12 ms·

I considered moving to SF but chose Austin instead. I refuse to live in a state with such a dysfunctional government ... You do realize you live in Texas, righ

by _pius 14y ago

I considered moving to SF but chose Austin instead. I refuse to live in a state with such a dysfunctional government ... You do realize you live in Texas, right?

Roybatty 14y ago
You do realize that there are people outside of your little world that aren't leftists/socialists/fascists, right?
- addlepate 14y ago
  Who said anything about leftism? The quote was about dysfunctional government. You do realize that there are dysfunctional governments outside of leftism/socialism/fascism, right?
- beatpanda 14y ago
  You do realize that, objectively, Martin Luther King was more instrumental in the Civil Rights movement than Lyndon Johnson was, right? Oh, wait, you might not, because the Texas Board of Education took it upon themselves to re-write history. Low taxes are cool and all, but I don't see how anyone could live in peace with that public school system.
  - hindsightbias 14y ago
    Anonymous wrote the Declaration of Independence too, apparently.
  - joonix 14y ago
    Let's face it: American governmental bodies are dysfunctional at almost every level. Most people live in California, Texas, Florida, and New York. All are poorly managed. And then there's the federal government sitting on top. The key to thriving in the US is to have a high net worth so you can feel independent of this dysfunctional government. And then ignore all the stressful noise in the crisis-obsessed news cycle.
- swift 14y ago
  One of these things is not like the others.
- enraged_camel 14y ago
  Honest question: do you actually know what fascist means? If so, do you not understand that it is vastly different than "leftist" or "socialist"?
  - Roybatty 14y ago
    Yeah, I know that leftist groupthink doesn't comprehend that fascism is a leftist political ideology. Hint, you know what NAZI means?
    - enraged_camel 14y ago
      You should educate yourself to avoid further embarrassment. From wikipedia: "Fascism was founded during World War I by Italian national syndicalists who combined left-wing and right-wing political views.[11][12] Fascists have commonly opposed having a firm association with any section of the left-right spectrum, considering it inadequate to describe their beliefs,[13][14] though fascism's goal to promote the rule of people deemed innately superior while seeking to purge society of people deemed innately inferior is identified as a prominent far-right theme.[15] Fascism opposes multiple ideologies, such as communism, conservatism, liberalism, and social democracy.[16]"
    - eli_gottlieb 14y ago
      Do you know what "Go back to /r/politics" means?
    - pnathan 14y ago
      More or less, fascism is the supremacy of the nation/state & creation of a civil religion around it. It merges the idea of the nation, the government, and links proper behavior to operating accord with the principles set forth by the leaders. At least that's what I got out of Mussolini's writings on the matter. It's the people in service of the State, as opposed as the State being the People(communism).
    - flyinRyan 14y ago
      Wow, you're shockingly ignorant for this site. Go education yourself a bit: http://politicalcompass.org/ http://politicalcompass.org/
icey 14y ago
As a non-Texan, I'd be interested if could you share some of the dysfunctions of their government? I haven't heard many people claim that before, so I'm curious as to what I'm missing.
- hindsightbias 14y ago
  TX has had massive shortfalls in the last two biennial budgets. As big as CA's annual one: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-states-idUSTRE71314420110204 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-st... So imagine an already very low service state having to cut budgets even more. Am sure that will work out well for the kids long-term. The State is tossing welfare/health/service issues down to the counties now, so expect your property taxes to skyrocket in the next decade. Some counties will be rich, and most will be poor. Not happy to with keeping MLK or Jefferson out of K-12 history textbooks, the governor and his lackies are going after those pointy-head elitists at UT. Expect the next short-fall to be ~$30B. You're going to pay one way or another.
  - aioprisan 14y ago
    except Texas has a lot more money from oil taxes to give to things like schools, no sales taxes etc.
    - shiftpgdn 14y ago
      There is a 6.25% sales tax in all of Texas with counties having the option to raise it an additional 2%.
  - flyinRyan 14y ago
    Does texas even have property taxes? They didn't use to.
    - hindsightbias 14y ago
      Counties set valuations and property taxes
kyrra 14y ago
Have you been to Austin? Or Dallas? (I'd personally stay away from Houston and San Antonio). It sounds like you're passing judgement without really experiencing the area. Texas is a fairly reasonable state when it comes to most of their laws. There has been some controversy around the human-origin that will be taught in schools, but this issue isn't isolated to just Texas. And beyond that, if you really dislike the public schools, you can always go for private or charter schools, or even homeschooling. Texas government tends to stay out of the way of their people for the most part (at least compared to NY or CA). No state income tax, though, property taxes are fairly high in the cities and suburbs. Gun laws are very lax. It's overall a pretty good state.
- david_b 14y ago
  Don't forget the Anti-Dildo laws: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_obscenity_statute http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_obscenity_statute http://daxlegal.com/dildos-sexually-obscene-toys-illegal-in-texas-for-now/ http://daxlegal.com/dildos-sexually-obscene-toys-illegal-in-... This is so fantastically nutty I could hardly believe it (when I first read about a woman that had been arrested in Texas for smuggling Dildos).
  - stoic 14y ago
    Well, they definitely sell 'em in stores in every decent-sized city I've been to in the state...
- flyinRyan 14y ago
  >It sounds like you're passing judgement without really experiencing the area. It sounds like you did the same to California. The parts of the government being reacted to are probably the laws about when you can kill people (e.g. if they rob your neighbor), express lane to the death penalty, etc., etc.
tsotha 14y ago
Yeah, the state with the surplus. The weather in Texas isn't anything to write home about, but in every way that matters it's a more competently run state.
- afterburner 14y ago
  They probably have a surplus because they underfund health care system, among other things... (I remember being surprised at the full-time firefighting budget cuts not long before the huge fires two years ago) EDIT: Oh and apparently there is no surplus http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-states-idUSTRE71314420110204 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-st...
  - yummies 14y ago
    the article cited was from last year. from last week: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/09/us/texas-budget-surplus-proves-as-contentious-as-a-previous-shortfall.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/09/us/texas-budget-surplus-pr... "A boom in revenues from sales taxes as well as taxes from oil and natural gas production have given Texas a budget surplus that the state comptroller has estimated at $8.8 billion." Of course this will start a new debate about how it's only a surplus because of previous budget cuts, but that's for another time and place. Still others will crunch the numbers differently and say there was actually a deficit. Politics is fun.
  - tsotha 14y ago
    2011? Try to keep up.
    - afterburner 14y ago
      Meh, original comment about shitty services holds http://www.texasobserver.org/how-the-budget-got-cut/ http://www.texasobserver.org/how-the-budget-got-cut/
      - tsotha 14y ago

