This winters' infrastructure catastrophe in Texas

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Wasn't he born in Canada?

We’re still trying to fumigate. Way to rub it in.

 

[Pamela]

“It’s like H-E-B is the moral center of Texas,” said Stephen Harrigan, a novelist and journalist who lives in Austin. “There seems to be in our state a lack of real leadership, a lack of real efficiency, on the political level. But on the business level, when it comes to a grocery store, all of those things are in place.”

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

Wasn't he born in Canada?

Ted Cruz being able to run for President did clarify and correct a mental fallacy in my head though. I thought I couldn't run for president because I was born overseas, but like him, my parents were Americans [well, mine more than his, think only one of his were].

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Yep, those are the two rules for born-citizenship. If your parents are American, you're a citizen no matter where you're born (jus sanguinis); and if you're born on US soil, you're a citizen no matter who your parents are (jus soli).

There is a concerted attack by some in the US against jus soli.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Police drop charge against black man arrested for walking home in Texas snowstorm

Rodney Reese was arrested in Plano, Texas, and charged with being a pedestrian in the roadway

www.theguardian.com

 

[Pamela]

Police drop charge against black man arrested for walking home in Texas snowstorm

Rodney Reese was arrested in Plano, Texas, and charged with being a pedestrian in the roadway

www.theguardian.com

Plano is so upscale they would probably arrest me for not being rich enough to walk their streets, and I am not even Black.

 

[detrius]

 

[Pamela]

Oh this is too good: Ro Kahnna, who represents the Bay area, is going to investigate how Texas’ govt has betrayed its citizens. Republicans will lose their minds.

 

[Myradyl Muse]

We’re still trying to fumigate. Way to rub it in.

That was merely an accident of a Canada goose as wingman for a flamingo, flying over a vacant lot somewhere in the far North. That nullifies Cancun Charlie's hypocritical citizenship imho. Also, stain removal will ensue after fumigation complete.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

‘Don’t be assholes’: Ted Cruz criticizes press reports over his Cancún trip

Speaking on a podcast, Republican complains about how the press treated him and his family after flying to Mexico as Texas froze

www.theguardian.com

 

[Roxanne Blue]

Yep, those are the two rules for born-citizenship. If your parents are American, you're a citizen no matter where you're born (jus sanguinis); and if you're born on US soil, you're a citizen no matter who your parents are (jus soli).

There is a concerted attack by some in the US against jus soli.

Just to be clear about this, it's if "your parent" (only takes one) is an American citizen, or if you are born on US soil, you are a citizen. Thus, even if Cruz was born in Canada and even if Obama had been born in Kenya, both are eligible to be President.

They will need SCOTUS to overrule jus soli.

So...

 

[Lexxi]

Just to be clear about this, it's if "your parent" (only takes one) is an American citizen, or if you are born on US soil, you are a citizen. Thus, even if Cruz was born in Canada and even if Obama had been born in Kenya, both are eligible to be President.

They will need SCOTUS to overrule jus soli.

So...

I recalled Wallis & Eddie and was curious if they had any children.

Bessie Wallis Warfield was born in Blue Ridge Summit, Pennsylvania. Warfield married Earl Winfield Spencer Jr in 1916, then Ernest Aldrich Simpson in 1928. Wallis Simpson then married King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom. They were married from 1937 until 1972. Any child would have been eligible to run for President of the USA. They had no children.

Archie Mountbatten-Windsor, age 21 months, son of an USAian. And descendent of George III. And dual-citizen of the UK & United States.

So Archie Montbatten-Windsor for President 2058?

 

[Innula Zenovka]

'Shivering under a pile of six blankets, I finally lost it': my week in frozen Texas hell

February was the peak of my pandemic depression – and then came the ‘Arctic blast’

www.theguardian.com

 

[Beebo Brink]

'Shivering under a pile of six blankets, I finally lost it': my week in frozen Texas hell

February was the peak of my pandemic depression – and then came the ‘Arctic blast’

www.theguardian.com

My take-away from this commentary, as well as many others along this line, is concern at just how many basic, I mean REALLY BASIC, survival skills have been lost in current generations of 1st world residents.

Your average homeless person knows how to stay warm in freezing temperatures when you have no heat, but I'm gobsmacked by how many other people do not. In story after story I've read about Texans without heat, they just burrow under a bunch of blankets while sitting in the middle of large modern rooms, while other people in their household lounge in the general vicinity. This is how you freeze to death, especially when asleep (which makes you especially vulnerable to hypothermia). Apparently it doesn't occur to people that you can build up warmth inside a small area just from your own body heat. Choose the smallest room in the house, build a tent with all those blankets, then everyone crawl inside. That's how homo sapiens survived the last Ice Age.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Victorian homes even in warm climates usually had one room such as a kitchen that had a low ceiling and a heat source for this kind of cold snap (with high ceilings in most of the building since heat rises and cooling is harder). Unfortunately modern construction has less insulation and includes open floor plans and raised cielings that require heating large spaces.

But you can still make a decent heater with a few bricks, a terra cotta pot and some candles. It makes a central source of heat and light that people can share, also a common pattern before electric lighting and central heat. Old houses are designed to keep a lot of furniture around the edge of the rooms and let you bring what you need to the light or heat source instead of treating the center of rooms as empty space.

 

[Beebo Brink]

You can also make a quick tent space by throwing sheets and blankets over some chairs or a table. Add some flat boxes or books to the table surface after the first layer and then drape a 2nd layer, creating an air pocket between for even great insulation.

Or bring everyone into a walk-in closet, then hang sheets over the louvered doors.

At the very least, everyone pile in together when you sleep, sharing body warmth. When I read about that 11-year-old boy freezing to death overnight... omg, WTF? Why wasn't the entire family packed together like sardines?

 

[Essence Lumin]

This reminds of a mariachi torture scene in and extremely weird movie called Greaser's Palace. Greaser has a son he hates, Lamey Homo who he continually kills but keeps coming back to life saying things like

Dad I was swimming in a rainbow with millions of babies and they was naked and then all of a sudden I turned into a perfect smile, just like last time. Dad I don't want to die any more.

In this scene Lamey is in jail being tortured by a mariachi band.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

My late partner's grandfather had been a wealthy landowner in Latvia before WW2, and had made it to the UK with his only surviving son after the war.

Anyway, apparently back at the family home, during the worst of the winter, the whole household, including the farmhands and servants, slept in the kitchen, which was built above the cattle shed to take advantage of the heat rising from below.

 

[Free]

during the worst of the winter, the whole household, including the farmhands and servants, slept in the kitchen, which was built above the cattle shed to take advantage of the heat rising from below.

I guess there's few suburban homes in the Houston area built something like in the low German house style.

 

[Roxanne Blue]

This reminds of a mariachi torture scene in and extremely weird movie called Greaser's Palace. Greaser has a son he hates, Lamey Homo who he continually kills but keeps coming back to life saying things like

Dad I was swimming in a rainbow with millions of babies and they was naked and then all of a sudden I turned into a perfect smile, just like last time. Dad I don't want to die any more.

In this scene Lamey is in jail being tortured by a mariachi band.

So, the original version of "South Park's" character Kenny?

Ending scene; Cue Cartman, "They've killed Kenny, Damnit!"

Cue Kyle: "You bastards!"