Showing posts sorted by date for query Glenn Hegar. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by date for query Glenn Hegar. Sort by relevance Show all posts

Monday, July 29, 2019

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is busy popping corn for the debates this week.

Two North Texans took on new tasks this week.



A couple of legal matters were resolved last week: the Supreme Court ruled that Trump could defer funds earmarked for the Pentagon to build sections of his border wall.

The court’s five conservative justices gave the administration the green light on Friday to begin work on four contracts it has awarded using Defense Department money. Funding for the projects had been frozen by lower courts while a lawsuit over the money proceeded. The court’s four liberal justices (opposed). [...] The Supreme Court’s action reverses the decision of a trial court, which initially froze the funds in May, and an appeals court, which kept that freeze in place earlier this month. The freeze had prevented the government from tapping approximately $2.5 billion in Defense Department money to replace existing sections of barrier in Arizona, California and New Mexico with more robust fencing.


HPM brings news about the agreement between the parties in Harris County's bail lawsuit.

Harris County has reached a tentative settlement in its historic lawsuit over a bail system that put people in jail if they couldn’t afford to pay bail on misdemeanor offenses, like driving with a suspended license.

County Judge Lina Hidalgo announced the agreement Friday, signaling that people arrested on misdemeanor charges would no longer automatically be held in jail if they can’t pay bail. Most people with misdemeanor charges — about 85 percent — would be released on personal recognizance bonds, meaning they wouldn’t have to pay a bail bond.

The controversial system that pitted poor people against the justice system has been subject to a lawsuit since 2016 and a federal judge ruled it “unconstitutional” in 2017.

Harris County Commissioners Court is scheduled to vote on the agreement at their meeting Tuesday.

But some law issues are still outstanding: with an assist from the Fifth Circuit and the Supremes, Attorney General Ken Paxton -- working on a change of venue for his own trial -- may very well succeed in killing Obamacare, but the rest of our leaders have no plan for what happens if he does.

It’s a strange thing: One branch of Texas state government is leading a crusade that, if successful, will cause another branch serious problems. (Not just about access to health care -- Pogue notes that the ACA provides $5 billion in subsidies to poor Texans to purchase insurance, money the state is unlikely to be able to pony up on its own.) That branch is watching events unfold without preparing for it.

Meanwhile, without any apparent basis in reality, everyone involved is telling the public: Everything is under control.

And as Democratic presidential candidates prepare to debate their healthcare proposals, a few other medical and health-related developments remain of concern to Texans.



In Great State climate reporting, SocraticGadfly invites you to be Simon and Garfunkel and picture the sounds of silence that a truly Green, Green New Deal on climate change would bring.


Houston Public Media, in a follow-up account to the ITC fire which burned for several days, also noted that the disaster created millions of gallons of waste water.


David J. Phillip/AP
This March 18, 2019, photo shows firefighters battling the petrochemical fire at a facility owned by 
Intercontinental Terminals Company in Deer Park.

The cleanup of millions of gallons of waste and polluted water is far from over, four months after a large fire burned for days at a Houston-area petrochemical storage site.

The Houston Chronicle reports that Intercontinental Terminals Company (ITC), the facility’s owner, must abide by a 31-page management plan that underscores how waste is sampled and identified, stored, and discarded.

The March 17 fire at the company’s Deer Park site ... triggered air quality warnings. More than 21 million gallons of potentially hazardous waste and contaminated water have since been collected from the tank farm and the Houston Ship Channel.

The Harris County district attorney’s office filed water pollution charges in April against ITC, alleging the fire caused chemicals to flow into a nearby waterway.


And in politics and elections ...


More from TXElects on Pete Olson's hitting the eject button, while John Coby waves goodbye to his Congressman.  Kuff did that thing he does with campaign finance reports from the Congress critters, and Stephen Young at the Dallas Observer noticed how one-note the Republican response to the Democratic Senate candidates is.

There is some confusion about Proposition Four, the state income tax prohibition constitutional amendment that will be on our November ballot.  Ballotpedia helps straighten it out, and Better Texas Blog explains why a 'no' vote is the right vote.

In the Metroplex, Glenn Hegar brags about the economy.


In El Paso, a group of ministers takes action on the humanitarian crisis.


Houston schools remain a topic of worry for educators, parents, and students alike.


Some new old bones were found in Big Bend.


Last: The Rag Blog's Jonah Raskin eulogizes Paul Krassner, and invites you to help celebrate Thorne Dreyer's 74th birthday this Thursday.

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Monday, January 07, 2019

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Not-As-Progressive-As-It-Could-Be Alliance welcomes the Texas Legislature back to work this week, as the 86th Legislative Session opens under the pink dome tomorrow.


The Corpus Christi Caller lists a few things we can expect; Juan Carlos Huerta tells Texas Standard that he's seeing less far-right legislation being filed early.  The Dallas News wonders if lawmakers can deliver on a property tax cut.  The funding of public education and addressing a new goal, accepted by Governor Abbott, of providing Texans health care coverage that would eventually replace Obamacare, present enormous fiscal challenges for the biennium.

To that end, Better Texas Blog will cover state Comptroller Jethro Bodine Glenn Hegar's revenue estimate, scheduled for 10 a.m. this morning, as numbers and promises begin to come into focus.  Ross Ramsey at the TexTrib, via Progrexas, says that fortunately for the Lege, voters just aren't that into the state budget.  On more positive news, Grits for Breakfast sees prospects for marijuana decriminalization as quite bright.  (Forget about a potential tax revenue stream from cannabis legalization, however.)

After the governor attacked and threatened HISD in the wake of their turning down a partnership with a private entity to manage some of the district's legacy African American schools, Texas Vox came out in strong support of their decision not to charter public schools.

