PerryCare to replace Medicaid in Texas

Or perhaps we should call it RepubliCare. "Cheaper, better, and without so many of those nasty poor sick people".

Medicaid is the health lifeline for more than 3 million of the most vulnerable Texans, but some Republicans, including Gov. Rick Perry, are talking about opting out of the program as a massive state budget shortfall looms.

The prospect, described by some as far-fetched, raises fears about the toll on poor children, people with disabilities, pregnant women and the elderly. Medicaid covers at least part of the cost for more than 60 percent of nursing home residents.

Speaker-in-waiting Warren Chisum is here to ally concerns.

Those looking to shake things up said they are not proposing to put existing Medicaid patients out in the cold. They said they want to find a way to deliver health care in a better, more cost-effective way as Texas bends under the burden of more needs than money. 

"It's not a warning that we're going to throw momma out of the retirement home, it's just saying we've got to do something different, because this is not working for us," said state Rep. Warren Chisum, R-Pampa, who cited the Medicaid opt-out idea as he runs for House speaker.

Rest assured, the Republicans say there will be no death panels deciding who gets treated and who gets rolled on a gurney out in the street.

With their ability to touch Medicaid hampered by federal requirements and the federal health care law aiming to add to the Medicaid rolls in the future, some fear the impact on areas such as education and public safety.

"It sends a strong message to the federal government that what you've asked the states to do, even with the (funding) matches that you're proposing, is going to cause the states to go bankrupt — or certainly it's going to compromise our ability to deliver on education, public safety and infrastructure," said state Rep. John Zerwas, R-Richmond, an anesthesiologist.

The Texas Health and Human Services Commission is looking at what the effect would be if Medicaid were abolished in Texas or federal matching funds were slashed. Zerwas, who carried the legislation that called for the study, is saying not that he supports an opt-out but that the idea needs to be thoroughly studied, including the human and economic effects.

Details are unclear on what would replace Medicaid if Texas opted out. Groups, including the limited-government Texas Public Policy Foundation, are working on proposals with the idea that the state still would be able to pull down federal funds in addition to its state health care money, or the federal government would otherwise continue coverage options. 

"It's not just opting out of Medicaid. It is replacing the Medicaid program with something that is affordable by the states and the federal government and can deliver better care," said the foundation's Arlene Wohlgemuth, a former state lawmaker. 

Perry told Fox News that he thinks Texas could find a "private insurance solution" that would save the state and federal government $40 billion each over six years while covering more people. He did not give specifics.

There it is: PerryCare. Which of the governor's richest friends wants to start the company to take Medicaid private? What private insurance company wants to take over coverage of the elderly, the poor, and the infirm? I forget; which ones are now?

Who said elections don't have consequences?

Update: STC has more, including a "superbad" quote from Speaker-to-be Chisum.

Sunday Funnies, Derision Points edition

"George W. Bush says he is glad to be out of the Oval Office because he doesn't have to think all the time. And I'm thinking: wait a minute, that was him thinking all the time. Really?" — David Letterman

"George W. Bush was interviewed by Matt Lauer, who asked him if he would still invade Iraq if he knew then what he knows now. It's an unfair question. For one thing I don't know if Bush does know what he knows now." — Jimmy Kimmel

"'Decision Points' by George W. Bush has dropped, and it's like 'War & Peace' without the peace. Here's the very first page: 'In the last year of my presidency I began to seriously consider writing my memoirs.' Right away he's got you hooked. Did he write them or didn't he? You won't know until you read the book. Maybe the rest of the pages are blank. If there's one thing we've learned it's that we can't believe something is there just because Bush says it is." — Stephen Colbert

"In his new book, George W. Bush says he’s happy to be out of Washington. Well, it’s unanimous." - David Letterman

"President Bush told Matt Lauer the most embarrassing thing he ever did drunk was ask a friend of his parents what sex was like after 50. That's nothing. John McCain asked Sarah Palin to be his running mate when he was sober." – Jay Leno

"No sir, I'm not going to read it until he reads it." – David Letterman

In the clearing stands a boxer ... somewhere

Willaim Greider (whom I have enjoyed reading since he wrote in the '80's for Rolling Stone) nails it again here.

Given the election results, the question Barack Obama has to decide for himself is whether he really wants to be president in the fullest sense. Not a moderator for earnest policy discussions. Not the national cheerleader for hope. Not the worthy visionary describing a distant future. Those qualities are elements in any successful presidency, and Obama applies them with admirable skill and seriousness.

What's missing with this president is power — a strong grasp of the powers he possesses and the willingness to govern the country with them. During the past two years, this missing quality has been consistently obvious in his rhetoric and substantive policy positions. There is a cloying Boy Scout quality in his style of leadership — the troop leader urging boys to work together on their merit badges — and none of the pigheaded stubbornness of his "I am the decider" predecessor, nor the hard steel of Lyndon Johnson or the guile of Richard Nixon.

I have never seen this fighter. I have never seen Obama respond to a challenge with a battler's mentality. During his debates with John McCain, I bemoaned to all those watching around me that he would not punch back.

Republicans, who are masters of deceptive marketing, seized on Obama's most appealing qualities and turned them upside down. Their propaganda cast him not as soft but as a power-mad (black) leftist, destroying democracy with socialist schemes. The portrait was so ludicrous and mendacious, the president's party hardly bothered to respond. Egged on by the Republican Party and Fox News, right-wing frothers conjured sicko fantasies and extreme accusations: the president is not only a black man (bad enough for the party of the white South); he is not even American. The vindictive GOP strategy is racial McCarthyism, demonizing this honorable man as an alien threat, just as cold war Republicans depicted left-liberal Democrats as commie sympathizers.

Even Obama supporters began to ask, Where is the fight in the man? Some critics blame a lack of courage, but that neglects the extraordinary nerve Obama displayed in his rise to the White House — a young black man with an unusual name and limited experience who triumphed through his audacity. Obama's governing style is a function of his biography — a man who grew up always in the middle, both black and white. He succeeded by learning rare skills, the ability to bridge different worlds comfortably and draw people together across racial, political and intellectual divides. He learned to charm and disarm, not to smash and conquer.

For the first time in his life, those qualities seem to have failed him. Indeed, he may have been misled by his high regard for his own talents. This is really his first encounter with devastating political defeat. The question now is, What will he learn from his "shellacking"? Possibly not much, since it is always very hard to rethink and adjust in midstream. But remember, this man is an unusually observant politician with a great thirst for self-reflection. One can reasonably hope that as he absorbs the hard knocks, he will make calculated changes in how he governs.

