The post-Easter Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is still looking for a few of the eggs the children did not find as it brings you this week's blog roundup.

Want to know where your preferred legislative candidates stand on the important issue of beer freedom in Texas? Off the Kuff tells you how you can find out.  

TruthHugger is disgusted with the candidate for the most corrupt Texas Governor list: Rick Perry Fairy Tales For Money Must Go, and that is a long list.  

BlueBloggin sympathizes with voting Texans who cannot believe their governor is saying oops... Rick Perry Makes Texas Look Stupid, Again.

Libby Shaw reports that our lying Repug leaders continue to do what they do best -- mislead the low information voter with their straight up lies. Check it out at TexasKaos -- Lt. Governor Dewhurst Earns F- in Math, A+ in Pants on Fire.

The Democratic primary for CD-7 is getting a little bitter. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs reprinted an e-mail he received about James Cargas' seedy oil and gas connections, and got a vitriolic defense in response from Hector Carreno of the Cargas campaign.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme notes that the Republicans are getting a twofer: killing higher education and shifting tax burdens to students.  

WCNews at Eye On Williamson shows that the "Texas Model" isn't all it's cracked up to be: low wages, poverty, wrecked safety net, crumbling infrastructure, while the rich prosper.

Without forgetting that the Texas forced sonogram is state-mandated rape, Neil at Texas Liberal posted on competing shorelines in Galveston. There is so much to see in everyday life. (Neil will soon be posting again to remind us that the Texas forced sonogram law is state-mandated rape)

CD-07 Dem primary gets contentious

Happy Zombie Jesus Christ Day. Hope you got your eggs in a row early.

The Democratic primary for CD-07 has taken a turn for the worse in recent days, with this e-mail I received some days ago from someone I do not know named Laura Nicol and titled "Insider Track: James Cargas’ Journey from DoE Intern to Energy Lobbyist to Democratic Candidate for US Congress". I will reprint her story in full, add bold emphasis to the names of the various parties she cites, and follow it with the response from the Cargas campaign.

Hector Carreno is a power broker in both senses of the word. Professionally, he is an energy aggregator. That is actually less important than what he seems to control through his business contacts. He knows people… and lots of them owe him favors. As “The Godfather” illustrated, that isn’t always a good thing.

Here’s how Carreno works…

 In February of 2002, Hector Carreno’s company, PowerSol, was written up by the Houston Press in an article that called the company “Little Enron.” <1> They don’t produce any energy themselves; they contract with Reliant to manage other minority firms for a 25% cut of the contracts; great work if you can get it! Carreno cobbled PowerSol together from Enron energy experts and city politicos (including Mayor Brown’s ex chief of staff Jay Aiyer). A few weeks after incorporation, they won a 12% share of the city contract with Reliant Energy as a minority contractor, before they had even been certified by the city’s affirmative action program. Shortly after the award, city councilman Gabe Vasquez paid a $14,000 consulting fee from his campaign funds to PowerSol officer Frank McCune, his own ex-chief of staff. Some council members were dismayed when they realized how well connected their new vendor’s officers were. Mayor Brown’s Hispanic outreach director, Marc Campos, called PowerSol a blatant attempt to cash in on political connections. We normally call that influence peddling!

===

In January of 2007, Illumina Energy (the new name of PowerSol) un-registered James Cargas as a power marketer and replaced him with Hector Carreno. The contact addresses and phone numbers remained the same, although the email address changed.

Why swap out Cargas? Because it was time for him to go to work for the city, advising them on who to buy power from. Let’s see, a power broker hires you for awhile, then sends you off to advise city hall on buying what he sells. How convenient! He might get some business in return; just a little favor, you know. Could be, could be.

This year James Cargas is running for US Congress in Texas District 7. He started running rather late in the season, without warning, forcing his friends to choose whether to abandon prior endorsements. A few of his organizational endorsements were clouded by procedural gimmicks. At some events, Cargas has appeared ill or upset. Is this run perhaps NOT his own idea? Did somebody make Cargas an offer he couldn’t refuse? If Carreno is behind this, what favors would he expect from a business partner in Congress?