In the state's longest-running snarkathon -- predating the Internet by decades! -- Texas Monthly has 2018's Bum Steer Awards, their annual list of "humanity's most ridiculous and idiotic endeavors".  Alex Jones came in first (as if no one could have predicted that).


Texas Leftist kept us current on the #JazmineBarnes murder case with a couple of updates prior to the arrest of two suspects.

Daniel Williams shares his research on the effect of ballot length on voter turnout.

Off the Kuff took a closer look at how the candidates for Harris County offices *zzzzzzz* ...

Somervell County Salon provides an update on a local anti-SLAPP lawsuit that has won a second time at the Texas Supreme Court.

Continuing its focus on rural Texas, the Observer sees Panhandle towns that are thriving because of their immigrant populations.

Jim Schutze at the Dallas Observer thinks city council in Big D is getting it both right and wrong about poverty and crime.

San Antonio native Carol Burnett received a new Golden Globe, named after her, at last night's annual celebrity awards presentation for film and television, reports the Current.  The list of winners is here, courtesy Buzzfeed.

BeyondBones shares a piece of Houston TV history.

The Travel Channel's Andrew Zimmern returned to Houston to eat again at some of his favorite restaurants, including Chinatown's Crawfish and Noodles.  There he demonstrated an odd affinity for crunching on the mudbugs' heads.  There's video at CultureMap.

SocraticGadfly made a New Year's resolution for other people: stop reading self-help books and the late-stage capitalism they're predicated on.

Elise Hu presents her New Year's resolutions.

The Texas Living Waters Project has New Year's resolutions for all of us on water conservation.

Harry Hamid celebrates a few early milestones in the New Year.

David Collins' winter travel itinerary included Leakey, Castroville, Marfa, Terlingua, Kerrville, Fredericksburg, and Luckenbach.

The Texas Tribune's 2016 bio of Elizabeth Warren's decade in Texas made a reappearance as she announced her exploration for the 2020 Democratic nomination.

Maria Eugenia Guerra at LareDOS profiles Yến Bạch Nguyễn, among the first of the Vietnamese immigrants who came to South Texas in 1975, and the lives they built there.

And Texas Monthly saluted RG Ratcliffe, a Texas political legend for our time, on his retirement.  Sorry about what Trump is doing to your 401k, RG.
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Monday, September 17, 2018

The Texas Dems I'll be voting for


The National Rifle Association has endorsed the state's top law enforcement official, who because of his felony indictments cannot own any guns himself.  Ken Paxton is the nuttiest of gun nuts anyway, declaring after the shooting at the church in Sutherland Springs that if more parishioners had been packing, fewer of 'em would have been sent to Heaven early.

Ken Paxton -- and 19 other GOP state AGs -- are asking the federal courts to end the pre-existing conditions acceptability requirement for Obamacare.  Ken Paxton's ultimate goal is to kill Obamacare altogether, and he is actually succeeding in doing so piecemeal.

Obamacare is on Paxton's list of ten things he despises (so are debates).  Paxton, with his lazy eye and slow drawl, is a caricature of a Texas Christian conservative gone badder than any cartoon villain: corrupt, venal, stupid, and built to stay that way.

Justin Nelson, his Democratic opponent, is by contrast solid and well-qualified and has done the hard work of getting publicity without a lot to show for it (although what he has earned has been very favorable).  I could pick a couple of nits over the use of 'access' to health care' on his website, maybe his clerking for Justice O'Connor back in the day, but those are minor enough for me to let slide.

We need Paxton removed, and we can't count on the Texas courts to do it for us.

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

State Comptroller Glenn Hegar hasn't written any steamy novels or left state websites unsecured for hackers to run wild and free like his predecessor Susan Combs, but I'm still voting for Joi Chevalier in the statewide race that has gotten the least attention of any this cycle.  This puts me in agreement with Ted at jobsanger, which is a rare thing.

Democratic Land Commissioner challenger Miguel Suazo just secured the endorsement of Jerry Patterson, the former GOP LC who gave up the job four years ago to run in the scrum of the LG primary.  Incumbent George Pee Bush has alienated more conservatives than just Patterson with his screwball Alamo business despite winning the March primary over "Hogleg".  (Chris Elam, mentioned in the TM link, used to blog from Sugar Land under the title 'Safety for Dummies', which he scrubbed off the Web long ago.  A devoted Tom DeLay acolyte back in the day, it seems as if Elam's mentors have all let him down.  Somebody should ask him where his support goes these days, if one can't tell from where he's drawing a paycheck.)

Suazo has made hay with Bush also fumbling Harvey relief, but the young Democrat has an "all of the above" energy strategy which doesn't particularly suit me.  It would be awfully difficult for a Texas land commissioner to stand against the fossil fuel companies and expect to get elected.  He favors wind and solar and renewables, so I'll swallow hard and click the box beside his name.

Roman McAllen is running against incumbent Republican Christi Craddick, daughter of former Texas House Speaker Tom, for Railroad Commissioner.

A governing body for the state's oil and gas interests -- shockingly, fewer 5% of Texans even know that much about it -- where cronyism and corruption is the rule, McAllen stands out for his blunt talk about the truths associated with the Railroad Commission.  He's been endorsed by the Sierra Club and Our Revolution ETX.  Let's see if we can get just one vote out of three on the TXRRC that isn't bought and paid for by O&G.

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

One more, separate post.
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Wednesday, March 07, 2018

The statewides: One May 22 runoff and November matchups

-- O'Rourke versus Cruz is your marquee.  As posted earlier, Lyin' Ted wasted no time in calling Robert a pussy "liberal man".  This is how it's going to be for the next eight months, Donkeys; better get used to it.  If Bob doesn't start counter-punching now, this race is gonna be over before the kids are out of school for the summer.

Update: This is the best take on the whole "Rafael versus Robert" nothingburger.  As a reminder, I will be using the candidates' birth names, not their chosen nicknames nor their assumed names (as with the incumbent lite governor), but I will be making puns like this out of them.

