Ag Commissioner Sid Miller tells Panahndle wildfire volunteer to "go jump in the lake"
Earlier this year, Ag Commish Sid Miller lambasted Rep Glenn Rogers for a text message challenging Miller and telling him to “kiss my ass.” Two elected officials sparring with each other is comical and made for days of fodder on Twitter and amongst capitol insiders in Austin.
But when Sid Miller tells a Texas Panhandle wildfire volunteer he is “ignorant” and “ungrateful” and tells him “to go jump in the lake,” it crosses a line. If elected officials want to jar at each other, that’s one thing, but for a sitting elected official to attack a Pastor of a small church in one of the communities hit hardest by the wildfires that’s a whole other thing.
Reece Watson, the Pastor of Fairlaines Baptist Church in Fritch, Texas, took Miller’s criticism and turned it into a fundraising opportunity. Watson posted a video on YouTube where he did jump in the lake and challenged Miller to donate $500 to help him purchase and bring in a load of livestock feed.
Miller said Watson told him to “go jump in the lake” after he asked Miller some very basic questions about his contributions to the wildfire efforts in Texas Wildfire Updates and Resources. Miller has since deleted this post, but Watson and others have posted copies of the exchange.
A Texas House wildfire investigation committee will meet in Pampa this week. One of the topics for discussion will be the state’s response to the devastating fires in Hutchison, Gray, Roberts, and Hemphill Counties. These resilient communities have stepped up to meet their needs with the support of organizations and individuals from multiple states and from around Texas. But there has certainly been a local conversation about whether the state’s response has been adequate, including the Governor’s admission that more could have been done in terms of fire support at the onset of the fires and by local leaders who are struggling with accessing necessary resources because of the slow pace and bureaucratic nature of government.
The Texas Panhandle is a place where we rarely look to the government to solve our problems. We are not strangers to extreme weather and harsh conditions. Our heritage is all about resilience and survival. We contribute food, fuel, and fiber in a big way to the state’s overall economy, and we get exponentially less back on state resources.
While Miller is clearly an entitled politician, not a public servant, and he doesn’t likely represent the attitudes of all our statewide elected officials, his attitude does speak to a broader conversation to be had, which is how to ensure the Panhandle and the rest of Rural Texas keep our seats at the table and continue to have the necessary resources to protect our communities and our land.