Batty In Houston

It's pretty remarkable that one of the most wacky, tyrannical definitionally un-American governing actions I've seen in this country, comes not from San Francisco or Burlington, Vermont, or not even from New York, L.A. or Chicago, but from Houston, TX. Houston recently imposed an act that allows choice in use of Men or Women's public bathrooms, irrespective of one's actual sex. And now, the Mayor and city attorney have issued subpoenas to five Houston pastors to turn over all sermons relating to homosexuality or Mayor Annise Parker. That is patently and in my lifetime would have been obviously un-American. The language is usually considered over-the-top exaggeration but hey, that's Nazi stuff!

Annise Parker is the Democrat Houston Mayor and is gay. Sure, central Houston is largely Democrat like all major cities. But Houston uncommonly is not bounded by innumerable suburbs. Houston has regularly annexed adjacent developed land. Particularly during daytime traffic hours, you can drive for over an hour WITHIN THE CITY LIMITS OF HOUSTON. An ever smaller percentage of the electorate is close-in urban. So it is not a complete explanation for this Mayor that the established central urban area is Democrat. So what gives?

It seems there must have been something similar to what elected President Obama President of the United States. Parker is the openly lesbian Mayor of Houston. But she is not flamboyant in exercising her lifestyle. She had been a good student before and a responsible employee in the oil and gas industry. Great. After that, she was long the liberal scourge of Houston City Council and then Houston City Comptroller where she did an unobjectionable job. So she can competently read, write and count. From there, she ran and won for Mayor of Houston and was twice reelected to 2-year terms..

There had to be many more votes than those urban Democrats. There were also those wealthier Democrats in Houston's Heights, Montrose, River Oaks and Memorial areas. We can also probably add business people and image-conscious Republicans who wanted to demonstrate their open-mindedness to a gay woman mayor. But either for President or Mayor, your own self-image is a high price to pay for social destruction. And competence at basic skills does not a competent governing official in America make. Because someone can read, write and count does not mean they aren't outright batty with respect to governing propriety in America.