Wednesday, January 05, 2022

A Sedition Eve Wrangle


Perhaps I should begin with another threat.


Or maybe this one.


Given the possibilities of dying or becoming disabled from COVID, or freezing to death because we can't keep the power on, it might be permissible to excuse people from worrying too much about the climate.  Or whether their votes are going to count.


Or whether an insurrection might take place again.


Texas is full of these right-wing extremist militias.  They're not just the national security threat we've been warned about but a danger to all Texans.  And they are emboldened by the tacit approval, the wink-and-nod from police.


Greg Abbott and company aren't too worried about them, either.


So while we mark an anniversary tomorrow, no one feels like celebrating.  Not even those responsible, from what I can tell.


I'll try to be a little more cheery in the next Wrangle, the one I promised yesterday for today but will appear tomorrow or Friday.
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Tuesday, January 04, 2022

Kicking Off The #TX2022 Season



This you?


In keeping with one of my resolutions, this post is an effort to be kinder to others, specifically here to some of the better Democrats running on the March ballot.  I won't be voting for them because I'm attending the Texas Green Party's conventions, but there's some of you who will, and if you're like me you have no interest in VBNMW.  So at this inception, you have several options -- perhaps more than your time allows -- to consider and research.  This is my effort to help you separate the wheat from the chaff.  I won't be doing as much of that as I have in the past.  As with COVID vaccines and masks, everybody has their own safe choices to make, and Texas Democrats should choose wisely.  Picking the same old Blue Dogs as in the past will result in the same mangey fall election results.  Be smarter; make them earn your vote with clear policy enunciations.

For example:

Beto lost my vote long ago in his Senate race against Ted Cruz when he took oil and gas money and abandoned Medicare for All, then became irredeemable in his lackluster White House bid two years ago, sealing the bad deal we're currently suffering under by jumping on the Biden bandwagon with the others at Obama's urging.  Delilah Barrios is the only person I can comfortably cast a ballot for in the governor's contest.  Best of luck to all you calf-crampers out there, but it's not happening again for him unless Governor Fish Lips gets upset in the Pachy primary.  And I don't see that either.

Same with the Lite Gov race and Mike Collier and Carla Braley.  As badly as Omicron Patrick needs to go, I have no votes left for perennial ex-GOP losers or Donkey party operatives.  Michelle Beckley seems okay, but tread carefully.  W/r/t Land Commissioner, Jay Kleberg is rich and and also a former Republican.  Jinny Suh is the best alternative.  And for Comptroller, Janet Dudding, Tim Mahoney, and Angel Vega all pass muster but I'd recommend Vega first.

My favorite statewide Dems are Joe Jaworski and Susan Hays.


Leftist-ish Dems running for Congress have been selected by American Youth for Climate Action, and for the most part I agree with their choices.


There are 5 more posts in that thread, and they include Claudia Zapata and D.L. Anderson in TX-21 (Chip Roy, seditionist), Jessica Cisneros in TX-28 (Henry Cuellar, oily Blue Dog), Jessica Mason in TX-30 (open, Eddie Bernice Johnson retiring), Beatriz Reynosa in TX-34 (Vicente Gonzalez, Blue Dog), Greg Casar and Eddie Rodriguez in TX-35 (open), Donna Imam in TX-37 (Lloyd Doggett, carpetbagger), and Diana Alexander, TX-38 (open).


For Texas Senate:


For the state's school board:


All these folks are big improvements on the Democrats and Republicans they're challenging.  Give them a close look and see if you agree.

A regular Wrangle coming later today tomorrow.
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Sunday, January 02, 2022

Sunday 'Old Acquaintances' Funnies


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Friday, December 31, 2021

Wrangling 2021


I suppose the best we can say about the year ending today is that we lived through it, if only because so many who should have did not.


If the Texas Progressive Alliance had selected a Texan of the Year for 2021, my vote would have gone to Dr. Peter Hotez.


