NY Review September 29, 2011
Republican Days of Wrath
Michael Tomasky
The national press has largely pigeonholed Perry into the “Tea
Party” category, a designation that is certainly not without
merit. It was, for example, outside a Tea Party rally in April
2009 that Perry made his remark about the possibility of Texas
seceding1:
Texas is a unique place. When we came into the union in 1845,
one of the issues was that we would be able to leave if we decided
to do that. You know, my hope is that America and Washington in
particular pays attention. We’ve got a great union. There’s
absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues
to thumb their nose at the American people, who knows what may
come out of that?
Yet calling Perry only a Tea Party candidate is misleading. He is
also a candidate of the Republican establishment—the senior party
members who raise millions of dollars and influence the party’s
priorities—because that establishment today is itself quite
right-wing. It is based chiefly not on Wall Street anymore but in
Texas (and in Wichita, Kansas, where Koch Industries is located).
The “tiny splinter group” of “a few Texas oil millionaires” whom
Dwight Eisenhower famously disparaged in 1954 now is arguably the
most powerful tendency within the party. The state’s rich
Republicans have been the chief backers of everything from George
W. Bush’s campaigns to attacks on Democrats like the Swift Boat
ads used against John Kerry in 2004.
---
NY Times July 20, 2011
Child’s Play, Grown-Up Cash
By KATE MURPHY
APART from the open bar by the swimming pool, the main attraction
at parties held at the Houston home of John Schiller, an oil
company executive, and his wife, Kristi, a Playboy model turned
blogger, is the $50,000 playhouse the couple had custom-built two
years ago for their daughter, Sinclair, now 4.
Cocktails in hand, guests duck to enter through the 4 ½-foot door.
Once inside, they could be forgiven for feeling as if they’ve
fallen down the rabbit hole.
Built in the same Cape Cod style as the Schillers’ expansive main
house, the two-story 170-square-foot playhouse has vaulted
ceilings that rise from five to eight feet tall, furnishings
scaled down to two-thirds of normal size, hardwood floors and a
faux fireplace with a fanciful mosaic mantel.
The little stainless-steel sink in the kitchen has running water,
and the matching stainless-steel mini fridge and freezer are
stocked with juice boxes and Popsicles. Upstairs is a sitting area
with a child-size sofa and chairs for watching DVDs on the 32-inch
flat-screen TV. The windows, which all open, have screens to keep
out mosquitoes, and there are begonias in the window boxes. And,
of course, the playhouse is air-conditioned. This is Texas, after all.
“I think of it as bling for the yard,” said Ms. Schiller, 40.
(clip)
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