[The presidential race] [i]s not as much fun without [Rick Perry]. At Rancho Perry, every day was Oopsday. Along the trail, he forgot how many Justices the Supreme Court has (eight is not enough); forgot the name of one of them (Sonia Sotomayor); placed the American Revolution in the sixteenth century; identified the voting age (fixed at eighteen four decades ago by constitutional amendment) as twenty-one; and suggested that the chairman of the Federal Reserve is a traitor, that Turkey (A NATO ally of sixty years’ standing) is governed by Islamic terrorists, and that Social Security is not only a Ponzi scheme but also a criminal enterprise, a monstrous lie, and unconstitutional. And there’s this whopper, from his farewell speech: “As a former Air Force pilot, I don’t get confused.”
I owe the above to the estimable Hendrik Hertzberg, writing in the January 30, 2012 New Yorker. And yes, I am a little behind in my New Yorker reading but how timely is my untimeliness! Because yesterday’s New York Times let us know what Perry and his good ‘ol white boy legislature have been up to since he returned to his home state of Texas: Women in Texas Losing Options for Health Care.
I then noticed a Times International section piece, on City Hall Still a Reach For Women in Mexico.
These two articles sent me rummaging through my 1939 Columbia Encyclopedia to remind myself that Texas was until the 1830s part of Mexico. Which it hasn’t been for a while, but gee, given the similar attitude Texan and Mexican males share in their treatment of women, not to mention their gun lust, maybe we should insist that Texas be re-united with Mexico.
I might even fight a war for that. My war cheer: “Take them back! Take them back!” It’s got a rhythm, you have to admit.
Think of all the problems this would solve. And the rest of us could all stop remembering the bloody Alamo and its crazy glorification of war and death.