As Molly Ivins said, “The Texas Legislature consists of 181 people who meet for 140 days every two years. This catastrophe has now occurred [88] times.” She also quipped, “All anyone needs to enjoy the state legislature is a strong stomach and a complete insensitivity to the needs of the people. As long as you don’t think about what that peculiar body should be doing and what it actually is doing to the quality of life in Texas, then it’s all marvelous fun.”
With that in mind, we look at some bills currently making their way through the Texas Legislature. Some will probably become law, some will not, and some are just idiotic. Have a listen and marvel at the peculiar place that is Texas. But first we share a listener email that calls us out for our lack of knowledge. Hi, Mark!
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5. Credits
As Molly Ivins said, “The Texas Legislature consists of 181 people who meet for 140 days every two years. This catastrophe has now occurred [88] times.” She also quipped, “All anyone needs to enjoy the state legislature is a strong stomach and a complete insensitivity to the needs of the people. As long as you don’t think about what that peculiar body should be doing and what it actually is doing to the quality of life in Texas, then it’s all marvelous fun.”
With that in mind, we look at some bills currently making their way through the Texas Legislature. Some will probably become law, some will not, and some are just idiotic. Have a listen and marvel at the peculiar place that is Texas. But first we share a listener email that calls us out for our lack of knowledge. Hi, Mark!
1. Topics
2. Additional Resources
3. Merchandise/Support the Show
4. Contact Us/Follow Us/Rate/Subscribe
New episodes every week!
Listen, rate, follow, and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts!
Follow us:
5. Credits
This week, a condescending email, and what's wrong with Texas? Welcome to Subpar Talks. Hey everybody. Welcome to Subpar Talks, where we have conversations about everything. I'm Jeff.
Chris:And I'm Chris.
Jeff:Thank you so much for joining us again, and you know what is coming, our standard disclaimer, listener discretion is advised. We like to curse. Sometimes we like to do a lot of it, and we will touch on some mature subject matter from time to time, and we inject our humor into all of this stuff. There's really nothing off limits as far as humor goes. So, if that doesn't set well with you, then maybe this is not the podcast for you. But for everybody else, get ready because here we go with this week's topic. OK. First up, I'm gonna share an email that we got from a listener. You wanna, you wanna hear an email?
Chris:All right! I love listener email.
Jeff:Yeah, me too. And I always, you know, every week at the close of, of the episode, I ask people, email us, give us a voicemail, whatever. We're gonna read it, listen to it. And we can't always guarantee that we will read it on our show, but in this case, I can't not read it, so.
Chris:OK.
Jeff:Yeah, this is good. This is from Mark, and don't worry, we're never gonna give anybody's last name, so you don't have to worry about that. We're not gonna out you. But we might read it or play a voicemail on the show. OK, so this is regarding our episode on space that we did. We did one on space and one on time. Mm-hmm. And so this is from Mark who listened to our episode on Space. All right. Hey guys. I recently listened to your episode on space and I want to correct some information that you presented. First, the reason we can't see the flag on the moon is because it's only about three feet wide, which makes it too small and too far away for current telescopes to view. It also, and you at least got this part correct. The flag is likely faded and deteriorated over time due to exposure to the harsh lunar environment, making it even more difficult to see. OK, second, you made the claim that NASA has lost communication with the Voyager spacecraft, which is not true. NASA still maintains communication with both Voyager one and Voyager two, which are currently in Interstellar space through the Deep Space Network. In the future, I hope you will do your due diligence in researching and fact checking before presenting information to your audience. Thanks for reading, mark. Whoa. Alright, well now Mark maybe should just come on the show. Yeah, exactly. If, if, uh, he knows so much more about space than we do, then maybe we should just have him as a guest. Yeah. Come on. Yeah. So I got two things about that and I just don't get how we can see so much of what we can see that is so far away. Those telescopes are clearly powerful, right? How could they not pick out a flag on the moon? So I looked into this cuz Mark is fact checking us, so I wanted to fact check Mark. What it boils down to is the telescopes are not big enough to have that type of magnification where it can see something so small. And we do have photos, but the closest they can get, you have no idea what you're looking at. And I didn't know this, there are like six or seven American flags on the moon and there's one Chinese flag. Really? Yeah. So every time we had a, a mission to the moon, they would plant a flag and the Chinese, through some unmanned spacecraft landed on the moon and they put a, uh, a flag on there. But the closest you can get, they can point it out where it is. But you wouldn't know what you're looking at unless somebody showed you. It's not like you see it in any kind of wow detail. That's really interesting.
Chris:Yeah. So I wonder, you know, like with Antarctica, there are treaties where no country owns that continent. It's, it's not, doesn't belong to anyone. Mm-hmm. There are multiple countries who work there, that have stations there. Mm-hmm. So I don't know how we came up with those treaties in the first place. And what is keeping everyone like in check that somebody doesn't just decide they're gonna take over that continent, but what's gonna keep that from happening with the
Jeff:moon? I don't know. You would think that we were the first ones there as like, it's ours. It's ours. Right. I mean, that's the way it worked when you're, you know, like explorers exploring a different part of the world or whatever's like, well, We put our flag here, we own it.
Chris:We We got here first. Exactly. His possession is nine tenths of the law.