===

How did Cargas get linked to Carreno this way? We have to roll back the calendar to introduce a pivotal player to the story; Emil Pena. Pena is a lifelong lobbyist; he’s good at it and has an impressive list of clients. He has lobbied for beer, cigarette, oil, and gas companies. But he made his name in the energy arena. He participated in the energy regulator/lobbyist revolving door, while also funneling money from energy companies to candidates they’d like to buy. This was noted by Texans for Public Justice in their report on PACs active in the 2000 election cycle, in a sidebar titled Stealth PAC. <2>

Pena ran the Emil Interests PAC in 1998 as a money conduit from TransTexas Gas Corp CEO Jack Stanley to Texas candidates, including John Cornyn for Attorney General. In 1999, Emil Pena was an energy lobbyist for 6 clients, including Enron. In 2000, Pena became Deputy Energy Assistant in the Clinton administration. He changed his PAC’s name to Government Interests. Despite donations reported by Cornyn & others in 2000, the PAC never reported activity or fund sources, which violates state law. The PAC’s treasurer in 2000 was Richard Bianchi, previously general counsel of TransTexas. By the way, Bianchi is infamous for switching from Democrat to Republican immediately upon winning election to the bench in 2008.

Pena appears to have become acquainted with Cargas when they were both working in the DoE's Office of Fossil Energy in 2000. Generation Power, Inc was created by Pena in 2001, with Bianchi as Regulatory Rep and Cargas as General Counsel. In 2006, Cargas is listed as Treasurer for Pena's disgraced PAC, and both he and Pena are listed as officers in Carreno's company Illumina Energy. They have become a team, shuffling company names, officer titles, and industry roles as needed.

===

 Since 2008, James Cargas has worked for the City of Houston, as their energy advisor. However, he continues to use advocacy groups and local clubs to push his insider agenda.

Cargas is a past Deputy Director of the North American Energy Standards Board, and is still a member. At a recent meeting, Emil Pena presented the idea that “system safety” might apply to shale gas, and explained how it could be implemented quickly. Now, as a lobbyist for oil companies, this advice probably seems quite reasonable to Pena: profits first, safety later … as PR damage control, maybe? For his part, Cargas proudly claims his involvement in NAESB, and seems perfectly content with their worldview. This is far from the “public service” attitude I expect in a city employee!

Cargas is also on the Board of the Energy Bar Association, where he basically says “alternative energy will not happen in Texas, due to existing regulations”. <3> One might interpret this as “don’t bother trying to compete with my partners; we’ve got the market sewed up.” Again, not the attitude I would hope for from someone advising the city on energy purchases, but all I could expect from an energy trading insider.

===

James Cargas deserves to lumped with his partners, Carreno and Pena: fossil fuel fans, shills for Big Oil & Gas, profiting off pushing their poisonous products, pinching OUR pennies for their pockets. No law against any of that … this is America, after all. But is this who we want making the law of the land, our land, our water, our air? No! Cargas is undeserving of our respect, much less a Democrat’s endorsement or vote.

 === === === === === === === ==

ENDNOTES

<1> http://www.houstonpress.com/2002-02-07/news/a-political-little-enron/  Carreno’s PowerSol wins city contract, gets 25% cut of all subcontracts; 2 officers are city insiders. 2002

<2> http://info.tpj.org/page_view.jsp?pageid=129&pubid=65 Pena’s Stealth PAC with Bianchi. 2000

<3> http://www.greentechmedia.com/images/wysiwyg/PVNews_0310_finalLowRes.pdf (page 3) Cargas says it’s tough to implement alternative energy in TX, due to pricing regulations.

I reached out to the Cargas campaign for comment, and here in full (except as noted* at the very end) is the response I received from Hector Carreno.