InnovationMap had Houston's top three COVID research stories.  I hope the 'rona and its latest mutation is not the most important story next year.  The climate crisis should be.  Maybe it will.


SocraticGadfly noted that Ronny Jackson and other Texas wingnut Congresscritters want to fight the effects of climate change, but only when it affects cops, and without admitting that the likes of Winter Storm Uri are connected.  The Concho Valley Homepage reported that the USGS recorded one of the largest earthquakes ever in the Permian Basin last Monday.  And Earth911 offers ten green living New Year's resolutions.


Texas will be changing enormously in the years to come.  All of us -- wherever we fall on the political spectrum -- are hoping the changes favor our points of view.


But the San Antonio Current quotes a recent report that advises liberty lovers to move somewhere else, ranking Texas 49th in personal freedoms.

Whatever the evolving demographics portend for the Lone Star State, we'll still have to deal with those who are stuck on stupid.  COVID isn't going to kill 'em all.


I'll be surprised if this remark does not cost Chairman Padron his job.


Still think they're both losers.

Here's a few criminal and social justice updates.


Mark Pitcavage presents some random facts about white supremacist tattoos.  Mandy Giles is now blogging at Parents of Trans Youth.  And as promised, some lists.

The Texas Observer submits its ten best longform reads of the year.  Politico collected the worst predictions of 2021.  The San Antonio Express News had all the spooky and strange things.  And Texas Freedom Network rounded up the ten best and worst from the Lege.

A few political items, and the soothers to close out the year.

Kuff covered a couple more redistricting lawsuits; a new one filed by Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer over CD35, and an earlier one filed by a state prison inmate objecting to the practice of counting inmates where they are incarcerated rather than where they live.   IPR opened a time capsule:

Prohibitionist Andrew Jackson Houston, son of the legendary Sam Houston, the hero of San Jacinto and first president of the Lone Star Republic, died in a Baltimore hospital on June 26, 1941.

Two months before his death, the 87-year-old Houston had been appointed to the U.S. Senate by Gov. “Pappy” O’Daniel to fill a vacancy created by the death of Democratic Sen. Morris Sheppard, who died of a brain hemorrhage on April 9.

Houston, who authored several books on Texas history and taught military science at St. Mary’s University on Trinity Bay, had been the Prohibition Party’s candidate for governor of Texas on two occasions. He also briefly challenged popular 1908 nominee Eugene W. Chafin for the dry party’s presidential nomination in 1912 -- the same year Roosevelt himself had snorted and thundered against the two-party establishment on his newly-formed Bull Moose ticket.

Houston was a Democrat at the time of his surprise Senate appointment on April 21, 1941.


Reform Austin introduced us to some school librarians who are fed up with and fighting back against book bans.  And Susan Hays and nonsequiteuse eulogized Sarah Weddington.

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Monday, December 27, 2021

The Between Holidays Wrangle from Far Left Texas


As we come to the end of another calendar I'll collect some listicles of noteworthy people and events from the past 12 months in a year-end Wrangle.  Today I'm playing ketchup.


As stated before, I favor mask requirements by public and private orgs but not vax mandates.


Moving on to the political happenings before and after the Yule.


Ted Cruz doesn't just want to be the '24 GOP nominee, he expects to be.


We'll see what we can do about that.

Here's a few news items about Lone Star Republicans and Democrats who definitely made Santa's 'naughty' list.


And some on the 'nice' list.


Which provides the segue to the social and criminal justice updates.


Background, ICYMI:


The other environmental headlines.


Influential Texans who departed us over the weekend.


US Rep. Colin Allred:

Texas was home to Sarah Weddington who argued Roe, which no longer exists here. A Texan, LBJ, enshrined voting rights but we're now the hardest state in the country to vote. Our history provides hope for our future. We must keep fighting for a better Texas.


And the calm-me-downs to close today.

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