Sunday Cruzin' Funnies

But they're not racists.

Gun rights protestors storm Alamo

Poll: Grimes leading McConnell in Kentucky

Transitions

-- After ten years at Burnt Orange Report, Karl-Thomas Musselman moves on to whatever's next.  Godspeed to a great blogger and even better progressive.

-- Eye on Williamson has suffered some server issues in recent weeks and has temporarily relocated to here.  Here's their latest, contradicting TIME's recent article: Why Texas doesn't have to be our future.

-- Rest in peace, Bum Phillips.  As some of you know, I grew up in the Golden Triangle, attended Lamar, and my dad worked in the same old Magnolia/Mobil/ExxonMobil refinery in Beaumont that Bum did (so did I, for one summer).  Bum's legacy in the southeastern-most corner of Texas is even bigger there than it is here in Houston.  And it is inextricably linked with the Astrodome's.

Twice Phillips’ Oilers battled the Pittsburgh Steelers for a berth in the Super Bowl, and both times they came up short. After each loss, they were welcomed home by more than 40,000 cheering fans at the Astrodome, inspiring one of the most famous quotations in the history of Texas sports.

“One year ago we knocked on the door. This year we beat on the door,” Phillips said after the 1980 title-game loss. “Next year we’re gonna kick the sumbitch in.”

[...]

Of the first of the two mammoth Dome pep rallies, Phillips said, “Don’t forget all those people standing along the road when we were driving in. There must have been a hundred thousand of them out there. And we’d lost the damned game. I’ll take that memory to my grave.”

Have I mentioned that I am voting to save the Astrodome?

-- Speaking of voting, here's a good site, compliments of ProgressTexas, that will help you make sure you have everything squared away in order to cast your ballot, beginning Monday morning at a location near you.

Sam Houston for Texas Attorney General

Matt Angle telegraphed it last week, and the Texas Democrat who earned the most votes statewide in 2008 confirmed it yesterday.  Careful parsing by the folks at First Reading reveals the distinction in the assertion.

This is very artfully done. When I first read this I assumed it meant that Houston ran ahead of President Obama in Texas. In fact, he did get a slightly higher percentage of the vote - 45.88 percent to 43.68 for Obama. But his vote total - 3,525,141, lagged ever-so-slightly behind Obama's 3,528,633. But Angle's statement is perfectly accurate because Houston did win more votes than any other "Texas Democratic candidate," because neither Barack Obama nor Joe Biden is a Texan.

Houston is light years ahead of the three stooges in the GOP primary scrambling to replace Wheelchair Coathanger Ken.  This blog has already pulled the curtain away from Barry Smitherman many times, and yesterday Dan "Curly" Branch stepped up to make his case.

State Rep. Dan Branch announced Thursday his proposal to create a Voter Fraud Task Force if elected as Attorney General.

“I have a clear plan to attack voter fraud in Texas,” Branch, R-Dallas, said in a press release.

Branch said the task force would:

•  ”closely monitor the activities of groups that would seek to subvert ballot integrity

•  appoint a Special Counsel devoted to exposing and prosecuting any instance of voter fraud, and

•  aggressively defend the landmark Texas voter ID law from the Obama Administration’s spurious attempt to invalidate it.”

Well, he has been getting out-kooked, after all.  At least Don Quixote could find a windmill to tilt.

It's now Ken Paxton's turn to do or say something ridiculously ignorant.  We shouldn't have to wait very long.

A pre-EV perspective

-- Charles delivers a good one here. Well worth reading (even with the perpetual underlying premise that more money means 'best chance of getting elected').  Thank goodness he and Texas Leftist and Texpatriate have worked this beat, because I haven't had the heart.  I'll add some predictions, though...

-- Mayor Parker wins without a runoff.  As best as I can tell, Ben Hall has already folded his tent.

-- I'll go out on a limb and say that city controller Ron Green loses a squeaker to the Republican, Bill Frazer.

-- Michael Kubosh and one of either Rogene Calvert or Jenifer Rene Pool in the runoff for AL3.  I can't seem to find many incumbents to vote for in city council races, except for my district representative, Larry Green.  I know I won't be voting for Stephen Costello or C.O. Bradford or Jack Christie.  That much is certain.  Update: Of course I am voting for James Horwitz.

-- I am voting for the Dome.

And I expect it to pass.

This is still the most lackluster election cycle in memory.

The last word on the shutdown

What the shutdown cost:

“The bottom line is the government shutdown has hurt the U.S. economy,” Standard & Poor’s said in a statement. “In September, we expected 3 percent annualized growth in the fourth quarter because we thought politicians would have learned from 2011 and taken steps to avoid things like a government shutdown and the possibility of a sovereign default. Since our forecast didn’t hold, we now have to lower our fourth-quarter growth estimate to closer to 2 percent.”

