Sunday Funnies

Goodbye Bettencourt

Imagine my surprise:

Harris County Tax Assessor-Collector Paul Bettencourt announced late Friday that he was resigning to pursue a private business venture.

The sudden announcement comes just a month after Bettencourt was reelected to his third term.

A simply remarkable demonstration of disrespect to the people of Harris County. Re-elected in a bitter contest over Diane Trautman a mere 30 days ago, Bettencourt cuts and runs now so that a majority of the Republicans on commissioner's court can pick the placeholder.

"I have spoken with Judge Emmett and told him of my intention to tender my resignation before Christmas. I want to give the Court time to address the vacancy and ensure an orderly transition," Bettencourt wrote.

He said he would issue a fuller statement next week. ...

His replacement will be appointed by Harris County Commissioners Court.

Bettencourt was the most partisan, the most rancorous, the most obstinate conservative left around these parts after we exorcised Tom DeLay. I am incensed at his timing, but couldn't be more happy about his departure whatever the reasons. As Gerry Birnberg notes, however, we haven't seen the last of him politically:

Bettencourt also drew criticism for his role of the voter registrar for Harris County.

He had been accused several times in recent years of overzealously purging the voter rolls and blocking new registrations. The Harris County Democratic Party sued Bettencourt last month, complaining of his handling of about 7,000 provisional ballots cast in the Nov. 4 election and accusing him of illegally rejecting voter registration applications. He denied any wrongdoing.

Friday night, Harris County Democratic Party Chairman Gerald Birnberg said he expected Bettencourt to resign at some point, believing he had an interest in statewide office.

"So, I had expected him to resign to run for another office or to be more involved in the radio business," Birnberg said. "It occurs to me that Paul is too deliberate for this to have occurred 'day before yesterday.' It has got to be something he was thinking about more than 30 days ago, before the election, and I am disappointed he did not share his plans with the voters." ...

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

Update: My top-of-the-morning prognostication is that the replacement will be former district clerk and vanquished Emmett opponent Charles Bacarisse, which could hardly be considered an improvement.

Update II: Even the stridently bipartisan and typically reserved Quorum Report seems a little taken aback:

Campaign contributors and supporters are no doubt stunned that Bettencourt used them to seek an office that he will not take. In his statement he says he received a private sector offer that he will accept despite having offered himself up for re-election. Ultimately the question will boil down to whether or not he knew when he filed that he did not intend to serve. Was his intention to simply leverage his name ID into a Republican win an an otherwise Democratic year while never intending to take the oath of office?

His statement does not clear up the mystery.

The kinder, gentler Kay Bailey (with Karl Rove's help)

With the announcement of the forming of her gubernatorial exploratory committee this week, Kay Bailey Hutchison throws down the gauntlet at the feet of incumbent Republican Rick Perry, and the Clash of the Cheerleaders is engaged.

The governor's office promptly responded with a new nickname for the senator: "Kay Bailout".

And in her press release was revealed the positioning that the senator is going to be using against her Aggie rival:

"There's too much bitterness, too much anger, too little trust, too little consensus and too much infighting. And the tone comes from the top. Texans are looking for leadership and results."

And with the news that Karl Rove is quietly advising the Hutchison campaign, we can expect to see a lot of matronly outreach to the moderate middling factions of the Texas electorate.

Rove -- a man who wants to rehabilitate both the Republican brand as well as his own hard-earned reputation as a miserable scumbag -- believes that the GOP is losing, among the many other reasons, because of the "bitterness" and "anger" demonstrated by its base toward Hispanics. He knows that Republicans need to recapture women's votes and those of the squishy center and is likely prepared to sacrifice some of the frothing base to do so. That means, if she takes his advice, that Kay is going to have to straddle a fine line; she'll have to throw a little red meat with her right hand while she extends the other kidgloved one to the left. She has to attack Perry on matters of competence and temperance without abandoning the rabid Texas conservative wedge issues of illegal immigration, voter ID and lower property taxes.

(Yes, those are all wedge issues, Matt. The majority of the Texas electorate isn't as riled up about Ill Eagles and the rest as those who vote in the GOP primary.)

Anyway, while they talk amongst themselves about which way they will go, the drama is going to play out in the fight between Perry and Hutchison for the GOP nomination for governor. Winner take all -- including a future chance at the presidency in 2016, without a doubt.

If Perry can summon enough outrage at Washington and "liberals" -- a direction that has never failed the Republican Party of Texas for the last generation -- then he might be able to pull off the upset in the primary. Yes, the incumbent governor is most certainly the underdog against Hutchison. The senator, for her part, is going to try a little Barack Obama Lite to defeat him. Naturally that's a strategy contingent on the continuing popularity of the president-elect over the next two years.

But assuming Hutchison wins and faces off against Bill White for the newly-rebuilt governor's mansion in 2010, it will be hard to find any differences between the two parties' standard-bearers. Which to me would suggest a third or even fourth option on the ballot, as in 2006.

"If 'ifs and 'buts' were candy and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas." It seems possible that we could have Christmas every day for the next year. Frankly, that diet makes me a little nauseous.

Dickens returns to a recovering Galveston

This weekend's Dickens on The Strand is Galveston's first major event since Hurricane Ike struck in September, and could indicate how quickly this island city can revive its vital tourism industry.

The 35th year of the festival, which recreates the 19th century with period costumes, also is an attempt by Galveston businesses to let the outside world know that most of its restaurants and hotels and many of its attractions are up and running.

We're going down for the day. I've posted about our prior trips here. There's a Chris Bell event in Galveston County at lunchtime on Saturday, and then we'll spend a few hours at one of the best street festivals in Texas before returning to Houston.

