So much to blog about, so little time. I’ll just have to hit the high points:
Where’s the SPCA when you need it? Last March, I reported on problems with the city pound that were brought before council. The city was spending money on artwork for the pound’s lobby while animals were being lost down drains and going without needed medical treatment. Well, guess what? Nothing’s changed.
But here’s what the city does have money for — new cement sculptures in the lobby and contemporary pet artwork worth nearly $2,000. The city says the money comes from another account. The goal: to make the pound seem friendlier for those who want to adopt.
Link to original story here.
A customer enters a pet shop.
Mr. Praline: ‘Ello, I wish to register a complaint.
(The owner does not respond.)
Mr. Praline: ‘Ello, Miss?
Owner: What do you mean “miss”?
Mr. Praline: I’m sorry, I have a cold. I wish to make a complaint!
Owner: We’re closin’ for lunch.
Mr. Praline: Never mind that, my lad. I wish to complain about this parrot what I purchased not half an hour ago from this very boutique.
Owner: Oh yes, the, uh, the Norwegian Blue…What’s,uh…What’s wrong with it?
Mr. Praline: I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it, my lad. ‘E’s dead, that’s what’s wrong with it!
Owner: No, no, ‘e’s uh,…he’s resting.
Mr. Praline: Look, matey, I know a dead parrot when I see one, and I’m looking at one right now.
Owner: No no he’s not dead, he’s, he’s restin’! Remarkable bird, the Norwegian Blue, idn’it, ay? Beautiful plumage!
Mr. Praline: The plumage don’t enter into it. It’s stone dead.
Owner: Nononono, no, no! ‘E’s resting!
Mr. Praline: All right then, if he’s restin’, I’ll wake him up! (shouting at the cage) ‘Ello, Mister Polly Parrot! I’ve got a lovely fresh cuttle fish for you if you show…
(owner hits the cage)
Owner: There, he moved!
Mr. Praline: No, he didn’t, that was you hitting the cage!
Owner: I never!!
Mr. Praline: Yes, you did!
Owner: I never, never did anything…
Mr. Praline: (yelling and hitting the cage repeatedly) ‘ELLO POLLY!!!!! Testing! Testing! Testing! Testing! This is your nine o’clock alarm call!
(Takes parrot out of the cage and thumps its head on the counter. Throws it up in the air and watches it plummet to the floor.)
Mr. Praline: Now that’s what I call a dead parrot.
Owner: No, no…..No, ‘e’s stunned!
Mr. Praline: STUNNED?!?
Owner: Yeah! You stunned him, just as he was wakin’ up! Norwegian Blues stun easily, major.
Mr. Praline: Um…now look…now look, mate, I’ve definitely ‘ad enough of this. That parrot is definitely deceased, and when I purchased it not ‘alf an hour
ago, you assured me that its total lack of movement was due to it bein’ tired and shagged out following a prolonged squawk.
Owner: Well, he’s…he’s, ah…probably pining for the fjords.
When the characters in a Monty Python start making more sense than how the city pound is being run, you’re in trouble.
But hey, maybe there’s someone on the staff of the Chronicle married to a vetenarian we can hire. No? Well how about a Special Assistant?
Mayor Bill White has named lawyer, real estate executive and civic leader David Mincberg as special assistant for multifamily housing, responsible for coordinating the work of local low-cost-housing agencies. Mincberg said he will work closely with three government agencies to increase the supply of apartments with rental rates affordable to families of modest means. Mincberg will donate his services as a “dollar a year executive.” He is the chairman and CEO of Flagship Properties Corp., a Houston-based real estate investment company.
Read: “I’m going to see if we can sucker the feds into giving the Housing Department more money. Pay no attention if my (and my clients’) investments suddenly do real well due to an influx of such money.” Well, I don’t know that we’re going to see that, but I don’t believe in altruism in government. That’s our mayor: He never met a federal subsidy he didn’t like to milk for friends. I’d suggest we might do better by getting rid of the intermediaries and abolishing the city government — just make the city a branch of the federal government — but considering how good they’re doing defending the border, I don’t think they’d be much help to Chief Hurtt with the crime problem.
