I originally wanted to fold this over into my last post, but instead decided it needed its own space. Tucker Carlson is at it again. Of course, it is all too predictable as Carlson has made a career of throwing bombs just for the attention. Yet, even for him this is completely outrageous and he knows it.

For those that don’t watch his program and don’t want to click on the link, Carlson suggested that if you see children wearing a mask outside that you should immediately call CPS because of the obvious child abuse. Yup, people being extra careful are guilty of child abuse. The problem is plain to see when you peruse the headlines. Carlson is obviously acting in bad faith because he wants the ratings. Other idiots don’t know any better.

While these stories are not directly related, Carlson seems to allow and encourage others to get their crazy on. Anti-maskers don’t necessarily directly relate to anti-vaxxers, but there is definitely a Venn diagram at work here. The ties that bind are the emotion involved in the grift. It entices those that already feel this way to act on their feelings no matter how ill conceived or clearly wrong.

Right on cue, a private school in Florida has decided to ban teachers that have previously gotten the vaccine. The apparent stated reason was related to the anti-vaxxing line of thinking. On the one hand, I suppose a private school can do whatever it wants to do, but the tale has to be the most ridiculous thing anyone has ever heard. That’s of course only true until you listen to Carlson’s clip. Hold my plant based beer I guess.

As I implied in the last piece, there is a special place for those that know better and inflame the passion of idiots anyway. He knows exactly what he is doing and he’s been doing it for years. I can’t even begin to address his argument because it is beneath us to do so. All I can do is sit back in shock at the unmitigated gall.

It’s difficult walking the tight rope between pointing out obvious shenanigans and avoiding those shenanigans to keep from giving them oxygen. That’s the life of commentating. Ultimately, we are all part of the same game. The name of the game is eyeballs. Once you get them focused on you then you get the sponsorship dollars, the speaking engagements, and the gravitas that comes with relevance.

Over the weekend, the outrage machine cranked the volume up to 11 over Biden’s new climate change requirement to cut red meat consumption by 90%. Upon hearing the news, right wing social media, fed by Fox Noise, went to DEFCON 4 and began launch sequence.  All the usual characters threw wall-eyed fits including Greg Abbott:

Not gonna happen in Texas! pic.twitter.com/zqYS9kH8CU

— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) April 25, 2021

Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert both followed suit with Greene even calling Biden the “Hamburgler”.  The only problem?  The story is complete bullshit, fabricated by the London rag The Daily Mail, which then metastasized into a trending story on social media.  Snopes did a full report on the claim and rated it False. I wish these clowns would spend the time spent on fake outrage on more important things like education, Medicaid expansion, and avoiding power blackouts, but that’s way too much too expect.

Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick is just plain goofy.

Like every other Republican state official in the whole damn country, he’s trying to restrict voting opportunities for people who generally vote Democratic.

In the last election, Harris County tried drive-through voting, citing COVID as the reason. It was wildly successful, with over 127,000 people using the centers.  And Dan Patrick is crying us a river over that.

Dan Patrick: “If they’re worried about people of color — on the Democrats side who came up with this drive-in voting — statistics show that more people of color don’t have cars than not. So how do (drive-thru voting centers) help those folks?”

Cringing grammar aside, statistics show no such thing.  Patrick is trying to contend that half of people of color in Harris County don’t have cars. The newspaper called his office to see those statistics but he’s not returning phone calls.  Because he just pulled those numbers out of his big wiggly butt.

Going to the Census Bureau —

Among the state’s 3.4 million African Americans, 88% own at least one vehicle, according to the 2019 American Community Survey, an aggregation of five years of data, the most recent available.

Quit pulling stuff outta your butt, Dan.  It stinks. And it’s generally racist.

Last night Houston area Republican State Representative Dan Huberty was in what he is calling “a minor auto accident” but police say they arrived at the scene to find a Corvette “parked under a minivan.”

Huberty was arrested at the scene for DWI after failing a field sobriety test.

He says —

Okay, Danny, so you drink too much and that is surely a problem. But you are also a 52 year old chubby grown man who drives a souped-up black and red Corvette. That, my friend, means you have a whole mess of problems you need to deal with. There’s even a You Tube of them towing off your age-impropriate mode of transportation.

Thelma says that her vast experience in the area of these things has led her to state as a damn fact, “Men who drive small fast car usually are.”