“Abbott Administration Seeks to Outlaw Practicing the Gospel!”
WASHINGTON — Attorney General Ken Paxton is seeking to shut down a Catholic nonprofit in El Paso that has helped shelter and feed asylum seekers for decades, accusing it of operating as a “stash house” and taking part in “human smuggling.”
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Paxton said in a statement that Annunciation House’s efforts amount to “facilitating illegal entry to the United States.”
“The chaos at the southern border has created an environment where NGOs, funded with taxpayer money from the Biden administration, facilitate astonishing horrors including human smuggling,” Paxton said. “While the federal government perpetuates the lawlessness destroying this country, my office works day in and day out to hold these organizations responsible for worsening illegal immigration.”
Annunciation House called Paxton’s stance “illegal, immoral and anti-faith.” In a statement, it said that if its work is against the law, then so are the efforts of hospitals, schools and food banks that also serve migrants, regardless of their immigration status.
“Annunciation House has done this work of accompaniment out of the scriptural and Gospel mandate to welcome the stranger,” the statement said.
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Sorry, Father, Gospel mandates don’t fly out here in God’sPaxton’s Country!"
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a group of man-made chemicals that are used in many products and industrial processes. PFAS are known as “forever chemicals” because they break down slowly over time and can’t easily break down in the environmen
Its a question as to who has more money to grease the palms, some mom and pop cattle ranch, or producers of industrial sludge. If they didn’t want their cows poisoned they should have made more money.
Primary returns are coming in for Texas and – it’s looking bad, guys. Abbott and Paxton weren’t on the ballot, but they’ve invested heavily in ousting a dozen or so state House Republicans who dared oppose them (by impeaching Paxton and opposing Abbott’s school voucher scheme). And those incumbents are mostly trailing in the returns. Including House Speaker Dade Phelan, who is trailing his primary opponent but will likely face a runoff due to a third candidate in the race.
This is bad. The Texas House has been the last bastion of still-somewhat-sane conservatism among Texas Republicans. Assuming these results hold up – and redistricting having entrenched the Republican majority for the next decade – there will be absolutely no bar to right-wing conservatives in Texas enacting their deepest fever dreams. I’m not even most worried about the obvious shit – privatizing the public schools, giving embryos legal rights, eliminating environmental protections, silencing dissent. With this level of control, they’ll feel free to feed the darkest impulses of their base with policies I can’t even imagine.
Unfortunately we won’t see lithobraking. Once they hit bedrock, these evil bastards will keep digging to new lows until they come out the other side of the planet. True lithobraking, would have stopped them in their tracks and shredded them to smithereens a long time ago.
Sigh. It used to a such a lovely country. Not so good for old men, but a lovely country nonetheless
I have some fond memories of my time in Texas, but stories like this make me glad I moved away.
The power grid in Texas is under strain, and it’s only early spring!
“Summer is two months away, yet the Texas power grid is already swooning. On Friday the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (Ercot) asked power generators to postpone scheduled maintenance early this week “to help alleviate potential tight conditions” as temperatures rise into the not-so-sizzling 80s.”
“The grid typically has excess power-generating capacity in the spring owing to mild weather. There’s also an abundance of solar and wind power. This is why plants go off-line for repairs in the spring to prepare for the summer when electricity use surges as people ramp up the air conditioning.”
“Yet merely warm spring weather is now enough to push the Texas grid to the brink. Tuesday’s high is forecast to be 89 degrees in Dallas and 84 in Houston. These temperatures shouldn’t force grid operators to break a sweat to keep the lights on, but they are.”
An 84-degree high is only a few degrees above normal for Houston this time of year.
The thought of brownouts or blackouts during even average summer temperatures in Dallas or Houston is not a pleasant one.
You get the distinct impression that Texas leaders are a long way from learning how to plan for energy challenges.