Jeff:There you go. So sorry to disappoint you, mark. But here's the thing, we are not experts. We never claim to be experts on the stuff we're talking about. I think we're, I mean, I guess we are experts on a few topics. We're knowledgeable. Most of the we're knowledgeable, that's the thing. We're knowledgeable but we are not experts and we're just two guys talking about whatever. So apparently he got his panties in a wad over apparently our space knowledge. Now
Chris:I wanna know about this deep space network.
Jeff:Yeah. What the hell is that? That, I dunno. We need to get mic on.
Chris:Does that mean some, there are some beings out there that built a network that are allowing us to communicate.
Jeff:I have no clue. I don't know how it works. I don't
Chris:either. I guess we're gonna have to learn about that too. But I really did think that they, I know they left the solar system, so I thought that we had lost communication. That's, that's actually good to know that we haven't.
Jeff:See, I could have swore that, that we did, I remember hearing something, something from NASA lost communication with whatever that they had launched. I know that for a fact. It's just not the Voyager, evidently. And why were there two? Were they launched around the same time, or, I know they
Chris:were launched within months. I think one was launched in I think maybe different years, but it was, uh, 77 and 78 or, or something. I think they're in different years, but they were within months of each other. And I don't know why. If, if they had different purposes or if they were trying to compare one with the other or what. I'm not sure. Hmm.
Jeff:OK. Maybe Mark can tell us. Yeah, I bet he could. Yeah. Anyway. Thank you, mark, I guess for emailing us and letting us know how stupid we are when it comes to space. Uh, what do you think of Texas? Oh, how long do we have? I mean, yeah,
Chris:exactly. You know, we've talked about this before. It's like we both have lived here our whole lives. I know when I was a kid, I really liked it and I, there is a pride about Texas that a lot of people have, and I think especially as a kid, I kind of absorb some of that. And then when you get older and you go other places and you hear more, you learn more, you talk to people from other places, all of that, you start to go. What's wrong with us,
Jeff:right? Yes. Yeah. Why?
Chris:Why is it like this here? It's backwards in some cases, in other ways. It's like they're trying to be forward, but they screw that up. Yeah, and and I still hear people talking about O Texas as the greatest, and then some of those people have barely left it. They've barely left the state. So like it's the greatest of what you know, which is
Jeff:very little. I yeah, I agree. I was the same way. And I don't, it's probably not this way in other states, I'm guessing it's not, but yes, you are. You're taught indoctrinated to have pride in Texas and you learn all about Texas history and people who fought at the Alamo and all that. And so you grow up in this state having a particular mindset, and then you're right when you go out of the state, When you start reading, watching things, learning about how other states do certain things, then it, it becomes apparent that, yeah, there's a lot that's screwed up about this state. What I've got for us today is the Texas legislature is currently in session. Now, for those of you who are not from here, haven't lived here, you probably don't know this. Why would you, and actually there are a lot of Texans who don't know this either, but our legislature is hardly ever in session. They're in session once every two years, and then it's only for 140 days and that goes talk about something being done way back when and we're still doing it. There might have been reasons why they set up a system for the legislature to meet so infrequently back a long time ago in the 1870s. And I can understand that. If you're way the fuck out near El Paso, then travel is a huge thing in the 1870s. And who knows if you're even gonna make it to Austin alive, you know? So it's a big deal. But now we have 30 million people here. We got one of the biggest economies. We have problems left and right in this state, and our legislature's hardly ever in Austin to deal with these problems. So I say that to say this, it's kind of a big deal when the legislature is in session because they have such a short time to try to get things done. So a lot of times there will be a tension, a lot of attention paid to some particular bill in the legislature. It'll get attention in the national media. I've already seen some of that, but I figured. In this episode, I would just run through some bills that are currently in the legislature and we can talk about these. I'd like to get your thoughts on these, and here's the thing you have here. So here's our starting point. Our state is run by religious fanatics, and I am not exaggerating there. It is run by very, very, very conservative Christian people, and the Republican party of course, dominates the state. So whatever bills are filed by Democrats in the legislature, they're probably not even gonna get any type of a hearing at all. They'll just get buried under a mountain of paperwork. So Republicans have enough people in the legislature to basically get through what they want. The only thing that really prevents that is infighting among Republicans, which does happen. Um, and that's always kind of fun to watch when people have the same political party are at each other's throats. But anyway, does this sound like a good idea? Let's go through these bills. Yeah, definitely.
Chris:You know, one of the, one of the best, um, I guess reasons I won't say justifications for our legislature meetings so infrequently is that whole conservative nature. And from a conservative standpoint being, hey, Texans as a whole don't want that much government influence. Correct. So
Jeff:just don't bring them together. Yeah. Oh, that's absolutely true.
Chris:Meet as infrequently as possible for the least amount of time as
Jeff:possible. There you go. That was their mindset back in the 1870s. They, they were like, OK, well we have to have some laws. So, but put'em in Austin for as little time as we can come up with basically. Yeah. Yeah. And, and here we are still doing it. OK. So this is, uh, by no means, um, a microcosm of some of the bills. I just picked out ones that I think are pretty interesting. I didn't touch on any, or I'm not gonna touch on any boring ones. And I think I have 14 or 15 here. So we'll run through these. And these are in no particular order, uh, just in the order that I found them basically. OK. So we've talked about this, uh, in a previous episode, but the Fed, so this involves guns of course. Yeah, of course. The federal law says if you buy a gun from a licensed gun dealer, then they have to conduct a background check on you, right? Under federal law and under Texas law. If you buy a gun from a non-licensed gun dealer or just a person off the street, there's no requirement that you have to have a background check at all. So there's a bill right now that would require universal background checks for all gun purchases in the state. And spoiler alert, it stands no chance of passing at all.