by _pius 14y ago

I considered moving to SF but chose Austin instead. I refuse to live in a state with such a dysfunctional government ... You do realize you live in Texas, right?

Roybatty 14y ago

You do realize that there are people outside of your little world that aren't leftists/socialists/fascists, right?

addlepate 14y ago
Who said anything about leftism? The quote was about dysfunctional government. You do realize that there are dysfunctional governments outside of leftism/socialism/fascism, right?
beatpanda 14y ago
You do realize that, objectively, Martin Luther King was more instrumental in the Civil Rights movement than Lyndon Johnson was, right? Oh, wait, you might not, because the Texas Board of Education took it upon themselves to re-write history. Low taxes are cool and all, but I don't see how anyone could live in peace with that public school system.
- hindsightbias 14y ago
  Anonymous wrote the Declaration of Independence too, apparently.
- joonix 14y ago
  Let's face it: American governmental bodies are dysfunctional at almost every level. Most people live in California, Texas, Florida, and New York. All are poorly managed. And then there's the federal government sitting on top. The key to thriving in the US is to have a high net worth so you can feel independent of this dysfunctional government. And then ignore all the stressful noise in the crisis-obsessed news cycle.
swift 14y ago
One of these things is not like the others.
enraged_camel 14y ago
Honest question: do you actually know what fascist means? If so, do you not understand that it is vastly different than "leftist" or "socialist"?
- Roybatty 14y ago
  Yeah, I know that leftist groupthink doesn't comprehend that fascism is a leftist political ideology. Hint, you know what NAZI means?
  - enraged_camel 14y ago
    You should educate yourself to avoid further embarrassment. From wikipedia: "Fascism was founded during World War I by Italian national syndicalists who combined left-wing and right-wing political views.[11][12] Fascists have commonly opposed having a firm association with any section of the left-right spectrum, considering it inadequate to describe their beliefs,[13][14] though fascism's goal to promote the rule of people deemed innately superior while seeking to purge society of people deemed innately inferior is identified as a prominent far-right theme.[15] Fascism opposes multiple ideologies, such as communism, conservatism, liberalism, and social democracy.[16]"
  - eli_gottlieb 14y ago
    Do you know what "Go back to /r/politics" means?
  - pnathan 14y ago
    More or less, fascism is the supremacy of the nation/state & creation of a civil religion around it. It merges the idea of the nation, the government, and links proper behavior to operating accord with the principles set forth by the leaders. At least that's what I got out of Mussolini's writings on the matter. It's the people in service of the State, as opposed as the State being the People(communism).
  - flyinRyan 14y ago
    Wow, you're shockingly ignorant for this site. Go education yourself a bit: http://politicalcompass.org/ http://politicalcompass.org/

