It's never good when Texas makes the national news

Yet another example, from the syndicated News of the Weird column:

Leadership in America
According to an Associated Press report, Texas House Speaker Tom Craddick told a middle-school class he was visiting in April that the U.S. Congress is different from the Texas legislature, in that in Washington there are "454" members on the House side and "60" in the Senate. (The real numbers are 435 and 100.) And the Kansas City Star, reporting in May on a Missouri legislative debate on the Confederate flag, quoted Rep. Jim Avery as stating that the 1803 Louisiana Purchase involved a fight with France over the territory: "Well, we fought over it. We fought over it, right? You don't think there were any lives lost in that? It was a friendly thing?" (It appears well-settled in history that the Louisiana Purchase was just a land deal.)