Sandra Bland's death, and Obama, Holder, and Lynch

Michael Wolfe, City of Hempstead Mayor, left, Frank Jackson, City of Prairie View Mayor, and Lois Kolkhorst, Texas State Senator, listen as Elton Mathis, Waller County District Attorney, right, speaks to the media at the Waller County Courthouse Friday, July 17, 2015, in Hempstead.

Frankly, the looks of disbelief on the faces of the two men on the left, and the look of concern on the woman's face (almost exclusively associated with her political career) tell you pretty much everything you need to know about this latest unconscionable death of a black person in police custody.

Waller County District Attorney, Elton Mathis, left, and Waller County Judge Trey Duhon, center, listen as Waller County Sheriff R. Glenn Smith speaks to the media Thursday, July 16, 2015, in Waller.

Waller County voted 58.33% for Mitt Romney in 2012, a little above the Republican's sweep of the state with 57.17%.  Perhaps the only thing holding it under 70% was the vote coming out of the precincts around Prairie View A&M, where Sandy Bland was about to start her new job at her alma mater.  Now that the official version of her arrest after being stopped for not signaling a lane change has been debunked by the DPS itself, it's imperative that a proper investigation determine exactly how she came to die in that jail cell.  It looks like even Waller County officials realize the importance of that.

If I were a black man in this country, especially after what has happened in Ferguson and Baltimore and Cleveland and Staten Island and everywhere else it has happened just over the past couple of years, I wouldn't be protesting with a sign outside the Waller County Courthouse or shouting down presidential contenders (admiringly peaceful but terribly unfocused and misdirected), I'd probably be rioting in the streets until some cop shot me down.

This shit has got to stop.  And the people best equipped to have stopped it, a long time ago, are the president, the former attorney general, and the current one.  Of course we know that Eric Holder has finally gone back from whence he came; the law firm that lobbied for the country's largest banks.  And that Loretta Lynch is opposed even to marijuana decriminalization, so I wouldn't expect to see much initiative from them despite being people of color, and especially since we haven't see much of anything to speak of to this point.

So that leaves Obama, for at least another year-and-one-half, to do something besides give a speech.  "If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon" just isn't going to cut it any longer.

And people of color shouldn't expect Martin O'Malley or Bernie Sanders to be able to solve this dilemma in a two-minute answer on a Saturday afternoon in a forum (though their words and deeds are important to get on the record) and they absolutely shouldn't consider Hillary Clinton's response sufficient, having had 48 hours and several staff members prepare her Facebook comment.  That's the equivalent of the two boys in the class getting a pop quiz, and the star female pupil getting the test to take home over the weekend.

If anybody thinks any of these people can do much besides be a bully from the pulpit until late January of 2017, that person needs a bucket of ice water over their head... and then again in the face.

The best place to start is with your own city's police chief, county prosecutor, and on up from there: mayor, state representative, state senator.  Before someone dies in your neighborhood or community.  Even a Repuke like Lois Kolkhorst needs to to feel the heat.  She's got her game face on; somebody take her on (at the ballot box).

"Dismantling structural racism in this country" needs to be on the fast track, like now.

Update: More from Isiah Carey.  And from Kuff (7/22).

Berning down the house

Dallas and Houston both fell into a Berning ring of fire yesterday.

(Sanders) implored his supporters to ask their Republican friends, families and co-workers if it makes sense to grant huge tax breaks for the rich while cutting spending on health care programs and federal student aid.

"Our job is to reach out to our Republican brothers and sisters, working-class people and middle class people, and get their heads right," Sanders said to a boisterous crowd of 5,200 people at UH's Hofheinz Pavilion.

"Today this is a conservative Republican state, but that doesn't mean it will be tomorrow."

Sanders brought his progressive message to Texas and rallied supporters by attacking Wall Street greed and income inequality. "Politics should be about improving the lives of our people," he said.

The Vermont senator's biggest applause of the night came when he vowed to help make college tuition free.

"Taxpayers bailed out Wall Street when they needed it, now it's Wall Street's turn to help out the middle class."

"One of the problems that exists in American politics today, in my view, is that the Democratic Party has conceded half of the states in the country at the national level, and that's wrong," Sanders, a Vermont Independent running as a Democrat, said during a rally at a downtown Dallas hotel.

Several hours later at a similar event in Houston, he sharpened his advice for Democrats, saying the "simple truth is that you cannot be a national political party which claims to represent working families and low-income people and turn your back on some of the poorest states in America."

"If we are serious about change in America, we can't just do it in blue states," he declared earlier in Dallas, emphasizing the need for a "50-state strategy" that leaves no voter in the dark.

A live-blog from a Daily Kossack who was in attendance.

Feeling the Bern Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is still putting aloe vera on its Berns as we assemble the best progressive blog posts from last week.

Off the Kuff looks at the lawsuit filed against the state for refusing to issue birth certificates to children of undocumented immigrant mothers.

Lightseeker at Texas Kaos makes a compelling argument as to why the Democratic Party needs to sharpen its message in a way in which it resonates with and motivates the majority of D voters: Why we need a better Democratic story and how Sanders' candidacy underscores this point.

Socratic Gadfly says that if Obama is going to visit a federal prison and talk about commuting sentences, he ought to throw the long bomb by going to Florida and freeing Leonard Peltier.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wants you to know Greg Abbott screwed up the child support payment upgrade. Republicans don't really care about kids. You can tell by action after action.

WCNews at Eye on Williamson smells the rotting fruit of one-party rule in Williamson County: County GOP elected officials using courts for petty political battles.

The disruption at Netroots Nation's presidential town hall forum by activists associated with Black Lives Matter was a clash between the politics of the old-school Social Democrats and that of the New Democrats' identity politics. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs thinks there will a coming-together of the two movements or a cleaving of the Democratic Party as the dynamic unfolds.

Neil at All People Have Value discussed Obama's role in taking away our freedoms through the New Horizons mission to Pluto. APHV is part of NeilAquino.com.

Egberto Willies went from the kerfuffle at Netroots Nation to the Bernie Sanders event in Houston, and even provided a live stream for online viewers of it.

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

The Texas Election Law Blog celebrates its second anniversary, and reviews the case that led to its beginning.

Ken Janda asks how can Texas continue to ask for billions of dollars in uncompensated care payments to hospitals for uninsured patients coming to emergency rooms, when more than one million of those people could be put into Medicaid Managed Care?

The TSTA Blog warns of "dangerous anti-educator" Scott Walker.

Texas Vox cheers the forthcoming end of coal.

Grits for Breakfast is pleased to see that funding has been allotted for research into the underlying scientific bases for the forensic tools and methods currently used in the criminal justice system.

David Ortez gives a graphical representation of the Houston mayoral fundraising race.

Rachel Pearson explains why that video hit job on Planned Parenthood is "pure applesauce".

Texas Clean Air Matters documents the trend towards clean, affordable power.