Oh no. Not at all.

So, not only is Sarah Palin's new book chock-full-o-crap, so is the so-called bus tour she's taking to promote it:

As much of her entourage, including HarperCollins publicist Tina Andreadis, risked a collective case of White Line Fever, covering more than 3,000 road miles during the book tour’s first week, Sarah Palin herself seems to have remained above it all, apparently cosseted in the luxury of a Gulfstream II 12-passenger jet rented from Universal Jet Aviation of Boca Raton, Florida, at a cost of more than $4,000 per hour.

More than two weeks ago, quoting Andreadis, USA Today reported that Palin would be “making two and sometimes three stops a day, traveling in a bus painted with the cover of her book.” And just before the tour started, Palin herself said on her Facebook page: “I’ll post our progress from the road.” To further the illusion, the populist heroine gave televised interviews from the bus, including one to Greta Van Susteren en route to Fort Bragg, North Carolina. [...]

It seems now that Palin hasn’t been on the bus, except for short hops between local airports and hotels and book-signing sites. Instead, as first reported by the Alaskan blog Palingates, she’s apparently been aboard UJT750, the Gulfstream American twin-jet ...

Both Palin and the publishing house that has invested so many millions of dollars in her seem to have felt it would send the wrong message to let the “common-sense conservative” be seen winging her away across the country just like any other good old-fashioned Republican CEO.

She's so real and honest.

Gordon Quan may take on Emmett

Miya Shay breaks ...

Former City Council Member Gordon Quan is THISCLOSE to throwing his hat in the ring for Harris County Judge. I heard the rumors a few days ago, but confirmed with Quan this morning...

When we spoke earlier today, I asked him what prompted him to consider challenging Ed Emmett. He replied, "Well, I'm thinking it's now, or never." However, Quan was quick to point out that this is not a "done deal." He's getting legal opinions on what relationship he can maintain with his firm. He's also looking at the quality of campaign consultants that would be available. In addition, he's got to convince his family members, who are often tough cookies.

Quan says he will make a decision in the next two weeks on whether or not to jump in the race. If he does, he says he will make a call to Judge Ed Emmett first, as it is the proper thing to do. Quan estimates he'll need at least a million bucks to run for County Judge. Considering his vast connections within the legal, political, and Asian-American communities, it should be a reasonable goal. In addition, the fact that Mayor Bill White is expected to jump into the Governor's race only makes more sense for Quan. He thinks it will be a well coordinated campaign county wide.

In 2004, after he was term-limited off city council, there was a big Democratic rally at which several people (a group I was part of) publicly begged Quan to run against John Culberson in CD-07. He passed on that; he also passed on a challenge to Tom Delay in 2006 -- ceding a certain win-and-then-out to Nick Lampson. He wasn't rumored for much in 2008 despite the clarion call of the presidential election (and likely could have had whatever he wanted and been elected to it). He also skipped the mayoral race this go-around. Quan would present an enormous challenge to "Hunker Down" Ed, who continues to accomplish nothing of distinction in the county's most powerful slot.

This announcement, frankly, would be more greatly anticipated this week than that of another Houstonian "considering" a run for higher office.

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance welcomes everyone back from the Thanksgiving holiday with these highlights from the blogs.

TXsharon has arranged by area 60 TCEQ fugitive emission videos obtained via the Texas Public Information Act. The videos were taken throughout the Barnett Shale area using a GasFindIR (Infrared) camera. Find the videos for your area at Bluedaze: DRILLING REFORM FOR TEXAS to see what you're breathing.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wonders why some destroyed Galveston beach houses were paid out at prices nearly double their county appraised value.

BossKitty at TruthHugger is fed up with road rage and wants it taken a more seriously by the authorities. Road rage is indeed vehicular terrorism! Vehicular terrorism is dismissed by the court system as misdemeanors with token consequences ... unless of course someone gets killed. Even then is not identified for what it really is. Vehicular terrorism! Is road rage is a way of life for Texans?

WCNews at Eye On Williamson posts on Gov. Perry's "jet-set" ways. A Watchdog group wants to know about Gov. Perry's travel expenses.

Bay Area Houston lists who the local bloggers are endorsing in the Houston mayor's race (it's one-sided).

Off the Kuff rounds up reactions to Bill White's announcement that he is considering a jump into the governor's race.

Libby Shaw, in her post Texas Republican Lawmakers Lose Huge Federal Contract, examines the whys and whos of the huge government contract Rick Perry and the Boyz just lost and what it means for Texas. Check it out at TexasKaos.

