Friday, November 27, 2015

Aldous Huxley vs. George Orwell: Who got it right?


And perhaps both of them got it right.  You know... market-based totalitarianism.  Here's more if you want to dive a little deeper.  It's lengthy, so be mindful of your 'almost infinite appetite for distractions'.

Thursday, November 26, 2015

More turkeys and more toons

Happy Thanksgiving!


Texas conservatives may finally have to admit that a bevy of lawsuits can't stop the Clean Power Plan before it goes into effect in 2018.  How sad for them.


Obama reminds certain governors -- *cough* Greg Abbott *cough* --  that they have no legal authority to refuse to take Syrian refugees.


Thanks to Erica Grieder at Texas Monthly for offering the perfect solution to our fears about a Donald Trump candidacy.


"Texas GOP in disarray as some leaders call for moving convention from LGBT-friendly Dallas"

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Some Texas Turkeys for the holiday


-- Texas SREC member wants secession on the primary ballot.  You go, girl:

A member of the executive committee for the Republican Party of Texas plans to introduce a resolution at the group's next meeting, which would add to the party's primary ballot a non-binding measure for Texas secession. Party leadership calls the prospect unlikely.

Tanya Robertson, State Republican Executive Committee member for Senate District 11, which covers parts of Harris, Galveston and Brazoria counties, said she'll present the resolution at the committee's December 4 meeting in Austin, and that she already has support from a few other members.

"There's been a big groundswell of Texans that are getting into the Texas independence issue," she said, citing conversations she's had with constituents. "I believe conservatives in Texas should have a choice to voice their opinion."

Yes they should.  Here's mine: you're a moron, Tanya.  I hope your resolution gets on your party's primary ballot, and I hope your fellow morons vote for it.  And then I want all you morons to take down your Stars and Stripes, burn your "USA" caps and shirts, and GTF out of my country.


-- I admire this lady's determination.  I just hope some conservative fool doesn't shoot her.

In the race to replace state Representative Scott Turner, a Collin County Republican, there’s one candidate who doesn’t have a prayer.

No Democrat running in this conservative stronghold has a clear path to the Legislature, really, but Cristin Padgett is going out on a limb to let voters know from the outset that she has “no religious affiliation or belief in a higher being.”

“I don’t want to make it a big deal, but I do want people to open up and think critically about it,” Padgett told the Observer. I had called to follow up on an email from her campaign bearing the subject line, “Will Texas Elect an Atheist?”

She said she wanted to get the question out of the way early in her campaign. “It’s going to be a concern for people,” she said. “People are afraid of what they don’t understand.”

Especially Texas Republicans (but also, sadly, too many Democrats).  There is some history for such a Quixotic undertaking here in Deep-In-The-Hearta.

Indeed, atheist campaigners who’ve gone before her have left some lonely footprints in the sand. Daniel Moran, an atheist college student who ran against state Representative Tan Parker last year — and who said he was Texas’ first openly atheist Lege candidate — didn’t crack 25 percent of the vote. Atheists were nothing but a punch line for Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller in his video holiday greeting last year. And last November, Austin City Council candidate Laura Pressley argued that because her opponent, Greg Casar, was an atheist, he was ineligible to run for office.

Pressley, who lost, was wrong about one thing: Casar isn’t godless, he’s Catholic. But she knew her Texas Constitution: Article I firmly bans “religious tests” for any elected official, “provided he acknowledge the existence of a Supreme Being.” It’s unenforceable, of course. Former Attorney General Jim Mattox agreed as much three decades ago, although it’s precisely the sort of molehill upon which today’s Texas leadership would love to plant their crosses.

I'm right there with her.  Hell, I'd have run for office years ago if I thought I wouldn't be assassinated for my atheism.  (Really and truly.)  Ms. Padgett has her appeal well articulated.

What’s more important to Padgett is that the constitutional ban on atheist officeholders — which also fails to imagine anyone but a man in elected office — is consistent with the way Texas politics tends to alienate young people today.

“Politicians such as Ted Cruz, Greg Abbott, they associate Texas values with ethnocentric beliefs,” Padgett said. “What happens to every other Texan who doesn’t agree with that? … It’s turning people off from the democratic process. We keep seeing the wrong people put into office by default. Not by choice, by default. And it’s sad to watch.”

In a periodic nationwide survey by the Pew Research Center, 2014 was the first time that, among self-identified Democrats, the religiously “unaffiliated” outnumbered Catholics, evangelicals, or any other faith group. Just half of millennials said they believe in the existence of God “with absolute certainty,” while for baby boomers and older Americans, the figure was 70 percent. To Padgett, such trends suggest that secularism won’t amount to sacrilege at the Capitol forever.

