She needs to be told, "Nooooo, you're not the fairest of them all, Norma."

And another one of our reps in Austin remains, alas, a rogue grouch.

So today is a tale of two long-time El Paso state reps:

In January, Norma Chávez and Joe Pickett lumbered off to the State Legislature ... and have done everything to confuse us.

Norma is scuttling another El Pasoan's bills. And Pickett is still saving us from TxDOT, his Lex Luthor.

But we're to understand it's all because they know what's best for us.

Chávez has been picking at El Paso teammate Marisa Marquez' bills when not attending classes at the University of Texas. What's that all about, Norma?

One of those bills is to get some ethics clout in county government. The other is a by-law adjustment for the Thomason Hospital Board of Managers.

Hey Norma! What the?

Why would she use her sway to hold those up ... to the point they might not reach the House for a vote?

What happened to Chávez' No. 1 priority for many years now, blowing the dust off Speaking Rock Casino's poker and blackjack tables?

And Pickett? He may have highways and biways and other infrastructure stuff figured out correctly. But nobody seems to know how he got it right, or if it's right. Pickett, it seems, dwells under a little black cloud of huff and gruff.

Pickett wants to slay the Texas Department of Transportation, which favors tolls as a way to fund new roads.

The other side of that, led by El Paso state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh and El Paso Mayor John Cook, contend that if Pickett doesn't pipe down it'll be 20 years before we get to send the semis around town, instead of through it.

It's touchy, all right, but it's just that Pickett can explain all this to himself, but nobody else seems to know what he's really up to. Last week he stuck a measure on a transportation bill that nobody in El Paso knew about ... until he stuck it there.

Chávez has been basically stalling El Paso-filed bills that relate only to El Paso.

She, and Pickett for a time, held up Marquez' bill seeking establishment of real ethics standards for county employees.

They didn't like some wooooording. So it sat, and then it sat some more in Chávez' Calendars Committee -- and she didn't ask the chairman to let it out until it looked too late to ever get to a House vote. The Senate passed it weeks ago.

She'll say she tried but, alas, time ran out. Sure.

And she's also said to be sitting on a Marquez bill for some by-law changes of the Thomason Hospital Board of Managers.

What's Chávez got to do with county ethics? And is she poking at the Thomason bill because Thomason is in her district and Marquez had the audacity to file a bill concerning something in HER district?

It's obvious that Chávez is doing favors for one side in our split-faction county government. On many issues there are County Attorney José Rodriguez and commissioners Commissioners Veronica Escobar and Anna Perez on one side. There's County Judge Anthony Cobos on the other.

The three worked with Rep. Marquez to get the ethics standards strengthened. No one else at the county has spoken in favor.

Ohhhh, the others weren't against the ethics thing, they'll say, they just had questions about the woooording.

El Paso to Chávez and Pickett ... El Paso to Chávez and Pickett. Yoo hoo, we're over here.