Tuesday, April 24

pond scum sinks to the bottom, right?

From time to time, I've opined here about the correlation between a Fine Texas Education and the likes of Karl Rove; Tom DeLay and George W. Bush (collectively determined to destroy this country). This is not to ignore the current crop of pond scum working its way into the national limelight .. their day will arrive soon enough.

Granted, Texas isn't completely filled with vacuous neanderthals, since this is also home to Ann Richards; Molly Ivins; LBJ; Dan Rather and Bill Moyers* (to name a few) .. but, the statistics presented in January's "Texas on the Brink: How Texas Ranks Among the 50 States" are certainly chilling.
* okay, Bill Moyers was born in Oklahoma. But he was Raised Up here in Texas.
And it ain't a gittin' any better, given what I've read about the 2007 Texas Legislature and the new cavalcade of insanity that is about to be laded upon us, like so much cream gravy. With that in mind, I hereby point out today's recommended reading: A Race To The Bottom. Amazing.

If you have the time for more, yesterday's post on The Bush Library Blog ain't half bad, either.

1 comment:

Jill said...

Statistics, statistics, statistics. When I see them, I always wonder what goes into them. Take a "A Race to the Bottom" for instance. Yes, Texas had a lot of problems, and, yes, the statistics are indeed dismal. I would like to know, however, if illegal immigrants are included in those numbers. I would like to know what percentage of Texas high school students take the SAT (reason being that in some states the majority of SAT takers are college bound [typically resulting in higher state scores] versus other states where most students take the SAT whether they are planning to go to college or not [typically resulting in lower state scores]).

Whether Texas or any other state, the low voter turnout always amazes me. On the other hand, once elected officials reach office, they seem to become like all the others already in office: being more concerned with partisan politics, investigating members of the other party, tearing down proposals, etc. than with actually accomplishing those action items they listed on their campaign platforms. When that happens, I can readily understand why voters stay home.