Don't leave the fighting-back to the bloggers, Bobo.

-- Valdez (or Average White Guy) against the juggernaut with $43 million, a bad attitude, and an ileostomy bag.  Valdez has a lot to do in the less-than-six-months after May 22 so as not to embarrass herself or the Texas Democrats to any worse outcome than they have experienced for the past 24 years.  Surely improving on 38% and not losing the female vote again, as Wendy Davis managed, is not so difficult as it sounds, yes?  No?

-- Mike Collier versus Danny Goeb.  Once more, if Texas conservatives actually functioned with a speck of rationality, this would not be a brainer.  But this is Texas, and conservatives think with their red, swollen, baboon-ish ass and not with the proper end.

"Keep Texas RED!"

Update (3/9): Goeb's challenger in the GOP primary, Scott Milder, has endorsed Collier this morning.

"I cannot on good conscience vote for a man who I know to be a liar, nor can I vote for a man who willfully ignores and disrespects his legislative colleagues and his constituents," Milder said in the (Facebook) post. "I will be casting my vote for Mike Collier, the rational Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor, and will strongly encourage all Texans who voted for me in this race to cast their votes for Mr. Collier as well."

[...]

"It doesn't happen very often that a Republican endorses a Democrat, but public education groups recruited (Milder) to run against Patrick and he and I viewed proper funding of public education as very important," said Collier, a retired Kingwood CPA and business executive.

"I've already had a fair number of moderate Republican donors (to Milder's campaign) who have called and said they want to join me."

The salience here is that Milder earned nearly 368,000 votes last Tuesday.  That covers a lot of the ground between Democrat (bit more than a million voters) and GOP (over 1.5 MM) totals in the two March 6 elections.  It also provides a bigger opening for Collier to go after the Joe Straus/Sarah Davis Caucus.  This development doesn't enthuse me at all -- I voted for Michael Cooper because I thought Collier was too much like a Republican as it is -- but it can prove beneficial for him if he can walk the line between pandering to mild conservatives while not losing any D votes.

If Straus, for example, followed suit with his endorsement as well as some of that cash he's still sitting on, it would become a more compelling storyline for November, the corporate media, and "we just wanna win something" Dems (Kuffner).  Not so much me.

-- Ken Paxton versus Justin Nelson.  Ordinarily when your state's top law enforcement official is under criminal indictment for fraud, he would stand no chance of being re-elected, much less nominated.  Paxton drew no primary opponent.  Why are Texas Republicans afraid to run against him?  Texas Republicans nominated his wife to serve in the Texas Senate, for crine out loud.

Banana republics point and laugh at this.  National politicos -- poorly informed ones -- posit questions a ten-second Google search would clear up for them.  This may indicate a depth of ignorance and dysfunction of our political gatekeepers that even cynical ol' me hasn't plumbed.

-- Sid Miller versus Kim Olson.  Would anyone mind if I just typed 'ditto' to all of the above -- especially the baboon's ass -- and moved on?  Okay, one thing: Jim Hogan, just as he did in 2014 as a "Democrat", made no effort to get elected beyond pay his filing fee but almost pushed Sid into a runoff.  Trey Blocker is still drinking somewhere this morning.

-- George Pee Bush v. Miguel Sauzo.  There was some buzz about Bush being in trouble against Jerry Patterson that I read as late as Monday morning.  Can't find that article now.  Some journalist had their webmaster scrub it, I guess.  Screenshot, anyone?  The story this morning is that it's okay to fluff Trump if you're a Texas Republican, or IOKIYAATxR.  I don't think anybody asked Kathaleen Wall about that, though.  (Next post.)

-- Glenn Hegar against Joi Chevalier.  Maybe a spirited race for the most boring job in state government could turn in the Democrats' favor.  Chevalier defeated my candidate, Tim Mahoney, by a nose, perhaps on the strength of glowing endorsements in the Dallas News, the Houston Chronicle, and others.  Chevalier is the only African American on the state D slate who's not a judicial candidate.  If she can campaign effectively, raise and spend a little money to get her name out there, take advantage of whatever boost she can get running against the charisma-challenged GOP beancounter Jethro Bodine ... possibly there's a chance.

-- Christi Craddick facing off with Roman McAllen to run Texas railroads fellate oil and gas interests under the guise of regulating them.  No offense intended to Mr. McAllen, but he's up against more Texas Republican nepotism here.  He'd be one against two other conservatives in trying to slow down the fracking train if he pulled off the upset anyway.  Still, if the Latin@ turnout (as with evidence of the Russians hacking the election) were to finally show up, I could be a believer.  I remain of the opinion that the onus is all on Lupe.

One judicial tilt I'll mention for now: Sharon "Killer" Keller barely survived her primary and will match up with Maria Jackson in the fall.  If I do any volunteer work this cycle, it will be in this race.

Congressional races, a much hotter topic, coming, maybe by lunchtime today.
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Wednesday, December 06, 2017

The Texas progressives in the 2018 Democratic primary

And dishonorable mention for some that are not, and those that are in camoflage.  This is a first pass; I need to do more research for a fuller slate.  With so many Democrats to choose from in next year's primary elections -- and with the presumption that holding my vote back for a Green ballot petition drive that is unlikely to be successful -- my focus is turning to candidates I can cast a vote for (and not the many against, since we don't have a real NOTA option beyond an undervote).

Update: DBC Green provides an update on the status of a couple of Green Party candidates (one planning to run as an indie) and ballot access requirements.

Notice the heavy use of the first person pronouns in the above.  This is my list of progressive candidates and you're welcome to it.  YMMV, and if it does, let me hear how and why in the comments.

For US Senate: Sema Hernandez.

