****WARNING - Blog navel-gazing ahead - WARNING****
In the 11 plus years that I've been blogging on various platforms, from way, way back in the live-journal days through Isolated Desolation, Lose an Eye, It's a Sport, Harris County Almanac, Your Drink Order Please and other, forgotten, blogs, I've almost always kept my focus trained on Houston and the surrounding region.
I've never been one to do National, until recently, and the vision for this blog was never for it to be a "national blog" that discussed national, or international, events. Part of the reason for this is because I only paid passing attention to those issues, and part was because I felt there were people out there doing a better job of it than I.
Granted, there were people doing the Houston Region better than I so I'm not sure why I used that as an excuse, but a large part of me enjoyed writing about my home because I really thought this was where change could, and should, be enacted. All politics is local and all of that.
So off I went on a merry crusade against New Urbanism, the Houston Way, bad politicians and possibly the worst local news environment in any big city in America. From the middling, regional daily to television news that often devolved into comedy, Houston always lacked the ability to report on itself in a critical manner.
The results?
As I said several months ago, I lost. I lost so bad the ground of my ideas were salted and refuse dumped on it. The idea that Houston should grow forward instead of backward was rejected by the only two factions that mattered. The New Urbanists, who have convinced anyone that matters in Houston that the solution forward are the failed 19th century urban policies of the past, and City Hall, which is a devolving mess of petty politicians appointing Houston Way proponents who view taxpayer dollars as their own personal slush-funds to bestow on their friends in return for trinkets which, they hope, will secure their "legacy".
Then, the unthinkable happened. The Houston Chronicle placed one of their editors as the judging panel chairman for 'commentary' and finally was in a position to gift itself its first Pulitzer Prize. In some small way, this column (through it's extensive use of "I" and "me") is an homage to the writing style of the gifted one. Predictably, this award didn't help things.
Post-Pulitzer the news is much worse, if that's possible, and the media shut-out any and all criticism in place of advocacy reporting while all but abandoning their role as watchdog. Because of this, news of the City of Houston debt problem being away bigger than anyone first imagined was suppressed until after the election of a life-long politician who, early results are indicating, is entirely unprepared for the job.
Then today, something that's been bugging me for a long time snapped. News that Houston area drivers were moving barrels and cones to access the as-yet unopened Grand Parkway (ignoring the safety of workers and others) reaffirmed my anecdotal evidence that suggested Houston was a selfish, ugly town that's getting exactly the governance it deserves.
So after all of these years I'm changing scope. I'm going to focus my gaze upward and take one what I think is a much bigger issue than Sylvester Turner trying to get people to love their way to potholes being fixed. I'm leaving Houston to the nitwits of the unproductive class as they try and craft a Houtopia that's only going to suppress economic activity, and drive people to the suburbs faster. I'm leaving the Houston Chronicle to itself as it continues to go after Houston's biggest, and most important industry, in the hope that it can aid in recreating Houston as the Boston of the South a city where the wealthy and connected thrive to the detriment of everyone else, where the pretty people are happy and gay, while the great unwashed are asked to please hide during big-ticket events. Houston will end up bankrupt and crumbling on its own, content to read the inane ramblings of sixth-generation Texans and the great block quote machine without having to be distracted by me.
One of the reasons for this is that I'm tired of Houston, but the other reason is that I feel the bigger problem of the future of the State and National conservative movement is of greater import. Should Houston collapse there are other cities (and States) in which to live, if America goes down the options will become pretty slim.
And that's a problem.
So in parting I want to say goodbye to a city that I've written about for over a decade. Despite yourself I've watched businesses thrive inside your borders and, recently, begin to flow out of them for the safety of the suburbs. I've watched Metro spend Billions trying to copy other cities, I've laughed at your parklets and your small-town attitude. For the foreseeable future I'll still call Houston my home, but I will no longer care what you decide to do with yourself.
It's not me Houston, It really is you.
