I am a life-long Austinite. I remember as a kid playing along Barton Creek. I also remember when I was 19, a girl was murdered along Barton Creek and that was a turning point for me. My utopia was now descrated. Still, I enjoy the area. I lifeguarded at Barton Springs for more than half a decade. As construction began along the creek, we started noticing more and more algae blooms in the pool. All the morning polar bears would convene with coffee at water's edge and discuss the SOS ordinances and their fight to save Barton Springs. I can only imagine how much of a sludge pond the pool would be today if these folks hadn't been fighting the good fight.
State Representative Paul Workman has now filed bills into the legislature weakening environmental protection. Environmental protection has long been a hallmark of Austin politics. Former Mayor Gus Garcia once called Austin "a city within a park". Workman's bills will create a statewide, state-backed deregulation that should really be left to cities and their governances.
The Austin-American Statesman article discussing Workman's legislation includes increasing the area allowed on land tracts over the Edwards Aquifer (where we get our drinking water from) from 15-25% developed footprint to 45-50% - a potential 300% increase. The basic issue behind this development, albeit necessary to a degree, creates polluntants into our drinking source. Oil from cars, fertilizers from the artificial facades created from the wake of bull-dozing the natural habitats, and trash from us contaminate the aquifer. Other regulations would remove the city of Austin process for tree-removal, which currently mandates a city arborist for any tree greater than 19 inches. Lastly, Workman intends to limit the Save Our Springs Ordinance.
So, city tree ordinances began in the 1980's. The SOS alliance was formed in the early 90's and city of Austin voters approved the SOS ordinance. City of Austin voters created and have supported what they wanted for greater than 20 years. Let us examine Mr. Workman's background.
Mr. Workman has a long history in construction, as evidenced on his webpage. He is also a highly touted civic leader, being involved in Rotary. Aligned with his primary income, he has been a Board member for the Real Estate Council of Austin and National Director for the Association of General Contractors. Mr. Workman has a clear tutalege and loyalty to the industries that said legislation would benefit.
One question I have after reading Mr. Workman's bio is this: he took over his father's construction business in 1980. He moved to Austin in 1983 and began his construction business in 1991 "with no work and little money". My question is, what happened to his father's business? Did he ruin it? Did his brother run it into the ground? I'm curious to know...
It seems to me that Mr. Workman is clearly introducing self-serving legislation to benefit his peers and his own business at the expense of the environment. I am truly disappointed that Mr. Workman would use state-backed deregulation to usurp tens of thousands of city voters, but this is what I have come to expect of politicians.
I have but one thing to say to Mr. Workman: Please, don't Dallas my Austin.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Thursday, March 7, 2013
TexasFred Is Making Us Texans Look Stoopid
For my 4th government assignment, I was tasked with crititiquing a Texas blog. I came across this gem from TexasFred.net written today, March 7, 2013. The article entitled "Too Much Money spent in Iraq For Too Few Results" was essentially a waste of my time. The article is pretty weak, devoid of any real substance, and is really just a bandwaggoning on an AP report posted on CBS News found here. Thankfully, this blog entry was short and not too cerebral, making my assignment a little easier.
TexasFred.net is aka Fred Witzell. Not much is available on Mr. Witzell per search engine results other than the predictable ancestory.com and linkedin.com results. Mr. Fred is a self-described ultra conservative. Being that his moniker is "Texas Fred", that comes as no surprise. Unfortunately, I have come to find ultra conservatives as a special breed of stupid so Fred is already at a disadvantage in my book. At the risk of derailing this assingment and finishing before I die, I will not veer off course and list all of the GOP's transgressions in the last 15 minutes, but I will state that the "right" has become synonymous with scandal, hypocrisy, and an absolute refusal to compromise even in the face of putting their constituents in harm's way.
Mr. Witzell's point about the CBS article is that he is upset that the AP never making any mention about the dead and injured soldiers and Dubya's personal issues with Saddam Hussien; it's just too bad that the CBS article was on the irresponsible spending, financial mismanagement, and lack of oversight on Iraqi infrastructure so Fred kinda veered off topic. Granted, Fred's blog is his own and he can say what he wants, but he doesn't really contribute anything to the conversation other than basic martyrdom bandwaggoning and anecdotal drivel. Let me clarify myself - a single life lost was too high a price, so please do not infer any disrespect on my behalf to the soldiers lost and injured. It seems that Fred is using their blood to bang his drum - my opinion.
Fred then goes onto his soapbox and states he was fine with invading Afghanistan in pursuit of Al Queda, then wanders off-topic about his irrelevant knowledge of uranium and Sarin gas, then teeters off to his finest bit of ridiculousness with his statement of "we went to Iraq because George W. Bush was pissed off at Saddam Hussein over threats Hussein made against George H.W. Bush, nothing more, nothing less".
