Adam Kinzinger

Adam Kinzinger (R-Illinois 11th), one of the few U.S. House Republicans who were not "going along" with Trump on everything like most every Republican did. Lynne Cheney? Thomas Massie? I must be forgetting someone or two, surely. Adam puts together a relevant read on today's insanity, and he even helped me remember a few things about the movie "Idiocracy." Well done, Adam.

I look around at the corruption, the bluster, the nonsense and I can't help but feel that we are living in the movie "Idiocracy." And the credits are rolling.

In 2006, Mike Judge released Idiocracy, a satirical comedy so niche that Fox buried it with almost no marketing or wide release. The studio apparently didn't know what to do with it, but we became it.

The premise is deceptively simple: Joe Bauers, the most average man in America, gets frozen in a military experiment and wakes up 500 years in the future. Humanity, having out-bred intelligence for generations, has devolved into a civilization of breathtaking stupidity. Crops are dying because agribusiness replaced irrigation water with a sports drink called Brawndo: The Thirst Mutilator — because “it’s got electrolytes.” No one can explain what electrolytes are, only that Brawndo has them, and Brawndo is good, so shut up.

The President of the United States is Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho — a former pro wrestler and porn star turned head of state, who opens his State of the Union address by firing a machine gun into the air from a stage surrounded by pyrotechnics, monster trucks, and screaming fans. He communicates in slogans. He doesn’t know how to fix anything. But he’s entertaining, and in the world of Idiocracy, that’s the whole job.

Joe, now the smartest man alive by default, is appointed Secretary of the Interior and given one week to fix the economy, the dust bowls, and the dying crops — or be thrown into a demolition derby death match called “Monday Night Rehabilitation.”

It’s a comedy. Mostly.

Enter: The Real-Life Camacho

When Idiocracy was released, it felt like a warning. By 2016, it felt like a prophecy. By now, it feels like a documentary with a ten-year delay.

Consider the parallels. President Camacho is a pro wrestler turned entertainer turned head of state. Donald Trump is a pro wrestler — legitimately, having appeared in WWE events and been inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame — turned reality TV star turned President of the United States. Both men built their brands on spectacle, dominance, and the performance of strength to adoring crowds. Neither was elected because of policy expertise. Both were elected because they were watchable.

The differences are largely cosmetic. Camacho is fictional.

The Parade, the Finger, and “Quiet, Piggy”

In Idiocracy, President Camacho rides through the streets of Washington on a motorcycle, flanked by adoring masses, and flips the crowd the bird — a gesture that is received not with horror, but with thunderous applause. To his people, it reads as authentic. He’s one of them. He doesn’t play by the rules. He’s real.

You don’t have to squint hard to see the echo. In November 2025, aboard Air Force One, Donald Trump turned to a female reporter who had asked him a question he didn’t want to answer and told her: “Quiet, quiet, piggy.” The remark — casual, contemptuous, aimed at a woman doing her job — was received by his base not as a disqualifying moment but as another proof of authenticity. He says what he thinks. He doesn’t pretend.

The gesture and the epithet are different in form, identical in function: dominance performance for a crowd that has been trained to read cruelty as strength.

The White House Gets a Makeover

The future Washington D.C. in Idiocracy looks like the Vegas Strip was dropped inside a demolition yard — garish, gold-trimmed, maximalist, empire-coded.

The real White House, under its current occupant, is trending in a strikingly similar direction. Trump’s ongoing renovation project calls for a $1 Billion State Ballroom to replace the East Wing, featuring gilded Corinthian columns, coffered ceilings with gold inlays, crystal chandeliers, gold floor lamps, and checkered marble floors.

The Oval Office has already been bedecked in gilded frames and golden details. The architect of record, McCrery Architects, specializes in classical design — which in this context means less Lincoln Memorial and more Roman imperial court.

The people’s house, retrofitted to look like a monument to one man. Camacho would recognize it immediately. And of course, the UFC fight.

The 250th Birthday Party Nobody Wants to Play

The single most Idiocracy moment of this particular season may be the slow-motion unraveling of the Great American State Fair — the White House-backed extravaganza planned for the National Mall from June 25 to July 10 to commemorate America’s 250th birthday.

