[Erasmus]

For years and years, the powers-that-be in Austin harassed its citizens about the in-town airport (Robert Mueller--not the FBI guy though). They needed to move it to some outlying location where they could rebuild it much larger. Over the period of a decade or more, they kept putting it on a referendum until it passed.

The favored site was in the sleepy burg of Manor, quite some distance from the center of town.

Various officials and their sycophants loaded up on private real estate around the proposed site before it was announced. (What better might one expect from an incorrigible city administration?)

Well, the Air Force came to the rescue, in a way. Despite the efforts of long-time Congressman J. J. ("Jake") Pickle, the base closing commission put Bergstrom AFB on the list. (I always call it Burpelson AFB, being convinced that it was the prototype for the base in Dr. Strangelove.)

The Burpelson site was leased from the City for $1 upon the establishment of the base in 1941. The lease stipulated that the site and all of its improvements would revert to the City if ever decommissioned as an AFB.

So the City finally then gave up on the Manor site, dispossessing all the crooks who tried to make a killing on it. They then spent a carload of money converting the AFB into a pretty nice airport: Austin Burpelson--oops, I mean Bergstrom--International Airport.

[Terry Mross]

I know about the airport. I was talking about MOPAC and Ann Richards.

Politicians from both parties have been pulling that crap since forever. They find out the government is going to build a lake so they go into a “partnership” with some money people and buy up the land. They then get to sell the “lake” land to the government PLUS they get the lakefront properties. Talk about insider trading. It goes on at all levels of government.