Posted 3/10/2005 05:31:00 PM by Douglas

After wasting so much of the State's time, it looks like the 79th legislature is finally getting down to some real business that affects Texas. Cupcakes.

Amid tense education funding debate, Texas House members paused Wednesday to take up a matter dear to school kids everywhere: cupcakes.

Legislators in a unanimous recorded vote cleared the way for public school students to bring the sweet treats - complete with candy sprinkles - to celebrate their birthdays.

With sprinkles? A cupcake bill is one thing, but I would have thought a sprinkle bill would have had to have been totally separate. . . .

In August, soon after setting the new rules, Combs issued a "cupcake clarification" stating that cakes and cupcakes could be brought to school for birthdays. The agriculture department did, however, recommend that birthday parties be scheduled after the last lunch period.

Look, you morons, if you're counting on the state legislature to keep your kid from becoming a lardass, that means you also depend on the sign in the bathroom that says "Employees must wash hands before returning to work" from keeping urine out of your salad. It just doesn't work that way. Yet, they continue.

"As a UT grad, I am, of course, very devoted to burnt orange sprinkles," Combs added.

Lawmakers made plenty of jokes, too.

"If we vote for this, can we all call you 'Cupcake?' " Republican Rep. Peggy Hamric, R-Houston, asked Dunnam.

"As long as I can call you 'Sugar Plum,' " Dunnam replied.

House Speaker Tom Craddick joined in the chatter and cast a rare vote.

"There being 148 ayes, zero nays, the cupcake amendment is adopted," Craddick declared.

I once read that a state legislator in Texas can qualify for welfare with their paltry state salary. Now I realize, they are grossly overpaid.