Tim Dunn: The West Texas Billionaire Trying to Turn Texas into a Christian Theocracy

[Goredho 17349]

I’m kinda ready for the rapture so people like this go away and those of us left behind can get to fixing this mortal coil.

Edited February 16 by Goredho

[TwiceHorn 31285]

6 minutes ago, Goredho said:

I’m kinda ready for the rapture so those of us left behind can get to fixing this mortal coil.

Should such thing as a Rapture come to pass, I am fairly certain that the Tim Dunns of the world will be left behind.

[Judge Roybeanbag 11810]

3 hours ago, Anastasis said:

Holy shit. Tito is a billionaire?

Yeah, a drunk one!  

[Goredho 17349]

4 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

Should such thing as a Rapture come to pass, I am fairly certain that the Tim Dunns of the world will be left behind.

You say that like someone who read every word of the original post.

[C-Man 27058]

 

Thanks for posting this. I was going to do the same. Ed Lavandera is a friend of mine and a Texas Ex. This is 100% worth your time.

[pacman 7330]

[Samson's Wig 3181]

16 hours ago, Horn Under a Bad Sign said:

Well, it says everything, don't you think?  If you invent something that you think is cool and will help people in your situation and it explodes/goes viral and this beautiful thing that you thought you were creating is used by others in ways that you don't support and had no way of foreseeing, that's not your fault and it says nothing about your motives, your goal when you set out etc ...  You might as well blame Tim Berners-Lee for Air BnB.  By inventing the World Wide Web, he set in motion the invention of Air BnB.  Never mind that it wasn't his intent to do so.  The Law of Unintended Consequences says that actions of people, and especially of governments, always have effects that are unanticipated. It is inviolate. 

The context (my original comment which you responded to) was about the outcome, so no, his original intentions have nothing at all to do with what I wrote.  If your point is that he might be a decent guy and a counter to Dunn's sorry ass, then sure his intentions might matter, but that's not what I ws commenting on.  Gebbia ran the company up until a year or so ago, so mentioning others misusing his ideas or the ridiculous stretch of bringing Berners-Lee into this are out of left field.   The results of Gebbia's actions were very much intentional and he has fought tooth and nail to fight back against any municipality trying to correct, or even balance out, the impact of his very intentional decisions while growing that monster of a company.  You may as well defend tobacco companies because they were just trying to make people happy and feel good and therefore the unintended consequence of causing cancer isn't their fault.

Besides, rarely is anything 100% wholly good/bad.  The very same Air BnB that you blame (in an incredible oversimplification, by the way) for making housing unaffordable is also responsible, in the cases of two elderly people I know in Marfa, for making it so that they are able to stay in their homes when they certainly would have been forced to leave after the Great Recession of 2008-2009. It has been a lifesaver for them, enabling them to not only pay their property taxes each year but to stash away extra cash in the case of an emergency --- an emergency that, in one of their cases, has arrived. Air BnB has also made it so that houses in my neighborhood which were in the process of falling down or even uninhabitable have been bought, refurbished, and tended --- thus raising the value of all the houses in the neighborhood, including mine.  Of course nothing is 100% good or bad.  Short term rentals work in some areas but on the whole are a big part of destroying the middle class' accessiblity to home ownership or even affordable rent.  I'm glad it has worked in your use-case but it doesn't change the reality of inreased institutional investing in residential properites and the terrible impact that has on real human beings.   To bring it back to tobacco, nicotine is an amazing drug that improves focus and energy and suppresses appetite, but it might kill you and those around you.  Not everything is 100% good/bad indeed.

Finally, I never said anything about him being commendable. I said that, given the track record of causes he financially supports, he would be a good candidate to consider when exploring options to mitigate the impact of Tim Dunn, the subject of this thread.  Maybe he'd do it because he feels bad the unintended impact of Air BnB. Who cares?  Anyone who can counteract Dunn is a good thing.  Dunn can lick a cow's taint and die from the resulting bacterial infection as far as I'm concerned.  Gebbia is not likely to be the one to lead this charge given his connections and business interests, despite where he has donated money.  This was the point of my original response.  Like Musk, Gebbia benefits greatly from the folks who control this state, and many of them are in bed with Dunn.  What do you think stops municipalities from banning or limiting access to short term rentals?  Do you really think Gebbia will actively work against them?  This is the point.

 

[atomheartbevo 89450]

8 hours ago, pacman said:

@YGIFS Upper right, the Defend Texas Liberty PAC, you can see where Dunn broke Abbott.

[Francisco 2.0 32342]

I'm assuming Mr. Dunn and this is linked:

 

 

 

 

Edited February 17 by Francisco 2.0

[Samson's Wig 3181]

They may as well ask the question the right way:  "Do you want your kids to be molested by a religious leader while they're at school, or would you prefer we give parents the choice to have their kids molested by a religious leader at church on the weekends?"   It's all about parents making the decisions for what's best for their kids, right?

[formermav43 4599]

2 hours ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

I'm assuming Mr. Dunn and this is linked:

 

 

 

 

I work part-time as a hospice chaplain.

I would in no way be qualified to work as a school counselor. Dealing with grief and loss is not at all comparable to the comprehensive mental health and child development training necessary for that role. It’s nuts.

[mchookem 16225]

wait...i thought there were two west Texas billionaires steering Texas into the right-wing theocratic abyss?? 🤔

[atomheartbevo 89450]

1 hour ago, mchookem said:

wait...i thought there were two west Texas billionaires steering Texas into the right-wing theocratic abyss?? 🤔

Dunn appears to be more enthusiastic and organized.   Brooks, not so much.