Thanks for the update.
Based solely on the really shitty reporting over the last 2 weeks, I don’t think anyone will ever know the exact death count. The RV parks were wiped out and who knows who was in each coach. The count of the ESTIMATED missing should have been updated daily as they located the people on the original list. It was widely thought that some were listed twice, some were thought to be in the area but had gone elsewhere, etc. The tracking and research they did was excellent, their communication was terrible.
Official missing list now down all the way to three sounds to me an awful lot like a cover-up.
Yep. Seeing how things work in Texas to get rid of problematic info relating to this event. They are probably only counting Texans, and any “illegal” or camper from the west coast doesn’t really count anyway.
Considering that they date from the 1930s and before in some cases, they were most likely set up as segregated camps, and are just recently accepting minority kids who’ve got the money to go.
Basically the camps on the Guadalupe are middle class and wealthier (most are wealthier) secular camps of both genders, along with a bunch of church camps which likely are still expensive enough that you’re not seeing a contingent from a big AME church in Houston.
While I wouldn’t piss on Ted if he was on fire, I don’t know that being a politician requires you to wear a hair shirt when something dire goes on in your state, especially if you’re half a world away and potentially waiting on a plane flight.
I mean, I’m a Texan, and I’d much rather Ted go on his regularly scheduled flight, rather than almost certainly spend State money getting home to grandstand and be obnoxious. He’s a senator; how much effect can he reasonably have in the immediate aftermath of a disaster like this? He could go try and wheedle Trump, or lean on that FEMA clown they’ve installed, but neither of those seems to be very effective.
This statement is contradicted by the feast of your post. Let fascists carry their own water.
I read it as more of a smorgasbord of his sentiments.
Look, I can absolutely not like the person, but also not think he’s obligated to self-flagellate himself because something dire happened somewhere in a state of 30+ million people and around 270,000 square miles.
Plus, it was a vacation with his family; as much as we all hate the guy, we’ve got to assume that at least his kids love him and want to spend time with him on vacation. A flood in the Hill Country doesn’t obligate him to screw them around.
Doesn’t make me a fascist if I disagree with criticism in one specific case, and that’s specifically that if someone’s on vacation, they aren’t necessarily obligated to come back for work stuff, unless it’s actually something that they personally need to sort out, and their delegates can’t handle themselves. Doesn’t really matter if the guy’s a senator, or a super wet-behind-the-ears new hire just taking their first vacation; that’s a boundary that shouldn’t be crossed except in the most extreme of circumstances, and I’m not convinced that Cruz had much of anything to do in this case except mug for the cameras and be his normal obnoxious self. Considering that, he probably should have stayed in Greece.
On top of that, Cruz wasn’t a governor or mayor, he is a senator. A senator’s job is on the Congress/federal level. It’s the job of the intra-state folks like Abbott, etc. to do the bulk or entirety of the flood-disaster fixing effort.
We can, however, fairly excoriate him for all the times he voted against disaster relief for all the states that aren’t Texas.
Oh, he’s probably the second most odious Texas politician by a long chalk. (Ken Paxton wibs that race to the bottom).
He sucks out loud, and between him, Sid Miller and Louie Gohmert, they pretty much embody the worst the state has to offer.
I plead auto-cognac.
I certainly don’t mean to do that. Just consider my own example: my mental health has substantially improved since I stopped worrying about whether the propaganda coming from my side was 100% correct in all respects and felt compelled to correct it if it was and instead learned to just… let fascists carry their own water. That’s my mantra now, anyway.
No worries. I have to admit it felt weird and a bit unclean sticking up for Ted Cruz in any capacity, but I’m a firm believer in drawing boundaries as hard as humanly possible between work and family life, and if I’m not sticking up for Cruz in that situation, then I’m being a hypocrite.
In that line, I think of it this way: Cruz couldn’t even pay me to speak in his behalf and I’m an attorney. I literally speak on other peoples’ behalf for a reason. So if I wouldn’t even do it for money, why would I do it for free when I’m at home?
YMMV, but I personally have found this to be a real difference-maker between how I lived through Trump 1.0 vs. how I am managing Trump 2.0.
Yes and no. A part of a politician’s job is ceremonial; pretending to give a shit about the people who vote for you (and even those who don’t). A senator might also be expected to be on hand to vote on emergency measures especially when that emergency is in your home state.
I think the question really is at what remove is it ok for a politician/leader to not be directly involved?
I’d say that in this case, all the county and local officials should be involved, the Governor and the personnel from relevant state agencies should be deeply involved, and their local state legislators should be on top of things, in case of a special session, and to fulfill that ceremonial role.
I’m not sure that Federal representatives need to be particularly involved, except to represent their area and rally support for aid in Congress. Senators are even more removed- I’d argue the President has a more direct obligation than a Senator, as they can proclaim disasters, direct Federal agencies, and so forth, none of which a Senator can do.
Which is why I mentioned their ceremonial role. Especially if your known for fleeing your state in times of crisis.
Not to defend Cruz, but is he known for fleeing impending crises, some of which are simply unpredictable?
Or it it more a matter that he spends 25 days a month not in Texas, and much of that junketing with the family rather than working. And as such it’s highly likely that any completely surprise crisis will find him half a world away?
Now what he does once the crisis hits and his location is [whatever] is 100% on him. As is the (assumed) fact he’s almost never in Texas.
As @ASL_v2.0 says, there’s plenty to hate about that bastard. I prefer to keep intellectually honest about what’s truly hatable about any of these bastards versus what’s just RO or guilt by association on our part.
Yes. There was a massive power outage in Texas during winter in 2021. During the outage he left Texas with his family for a vacation in Cancun:
This outage was during weather which no one in the snowbelt would consider unusual–but the Texas power industry decided to save a few bucks and not harden many of their facilities to handle cold weather.
Technically, this is a “no”. He was already inside the crisis when he fled, so there was nothing to predict - it was already upon them. It was not “impending”.