The event, organized under the White House initiative “Freedom 250,” was initially billed to artists as a nonpartisan celebration of the nation. Then the lineup was announced. Then artists started reading the press coverage. Then the exodus began.

Morris Day and The Time pulled out. Young MC pulled out, saying he was “never told about any political involvement.” Rapper-turned-country-artist Jodie Rocco of Milli Vanilli backed out. Country star Martina McBride posted on X that she had believed the event was nonpartisan and dropped out the moment she learned otherwise. The Commodores withdrew. Bret Michaels, frontman of Poison, dropped out.

Who stayed? Vanilla Ice, who is contractually obligated to perform on June 26 and, per his management, will honor that contract.

The optics are almost too perfect. A celebration of America that most of America’s entertainers — the very people who were supposed to make it feel festive — want no part of. What was sold as a national birthday party has been understood, correctly, as a campaign rally with better fireworks.

In Idiocracy, the president throws a party and everyone shows up because they have no choice and no context. In America 2026, the entertainers have a choice, and they’re using it.

A Star Burns Bright Before It Implodes

There’s a phenomenon in astrophysics that most people know intuitively even if they’ve never studied it: a dying star doesn’t go quietly. In its final phase, it expands — burning hotter, brighter, and more dramatically than at any point in its life. It becomes a red giant, luminous beyond reason, consuming everything within reach. And then, with a violence proportional to its brilliance, it collapses.

MAGA, at this moment, is burning very bright.

The big beautiful ballroom. The gilded columns. The 250th birthday spectacular on the National Mall. The motorcades. The slogans. The performance of power, non-stop, unyielding. It looks, from a certain angle, like an empire at its peak.

But the numbers tell a different story. As of May 2026, 31 percent of Americans approve of the way Donald Trump is handling his job. Sixty-four percent disapprove. His net approval rating — positive minus negative — sits at -34, compared to -6 just fourteen months ago. Just 29 percent approve of his handling of the economy.

These are not the numbers of a movement at high tide. These are the numbers of a star in its final expansion.

And in November 2026, Americans go back to the polls. 

Democrats need to flip three seats to reclaim the House. Generic congressional ballot polling shows Democratic leads ranging from 4 to 13 points. The historical pattern — the president’s party almost always loses ground in midterms — has not been suspended.

The sequels to Idiocracy were never made, perhaps because the movie ends on a cautiously hopeful note: Joe becomes president, introduces water to the crops, and slowly, painfully, things begin to get better. Intelligence, it turns out, is not entirely extinct. It just had to wait for the right moment.

That moment may be coming.

The star burns bright and big — spectacular, impossible to ignore — right before it implodes. What comes after a supernova is not darkness. It’s a new beginning. The fuel is running out, the approval ratings are cratering, the entertainers are walking away, and November is on the calendar.

Idiocracy was a warning. The warning was ignored. But the ending — the part where someone finally waters the crops — that part is still being written.

- Adam Kinzinger

(one more on Facebook)

Glee Violette

Trump has built up such an edifice of bullshit it looks intimidating to many. Certainly intimidating to Congress, but that body never has had a preponderance of SPINE. Sometimes I get discouraged at what Trump seems to be getting away with. But is he really going to skate scot-free? Unlikely. A lot of what Trump is doing is barely hanging on by a thread. A strong push one way or the other is enough to get this bully to back down and cave. He may try an end-around and push again, but we the people have to be ready. That's not just regular citizens. It's everyone: lawyers, bankers, truck drivers, carpenters, teachers, accountants, judges, law enforcement, musicians, ANYONE who has a vested interest in stability and peace.

Another independent voice I discovered online is Glee Violette. People are popping up all over. 

BREAKING - NOW HE SAYS HE DOESN'T WANNA.

by Glee Violette

Excuse me while I while I hurl every filthy, nasty obscene term I know in the direction of a certain bloated, decayed, somewhat human-shaped creature. The one that recently erected a golden idol of himself, and dedicated it in his own "honor" - a word he uses often, but which does not mean what he thinks he means.