Fred pretty much discredited himself with that lone statement. I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure we invaded Iraq due to Hussein's human rights violations, torture of the Iraqi people, his fascist regime, and his threats of pursuing nuclear capability. I have a hard time believing the POTUS would arbitrarily invade a country, without the vote of the US Congress (constitutionally mandated unless by executive priviledge) on a personal beef. I think that is a bit of a stretch. I do believe that Dubya had possible credible information linking Hussein to Al Queda and/or WMD's but hindsight found that to be not the case. For those reasons i can see starting a war, but not because of being butt-hurt over empty threats.
Fred then cut-n-pastes points regarding misappropriations for Iraqi infrastructure projects that are all too well known, detracting from his point. He then declares how money was wasted but then restates his anger at the lack of acknowledgement of loss of life. Fred then furhter discredits himself by speaking about how the soldiers deaths and exorbinant costs of the misappropriation is what caused our nation's economic recession. I would remind Fred that deregulated financial institutions, expansion of junk holdings to inflate stocks, creation of artificial economies, and the governmental intervention into the economy is really what caused our current situation... that, plus 2 wars, and the $11 trillion dollars in consumer holdings. Just sayin'.
I will take a moment to applaud Fred on not willy-nilly unconditionally supporting his party regardless of their action - i.e. his statement about Dubya taking in into Iraq in the first place. It seems too often that, in my perspective, people will side with polital affiliation rather than what is morally/ethically right, regardless of the issue. 10 gallon Hat's Off to Fred for that, but unfortunately the rest of his commentary is kinda silly - ergo, his moniker of "Texas Fred" lumps him into the same fold as I, yet I don't want Fred speaking for me. He makes us Texans look kinda stoopid, and Rick Perry is doing enough of that already.
TexasFred.net is aka Fred Witzell. Not much is available on Mr. Witzell per search engine results other than the predictable ancestory.com and linkedin.com results. Mr. Fred is a self-described ultra conservative. Being that his moniker is "Texas Fred", that comes as no surprise. Unfortunately, I have come to find ultra conservatives as a special breed of stupid so Fred is already at a disadvantage in my book. At the risk of derailing this assingment and finishing before I die, I will not veer off course and list all of the GOP's transgressions in the last 15 minutes, but I will state that the "right" has become synonymous with scandal, hypocrisy, and an absolute refusal to compromise even in the face of putting their constituents in harm's way.
Mr. Witzell's point about the CBS article is that he is upset that the AP never making any mention about the dead and injured soldiers and Dubya's personal issues with Saddam Hussien; it's just too bad that the CBS article was on the irresponsible spending, financial mismanagement, and lack of oversight on Iraqi infrastructure so Fred kinda veered off topic. Granted, Fred's blog is his own and he can say what he wants, but he doesn't really contribute anything to the conversation other than basic martyrdom bandwaggoning and anecdotal drivel. Let me clarify myself - a single life lost was too high a price, so please do not infer any disrespect on my behalf to the soldiers lost and injured. It seems that Fred is using their blood to bang his drum - my opinion.
Fred then goes onto his soapbox and states he was fine with invading Afghanistan in pursuit of Al Queda, then wanders off-topic about his irrelevant knowledge of uranium and Sarin gas, then teeters off to his finest bit of ridiculousness with his statement of "we went to Iraq because George W. Bush was pissed off at Saddam Hussein over threats Hussein made against George H.W. Bush, nothing more, nothing less".
Fred pretty much discredited himself with that lone statement. I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure we invaded Iraq due to Hussein's human rights violations, torture of the Iraqi people, his fascist regime, and his threats of pursuing nuclear capability. I have a hard time believing the POTUS would arbitrarily invade a country, without the vote of the US Congress (constitutionally mandated unless by executive priviledge) on a personal beef. I think that is a bit of a stretch. I do believe that Dubya had possible credible information linking Hussein to Al Queda and/or WMD's but hindsight found that to be not the case. For those reasons i can see starting a war, but not because of being butt-hurt over empty threats.
Fred then cut-n-pastes points regarding misappropriations for Iraqi infrastructure projects that are all too well known, detracting from his point. He then declares how money was wasted but then restates his anger at the lack of acknowledgement of loss of life. Fred then furhter discredits himself by speaking about how the soldiers deaths and exorbinant costs of the misappropriation is what caused our nation's economic recession. I would remind Fred that deregulated financial institutions, expansion of junk holdings to inflate stocks, creation of artificial economies, and the governmental intervention into the economy is really what caused our current situation... that, plus 2 wars, and the $11 trillion dollars in consumer holdings. Just sayin'.
I will take a moment to applaud Fred on not willy-nilly unconditionally supporting his party regardless of their action - i.e. his statement about Dubya taking in into Iraq in the first place. It seems too often that, in my perspective, people will side with polital affiliation rather than what is morally/ethically right, regardless of the issue. 10 gallon Hat's Off to Fred for that, but unfortunately the rest of his commentary is kinda silly - ergo, his moniker of "Texas Fred" lumps him into the same fold as I, yet I don't want Fred speaking for me. He makes us Texans look kinda stoopid, and Rick Perry is doing enough of that already.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)