In a recent blog written by Laura Nicol’s I was mention as a “power broker in both senses of the word”. I am flattered by Ms. Nicol’s statement, but I’d like to point out the truth that escaped her attack on me and my good friend James Cargas.

First, I am not now or ever have been and energy aggregator. Second, in the Houston Press article of 2002 that Ms. Nicol’s refers to, she fails to mentions that myself and former business associate had just finished working on the campaign of Orlando Sanchez for Mayor, in 2001. So her argument that we won a contract because we have political connects is totally incorrect since the person we were attempting to defeat was the incumbent Mayor. We won the contact because we had a better proposal. Third, Ms. Nicol’s should be better informed to understand that power marketer do not generate power, they sell power. I am sure that she would be surprised to find out that most companies selling power in Texas do not own the power plants. I should also point out that the Brown Administration used their political clout to try to kill the contract. Fourth, Mr. Cargas decision to run for Congress was his, and he certainly is not doing it for personal gain. I was excited when I found out he filed. He will make a great Congressman.

As to her point that former Council Member Gabe Vasquez paid my business partner $14,000 after we were awarded the contract, I am not sure what point she was trying to make. The facts are that the former Council Member owed us the funds for running his re-election campaign.

As to the partnership of Illumina Energy, ever single statement she made was totally incorrect. Illumina was set up as a minority-owned company seeking to compete with the majors and pass the savings on to its government and minority customers.

In her reference to Mr. Emil Peña, his PAC and other business interest, I once again think she should get her facts correct before she continues to make false clams.

The final innuendo in Ms. Nicol’s blog is what do I and Emil Peña expect to receive when James Cargas is elected to Congress. I can only speak to what I expect and that is to have James Cargas represent the interest of all residents of District 7, to work hard for all Texans and to conduct himself in a professional manor (sic) – just as he has done in his prior public service positions.

Ms. Nicol’s end (sic) her fantasy story with asking her limited readers not to vote for James Cargas to be the Democratic challenger against the incumbent GOP Tea Party Member. In the America I live in, we have the right to say and vote for whomever we want. In the America I live in, everyone has the right to their own opinions – every incorrect ones. In the America I live in, we all have the freedom to choose who we support.

James Cargas has worked hard his entire life and has been working with Democratic elected officals (sic) since he was 14 years old. Why do you attack him for working in the oil and gas industry, as if that was something he should ashamed of? Doesn’t Ms. Nicol’s husband work for one of those alleged big bad oil service companies? Isn’t Houston the Energy Capital of the World? Are we not proud of Houston?

Ms. Nicol, I am proud to support James Cargas for Congress and I am proud to call him my friend. Stop spreading misinformation and innuendos – get all your facts correct. Your tactics remind me of something I would have expect (sic) from Governor Sarah Palin or Senator Joe McCarthy not from a so-called Democratic activist. I guess you must be very proud of the candidate you are supporting to create such lies for her.

(At the end*, Mr. Carreno added the e-mail address from Ms. Nicol as well as his own. I have deleted those as the only part of his response I edited.)

I previously posted my endorsement of Lissa Squiers in the CD-7 Dem primary. I leave it to you to decide if Ms Nicol's article has merit for consideration for the voters of Congressional District 7, likewise if Mr. Carreno's defense serves as appropriate rebuttal. You know where I stand.

Easter Sunday Funnies

The Supreme Court says corporations are people. The Supreme Court also says that people can be strip-searched for any reason whatsoever. Therefore, corporations can now be strip-searched for any reason whatsoever. Let's start with…*Snaps on latex glove*…oh, how 'bout Koch Industries. -- "Bill in Portland Maine"
 

The Easter Week Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is boiling eggs and stocking up on pastel-colored dyes as it brings you this week's roundup.

 Off the Kuff reminds you that there is only one Democrat running in CD22.  