“Twenty-five percent of registered voters in my district are millennials,” Padgett says, “but the issue is that they don’t vote.” Her campaign website even includes “A Message to the Millennials.” She’s counting on luring those young folks to the polls to upset her primary opponent, retired Raytheon Program Director Karen Jacobs, who is more deeply entrenched in the Rockwall Democratic community — and then pulling off a miracle in November.

All the best to her.  The turkeys in this segment look like the good ol' boys in the photos above.  What you can't see in the pictures is that they have crapped their pants full several times in the past few years over things like Ebola, and Latino children coming across the southern border, and now, of course, Syrian refugees.

I'm doubtful an atheist can help the residents of Collin County see the light.  But thank the FSM she's giving it a try.

-- Erica Grieder at Texas Monthly, on Donald Trump:

In August, I noted that Republicans were “starting to get seriously nervous about their Trump problem, without fully understanding the nature of the problem, or its severity.” Donald Trump, at that point, was the frontrunner for the party’s presidential nomination, and had been for much of the summer. Many on the right were clearly inclined to disavow him—historically, Trump has not been a Republican, much less a conservative—and to dismiss his popularity as a mirage, a sort of sinister summer fling on the part of a cynical electorate with an appetite for political theater.

Now here we are in November, barely two months away from the Iowa caucuses, which will be held on February 1. Trump remains the frontrunner for the Republican nomination; his lead has actually grown since I wrote that ominous post in August. At this point, Americans on both sides of the aisle are starting to get nervous about Trump’s apparently durable popularity. “‘We’re potentially careening down this road of nominating somebody who frankly isn’t fit to be president in terms of the basic ability and temperament to do the job,’’ as one Republican strategist told the Washington Post’s Philip Rucker and Robert Costa earlier this month. And as he continued, Americans can’t take much comfort in the fact that a major party’s suboptimal presidential nominee will inevitably mitigated by the candidate chosen by the other: “What if Hillary hits a banana peel and this person becomes president?”

That's my concern.  Hillary's slipping on banana peels nearly every single day already.  Skipping to the end...

As I wrote in August, Trump’s defeat would only mean the end of America’s proximate problem. The underlying problem is that one of our two major parties is so receptive to someone so hateful, toxic, divisive and belligerent; Trump is only a symptom of that problem.

She's supposed to have a good news follow-up today.  I'll keep a watch out and update here when she does.  Update: Grieder says that Ted Cruz, obviously, is going to win the Republican nomination -- or at least the Iowa caucus, anyway -- and that will eliminate Trump and thus we'll all be better off.

I didn't think even Eric Grieder was this stupid until now.  Partisan and somewhat thick-headed, but not stone-cold stupid.  In the spirit of the holiday, I'm going to leave my analysis at that and let you just read her take.  It's kind of a disgrace what Texas Monthly has turned into, but I suppose they need all the Republican advertising dollars they can manage.

Enjoy your bird or your swine and all the carb-heavy trimmings tomorrow.

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

The P Slate for the runoff

I believe I have spent enough time on these to go ahead and release them now.  My list is much the same as the Tejano Dems with one exception: no endorsement in AL 5.  Sharon Moses missed it by a country mile; see below for the reason.

For Mayor, Houston: Sylvester Turner (can any Turner campaign people get me a yard sign, maybe a walk list for my two precincts?  Get in touch with me, please).

For Controller, Houston: Chris Brown.

For Houston City Council, District F: Richard Nguyen.  This incumbent needs the most help, and the Republicans will flip the seat if Democrats don't find enough Vietnamese-speaking campaign workers to turn out his vote.

For District H: Jason Cisneroz.  As mentioned before, I would prefer someone younger and more enthusiastic over someone who married into a Latino surname and is using Marc Campos as a consultant (scroll down to the end).  That guy has turned into a permanent deal-breaker for me.  No voy a votar por cualquiera de sus clientes. Nunca más.

For District J: Mike Laster.  One of the most valuable members needed back on Council.

For At Large 1: Georgia Provost.  She would be better than Mike Knox by a far cry, even if there aren't enough good reasons to elect her.  A 'hold-your-nose' pick.

For At Large 2: David Robinson.  CM Robinson needs to raise his profile a lot in order to avoid this runoff precariousness next time (if there is a next time).

For At Large 4: Amanda Edwards.  Your best choice anywhere on the ballot.  If you only voted in two citywide races -- the mayor's and this one -- your ballot would pass muster with me.

For At Large 5: NeitherHere's why I'm not voting for Moses.

For HISD Trustee, District II: Rhonda Skillern Jones.

For HISD Trustee, District III: Jose Leal.  Let's get rid of the homophobe on the board, folks.

