Spent a long and interesting day at the Texas legislature. Bigots in the Leg have piled on to the Red State Hate Wagon and are preparing to pass a law to prohibit treating trans kids and making any doctor who did a felon. My wife and I simply had to be there to protest.

Now I'm an old fart of 73, and in all that time I have met exactly three trans people in the flesh, everything else I've done has been by mail or Internet. There were about fifty people gathered, well organized and led. There was a strong emphasis on safety and not confronting the red-shirted wackos there to "Save Texas Kids" by denying them appropriate medical care. (I do have to wonder if any of those geniuses had ever watched Star Trek.) Only ran into one meatball from Infowars screaming about castrating kids and virulently anti-vax.

Surprisingly, there were exactly four of us old farts in the group and almost all the rest were in their twenties or younger. We sang songs (none of which I knew) spent some time in the visitor's gallery and tried to make our presence obvious but non-confrontational. Apparently they forcibly cleared the gallery a couple of days ago - oddly enough only the trans advocates were arrested. There were dozens of armed cops, several with AR-15 type weapons. I felt so damn safe there with military weapons - NOT.

The vote was supposed to be about 11 AM, but it was close to three when it started. I am proud of the many members who fought tooth and nail with every procedural weapon possible. We finally had to leave (the dog had been waiting far too long) when another point-of-order was called pointing out the legislative summery was a complete fabrication when compared to the actual bill. (True) The day was complete proof of the old saw about sausage and law.

I have little doubt the bill will pass, the bigots have unbeatable majorities. Still, we can only keep trying.