We're in This Together?

You gotta love Texas. As their department of tourism once described it, it's a whole 'nother country. And months into the COVID pandemic, it's obvious that wasn't just a tagline.

Texas was a leader in the we-don't-need-no-stinkin'-masks movement. Texans knew intuitively that masks were a hysterical response to something that didn't really exist. Swollen with ego and defiance, any Texan within range of a television camera was only too happy to tell you how tough they were. How indomitable.

Of the joy they took in flouting liberal's timid and fearful protocols.

And however saturated the population was with its teen-aged sense of invincibility, it reached even greater extremes within the offices of the state's Republican party. They were incapable of contamination. Or infection.

Of course, this was a falsehood concocted to keep the runaway train of Texas capitalism roaring, and if you didn't like it you should just stay the hell out of the way.

Social media is stuffed with footage of their constituents thumbing their nose at the new normals of mask wearing and social distancing. They frolicked in their pools and gathered in their roadhouses and cavorted on their beaches.

Yee-hah! Gimme a T for Texas! Don't mess with Texas! And all of that.

I once asked a native of Oklahoma why it was so windy there. “Texas blows” she said. “Or sucks. Take your pick.”

All was going swimmingly until governor Greg Abbott got infected. It wasn't an especially contagious virus and is actually pretty rare in twenty-first century Republican circles. It bears the name common sense.

In its clutches, Abbott began to act strangely. First there was the involuntary attention to facts. Abbott listened to them. Considered them. And most-dangerously, acted on them.

Then he (gulp) issued a statewide mask-mandate.

Not long afterwards, the skies inside the state's GOP headquarters turned black. Lightning flashed. Thunder boomed. The end of days had arrived. The state's Republican leadership swung into action. If they didn't, lives would be saved. Curves flattened. Economies offered a long-term chance at restoration.

First there was a social media smear campaign. Abbott was painted as a mask-wearin' sissy. Then 130 Republican leaders vowed to censure him. Resolutions slandering the governor filled the air.

Then they looked inwards. If they had lost Abbott, someone—or something—was to blame.

The party's brain trust  (yes—that's a thing) spent days picking lint from their navels, because nothing precludes a deep dive like lint. Just ask your dryer. How many deep thoughts has it had lately?

James Dickey, the sitting chairman, was fired. Apparently, he had transmitted the common sense virus to Abbott that lead the newly life-loving governor astray. Left unexplained was if Dickey were also infected, why didn't he resign from the party as opposed to being marginalized by it?

At any rate, it was decided Texas needed a genuine, ass kickin' right-winger to get the state back on track. And they found him.

Allen West is a tried and true, one-hundred percent freak-a-zoid. And he just happens to be African-American, a fact which state Republicans can exploit until November third.

Trump loves him because as a U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, West fired a gun at an Iraqi policeman's head during an interrogation. And as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, characterized then-president Obama as a “low-level socialist agitator”.

And West is already borrowing liberally from the Book of Trump. In a video address to delegates, West reiterated his ability to issue executive orders (huh?) and referred to Abbott's mask mandate as “tyranny” and called it a “new battleground.”

However much I love the sights and sounds of Republican infighting, there is a sad truth here. And that is the hypnotized, heartened by the conservative anti-mask response, will continue to embrace it.

As I have stated before, I fully support the conservative death wish. At least in theory. It is my wish that every right-winger in the land refuse to wear a mask, congregate in tightly-packed indoor spaces and drink from one another's cups until dead.

Alas, the COVID virus has shown no ability to discern those who want it to thrive from those who wish to extinguish it. In other words, despite Republican's pro-life COVID stance, it won't just kill them.

It infects, sickens and kills indiscriminately.

Mr. West, it seems if anyone should be crying “Tyranny!” it is those of us who understand and respect the power and the scope of this threat to humanity, and yet risk illness and even death thanks to the politicized beliefs of the most-childish, selfish and ignorant elements of our society.

Texas Republicans are a panicked collection of people grasping at straws over something they can't shout or shoot away. At best, they lack the intestinal fortitude to face the challenges presented by sheltering in place, mask-wearing and social-distancing.

At worst, they appear willing to sacrifice everything (i.e. your life) for the economy. It must survive at any and all costs. How else to sustain the financial edge their favored brand of political leadership enjoys?

As it always has been, this is what is at the center of Republican action: politics and power—above all.