ONE MORE TIME, this slimy creature has destroyed something, and then slithered away, leaving the REST of us to clean up his mess. And pay for the damage.

YES. We are talking about The John F Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts in Washington DC.

Which this abominable creature closed for TWO YEARS of renovations. After first FIRING the people who turned it into the gem of the nation, and putting himself and his cronies in charge. After turning its premier entertainment schedule into a pathetic lineup of his handful of washed-up one-hit wonders, and boring religious indoctrination films. After banishing our National Symphonic Orchestra and our National Ballet and Dance Companies.

And most despicable of all, after putting his OWN shameful name ABOVE that of the REAL President that our National Arts Center was built to TRULY honor, as a living memorial to his memory.

Today, Friday, a federal judge ruled he could NOT rename the Center OR close it for renovations. unless CONGRESS approves the plans.

And this is what he posted this evening in retribution:

"Unless I am free to do what I do better than anyone else, bring this Institution back, physically, financially, and artistically, I have no interest in continuing what could only be a hopeless journey into "NEVER NEVER LAND"

"Therefore, based on the fact that the Radical Left Democrats care more about opposing your favorite President, ME, than saving a dying Performing Arts Center, almost all of which lose large amounts of money throughout the Country, we are going to be working with Congress to transfer this failing Institution back to them so they can make a determination as to what to do with it," he posted.

"Transfer BACK"??? WHAT, he thinks he OWNS the place???

Excuse me. I have thought of a few more words to yell out my window, in the direction of Washington DC.

I hope it rains like HELL on June 14th. And never mind it raining locusts and frogs. May there be a plague of wasps and snakes. Not the harmless baby Black Racers that RFK Jr just made a big show of molesting. The kind of snake that junior's BOSS recited about at rallies.

As for HIM, he is not even a TRUE snake, at all. Just a shape-shifting FAKE creature. A disgusting, ugly and USELESS creature that needs to slither back under its rock. And STAY there.

via Facebook

Dominique Alexander

My being an atheist doesn't mean I won't even listen (now and then) to what ministers/ preachers/call 'em whatever you wanna call 'em have to say. Lord knows there are plenty of charlatans masquerading as true believers that are in it to win it and fleece the flock of whatever they can get. I think Dominique Alexander is in it for the right reasons: to help people. 

Dominique Alexander

Texas, we must prepare ourselves for what is coming. The moment Ken Paxton became the Republican nominee for the United States Senate seat, the same political strategy immediately returned: fearmongering, division, and misinformation. We are already hearing the same recycled attacks targeting transgender kids in sports, dishonest narratives about energy, and misleading statements designed to distract Texans from the real issues impacting our communities every single day.

This is not leadership. This is a calculated political tactic used to divide people, create outrage, and manipulate voters through fear instead of facts. Texans deserve better than politicians who build campaigns on confusion, deception, and culture wars while families struggle with rising costs, failing infrastructure, public education challenges, healthcare access, and economic uncertainty.

We must rise up across this state and commit ourselves to truth, transparency, education, and voter engagement. We cannot allow lies to go unanswered. We cannot allow fear to define the future of Texas. Every community must be informed, every voter must be educated, and every voice must be empowered heading into November.

The lies will come. The attacks will come. The misinformation campaigns will continue. But our responsibility is greater than their politics. We must organize harder, educate deeper, and mobilize stronger than ever before. The future of Texas depends on people who are willing to stand on facts, defend democracy, and fight for a state that works for everyone not just political extremists chasing power.

November is bigger than politics. It is about the soul and direction of Texas. Let’s organize. Let’s educate. Let’s mobilize. And let’s make sure every Texan is informed, prepared, and ready to vote.

via Facebook

Jochum, Pt 2

When I try to write columns for release in the wild, I struggle. I have a decent vocabulary and a fairly good sense of history, but something keeps me from finishing the column. Myself, I guess. I find myself writing things that I have perhaps recently heard, not exactly plagiarism but drifting toward it. Writing paragraphs that don't bear much relation to earlier paragraphs. Spending hours looking up quotes to include, only to have trouble finding just what I want. So....on this blog, I tend to not publish much myself, but highlight those with opinions I can relate to.

