ZL0b-ing it yesterday

That's the name of the nasty virus I picked up and dealt with all of yesterday. It's still got one last annoying little thing popping up, and it's dug its fingernails into the registry, but I will shortly rip it out by the roots.

On Saturday we spent the day in Galveston at Dickens on the Strand, and Sunday we attended Jim Henley's campaign kickoff.

So that's why you haven't seen me around here for awhile.

A few things happened while I was away...

Tom DeLay got bad news on three fronts: he'll go to trial on money-laundering charges after the holidays, the House Republicans are desperate to ditch him, and he polls well behind an unnamed 'Democrat' in his district. (Pssst, Gallup: several of us in Texas know the name of the Democrat.) La Cucaracha Grande still hasn't awakened and smelled the coffee, though, because he was all smiles at a fundraiser for his lawyers last night. The protestors outnumbered the donors again; about 300 to 100. I think they call that a 'slam dunk'...

It now appears as if a handful of Democrats -- from Bob Gammage to Pete Laney to Tony Sanchez to Bill White -- are grinding their rumor mills in an effort to build support for a run for Governor. None of them seem to have noticed that there are other statewide offices with no candidates. And the Houston Chronicle still may not be aware that David Van Os has been running for Attorney General for months now. (I will have a post regarding Gammage in the next day or two regarding his online viral campaign, and a handful of unanswered and rather unsettling questions.)

And the network of Lone Star Lefty bloggers' Texan of the Year campaign finally made the MSM.

I'll try to get caught up later.

GOP Goobers finally fire their muskets

We've all been waiting for the eye-scratching and hair-pulling to commence in the Republican gubernatorial primary. It's finally time to microwave Orville Redenbacher:

Gov. Rick Perry's campaign Friday accused Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, his Republican primary rival, of using her state office equipment to produce a campaign news release.

That prompted Strayhorn's camp to fire back and accuse a Perry aide of acting as a political operative even when he was working in the governor's press office at the state Capitol.

"Yes you did!" "No I didn't, but you did!" "Neener, neener!"

Another stimulating debate between the GOP leaders of the Great State of Texas on the difficult issues facing us. Repeat after me: "Adios, MoFos".

Texas redistricting was illegal -- but the GOP did it anyway

Others have this news from overnight, so I'll be brief with the snips and the linkage. From the WaPo:

Justice Department lawyers concluded that the landmark Texas congressional redistricting plan spearheaded by Rep. Tom DeLay (R) violated the Voting Rights Act, according to a previously undisclosed memo obtained by The Washington Post. But senior officials overruled them and approved the plan.

The memo, unanimously endorsed by six lawyers and two analysts in the department's voting section, said the redistricting plan illegally diluted black and Hispanic voting power in two congressional districts. It also said the plan eliminated several other districts in which minorities had a substantial, though not necessarily decisive, influence in elections.

...

One of two DeLay aides also under indictment in the case, James W. Ellis, is cited in the Justice Department memo as pushing for the plan despite the risk that it would not receive "pre-clearance," or approval, from the department. Ellis and other DeLay aides successfully forced the adoption of their plan over two other versions passed by Texas legislators that would not have raised as many concerns about voting rights discrimination, the memo said.

... the Justice Department's approval of the redistricting plan, signed by Sheldon T. Bradshaw, principal deputy assistant attorney general, was valuable to Texas officials when they defended it in court. He called the internal Justice Department memo, which did not come out during the court case, "yet another indictment of Tom DeLay, because this memo shows conclusively that the map he produced violated the law."

...

Jerry Strickland, a spokesman for Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, said he did not have any immediate comment.

You can read the 73-page memo here (.pdf file).

So, two things:

First, it's clear once again that Nothing Gets In Tom DeLay's Way. Not the law, not the Justice Department, not the will of the people, nothing.

He's proven -- once again -- that he's the one at the heart of the Republican Mafia running Texas and the nation. Not the brains (that's Rove and Cheney) but the muscle. DeLay is the capo who breaks the kneecaps and collects the insurance, which he then doles out to his little henchmen all over the country. DeLay is both good earner and enforcer.

A reminder: Big Time Dick will be in Houston next Monday to keep the Republicans' Thing going -- he's coming to help The Hammer raise money for the brigades of lawyers working nights to keep his sorry ass out of jail. With them wll appear the Governor of Texas, Rick "Adios MoFo" Perry, and the junior Senator from Texas, John "I Love Torturing Box Turtles" Cornyn.

A Corruption Superfecta.

It may yet be that the good people of the 22nd District will get to deliver the message the Sugar Land Bugman has been ignoring for years now, or maybe the law will eventually catch up to him, whether that is Ronnie Earle or the Justice Department attorneys who will prosecute the charges resulting from the misdeeds of Jack Abramoff and Michael Scanlon. But like Al Capone, Tom DeLay ain't goin' to the end of the block without a fight.

Second, DeLay and his illegal cash corrupt everyone they touch. Why the Attorney General of Texas would roll over for Tom DeLay in defiance of the the Department of Justice makes him a stooge of the first rank. The only reason these nonbinding-but-heavily-weighted memos are issued is to avoid lengthy and expensive (to the taxpayers) court battles.

The law said no, and the GOP political hacks said screw the law, we're doing it anyway. Let them try to stop us.

Well guess what, thugs? The people are going to stop you. One way or another, we're taking you down.