Moody’s Analytics reported a similar number Wednesday, saying by the end of the day the shutdown will  cause a $23 billion hit to U.S. GDP or $1.4375 billion per day.

-- $3.1 billion in lost government services. Although furloughed workers will get their back pay,  taxpayers won’t see the products.  (Source: I.H.S.)

--  According to the U.S. Travel Association:  There has been $152 million per day in all spending related to travel lost because of the shutdown. As many as 450,000 American workers supported by travel may be affected.

--  According to the National Park Service: They welcome more than 700,000 people per day usually in October and visitors spend an estimated $32 million per day impact in communities near national parks and contribute $76 million each day to the national economy.  Those revenues were lost.

--  According to Destination D.C., the official tourism corporation of D.C.: There is a 9 percent decrease in hotel occupancy from the last week in September before the shutdown to the first week of October during the shutdown. This year, hotel occupancy was down 74.4 percent for the week Sept. 29 to Oct. 5 compared to the 2012 numbers. (Source: Smith Travel Research, Inc.) In 2012, an estimated $6.2 billion of visitor spending supported more than 75,300 jobs.

What the shutdown's lost revenue could have paid for:

• The net cost of to the government from the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP): $24 billion
• The Department of Agriculture’s proposed budget: $22.6 billion
• NASA’s approved budget: $16.6 billion
• All air transportation programs, including the Federal Aviation Administration, security, research, and other costs: $21.9 billion
• The Child Tax Credit: $22.1 billion
• The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program (formally known as welfare): $17.7 billion
• The cost of Head Start, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and Women Infants and Children (WIC) program combined: $25.2 billion

The topline figure may not take many other costs into account, such as loans that didn’t go out from the Small Business Administration, permits that got held up, and the loss of billions in tax revenue. Plus the government could still get a downgrade on its credit, which could ding business and consumer confidence and bring about more costs.

The shutdown was just the latest budget crisis that has been costly to the economy. A recent report found that the uncertainty created by fights over funding the government and raising the debt ceiling that have cropped up since 2010 has cost the economy nearly a million jobs. 

Ted Cruz:

"It was an incredible victory." 

Truly epic conservative fail

Your linkage for the above:

"An obvious disaster for the GOP"

"House Republicans are the clear losers"

"Humiliating failure"

"Fiasco"

"Disaster ... Debacle"

"This party is going nuts"

"Republicans have to understand that we have lost this battle"

"We really did go too far. We screwed up"

"Speaker Pelosi Part 2: Opening Jan. 5, 2015"

More surrender roundup here if you need it, want it, like it, have to have it.  A few more developments from late last night worth mentioning....

Senate Conservatives Fund hits McConnell for getting 'Kentucky Kickback' in Senate deal

Ten Takeaways from the Great GOP Cave-in

Ted Cruz admits budget standoff was all about building fundraising lists

No Texas Republican votes to reopen US government or avoid default 

Then there's the actual satire.

Cruz: "The Dream of keeping poor people from seeing a doctor must never die"

His eyes welling up with tears, Sen. Cruz said, “I embarked on this crusade with a simple goal: to keep affordable health care out of the reach of ordinary, hard-working Americans. And while this battle was lost, that dream—that precious, cherished dream—will live on.”

Reflecting on the government shutdown and near-default that almost touched off a global financial apocalypse, Sen. Cruz said, “We’ll give it another try in a few weeks.”

Sen. Cruz’s closest ally, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) also spoke reverently of the shutdown, calling it “the most expensive Civil War re-enactment in history.”

“Unfortunately, once again, the wrong side won,” he said.

Over in the House of Representatives, Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) congratulated his colleagues on the deal to resolve the shutdown, telling reporters, “This proves that when we work together, we can come up with a totally unsatisfactory solution to a completely unnecessary crisis.”

With fail this epic, it's hilarious (or maybe just pathetic) to find there are Teabaggers this morning -- sober, I must presume -- who still think they are winners.  And still support the Speaker, even as they voted 'no' in perfect lockstep last night.

I have to say that this madness among conservatives leaves me astounded.  They're already talking about shutting it down again in a few months.

Is it possible that the Democrats could screw up such a gold-plated gift?  I suppose so, but on the morning after this capitulation by the seditionists in the House of Representatives, it certainly smells like their goose is cooked.  Burned to a crisp, even.

I'd rather see them snapped back to reality in a little over year, and not much sooner than that.

T'was the day before Defaultmas...

