Texas Gov. Rick Perry was talking big a few months ago. Texas didn't want any stinking stimulus funds. Faced with the federal oppression of stimulus funds, why Texas just might secede from the union.
Of course, all pious protestations to the contrary, he wound up taking $17 billion in stimulus money, but turned down $555 million which would have gone to help the unemployed. Natch.
Now that Texas is in dire financial straits, however, Perry is asking the federal government for a loan to cover the additional costs of unemployment--in other words, the very expenses the rejected stimulus money would have paid for.
Way back in the early 80's, Texas elected its first Republican Governor since Reconstruction, a Dallas-area oil & gas man by the name of William P. Clements. Clements was also linked to the scandal that brought the NCAA's "death penalty" to the SMU football program in 1985. He was an atrocious governor and at the time of his departure from office, we thought we'd seen about the worst governor we'd ever see. Sadly, Governor Goodhair has shown that the barrel's bottom is a lot deeper than we had previously imagined.
Posted by: Dan Hays | July 17, 2009 at 01:29 PM
Actually, make that 1987 for SMU's death penalty.
Posted by: Dan Hays | July 17, 2009 at 01:31 PM
I actually remember Bill Clements, not fondly.
Posted by: John Petty | July 17, 2009 at 01:39 PM