GOOD DEED OF THE DAY

Continuing my reminder this week, Father's Day is this weekend and you should reach out to loved ones if you can and if you can't then reach out to those people around you, they'll be there for you if you tell them you need them. We've all been there. #NerdsUnite

THIS IS FOR REPRESENTATIVE VERONICA ESCOBAR

So yesterday I wrote about Jon Stewart's incredible speech on Capitol Hill to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties where only 5 members of the 14 member committee were present for his words. He was assured it wasn't intended as disrespect. Here's what I wrote about it…

"Jon Stewart's moment on Capitol Hill yesterday was beautiful and amazing and no one in congress saw it. Five of the 14 members of the House Judiciary subcommittee were there for the speech, the rest couldn't be bothered to listen to him speak up on behalf of 9/11 first responders. 9/11, remember "Never Forget", remember how patriotic everyone got? Remember how everyone hugs flags and respects soldiers and everything we all do is patriotic? How dare that quarterback take a knee! This is service, this is patriotism, there was no lower moment in recent American history and yet only 5 of the 14 members of the House Judiciary Subcommittee saw fit to be there today for the first responders. FIVE. That's a shame, Houston's Sheila Jackson Lee was one of the members who skipped as well as Veronica Escobar, Sylvia Garcia and Louie Gohmert all while representing Texas, that's a shame."

I received an e-mail about the blog, as I do a few times a week (it's why the e-mail address is in there, I like e-mails), from Elizabeth Lopez-Sandoval who said she's the Communications and Special Projects Director for Representative Veronica Escobar, this is the e-mail…

"Good morning Cory – Elizabeth from the office of Congresswoman Veronica Escobar here. Reaching out because you stated in your piece that Congresswoman Escobar was not present during yesterday House Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund Act.

Congresswoman Escobar was present during the first panel of the hearing and she is a proud co-sponsor of H.R. 1327, the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund Act.

Can you please correct your piece?

Thank you,

Elizabeth

--

Elizabeth Lopez-Sandoval

Communications and Special Projects Director

Office of Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (TX-16)

1505 Longworth House Office Building
Phone: (202) 225-4831
elizabeth.lopez-sandoval@mail.house.gov
www.escobar.house.gov"

So now that I feel like I've been fair, let me be annoyed. I was only talking about the panel in which Jon Stewart was speaking but that's fine. Rep. Escobar attended the first panel, saw that the First Responders were scheduled to speak later and decided to spend her time somewhere else. Is that a better distinction? Does that sound better? I don't think so, but there, it's corrected. Also as far as co-sponsoring the bill goes, there are 313 co-sponsors of the bill and she wasn't even part of the original 92 who co-sponsored it when it was introduced, she wasn't even the first Representative from Texas to jump on the bandwagon.

On an aside, who are the 122 other members of the House who didn't jump on that bandwagon? I don't know if I like them more or less for that, but it's bold none the less. Anyway after Jon Stewart's amazing speech, the media made the House look foolish all day Tuesday so yesterday the House Judiciary Committee unanimously voted to send the bill to The House for a vote. If I remember my schoolhouse rock song "I'm just a bill" that means it needs a vote there and then if it passes, it would need to be voted on by the Senate and then signed by a certain President from NYC. Way to finally get the ball rolling guys, before anyone gets too excited, they should know this same bill existed last year in congress and never made it out of the House of Representatives, so let's not be too congratulatory of anyone.

BIG PLANS FOR THIS WEEKEND?

House of Blues has something pretty cool going on this Saturday, Local Brews and Local Grooves. It starts at 3pm and will feature 20 local craft breweries, 40 beers and 16 local bands and DJs. There's food as well, they sell a $10 admission package, a $25 admission package that comes with a wristband good for 5 samples of beer, food or sodas and a $35 package that comes with two wristbands. There's a crazy list of bands and breweries on the HOB's page which is linked: here.

ROLL THAT D20!

This Saturday is also FREE RPG Day, so swing by your local nerd store and see what they have going on. There's plenty of fun games to get into and all kinds of stores are doing all kinds of events, I know The Adventure Begins up in Conroe (proud sponsors of Nerd Thug Radio) have a whole day of events planned and I bet everyone else does too. So if you've ever been curious about RPGs or D&D or anything else, this is the day to try it out.

NOT THAT YOU ASKED

So I'm going out on a limb here by running this blog today and I know that. I want to be clear about something as this happens though, while I am worried that maybe Sportsmap will fire me and cancel my work with them (which would really suck, I like it here guys, honestly) I feel like it's my job to say this. I'm not a journalist but I realize though that it's important to be accurate when speaking to the public and it's something I try to do every time I get in front of a microphone for my shows or when I write for here or for cyberpunks.com or anywhere else. We live in an era right now where everyone is trying to spin stuff and that isn't my intention and if there's ever someone who deserves our respect it's the people who lay it out for us on a daily basis to help make society better. That being said, I have spoken out about issues before in this blog and in other places when I think people overstep boundaries. I think the spokesperson for the Houston Police Officer's Union Joe Gamaldi regularly stirs the pot and hurts more than he helps (something I've said privately to my friends who are officers who then strongly disagree with me, and that's ok too). Overall I think it's important to be honest and fair and kind to people, but I didn't appreciate the unnecessary correction from Rep. Escobar's office yesterday because I think what she missed was really important and deserved her time, especially if she's representing Texans and I think her stating how proudly she co-sponsored this bill in particular was intended to sound like she's above criticism on this matter.

Also, if they do fire me then could some people buy some shirts from me? Or remember I'm a freelance writer for hire?