But those around him continue to kowtow and cave in, crawfish and backpedal. Does this reflect their own weakness or just their counsel to him, or the president's own view? Or is this just more of the confusion coming out of the White House right now?

Bluntly put, Obama needs to learn hardball. People saw this in him when he fired Gen. Stanley McChrystal, and many of us yearn to see more. If he absorbs the lesson of power, he will accept that sometimes in politics you can't split the difference or round off sharp edges. He has to push back aggressively and stand his ground, more like those ruthless opponents trying to bury him. If Congress won't act, the president will. But first he has to switch from cheerleading to honest talk. Tell people what the nation really needs, what Republicans intend to sabotage. In a political street fight, you've got to hit back.

Only Obama can decide this about himself, but others can influence the outcome by surrounding him with tough love and new circumstances created by their own direct actions. It does not help Obama to keep telling him he did great but the people misunderstood him. He did lousy, not great, and in many governing dimensions people understood his failures clearly enough. They knew he gave tons of money to bankers and demanded nothing in return. They knew he thought the economy was in recovery. They couldn't believe this intelligent man was that clueless.

Popular forces can blow away the fuzziness. They can mobilize to demonstrate visible support for the president's loftier goals and to warn him off the temptation to pursue a Clintonesque appeasement of the right. Given the fragile status of his presidency, Obama needs to know that caving in is sure to encourage enemies and drive off disheartened supporters. People should, likewise, call out the president's enemies and attack them with the harshness that's out of character for him. The racial McCarthyism of the GOP establishment is a good place to start.

People who still have great hope for Obama can help revive his presidency, but only if they toughen up themselves. Stop holding his hand (he's an adult) and start building a people's agenda that compels the president to change his. Obama won't like this at first—his own supporters talking back—but he can learn to draw strength from their courage. If people fail to step up with their own message, the president will likely fail with his.

2012 is literally going to be won or lost by Obama, entirely through his own action or lack thereof, in the next few weeks. Will he fight against renewing the Bush tax cuts for millionaires with a lame-duck Congress and Speaker? Will he pick up the gauntlet thrown at his feet by Mitch McConnell?

How badly does he want to be re-elected in 2012, and help Democrats down the ballot get elected as well? We'll find out soon enough.

Sunday Funnies

Rachel Maddow's interview with Jon Stewart

One of my Facebook friends indicated that Stewart was being disingenuous for not owning his power as socio-political commentator. I agree wholeheartedly.

His repeating that "he's just a comedian" gives him the illusion of absolving himself of responsibility for influencing the sad state of the national political media for the better. Avoiding accountability means he can keep laughing and pointing at the mess, but not do anything to clean it up.

Unfortunately for Stewart, he's outgrown those pants.

Update: From Mediaite ...

Stewart goes on to explain, quite adroitly, his role as satirist relative to that of an opinion media personality, but it’s not exactly correct to claim that he adds his commentary from the sidelines. Mr. Stewart is very much in the game of forming opinions based on the news, though to be fair, his take is significantly different from that of Maddow and others. But 200,000 participants at the Rally to Restore Sanity didn’t “meta-participate” in a support for a reasoned and sane discourse. Stewart is in the game, though he’s clearly much more comfortable (and perhaps even effective) voicing his critique from the sidelines. Whether he asked for it or not, Stewart has been handed the Cronkite “most trusted” mantle. That puts him, not in the game, and not in the stands, but in the zebra shirt, refereeing the whole affair.

No comprende

How does he expect Democratic voters to support him in two years if he does everything the Republicans want?

President Barack Obama's top adviser suggested to The Huffington Post late Wednesday that the administration is ready to accept an across-the-board continuation of steep Bush-era tax cuts, including those for the wealthiest taxpayers.

That appears to be the only way, said David Axelrod, that middle-class taxpayers can keep their tax cuts, given the legislative and political realities facing Obama in the aftermath of last week's electoral defeat.

"We have to deal with the world as we find it," Axelrod said during an unusually candid and reflective 90-minute interview in his office, steps away from the Oval Office. "The world of what it takes to get this done."

Breathtaking in its defeatist posture. Well almost breathtaking, if I hadn't seen it so many times before. Meanwhile, the Catfood Commission recommends Social Securtiy cutbacks:

The plan would gradually increase the retirement age for full Social Security benefits -- to 69 by 2075 -- and current recipients would receive smaller-than-anticipated annual increases. Equally controversial, it would eliminate the current tax deduction that homeowners receive for the interest they pay on their mortgages.

It would be so much more fun to be cracking wise at Rick Perry and George Bush's hapless dueling book tours, or even the Texas House Speaker shenanigans -- "Quien es mas conservador?" -- but these developments are more critical.

Obama seems to be folding his tent, and along with it the future of his political party.

Is there anyone willing to fight out there for this man?

Update: Not so fast, says Axelrod. And if that is accurate, then the White House has once again screwed up their message, or their 'triangulation', or whatever the fuck it is they're trying to do.

Not a publicity stunt

Now fire Phil Griffin.

MSNBC's head honcho is STILL a Triple-D douchebag. (I'd like to say "Worst Person in the World", but Keith has suspended that segment.) "Indefinite suspension", my ass ...

... Olbermann's "crime" wasn't donating to political candidates. It was failing to ask permission before making the donation.

After all, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough has donated more money to political candidates than Olbermann, he's headlined fundraisers, and he even campaigned for George W. Bush in 2004 while hosting a program on the network.

Given the case of Scarborough, it's clear that Olbermann would have been allowed to make the donations. So the issue here isn't the donations: it's that Olbermann didn't ask first. The fact that Phil Griffin thought Olbermann's slip-up was something that rose to the level of a suspension (and initially an indefinite one) is rather breathtaking.

Griffin blew this way out of proportion, ultimately making both himself and the network look arbitrary and foolish. Worse, Griffin showed absolutely no respect to Olbermann's audience. Suspending Olbermann for such a ticky-tack HR dispute wasn't just a punishment for Keith O. -- it was a punishment of Countdown viewers. And as any decent network executive will tell you, the last thing you should ever want to do is punish your audience.

Griffin's rapid capitulation almost gives this the appearance of a publicity stunt. It wasn't. It was Phil Griffin making a huge mistake, being called out on it by a quarter of a million of Countdown's viewers in a matter of days, and then backing up quicker than a scared crawdad.

MSNBC is going places in spite of Griffin, and it will go farther and faster if he gets replaced. Fast.