As for predictions, the fate of many Democrats down the ballot turns on how well Turner's team gets out the vote.  This should especially be the case for candidates on the bubble, like Laster and Provost and Robinson and Moses, perhaps even Brown in the controller's race.  If Dems stay home, it could get really ugly.  I don't want to think about how ugly, either.

Early voting for the Saturday, December 12 runoff election begins on Wednesday, December 2nd (that's next week) and concludes on Tuesday, December 8.  It's already crunch time, folks.

Scattershooting World War III, and more important topics

-- "World War III" is trending again on Twitter (mostly because some dude has predicted apocalypse in June, and also because people are reTweeting 'WWIII is trending on Twitter').  But there is trouble:


I wonder if I have time to eat breakfast before we all go up in a flaming mushroom cloud.  Please be reminded, via Ted Rall, that everybody has the blood of innocent victims on their hands.

People in the West wonder where the Islamic State will strike next after the Paris attacks. Some commentators wonder aloud whether ISIS would strike a hospital, ignoring the irony that the U.S. blew up a hospital in Afghanistan recently.

-- While we wait for The End, Killer Mike had lunch yesterday with Bernie Sanders...


... and endorsed his candidacy for president at an Atlanta rally.   Egberto thinks it's a big deal, and certainly it is.  There's still a lot of ground to cover between now and, oh, Super Tuesday in March.... if you believe that the polling has not excluded a lot of millenials.

Maybe it has and maybe it hasn't.  If the polls get flipped on their ear by massive numbers of young and minority voters turning out for Sanders, then our political revolution may finally have arrived.

I'm still skeptimistic, but have a bit more hope today.

-- Worth repeating: Poor white voters aren't voting Republican; they're not voting at all.  First Draft with a little more (caustic) insight.

Nobody is talking to them. Nobody. I’m goddamn sick of hearing the condescending crap that poor white people vote against their own best interests. NO THEY DON’T. They don’t vote, period, because nobody has made them a priority. Not Republicans and not Democrats who are trying to act like Republicans, not for the last 40 years at least. Nobody has given a shit about these people since RFK and we’re gonna sit here and talk about how they’re just too dumb to know they’re going to get screwed? Thank you, no.

Where exactly are they supposed to get their information, by the way? If these people have been abandoned by politicians they’ve also been abandoned by news organizations that are supposed to be making a good faith effort to inform them. Who covers poor communities? I used to do it and I’ll tell you who does it: No one. Unless there’s a shooting, a convenient lesson to package up as a cautionary tale for scared rich suburbanites, no one covers the poorest communities in America. There’s no advertising to be sold there, no subscriptions, and certainly nobody there is signing up for the newest hyperlocal app, so fuck those places and those people, they don’t deserve the news.

This ignorance isn’t about anything other than we threw these people out and we get mad that they don’t care about what we care about. It’s nonsense. When is the last time a presidential candidate spoke to them? When is the last time a campaign put resources where it never had before and got poor people to vote? When is the last time anyone fought for them?

Democrats and/or Greens: this is your wakeup call.  Don't hit the snooze.

-- Five Republican presidential candidates will receive 60 minutes of equal time -- in exchange for Trump's SNL appearance -- during Black Friday weekend.  Via Ballot Access News and Rick Hasen, the blog linked in the excerpt below (and streamed via RSS feed into the right hand column).

Arizona's Politics is learning details on how NBC and its affiliates are giving equal time to five of Donald Trump's GOP presidential rivals, in response to his November 7 "Saturday Night Live" hosting gig. The requesting candidates -- none of whom are among those closest to him in the current polls -- will receive their 12 minutes of free airtime spread out in small chunks this coming Friday and Saturday.

A reliable source with knowledge tells Arizona's Politics that the time will be allocated on the NBC affiliates in the three earliest-voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. Each candidate will receive network commercial and promo time during primetime hours on "Black Friday" and Saturday, November 27 and 28, as well as during SNL on the 28th.

There are five settling candidates: Ohio Gov. John Kasich, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, former NY Gov. George Pataki, and former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore.

With each receiving slightly more than 12 minutes of unfiltered airtime, NBC's tab will run to approximately 120 30-second spots. No word yet on how the candidates will be using their 12:05.

Hilarious.  What will they do for Bobby Jindal, I wonder?  I suppose the front-runners will wait to get theirs later.  Update: More here, and indicating Pataki hasn't agreed to the terms, though NBC has offered the same settlement the other four took.  Which suggests the leading candidates -- and Jindal -- weren't part of the original complaint, and won't be granted any free airtime.

