, and will affect multiple states in Congressional representation in 2022 and beyond, as well as the Electoral College.

A number of the larger populated states will continue to lose representation and electoral votes, as they have faced for several decades.

This includes New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, and Michigan, but also California is likely to lose a Congressional seat and an electoral vote for the first time ever in America history. Also, West Virginia, Rhode Island and Minnesota are likely to lose a seat and an electoral vote.

The states which will gain include Texas, Florida, North Carolina, Arizona, Colorado, Oregon, and Montana, with Texas and Florida gaining the most.

Montana will move from one statewide House seat to two, while Rhode Island will move from two seats to one, so Rhode Island will join Vermont, Delaware, Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming as the seven states that have only one House member for each state.

Texas Is Crazy To Drop COVID 19 Restrictions: Will Likely Lead To New Surge Of Cases And Deaths!

Texas is the second largest state in population and in land area, but Texas government under Republican dominance in the past four decades has been a total disaster!

It continues to discriminate against its African American and Latino population, making it more difficult for them to vote!

Its electric grid system led to disaster and loss of property and life last week, and no apologies from Texas Republicans!

And now, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has announced that COVID 10 Pandemic restrictions are ending in the next week!

This is a total disgrace, and undermines the fight against the pandemic, as Texas with more than 30 million people, and with so much commerce and travel in a state as large as Texas, is a prime area of the infection, and undermines what President Joe Biden, scientists, and medical personnel say needs to be done to overcome the pandemic, which has cost more than half a million lives in one year!

This is states rights gone mad, and already, Mississippi, the poorest state in America, is also abandoning the restrictions on the pandemic, and do not be surprised that Florida, with its moronic governor Ron DeSantis, will be next!

So the battle to overcome COVID 19 is being sabotaged, and will make the recovery be more extended, at much greater loss of life!

Demographic Changes Dooming The Republican Party Future

The Republican Party has lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight Presidential elections, ever since 1992, except for 2004.

The suburbs, and particularly suburban women, are leaving the Republican Party in droves, and racial minorities are increasing rapidly as part of the voting population, despite attempts to suppress it.

At the rate the situation is changing, once Texas goes to the Democrats in the race for the White House, likely in 2024, but certainly in 2028, the Republican Party will never be able to win the Presidency again without changing their views.

The Republican Party must stop its anti immigrant and racist and misogynist policies, as white male America, much of it rural in nature and non college educated, is not the future of the nation.

So demography, along with education affecting the future, rapidly changing before our eyes, America will never be what it was a half century or more ago!