TruthHugger sees danger when disconnected and medicated American voters make the critical election decisions that impacts the future of our country and the planet: American Voters On Drugs: Their BUY-ological Political Weapon. And BossKitty thinks that Earthlings have lost their mothership.

BlueBloggin reviews the deceptions of Affordable Health Care.  

WCNews at Eye On Williamson has a few thoughts on the 2012 primary in Williamson County.

Keith Olbermann and Sarah Tressler were just two of many journalists who parted company with their employers last week, and PDiddie at Brains and Eggs noted the transitions without commenting on the similarities of their circumstances.
  
CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wants you to know that Lamar Smith is a rapist enabler like fellow Republican John Cornyn.

At TexasKaos, lightseeker explains the high price of "Cheap Righteousness". A preview, it really isn't cheap at all.

Neil at Texas Liberal posted a letter he co-wrote to Amnesty International asking for AI to come to Texas to consider the forced sonogram law. This law is state-mandated rape. Neil has been posting on this issue in recent weeks, and will continue this focus in the days ahead.

Not so Funnies, wearing hoodies

"A hooded sweatshirt can make an innocent teen look like a criminal. Just like a suit and glasses can make Geraldo Rivera look like a journalist." -- Stephen Colbert
 

Keith Olbermann and Sarah Tressler come and go

Heavy sigh.

Keith Olbermann has been fired by Current TV, the network announced Friday. He will be replaced by former New York governor and CNN host Eliot Spitzer.

Olbermann had hosted "Countdown," which he brought from MSNBC after his exit there, since June. His short tenure began with fanfare, but ended, as many of Olbermann's previous jobs have, with deep acrimony on both sides.

Spitzer, who had his own short-lived stint as the host of "Parker Spitzer" (later called "In The Arena") on CNN, began hosting his show, "Viewpoints," immediately on Friday night. He made no mention of Olbermann or his somewhat unusual arrival to the post at the top of the show.

The news of Olbermann's termination was first reported by the New York Times' Brian Stelter. A source told Politico that Olbermann was fired for breach of contract, saying that he had "sabotaged" the network. Howard Kurtz reported that Olbermann had begun refusing to toss to other peoples' shows or appear in advertisements with them.

The feud went public in January and never calmed down. He'll be on the Late Show on Tuesday to tell his version. So where does he go now? My guess is his own webcast-by-subscription. More from the New York Mag and Mediaite, and this from The Daily Beast:

But in the short term, Olbermann and Gore will do battle in court. If the first shots fired are any indication, it’s likely to be messy and brutal. In the absence of any other ratings drivers, perhaps Current might consider broadcasting the proceedings in prime time.

Tressler, the Houston Chronicle society-writer-by-day/stripper-by-night whose story went national after her 2nd gig was discovered by the Chronicle heads, has a few things to say in advance (no doubt) of her tell-all.

Good Morning America flew her to New York and she spoke about her experience. Two things we did not know that we learned in the intro: 1) Houston is "a city famous for big oil, big spenders and genteel Southern living" (say whaaat?) and 2) the Chron is "one of the country's most prestigious newspapers." We also learned an actual important thing, one we'd been highly curious about: Had Tressler told anyone at the Chron about her semi-publicly blogging about her stripping, including putting pictures of herself out there? When asked, Tressler giggled a bit and said no, she hadn't told anyone.

The Jane Dough takes up her cause.

Though it would have demonstrated good form on Tressler’s part to notify the Chron of her other work, if anything to give higher-ups a sense of her availability and schedule, the other staffers have no business expressing outrage over another employee’s side gig. She’s clearly trying to earn more money, and, as Connelly suggested, perhaps score a book deal of some sort. But Jezebel nicely points out that this is a major goal of most scribes, particularly those in nonfiction writing.

As you may have noted, I feel a little bit for both parties and their somewhat-voluntarily-unemployed statuses. And I expect both Olbermann and Tressler to land on their feet. I leave it to you to make any observations you choose in the comments.

