Oh noes,
and so forth.
Local fracking bans. Laws outlawing plastic bags. Strict tree-cutting ordinances. Another day in California? Nope. Welcome to life in urban Texas, where Democratic-controlled city councils are enacting powerful consumer and environmental protections—much to the chagrin of the state's leading conservatives. "Texas is being California-ized, and you might not even be noticing it," Gov.-elect Greg Abbott complained last week at a meeting of the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation. "We're forming a patchwork quilt of bans and rules and regulations that is eroding the Texas model."
There's a separate conservative theory that posits government governs best at the county or local level and that meddling in the choices of those local citizens is Bad, but we all know that's a hill of beans. The best and most righteous level of government is whatever level of government conservatives happens to be in charge of, and the worst and most overreach-y level of government is any government entity a conservative is not in charge of, and that's why Texas cities banning fracking within their own city limits—seemingly a perfect example of local residents deciding what is best for their own communities—is instead an abomination.
More than half of all Texans now live in 10 large urban counties that are growing much faster than the state as a whole. Their voters tend to be more liberal than other Texans, a trend that's accelerating [...]. According to a 2012 analysis by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News, 70 percent of Democratic gains in Texas since 2000 have come from the four counties that encompass Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin.
And we can't have that, obviously.
"My vision," Abbot said, "is one where individual liberties are not bound by city limit signs."
You have to burn down individual liberties to save them, you see. Or perhaps Texas will secede from its own cities.
I think we're all eager to see what Greg Abbott's new plans for Texas are. Texas has been getting a bit of a reputation of late for putting dullards at the governor's desk, and I suspect even most Texas Republicans would concede that Abbott is a considerable step down from the statesmanlike intellectual heft of a (cough) Rick Three-Things Perry or a George Dubya Bush. So that'll be interesting.