As regular readers know, Beto O'Rourke has consistently disappointed me (scroll to the end) with his mush-mouth on universal single payer.  Saying 'health care is a human right', but calling for everyone to pay in, and holding out on the Medicare for All bill because it does not give a role to for-profit hospitals is simply too duplicitous on my most important issue to earn my support.

Hernandez, by contrast, checks all the boxes.  If I had gotten on the ball I would have advanced her appearance with the Independent Outsider progressive radio folks Dave Denton, Holly Seeliger (blogging as Zoon Politikon) and Stevie "Redneckonomics" King this past Monday.  Thanks to the miracle of Net Neutrality, you can still view that interview below.  There is a noticeable lack of professional expertise in that broadcast that people like Kuffner -- who hadn't heard of Sema before he checked the Brazoria County Dems page last week, despite her long and very active Facebook and Twitter presence -- are just going to have to get over.



Catch Sema on Tim Black's show tomorrow night.


She's more Democratic Socialist than you usually find running for office in Texas, and thank Doorknob for that.  She is, in fact, the kind of Democrat that led the way in victories for the Democratic Party just a month ago.  Sema needs your help raising the $$$ for the filing fee to get on the ballot with less than a week remaining.  As with all citizen activist progressives, a few dollars goes a long way toward a much, much better government.

For Governor: Tom Wakely.

Back in July I suggested that Texas Democrats abandon this line in favor of a Joe Straus independent run for the Mansion.  Neither party to that suggestion took my (admittedly sarcastic) bait, but I knew I would be okay with "Bernie Sanders in a cowboy Panama hat".  Wakely is a reincarnation of my favorite Texas politico ever, David Van Os.

That ought to be enough to make plenty of centrist Donkeys curl their lip and vote for Andrew White, I suppose, especially if Lupe Valdez does not enter the race.  *Update: She is rumored, again, to do so this morning.

Contrary to some accounts, Jeffery Payne (aka Mister International Leather) was not the first candidate to file that was 'considered newsworthy'.  This is just another diss from a card-carrying establishment douchebag.  Here's Wakely's latest at Down With Tyranny.


For Lieutenant Governor: Michael Cooper.

Mike Collier, who ran for state comptroller and lost to Glenn Hegar in 2014, voted for Mitt Romney in the 2012 GOP primary, and is the kind of business-oriented former Republican some Democrats think they need to focus on to win elections, especially in Deep-In-The-Hearta.  I'm obviously not one of those people.

African American Texas Democrats will turn out for Cooper and the rest of the ticket, but will do what they did in 2016 with a Caucasian centrist at the top of the ballot: take a pass on voting.  Cooper is running in tandem with Wakely, has an active Twitter feed and Facebook page, but has let his website, linked above, lapse as of this posting.  He campaigned with Wakely in East Texas just this past weekend, so I'll take it that his webmaster simply dropped the ball.  I'm dubious it's a sign of wavering commitment to the race, after announcing his run back in May and having filed on November 11, the first day of the period.

For Agriculture Commissioner: Kim Olson.

She might not be as progressive as, say, Hank Gilbert, but nobody could be as terrible as the incumbent, Sid Miller, or his GOP challenger, Trey Blocker.  That may sound like a left-handed compliment, but it isn't.  Olson is well-qualified in a race Texas Democrats, at this early point in the cycle, stands the best chance of winning.  JMHO.

For Texas Railroad Commission: Roman McAllen.

Even if Lupe Valdez decides not to run for governor, Texas Latin@s have a load of good candidates running for office, and McAllen is one.  I'm on my soapbox to say that they should be doing the heavy lifting NOW to show their support.  With the repeal of ACA and DACA, "build the wall" and other hot-button issues waiting for them to weigh in on, 2018 is a no-excuses year for Latino turnout.

For CD-7: Laura Moser or Jason Westin.

Alex T isn't on board with single payer and neither is Lizzie Fletcher (weakest website ever for a candidate of her stature), so they're both non-starters for me before you even get to their establishment cred -- the mega-money raised, the well-connected endorsements.  Westin is apparently losing the charisma contest to everybody but Cargas and Josh Butler.  Westin is much stronger on single-payer than Moser, who uses the non-specific phrase "access to health care" on her website a little too much for my taste.  This is Beto O'Rourke's path, right down to the "healthcare is a human right" pablum.

Down With Tyranny likes Westin.  But the doctor loses me when he says things like 'a race to the left is one nobody can win', as he reportedly did in a recent candidate forum.  He describes himself as a moderate (see the WaPo link at the end of this graf) on most issues except healthcare.  That's two dogwhistles to centrist Democrats -- not to mention Sarah Davis/Joe Straus Republicans -- who wouldn't be likely to support a general election progressive, a premise which has been verifiably field-tested since 2008.  As a reminder ...

Based on data from the 2008 Cooperative Campaign Analysis Project, a YouGov survey that also interviewed respondents multiple times during the campaign, 24 percent of people who supported Clinton in the primary as of March 2008 then reported voting for McCain in the general election.

An analysis of a different 2008 survey by the political scientists Michael Henderson, Sunshine Hillygus and Trevor Thompson produced a similar estimate: 25 percent. (Unsurprisingly, Clinton voters who supported McCain were more likely to have negative views of African Americans, relative to those who supported Obama.)

For those who can't be bothered to click over, the nut graf is: two to three times as many PUMAs bagged on Obama in '08 than Sandernistas did Hillary in 2016.  I would expect nothing less in 2020 if Bernie Sanders becomes the nominee.

But that's a digression.  It's either Moser or Westin, and it may come down to a coin flip.

Update: Ivan Sanchez, formerly president of Houston Millennials, was the last to file for this race on the deadline.  Nothing on issues on his Facebook page, nor his Twitter and Instagram activity.  Should be interesting to see if he can get any traction over the next three months in such a crowded, high-profile field.

For CD-29: Hector Morales.

I've already posted about him, so I'm not "basically everyone".  This Tweet from the young schoolteacher says it all.


