This prescient bit of futurism is looking more and more probable.
Here’s a fun question. What’s Abbott’s plan if the undocumented individual refuses to get on the bus?
Your link is not at all helpful. If you’re going to link to something, it ought to explain why you are bringing this up, or explain your comment. Your link does neither.
This is more helpful:
Beto called an Abbott supporter who was heckling and laughing while he was talking about Uvalde a “motherfucker.” Outstanding.
That really makes me like Beto.
The reaction of the crowd warmed my heart.
Agreed. Same.
From Tribune article on Beto:
Like their dumb protesting, it’s awesome how their ploys backfire, like the “I Did That!” sticker.
When Trump was stalking behind Hillary Clinton during their debate, she would have won the election if she had turned around and said, “Get back to your side of the stage, motherfucker!”
It’s the Onion but they’re just ahead of the curve (it’s tough keeping up with real news these days).
I was hoping she’d punch him. You know Tan Baby Huey has a glass jaw and he’d’ve dropped like the 250+ (my guess; I’m not trusting his “official” release on that) sack of junk food he is.
When I first read it, I thought “Well, that’s about right.”, THEN thought “That’s got to be The Onion.”
Before the last six years, it was always the reverse.
This doesn’t specifically refer to Abbott, but I didn’t want to start a new thread on Stupid Shit Promoted by Texas Republicans (if someone else wants to, however…):
Texas lawmakers are returning to Austin this week with an overflowing budget surplus, thanks to the pandemic recovery, inflation and high energy prices, Comptroller Glenn He-gar said Monday.
The state is projected to end the 2022-2023 biennium in August with nearly $33 billion in excess cash, up from the $27 billion Hegar predicted last summer. Revenue for the next two fiscal years is also expected to grow by about $10 billion, he said.
…
The record Texas surplus will be welcome news to Republican state leaders, who are already weighing how best to use the money. The Legislature is almost certain to put much of the surplus into lowering property taxes for homeowners, and many have talked about infrastructure projects such as shoring up the state’s electric grid and expanding access to high-speed internet.
…But Texas also continues to face chronic funding shortages and has seen a growing exodus of public school teachers in a state with relatively low salaries.
“A number of critical services — like Early Childhood Intervention for toddlers and the state’s system for processing children’s Medicaid applications — are dealing with staffing shortages and years of underfunding,” Stephanie Rubin, CEO of the health advocacy group Texans Care for Children, said in a statement. “This session, there’s no excuse for shortchanging services that kids and families rely on.”
(My bold)
Don’t need no excuse to shortchange teachers or children’s health and education. Those kids were dumb enough to get born into poor/middle-class families, so fuck ‘em and their parents, too. And, by all means, lets talk about the energy grid and infrastructure projects. Talk don’t cost nuttin’. But let’s make sure our wealthiest property owners get some tax relief. That’ll make everyone (who counts) happy.
I’m not quite sure what their dogged focus on property tax decreases is. I mean, I’m all for not paying as much in property tax, but I also think that you start looking at that after we’ve adequately funded everything that needs funding, like special education, education in general, aid for the disabled, and any number of other things that help needy people that they’ve perpetually starved for funding.
THAT is why there are budget surpluses- they tend to starve a lot of stuff and raid money-producing departments (Parks & Wildlife), and then claim “Hey! We’ve got money left over! We don’t need to tax as much.”
Which is BS, but that’s how they roll.
You are so right. But as we know, logic doesn’t enter into it.
I think the property tax fixation appeals in two ways.
First, yeah, regular property owners will see some reduction in taxes, but the Republicans can crow that they actually put cash back in people’s pockets and thus give them the illusion that their gummint is helpin’ 'em out. Larger issues like education and stuff that helps needy people are librul concerns (even -gasp!- Socialism!) and who cares about those people (even if, paradoxically, I AM those people) when-bottom line-I wind up with a few extra bucks right now. I can use those $$ to buy more lottery tickets!
Secondly, the property tax reduction will be felt most by wealthy people in a big, big way, and they’re the ones that matter.
Not to worry. The money that the property owners save via the tax reduction will trickle down to those who need it. (When the property owners flip them a quarter for cleaning their windows at the intersection.)
When Jesse Ventura was governor of Minnesota, the state had a large surplus that everyone agreed should be returned to the taxpayers in some way. Republicans favored a property tax cut, which favored the rich, while Democrats proposed a income tax reduction which favored lower income families; either one would take a while to provide any immediate benefit. They were deadlocked until Ventura, an independent, suggested direct rebate checks, known as “Jesse checks”. (It was probably the one decent idea he had while in office.)
Since Texas doesn’t have an income tax, they don’t have any other option than to roll back those pesky property taxes. Their property tax rate is higher than Minnesota’s, as is their sales tax rate. Overall though, Minnesota tax burden is over 10% while Texas is 8.2%. Thankfully, Minnesota had another large state surplus and has the same property tax/income tax cut debate as before, but Walz, a Democrat (DFL) is again proposing direct rebate checks.
Well, no other option maybe when it comes to taxes. But, there are plenty of other areas where that surplus could do some good. To quote the article I cited above:
“A number of critical services — like Early Childhood Intervention for toddlers and the state’s system for processing children’s Medicaid applications — are dealing with staffing shortages and years of underfunding,” Stephanie Rubin, CEO of the health advocacy group Texans Care for Children, said in a statement. “This session, there’s no excuse for shortchanging services that kids and families rely on.”
Texas has the highest number in the USA of children who have no health insurance coverage. What about help for the immigrants that are coming over the border (besides busing then to Kamala’s front yard)? What about the homeless?
And if those issues are too tainted with Sociaism (ya know, “doing good” for people who aren’t US), then there’s the energy grid problem-- hello! Winter isn’t over yet.
It doesn’t have to be tax relief.
They’ve got LOTS of options if you consider keeping the tax rate level, or slightly decreasing it. They could fund all sorts of stuff- ECI, special ed, ERCOT, education, and so forth.
There’s no requirement that they absolutely have to enact tax rate decreases, except for a self-imposed one. And I think it’s foolish and frankly immoral to do so, if there are programs like ECI that have funding issues.
Even if you assume that the surplus has to go to a tax cut, the largest source of state tax revenue in Texas is sales tax which is disproportionately impactful on low-income individuals. But no Republican is proposing sales tax relief. There’s also likely to be at an effort to eliminate the franchise tax levied against businesses.