The post-Democalpyse Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance remains committed to moving forward as it brings you this week's blog roundup.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme is still reeling from the republican blowout. Say goodbye to your Social Security and hello to Warren Chisum in your bedroom.

Off the Kuff starts to discuss a way forward from this election.

There was some good, some bad, and some ugly in last Tuesday's election returns. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs has the deets.

After Tuesday's Demageddon, Mean Rachel offers some advice as to what political candidates should do with their social media accounts after losing an election.

Len Hart at BlueBloggin has a few words on Election Postmortem: A Picture of Dorian Gray. It is said that insanity is repeating a failed strategy in the expectation of one day getting a different result. Because that never happens, the nation is nuts! Just enough people always vote against their own interests to guarantee that wealth will continue to 'trickle up'...

Andy Wilson over at Public Citizen's TexasVox wants to point out that members of Congress who lost their re-election in Texas all had one thing in common: opposition to climate change legislation.

TXsharon at Bluedaze recently traveled to EPA headquarters in North Carolina to present four case studies of health impacts caused by natural gas extraction in the Barnett Shale. She met with the top rule-makers in the Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards, who are working on new rules for the oil and gas industry. They said it was "incredibly strong evidence."

A day after the election, Letters From Texas identified dark clouds on the horizon for victorious Republicans. Later in the week he detailed the first cloud: the state budget.

Lightseeker over at TexasKaos tries to figure out where we are and where we go next after the mid-terms. Check it out.

While things were rough at the ballot box in the orthern hemisphere, in Brazil the political left won a third consecutive national victory. Neil at Texas Liberal notes that even on the darkest days, there is always progress being made someplace in the world.

After a campaign-work related hiatus, Capitol Annex returns to active blogging with a new look, a new logo, and this post addressing the growth of food service jobs in Texas and why the growth of low wage jobs sill eventually cause the Texas economy to grind to a halt.

Gorgeous Sunday Afternoon Funnies

Olbermann suspended

Honestly ... this bullshit pisses me off way more than any election result.

MSNBC suspended "Countdown" host Keith Olbermann Friday after the news that he donated to three Democratic candidates.

"I became aware of Keith's political contributions late last night," MSNBC President Phil Griffin said in a statement. "Mindful of NBC News policy and standards, I have suspended him indefinitely without pay."



Olbermann gave the maximum individual donation of $2,400 to three candidates in Tuesday's election: Arizona Reps. Gabrielle Giffords and Raul Grijalva and Senate hopeful Jack Conway, who lost in Kentucky to Republican Rand Paul. (Grijalva appeared on Olbermann's "Countdown" on Oct. 28, the same day the host donated to his campaign; Conway was last a guest in May).

Phil Griffin is a Triple-D douchebag. He's just screwed his network right down the tube, and himself ultimately out of a job. That result, should it come to pass, would actually make me happy. Kos:

Real smart, Phil! Olbermann isn't just MSNBC's highest rated show, but it's the only one that breaks Fox News' stranglehold on the top 10 cable news shows.

Of course, this is par for the course for Griffin -- letting his lowest-rated host Joe Scarborough call the shots, to the point where Scarborough has dictated Olbermann's guest list by blackballing me from the network. As Atrios pointed out on Twitter, Pat Buchanan gave five political contributions between 2005-08, and he keeps his permanent cot in the MSNBC green room.

CNN's ratings are in the gutter. I'm sure they could use the boost in the ratings that Olbermann would provide.

Update: Hey, Phil -- What about this?

SCARBOROUGH, JOE PENSACOLA,FL 32503 MSNBC/HOST 3/31/06 $2,100 Kitts, Derrick (R)
SCARBOROUGH, JOE PENSACOLA,FL 32503 MSNBC/HOST 3/31/06 $2,100 Kitts, Derrick (R)

It's okay if you're Joe Scarborough I guess.

MeMo at the Chron:

I have no inside information, but I know the workplace. Olbermann and his boss, Phil Griffin, do not love each other, and Olbermann often pushes the envelope in ways that, it is said, make some at MSNBC and NBC uncomfortable. ...

My point is this: Olbermann knew exactly what he was doing and he must have guessed there would be consequences. And the consequences are, in my opinion, deserved, though I think if Roethlisberger had to sit out four games, Keith should sit out no more than a week. It's not that bad, given that nobody had any illusions about where KO stood politically.

I don't know what, if any, policy opposite-number-cable-network Fox News has on contributions, but they gave a cool million to the GOP. Also, it seems like a lot tougher place to get suspended from.

As for the violation of MSNBC's policy, fine. I really hope Keith tells Griffin to shove it.

You may recall Griffin suspended David Shuster seven months ago -- he's on the same "indefinite" plan -- and not for just filming a pilot for CNN, but also for getting into a shouting match with Andrew Breitbart and Tweeting that James O'Keefe would likely go to prison for his anti-ACORN antics.

It's time for both guys to go to another network.

In case anyone has been unable to locate their PMA

The good, the bad, and the ugly

I lived through this in 2002, and 2004, and 2006, and I suspect I'll be fine going forward. I posted similar election analysis a couple of years ago under the same title above -- see Good, Bad, Ugly, TBD, and a little more of each --  and it merits a reprise in the wake of last night's crimson high tide. Though I will be briefer.

The Good: not much, especially in Harris County and Texas. Michael Soto was elected to the SBOE, so that body will -- may -- moderate somewhat. This note:

The election will last two years as all 15 board members will have to run again in 2012 because of redistricting to reflect shifting population trends. The next board will develop new health curriculum standards, which is sure to trigger arguments over sex education.

State representative Donna Howard held on by .03 percent, which is 15 votes. She must still survive a recount. Hubert Vo was in trouble early in the evening but pulled ahead late. Nationally, in California Jerry Brown and Barbara Boxer held the line, and Harry Reid turned back Sharron Angle somewhat easier than anyone thought.

The Bad: where to begin? National results turned out almost as predicted, with Speaker Boehner, and a Senate Tea Party caucus of Rand Paul and Marco Rubio and Pat Toomey and a few other loons trying to take over for Mitch McConnell. Chet Edwards and Ciro Rodriguez and even Solomon Ortiz -- though those last two may go to run-off -- fall out of the Congress. The Texas statewide results keep the sixteen-year undefeated streak alive for Republicans. Anger at incumbents? What's that?

A couple of Senate seats nearly won by the Democrats -- Pennsylvania and Illinois -- were lost to the GOP late in the evening.

The Ugly: Harris County was a bloodbath of straight ticket Republican voting. The GOP amassed almost a 50,000-vote lead across the board that no one could overcome: not respected Democratic incumbents District Clerk Loren Jackson, Judge Dion Ramos, nor Commissioner Sylvia Garcia.

