The Texas Lottery has paid out many millions of dollars to winners of its games of chance since voters in the state approved its creation in 1991. This week, Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced a new lottery of sorts — the “Texas Antisemitism Lottery” — that could rival and maybe even surpass the original Texas Lottery in cash payouts.
Tag: Greg Abbott
Texas Governor Greg Abbott went into tyrant mode in 2020 on the excuse of a coronavirus “emergency.” He unilaterally imposed a plethora of mandates and new government programs. Included among Abbott’s actions that year were statewide forced closures of businesses, schools, and other places beginning in March, as well as mandated mask wearing beginning in July.
Maybe Texas Governor Greg Abbott was influenced by the billboards that appeared around Texas last month urging people to resist bullying regarding experimental coronavirus “vaccine” shots and to instead make their own informed choices. Maybe Abbott perceived the strong opposition among voters to the increasingly harsh measures being taken to push the shots on people. Maybe Abbott’s conscience urged him to act. No matter the reason, Abbott on Monday took a stand for the rights of Texans. Abbott issued an executive order in contradiction to a mandate President Biden announced in September that employers require employees to take the shots. Abbott also added to the agenda of the state legislature’s ongoing special session consideration of legislation similar to the executive order.
The Republican Party of Texas executive committee has taken a heroic action that could serve as an example for Republican and Democratic parties across America. It has adopted, by a 54 to 4 vote, a resolution clearly and emphatically demanding that Texas Governor Greg Abbott immediately end all the liberty-repressing measures that, over the last six months while the state legislature has been in recess, Abbott has imposed unilaterally in the name of countering coronavirus.
The rebuke and demand of the resolution are particularly strong given that they come from Abbott’s own party.
This week, Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, has been the subject of much attention because of her on the sly visit at a salon in her hometown of San Francisco despite such being forbidden under the local coronavirus crackdown and despite Pelosi being one of the most prominent coronavirus fearmongers in America. A few months before Pelosi’s salon visit, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot was similarly in the spotlight. A picture circulated in April of Lightfoot with her hair stylist at a haircut appointment after Lightfoot had been encouraging people to adhere to the local shutdown of hair cutting business operations.
Texas Governor Greg Abbot, in an April 27 executive order concerning coronavirus, declared: “Individuals are encouraged to wear appropriate face coverings, but no jurisdiction can impose a civil or criminal penalty for failure to wear a face covering.” This executive order provision stopped in their tracks local governments that sought to enforce mask mandates as part of their coronavirus crackdowns.
Because of his stand against mask mandates, Abbott gained praise for defending liberty. But, on Wednesday, Abbot turned his back on liberty when, in a KWTX-TV of Waco, Texas interview, he endorsed local governments ordering stores and other businesses to require people at the businesses to wear masks.
Last week the Wisconsin Supreme Court became the first among the highest state courts in America to void much of a state government’s coronavirus crackdown. With legal challenges being pursued in response to liberty suppression through the expanding of government power across America in the name of countering coronavirus, expect other states’ top courts soon to be considering the legality of state and local crackdowns as well. A declaration earlier this month by four of the nine justices of the Texas Supreme Court suggests that there may be strong support in that court for taking similar action as did the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
Some people will be heralding Texas Governor Greg Abbott for his announcement today that he will be taking yet-to-be-explained steps to allow the reopening sometime of some businesses closed in the state’s coronavirus crackdown. Easing up on the restrictions is a positive for liberty. But, if you are looking for someone to admire for taking on the coronavirus crackdown in Texas, I suggest Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price fits the bill much better.
On Saturday, I wrote about Rhode Island Governor Gina M. Raimondo adopting a set of draconian orders in the name of countering coronavirus. In particular, I wrote about her orders targeting people who have entered Rhode Island from other states or countries. Included among these mandates was Raimondo’s direction to state police to pull over cars with New York license plates and order the people inside to quarantine for 14 days if they intend to stay in Rhode Island.
Here is an update on the order regarding cars with New York license plates. Raimondo has repealed that order. But, before you cheer a victory for liberty, consider the rest of the story. Tom Moroney reports at Bloomberg that Raimondo replaced that order with a new order that applies the same policy toward all out-of-state licensed vehicles. In other words, she massively expanded the police action.
Categories
Texas Bans Red Light Cameras
On Saturday, after over ten years of red light cameras use by local governments across the state to impose fines, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed into law legislation that bans the use of red light cameras in Texas and ensures people who have been ticketed based upon photos taken by such cameras can register their vehicles despite their having not paid the tickets.