Neil at Texas Liberal ran a post about a great white whale: We Are All Shipmates --Moby Dick. This post offers up a picture of the excellent ship pulpit featured in the book and its movie adaptations. Neil reminds you that we are all shipmates.

WhosPlayin is still watching Lewisville ISD and wishing they would just answer a simple question.

Maybe the BAE Systems plant in Sealy, which lost its $2.6 billion Pentagon contract due to the economic incompetence of Rick Perry and other Republican elected officials, can now manufacture "Republic of Texas" trucks, according to PDiddie at Brains and Eggs.

Xanthippas at Three Wise Men takes a look at the results of a study that demonstrate how conservative anti-tax rhetoric has resulted in a substantial shift of the nation's burden from the wealthy to the lower and middle-class, and wonders what that means in an age when irresponsible investors crash the economy, are bailed out by the federal government and reward themselves with billions of dollars in bonuses.

Vote today in Houston

You can actually vote any day all week at the usual early voting locations. Why not get it done and get back to your Black Monday shopping?

After failing to appear at the televised mayoral debate, Gene Locke went there over the holiday weekend --"there" being Hotze-ville. This mailing follows hot on the heels of high-profile homophobe Dave Wilson's ad last week. Rick Casey reminded us of Houston's illustrious past mayoral contests featuring gay-baiting -- the lesson being that they always fail. As shitty a campaign as Locke has run, there's no way he gets elected IMO ... but we still have to turn out and beat him. Vote for Annise for Mayor, so that Gene can hurry up and get back to the rackets.

In the controller's race, Ronald Green needs to survive his tax problems and defeat MJ Khan, who is -- like Locke -- desperate to consolidate conservative support. The difference between Locke and Khan is that Khan doesn't have to try to pretend to be a Republican; he actually is one.

The city council races have been lively; great story here about the progressive Lane Lewis and the TeaBagger Brenda Stardig having a spirited debate as they street-raced down Long Point, after Lewis photographed Stardig's car in a nearby bar's parking lot (apparently she preferred a couple of pops to showing up at a neighborhood association meet-up). Lewis is, again, the only choice.

And Karen Derr should get past "confused independent" Stephen Costello.

Sue Lovell over perennial candidate Andrew Burks and Jolanda Jones over neoconservative Jack Christie. Please.

What are you still doing here? Go vote.

Press names 39% Turkey of the Year

Tough call.

Last year Rick Perry won the Turkey Politician of the Year award for his prissy response to Mayor Bill White's cursing incident during Ike; this year he takes the whole turkey enchilada for a stunningly entertaining and embarrassing string of events that brought applause from the tea-bag minority of the country and derision from the rest.

Perry is the longest-serving governor in the state's history; the strange thing is that people don't seem to like him much. He won his last re-election with 39 percent of the vote, which is about what George McGovern managed to scare up against Richard Nixon in 1972. ...

Sure, Perry entertained us with episodes such as firing a state board of forensics experts who dared to question whether he had wrongly executed a man, or suddenly setting aside, the moment he had a ­viable primary opponent, his long-standing, quixotic attempt to build a massive superhighway wanted by absolutely no one who wasn't directly getting a big paycheck from it, but it was his Tea-Bag Tango that set him apart from the other Turkeys of 2009.

Their summary of his winning efforts ...

He boldly rejected federal stimulus money, then later quietly took it. "It's nothing out of the ordinary," he said after making his money grab. Perry also — while ranting loudly about federal interference with the states — found no trouble asking for funds to battle swine flu or "protect the borders."

He told a Midland crowd that the Obama administration was taking illegal immigrants arrested in Arizona and dumping them off in Presidio. "This is a city that does not have the social services, does not have the law enforcement, does not have the ability in any form or fashion to handle that type of influx of people," Perry said. "Do the math on that. In a year period of time, we're talking 28,000 people that are going to be turned loose on our border." ... In the same speech, he said Obama was "hell-bent toward taking America towards a socialist country," which is somewhat close to being in English, but which also got him a nice big red headline on the Drudge Report and lots of face time on Fox, which Perry gleefully Twittered about.

He jumped on the bandwagon about Obama's speech to schoolkids. Remember that run of idiocy? Obama, like presidents before him, was going to give a televised speech to students. ... Here's the lead from an Associated Press story: "Austin — Gov. Rick Perry called President Barack Obama's plan to speak to the nation's school children about the importance of education 'disturbing,' but he said he would not advise parents to keep their children home from school that day despite calls to do so from angry critics."

Anytime you can call a "plan to speak to the nation's school children about the importance of education" disturbing, you've accomplished something.

Go read all the snarky goodness.