Sunday Funnies, Supremely Disgusting edition

"The Supreme Court isn't handing down its Obamacare verdict until late June, as it takes that long for Clarence Thomas' wife to write his opinion for him." -- John Fugelsang

Voter registrations In Harris County to be mediated today

A little meeting today over the Harris County tax assessor/collector's continuing efforts to thwart voter registrations.

Harris County officials have rejected far fewer would-be voters since 2008, but Democrats are demanding more proof that voter rolls are not being illegally suppressed -- particularly among Hispanics -- as another U.S. presidential election approaches. The two sides will meet in secret mediation Friday as Democratic officials seek assurances the county is following the terms of a 2009 settlement reached after the party challenged Harris County voter reviews in a federal lawsuit. The county's voter registrations have remained fairly flat at about 1.9 million since 2008 (emphasis mine), failing to keep pace with a boom in the eligible voting population. "Harris County continues to fall behind other large cities. Harris County rejects far too many applications and removes far too many eligible voters from the rolls," Chad Dunn, an attorney for the Democrats, told the Houston Chronicle.

Sumners has severely curtailed efforts to recruit and train deputy voter registrars as well. Sumners is in fact a tool of the King Street Vote Suppressing Thugs, about which much has been written here.

Sumners said he believes more applicants were rejected in 2008 primarily because a group of deputy voter registrars working for nonprofit groups turned in thousands of duplicate, illegible or incomplete applications. He said he hopes that the quality of applications in 2012 will improve under a new law requiring deputy registrars to complete mandatory training. But Dunn told the court that party leaders need more information to confirm applications are being reviewed as the settlement requires. U.S. District Court Judge Gray H. Miller, who oversees the settlement, ordered both sides to meet with a mediator Friday. If the dispute is not resolved, a hearing has been set next week.

Sumners, in the first sentence of the above graf, refers to Houston Votes, which as an offshoot of Texans Together conducted voter registration drives in minority neighborhoods prior to the 2010 election. Those efforts were effectively demonized by Sumners' predecessor Leo Vasquez, the KSP/True the Vote pasty gangsters, and pretty much every conservative media outlet they could find.

On and on it goes. Progressives encourage people to vote, conservatives restrict it. They only want their voters to vote. They cannot win if more people vote. That "center-right" urban legend is thus advanced. It is fallacy that conservatives represent the view of Texans and Americans when 50% of the population doesn't vote and hundreds of thousands more -- perhaps millions just in Texas -- are prevented from voting. Update: Big Fat Republican Bloggers have their own take.

But conservatives would go further if they could, restricting voting to taxpayers and/or landowners exclusively. That's where we're eventually headed, and Texas will lead the way.

Texas has had "fewer than five" voter impersonation cases

In the past three years. Via ThinkProgress, the San Antonio Express News' Gary Scharrer:

Fewer than five “illegal voting” complaints involving voter impersonations were filed with the Texas Attorney General's Office from the 2008 and 2010 general elections in which more than 13 million voters participated.

Less than 5 out of 13 million. Aren't those fairly close to the MegaMillions winning odds? As the e-Trade baby says, 'that's the same chance as getting mauled by a polar bear AND a regular bear at the same time'. So clearly there oughta be a law.

Texas has suffered from “multiple cases of voter fraud,” Gov. Rick Perry said in a recent FOX News interview, though the attorney general handled just 20 allegations of election law violations in the 2008 and 2010 elections. Most involved mail-in ballot or campaign finance violations, electioneering too close to a polling place or a voter blocked by an election worker.

The Texas attorney general's office did not give the outcome of the four illegal voting complaints that were filed. Only one remains pending, according to agency records.

Sen. Rodney Ellis nails it.

"(T)here are more UFO and Bigfoot sightings than documented cases of voter impersonation."

Meanwhile, back in reality...

The D.C. district court has set trial in Texas’ voter ID suit for July 9-13.

That’s nearly three weeks earlier than requested by the Justice Department and intervenors.