Chris:Yeah, I'm surprised it's even
Jeff:out there. Yeah. It's one of these bills that Democrats will file, um, and they, they, they probably really believe that it needs to become a law. They know it's not gonna become a law, but they gotta go back to their constituents and say, look, I filed this bill. You know? Right. Yeah. It's a lost cause. Yeah. That's going nowhere here. Should it be a law? I, I
Chris:don't have a problem with it. I, I wonder how it would be, how it would happen. You know, who's going to do that background check and who's going to. How's that going to be enforced? I don't have a problem with doing it or with it being
Jeff:done. Yeah. Yeah. I'm the same way. I have read, so that is the law in California. And from what I have read, when you want to have a private gun sale, you both have to go to a licensed gun dealer and you fill out the paperwork there, and then they're the ones who actually conduct the background check. And I don't know how the exchange of the firearm actually works. I don't know if they hold it there till the background check is cleared. I don't know how long a background check takes. Is it hours? Is it minutes? I have no.
Chris:Um, I've bought a gun at a gun show before and it goes through the, can't remember, I want to say Nick's, is it n i c s? Something like That's sounds familiar. Yeah. Yeah. That's the f b i background check database. And I think now, this was a long time ago, um, but at the time, I think it took like an hour at the gun show. Oh, OK. Yeah. And now the gun show loophole thing is exactly like what you're talking about, right? Is that you can have private people there who are not dealers, but just, Hey, I've got a few guns that I want to sell. I show up, get a table, you know, get a booth and I can sell those. And it has to do with like how many you sell in a certain amount of time and all that. Mm-hmm. As whether or not you have to have a dealer license. Um, but anyway, I, you know, I was buying from an actual dealer and so they had to do the background check Now, I also have a concealed carry license and with that, the background check's already been done. So if you go to buy a gun with that, you can just show them the license. And I'm sure they have to do something like, you know, there have to be a record that you bought it from that dealer. Yeah. But they're not actually having to do the background check on you because you're already background
Jeff:checked. Um, you don't even have to have that license anymore. Just strap it to your hip. Yeah, right. OK. I didn't know that this was a thing until I was talking to some of my students last year. Did you know, and I don't know how many cities it is, but did you know some, at least cities in Texas have curfews for kids? Have you heard of this?
Chris:No, I didn't. Not in Texas. I've heard of it somewhere else,
Jeff:but Wow. Yeah, I didn't know it was a thing. Anyway, there's a bill that would prohibit cities from an acting curfews for kids. I have no idea who filed it, whether it's got a chance to pass or not, but I was surprised when I heard that from my students and they were giving me the different times. I think they said it was like 10 o'clock on weeknights and I think midnight, maybe on weekends, something like that. I think I
Chris:remember as a teenager, after I started driving, there was a time that there was a curfew and it was, uh, because if I would go out, um, like on the weekend, and I, I think it was like 16, I think it was 16 and under. You had to be in after. 10 or
Jeff:11 on the weekend. Really? This is in Dallas? Yeah.
Chris:Wow. But I might be out say till midnight, and I was out with a girlfriend who was under that age. Uhoh was like, well, what am I
Jeff:supposed to do? Should violate the law. Oh it did? Yeah. Violate the law before you violate her.
Chris:Right? Yeah. I actually forgot about that. So what do you think about that? Should we have it?
Jeff:Do we need it? My inclination is to, my inclination is to say it's ridiculous that we have curfews for kids. On the other hand, how much good stuff happens past midnight with kids under 18? Yeah.
Chris:And that's true. And you know, The sad thing is there are those parents that just don't care. True. And like, Hey, you know, it's 10 o'clock. Where do you know where your kids are? Nope. You're right. And don't care.
Jeff:Well, republicans are always talking about the nanny state, the government, you know, taking care of everybody. Cradled a grave and all that. Well, aren't curfews the nanny state? Like you're taking the job of the parent. Right. So, right. Why are we doing that? And maybe that's why this bill's been filed. Maybe it's been filed by conservatives said, why are, why is the government getting in the business of telling kids they gotta stay home? I don't know. True. When did you first become aware that there was a Texas Pledge of Allegiance? Um, we did
Chris:it sometimes in elementary school.
Jeff:Really? OK.
Chris:Yeah, sometimes. And then, I don't know. I don't think we did it quite, no, I guess we did. Um, I was gonna say, I don't know if we did it quite enough for me to memorize it, but I think we did and then it just completely dropped off my radar and the school that my kids went to in elementary, they would do it. So I started hearing it again all the
Jeff:time. Yeah. So I didn't become aware of it. I didn't even know it was a thing cuz we never said it in school. And yes. For those of you outside Texas, yes. There actually is a Texas Pledge of Allegiance and I didn't become aware of it until the legislature added under God to it. I remember I. Reading an article. I saw the headline legislature adds under God to the pledge. I'm like, to the what? Like, I don't even know what you're talking about. Anyway, for those of you curious, here it is, the Texas Pledge of Allegiance, honor, the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the Texas one state under God won and Indivisible. So that's the Texas pledge. The reason I'm bringing this up is because there is currently a bill in the legislature that would add to the end of the Texas Pledge of Allegiance. God bless Texas with an exclamation point. Well, of
Chris:course you gotta have the exclamation point. So being under
Jeff:God isn't enough. No, no. You need at least two Gods in there. So stupid.
