By Faith Chatham - June 5, 2015
Some of the awful bills that were filed in the Texas Legislature this session died. Other truly awful ones were passed and in a totally irresponsible fashion, Gov. Abbott is bragging about signing them into law.
Brian Birdwell and Konni Burton head our Senate Wall of Shame this Session:
Birdwell, a decorated military man who was injured when the plane flew into the Pentagon, earns our biggest Senate Blaggard Award. It was a hard choice but he stands out on two fronts.
1. Attacking the benefits of other military veterans and their descendants with his bill that would reduce the number of Texas Veterans who qualify for education assistance under the Hazlewood Act. Birdwell's proposed eliminating eligibility for reservist and national guard who were called to active duty to qualify under the Hazlewood Act. Those men and women who were called to Active Duty during the Bush and Obama administration, many of whom were deployed abroad into combat for long tours of duty and retained abroad when those tours ended are disqualified for Hazlewood Act Benefits under Birdwell's bill. Birdwell also proposed shortening the number of years in which the education benefits could be used. For many soldiers, their children would not be old enough for college before the benefits expired. Thank You Brian Birdwell for being so callous to other Veterans! This bill is deplorable and Birdwell is too callous to even comprehend how very mean spirited this bill is. His service to this nation is noted. His attack on the welfare of other veterans takes him down several knotches in my estimation. This bill dishonors the uniform he wore and the nation he served. He ranks as blaggard for refusing to honor the service of other veterans.
2. Birdwell earns the nickname of "Tote those Guns on Campus" for sponsoring the Campus Carry bill which was passed by both houses of the Legislature and signed into law by Governor Abbot. As drafted, the bill did not allow State Universities to prohibit guns anywhere on campus. To get it passed, it was amended to allow universities the option of establishing gun free zones. Because Birdwell represents Waco, in self-preservation when Baylor University objected to campus carry, Birdwell exempted private schools from having to allow guns on campus and reworded it to apply to State School. Gee. What a creep. I truly hope he has a strong opponent in the Republican Primary who takes him out in 2016. I hope there is a strong candidate in the Democratic Primary who wages a good fight in the General Election. He's gotten a free ride in too many election cycles. His assault on Veterans removes the advantage he had from military service. Would be great for another vet (or 2) to challenge him and one of them claim that seat.
Then we come to Senator Konni Burton. She jumped in and carried water for the Oil and Gas Industry and put her name on an abominable anti-local governmental control bill which I think violates both the Texas and the U.S. Constitution. Named Senate Bill 40 because the Oil and Gas industry is said to be 40% of the Texas economy, the bill removes the right of local citizens to petition their government and vote in ordinances which regulate underground activities. Citizens in Denton, a city which is far from a liberal stronghold, voted overwhelmingly to ban fracking. Burton's bill not only restricts local governments from banning fracking, it nullifies all local ordinances which have been passed in the past five years which pertain to any underground activity.
Cities such as Arlington can no longer prohibit injection wells. With the rash of earthquakes in the Barnett Shale, which evidence shows are probably related to injection wells, and other Oil and Gas activity, passage of this bill places local landowners at greater risk of property damage. The sponsors of this bill are so proud of their service to the 50% yet they put the rest of the economy and all residential property owners at greater risk by removing local oversight totally from the Oil and Gas Industry. If the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality or the Texas Rail Road Commission actually did their job instead of being a full time state sponsored lap dog of the industry, state oversight would be a very different thing. Texans have litte reason to expect State Regulators to enact reasonable controls. Cities such as Fort Worth and Arlington which have hundreds of wells are pretty well screwed. Those who signed gas leases were informed of stricter local ordinances. Now that those ordinances are null and void thank to Konni Burton and a cadre of other fossil fuel agents, the environmental realities in many neighborhoods will probably deteriorate. It is a shame that Burton tired of her Wedding Planning business. She is more suited to such endeavors than she is to legislation. Unfortunately, Senators serve 6 year terms and Senate District 10 is probably stuck with her until 2020!
