Regular Ramble

First, and just for fun; a lesson I learned early "Never fry bacon nekkid"

We had a gosanangelo poster comment on access, how easy it is: This I am glad to see. Our former Mayor, JW Lown finally took me for real one Sunday; Drizzling cold rain, he is driving by and I'm standing under a bumbershoot taking notes of the posted agenda for City Council outside the old City Hall. I couldn't for the life of me tell you what I was taking notes of; Had something to do with economic development funding, I'm not sure which bit of foolishness in particular, RG Barry maybe.

Point is, Mayor Lown drives by, sees me doing this when any sane person would have been home under the covers: well he calls me later that Sunday; wants to know if I'm that crazed or that dedicated. If I recall correctly, by end of that conversation JW was convinced I was both.

Brings me to the point about "access". I have a copy of the Jan 16 2001 City Council Agenda packet,(All 32 pages of it then) the second time we "paid" for Hickory water rights, a project now held up over deer hunters' rights! God forbid we interfere with someone's God-given right to sit in a propane heated plastic box and drink cheap whiskey one Sunday while "Hunting" deer and watching the NFL games on an over-priced cell phone!

Well, I told everyone last year, I'm not totally "sane", I'm manic/depressive, I sleep like a day-walking vampire, but just for fun, I keep up with City issues. A recent Agenda Packet from December ran 312 pages and nobody but Mr. Turner and I read it. Old saying, sometimes the best place to "hide" something is in plain sight, just buried under a ton or two of rubbish

Brings me to the MedHab grant. There was little to nothing in the Agenda Packet on this if one went to the trouble to read it. $3.6 million, about 3 times what San Angelo spends on street maintanece a year (Driven down Bell St lately; great job we're doing on streets, eh what?)

What little info presented was done in "excutive session" (closed to public "access" BTW) while Mayor New, an investor, was coincidentally "vacationing" in Australia, the only country on Earth which permits the only Patent MedHab owns to be sold, if this storefront shop ever gets an actual product on an actual shelf!

OK, that last sentence was "windier" than Mayor New, and that's a stretch. Council had to change its own rules as to COSADC to allow this grant, some little quibble about "conflict of interest". Even then, Council forgot this inconvenice known as City Charter, which cannot be changed without a full-blown election! Which Election, thanks to Council, will cost 3-4 times as much as the old style election, but heck, what do I know, I just be a truck driver, I don't knows nuttin'.

Folks, I worked hard to beat this half cent tax during the 90s; With a lot of help, we beat it 3 times running. My primary arguement was always that this will inevitably turn into a irresitable pot of gold, sought after by herds of leprechauns.

Where the heck did I put that Karnak the Magnificent Turban? Folks I'm an old style, hard-drinking Irishman, politcal from birth; think Tip O'Neill, who would have as Speaker of the House, put Newt Gingrich ever so subtly to shame. Tip knew how to bring home the bacon (Not that he ever tried to fry it nekkid).I'll tell you one thing; Tip's olfactory sense would have detected the strong oder of snake-oil emmanting from this deal half a continent away!