...and all through the House,

not a creature was stirring.

Not even a louse.

This is going to be a busy week for the cartoonists, and there are so many good ones already that I need to get a few posted before Sunday.

A new Gallup poll shows 60 percent of Americans think the Democratic and Republican parties have done a poor job of representing the people during the government shutdown.  They think a third major party is needed.

Blog Action Day: Human Rights

Here's what we're doing today.



The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is where the conversation begins. Here's some history, examples of violations, and some additional dimension and focus.



Among the participating partners of #BlogActionDay, Amnesty International is at the forefront of the consciousness of this topic in the USA and the world. This post on the scourge of human trafficking in Houston is my most recent contribution to the discussion. Also my brother Neil is making a financial contribution to Amnesty Int'l every time the Houston mayoral campaigns of Annise Parker and Ben Hall send out an e-mail attacking one another, a noble if too-active public shaming.

There's lots of places to join the conversation. Feel free to pick one.

#BAD2013 #OCT16 #Humanrights

Steve Stockman is still a dope

When Kinky announced for ag commissioner and highlighted the ganja as his primo issue, I predicted that there wouldn't be any Republicans who would ask him not to bogart.  (This definition, not that one.)  My mistake: I overlooked former homeless person -- I prefer this term over 'vagrant' -- and once-jailed-on-a-drug-charge-himself Congressman Steve Stockman.

But even when blind hogs occasionally find acorns, they're still blind... and they remain swine.

Texas Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Friendswood, has recently backed a bill to require federal officials to comply with state marijuana laws, which was introduced in April and has since garnered support from Congressmen on both sides of the aisle.

The Respect State Marijuana Laws Act of 2013, introduced by California Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican, would bar federal drug enforcement agents from penalizing any person abiding by the marijuana laws in their own state.

The law “shall not apply to any person acting in compliance with State laws” — that is, people who are in compliance with their state laws regarding possession, manufacture or use of marijuana will not be subjected to federal penalties.

That's the rub here: Texas is the second worst of these United States in which to get busted for pot.

On an annual basis, no state arrests and criminally prosecutes more of its citizens for pot than does Texas. Marijuana arrests comprise over half of all annual arrests in the Lone Star State. It is easy to see why. In 2009, more than 97 percent of all Texas marijuana arrests — over 77,000 people — were for possession only. Those convicted face up to 180 days in jail and a $2,000 fine, even upon a first conviction.

Despite Texas’ dubious distinction as the #1 pot prosecuting state in America, police and lawmakers have little interest in exploring alternatives. In 2007, Gov. Rick Perry signed legislation (HB 2391) into law granting police the option of issuing a summons in lieu of an arrest in minor marijuana possession cases. Yet aside from police in Austin, long considered to be the state’s lone bastion of liberalism, law enforcement have continued to fervently make arrests in even the most trivial of pot cases.

In 2011, Houston Democrat Harold Dutton introduced House Bill 458, which sought to reduce penalties for the adult possession of one ounce or less of marijuana to a Class C misdemeanor, punishable by a fine not exceeding $500 and no criminal record. Within weeks, over 2,500 Texans contacted their House members in support of the measure. Nonetheless, House lawmakers refused to even consider bringing the measure to a vote. 

You can guess why, can't you?  One word: it starts with an R and ends with 'douchebags'.

Stockman's signing on to this federal legislation does absolutely nothing to advance the cause of marijuana decriminalization -- not to mention fracturing the prison pipeline -- in Texas.  That's why it's perfect for a duplicitous sack of shit like him to support.

So while it may be perceived in some quarters that grass could be a bipartisan issue, the truth once more is that the only way things like this are ever going to change is if people simply stop voting for Republicans running for statewide office.

And if you're one of those people who likes to get stoned but doesn't like to vote, you might want to be the first on your block to change that habit.

Update: More Grits. And also The Defense Rests.

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance thanks Ted Cruz for his hard work making the Republican Party more unpopular than ever as it brings you this week's roundup.

Off the Kuff connects a flap over reduced tuition at UTSA for same-sex spouses of active military members to the 2014 campaign.

Horwitz at Texpatriate reports on the Houston mayoral debate, noting that no matter who you thought the winner was, the real losers were Houstonians themselves.

Of all of Greg Abbott's mistakes, one stands out like a sore thumb: he birthed Ted Cruz. Then again, Democrats should really thank "Poop" for what he's accomplished recently on their behalf.  PDiddie at Brains and Eggs knows you have to take a little bad news with the good when it comes to Abbott and his protege'.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme thinks picking turncoat Aaron Peña to do Hispanic outreach for republicans is ludicrous. Good luck with that.