You just never know. I have a collection of incomplete writings that I might just be able to put together into a sensible whole. Or not. 

Meanwhile...

Fools Paradise

by Michael Jochum

I saw the writing on the wall in 2016. I really did. I assumed, naively, as it turns out, that four years of Donald Trump would function like an inoculation. That Americans would witness the chaos, the narcissism, the corruption, the relentless lying, the casual cruelty, the degradation of the office itself, and collectively say, well, that was a national fever dream, let’s never do that shit again. I figured he’d drift into obscurity like a musical one-hit wonder with a bad spray tan and a grievance addiction. Instead, America handed him an encore.

And here we are.

What I did not fully appreciate then was that Trump was never the disease. He was the symptom. The loudest, ugliest, most shameless manifestation of something darker that had apparently been fermenting beneath the floorboards of this country for a very long time.

What we’ve witnessed in these first sixteen months is not governance. It’s a smash-and-grab operation dressed up in patriotic cosplay. A fascist improvisation with flags as props and the Constitution treated like an inconvenient suggestion. Due process becomes optional. Human beings are detained as political theater. The emoluments clause might as well be cocktail napkin copy for all the regard this administration appears to have for constitutional boundaries. The poor are told to tighten their belts while the already obscenely wealthy are handed bigger forks.

And then there’s the grotesque vanity project of it all. Plastering his name, figuratively and spiritually if not always literally, across institutions and symbols patriotic Americans have long held sacred, as though the presidency were not a temporary stewardship but a licensing agreement for his personal brand. Remodeling the White House to suit his gold-plated ego, turning the people’s house into some gilded monument to insecurity and self-worship. Always with the underlying sense that the man who dodged service with bone spurs needs a bunker nearby when the turbulence of his own making inevitably arrives at the front door. It would all be darkly comical if it weren’t so serious. Decimating the arts, politicizing cultural institutions, treating places meant to elevate the American spirit as props in his endless reality show performance. Every institution becomes either a mirror or a target.

And I sit here now on the outskirts of Omaha, Nebraska, looking out at a stretch of American heartland I genuinely love, and I cannot shake the feeling that millions of decent people are being conned by one of the greatest con men ever to occupy the Oval Office, a Cohn man in every sense of the phrase, carrying forward the cynical playbook of Roy Cohn with all the empathy of a casino foreclosure notice. That’s the maddening part. Not just the corruption itself, but the astonishing durability of the con.

Because authoritarians always come for the press.

A free press is not an annoyance to democracy. It is democracy’s immune system. And what does Trump do? He attacks journalists, vilifies reporters, restricts access, weaponizes language against those whose job it is to ask inconvenient questions. But his particular contempt for women in the press has always carried its own special stench. Women who challenge him. Women who refuse to smile on command. Women who don’t package their intelligence in deference. Women who insist on facts rather than flattery. In Trump’s world, women who do not bow become enemies. The pattern is unmistakable: if he cannot dominate you, he will attempt to demean you.

Because that’s always been the formula.

Anyone Trump perceives as inferior becomes a target. Reporters. Democrats. Immigrants. Minorities. Political opponents. Independent women. Anyone unwilling to genuflect before the altar of his endless emotional need.

If you continue to actively support this attack on democratic norms, constitutional governance, and basic human decency, then this is no longer some abstract policy disagreement over marginal tax rates or regulatory philosophy. This is moral territory. You are not merely voting differently than I do. You are endorsing conduct that places people I love—and people you should care about—at risk.

My family.

My friends.

My grandchildren.

Your neighbors.

Because this stops being politics when cruelty becomes policy. It stops being ideology when vengeance becomes governance. It stops being patriotism when dissent is recast as treason by a wannabe strongman wrapped in a flag he fundamentally does not understand.

There are days I feel like a man without a country. That’s a painful thing to admit, because I love this country. Deeply. Imperfectly. Fiercely. I believe in its highest aspirations, even while watching its institutions be hollowed out by a malignant narcissist who mistakes domination for leadership and wealth for virtue.

But Trump is still only one chapter in a much larger American reckoning.

The sentence that may explain all of this is brutally simple: “He says the things I’m thinking.”

