Greg Abbott's Plan to Drown Government (And Spend More Money!)
Today {Tuesday}, Governor Greg Abbott gave his second State of the State address in the Texas House. Apparently, Abbott had been squirreled away somewhere working in earnest on his speech for months. His team was mum about the contents.
For a governor who seems to have no real raison d’être other than Being Governor and trying to keep from being primaried from his right by Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, this was a speech that was perhaps designed to help define a leader who just seems a bit out of focus.
Abbott’s speaking style is odd. It has a kind of Toastmasters quality, like a speech that’s been practiced a few too many times. He has none of the folksy charm of previous Texas governors. Still, he warmed to the task today, buoyed along by a couple rounds of heavy applause (abolishing sanctuary cities brought some in the gallery to their feet). He also liberally employed first-name shoutouts to individual lawmakers. Listen up, Dennis! Hey there, Paul. You know what I’m talking about, J.M.
The tone was mostly the sunny optimism of a late-20th-century American politician. Texas is “exceptional”; we have the second-most Fortune 500 companies; our economy is bigger than Canada’s. But on the whole, Abbott laid out a vision of government that is basically a libertarian state with lots of cops. His speech was filled with paeans to law enforcement (he proposes making attacks on cops a “hate crime”) while calling on citizens to solve complex, expensive social problems with volunteerism. Though he admonished the Legislature to “not underfund” the “rickety” child welfare system, he also urged citizens to create a “Network of Nurture” by taking in foster kids. (Few legislators have so far heeded this call, I regret to report.)
Read more: https://www.texasobserver.org/greg-abbotts-plan-drown-government-spend-money/