Personal note to George W. Bush: Wasn't that a great graduation ceremony
last Thursday night? I know you are terribly proud of your daughters,
Barbara and Jenna.
You probably remember Kristy Reyna -- she was the only one of the 400
Austin High graduates who was in a wheelchair. Kristy was the young woman
with the million-dollar smile -- always reminds me of Magic Johnson's. That
smile and the big thumbs up as she rolled across the stage lit up the whole
Erwin Center. I think she got a bigger hand than your daughters. It was a
lot harder for her. The entire Reyna clan was there, on their feet, cheering
madly.
Kristy was born 21 years ago with spina bifida and has been through 10
operations to correct some of the effects of that birth defect. So it took
her a little longer to get through school. Her mother is Hope Reyna, single
mother of five, who supports her children by working as a housekeeper.
(Let's hear it for Big Rudy, who kept up the child support and who was there
to see their second-oldest child graduate.)
For many years, every year on Kristy's birthday, Hope got on the Greyhound
bus and rode six hours down to San Juan to pray at the shrine there for a
miracle for Kristy. Then she got back on the bus and rode six hours back to
Austin. I believe that miracle came last Thursday night, when Kristy
graduated high school.
Governor, I think you should know there is not one single thing you have
ever done in public office that has helped the Reyna family. If you've ever
wondered why I seem a little sour about your record, chalk it up to the
Reynas.
I know you've helped the oil industry, and the insurance industry, and the
funeral industry, and the herbal-diet industry, and the utility industry,
and all those air polluters with your new voluntary clean-up program -- all
those people who have given so generously to your campaigns. But everything
you have ever done that touched the life of the Reynas has made it harder
for them.
When Big Rudy wasn't working, the other kids had no health insurance.
Kristy got Medicaid and SSI from the federal government. (The Republicans in
Congress wanted the SSI taken away on the grounds that poor parents like
Hope might have coached their children into "faking disability." You should
come and see Kristy's "fake disability" some time.)
You wanted to keep 200,000 Texas children like the Reynas off the new
federal children's health insurance program, even though it would hardly
cost the state. But then, maybe you agree with your Health Commissioner Reyn
Archer that health insurance isn't important.
You tried to make it harder for poor moms like Hope to apply for Medicaid
for their kids. You got a tax cut for property owners, but Hope doesn't own
any property -- she pays the same regressive sales tax everyone else does,
but it eats a bigger proportion of her income. It's nice that the high-tech
industry you favor has made Austin boom, but it's also made it impossible
for people like Hope to buy a house and it has forced up rents.
And now, let's talk about something completely different. The New York
Times ran the saddest story last week, about the Guatemalan squatters who
are burning down the great rainforest in the Peten region in the north of
that country.
Illegal loggers cut down the great mahogany and cedar trees while
land-starved peasants torch what remains to clear the land for cornfields,
reports the Times. Of course, the jungle soil is so poor they produce only
two or three crops, then the squatters have to move on and burn more
rainforest. All this is taking place in a national park, but it is protected
only on paper.
The director of the Guatemalan Wildlife Conservation society said to the
Times: "How can Guatemala prioritize conservation in the face of
overwhelming pressure? When you're hungry for tomorrow, it's impossible to
think 20 years down the road."
So, what's our excuse? As they say in AA, denial is not just a river in
Egypt. Every year the reports on global warming get worse. Every year the
evidence accumulates. Every year the forecasts get grimmer. The insurance
industry, which can think 20 years down the road, knows what's coming. Even
some oil industry execs are starting to talk about it.
But our government is following the lead of such great thinkers as Jesse
Helms. The senator gets apoplectic at the thought of ratifying the Kyoto
Accords to cut greenhouse gases. What an indictment of our ability to
respond intelligently this is. And we have no excuse.
Molly Ivins is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. To find out
more about Molly Ivins and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers
and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.
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