They don’t get much crazier than this: meet Texas’s new Lieutenant Governor:
Texas produces a reliable crop of loons in state government, but this one is especially bizarre. It’s Republican Dan Patrick, who was elected November 4 and recently took office. If, God forbid, something happens to governor Gregg Abbott (another conservative Republican), Patrick will be in charge of Texas. That’s a scary thought.
Even Texas Monthly calls this guy “The Worst,” characterizing him like this:
There are few types of lawmakers less helpful to the legislative process than bullies and ideologues. Unfortunately, Dan Patrick too often seemed to be both in his first session as the chair of the Senate Education Committee.
But Patrick’s full-on Cunkery is revealed in a piece from last October’s Mother Jones: “The man who believes God speaks to us through ‘Duck Dynasty’ is about to be Texas’s second-in-command.” The piece first notes this: “Texas’ lieutenant governor is sometimes called the “most powerful office in Texas” because of the influence it has on both the legislative and executive branches.”
Then a few lovely notes from Mother Jones (my emphasis):
As a Texas state senator, Dan Patrick has conducted himself in a manner consistent with the shock jock he once was. Patrick—who is now the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor—has railed against everything from separation of church and state to Mexican coyotes who supposedly speak Urdu. He’s even advised his followers that God is speaking to them through Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson.
. . . In 2006, he parlayed his radio fame into a state Senate seat—and kept the talk show going. In office, he proposed paying women $500 to turn over newborn babies to the state (to reduce abortions), led the charge against creeping liberalism in state textbooks, and pushed wave after wave of new abortion restrictions. For his efforts, Texas Monthly named Patrick one of the worst legislators of 2013.
Here’s his stand on a few Important Issues:
On the border: “While ISIS terrorists threaten to cross our border and kill Americans, my opponent falsely attacks me to hide her failed record on illegal immigration,” he says in his first general-election campaign. Patrick’s website, meanwhile, warns that Pakistanis are crossing the border as well, presumably to do bad things to Americans. “This is an Urdu dictionary found by border volunteers that was dropped by a human smuggler,” Patrick writes beneath a photo of an Urdu-English dictionary. “It is concerning that Mexican coyotes are learning Urdu in order to smuggle illegal immigrants?”
On migrants: “They are bringing Third World diseases with them,” he said in 2006, warning that immigrants could bring leprosy and polio to Texas.
On his first book, actually titled The Second Most Important Book You Will Ever Read: “As the author, I am obviously biased,” Patrick wrote in an Amazon review of his own book. But “since God inspired me to write this book,” he added, “He automatically gets 5 stars and the CREDIT!’”
On creationism: “Our students…must really be confused,” Patrick said at a GOP primary debate last spring. “They go to Sunday School on Sunday and then they go into school on Monday and we tell them they can’t talk about God. I’m sick and tired of a minority in our country who want us to turn our back on God.”
On the separation of church and state: “There is no such thing as separation of church and state.”
And this bit makes him sound like Prince Phillip:
On Connie Chung’s TV show, Eye to Eye: Patrick quipped in 1992 that the Asian American journalist’s show should be called “Slanted Eye to Eye.” Although Patrick’s remarks sparked a local media firestorm, he did not change his ways. In 1999, a Houston Press profile noted that “Patrick lapsed into a faux-Chinese accent when he thought he heard a network correspondent call Clinton, in the midst of the Chinese-espionage scandal, ‘President Crinton,’” and later joked that Clinton should get surgery to “make his eyes slanted.”
An amateur painter, Patrick produced this portrait of the Statue of Liberty with the face of Jesus:
Given his stand on women’s issues and immigration, I was astonished to read this on Patrick’s official website (my emphasis):
Dan Patrick was elected Lt Governor of Texas in 2014, winning the general election by almost twenty points, including historic levels of support from Hispanic voters and women.
I apologize on behalf of my country.