-- Fort Bend-area state representative and disgraced Democrat Ron Reynolds has been sentenced to a year in jail for soliciting legal clients via paid recruitment.  AKA ambulance-chasing.

According to the Houston Chronicle, which first reported the sentence, Reynolds was escorted out of the Montgomery County courtroom by deputies and taken to jail after jurors returned the sentence.

The charges stem from a 2013 sting that nabbed Reynolds, who was initially charged with felony barratry, and seven other Houston-area attorneys accused in an "ambulance chasing for hire" racket. According to prosecutors, the attorneys enjoyed the services of a four-time felon named Robert Ramirez Valdez, Sr., who would scour police reports for the names of accident victims and persuade them to sign on for legal representation. Prosecutors claimed that Valdez, who testified against Reynolds last week, was paid on average $1,000 per client referred to Reynolds' Bellaire law firm.

While the other attorneys accused of using Valdez, who's currently serving a five-year prison sentence for his part in the scheme, struck plea deals with prosecutors and avoided jail time, Reynolds insisted on taking his case to trial. He was convicted on six counts of misdemeanor barratry last year, but a judge tossed the conviction and ordered a retrial after a juror on the case claimed her decision was influenced by the fact that other attorneys had already admitted to being involved in the scheme. 

He's appealing.  Let's see if the voters in his district can get him replaced in the statehouse with someone who is less dumb and less corrupt.  Which is the same thing as saying 'not a Republican'.

-- "Why Turkey is So Awful, and How You Can Make It Better".  You still have time, Chef.

Monday, November 23, 2015

The Weekly Chill Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance wishes everyone -- including Syrian refugees -- a happy Thanksgiving as it brings you this week's roundup.


Off the Kuff looks at Rick Perry's day in court as he tries one more time to quash the indictments against him.

Libby Shaw, contributing to Daily Kos, says the Houston Chronicle's editorial board perfectly describes Greg Abbott's stand on Syrian immigrants: "Never one to hesitate when he sees an opportunity to pander to the nativists and the narrow-minded among us, Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday became one of 11 Republican governors (as of this writing) to declare his state would shut the door on Syrian refugees in the aftermath of the terrorist attack in Paris." Shaw writes Greg Abbott Brings Out the Worst in Texas. Again.

Stace at Dos Centavos offers a tribute to his uncle, Sheriff Jose Serna. Sheriff Serna was the first elected Mexican American sheriff in Zavala County.

There may be some lessons for Democrats to learn from Louisiana, where they elected a Democratic governor on Saturday, but PDiddie at Brains and Eggs suspects the biggest one is "Run the Bluest Dog you can find against the worst Republican you can find". And that's just a tired recipe for the same failed election results in Texas over the past twenty years.

SocraticGadfly appreciates the intent, but questions the wisdom of states making a state-by-state attempt at single-payer type national health care.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme doesn't understand why some Texas pastors go out of their way to spew hate.

Neil at All People Have Value said the value of everyday life is a good foundation for a broad movement demanding that our everyday work and relationships be given proper regard. APHV is part of NeilAquino.com.

TXsharon at BlueDaze says, "To Hell with your fracking indignation!"

Texas Leftist asks the right questions as to whether Houston needs a UT medical school.  (It does, but it seems to want one affiliated with the University of Houston.)

And John Coby at Bay Area Houston closes the casket lid on Chris Bell's political career.

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

Craig Malison writes that animal rights advocates would like you to skip the elephant rides at the Texas Renaissance Festival.

Grits for Breakfast calls for police disciplinary files to be opened.

At Burnt Orange Report, Rep. Lloyd Doggett tries to walk back his vote against Syrian refugees, where he and four other Texas Democrats voted with Republicans to block their entry into the US.

Juanita Jean goes biblical on Greg Abbott's shameless announcement blocking refuge to people from Syria, Robert Rivard notes that Abbott's decision is in contradiction to Catholic teaching and practice, and Paradise in Hell annotates our governor's surrender to the terrorists.

Haley Morrison says it is our American duty to show compassion to refugees.

The Texas Election Law Blog mocks the three-federal-judge panel for its refusal to act on the ongoing redistricting litigation.

Dallas City Council member Lee Kleinman touts his city's non-discrimination ordinance.

Mary Pustejovsky says no one should have to lose a loved one to an automobile accident.

Austin On Your Feet provides five lessons from the passage of a "granny flat" ordinance.

TFN Insider mentions the SBOE's defiance of fact-checkers for school textbooks.

Houston real estate blog Swamplot returns after hiatus, and is looking to ramp up with some additional reporters.

Last, Fascist Dyke Motors continues with her evolution as a Grim Reaper, but is thwarted to some degree by a date with the Crown Princess of Pareidolia.