Though we often take them for granted, streets are vastly important to our communities. They're the true lifeblood of any community. Whether we're are traveling to work, visiting friends, or any reason that we need to get from point A to point B, that journey starts and ends with our streets. Which is why Texas Leftist was glad to hear of a landmark initiative for Complete Streets in Houston. It's been a long time coming.

Neil at All People Have Value said this week that the things you had ordered from Amazon have arrived. All People Have Value is part of NeilAquino.com.

At TexasKaos, Libby Shaw tells it like it is, in Deadbeats, Bums, Extortionists and Saboteurs. Give it a read.

======================

And here are some other posts of interest from Texas blogs.

Egberto Willies prints a letter to Rep. Ted Poe from one of his constituents.

The Texas Monitor implores Latinas to run with Wendy.

Juanita Jean shows what real political junkies do on their weekends.

Nancy Sims evaluates the Houston mayoral debate.

Rep. Mike Villarreal explains how to get help with the health insurance exchange.

The TSTA blog observes that the Rainy Day Fund is in excellent shape.

AzulTX reports from the immigration reform rally in Houston.

What Ted Cruz has accomplished... for Democrats

Extending the premise advanced in yesterday's post with regard to the fact that Ted Cruz is Greg Abbott's biggest mistake...

First, recall that it was Abbott who hired Cruz to serve as solicitor general for the state of Texas in 2003, where he worked for five years.  During that time Cruz argued several significant cases, including nine times before the SCOTUS.  From the Cruz Wiki page...

In the landmark case of District of Columbia v. Heller, Cruz drafted the amicus brief signed by attorneys general of 31 states, which said that the D.C. handgun ban should be struck down as infringing upon the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. Cruz also presented oral argument for the amici states in the companion case to Heller before the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

In addition to his victory in Heller, Cruz has successfully defended the constitutionality of Ten Commandments monument on the Texas State Capitol grounds before the Fifth Circuit and the U.S. Supreme Court, winning 5-4 in Van Orden v. Perry.

Cruz authored a U.S. Supreme Court brief for all 50 states successfully defending the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools, winning 9-0 in Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow.

Cruz served as lead counsel for the state and successfully defended the multiple litigation challenges to the 2003 Texas congressional redistricting plan in state and federal district courts and before the U.S. Supreme Court, winning 5-4 in League of United Latin American Citizens v. Perry.

Cruz also successfully defended, in Medellin v. Texas, the State of Texas against an attempt by the International Court of Justice to re-open the criminal convictions of 51 murderers on death row throughout the United States.

That is a cornucopia of "Hall of Shame" conservative litigation.   It's noteworthy that Abbott's won-loss record in lawsuits of all kinds has gone down significantly since Cruz left his employ.

But this post is about mistakes, and Cruz made plenty while he was SG.

In his ongoing gambit to claim Greg Abbott’s record as his own, Ted Cruz has opened up his record to intense scrutiny from Texas voters.

It has been revealed that Cruz as a bureaucratic lawyer severely mishandled a court case that would have expedited justice and punished child rapists with the ultimate penalty.

The Texas Legislature passed “Jessica’s Law,” which imposes the death penalty on certain child rapists. Several states joined Texas in calling for justice, and liberals sued, claiming the laws were unconstitutional.

Greg Abbott told Ted Cruz to defend the law before the Supreme Court, but Cruz completely failed to perform elementary research surrounding the death penalty, and Texas’ law was rejected.

"The oversight became the basis of an unsuccessful effort to get the Supreme Court to rehear the case. The request for rehearing noted that the oversight was a ‘significant error.’"

Cruz’s “significant error” caused the Texas law to be defeated, and tougher penalties for child rapists were dismissed.

Cruz doesn’t mention this embarrassing error when he gives speeches. He instead ignores his failures and claims credit for Greg Abbott’s leadership. In fact, he won’t even publicly admit that his appalling incompetence during the case had any significance.

"At the time, however, Cruz was concerned that a New York Times reporter might write that the office of the solicitor general ‘screwed up by not finding (the military provision)’…"

Official correspondence from a defeated Ted Cruz illustrated his attempt to hide his malfeasance.

"Would love to have some sort of response so we don’t look silly," Cruz wrote to a lawyer in the attorney general’s office.

There's a lot more at the link.  But let's just concern ourselves with the present day, as Abbott bids for governor and Cruz keeps the federal government shut down.  In a nutshell, over the past thirty days Ted Cruz has almost single-handedly resurrected the Democratic Party nationally. "Single-handedly" contains only a little bit of hype, since he couldn't have done it without help from John Boehner and these 32 schmucks in the House.  But the accomplishments are still remarkable:

-- A month ago, Democrats were divided and fighting over Obama as it looked as if the nation would go to war in Syria.  Now the party is united again. (!)

