Molly Ivins -- Cool heads Are Hard To Find These Days

Gov. Goodhair Perry, who keeps saying he wants more civility and bipartisanship, denounced the AWOL solons as "cowardly," childish" and "irresponsible."

It was a bad day for bipartisanship.

Everyone mourned the death of legislative civility while colorfully cursing the other side.

What with one thing and another, it's hard to embarrass Texas. (The price of gasoline has gotten so high that women who want to run over their husbands have to car-pool now.) But it is kind of embarrassing to have a government that decides to cover a $10 billion deficit by taking services away from the poorest, weakest, frailest, oldest and youngest Texans.

Perry asked neighboring governors to arrest the perps on sight. The attorney general of New Mexico obligingly put out an all-points bulletin on any politicians who favor health care and oppose tax cuts for the rich.

Many years ago, when Delwin Jones was redistricting chairman, an aggrieved member addressed him: "Dell-win, lookahere what you have done to mah district. It's got a great big ball on the one end, then it runs in a little bitty strip for 300 miles, then there's a great big ball at the other end. Damn thing looks like a pair of dumbbells. Now, the courts say the districts have to be com-pact and con-tiguous. Is this yer idea of com-pact and con-tiguous?"

Delwin pondered deeply before replying: "Whaell, in a artistic sense, it is."