No abortion, probably no birth control in the future. Gotta replace the fallen soldiers children somehow.
I have to add this here, because: a) I love it, and b) while it doesn’t apply to Texas exclusively, it surely applies to Texas squarely:
"The unborn” are a convenient group of people to advocate for. They never make demands of you; they are morally uncomplicated, unlike the incarcerated, addicted, or the chronically poor; they don’t resent your condescension or complain that you are not politically correct; unlike widows, they don’t ask you to question patriarchy; unlike orphans, they don’t need money, education, or childcare; unlike aliens, they don’t bring all that racial, cultural, and religious baggage that you dislike; they allow you to feel good about yourself without any work at creating or maintaining relationships; and when they are born, you can forget about them, because they cease to be unborn. It’s almost as if, by being born, they have died to you. You can love the unborn and advocate for them without substantially challenging your own wealth, power, or privilege, without re-imagining social structures, apologizing, or making reparations to anyone. They are, in short, the perfect people to love if you want to claim you love Jesus but actually dislike people who breathe.
Prisoners? Immigrants? The sick? The poor? Widows? Orphans? All the groups that are specifically mentioned in the Bible? They all get thrown under the bus for the unborn.
–Dave Barnhart, a pastor at Saint Junia United Methodist Church in Birmingham, Alabama.
I am not religious by any stretch, but I support this pastor 100%
But Texas Republicans will spend $2 billion in the next state budget to “secure the border,” which mostly involves forcing bored state guardsmen to bake in the South Texas sun for months on end to little-or-no effect on illegal crossings.
Oh my, indeed. I’m totally an atheist raised in a christian environment, and that is not only wonderfully reasonable, but also eloquently delivered.
Gov. Greg Abbott says he was all too happy to snub President Joe Biden after being invited to the White House with other governors over the weekend.
Speaking to the Young Americas Foundation in North Texas on Saturday, Abbott told the crowd that he had a choice to make.
“I was invited to spend a day and tonight at a black-tie event in the White House with President Biden,” Abbott said.
“I could be with Biden in Washington, D.C., or I could be with you in Grapevine, Texas.”
“It was an easy choice,” he said, to applause from the conservative group.
…
Abbott wasn’t the only Republican governor missing from the meeting. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, both considered potential GOP White House contenders in 2024, were also absent, as was Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders who delivered a sharp rebuke of Biden after the State of the Union address last week.
But plenty of other Republican governors made the trek. Governors of Tennessee, South Carolina, Oklahoma and Utah were among those at the event, according to the White House.
…
Keep it classy, Republican governors! Show the world what you’re made of. 
I think they’re trying to show their base what they’re made of.
TBF I’m thinking how unwelcome out of place a Democratic governor would be at a T**** White House fete.
I doubt they’d crow about it, though.
Certainly couldn’t see invites forthcoming.
To be fair, Biden’s shtick is ‘bipartisanship’ - Trump’s is ‘fuck those guys’.
Abbott gave his “state of the state” speech last night, outlining his priorities for the legislative session. Nothing particularly surprising – property tax cuts, securing the border, “school choice” (i.e. gutting public schools), banning pandemic public health restrictions, etc. Rather than give the speech at the Capitol, he gave it at a private business’ campus in San Marcos which allowed him to ban journalists from attending. Originally his office was going to require attendees to sign a nondisclosure agreement but had to back off when even Republicans balked.
Wouldn’t this defeat the whole purpose of the state of the state speech? I would think that the purpose of such a speech would be to get your message out to the public. Its basically a free hour long campaign ad, why would you want to keep it under wraps?
You don’t need the press there to get the message out. Obviously that happened, or we wouldn’t be talking about it. Keeping out the press just avoids pesky things like “questions”.
I assume the NDA wasn’t for the content of the speech, which of course he’d want to make public, but likely for everything surrounding it. Even if the press isn’t there, he’s surely going to get questions from people like his own party members, and he may not want that getting out.
That really shows how insecure he is though.
Sorry I wasn’t clear — the speech was broadcast, but as @Atamasama says the location let him avoid any pesky questions from reporters or reactions from a less-than-worshipful crowd.
Texas, our Texas… 
Civil rights advocates are gearing up for another contentious session at the Texas Capitol, where Republican leaders are again pursuing a slate of measures that target members of the LGBTQ community.
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, the president of the Senate, released a list of 30 priority bills last week, including proposals to stop children from attending drag shows; to remove “obscene” books from school libraries; to prevent transgender children from obtaining gender-affirming care; and to ban transgender athletes from participating in college sports that align with their gender identity.