More to come on Lina Hidalgo, Adrian Garcia, and others.
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Monday, October 16, 2017

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance reminds you that there's an election coming up in a few weeks (and early voting begins next week).


Off the Kuff says that if giving a tax break to homeowners affected by natural disasters is a priority, the state should cover the cost of that tax break to counties and school districts.

SocraticGadfly looks at a couple of recent pieces by a business columnist at the Chronic, and wonders how many of them apply there and if that will ever be asked?

How about Texas Democrats ask Sylvester Turner to run for governor, PDiddie at Brains and Eggs helpfully suggested.

jobsanger posts eleven steps to a healthier (and fairer) US economy.

Grits for Breakfast knows that criticism of police unions is warranted, but disagrees with the proposed solutions.

Murray Polner at The Rag Blog shares a concise summary of his views on the Vietnam war, motivated by Ken Burns' documentary.

In the Texas Observer's Strangest State roundup, you can read about a cow in Kerrville that looks like KISS rocker Gene Simmons.

The Texas Energy Department's collation of news includes a reminder that Rick Perry is always good for a joke, especially when he's the butt of it.

Neil at All People Have Value attended the weekly Tuesday protest outside the Houston office of Senator John Cornyn.  Senator Cornyn is doing a bad job.  APHV is part of NeilAquino.com.

And the Lewisville Texan Journal shares the Mom of No's story about teaching the Son of Never Stops Eating how to speak up at a city council meeting.

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

More Texas news and blog posts!

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram's PoliTex blog reports that over 6,000 inmates in the Texas Criminal Justice System pooled their commissary funds totaling nearly $54,000 and donated it to Hurricane Harvey relief efforts.

The Rivard Report shares Ross Ramsey (of the Texas Tribune)'s analysis of bathrooms, business interests, and ballots.

The TexTrib also was first with the news that a federal judge ruled Greg Abbott violated the First Amendment when he ordered a mock Nativity scene removed from the Capitol two years ago.


Bonddad's most recent thought for Sunday regards the rule of gerontocracy.

Chris Ladd at Political Orphans asserts that Democrats will no more recognize -- or effectively oppose -- the rise of their own Trump than Republicans did.

Elizabeth Lewis at Burkablog believes we are misdiagnosing the cause of gun violence.

Better Texas Blog dives into the latest revenue estimate from the state's comptroller, Glenn Hegar.

The TSTA Blog laments the lack of role models at the top of our government.

Therese Odell at Foolish Watcher gamely explains what the First Amendment is.

Grant Brisbee at SB Nation isn't a Texan, but he truly gets what the Astros mean to the city of Houston at this moment.

And Harry Hamid has a tale about mutatis mutandis (if you need to look up the meaning -- like I did -- here you go).
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Tuesday, January 10, 2017

Dan Patrick, Potentate of Piss, and other 85th Session previews

(Mad props to Cort McMurray, who gets all the credit for most of the following scatologically inspired titles for the right honorable gentleman presiding over the Texas Senate.  I was motivated to add a few.)

The 85th Texas Legislature officially gavels in at noon on Tuesday, kicking off nearly five months of nonstop banter, brawls and bills under the pink dome. When lawmakers gather for the first time since 2015, they'll have a lot on their plate: the state's ongoing foster-care crisis, property tax reform, a "bathroom bill," and public school funding, to name a few.


Our self-appointed Umpire of Urinating, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, has moved forward his bill abolishing the right of transgendered people to pee in the water closet of their choosing as our part-time working,  full time-damaging Texas Lege reconvenes.  The Kaiser of the Crapper has more serious matters of statewide business to deal with, but fear of the 'other' has consumed him, and he intends to make his mark by standing up -- not sitting down -- for the rights of scared old men across the land to avoid having to do their business in public with people they loathe.


They claim -- as they always do -- that it's being done to protect the children.  It's hard to envision how crushing the Texas economy in similar fashion to North Carolina's helps anyone, especially the kids, but logic has never been the GOP's strong suit.  Speaker Joe Straus and even Governor Greg Abbott don't share Patrick's high toilet priorities, and neither do the state's business interests, so perhaps the bill will be allowed to die quietly in the corner of some House committee room.

-- The state's revenue for the next two years is estimated by Comptroller Glenn Hegar to be $104.87 billion.  One hundred nine billion is needed just so state services can be maintained at current levels (adjusting for inflation).  That means massive cuts to critical programs, or 'belt-tightening' in Republican euphemism.  The TexTrib carefully breaks it all down, but it's bad news no matter who's spinning it.  Better Texas Blog is going to be your go-to all session long, and they've already done some heavy lifting.

(I)t’s worth remembering that the Legislature’s short-sighted tax breaks and diversions have done much more to limit future General Revenue collections than the oil/gas downturn did. CPPP will be ready with analysis after the Biennial Revenue Estimate is released to discuss the implications for critical state investments in education, health, highways, and public safety.

Their first post out of the box yesterday afternoon dealt with the ACA's pending repeal in Congress and the harsh effect it will have on mental health funding in Texas.

The just-released Texas House Select Committee on Mental Health report recommends enhancing enforcement of mental health parity protections.

A full repeal of the ACA would move in the opposite direction.  Full repeal would substantially reduce the reach of mental health parity protections, reducing access to mental health and substance use disorder (MH/SUD) care for 2.5 million Texans.[i]  One of the less-publicized benefits of the ACA is that it extended the reach of mental health parity to types of insurance plans that had been previously excluded.  An ACA repeal would mean millions of Texans would lose equal access to mental health benefits in insurance.

