Some how, some way, Texas Longhorns head coach Mack Brown survived his imminent demise and is now holding the Texas football program hostage because of his ego, his stubbornness, his spitefulness, his pettiness, his vindictiveness, and because he's too delusional to have any conception of what's best for the program that he pulled out of the post-Darrel K Royal malaise.

And this isn't a time to say any of those nice, warm fuzzy things about the national championship or the streak of 10-win seasons or even what a nice person he is or his class or his integrity -- Mack Brown does not remain the head coach in Austin on Saturday because of any of those things.

He's still here because he lashed back against the reports of his resignation. He's still here because the decision-makers at the highest levels of Texas athletics, from president Bill Powers to mega booster Joe Jamail to whomever else calls the shots in this dysfunctional mess, have no better idea of what needs to be done than Brown. He's still here because of the worst parts of his character, many of which have contributed to the mess that is Mack Brown-Texas Football in late 2013.

The parts of his character that make him so concerned with what's being said about his program that he spends his time searching down those who leak information he doesn't want out instead of worrying about what's happening inside his own program. Pathetic.

It's a sad situation that tarnishes the legacy of all of the principals -- Jamail, one of the university's biggest benefactors and probably the greatest trial attorney of all time, and Powers, who has survived his battle with the Board of Regents to protect the best interests of the university's academic reputation and future, but has apparently taken advantage of his survival to blindly protect an old friend, the type of misplaced loyalty that has defined the last few years of a bloated athletic department nearly incapable of making the tough and necessary decisions.

Right now, Powers is an academician with a sterling record in that regard who is completely over his head making the most crucial sports-related decision of his tenure.

How many others were involved in at least temporarily saving Brown from his seemingly assured fate? It's extremely difficult to say at this time. At least they don't have their names on this to let it tarnish their own legacies.

As numerous putrid efforts in recent years vie for the worst losses of the Mack Brown era, none can come as close to the possibility that Brown could return for a lame-duck season that may not even feature many of his current assistant coaches, a situation that would further crater the program with no chance of Brown being able to find adequate replacements with zero job security.

This is the time for new athletics director Steve Patterson to step fully into his job and assert some control over the process and live up to his promises to be willing to make changes, including chopping off the head of an underachieving football program with a broken culture and a head coach who can't even meet his own standards of excellence.

And if there is any sanity remaining in this cesspool of leaks, power struggles, and disconnection from the reality, there are still powerful forces amassing against Brown to effort for his necessary removal, people who understand that Patterson probably can't do this all on his own.

Apologies for the repetition, but there were no excuses entering this season -- Brown himself make that clear at any opportunity that he had as he attempted to build a narrative of process, of "getting this thing fixed."

It's not fixed. He failed. And now he needs to go. Period.

The lunatics are running the asylum and Mack Brown may not be the head lunatic making the decisions, but he needs a straight jacket and a round rubber room. For his own good and for the good of Texas football, which needs no single person's name in front of it because it's so much bigger than one small, petty, vindictive, delusional man and his last few delusional cronies with their misplaced loyalty.

There's still time.