And if that’s true, then perhaps that is the most terrifying revelation of all.

Who knew tens of millions of Americans were carrying around this much grievance? This much resentment? This much hostility toward fellow citizens? Toward women who refuse submission? Toward minorities demanding equality? Toward expertise? Toward compassion? Toward democracy itself?

Who knew that beneath decades of supposed progress there remained this much emotional dry tinder, waiting for a demagogue with a microphone and no conscience to strike the match?

Maybe we were living in a fool’s paradise.

Now we aren’t.

And so I come back, again and again, to the same exhausting question: What is it going to take?

Because rationally, you would think the answer would be: all of this. The corruption. The cruelty. The constitutional contempt. The performative wars. The assaults on institutions. The degradation of public discourse. The normalization of authoritarian behavior. Surely somewhere in the cumulative weight of the last eighteen months lies the tipping point.

And yet here we are.

As we approach the midterms, I’m trying to remain cautiously optimistic. I have to be. Cynicism is easy; action requires hope. But optimism without honesty is delusion, and the honest truth is that we still have a tremendous amount of ground to cover.

Opposing Trump is not, nor has it ever been, a political decision.

It is a moral one.

Michael Jochum

Author of Not Just a Drummer: Reflections on Art, Politics, Dogs, and the Human Condition

Veteran drummer, writer, observer of the absurd, and still foolish enough to believe truth matters.

on Facebook

Taylor Swift

And now for something completely different. Taylor Swift! Gotta mix it up now and then and turn away from the orange parasite. This is a good story I remember hearing a little while ago, but it is real, and it bears repeating. It's great to see wealthy people generously spreading their wealth around, even if it is only to her team. Not many like Taylor around. Can't say I love her music that much, but I don't hate it like I do some genres.

It was a Monday in early August 2023. The exhausted truck drivers of Taylor Swift's Eras Tour thought they were heading to a routine production meeting before the Los Angeles shows.

They had no idea what was coming.

Scott Swift walked in. Taylor's father didn't say much—he just began handing out envelopes. When the drivers finally peeked inside, some thought the check said $1,000. Others read $10,000. The third driver stared at his and said out loud: "This has to be a joke." It wasn't.

$100,000.

Each driver. Nearly 50 of them. The industry standard bonus from the biggest stars? $5,000 to $10,000. Taylor had given them more than ten times that.

But here's what made it matter most: these drivers weren't wealthy. They lived in truck cabs. They hadn't seen their families in 24 weeks. They were people who would never own homes—until now. Until that envelope.

That moment of shock and tears? It was just the beginning.

Across the entire Eras Tour, Taylor quietly handed out $197 million in bonuses. The dancers. The band. The riggers. The lighting and sound technicians. The caterers. Every single person who built the show—they got bonuses, handwritten notes, and wax-sealed letters. When dancers opened theirs on camera in her docuseries, they broke down crying. Some couldn't believe she was real.

"If the tour grosses more, they get more," she explained simply. These people work hard. They deserve it.

But the crew bonuses weren't the only quiet revolution happening.

Starting in March 2023, in every city where the tour touched down, a call came to local food banks. Taylor wanted to donate. No press conference. No announcement. No photo op. One donation fed 75,000 meals. Another provided hundreds of thousands of pounds of fresh produce. Across the tour, the total reached millions of meals—possibly more—all delivered in silence.

She never posted about a single one. And it wasn't new for her.

In March 2020, when the pandemic locked down the world, Taylor scrolled through social media posts from fans who were breaking. A photographer about to lose everything. A person staring down eviction. She sent direct messages with rent money—$3,000 here, $13,000 there. Some fans got enough for months of bills. She read the Washington Post. She noticed the names. She helped.

She never announced it.

Years later, in October 2025, a two-year-old named Lilah—fighting a cancer so rare that only 58 families in America had ever known it—was filmed by her mother dancing to a Taylor Swift song. Lilah called Taylor her friend. A few days later, the GoFundMe received a $100,000 donation.

The note said: "Sending the biggest hug to my friend, Lilah! Love, Taylor."

Mike Scherkenbach has worked with the wealthiest people in music. He's seen the bonuses. He's seen the behavior. He's watched billionaires guard their money jealously. What he saw with Taylor was different.

