Happy Texas independence Day

@yakkoTDI

Hey there.
Y’all shore do got yourself a Texas-sized sense of humor there

Welcome, pardner.

/giphy “ Texas sized“

@Kidsandliz

You may be operating some sort of proxy or VPN or content blocker the blocks Twitter contact in order to prevent you from loading a bunch of Twitter trackers

If you do have that that’s good and I’m glad you have it

Here’s an image. Can you see it?

@Kidsandliz

@f00l Thanks. That looks about right. Reminds me of the older maps from the point of view of east coast and west coast states where the fly over states are left to be found basically using a magnifying glass.

@f00l @Kidsandliz

@Kyeh

That image is exactly a correct map of the Continental US, at least covering all those years when I dwelt in Little Italy.

/giphy “everything revolves around me”

@f00l @Kyeh people who stand by you must get dizzy from spinning around you so fast…

@Kyeh @Oldelvis

Well, that’s convenient for me, since I do need some entertainment.

@mbersiam

/giphy Howdy!

/image Big Tex

@mbersiam “Upper Peninsula of Michigan”
That’s a funny way to spell Wisconsin.

@mbersiam @yakkoTDI

Texas is easier to spell.

Welcome home!

@yakkoTDI

/giphy nope

@f00l @yakkoTDI Maybe you’re right. The lower mitten definitely needs to be a part of Texas not New York.

@mbersiam @yakkoTDI

What? You aren’t just begging to inhabit the “energy industry state”, aka the “energy industry FAILURE state”, esp during extreme winter?

Poor thing. How you must envy us.

; )

@f00l @yakkoTDI If I have to choose between Texas and New York… I’d choose Texas: freezing, black-out, or even under water in hurricanes, over New York.

@mbersiam Yoopers.

@macromeh @mbersiam

I’ve lived rather happily in both places.

Amd both places have their fair share of suckage.

However, most humans can’t afford NYC anymore.

Upstate NY is nothing like NYC. It’s mostly small-town-rural-quiet, once one is 50-100 miles from Manhattan and one is not near the Atlantic coast.

@f00l @mbersiam @yakkoTDI this Texan’s one trip to NYC; I saw a live rat in Kmart. I don’t know what shocked me more. Seeing the rat or that there was a Kmart in the middle of Manhattan

@ironcheftoni I sort of miss KMart… only because I could get really good deals on their super clearance. And ours had a Little Caesars in their deli area … so when I had no money I would be able to splurge and get a $5 pizza for my family. and on days I did have “extra” money I would be able to get their cheese-filled breadsticks for an extra $3.49. Now I’m on here buying IRKs for the same price I would feed my family. ahhhhh the good ol’ days

@mbersiam when Kmart was around, I had a cat whose favorite toy could only be found at Kmart. It was called Sid the Squid but looked more like a spider. A little puff ball with leather legs glued on. That cat would play with it until it was torn apart. So when the stores started closing, I bought all they had. When she passed, the last Sid was placed on top of her cedar box in the curio cabinet.

@lonocat

We’re all very proud of our unregulated independent energy grid that doesn’t work in cold weather:
Esp since we are the energy center of the country,
and esp since the independent grid was pushed thru the state leg by politicians who lied a lot about the results, and promised a bunch of missing-in-action supposed benefits, and who received enormous donations to their PACs from the energy industry.

Obviously that was a great idea.

In the same league as killing the state mask mandate too early.
(Purpose: to thwart Biden).
(Effects: just ask the hospitals in a month or so)

Bidness as usual.

@f00l @lonocat MS dropped the mask mandate too starting today. MS is just a TX follower so it is probably right that it is part of TX. TX even gives us our weather, used, a day later LOL. Heck they are only now talking about federal disaster assistance for the no water on day 17 going on here with no estimation of when the rest of us, me included, will get our water back. And of course TX beat MS by 5 days calling in the National Guard to help with the water situation. We are a TX follower on the no state income tax being talked about right now. At times I think we’d likely be better off if we WERE part of TX and that is saying a lot!

@f00l @Kidsandliz @lonocat
Well, it certainly seems Texas considers the taxpayers of all the other states to be part of Texas when it comes to bailing their dumb asses out for climate change consequences they claim don’t exist and didn’t need to plan for. While screeching from thd rooftops about accountability in Congress. Benghazi! Emails! Rigged!

Texas residents just have to deal with the government they elected. That they did not choose wisely is not the rest of the country’s mess to clean up after. It seems the evidence is clear as to which of the two major political parties has been in charge in Texas setting mispriorities and doing a piss-poor job of governing while creating massive economic and healthcare problems that burden the rest of the country.

Cut 'em loose, the ingrateful bastidges.

@mike808

Our “oh-so-very/wise” and completely “/intellectually/financially honorable” R political leadership is considering numerous proposals to help the situation.

But they are not considering the proposal to require industry participants to winterize, nor for a requirement for the energy industry to have local emergency stockpiles of coal or natural gas, where appropriate to the generating method, when extreme weather is forecast.

Something to do with various big lies that far too many Texans seem willing to fall for.

And we are gerrymandered to the hilt.

I’d say “pity us, please”; but I’m not sure your state is much of a political improvement over mine.

In the political-rationality sweepstakes, so many states flunk. Including mine.

@mike808

Certain facts are understood to be perennially true.

@mike808

Preparedness might cost the energy industry participants a dime or two.
And they would scream about far-left-wing socialism.

Non-preparedness only costs statewide business outages for a week or more.

Plus massive property damage and repair bills, insurance claims, lost income, health problems, and global public humiliation, among other costs.

Plus, non-preparedness costs lives.

You can see how important it is to avoid “antifa-socialism”, can’t you?

@mike808 But perhaps there’s more method in the madness than we see. Lifting all of the covid-19 restrictions will surely end in a lot more deaths, and the latest kerfuffle might make people rethink a move to Texas. That will shrink the population and thus reduce the need for power in the inevitable future disaster.

@mike808 @rockblossom

I don’t think that analysis really covers all the variables, nor does it cover all the back room big $ game theory manipulation used by the energy industry in its habitual control of the pitiful and vacuous idiot-captive state legislature

if the local R politicians can find a way to further benefit the energy industry, by allowing them to further cut maintenance and durability, the R’s will.

And then when the next inevitable and predicted energy grid disaster occurs, then R politicians will follow this season’s script and blame AOC/“Antifa”/Hillary/etc.

It’s always good to have an excuse handy, isn’t it?

@f00l @rockblossom
One would think people understood that “antifa” is shorthand for “anti-fascist”. So wouldn’t being against Anti-Fascism makes them Pro-Fascist?

@mike808 @rockblossom

I have not noticed that the current “political philosophy” expounded at CPAC/TPAC has any discernible contact with rationality.

@f00l @rockblossom CPAC? You mean the Insurrectionist Reunion last week? The one with the stage designed in the form of the SS patch symbol? How could you Nazi it?

/image CPAC odal rune stage

@f00l @mike808 @rockblossom
Don’t forget the golden idol. Which was made in China.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-cpac-golden-calf-trump-statue-is-spurring-backlash-of-biblical-proportions-11614360507

@mike808 all cat and no haggle!

@Kyeh The designer is quite proud of his “priceless” creation. I thought that statue was mocking him. Until I realized they were serious.

@katbyter I know, it LOOKS like it’s meant to be an insult. I feel like we’re living in mockumentary!