-- Dawnna Dukes isn't going to give up her seat after all, despite ongoing ethical investigations and a previously-disclosed inability to serve after suffering injuries in a 2013 auto accident.  While she had indicated she would resign last year, and her stalling through the holidays prompted questions from others (coveting her post, oddly enough) concerned that her waffling would delay a special election, she effectively further handicaps an already-crippled House Democratic caucus in its super-minority status.  Dukes is just one more brick in the wall Texas Democrats continue to build to keep themselves inside a prison of irrelevance.  Dukes was about to be indicted before she said she was quitting, so we'll see what happens with that now.

Update: That didn't take long.

-- As mentioned in yesterday's Wrangle, Grits points out the blinding hypocrisy of SD-17 flack Joan Huffman and her union-busting bill.

SB 13 by state Sen. Joan Huffman -- which is one of Lt. Governor Dan Patrick's stated priorities -- would eliminate payment of union dues directly from public employees' paychecks except for police, fire and EMS unions.

Include police unions in the ban and Grits might go for that idea. They're the main source of public-employee-union generated economic headaches at the local level, from excessive salaries bloating the budget in Austin to vitriolic attacks on the city manager in San Antonio to massive unfunded pension liabilities threatening to bankrupt the city of Dallas. They're also the unions most frequently throwing their weight around in local elections, to the detriment of both officer accountability and city budgets.

If the goal is to reduce organized labor's stranglehold on local budgets and politics in Texas, police unions are the place to start.

Nobody -- no legislator, no mayor, no city council -- wants to take on the guardians of the elite keepers of (alleged) law and order in any manner such as this.  They are all much too frightened of the possible repercussions.  In this strict cost-analysis of every line item in the state budget, nobody ought to be getting a free lunch.  Cops included.

-- Governor Abbott, like President-elect Trump, seems capable of exacerbating tensions with China in ways both predictable and accidental.

On Saturday, Gov. Greg Abbott met with Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen in Houston to discuss energy and trade relations, according to a news release from Abbott's office.

"Thanks to our favorable regulatory and legal climate, Texas remains and will continue to be a premier destination for Taiwanese businesses to expand and thrive," Abbott said in a statement. "I look forward to strengthening Texas' bond with Taiwan and continuing my dialogue with President Tsai to create even more opportunity and a better future for our citizens."

Lots more cheap crap to buy at Walmart.  Yay!

Abbott may have "committed a cultural faux pas" when he gave Tsai a clock as a gift during their meeting, according to Taiwan News. In Chinese, "giving a clock" means "attending a funeral," symbolizing an early death for someone who receives a clock as a gift.

Oops.  Didn't someone say that Abbott was more intelligent than Rick Perry?  In what way?

-- Stand by for more from the scene of the crimes in Austin; follow my Twitter feed as we cover today's Opening Day (traditionally filled with more pomp than circumstance).
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Monday, January 09, 2017

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is firmly bracing itself for the mostly white, male, and middle-aged Texas legislators to work their will on the rest of us in the biennial 85th session, which begins tomorrow in Austin.


Off the Kuff looked ahead to the upcoming Houston elections for 2017.

Libby Shaw at Daily Kos understands that if pain and suffering have to be inflicted on the American people, the cruelest party for the job is the Texas Republican Party. Yes, they are coming after Social Security. Worse: the hatchet man is a Texas Republican.

With January 20 just two weeks away, Socratic Gadfly takes an initial snapshot look at President Obama's legacy from the left. Updated Presidential rankings to follow.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme remembers the greedy corporate interests fighting the white nationalists in the 2000s. The white nationalists won that one. We're at it again with today's Texas Legislature.

Texas Leftist piles on the Lord of the Lavatory, Lite Guv Dan Patrick, and his petty, potty politics.

The top environmental stories affecting Lewisville were summarized by the Texan Journal.

Dos Centavos has a few thoughts on the HISD board vacancy.

The latest -- and hopefully the last -- on "русские сделали это" was posted by PDiddie at Brains and Eggs.

Txsharon at Bluedaze is not as Trump as you drink she is.

After many years toiling away for the liberal cause in Amarillo, Ted at jobsanger announces his relocation to Austin.

DemBlogNews surveys the playing field in the contest to be the next DNC chair.

Neil at All People Have Value was out on the streets of Houston calling for kindness, respect, and not giving up. APHV is part of NeilAquino.com.


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

More stories from around Texas!

Peggy Fikac at the SAEN sees us all on tenterhooks waiting for the state's revenue estimate from Comptroller Jethro Bodine Glenn Hegar. Update: And the bad news breaks: almost $105 billion, or about $4 billion less than necessary to meet continuing obligations.  Yuuge cuts in state services are in store.  Follow Better Texas Blog for the deep dive.

The Houston Communist Party respectfully requests that the real hackers please stand up.

Grits for Breakfast suggests that if SD-17 Sen. Joan Huffman is serious about busting unions with her recently-filed legislation, she shouldn't leave out the police labor organizations.

John Wright makes five queer predictions for LGBT Texans in 2017, and Ashton Woods at Strength in Numbers says, simply: when people's lives are under assault, the proper response is to fight back.

Paradise in Hell wants the holes in the Texas Freedom of Information Act to be patched.

The TSTA Blog explains how the state abuses school property taxpayers, and the Rivard Report sends home the report card from the state's public school districts on the state education agency's A-F  accountability score.  Their grade?  Incomplete.

The Bloggess submits an application to become a vampire, and It's Not Hou It's Me
gives a hand with your New Year's resolutions with a guide to working out in Houston.

And Pages of Victory had some truck trouble in the cold over the weekend.
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Sunday, September 06, 2015

The Houston city controller's contest

Once more from the top of your ballot to the bottom.




Both of my previous postings about this race got lots of clicks, so if you want some recent past history about these men then there it is.  Here's one relevant excerpt...

Frankly I am delighted to see Jew Don Boney run for city controller against Carroll Robinson. They have squared off before, and it wasn't pretty. No matter his own bumpy history, I will be pleased to support former councilman Boney's campaign -- unless I vet the potential candidates for a better one -- because Robinson is not only shady himself but also aligned with the absolute worst political mafia in Houston politics. I'm looking at you again, Hector Carreno, you slug. And Reps. Miles and Thompson, you should know better.