However, the court also directed that issues related to the constitutionality of section 5 of the Voting Rights Act be bifurcated from the main trial and said that those issues would “not be addressed unless the Court denies judicial preclearance of Senate Bill [14].”

Since that means that hearings on constitutional issues would take place only after a ruling on the preclearance claims (by definition some time after the July 13 end of trial), that would seem to make it less likely that the constitutional issues could be teed up in time to get them to the Supreme Court before the November elections.

So there's a strong possibility that we won't have to deal with this BS in this election cycle. Everyone should continue to train and inform as if we will, however. One last legal note about the most active vote suppressors in the nation, that little old band of patriots thugs who call Houston home.

“The Texas Democratic Party contends that the King Street Patriots made unlawful political contributions to the Texas Republican Party and various Republican candidates by training poll workers in cooperation with the Republican Party and its candidates and subsequently offering the watchers’ services only to the party and its candidates.” The group also held forums only for the Republican Party and its candidates.

The court split off the KSP’s constitutional complaints into a separate lawsuit and in an opinion issued today sided with Democrats, rejecting the constitutional claims. This will allow the Democrats’ clams to go forward.

Cutting the nuts off these feral hogs is a great first step toward resolving some of the vote suppression efforts in Texas and everywhere else.

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is wearing a hoodie this week as it brings you the blog roundup.

Many groups and organizations provide guides telling you who to vote for. This year, Off the Kuff has a guide of who not to vote for in the 2012 Harris County Democratic primary.

BossKitty at TruthHugger is angry that Republicans are all about manipulating personal liberties and imposing their specific religious rules on America, while allowing a real crisis to get worse: GOP Candidates Ignore Water Crisis, Prefer Religious Culture Crisis. On top of imposing their narrow religious interpretations to the general public, Republicans want a dumber America: Corporate Religion, Corporate Education and the Mental Devolution of America.

BlueBloggin sees that Trashing Texas Is BIG Money For Republican Donors and Rick Perry.

We've moved so far to the right, as a state and a country, it's hard to see how we move back. WCNews at Eye On Williamson points out that A Budget for All is the place to start.

At TexasKaos, Libby Shaw explains the Texas version of the Republican assault on women. Check out Rick Perry's and the Texas GOP Unrelenting War on Women.

Annise Parker is quite possibly the best mayor Houstonians could have ever hoped for, if you consider her actions from a moderate Republican point of view. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs breaks it down.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme knows Republicans just pretend to like the troops. Words are cheap, just like them.

Neil at Texas Liberal continued to focus on the fact that the Texas forced sonogram law is state-mandated rape. In the week ahead Neil will post a letter he co-authored asking Amnesty International to come to Texas to investigate this human rights abuse.

Bay Area Houston comments on the GOPs' 'Don't Re-Nig' bumper sticker.

More Sunday Funnies (Etch A Sketch edition)

Greg Abbott tries to obstruct both DOJ and justice itself

The Austin American Statesman, via Socratic Gadfly.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott this week asked a federal court in Washington to prevent 12 state lawmakers from giving depositions in the state's voter identification case.

The U.S. Department of Justice, which is facing off against Abbott's office in a case to allow Texas' voter ID law to go into effect, has asked to depose — or question under oath — the author of the voter ID bill, Sen. Troy Fraser, R-Horseshoe Bay; its House sponsor, Rep. Patricia Harless, R-Spring; and other lawmakers.

In addition to deposing lawmakers, the Justice Department is seeking copies of written communications among members of the Legislature, communications between legislators and staffers and communications between legislators and their constituents.

Abbott's rationale?

The filing says, "If litigants can depose individual legislators and traipse through every communication of those legislators simply by alleging that a state law was enacted with an impermissible purpose, then state lawmakers will be chilled from engaging in the communications necessary to perform their jobs properly."

SG's take:

Anybody else in Texas mouthed bullshit like that and Abbott would call it obstruction of justice.

I don't have anything to add to that.