On Saturday night, somebody climbed the walls around the 152-year old Texas Governor’s Mansion and set in on fire.
There is significant damage to this historic building — the Greek Revival house was the oldest continuously occupied executive residence west of the Mississippi River, and fourth oldest in the nation.
The Lincoln-Douglas debates occurred on the mansion’s 2nd birthday if you need a historical time-frame reference.
Thankfully, Governor Perry and his family weren’t home as the Mansion is currently in the middle of a renovation (ironically enough, part of that renovation included finally upgrading the old building with a sprinkler system).
Also fortunately, the mansion was completely empty because of the renovations — all historical paintings, artifacts, and furniture had been removed.
But that doesn’t minimize the loss to Texas history and culture.
And pride.
From the Statesman:
State fire officials were viewing hours of security video Sunday night as part of a massive investigation into who set a predawn fire at the Texas Governor’s Mansion that sent huge plumes of smoke through downtown and left the 152-year-old building with a partially collapsed roof, blackened windows and fire-charred white columns on its porch.
Authorities said that they were interviewing as many as a dozen possible witnesses and that a team of national experts from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives would arrive in Austin today to assist them.
“This is a huge, terrible loss,” said State Fire Marshal Paul Maldonado, who is leading the investigation. “We’re going to come get the person responsible for causing this damage.”
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I can’t believe for a moment that this wasn’t politically motivated — the current Governor, Rick Perry, is not a big favorite amongst Liberals. And his predecessor, President Bush — who lived in the Mansion from 1995-2000 — is slightly less popular.
It’s been a long time since a Democrat lived there. And the outlook for another Dem to occupy that old building anytime soon looks even bleaker.
And frankly, around the country, unhinged BDS-suffering Liberals have been stepping up their violence and destruction against Conservative and military property and institutions.
Now, take into consideration that the Democratic State Convention was in town over the weekend…
I’m just saying…if this was politically motivated (rather than the work of a serial arsonist) I’ll bet you dimes to nickels it wasn’t a Republican who did it.
Anyhow — I hope they catch whoever did this. And then I hope they set them on fire.
Just kidding. Sort of.
While I’m disappointed at the tragic loss of a historic building, I must say - Gov. Perry isn’t particularly popular with conservatives either. Hell, you’ve got landowners in this state ready to take up arms to fight for the land they’re losing to the Trans-Texas Corridor. Land that has been in their families since the time of the Alamo. You don’t have to be a liberal to be dissatisfied with the praetorian shenanigans of our Governor.
[Editor --- Good point, Jennifer, about a lot of conservatives being a big pissed at Gov. Perry, too.
I'm a big fan of Rick...more for the good and decent man that he is than for some of his politics.]
Left by Jennifer on June 9th, 2008 at 11:14 am