The biggest tour in history grossed $2 billion. The artist behind it became a billionaire from her own songwriting. And then she signed her name onto hundreds of envelopes by hand and sent enough money back to the people who built her dream that they cried opening their letters.

That isn't strategy. That isn't a publicity stunt.

That's what happens when someone, somewhere along the way, remembered what matters.

No attribution.

Emily Solberg

This whole $1.776 BILLION dollar slush fund is an insult to and an assault on our democracy. Maybe now the GOP will stand up and say WTF? Are we really going to allow millions to be paid out to the J6 terrorists who attacked our Capitol on 1/6/21? They deserve to be still in jail. Trump says the J6 terrorists were treated "so badly" by Biden. Well, fuck yeah, they tried to overturn the 2020 election. And obviously Trump belongs in jail too, but the entire machinery of the government has been taken over/captured by this gang of criminals aka the Republican Party.

Ya know, I didn’t think it could get much worse than a ballroom.

Using OUR taxpayer dollars for a G-D ballroom when people can’t afford gas or groceries is Marie Antoinette-level egregious, but I think this may just take the cake.

Now we have a president who sued his own IRS, then negotiated a deal with his own DOJ and dropped the charges, but only on the condition that they NEVER investigate ANY tax claims related to him, his family, or his businesses up to the date of the settlement. Lest we forget, this is the same guy who was convicted on 34 counts of falsifying business records. But hey, nothing to see here!

Oh—the attorney general who oversaw this entire charade? Just the president’s former personal lawyer. Totally unbiased and nonpartisan. 

As part of this deal, the president also gets a formal apology from the United States for hurting his feelings ANDDDDD—*drumroll please*—a $1.776 BILLION slush fund for victims of “lawfare,” aka, allies and loyalists, including but not limited to the darling insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021.

How patriotic.

Roughly 1600 people faced federal charges for their involvement on January 6th. If every one of those people files a claim, that amounts to what?

Only a smooth $1.1 MILLION per person.

For some perspective, wanna know how much the federal government pays in a death gratuity for service members who die on active duty?

$100,000.

So you’re telling me the people who sh*t all over the Constitution (literally, they spread feces all over the Capitol building) are rightfully entitled to TEN TIMES the compensation allotted for service members who sacrificed their LIVES defending the same Constitution??

Raise your hand if, instead of ballrooms, and shady deals, and AI data centers, and tax cuts for billionaires, and senseless wars, and million-dollar immigration ad campaigns with horses and make-up, and road trip reality shows, and private scuba excursions in Hawaii, and locker room Olympic parties, and steak and lobster for cabinet members . . .

You want YOUR hard-earned tax dollars to go to healthcare, national parks, cancer research, science, clean air and water, food for the hungry, veterans, education, mental health initiatives, social safety nets, and more amazing NASA moon missions.

And raise your hand if you are sick and tired of the most corrupt, incompetent, nepotistic people in this country getting to make the choice for you.

from Facebook

Molly Ivins

I ran across this piece from last summers Texas Observer. Every now and then they pull up a piece from Molly Ivins, who was a big supporter of the Texas Observer until she passed away in 2007.

This piece, on school vouchers was originally written by Molly in 1997, but, needless to say, things have gotten worse in Texas. The voucher program is now running and shipping lots of money to people that don't need it, in accordance with the unwritten rule that Republicans will always try to benefit the wealthy.

MOLLY IVINS ON SCHOOL VOUCHERS (1997)

Another bad idea whose time has come in the Texas Legislature is upon us...

by Molly Ivins

Editor’s Note: The Observer published this column in its April 11, 1997, edition under the headline: “Texas: Laboratory for Lunacy.” That year’s private school voucher proposal narrowly died at the Lege.

Three strikes and you’re out? Watch Texas spend more on prisons than it does on schools. Thinking of making your tax structure more regressive? Come to the Lone Star State and see how it’s done.