…Texas lawmakers proposed dozens of LGBTQ restrictions in the 2021 legislative session, and this year’s tally has already reached 72, according to a bill tracker put together by the advocacy group Equality Texas.
…Johnathan Gooch, spokesman for Equality Texas, said lawmakers should pay attention to how even just debating these bills can have a grave impact on LGBTQ youths’ mental health.
A 2022 Trevor Project study found that 47 percent of LGBTQ youth considered suicide that year and 16 percent had attempted it.
…“When it comes to sexually explicit content, we have got to keep our kids away from it,” Patterson told Fox 4 Dallas-Fort Worth last month. “Whether that’s in the school library, whether that’s in the curriculum, whether that’s at a drag show, no matter where that is in society, we should be focused on protecting our kids, protecting their mental health and wellbeing.”
…PEN America, a free expression advocacy nonprofit, found that Texas schools had banned 801 books, more than any other state in the country, between July 2021 and June 2022.
…
My bold.
Obviously the solution is (1) to stop telling kids where babies come from, and (2) forbid them to touch or even look at their genital organs EVER. Possibly until they are married, and then with written permission from Someone in Authority. No more full-length mirrors! We must keep from kids any awareness or knowledge that males and females are different from each other and that that (hypothetical) difference has any biological purpose or consequences. That will solve the whole Right to Life problem because there will be no more babies except those produced by married couples. The Texas Legislature can do this! Need more amendments to the Texas Constitution (there are already 507… must have more…).
How does one say Droit du Seigneur / Ius Primae Noctis in Texan?
Get ‘er Done?
Classic case of IOWRDI:
Republican lawmakers seek to curb powers of blue cities through legislation crackdown
For as long as he’s been in office, Gov. Greg Abbott has waged war with Texas cities, warning that the state is being “California-ized” by local overregulation.
But until now, the offensive has stuck to single measures, like barring cities from regulating most oil and gas drilling or forcing landlords to accept federal housing vouchers. Republican lawmakers have pushed off more sweeping proposals, including attempts to prohibit local governments from passing any ordinance more stringent than state law.
Those sorts of measures are on the table this year in what could be the most productive legislative session yet for conservatives looking to rein in the state’s largest cities and counties, most of which are run by Democrats. Among the ideas are enhancing state oversight of county-run elections, taking aim at progressive judges and prosecutors, slashing local officials’ emergency powers and broadly restricting the types of regulations cities and counties can enact.
…Helping lead the GOP legislative response is state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, a Houston Republican who previously oversaw the voter rolls as Harris County tax assessor-collector. One of his bills, Senate Bill 220, would create teams of election marshals to investigate potential voting violations and enlist visiting judges to quickly review the cases.
Bettencourt also is carrying a bill in the Senate that would allow the secretary of state to suspend an appointed county elections administrator and appoint a replacement, if there’s “good cause to believe that a recurring pattern of problems with election administration exists.” The bill outlines five causes for suspension, all targeted at Harris County [Houston].
…
My bold.
“Good cause…” Yeah, right.
But that’s not all.
A new bill under consideration in the state Legislature would remove all polling places from Texas colleges and universities, prompting outcry from voting rights advocates who say the proposal would make it even harder for young people to cast a ballot.
House Bill 2390 would expressly prohibit county commissioners from designating college campuses as voting sites. State Rep. Carrie Isaac, a Dripping Springs Republican, said she authored the bill as part of a school safety initiative to keep potentially dangerous people off school grounds — an assertion that critics called offensive and dishonest Tuesday.
…
My bold.
“Potentially dangerous people,” meaning voters?
Continuing from the article:
Other Democrats and voting rights activists have characterized HB 2390 — narrowly tailored to college campuses — as an attack on young Texans, many of whom already don’t have easy access to the ballot box. On-site polling places are almost always the fastest way for college students to cast a ballot, especially when they don’t have cars to drive nearby.
“Texas has the fastest growing population in the nation, largely led by young voters of color, and some politicians clearly see this as a threat,” said Katya Ehresman, the voting rights program manager at Common Cause Texas. …
…Young people — those between 18 and 29 — are far more liberal than previous generations, but few of them show up to vote. After record turnout in 2018 and 2020, about 75 percent of all registered young Texans stayed home during last year’s midterm election.
It is more difficult to vote in Texas than it is in almost every other state, but the barriers are especially high for young people.
…
People who think. Can’t have that.
And edumacated people. Very dangerous.