-- The Affordable Healthcare Act was polling badly; now it is trending up.  (!!)

-- Obamacare's glitch-filled start has been obscured by the GOP's machinations over the shutdown -- including Cruz's "filibuster" --  and many Americans are blaming that on the shutdown instead of the administration. (!!!)

-- A tight governor's race in Virginia now has the Democrat starting to pull away.  The Republican nominee, a Tea Party moron named Ken Cuccinelli, skillfully avoided having his picture taken with Cruz at a GOP dinner where they were both keynoting.  (!!!!)

-- Cruz's private practice client way back in 1998, Speaker Boehner, is on the verge of being ousted by the crazies in his caucus.  (!!!!!)

Give Abbott a little credit for recognizing the "Poop" Cruz disaster and trying to distance himself from it, but that won't endear him to the kooks who vote in the TXGOP primary.  As with his weak attempts to court Latinos, Abbott is rolling over thin ice.  There is little doubt that Texas Republicans are eventually going to rue the day that Ted Cruz burst on the scene.  And Greg Abbott owns that.

This past Friday I made a phone call to my Congressman, John Culberson, speaking to a staffer who answered the phone, and it went like this:

"First let me say that your job must be awfully tough right now and I sympathize with you, particularly as your boss is trying to take away your employer-provided health care.  That said, I want to thank Mr. Culberson for the excellent work he is doing for the Democratic Party.  A month ago there was no hope that Democrats could retake the House, but thanks to the work done by he and the other Tea Party caucus members, there are now 24 Congressional districts that have moved from 'likely Republican' to the toss-up category.  Please pass on my gratitude and tell him to keep up the good work."

Yes, you can use that when you call Ted Cruz's office next week.

Update: "Ted Cruz was a smelly, terrible roommate." LMAO

Kinky's in for Ag Commish

As a Democrat. And he's running on weed.

"The better Wendy does, the better we will do," (Friedman) said. "And we will also be able to bring a lot of independent voters and people who have never voted before."

Friedman, who describes himself as "an old time Harry Truman Democrat," had been mulling a gubernatorial bid. He previously expressed interest in promoting the legalization of marijuana and casino gambling in Texas. On Saturday, he said that the two issues would remain a part of his platform as a candidate for ag commissioner, especially the idea that the state should "legalize, cultivate, tax and regulate marijuana."

"It could be an economic engine for the state, enabling us to do whatever we want to do," he said.

What's significant this time around is that Texans are polling solidly in favor not just of decriminalization, but legalization.  And half of those folks describe themselves as Republican.  Normalizing marijuana laws is, as we are all aware, a national trend.  It's building a head of steam in simliar fashion to the increasing tolerance for marriage equality.

The weed issue and the gambling thing are indeed big deals to people who aren't usually drawn to the polls.  And it's not like the TXGOP is going to have any advocates for those, anyway.

Friedman acknowledged that he is not currently an expert on major issues such as water policy, nor is he much of a bureaucrat. But like Jim Hightower, the state's last Democratic agriculture commissioner, he said he hoped to expand the scope of the state's Department of Agriculture to bring attention to issues he feels are important. "I would like to do something for rural Texas," he said, adding that he also hoped to reach out to people who currently felt left out of politics.

My emphasis.  That's Republican heartland, and if Friedman pulls soft Republicans and non-voters to the polls to vote for him... why, they just might vote for a few other Democrats as well.

I've been real harsh on Kinky in too many posts to count, so I'm going to soften up a little myself and say: let him run.  Why?

-- He draws earned media, and as long as he isn't making a racial joke, that isn't hurting.

-- There have been worse Democratic nominees for statewide office, Lord knows.

-- As it relates to his topics, most of the people I know personally who are smoking dope and eligible to vote live in the suburbs and vote Republican, if they vote at all.  The proponents of casino gambling, on the other hand, cut across all demographics, all classes, all geography.  The only people steadfastly opposed to these are evangelical conservatives, who have far too much influence in state government.  Pruning back that invasive species benefits all Texans.  And if Kinky will hire someone who can get him up to speed on the water issues -- and eminent domain -- then he might actually make a real difference in breaking the Republican stranglehold on exurban and rural voters.

That's not a bad thing.  A blue Texas, or a more purple one, has to see that sort of thing happen organically anyway, so why not let Kinky spread some seeds and see what happens?

(I hope I don't come to regret this quasi-endorsement.)