Oh, there are rumblings that two of the freshmen have established policies that exclude constituency service to anyone who did not vote for them. Mollie White (TX-H Belton) and Konni Burton (TX-S 10) seem to fail to realize that once elected, they are supposed to serve EVERYONE. These two are reported to have instructed staff not to schedule appointments for people who live in their districts who were not their supporters! Senate 10 has 602,461 Voting Age Residents. Since she only got 95,532 votes so according to her policy it appears that she intends to serve less than a 6th of the district! Maybe she can get 1/6 of her stipend and salary. Granted, the Legislature doesn't make that much, but for those who choose to cherry pick who is and who isn't constituents, they deserves less than they get!
Their success directly depended on us, and on the well-being of the nation, and they knew it.
But times have changed, and the super-rich of the 21st century no longer think that you and I are needed for their continued success.
And in some ways, they have given up on America, period.
As Paul Buchheit brilliantly points out over at AlterNet, "As they accumulate more and more wealth, the very rich have less need for society. At the same time, they've convinced themselves that they made it on their own, and that contributing to societal needs is unfair to them. There is ample evidence that this small group of takers is giving up on the country that made it possible for them to build huge fortune."
Buchheit goes on to say that, "The rich have always needed the middle class to work in their factories and buy their products. With globalization this is no longer true... They don't need our infrastructure for their yachts and helicopters and submarines. They pay for private schools for their kids, private security for their homes. They have private emergency rooms to avoid the health care hassle. All they need is an assortment of servants, who might be guest workers coming to America on H2B visas, willing to work for less than a middle-class American can afford"
Unfortunately, these millionaires and billionaires who have given up on America and on the working class are in control of the political process in this country.
They have brainwashed Republicans into thinking that the success of working-class Americans no longer matters for the future of this nation.
As a result, Republicans are no longer investing in things that have traditionally made America - and the working-class - successful.
Take America's infrastructure for example - or lack thereof.
According to the American Society of Civil Engineers annual report card on America's infrastructure, America's infrastructure is a mess.
Our roads are falling apart, our transportations systems are in turmoil, and our energy and electrical systems are stuck back in the 1900's.
A new graph released by investment research firm BCA shows why.
Non-defense related infrastructure spending was around $325 billion per year when George W. Bush stepped foot inside of the White House.
Today, it's around $235 billion per year, a $90 billion drop in funding from when Bush took office.
Republicans, brainwashed by America's super-rich, have repeatedly refused to fund comprehensive infrastructure spending bills, all in the name of austerity.
But cutting funding to the nation's infrastructure isn't the right way to address American's debt or spending problems. And it certainly isn't the right way to rebuild this nation.
As Cardiff Garcia over at The Financial Times points out, "It's also likely that much of the investment that has been forgone in the name of fiscal consolidation will have to be made eventually anyways - only it will be made when rates are higher, exacerbating the long-term fiscal outlook rather than improving it. And as Think Progress points out, "continued underfunding in this arena over the coming years will cost businesses a trillion dollars in lost sales and cost the economy 3.5 million jobs."
The Society of Civil Engineers says that it will take a staggering $3.6 trillion investment by 2020 - or $450 billion per year - to bring the American infrastructure into the 21st century, and to avoid risking a complete infrastructure collapse.
But the super-rich don't care about how much funding is needed to save this country, as long as they have their private schools, private hospitals, private airports and private places.
The super-rich in this country are bleeding working-class Americans dry, while destroying the infrastructure of the nation that has done so much for their success.
No matter what Jamie Dimon, Charles Koch, or Shelly Adelson will tell you, America's wealthy elite did not make their fortunes on their own.
Without a strong economy and infrastructure, America's millionaires and billionaires would not be where they are today. It's that simple.
So what can we do right now to rebuild America's infrastructure and give a boost to the American economy?
First, it's time to bring an end to globalization.
We need to be protecting American jobs, instead of letting the super-rich ship them overseas and build factories in China and third-world countries.
But more importantly, we need to roll-back the Reagan tax cuts, and make sure that America's wealthy elite are paying their fair share to support our economy and infrastructure.
Right now, the burden for rebuilding America is on the backs of working-class Americans, and that's just wrong.
It's ridiculous that working-class Americans struggling to survive day-to-day are paying more in taxes than billionaire banksters and oil tycoons.
A lot has changed in America over the past 100 years or so but one thing remains the same: The success of the super-rich still depends on the success of you and me.
The super-rich still need us for their roads, for their businesses, for their communications, and for their transportation.
Our infrastructure may be crumbling, but there's still time to get America back on the road to success.
We're all in this together.
