My husband says I’ve been in a bad mood since 2000. I’m entitled.
On Monday, the Republican-led Texas House passed HB 1076 , a bill that would ban state agencies from enforcing any new federal gun laws, including background checks. The self-satisfied know-nothings who voted for this bill are very pleased with themselves.
Talk about embarrassing. Every student who participated in the We the People competition I referenced earlier this week would know better.
I don’t know whether this bit of unconstitutional stupidity is the product of grandstanding or ignorance, but really–how much dumber can state lawmakers get? Granted, Texas is in a league of its own, but there are plenty of other states–largely but not exclusively in the south–where similarly ridiculous measures are being solemnly debated and enacted. (Next-door Louisiana, where several loony laws championed by boy Governor Bobby Jindal have been struck down by the courts is a case in point. And the Indiana General Assembly keeps trying to equal its signal accomplishment–passage of a law in 1897 changing the value of pi.)
Read my lips: nullification runs afoul of the Supremacy Clause. In language even Texas legislators should be able to understand, that means that there is a provision in the U.S. Constitution that says federal laws trump inconsistent state laws. States don’t get to decide which federal laws they’ll obey.
I’m so tired of these posturing morons–and so disappointed in the voters who elected them. Gerrymandering can only explain so much.
America is currently experiencing the “perfect storm”–paranoia and anti-intellectualism have combined to destroy any semblance of rationality. The adults have left the room; the inmates are running the asylum.
We are left with only self-parody.
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