icey 14y ago

As a non-Texan, I'd be interested if could you share some of the dysfunctions of their government? I haven't heard many people claim that before, so I'm curious as to what I'm missing.

hindsightbias 14y ago
TX has had massive shortfalls in the last two biennial budgets. As big as CA's annual one: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-states-idUSTRE71314420110204 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-st... So imagine an already very low service state having to cut budgets even more. Am sure that will work out well for the kids long-term. The State is tossing welfare/health/service issues down to the counties now, so expect your property taxes to skyrocket in the next decade. Some counties will be rich, and most will be poor. Not happy to with keeping MLK or Jefferson out of K-12 history textbooks, the governor and his lackies are going after those pointy-head elitists at UT. Expect the next short-fall to be ~$30B. You're going to pay one way or another.
- aioprisan 14y ago
  except Texas has a lot more money from oil taxes to give to things like schools, no sales taxes etc.
  - shiftpgdn 14y ago
    There is a 6.25% sales tax in all of Texas with counties having the option to raise it an additional 2%.
- flyinRyan 14y ago
  Does texas even have property taxes? They didn't use to.
  - hindsightbias 14y ago
    Counties set valuations and property taxes

kyrra 14y ago

Have you been to Austin? Or Dallas? (I'd personally stay away from Houston and San Antonio). It sounds like you're passing judgement without really experiencing the area. Texas is a fairly reasonable state when it comes to most of their laws. There has been some controversy around the human-origin that will be taught in schools, but this issue isn't isolated to just Texas. And beyond that, if you really dislike the public schools, you can always go for private or charter schools, or even homeschooling. Texas government tends to stay out of the way of their people for the most part (at least compared to NY or CA). No state income tax, though, property taxes are fairly high in the cities and suburbs. Gun laws are very lax. It's overall a pretty good state.

david_b 14y ago
Don't forget the Anti-Dildo laws: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_obscenity_statute http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_obscenity_statute http://daxlegal.com/dildos-sexually-obscene-toys-illegal-in-texas-for-now/ http://daxlegal.com/dildos-sexually-obscene-toys-illegal-in-... This is so fantastically nutty I could hardly believe it (when I first read about a woman that had been arrested in Texas for smuggling Dildos).
- stoic 14y ago
  Well, they definitely sell 'em in stores in every decent-sized city I've been to in the state...
flyinRyan 14y ago
>It sounds like you're passing judgement without really experiencing the area. It sounds like you did the same to California. The parts of the government being reacted to are probably the laws about when you can kill people (e.g. if they rob your neighbor), express lane to the death penalty, etc., etc.

tsotha 14y ago

Yeah, the state with the surplus. The weather in Texas isn't anything to write home about, but in every way that matters it's a more competently run state.

afterburner 14y ago
They probably have a surplus because they underfund health care system, among other things... (I remember being surprised at the full-time firefighting budget cuts not long before the huge fires two years ago) EDIT: Oh and apparently there is no surplus http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-states-idUSTRE71314420110204 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/04/us-usa-deficits-st...
- yummies 14y ago
  the article cited was from last year. from last week: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/09/us/texas-budget-surplus-proves-as-contentious-as-a-previous-shortfall.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/09/us/texas-budget-surplus-pr... "A boom in revenues from sales taxes as well as taxes from oil and natural gas production have given Texas a budget surplus that the state comptroller has estimated at $8.8 billion." Of course this will start a new debate about how it's only a surplus because of previous budget cuts, but that's for another time and place. Still others will crunch the numbers differently and say there was actually a deficit. Politics is fun.
- tsotha 14y ago
  2011? Try to keep up.
  - afterburner 14y ago
    Meh, original comment about shitty services holds http://www.texasobserver.org/how-the-budget-got-cut/ http://www.texasobserver.org/how-the-budget-got-cut/
    - tsotha 14y ago