The Conservative Version of Pro-Life
Are Texans Just Mean? If not, it's time to set your legislators straight
Amazing ... even the conservative Dallas Morning News understands the callousness of the new Texas leadership:
Some things happen by accident. Some things happen by coincidence. But a pattern is a pattern ? even when we'd rather not acknowledge it.That's the uncomfortable realization that many Texans must have reached over the weekend, with the front-page story about how, because of budgetary constraints, the Texas Board of Nursing Examiners doesn't run criminal background checks on nurses. In consequence, scores of drug and sex offenders are caring for unknowing patients, including children, across our state.
A moderately disturbing story, taken in isolation ? only it didn't appear in isolation. It appeared on the heels of other disturbing stories. A partial list:
? More than 167,000 children lost state-funded health insurance in the last 15 months after the state tightened eligibility requirements to trim the budget.
? Because money is scarce, caseworkers for Child Protective Services must juggle roughly 60 cases at a time, with the inevitable result that children die.
? Being old and helpless is no better. In the Dallas region, at least, workers for Adult Protective Services carry 50 to 80 cases at a time, and state funds for emergency interventions are shrinking.
? You don't even have to be poor to get shortchanged. Because of a state cap on local property taxes, the state fails to provide public school students with an adequate education, state District Judge John Dietz ruled in September.
This pattern is very disturbing, and it raises an urgent question: Why is this happening? It's hard not to conclude that the answer ? or part of the answer ? is that our elected officials think we are content to give our children a second-rate education and turn our back on our most vulnerable neighbors.
Are they right? Is the pattern acceptable? Is this who we are?
Amen ...