The latest brainstorm to afflict our friendly pols in Austin is school vouchers. Consider the beauty of this nifty scheme as it might eventually be worked out under the guidance of the Texas Lege. To improve the public schools (I swear, that’s how the advocates are advertising this lunacy):

• We give vouchers to all the students who are already in private or religious schools around the state. Right there, before anybody else even gets a voucher, we will have taken, say, $1 billion out of the budget for our public schools. Shrewd move, eh?

• We also give all the kids now in public school a voucher, thus theoretically enabling these children to attend the schools of their parents’ choice: Unfortunately, private schools might find themselves under no obligation to accept any of our kids; they could be rejected because of their religious affiliation, their disabilities, on the grounds that they’re not bright enough, because the school administrators don’t like their looks—any reason not specifically excluded by law. The Texas Freedom Network, a normally sensible group of good guys, is running around like Paul Revere, trying to alert the citizenry to this dread downside of the school voucher idea. “Proposed voucher legislation would allow private schools to recruit the best athletes and students at taxpayer expense.” Folks, we’re talking football now! I knew you’d be concerned. Quel horrifying thought: The whole high school football tradition is in dire peril. Stop the madness now!

THIS CONCEPT IS SO BAD THAT IT HAS AN EXCELLENT CHANCE OF PASSING THE LEGISLATURE.

On a more sober note, the good private schools we’d all like to send our kids to already have waiting lists a mile long. No public school kid is going to St. John’s in Houston or St. Mark’s in Dallas with a voucher clutched in his or her little hand; those schools cost $10,000 a year, and our little school voucher won’t cover half the cost.

Now maybe, just maybe, some upper-middle-class folks might be able to afford a fancy private school with a voucher to help, but working-class and middle-class kids are going to be stuck just where they always were. Why should we spend public money to help just that one thin slice of the population when it won’t improve the public schools?

The rural kids are really going to get burned by this idea. As you may have noticed, almost all private schools are in cities. Hundreds of rural school districts don’t have a single private school, but because of the way state education financing works, they’d still lose thousands of dollars from their budgets for the public schools without a single kid going to private school.

I realize this means nothing to our Legislature, but it should be mentioned that the whole idea is rankly unconstitutional.

All in all, this concept is so bad that it has an excellent chance of passing the Legislature. Much as we would like to help the rest of the nation by demonstrating once more just how stupid ideas work out in practice, couldn’t we give this one a miss?

In case you’re wondering who is pushing this dingbat notion, it’s the religious right, the same charmers who helped elect the right-wingers who now grace the state Board of Education. If you haven’t checked in on the state board lately, you really should. It’s a lot of fun—fruitcakes unlimited, flat-Earthers, creationists, all manner of remarkable specimens. In fact, it’s gotten so bad that there’s even a bill in the Lege to replace it with an appointed board again.

You may recall that we’ve had this fight before. In keeping with my Theory of Perpetual Reform, I now favor an appointed board. Last time, I favored an elected board. What I really favor is the idea that no matter what we try, in about ten years, it’s always a mess again and we need to try something else.

Molly Ivins (Alan Pogue)

Speaking of matters educational, let me take on a sacred cow that is long past its prime: local control. Have you noticed that the people who consider local control of the schools a sanctified arrangement are the same people who are always complaining about how terrible the schools are? If local control is such a great idea, then how come the schools are so bad? Have we considered the possibility that maybe local control is the problem?

A truism of the everlasting education debates is that someone somewhere has already solved whatever the problem is. Someone somewhere is always doing a brilliant job of teaching physics to inner-city kids, or teaching music to a bunch of rural kids in the 4-H who have heretofore considered Loretta Lynn classical music, or getting bored suburban brats excited about Herman Melville.

The problem is that we can’t seem to replicate the successes in the schools across the board because there is no across the board. Instead, there’s local control. Sometimes it’s superb, granted. But often, it’s hopelessly knot-headed. Ask the folks in Dallas—they’ve had some lulus lately. It seems to me just possible that maybe what we need to do is take education out of the hands of insurance salesmen, Minute Women, and other odd ephemera of the electoral process and put it in the hands of… well, educators.

Molly Ivins, co-editor of the Observer from 1970 to 1976, was a stalwart advocate of the magazine until her death in 2007. Her irreverence and irrepressibility continue to help define the Observer today.