"Behold, the noise of the report has come,
And a great commotion out of the north country,
To make the cities of Judah desolate, a den of jackals."
Jeremiah 10:22
Dennis Bonnen yesterday:
After more than 20 years in the Texas political arena, I know that, sadly, our state (and maybe even our species) is overpopulated with critics and naysayers who find it easier to disparage the efforts of leaders than to affirm and encourage them as they do what is right for the whole state, not just their particular political sect. (Incidentally, some of them have made a very nice living doing so.)Ross Ramsey this morning:
In the very recent past, the critics have come out in force to disparage and censure one of the great governors our state has known. I think of Governor Greg Abbott when I read the rest of the quote:
“The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.“Today, as our state battles a resurgent pandemic, political nincompoops have chosen to waste time and energy drafting resolutions to censure a man who has been working around the clock for the past four months to protect our state from a deadly virus.
Theodore Roosevelt
The trolls are real.You get the picture.
Gov. Greg Abbott is feeling the derision of restive activists in his own party.
They’re noisy — and powerless. They work with the same machinery used by trolls on social media, who labor in the hope that public shaming of their enemies might give them the leverage to shape the world, or some corner of it.
The Texas trolls want to ignore the governor’s latest restrictions for wearing masks and keeping social distance and closing bars as the measures of the pandemic worsen. Abbott folded when confronted by people protesting business closings in May but this time is ignoring them, and responding to the coronavirus as a big deal — a task worth his government’s time and attention.
The sentiment isn't surprising. For Dennis Bonnen and Ross Ramsey to be condescending and smug is expected. That being said, the vitriol IS noteworthy. Clearly, something is getting under their skin.
This is especially true for Ross Ramsey. While his so-called 'analysis' is often cliched and trite, he's usually nice about it. In nearly a decade of reading his columns, we've never seen him lose his cool like this.
Besides being funny, Dennis Bonnen's thin-skinned brownnosing isn't all that noteworthy on its own. Coupled with Ramsey, however, it's a trend. Somebody's spooked about something.
Bottom Line: Sometimes, the reaction of other people highlights something you would have otherwise missed.