Texas Dems lost almost two dozen seats in the statehouse. The worst of it included caucus leader Jim Dunnam, Houston reps Kristi Thibaut and Ellen Cohen, Austin-area incumbents Patrick Rose, Valinda Bolton, Diana Maldonado, El Paso's Joe Moody, Plainview's Joe Heflin, Dallas-area legislators Paula Pierson, Chris Turner, Robert Miklos, Carol Kent, Kirk England, and Allen Vaught, and East Texans Mark Homer, David Leibowitz, and Jim McReynolds.

Solomon Ortiz Jr., Abel Herrero, and Yvonne Gonzalez-Toureilles in South Texas also went down. What does that tell you about Democratic turnout?

And Justice Linda Yanez also lost her race to retain her 13th Court of Appeals seat, 50.8 - 49.1. There will many stones thrown at the Hispanic communities statewide for letting so many of their incumbents get defeated.

If you need to know more, you know Kuffner always does this better than me. The Trib also looks ahead to a Speaker's contest and some of the redistricting and legislative challenges.

Update: Harold Cook ...

The (state's) Republicans have an additional challenge - redistricting. They can't protect them all, there aren't enough reliable Republican voters Texas to draw into that many districts. Their first order of business will be to figure out who to throw over the side. Their caucuses will get ugly in a hurry.

Republicans made historic gains only two years after suffering historic losses. Voters across America aren't attracted to either political Party in current-day politics - they're merely repelled by the latest thing that the Party in power does.

Democrats in Texas should remain constructive, but they should be very clear who they answer to: the constituents packed into their districts back in 2001, who are about to be the biggest victims of historic budget cuts in the history of the state.

Good luck governing, Republicans. You're going to need it.

Update: Heh.

Bennet has just taken the lead in Colorado. And with just Boulder (deep Blue) and a sliver of El Paso County (Colorado Springs) left to report (and maybe Arapahoe, though that looks like another AP glitch), this one stays Blue.

So thanks Teabaggers! Thanks to your efforts, we got to keep seats in Colorado, Nevada, and Delaware.

Thanks to your efforts, we'll have a 53-47 Senate, rather than a 50-50 one.

Heckuva job rescuing the Democrats from themselves!

New day, new look

Tell me what you think in the comments.

We'll have some response to today's developments in the morning.

Breitbart removed from ABC's panel

This flash news ...

ABC News sends over the letter that Andrew Morse, the chief of their digital division, has sent to Andrew Breitbart, pulling the plug on their much-discussed, widely-parsed-over invitation for him to join in their election night coverage:

Dear Mr. Breitbart,
We have spent the past several days trying to make clear to you your limited role as a participant in our digital town hall to be streamed on ABCNews.com and Facebook. The post on your blog last Friday created a widespread impression that you would be analyzing the election on ABC News. We made it as clear as possible as quickly as possible that you had been invited along with numerous others to participate in our digital town hall. Instead of clarifying your role, you posted a blog on Sunday evening in which you continued to claim a bigger role in our coverage. As we are still unable to agree on your role, we feel it best for you not to participate.
Sincerely,
Andrew Morse

Cue up conservative sh*tstorm...

It sure doesn't take long for this dude to get stale, does it?

Post-Halloween, Pre-Election Day Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is ready for Election Day as it brings you this week's blog roundup.

Off the Kuff takes a look ahead at redistricting.

Letters From Texas pointed out a low-down dirty Republican plot to cheat African-American voters out of casting their ballots, then turned around and did the same thing to voters casting ballots for Republicans, Libertarians, and Greens.

WCNews at Eye On Williamson notes that while most Texans know our our state needs investment in our people -- like education and infrastructure -- instead we will get the GOP's planned austerity, which will irrevocably harm Texas.

South Texas Chisme offers kudos to Hidalgo County Texas Democratic Women, the Stonewall Democrats and the new County chair for the big turnout!

Phillip Martin at Burnt Orange Report reminds everyone about what is at stake on Tuesday with a lot of posts he's put in one place: Rick Perry's Cover-Up and Corruption: A Ten Part Series.

The revealing of Todd Staples's slimy pyramid scheme was only the latest devastating hit the incumbent agriculture commissioner has taken during the 2010 election campaign. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs exposed the corruption.

nytexan at BlueBloggin looks at The Constitutional Ignorance of the Tea Party. As we have all come to learn, the Tea Party's candidates and their supporters are extremely ignorant of the document they want to restore: the U.S. Constitution. Let's not fool ourselves and think that the Tea Party and the wing nuts just stumbled upon their ignorance; its been in full bloom since Bush began stripping the Bill of Rights. It didn't seem to bother them because it was the Patriotic thing to do.

The newest scandal to rock a Republican elected? It's all about a pyramid scheme and Todd Staples.

Neil at Texas Liberal made an effort with a variety of posts over the past week to encourage folks to vote in Houston, Harris County, Texas, and the nation. That's all one can do. Let's get past Tuesday and move ahead to a better day. Thanks for reading Texas Liberal and all TPA blogs. There are hopeful days ahead and we'll keep fighting.

Sunday Sanity Somewhat Restored Funnies

This week's King Street Thugs update

-- Rep. Borris Miles had an altercation with the True the Vote criminals at the EV poll in Sunnyside.

... Miles said he was there in the first place because a constituent had called to complain about intimidation by poll watchers, including an incident in which a poll watcher bumped a voter. Miles said he spent two hours at the Sunnyside Multi-Purpose Center, 4605 Wilmington, but stayed near the reception desk perhaps 150 yards from the voting machines.

Miles said he witnessed poll watchers speaking to voters, looking over their shoulders as they voted, and walking among the voting machines. He summed up what he saw as: "The Republican/tea party poll watchers that are there intimidating, and the Republican precinct judge allowing it to happen."

-- Sunnyside and Moody Park also saw this flyer distributed.

Miya Shay again with the report:



And more from Isiah Carey:



jobsanger and Juanita Jean have more.

-- Both sides requested the USDOJ send election monitors to Houston next Tuesday.  From Cong. Sheila Jackson Lee's letter to US Attorney General Eric Holder:

"Although there are usually a few isolated occurrences of voter intimidation during the election season, the incidents that took place at polling stations earlier this week appeared to be both organized and systematic. Poll watchers have been reportedly over-stepping the boundaries between observing and interacting in the democratic process by hovering directly behind voters as they entered their votes. The group thought to be behind these acts is known as the King Street Patriots, reportedly tied to some Tea Party activists. The King Street Patriots have deployed poll watchers around the city as they implement their “True the Vote” campaign."