Of course, politics has nothing to do with this appointment either:
Mincberg is a native Houstonian and a former Harris County Democratic Party chairman.
It’s also just another example of why the Chronicle is also known as “Mrs. White.”
He and his wife, Houston Chronicle marketing director Lainie Gordon, have five children.
Bloghouston remarked that the Chronicle was conducting incest yesterday, but I beg to differ. This is incest, that was selfcest.
Incest! It’s not just for hentai any more!
Donald Sensing has a few things to say on energy independance and our continuing reliance on hydrocarbons for the foreseeable future. Once again, SDB’s discussion of energy alternatives surfaces. (Steven: put a link to it on your “Best Articles” page! Note to self: Move my link to that page into “Resources”).
The U.S. is sending anti-missile batteries to Okinawa.
Someone tell Chief Hurtt that tasers aren’t a perfect solution, whether or not they have a camera. Of course, only AI would give a rip:
A recent Amnesty International study found that in seven U.S. cases, a medical examiner had listed tasers as the primary cause of death.
Some folks won’t be happy until our police are armed with nothing but whistles and billy clubs, like the British do it. Except that they don’t anymore.
Edit: A study? Is that what they call a Google search these days?) Evidently not.
Sixty-nine deaths nationwide have been reported after tasings, including three in the Puget Sound area.
Well, granted they’re not 69 cases where the ME’s is saying that it’s the primary cause of death. Unusually restrained for AI. Or perhaps the local reporter ?
Houblog readers have started asking difficult questions of the council, based on my agenda posts here. It warms the heart to see some good come of openess in government. 🙂 I’ll have more on that later (can’t access my Houblog email at the moment), but to answer one writer’s question: I don’t think this will appear in the CIP. The city’s not building it, it’s “helping” to build it. So we’ll see individual items like the architect services contract from time to time, but there will be no CIP item because it’s not “a city building.” We’re just paying for part or all of it, that’s all….
Tom DeLay will remain on the ballot in district 22. Because, you know, the Democrats belelieve that the people of district 22 should be able to vote on the who represents them — as long as it’s a Democrat.
Is KHOU also waiting on a Ben Reyes return? Well, I’d say that it was odd they haven’t mentioned him much for the seven years he was in jail, but they just happen to drop his name into this article on Hispanic politics. But were they trying to be funny when they wrote this finishing line?
The old neighborhood, itself, remains heavily democratic. But only because people like Adolph Postel moved out.
So much said on so many levels, with just those few words.
Oh wait. They dropped a bit more than a few words yeterday and today. Based on it, I don’t think they’re as friendly to the idea of a Reyes resurgance as Mrs. White is, though.
“We’re gonna go and purchase us some leaders because that’s what it takes,� Reyes was heard saying on the tape. “I never did it for nothing.�
Nice of them to remind us why he spent the last seven years behind bars. Pitty he only had Betti to keep him company.
Castillo could have been in prison with him. He too, took an envelope of cash, but convinced a jury he didn’t know it was money inside. …
Compos, a Hispanic political advisor, said the convictions of Reyes and former port commissioner, Betty Maldonado, hurt Hispanics, but taught lessons. “It taught folks a lesson, you know, as how to conduct yourself in public office,� said Campos.
Yep. Some lessons were learned better than others.
UPDATDE: Maybe I should tone down the criticism of Mrs. White. I might earn me some of that push back. Or as Kevin Murphy, the first commenter on that article, noted:
A paper’s only stock in trade is credibility. You lot threaten that. It’s a business, and they’re going to defend it, just like any other business. Oh, sure, they could change their approach and become objective and responsible. But I doubt it. Like most people they only see the harm done them and never their part in it.
So how’s about it, Mrs. White? After buying out your rival, you’ve got no one to lose a circulation war against but yourself. Could you stop trying so hard to achieve that goal?