But this "lesser of two evils" option once again might let the Republican slip into office.

As a reminder: one of the easiest choices you can make as a voter is to never, ever vote for a candidate who doesn't understand what the responsibilities of the office he is running for are.



Also in the doomed-to-repeat-history department, both of the two Republicans bidding again for this seat barely lost to outgoing incumbent Ronald Green.  From 2013, here's my live-blogging as the returns came in that night (scroll all the way to the bottom):

Bill Frazer - 47% 47.89% 48.28% 49.02% 48.86%
Ronald Green - 53% 52.11% 51.72% 50.98% 51.14% 
The incumbent may yet hold off the Republican challenger, but late returns will tell the tale. At 9:00 p.m., Election Day results continue to narrow the gap for Frazer. 
At 9:30 p.m., just 2200 votes out of 110,000 cast separate the two. But the real news is the 30,500 undervotes in this race. At 10 p.m. Green gets a little breathing room, leading now by 3000 votes 
At 10:20 p.m., when the votes from Fort Bend and Montgomery are added, Controller Green has a 5,062 vote lead. He has narrowly avoided being upset. 38,134 Harris County voters did not vote in this race.

Khan is experienced as a former three-term council member, came very close to beating Green himself in 2009 when the term-limited Annise Parker first ran for mayor, and benefits from being tops on the ballot in a race filled with qualified candidates.  But Khan's greatest value is in siphoning off enough of Frazer's Republican support to force him into a runoff with a Democrat.  Frazer is in the catbird seat with the four Ds squaring off and "bathroom election" turnout looking promising for the city's conservatives.  He's hosted fundraisers with David Dewhurst and state comptroller Glenn Hegar, and earned the endorsement of the Kingwood Tea Party (that covers all the the GOP bases, from plain old stupid to stupid, mean, and crazy).

So who has the best chance of advancing to the December playoff with Frazer?

Morning-line handicappers might favor Son of Brown-Schlumberger.  He's been the city's deputy controller throughout the Green years, has access to all the money he needs not to lose, and he's a legacy.  Constable David Rosen wrote his own forecast of this race in the Daily Court Review praising Brown's "colossal network", evaluating the candidates most particularly on the basis of their campaign finance reports.

At least two of those four are reasons are why I cannot support Brown, though many Democrats of the Caucasian persuasion will, and that could be enough to get him over the hump.  There's also the fact that African American voters both liberal and conservative will split their votes among Boney, Robinson, and Jefferson.  The two Democratic former city council members and one former Republican state district judge (in that order) have some divergent opinions about how the office they seek helps manage the city in harmony -- or discord -- with the mayor's office.  There's an opportunity here among all these controller hopefuls for some very strategic voting.

Consider some mayoral runoff possibilities: Hall-Garcia, Hall-Turner, Turner-Garcia for just a few. With a conservative Democrat or quasi-Republican mayor and Frazer (or Khan) crunching the numbers, you can pretty much count on a lot of municipal employee layoffs to try to balance the looming crisis of a city budget, a hard line on firemen and police pensions, lots of closed libraries and swimming pools, city parks going to seed, and yes, more potholes.  If the cons sweep some of the swingy seats on council as well, a new dark day of severe austerity and homophobia takes reign over Houston.

If a someone more moderate, like Turner (or Steve Costello or Chris Bell) makes the runoff and prevails in it, then a controller like Brown or Boney or even Jefferson gives the city a little less talk and a little more action that demonstrates tolerance for threatened municipal employees, be it their jobs or their retirement plans.  In short, consider whether your choice for mayor is going to have someone in the beancounters' office he can work with... or will have to fight with.  And which of those scenarios you think might be preferable, depending on how things turn out on November 3rd.

Chris Brown straddled the fence on this matter when asked about it at the Sunnyside candidate forum.  That's not leadership, IMHO.

Prediction for the general: Too close to call on whether there will be a runoff, or whether who on either the left or the right might make one.  This is the least predictable contest on the ballot, and one which depends completely on whose voters show up.
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Monday, March 30, 2015

Spring is Springing Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance thinks even Ted Cruz deserves affordable health insurance as it brings you this week's roundup.


Off the Kuff hears the death rattle of the anti-gay forces.

Harold Cook explains how the "school choice" scam works.

Horwitz at Texpatriate makes an early pick and endorses Sylvester Turner for mayor of Houston.

Libby Shaw at Texas Kaos and contributing to Daily Kos is pleased to see the H-Town's daily newspaper called out Ted Cruz for being all about Ted, in The Houston Chronicle spanks Ted Cruz.

Houston's LyondellBasell refinery's management turned off an advance warning system near the front gates of the plant, where striking USW workers walk the picket line. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs says that if this is how they demonstrate their concerns for worker safety, it's no wonder they won't end a work stoppage despite the national settlement.

Neil at All People Have Value said you should make an effort with the people in your life as part of a complete outlook on life. APHV is part of NeilAquino.com.

From WCNews at Eye on Williamson: Bad things happen when a bunch of government haters try to run the government like a business. This is what happens when we turn government over to corporations.

Bluedaze logged all the Texas (and Oklahoma) frackquakes this past week.

Dos Centavos attended the Cesar Chavez parade in Houston's East End and posted several pictures from  the rally.

Bay Area Houston offers a guide to the Texas legislators who are stealing campaign donations and taxpayer money.

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

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

Nonsequiteuse analyzes Ted Cruz's font and logo choices.

Paradise in Hell examines the Supreme Court arguments about specialty license plates sporting the Confederate Battle Flag.

Grits for Breakfast hopes the state loses that specialty license plate case, though not for the same reason as the plaintiffs.