Chris:So we have to know we're under God, but please bless us
Jeff:too. Right. And what does that even mean? Like what the fuck does that even mean? Well, I
Chris:don't know. We could just be out here hoping for the best. But if God blesses Texas, then we got a
Jeff:little bit of hope. So I have to read this because, uh, I had to look up the Texas pledge cuz I don't know it. We never said it. According to the, the Handbook of Texas Online quote, in 1933, the legislature passed a law establishing rules for the proper display of the flag and providing for a pledge on the flag. And the pledge was honor the Texas flag of 1836, I pledge allegiance to the Texas one and Indivisible. The pledge erroneously referred to the 1836 National flag instead of the Lone star flag. Senator Cersi Bracewell introduced a bill to correct this error in 1951. But the legislature did not delete the words of of 1836 until 1965. Whoa. So they didn't even get the flag. Right. That's funny.
Chris:So I was gonna ask when, so 1930,
Jeff:what'd you say? 33 is when they first did it. So
Chris:that was the first
Jeff:time we had a pledge. A Texas pledge. Yeah. Yeah. OK. And
Chris:so when you go, and I'm thinking Six Flags, like Six flags over Texas, the amusement park, you know, which now they only have American flags up. And I don't remember what the whole thing was with that. It was ridiculous. But the Texas flag, the Texas state flag is one of the flags. That was one of the six. Yeah. So I didn't realize that that wasn't the. National Texas flag as well. So the 1836 flag's
Jeff:different. Yeah, it is. Uh, it's blue with a yellow star in the middle or a gold star in the middle. That's not
Chris:one that they had up at Six Flags. It seems like that would've been one of them because all the rust or the other countries, Texas as its own country, was one of the
Jeff:six flowers. Yeah. So I don't, I don't know why. I don't know why they didn't either. It should be Seven Flags. Interesting. Yeah. So anyway, that'll probably pass, it's gonna be one of those raw rah Texas bills that people get behind and, OK. Yeah. Uh, there's another bill that would reduce our state sales tax rate to 5.75%. It is currently 6.25%, but cities can add up to 2% on the end of that and most do. So most anywhere you're gonna be paying 8.25% on stuff that's taxed, which is high. That's one of the highest in the country. I don't know if that's gonna pass because when people learn what it's actually gonna do, uh, I don't think it'll be pretty popular, but I read it's gonna reduce revenue by about 7 billion a year. Yeah. I
Chris:don't think us taking in less money is gonna
Jeff:solve any problems. I don't either. We're always strapped for cash, usually. Yeah.
Chris:Well, and then for those that don't know, Texas is one of, what are we two or three states that don't have an income tax? Right. Which is part of the reason that that's made up for by higher sales tax and
Jeff:property taxes. Yep. Sure is. That's exactly right. We have some of the
Chris:highest property taxes in the nation
Jeff:as well. People always say Texas is a low tax state, but uh, that depends on your income. If you're sitting pretty, it is. Right. But if you're struggling like a lot of people or just everyday average people, that that sales tax and property tax hurts. Yeah, it
Chris:does. It cracks me up that, that people, you know, there again talking about, oh, Texas is the best, is, you know, OK, yeah, we don't have an income tax, but money has to come from somewhere. Mm-hmm. Where do you think it's gonna come from? So then they get in another places, property taxes being one of them. Property taxes help fund education. But how many people are out there complaining about their property taxes being high? Yeah. Or like, our property taxes are outrageous, you know? Yeah. I want lower property taxes. But do you want teachers to be paid well? Oh, absolutely. You know, I know teachers, teachers are the backbone. Yeah. We gotta pay teachers Well, Which
Jeff:do you want? Yeah, I know, I've always told my students this, that Americans, and, and this includes Texans, want more government than they're willing to pay for. Hmm. If you look at polls, people say they want like a good social security system. They want Medicare, they want higher pay for teachers, they want better roads, all that stuff. And then you ask them are, well, are you willing to pay more tax in order to do that? And people say, well, no, I don't. I don't wanna do that. You know? Right. Yeah. Yep. It's a disconnect for sure. Well, I think
Chris:part of that also comes from just the, that general distrust in government, you know, because if people felt like the taxes that they were paying were coming back to them fairly, you know, I'm benefiting from the taxes I pay. Then they would be more willing to pay the
Jeff:taxes. OK. I didn't have this on the list, but you just reminded me of this, and I don't know how I missed this. There is a bill that would create, it's called a voucher system. If you have a kid in a public school, you can get a voucher from the state to pay for your kid going to a private school. Yeah. Yeah. It's big news around the state right now, and I've seen national stories on it too. But if you, if you do that, you are taking money away from the public schools. Speaking of funding, public schools like that, money's gotta come from somewhere. So they're gonna take it from what they're using to fund that school and then send that kid to a private school. And it's interesting to watch. I don't know. I mean, you can gimme your thoughts on that. It's interesting to watch who's for and against it. Democrats are largely against it because yeah, you're ripping money from the public school, but you're gonna find some Democrats who say, why should I use my tax money to help fund a religious education? Because most private schools are gonna be religiously based. So why should tax mayor taxpayer money go to, you know, fund religious instruction? But you will also find republicans in the legislature who represent rural districts and their constituents have really, really limited options when it comes to private schools. And you know, if you're gonna send your kid to a private school, you're talking about an hour round trip or more just to do that. And a lot of people don't want to do it. And a lot of rural districts in the state, the school district is one of the biggest, if not the biggest employers. So they're worried about people getting laid off. So I actually don't know if it's gonna pass or not, but it's interesting to watch.