-- County attorney Vince Ryan issued Election Day directives for poll watchers and election judges. From Kronberg:

The first opinion (both links .pdf) says that election officials may "designate lines on the floor to protect voters from poll watcher intrusion."

The second opinion prohibits cell phones, cameras and wifi enabled computers within 100 feet of a polling station.

Electronic devices have ALWAYS been verboten inside the poll, but a King Street Thug poll watcher was observed wearing a 35mm camera around his neck at the Fiesta Mart EV location this week, in clear violation of the Texas Election Code but apparently ignored by the election judge there.

-- The King Street Thugs surrendered some of their paperwork, but it doesn't clear up the mystery of their funding: large, anonymous GOP donors.

The $15,000 hat

Though acknowledging the receipt of over $80,000, the King Street extremists refuse to disclose who contributed the money. Incredibly, the group contends that the funds were raised by “passing the hat” at their meetings.

To put this outrageous claim into perspective, it would take 1,600 people contributing $50 each to raise $80,000 while a group of 400 people would have to contribute an average of $200 each.  According to activist participants, the King Street extremists' meeting space could barely hold 200 people, yet they claim to have raised as much as $15,000 at a single meeting simply by “passing the hat.”

More at Off the Kuff.

-- Lastly, the KS Thugs, Karl Rove, and the US Chamber of Commerce are essentially acting as if Citizens United is settled law.

As a nonprofit 501(c)4 corporation, King Street Patriots (KSP) should be allowed to engage in electioneering without disclosing donors or registering as a political committee, and Texas laws to the contrary are unconstitutional, said the Indiana attorney who put together the pivotal U.S. Supreme Court Citizens United campaign finance case. He placed the burden of enforcing regulations squarely on the Internal Revenue Service.

“(KSP opponents) are trying use Texas law to shut up their opponents, to throw them in jail for talking about issues,” said James Bopp Jr., general counsel for the James Madison Center for Free Speech.

Houston tea party spinoff KSP and its 501(c)3 initiative KSP/True the Vote are the subjects of a state ethics complaint by nonprofit Texans for Public Justice and a lawsuit by the Texas Democratic Party, both alleging KSP has broken state prohibitions against corporate campaign contributions — and that it should be registered as a state political committee and have to reveal its donors’ identities.

“The Supreme Court has consistently held that you cannot require an organization to be a PAC unless its major purpose is to be involved in elections. A c4 lobby group’s primary purpose is to educate and lobby, rather than participate in elections,” Bopp said. “Otherwise the IRS wouldn’t let it be a c4. They would say it’s a 527.”

[...]

Bopp, who’s currently challenging campaign laws in at least a dozen other states, said it’s clear to him that Texas laws run afoul of the First Amendment when they require 501(c)4 nonprofit corporations to register separate political committees to report coordinated campaign expenditures.

[...]

Basically, the Citizens United decision enabled corporate entities to spend unlimited money advocating for or against political candidates, as long as they don’t coordinate those expenditures with the campaigns. While the ruling did not address in-kind donations, such as hosting one-sided candidate forums, the case may have cleared the way for further challenges to remaining restrictions on corporate political contributions.

“Particularly now that the last barrier on many independent expenditures has been lifted by Citizens United — it was the last one in a chain — there will be a lot more attention paid to exactly what constitutes a coordinated expenditure,” said Justin Levitt, associate professor of law at Loyola School of Law.

In Bopp’s reasoning, the underlying assumption is that KSP is abiding by federal regulations on 501(c)4 nonprofits — namely that the organization’s primary purpose is not electioneering, generally interpreted as meaning the organization spends less than 50 percent of its resources trying to influence election outcomes for or against particular candidates.

As with national Democratic allegations concerning the Karl Rove-linked American Crossroads GPS, also a 501(c)4, the responsibility for discovering whether KSP is devoting the majority of its funds to electioneering would belong to the IRS, whose investigations are generally not very swift or public. There are also questions about how to measure the percent of an organization’s political activity.

It's not settled law, of course, but as long as you have Republicans in Congress and on the Supreme Court, it will be difficult to impossible to change.

That's all the information you should need not to EVER cast a vote for ANY Republican running for ANY office.

Patrick uses Tea P to clean up his ICRoT

Dan Patrick has never observed an ultra-conservative movement he wouldn't try to get ahead of.

Sen. Dan Patrick -- the Houston Republican who earlier announced the founding of the Independent Conservative Republicans of Texas to reach out to Tea Party activists and independents -- now says he's joining with other lawmakers to create the Tea Party Caucus.

"The Tea Party has played an important role this year and I want to be sure their voices are heard in Austin long after next Tuesday," Patrick said in a press release. "The power of the Tea Party beyond election day is to hold those elected accountable for a conservative voting agenda."

Patrick's office in its release said the Tea Party caucus will meet with leaders of that movement and build support for "important conservative legislation" in the coming session.

It said continued membership in the caucus will be based on whether lawmakers support key Tea Party issues, sign the Texas Conservative Coalition Pledge and keep "a conservative voting record that is in line with the coalition's annual report card."

Patrick said several lawmakers already have agreed to serve on the caucus board and he'll invite others to join the caucus over the next two months.

Patrick's obsequiousness is so obvious that even Big Fat Dumbass Jolly can see through it. Via Neil, who is once again much more polite than me.

Too funny to wait for Sunday

Yes We Cannabis

Maybe? Possibly? Kevin Drum at Mother Jones:

Via Mark Kleiman, here's an interesting poll result for Proposition 19, the initiative to legalize marijuana cultivation and sale in California. It comes from the pro-19 forces, and I don't have any independent way of knowing how reliable it is, but it shows that standard polling has Prop 19 losing 46%-41%, while automated polling shows it winning 56%-41%.

Take this for what it's worth. I'm basically skeptical that Prop 19 will pass, and I have my doubts that there's really such a large number of people who are afraid to express support for Prop 19 to a live interviewer. Supporting pot legalization isn't really a huge stigma in California, after all. Still, it's interesting if it's legit. We'll find out a week from Tuesday.

People lie to pollsters? Really? And from the Kleiman post ...

One of the yes-on-19 groups did a split-sample poll, with some respondents answering a live interviewer and others punching keypad buttons. The results (assuming the poll is being reported accurately) suggests that live polling may be noticeably under-estimating support for the proposition: the fact that the demographics of the two subsamples match closely makes me a tentative believer. With virtually every politician and newspaper in the state denouncing Prop. 19, it wouldn’t be surprising if some people were reluctant to express their disagreement (and risk being thought of as potheads).

