As a socialist libertarian who voted for Obama and as an ex-southerner, I'm sick to death of seeing those in the south characterized by idiotic, knee-jerk liberals as crazed cretins who understand little more than inter-breeding with cousin Suella. What a bunch of idiots.

Gods, I'm fed up with you.

Those children desperately need protection and stability and to be away from the madness. My own father once faced a similar decision, and I can tell you without any doubt whatsoever, it would have been far better for my siblings and myself had we been removed from the home of our schizophrenic mother. Instead, we lived in incredible fear and chaos for both our mother and ourselves.

I realize that I'm writing from the gut out of the distant past where medications were less helpful and therapies were non-existent for mental illnesses this severe, however, I write from experience. Hell, I made peace with my parents long ago and love my mother dearly.

But the shit I grew up in is no place for a child. It's sad, but it's necessary to get those kids away from the environment living with their mother creates.

I had a neighbor like your father when I was a kid. The whole neighborhood knew there was one lawn you could not step on. That guy had the *best* lawn. Everyone knew that too :)

I loved this piece. Thanks :)

Credentials: 38 years a Texan, born and raised there.

1--Secession talk is nothing new, and it's not fringe. All the way back in the 80's when the conservative holy man Reagan was in office, I attended parties (numerous) where non-fringe folks discussed at length desire to secede from the United States. Their reasons were pretty much what the current reasons stated are.

2--The rudeness,idiocy, and stereotyping in this thread reminds me of what happened on a camping trip I put together two years ago. The invitees consisted of some mid-western folks, some Pac-Westerners, and some family from back home--Texas. Said family is about as liberal as they come, did not vote for George Bush, and in fact don't live in Austin. Upon introduction, they were treated to three of the other party members' at length opinions of "Texans," accompanied by mockery similar to what a lot of folks here just displayed. I'll never forget what my son did. He stood up and said, "Welp, we may be from Texas, but I can tell you that I don't know a single soul from Texas that would have ever acted like you folks just did." The entire Texas group then walked away. Wow, what a lovely party that turned out to be.

3--When I moved to the Pac-West, I was hoping for a bit of an escape from the pervasive, knee-jerk GOP support one sometimes encounters in Texas. Living in Seattle, however, the inverse is true. Obama, the holy liberal, is embraced with all the lack of thought that Bush was down south. It's pretty discouraging. People seem thoughtless and biased no matter where ya go.

This is pretty simple. If the American people have to sacrifice money out of their pockets to help the auto workers (cause I don't give a rat's ass frankly about American automobiles, nor the executives of those companies who have managed them poorly), then I expect the auto workers to LIKEFUCKINGWISE sacrifice out of their pockets. In gratitude. Hell, they shouldn't even have to be asked. This economic problem is horrible for everyone--not just auto workers! And bailing out the companies isn't free, people. We have to pay for it.

And those of you who keep saying that 2 bucks an hour is so little, I wish you'd take a calculator to your assumptions. Either that or turn this around and apply that logic to the intransigence of the auto workers. If it's so fucking little, they won't miss it a damn bit. And it might go a long way towards making someone such as myself who's normally pretty generous towards her fellow human beings feel a little more "richly connected" to what I do regard as our mutual plight.

Oh, and I'm just tickled pink to keep people in houses, too, when I don't own one myself. When did people in this country start feeling entitled to a certain standard of living divorced from the choices they make about what kind of life they want for themselves? That woman with five kids?!! She chose to have them didn't she?! Does that make her noble or something.

Damn, give me a break here.