Socratic Gadfly updates on the developments surrounding oil prices, and takes another poke at Comptroller Glenn Hegar.

HOUequality provided the latest update on the HERO petitions trial, noting that it comes down to 8,500 signatures that the judge has ruled illegible.

Purple City thinks the legislative attempt to kill the private high speed rail line may not amount to much.

Better Texas Blog gamely stumps for Medicaid expansion.

The Texas Election Law Blog explains what recent SCOTUS decisions on voter ID and redistricting have to do with pending litigation over those issues here.

Raise Your Hand Texas testified against the voucher bills in the Senate.

And Fascist Dyke Motors has the second part of a family mystery, involving a talking tree and Charles Bronson.
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Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Texas Lege playing a dangerous one-upsmanship game with tax cuts

The House, yesterday.

Texas House leaders said Monday they believe they can cut taxes by more than $4 billion, indicating a larger reduction than initially proposed by their Senate counterparts.

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dennis Bonnen, R-Angleton, gave the assessment in an interview but didn’t say how much more in cuts is being contemplated.

“We really believe that we ought to be able to do more than $4 billion in tax cuts here in the House,” Bonnen said. “We don’t have a number at this point. We just know that we can do better than that.”

Asked about exceeding $4 billion in tax cuts for homeowners and businesses combined, House Speaker Joe Straus, R-San Antonio, said, “We’re on the same page.”

It’s the first time House leaders have indicated the specific tax cut figure they’re contemplating.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Senate Finance Chair Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, earlier made an initial proposal for $3 billion in property tax cuts and $1 billion in business tax reductions over the next two-year budget period. Patrick said then that there could be more tax relief if additional dollars became available.

The Senate today.

Senate GOP leaders on Tuesday proposed a cut in school property taxes that would be worth about $240 $234* next year for the average Texas homeowner and closer to $275  $263* per homestead the following year.

*corrected at original.

The senators, trying to stay ahead of Gov. Greg Abbott and House Republicans in promising the most tax relief, unveiled a package of tax cuts that would cost more than $4.6 billion in the next two-year budget cycle.

About $2.5 billion of that would go toward increases in homestead exemptions on school property taxes. The rest would go to business tax relief.

It gets worse, as "experts" say there will be more money from more oil at higher prices than is currently sustainable.  Or even plausible.

Number cruncher extraordinaire Dr. Stuart Greenfield says Comptroller Glenn Hegar’s estimate might not be optimistic enough. Among other things, he notes oil production for the fiscal year will exceed one billion barrels. That hasn’t happened since 1978.

Newly elected Comptroller Hegar’s Biennial Revenue Estimate –- the BRE –- has been called quite optimistic by many commentators, especially given the dramatic decline in the price of crude oil. But the release of revenue collections for January indicates his estimate might not be optimistic enough.

Chart 1 shows the year-to-date (YTD) growth rate in tax collections for FY10 through FY15, and both the estimated growth rates from the Certified Revenue Estimate (1.8 percent) released in December 2013, and the current BRE (1.6 percent). Check out the fact that YTD growth in tax collections (6.8 percent) is 325 percent greater than the estimated rate (1.6 percent). The YTD growth rate in total state revenue (8.1 percent) is 80 percent greater than the estimated growth rate (4.6 percent).

The latest estimate of state tax collections are projected to grow by 1.6 percent in FY15 and then increase by 2.4 percent in fiscal 2016 (FY16) and 5.6 percent in FY17. Total net revenue is expected to increase by 4.6 percent in FY15, increase by 1.7 percent in FY16 and then decrease by 1.9 percent in FY17.

I'd really like it if these guys were correct.  I would rather me be wrong and not them, even slightly.  But this is absurd.  Everybody knows this brand of extreme conservatives fixes the facts around their policy, and if the oil companies keep laying off workers in the shale fields, and the barrel price keeps see-sawing back and forth between speculation and reality about supply and demand, at some point the chickens are coming home to roost and we're all screwed and tattooed.  Even Dan Patrick and Greg Abbott (and he hasn't had any relations since that tree broke his back).

If you believe in God, then you better start praying that the price of oil goes up to about $75 dollars pretty quick and holds, and perhaps even rises from there, for the next couple of years.  Because if it doesn't, the traffic that guy in a wheelchair can move faster than -- and the potholes and the classroom sizes and the condition of the state's office buildings and everything else that depends on taxes and spending in Texas -- are going to look like specks on Google Earth compared to the problems we'll have if they have blown the numbers and the budget again.

Sen. Kevin Eltife appears to be the lone voice of reason from the right, but nobody seems to be listening to him.  That roaring sound you hear might be Niagara Falls, and this isn't a canoe we're riding in or even a barrel.  It's a handbasket.

Update: From the comments, Socratic Gadfly reminds me that the judge who ruled the state's education funding schemes out of order on two occasions has scolded the Lege in his valedictory...

Just weeks after stepping down from 23 years on the bench, retired state District Judge John Dietz lambasted state lawmakers Sunday for not having the best interests of Texas' public school students in mind.

"We are dooming a generation of these children by providing an insufficient education and we can do better. It's been our best interests to do better," said Dietz, who has twice in the last two years declared the state method of funding public schools unconstitutional. "It's about time the Legislature take its own advice and take the best interests of the children at heart and do something."

 ... and that the price of oil may be in a historical correction period.

Meanwhile, the International Energy Agency expects crude prices to average $55/bbl for this year, and not to get above $70 for some time. Oh, and $100 oil? Not even on its current horizon.

The IEA story is worth a read right there. Going by Brent prices, which it expects to only get to the low-mid $70s by 2020 (yes!), this is not a one-year slump, it's potentially a multi-year readjustment.

And, the IEA is right to be concerned. Its U.S. counterpart, the Energy Information Agency, says current stockpiles are at an 80-year high for this time of year.

Dan Patrick et.al. need to really start praying harder.
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