Moreover, support for Prop. 19 declines sharply with age; the under-30s are overwhelmingly for it. They’re also much more likely than their elders to have cell phones only and therefore be missed by most polling, which calls only land-lines.

So this could still go either way. The InTrade market, which showed the proposition favored as recently as a week ago, now gives it one chance in three of passing. At those odds, I’m not taking either end of the bet. It may come down to whether the “amotivational syndrome” some drug-prevention folks have tried to attribute to cannabis applies to voting.

I think this observation in the polling is quite hilarious. I have no idea whether the referendum passes or fails, but it's certainly drawing a certain bloc of voters to the polls in California who don't seem likely to vote Republican.

Todd Staples' slimy pyramid scheme

Even compared to the vast corruption of Rick Perry, the incumbent agriculture commissioner occasionally manages to one-up the Eagle Scout/Aggie yell leader.

A criminal case from the mid-1990s refers to an "endless chain scheme" called the Friends Gifting Network (or the "Friends Gift Network" or  "Friends Network" or "Friends Helping Friends", and a variety of similar names).

In 1994, Todd Staples participated in this pyramid scheme and had family (his brother-in-law) participating in it. A criminal complaint was filed in Anderson County -- the seat is Palestine, Staples' hometown -- and Staples' brother-in-law was arrested and charged. The Palestine city attorney followed up by requesting help from the Anderson County district attorney for assistance in investigating the illegal pyramid scheme. (Staples is between elected-official jobs at this time; he has previously served on the Palestine city council, and for the years 1990 and '91 as mayor pro tem.)

This document reveals that the case was put on "hold" in 1994 and then dismissed in '96.

The case was dismissed because Todd Staples -- who was elected state representative in a special election to fill a vacancy in 1995 -- voted in favor of legislation that legalized the crime for which his brother-in-law was charged. This had the added benefit, of course, of making it impossible for Staples himself to ever face any charges or even be questioned in detail about the matter by a prosecutor, or the media.

But Staples wasn't finished. From the press release:

Staples and others managed to escape prosecution for their participation in the illegal enterprise, and court records reveal that Staples and Jeff Herrington, the Anderson County DA at the time, worked in concert to get the officer that investigated the scheme and arrested Staples’ brother-in-law removed from his job. At the time, the same police officer who investigated Staples’ brother-in-law was raising serious questions concerning why Herrington and his office received an unauthorized share of federal drug forfeiture funds. Additionally, a member of Herrington's staff had been implicated along with Staples in the pyramid scheme.

You read it right. Staples exacted revenge on the officer who investigated the case, Commander Jerry Powell of the Texas DPS, by colluding with DA Herrington to remove Powell from his post.

According to additional court records, shortly thereafter, Staples became involved in a series of events leading to the removal of a narcotics officer who arrested his brother-in-law and was the lead officer investigating the Friend’s Gifting Network.

Court records show that Staples’ facilitated meetings with the head of the Texas Department of Public Safety at the behest of, among others, the same Anderson County District Attorney whose staff member was involved in the pyramid scheme, in order to discuss removal of the police officer.

Court filings also show that, were the word of Staples’ high-level participation in the Friend’s Gifting Network become publicly known prior to the 1995 special election to replace State Rep. Elton Bomer, it would have likely ended Staples’ political career. The same court filings show that Staples’ assistance to the District Attorney came at a time when he and his office were accused of receiving an unauthorized share of funds seized during a federal narcotics investigation. The same police officer who arrested Staples’ brother-in-law had initiated inquiries to determine why the DA’s office had received this share of funding.

This document contains a transcript of an undercover phone call regarding Friends Gifting Network; these documents show Staples' rise to "vice-president" in the Friends Network pyramid scheme and contain the police case file on Staples' brother-in-law. This document is the transcript of the arrest in which Staples' brother-in-law helps entice the undercover police officer to participate in the pyramid scheme.

Finally, these documents contain the response to Staples' Motion for Summary Judgment, and the Affidavit of Plaintiff talks about Staples' motivation, mentioning the case's potential for damaging his budding political career.

Let's review: Todd Staples participated in an illegal pyramid scheme which bilked hundreds of East Texans out of thousands of dollars. The crime was investigated and his accomplice brother-in-law charged. Staples went on to be elected to the Texas Legislature, where he voted in favor of a bill which made illegal pyramid schemes legal, exonerating his brother-in-law in the process. Staples then conducted a personal vendetta against the investigating officer of the case.

All so as not to damage his future political viability. Because as all Texans are aware, you never know when the agriculture commissioner might one day become the longest-serving governor in the history of Texas.

Do we want to really reward this slimeball with re-election? No, we don't.

We want a new Commissioner of Agriculture (whose greatest crime, it should be noted, happens to be not wearing his seatbelt, and working out a payment plan with the IRS).

Update: Read this Dallas Morning News story and don't miss reading the comments.

The House may be lost

Some additional insights here from electoral-vote.com worth knowing.

Long-time political observer Charlie Cook is predicting the Republicans are likely to win 198 seats in the House, with another 47 being tossups. If the Republicans win even half of these, that gives them the majority. But in wave elections most of the tossups go the same way, so the odds of the Republicans winning 30 or more of the tossups are reasonably good. Cook's best guess is that they will pick up something in the range of 48 to 60 seats. This would put this election on a par with 1994, when they picked up 52 seats in the House.

In the Senate, he is predicting a Republican gain of about 8 or 9 seats. If that happens, all eyes will be on Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) to see if they jump ship. However, both of them are keenly aware of what happened to Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) when he did just that: he was defeated in a primary. Both of these could expect nasty primary fights if they became Republicans, especially if it were to save their own skins rather than out of some deep-seated convictions that have been rather absent until now. Nelson has to worry about the fact that Nebraska is full of Republican politicians who would primary him with the slogan "vote for a real Republican." If he decided to switch, his real battle would be the primary--where only Republicans can vote--rather than the general election, where Democrats can, too. Lieberman is so unpopular and unpredictable that anything is possible with him, but he has nothing in common with Jim DeMint and even less with Rand Paul and Sharron Angle, so he is likely to continue to caucus with the Democrats.

If the Republicans capture the House, as Cook, Nate Silver, and other close observers predict, the new Speaker of the House is virtually certain to be Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) (which he prefers to pronounce "Bayner" rather than "Boner" or "Booner"). Boehner has an everpresent deep tan and smokes two or three packs of cigarettes a day. The Washington Post has a long profile of him today.