Chris:Yeah. And then you have to wonder what kind of private school would they be going to, because their taxes are gonna be lower anyway, so whatever money they're taking from that public school to go to the private school isn't gonna be as much as the money that would be taken in other more populated
Jeff:areas. I wonder that too, like how much money are we talking? Because I mean, look at some private schools in Dallas, you're talking about the equivalent of a college tuition in some places and maybe more like there's no way you're gonna be able to pay for that. Right? Right. And then here's another thing I just thought of. Are the private schools even gonna want the kid. Like, you know what I mean? Like that's true. If you have a kid from say, inner city Dallas, are they gonna want to take in, uh, you know, some, some nice school in suburban Dallas? Are they gonna want to take that kid and what do they have to do to qualify to get in? And there's a lot of issues there. OK. How much did you make per hour in your first job?$4.$4 an hour.
Chris:And minimum wage was 3 85. So I thought I was doing pretty good.
Jeff:Well, I mean, you weren't doing bad. Yeah, mine was around there. Uh, I think four 15 is what I was four 20, something like that. I don't remember what minimum wage was at the time. Anyway, there's a b, this bill's going nowhere by the way. But there is a bill to raise the minimum wage. So 15 bucks an hour in the state. You think it needs to be raised? You think it's too high? What do you think? No, I think it needs to
Chris:be raised. It's uh,
Jeff:I mean yeah, too. It's been way low for too long. Yeah. We've gone the longest. So the National Federal minimum wage was created in 1938. I think. We haven't raised them since 2007. That's the longest stretch we've gone without raising it. Yeah, that's a crazy amount of time. Yeah, it is. Now there's another bill that would allow cities in Texas to raise their minimum wage. But that's not gonna pass either.
Chris:No. According to uh uh, uh, just the, in inflation, it should be, it should be over 15. Yeah. Even just by
Jeff:inflation. Right. So there's another bill. This would allow pharmacists to refuse to fill an order for emergency contraceptives. So yeah, you're shaking your head. You don't like it either?
Chris:No. I mean, I don't know that there are a lot of jobs that you could have where you might have to do something that you don't like. Mm-hmm. Then you need to get a different
Jeff:job. I agree. I used to be of the mindset that, oh, we need to balance the interest here. We need to balance the interest of the pharmacist and his or her religious beliefs and their religious conscience and all that with the needs of whoever's getting that particular prescription, whatever it is. But now, no, I, I've, I've done a complete 180 on that. Like, this is your job and. Are we gonna start nitpicking? Like, oh, I have a problem with this. Well, then you, now you're starting down the road of Well, I don't think that medicine's, I, I, I don't think that you should have this particular type of medicine for whatever it is. Like I don't, I don't think that that's a good idea. Yeah. It's like that's the doctor's job. Right? The doctor's job is to decide what medication is appropriate for his or her patient. That's not the pharmacist's job. Their job is just to fill the prescription.
Chris:Yeah. There are people religiously who don't believe in like organ transplants, something like that. Yeah. So then are they not going to fill a prescription? That's the, what do you call it, the anti-rejection medication, whatever. Yeah. There you go. Keep you from
Jeff:rejecting the organ. Yeah, it's a good example. It's pretty messed up, but it wouldn't surprise me if that also passes. OK. There is a bill. This won't pass either. I don't think it will, that would allow casinos in the state. We're not there yet.
Chris:No, I I don't think that'll, no, I don't think that'll pass. I don't really see what the difference is between what we do have. We have the lottery and we have, you can do param bedding, like horses. I don't know if there're, I don't think there are dog
Jeff:tracks in Texas. Are there? I don't think so.
Chris:I mean, the thing about casinos though is, and, and this is the argument is you go 15 minutes into Louisiana. Mm-hmm. Or you go five minutes, 10 minutes into Oklahoma and there are casinos. Right. So it's not that people, now, obviously, depending on where you live in Texas, but. It's not that people in Texas don't have access to casinos, they're just sending their money. Yeah. They're just sending their money to the other states though.
Jeff:Right. To me, that's the biggest argument for it is right. Texans are spending their money. Do you want their money to stay in Texas or do you want it to go to New Mexico or, uh, to Oklahoma and, and Louisiana. Right. Well, I remember it was a big deal getting, uh, horse racing in the state and me going to a private Christian school, man, there were people talking about it, how it's a sin, you know, if you, if you vote for that, it's a sin. Yeah, absolutely. And the lottery too. Yep.
Chris:The, I mean, this is a, this is a different argument. The, the problem I could say with any of that is that it's a, can act like a regressive tax. Oh, no doubt. You know, in terms of hurting, hurting, poorer people more. Mm-hmm. So there's a whole argument about that, but leaving that out of the equation, just whether we should have it or not, when you look at everything else, I don't really see why we shouldn't with what we already have. And the fact that it's pretty readily available, at least on the, the, the northern and eastern part of Texas, it's readily available.
