In 1998 there were some pretty bad ice storms in Canada. One of the worst hit areas was Boucherville, on the South Shore of Montreal. With the power out in January and no quick restoration coming the mayor of Boucherville got creative. They figured out how to intentionally derail a diesel electric locomotive, drive it 1000 feet up the street on it’s flanges (destroying the pavement), and hook it up as an emergency generator.
“the loco went under its own power about 1000ft from the rails, on its own flanges, and left deep grooves in the pavement which had to be repaired afterwards. I’m pretty sure there was a consensus of “who cares” about the pavement - they could fix that in summer in the land of eternal potholes - but this was a crisis!”
The point is that he should do his job. Period. He’s an elected official and him acting as if his position some part-time distraction from “real” life is the core of the problem. We have to stop acting as if partisanship is reason enough to refuse to do the work people are elected to do.
maybe an object lesson was the point but aoc demonstrated that neither partisanship nor regionality was any reason not to help texans in need. if she could help raise and direct $4+ million in aid from her democratic district in new york what the fuck prevented ted from working his connections to do something for his own state?
one observation i saw about ted on twitter that struck me as profoundly true was that both supporters and detractors of cruz agreed overwhelmingly that cruz was useless in a crisis.
Probably time to get a new Senator then, if he’s entirely unable to do his job. Hopefully this whole thing will put his job in jeopardy, and a Democrat can take his seat. When’s he up for re-election next?
IIRC he’s going to be up for reelection in 24. It was '18 that Beto ran against him. It would be great if Texas republicans could remember this and how he failed them but I have a feeling they’ll only remember his loyalty to cheeto and vote on that.
staying out of the press mostly. from my knowledge of people and politics in texas (not much more than public knowledge but maybe a little) cornyn is an old-school republican who loathes cruz and despised trump. he isn’t up until 26 so he’s probably pretty tickled by ted’s problems.
eta–
unfortunately, the state of the g.o.p. in texas is such that he could only lose if he was primaried to the right. it’s possible we may be blue enough to beat him in the general election that year but i can’t count on it.
P.J. O’Rourke:
“Republicans say government doesn’t work. Then they get elected and prove it.”
There’s some perverse, frankly unhealthy obsession among a subset of Texans that are more than ready to re-elect these bozos over and over, if for no other reason than to (a) profiteer from the public treasury in all ways possible for as long as possible; and (b) basically say “see? see? this just proves that aLl GuMmiNT iS bAd!”
I can’t wrap my mind around what level of cynicism and self-talk such folk must maintain daily–it’s gotta be exhausting.
We have to stop acting as if partisanship is reason enough to refuse to do the work people are elected to do.