Boehner has a strange history within the caucus. He was one of the authors of the Republicans' "Contract with America" that propelled them to victory in 1994. But in 1998, he was booted out of his leadership position, only to be elected majority leader in 2006. He is more of a back-room wheeler-dealer type person than an "ideas" man, as former Speaker Newt Gingrich fancied himself. Still, if the Republicans have a small majority starting in January, he is going to need all his people skills to rein in the fractious tea partiers intent on changing Washington the moment they arrive. It is likely that the tea partiers will form their own coalition. If they get more members than the Republicans' majority, they get a de facto veto on everything he does, much as the Blue Dogs have with the Democrats. However, since the brunt of the voters' wrath is going to fall on the Blue Dogs next Tuesday, the Democratic caucus is going to move to the left, and with the tea party members of his own caucus pulling him to the right ... he is not likely to accomplish much.

If Boehner moves up, the other Republican leaders will move up. Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA), the only Jewish Republican in Congress, is likely to become majority leader and Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) would then become whip. Boehner is not very close to either of these -- just as current Speaker Nancy Pelosi doesn't especially care for her #2, Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD). Boehner tends to hang with some of the rank-and-file Republicans, especially Rep. Tom Latham (R-IA). Boehner lives in a basement apartment he rents from one of his many lobbyist friends. His wife, Deborah, lives in Ohio.

The Weekly GOTV Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance hopes you all have voted or will be voting soon as it brings you this week's blog roundup.

This week at McBlogger, we take a look at the increasingly desperate campaign being run by Todd Staples. Last Friday they attempted to eavesdrop on an internal Gilbert campaign conference call, if that tells you much. You simply won't believe the rest...

Letters From Texas spent most of the week pointing to Republican efforts to scapegoat and alienate minorities, first pointing out both Parties' failure to communicate effectively with Hispanic voters, then pointing out Republicans' blatant attempts to prevent them from voting, and showing that they'd planned to do it in Texas too. Most shocking, however, was the release of a photo of the most disturbing political sign in Texas.

Off the Kuff published his last interview of this cycle, with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bill White.

Bay Area Houston would vote for Proposition 1 in Houston if....

Ever wonder why republicans have gotten so batsh*t crazy? CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme thinks they're locked inside their own tiny, tiny minds.

The news of the week in Harris County spread all across the country: well-fed Caucasian conservatives are going places they've never gone before -- minority early voting polling locations -- and doing their damndest to keep as few of 'those people' from casting a ballot as possible. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs kept the story up to date.

WCNews at Eye On Williamson shows the choice for governor comes down to this very simple issue: We must end Perry's unprecedented time as governor - he's been in office too long.

Martha Griffin at musings has questions about Prop 1 on the ballot in Houston. Why the lack of details about the plan and where is the political muscle to get this passed?

BossKitty at TruthHugger just decided to vent about the direction this election is trying to take the country ... with me in it: Federal Government in the crosshairs – OpEd.

Public Citizen is getting into the fray over early voting and intimidation activities across the state, with a press release and conference Monday afternoon in Houston with the League of Women Voters and a blog over at TexasVox. Keep watching for more coverage as this story continues to develop.

Len Hart at BlueBloggin looks at A Party of Panic and Depression, the Republican world of economics, death and destruction, K-Street and war. The administration of Ronald Reagan ushered in a depression of some two years, a contraction of the economy, and a transfer of wealth upward to the upper quintile, the nation’s richest 20 percent. A windfall of this nature is not stimulus to invest but rather to transfer the gains offshore.

Lightseeker at TexasKaos reports that according to a recent Gallup poll, Latinos, Asians, Native Americans... basically our non-white/non-black population... are going to vote for the Republicans in this election by a 52%-42% margin. Turns out that polling on this mid-term election has some serious problems. There is more at The Polls are Off and Nobody Knows by How Much!

Neil at Texas Liberal offered his election endorsements for Texas in 2010. And as a long-time former resident of the Buckeye State, he also made endorsements for Ohio.

The finish line in sight

When even poor ol' Karl-Thomas is down in the dumps over the polling, you know there's some gloomy Guses out there. But leave it to Kuffner to destroy that stubborn inevitability meme again. Only fools and Republicans -- there's a difference? -- believe it anyway. Look what the Texas Democratic statewides are doing:

-- Hank Gilbert is working West Texas hard in the closing days before the election.

Gilbert will meet and greet voters in Amarillo, Clyde, Panhandle, Pampa, Canadian, Perryton, Dalhart, Dumas, Stinnett, Fritch, Borger, Canyon, Tulia, Levelland, and Midland.

What, no Plainview?! These are not the kind of Texas towns in which a Democratic candidate usually spends the week before Election Day getting out the vote. But Gilbert has won over many Republicans and Tea Partiers in his campaign this year, and he's going fishin' where they're bitin'.

Update: jobsanger has photos from Amarillo yesterday.

-- Barbara Radnofsky kicks Greg Abbott in the pants again...



As she pointed out in her debate with the suddenly-proud-he's-wheelchair-bound attorney general, the amount of money the Wall Street banksters cost Texans comes pretty close to equaling the amount of money the state budget is lacking.

So even though the governor won't acknowledge the budget deficit, why aren't Perry and Abbott trying to recoup those billions? Because it would anger their fat cat donors, that's why. Perry's already been exposed for having pushed TRS trustees to invest in his cronies' companies, an investigation into which was essentially whitewashed. Harvey Kronberg had more on the curious case of Roel Campos last Friday:

Earlier this week, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bill White released a whistleblower memo reporting that the Perry appointed Teacher Retirement System board reversed staff investment recommendations which benefitted the Governor’s campaign contributors.

The Governor’s office responded to Dallas Morning News' Wayne Slater: "This matter was brought up over two years ago. TRS had an outside lawyer review the facts and they said they had no merit or such, the matter was then turned over to the state auditor's office and they took no action."

Of course, the identity of “outside lawyer” proved to be a entirely separate issue of bad judgment on its own. Roel Campos of Cooley Godward Kronish LLP was the attorney that issued the report that ignored most of the substantive issues raised by the whistleblower and essentially reported that bosses get to over rule staff.

Our colleague Paul Burka called the report “pablum” and he may have been too gentle.

But the real question is how did someone with Campos’ resume’ ever get close to TRS and not once, but twice?

There is more to the story of Roel Campos and the Teacher Retirement System.

-- Speaking of the governor, he's lying again.



Border security is the signature hot button issue with the freak right. But Perry is demagogueing it by repeating the same "sanctuary city" BS his base keeps mumbling.