Jeff:Yep, definitely. What do you know about drag shows?
Chris:I've never been to one, so I don't really know much about'em. I just know they're
Jeff:out there. Have you heard about'em in the news at all? I've heard about
Chris:wanting to stop them.
Jeff:Yeah. But I don't know what this comes from. But evidently some Republicans are obsessed with drag shows now. Yeah. And. They're afraid of, I don't know what they're afraid of. People in drag, I guess. I don't know. I've heard about bills similar to this one, but what this bill would do is it would change the definition of a sexually oriented business, and it would change the definition so that if there is a drag show anywhere, that has to be a sexually oriented business. And so now you can restrict people based on their age from entering that place, whatever it is, so they don't want kids attending drag shows.
Chris:Is that a frequent problem that kids attend
Jeff:drag shows? Thank you. Does regardless of party, uh, ideology or whatever, it gets under my skin when. Legislators propose a bill that is trying to tackle something that's not actually a problem. Our government leaders should be doing things to try to solve problems. Is this a problem? And I don't think it is. I don't think there are kids just dying to go to drag shows. No, I
Chris:wouldn't know how to go to a drag show if I wanted to. And, and by that I mean, it's not like I'm driving by places and I know that, oh, that's, that's a drag show place,
Jeff:right? Where is this happening? Yeah.
Chris:So how are the kids finding it? I mean, yeah, the, the kids would have to be seeking it out and intentionally going, because in all the time that I've lived here, I've never known where there was a drag show to go
Jeff:to. No, no. Me. And I, I mean, OK, so they're afraid of people in drag or what they're gonna do to kids. They think their kids are gonna get molested or whatever, which is not gonna happen at a drag show. Those are just performers, but these same parents who are worried about their precious kids are sending them to church every Sunday. And I guarantee you they have way more of a chance of being molested at the church than they do at the drag show. And I got a whole mountain of data of the show to prove that, correct? Yep. Preachers and priests and deacons and elders and whoever else. The youth ministers. There you go. Yep. The ones that have the,
Chris:the best and most frequent access to the youth are the ones doing
Jeff:it. There you go. Yep. OK, so there is a bill. This one won't pass. To prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity in places of business. So right now, under Texas law, if you own like a restaurant and you see a gay couple come in there, you can refuse to serve them because they are gay. I don't think
Chris:I knew that. Yeah, that
Jeff:you could do that here. Yeah. It's actually still legal still at this point. Legal under federal law too. You have a right to refuse service to somebody based on, you know, the sexual orientation or if they identify as whatever that you don't think they are. Like if they came in in drag, you could refuse to serve him. Mm-hmm. OK. So is that their right to be served or does the business owner have a right to reject them? So how does that work
Chris:if you can't discriminate on the basis of sex? Like, I can't refuse to serve. I can't refuse to serve a woman. Right.
Jeff:OK. That's a really good question. So the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination in public places. So any place that's open to the general public, it prohibits discrimination based on race, color, national origin, sex and religion. It also prohibits discrimination and employment based on those things I just said. So a few years ago, there was a case where I think there were three cases that came to the court at the same time, and these people had all been fired because they were gay, transgender, I think one was a lesbian, but there was no dispute about why they were fired. And they were claiming that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 when it mentioned sex also also covers sexual orientation. And the Supreme Court agreed with that. So now you can't fire somebody, for example, for being gay. However, the Supreme Court so far has not extended that to places of business. So, OK. There's a certainly an argument to be made that it should also cover that, but as of right now, it doesn't. Hmm. That's very complex. Yeah, it is. It's an interesting issue though. And here, here's the issue. The people in charge of this state, they think being gay is a choice, right? Yeah. So, They're not gonna support a bill like this because they say it's your choice to be gay. So why should you to stop doing it to be right? Why should you have a right to be served in a restaurant or whatever, based on a choice that you made, a conscious decision. And if you wanna be served, then don't be gay. That's what they would say. Now I would say something different that no, being gay is not a choice and it's no different from anything else that you can't change. It's an immutable characteristic. So why should they be punished for being something that they can't change? Right. But it won't pass no chance in hell, which puts it in the same
Chris:category as race, sex, right? Any of the other
Jeff:things. Yep. OK. There's been a lot of consternation lately over Confederate monuments. Have you saw, have you, uh, followed any of this stuff? Oh yeah. So there is a bill right now. I read the bill and it gets really complicated about who's gotta approve it and all that stuff. But the bottom line is it will make it harder for cities to remove Confederate monuments based
Chris:on what, what are they gonna have to, what kind of hoops are they gonna have to jump through? What do they have to do now?
Jeff:So they have to, uh, so I read it, if the monument's been up for longer than 25 years, which most of these Confederate monuments in the state have. Mm-hmm. There's a whole thing they gotta go through. They gotta get a certain amount of City council members to support it. They've gotta go through some. Historical commission, something or other, they gotta provide for another location of the monument. And I don't remember what else. It's just gonna be, it's gonna be a bitch now to remove Confederate monuments if this bill passes. Yeah, I'm sure
Chris:that'll pass. There are plenty of people that want us to secede
Jeff:again, so, boy, that's the truth. Did it ever occur to you? Um, just growing up, and it probably didn't, it didn't me, but having Confederate monuments around, did it strike, strike you as weird, mean neither? No. Didn't think twice about it.