-- Bill Clinton is in Brownsville today rallying voters.

There's more, but you get the picture. This year's election results are still a cake in the oven.

MoDo is making me ill again

It's just too early in the morning to be this nauseous. Two excerpts I can manage to keep down:

It’s too late to relitigate the shameful Thomas-Hill hearings. We’re stuck with a justice-for-life who lied his way onto the bench with the help of bullying Republicans and cowed Democrats.

... and ...

The 5-to-4 Citizens United decision last January gave corporations, foreign contributors, unions, Big Energy, Big Oil and superrich conservatives a green light to surreptitiously funnel in as much money as they want, whenever they want to elect or unelect candidates. As if that weren’t enough to breed corruption, Thomas was the only justice — in a rare case of detaching his hip from Antonin Scalia’s — to write a separate opinion calling for an end to donor disclosures.

In Bush v. Gore, the Supreme Court chose the Republican president. In Citizens United, the court may return Republicans to control of Congress. So much for conservatives’ professed disdain of judicial activism. And so much for the public’s long-held trust in the impartiality of the nation’s highest court.

Justice Stephen Breyer recently rejected the image of the high court as “nine junior varsity politicians.” But it’s even worse than that. The court has gone beyond mere politicization. Its liberals are moderate and reasonable, while the conservatives are dug in, guzzling Tea.

And if you want more of this, vote Republican.

Sunday Evening Funnies

Rangers and Giants in the World Series

Here's a good story about how the American League champions turned things around and got to the Fall Classic.

Wearily, Nolan Ryan plopped down in the Rangers Ballpark press box dining area, covered his face with both hands and rubbed. It didn't help.

On this Thursday, July 8 evening, he scarcely touched his tuna salad and cantaloupe. Glumly, he described his day in bankruptcy proceedings and the previous day's hospital visit to a fan who had tumbled from the stands.

The rock-like Rangers president and Hall of Fame pitcher who KO'd a record 5,714 batters and pummeled Robin Ventura's face seemed – gasp – defeated.

"This just isn't a whole lot of fun right now," Ryan said.

Thus began the most pivotal 24 hours in Rangers history. There was no hint that half-century-old dark clouds were about to disperse, that this luckless and literally broke franchise would unearth a diamond rabbit's foot:

Cliff Lee.

With Texas now in the World Series, its heist of star pitcher Lee from the New York Yankees' greedy clutches is the Cliff-hanger moment of a Hollywood-esque story.

Without Lee, there would be no feel-good plot about the manager who tested positive for cocaine use but, given a second chance, guided Texas to its first American League pennant – 78 days after the franchise was auctioned in federal bankruptcy court.

It was Lee who twice beat Tampa Bay in the American League Divisional Series, including in the decisive Game 5. It was Lee who earned Texas' first playoff victory in Yankee Stadium – fittingly, against the team that nearly acquired him from Seattle in July.

And it will be Lee who starts Game 1 of the World Series on Wednesday night.

There's also the renaissance of Josh Hamilton, who beat his addiction demons to come all the way back to MVP for the ALCS, and the team celebrated (again) by showering him with ginger ale and not champagne. However I still feel like a National League guy, despite the storyline and the bandwagon effect, and not just because Vlad Guerrero has to play in the field.

I feel kinda bad for Roy Oswalt and Lance Berkman, who once again will be watching it on teevee like the rest of us.

I'll say it will be a classic seven-game series with the Giants prevailing. But I won't be unhappy -- or jealous -- at all if the Rangers get it done.

Update: On the other hand, this could give Texas a significant advantage.

Sunday Funnies

Koch Suckers

It's been making news elsewhere, I'm just playing catch-up here.



Via Palingates, the ThinkProgress reveal:

In 2006, Koch Industries owner Charles Koch revealed to the Wall Street Journal’s Stephen Moore that he coordinates the funding of the conservative infrastructure of front groups, political campaigns, think tanks, media outlets and other anti-government efforts through a twice annual meeting of wealthy right-wing donors. He also confided to Moore, who is funded through several of Koch’s ventures, that his true goal is to strengthen the “culture of prosperity” by eliminating “90%” of all laws and government regulations.

Ninety percent of all? Hmmm.

ThinkProgress has obtained a memo outlining the details of the last Koch gathering held in June of this year. The memo, along with an attendee list of about 210 people, shows the titans of industry — from health insurance companies, oil executives, Wall Street investors, and real estate tycoons — working together with conservative journalists and Republican operatives to plan the 2010 election, as well as ongoing conservative efforts through 2012. According to the memo, David Chavern, the number two at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Fox News hate-talker Glenn Beck also met with these representatives of the corporate elite. In an election season with the most undisclosed secret corporate giving since the Watergate-era, the memo sheds light on the symbiotic relationship between extremely profitable, multi-billion dollar corporations and much of the conservative infrastructure. The memo describes the prospective corporate donors as “investors,” and it makes clear that many of the Republican operatives managing shadowy, undisclosed fronts running attack ads against Democrats were involved in the Koch’s election-planning event ...

More from Salon:

According to that document, the Palm Springs meeting attracted such corporate and financial titans as Stephen Schwartzman of the Blackstone Group, Philip Anschutz of Anschutz Industries, and Steve Bechtel of Bechtel Corp., as well as representatives of Bank of America, Allied Capital, Citadel Investment, among many others – all of whom gathered to learn how to “elect leaders who are more strongly committed to liberty and prosperity” with a “strategic plan to educate voters on the importance of economic freedom.”

More from HuffPo:

(T)he New York Times reported that an upcoming meeting in Palm Springs of "a secretive network of Republican donors" that was being organized by Koch Industries, "the longtime underwriter of libertarian causes." Buried in the third to last graph was a note that previous guests at such meetings included Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, two of the more conservative members of the bench.

And from that article in the NYT, more on the inclusion of Supreme Court Justices Thomas and Scalia in the conspiracy:

To encourage new participants, Mr. Koch offers to waive the $1,500 registration fee. And he notes that previous guests have included Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas of the Supreme Court, Gov. Haley Barbour and Gov. Bobby Jindal, Senators Jim DeMint and Tom Coburn, and Representatives Mike Pence, Tom Price and Paul D. Ryan.

Of course "some say" there is nothing wrong with this sort of thing at all. Nothing illegal or unethical at all about people with similar interests gathering together to discuss ways to affect political change.

Why it's the same thing as when, say, the Harris County Democrats have a rally over a dinner, or a blockwalk followed by a fish fry. Except without the Supreme Court justices or the captains of industry. Or their money.