Chris:No. It was just there. Well, and it, I mean, it is a part of history that's not up for debate. It is a part of history and so then what's strong with that? And it's taken me a while. What do I say? I've come around, I am coming around. I, I understand the debate. I, you know, and it's, it's kind of like, um, so I went to, uh, Czech Republic a few years ago. Mm-hmm. And you know, I became aware when I was there of a lot of old Russian socialist stuff that had been taken out mm-hmm. Since they were now a democratic republic. Right. And I think that's one of the things that kind of got me thinking differently about it is, hey, the Confederacy was a different country at the time. Mm-hmm. It was not the United States. We are the United States. Where else would you find a country that says, you know, whatever the country was before is what we're still going to have up. Yeah. It's not part of us, it's not part of the United States for the Czech Republic, Russia, U S S R, any part of that is not part of them
Jeff:now. Yeah. The, the reason we put up monuments is to honor somebody or somebody's, right, right, right. So why should pick any Confederate general? Why should that person be honored for fighting against the United States? Just from that standpoint? It doesn't make any sense. That's a good point. I just, I don't get it. Uh, and, and I'm white. I mean, imagine like black people growing up and they're going to whatever, Robert E. Lee Elementary School. Right. And there are plenty of those around. What, what is that kid's mindset when they learn about what Robert E. Lee stood for and any other Confederate general and anybody who supported the Confederacy is like, what are we doing? You know, why does that deserve any honor? So it'll probably pass just cuz that really gets under a lot of Republican skin, uh, doing away with Confederate monuments. Have you ever bought tampons?
Chris:Um, I have never needed them. Well, that's good to know. Yeah. Yeah. I have
Jeff:actually. Did you know that you were taxed on the tampons or did you even think about it? I
Chris:didn't think about it, I guess. Huh. That's interesting. I don't know if, if I had been asked would I be taxed? I don't know if
Jeff:I could have answered that. So right now you are taxed when you buy tampons and there's a bill that would get rid of that. I have read all these rules before for what's taxed and what's not, and I think my eyes glazed over. But what it boils down to is if it is classified as a necessity, then it's not taxed. So, mm-hmm. Medicine's not taxed. Band-aids are not taxed, but tampons are taxed. And a lot of states, I think about half the states now have removed the tax on. Now that's Texas law. I'm sure other states have different laws. They might be similar, but there are probably some differences. But a lot of states have removed that, that had it in place. And there's a bill now, and I think it's got pretty widespread support actually to do away with. That because women are saying hello, it's a necessity. Right? Like, what am I supposed to do? Right. So, anyway, and, and
Chris:I, I did know that that was the way, it was. The, the tax or no tax was based on necessity. I wasn't thinking about that in terms of that as to, cuz I was, I was trying to think about other, um, toiletry items. Mm-hmm. But I really c like, is toilet paper taxed? I've never thought about it. I don't know. I, I would think probably not based on that, but I don't know.
Jeff:So part of, of what's in that, uh, in the law about what's taxed and what's not is wound dressing is not taxed. So, OK. Hopefully they don't look at toilet paper as trying to dress a wound. Well, that would be
Chris:rough.
Jeff:That reminds me of the George Carlin bit where he is talking about out. We're just getting fucked over by corporations left and right. Mm-hmm. And he said whoever came up with the saying, buyer beware, was probably bleeding from the asshole.
Chris:That is about right.
Jeff:I love that line. All right, so my students have been very interested in this since it happened. So Roe versus Wade was overturned last year by the Supreme Court, US Supreme Court and Texas had a law already on the books called A Trigger Law. That said, if Roe versus Wade is ever overturned, then abortion is illegal and uh, it provides criminal penalties for anybody doing an abortion, any assisting of that or whatever. It's a second degree felony up to life in prison, a hundred thousand dollars fine. They're presently is no exception, except in the case of a life-threatening emergency. So there's a bill in the legislature now that would allow for exceptions in the case of rape or incest. Hmm. I wonder you think that'll pass? I know some Republican, I mean every Democrat will support it, but that's not saying a lot. Yeah, because there's so many Republicans. I have heard some Republicans a little uneasy at the fact that there's currently no exception for. For rape or incest. So it'll get some Republican support. But it's just a question of the Republicans in power in the legislature. Yeah. Is it gonna be enough to actually bring it up for a vote? Well,
Chris:when the governor was challenged on that in a press conference, you know, he just said that we were gonna eliminate rape in the, in the
Jeff:state. Right. Get rapists off the street.
Chris:I mean, he should just look at the law as unnecessary.
Jeff:Right. It's redundant. Such an idiotic response was he asked a question in response to that. I mean, the obvious question is, how are you gonna do that?
Chris:I don't know. I, I don't remember if he
Jeff:was, man, I, to me it, it is, uh, it is incredibly cruel and that's probably an understatement to tell a 13 year old girl who was raped mm-hmm. That she's gotta have that kid. Yep. But that's the law in Texas right now. Or
Chris:incest too. Yeah. Which right. Was very likely
Jeff:rape anyway. Yeah. Well, not necessarily, but there are reasons we have law in incest. Right. I mean, we don't want more stupid people walking around.
Chris:Right.
Jeff:That's all we need. OK. We are, uh, as of this recording, we are on standard time, but right around the corner is daylight savings time. Which do you like better? You know, I
Chris:don't even know how to answer that question because I think it doesn't take into account the fact that the seasons alter the time as well. You know, everybody says, oh, I hate standard time, because I like it to stay light longer. Well, OK, if we were on daylight savings time in the middle of December, Yes, it might get dark at six o'clock instead of five o'clock. Mm-hmm. But it's still dark at six o'clock, right? Not nine o'clock. And that's because it's winter. So yes, I, I don't really have a preference, honestly, because I don't, I guess I would have to say I like daylight savings time in the summer because of what the weather is and so on that OK, it's gonna get dark at nine o'clock instead of eight o'clock. But like in the winter, I guess I don't really
Jeff:care. So there's a bill right now that would make daylight savings time permanent in the state. And for me, I prefer standard time. I hate daylight savings time, but I think I hate switching the time even more. So for me, yeah, just pick one and go with it. Right. And. I mean, it's such an antiquated thing. I don't even know why we still do it. It's stupid.
Chris:Yeah. Switching the time is rough. And it's interesting that it's rough going either way, gaining or losing the time It is and, and it's, it's only an hour, but it, it
Jeff:can mess with you. It messes with me. Day life savings time always messes with me and they've done studies. I mean, that's never deterred our legislators from, from doing anything. They just don't pay attention to what the experts say. But like, there's a lack of productivity in the first couple of weeks after that. People calling in smore. There are car wrecks, car wrecks go up. There's just all sorts of shit that happens, but we keep doing it. It's just dumb. There's no reason to keep doing. A real problem
Chris:I see with daylight savings time all the time though is like in December and January, it's not getting light on standard time until close to seven o'clock. Right. That means it's gonna be close to eight o'clock if your daylight savings time all the time. Yeah. Kids are gonna be going to school in the dark. Yeah. Right now it's barely light, but they will be in the dark, dark that they are and, and they are walking to school. They're riding their bikes to school.
Jeff:Mm-hmm.
Chris:When, and, and they're doing that and the pitch black plus, I mean, then you've got them going out, you know, standing at bus stops and all. I, I just, I don't
Jeff:think that's a good idea. What's even makes this dumber is we're on standard time less than we are on daylight savings time. Right. It's standard. Like that's the standard, but we're not even on it as much as daylight savings time. Just stupid. Yeah. OK.
Chris:I think that's another one of those solutions in
Jeff:search of a problem. Yeah. Yeah. It might be. How many 10 Commandments can you name? Well, I don't know. Maybe six or seven. Really? I don't think I could do six or seven. Don't kill, don't steal. Don't lie. Oh, I was lying in there. Still don't lie. Your
Chris:father and mother.
Isn't
Jeff:that one of them? Oh, OK. That's four. We're up to four. Um, don't commit adultery. Don't. Yeah, there you go. Don't have any other gods before God. Oh, yeah. So that's six. Yeah. All right. Love thy neighbor as thyself. Oh, wow. Wait, is that. I think so. Yeah, I have no idea.
Chris:OK. We're at six or seven. Which ones did we, which ones did we not get?
Jeff:Those are the ones we need to worry about. Right. Um, there's a bill in the legislature right now that would require public schools to display the 10 commandments. Oh, hell
Chris:no. No.
Jeff:It would most likely get struck down by courts. It's unconstitutional, first amendment problems and all that. But that doesn't stop our legislators from passing such a bill. Does it
Chris:have, yeah. Does it have any chance of passing? Does it have that much support?
Jeff:I wouldn't doubt it. Well, that's ridiculous. I mean, you're gonna find, you're gonna find a lot of people in the legislature who they don't give a damn if the state gets sued and it ends up in federal court, they don't care about that. They're just gonna pass it cuz they like it and they want to please their voters back in their district. So yeah, it wouldn't surprise me if it passes. Wow. It's so stupid though. It's so stupid. It's like the, God bless Texas at the end of the pledge, it's like, what are we doing? Right. All right, there you go. That is some bills in the Texas legislature and who knows how many of those will pass. And we also had an email, a lovely, lovely email from Mark telling us that we don't know shit about space. So anyway, keep those emails coming. We might read yours on the air if you like this kind of. Then this is your type of podcast and you should absolutely follow us on whatever platform you listen to podcasts on. That way you will get new episodes delivered to you every single Tuesday when they drop. And while you are there, go ahead and rate us. We would be ever so grateful if you'd give us five stars. And while you are there, write something. It doesn't matter what you write, you can write, God bless Texas. I don't give a shit. Just write that stuff. Because the way these apps work, if you have stuff written there, then it makes it easier for people to discover this show. We have a website if you want to go there, you can learn more about me. Chris, anything and everything show related, that is Subpar Talks dot com. You can email us just like Mark did, or you can leave us a voicemail and we are on social media on Twitter. We are at subpartalks.com on Facebook, we are subpartalks.com. If you wanna follow our personal Twitter accounts, you can do that as well. And we would like that on there. I am at@independentjeff and I am at
Chris:Chris Bradford, tx.
Jeff:And last but not least, please share this with your friends, family, colleagues, acquaintances, share this on social media. Get the word out about Subpar Talks because the more people we have listening to this show, that makes it easier on us to get this content to you each and every week. And that is another episode. Wrap. Chris, final thoughts on Mark, Texas, anything related to that?
Chris:Hey, if Mark wants to come on the show and straighten us out,
Jeff:bring it on. Maybe we'll do it. All right. That is another episode, and until next week, so long.