Despite the strain, all 130 vendors and booths will return along with 50 entertainment groups, said Dwayne Jones, foundation executive director.

The storm cost the foundation about $6 million in damage to its historic properties and lost revenues, Jones said, forcing it to cut in half its usual budget of $150,000 to $200,000 for Dickens on The Strand.

The foundation also had to lay off 40 of its 70-member staff and lost much of its Dickens equipment to the storm surge, he said. ...

Storm water fouled the 500 lamps that are normally scattered throughout the festival area at night, forcing the event to close three hours earlier than normal Saturday, Jones said.

Dickens on The Strand will run from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, he said.

The event is usually within a 10-block area between 20th Street and 25th Street on The Strand and Mechanic Street, but this year it will be limited to The Strand, Jones said.

The Galveston Historic District was inundated by more than 10 feet of sea water that left floors caked with slimy mud and store interiors in shambles.

The Festival of Lights at Moody Gardens is up and running, though also smaller:

Hurricane damage forced Moody Gardens to alter and slightly shorten the path of lights and reduce the number of exhibits from 100 to about 75, said Moody Gardens spokeswoman Jerri Hamachek.

The Festival of Lights is open Thursday through Saturday through Dec. 17 and nightly Dec. 18-31. Tickets have been reduced $2 to $3.95, she said.

Jones is expecting about half as many visitors to Dickens on The Strand this year because of the ailing national economy and the perception that nothing is open in Galveston because of the storm. Online ticket sales are less than half of last year's tally, but most of the proceeds are from gate sales anyway, he said. About 32,000 tickets were sold last year.

Gaskins said Galveston hotels were nearly full and only about 50 rooms were left on the entire island as of Thursday because of bookings for Dickens on The Strand and company Christmas parties.

Hamachek said the Festival of Lights drew about 5,000 visitors Thanksgiving weekend, about half as many as last year, but described it as a good showing considering the storm and the economy.

Several companies donated services, such as portable bathrooms, and 15 of the 17 entertainers have agreed to forgo their usual fee, Jones said.

There would be no better way to give Galveston a hand up than to pay them a visit this weekend (and drop a little coin).

The Boogie Man Rag

Dunbar's latest

"Even if you question the accuracy of my constitutional interpretation as proof of the inappropriateness of a state-created, tax-payer supported school system, still the Scriptures bear witness to such an institution’s lack of proper authority in the life of the Christian family."

That's State Board of Education member Cynthia Dunbar, from page 102 of her book One Nation Under God. Want more from this Jesus freak?

Dunbar (on p. 100) calls public education a “subtly deceptive tool of perversion.” She charges that the establishment of public schools is unconstitutional and even “tyrannical” because it threatens the authority of families, granted by God through Scripture, to direct the instruction of their children (p. 103). Dunbar, who has home-schooled her children and sent them to private schools, bases that charge on her belief that “the underlying authority for our constitutional form of government stems directly from biblical precedents.” (p. xv)

I know. You gotta have more...

“This battle for our nation’s children and who will control their education and training is crucial to our success for reclaiming our nation,” Dunbar writes (p. 100), after earlier condemning what she calls a secular society that resembles Nazi Germany just before the Holocaust. Those at risk today are “the devout, Bible-believing Christians,” she writes (p. 2).

Dunbar argues that the Founders created “an emphatically Christian government” (p. 18) and believed government should be guided by a “biblical litmus test.” (p. 47) She also endorses a “belief system” that would “require that any person desiring to govern have a sincere knowledge and appreciation for the Word of God in order to rightly govern.” (p. 17)

Dunbar sees public schools as a threat to that belief system: “Our children are, after all, our best and greatest assets, and we are throwing them into the enemy’s flames even as the children of Israel threw their children to Moloch.” (p. 101)

How is that a person can help govern a public education system she loathes? Because she intends -- sort of like Grover Norquist drowning government in a bathtub -- to destroy it.

Dunbar sits on the state board’s Committee on Instruction, which guides the SBOE’s policies on curriculum and textbook adoptions. Earlier this year Dunbar used her position on that committee to win approval for vague guidelines that some public schools have used to offer deeply flawed and blatantly sectarian Bible classes. Even worse, she then joined three other board members in endorsing a constitutionally suspect Bible course curriculum that Odessa public schools had been forced to remove from classrooms after being sued by local parents.

The SBOE is currently debating a revision of science curriculum standards for the state’s public schools. Dunbar is part of a bloc of creationists who want public schools to teach students that evolution is not established, mainstream science.

Texas Freedom Network today called for Dunbar to be removed from the Committee on Instruction. It can't happen fast enough.

The jockeying for political position in 2010 (and 09)

Texas Governor: The GOP primary between Incumbent Governor Mofo and Senator Perjury-is-a-Technicality is officially under way:

From the Wall Street bailout bill to helping the Gulf Coast recover from Hurricane Ike, it seems the federal government can do nothing right in the eyes of Gov. Rick Perry.

The latest shot came Tuesday, when Perry accused federal environmental protection officials of "actively working to do more economic harm" to the state through potential regulation of carbon emissions linked to climate change.

"Washington has Texas in its sights," he said.

Many political observers believe Perry's harsh rhetoric is designed to position the governor in his bid for an unprecedented, third four-year term in 2010. The target is his likely challenger in the Republican primary, U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, who is more popular than Perry in some polls.

Hutchison in late September told her Senate colleagues that she wouldn't seek re-election to a leadership post and is planning to form an exploratory committee for the governor's race.

"I guess it's a pretty good shot to take on the federal government if you're running against someone who is an agent of the federal government," said Greg Thielemann, director of the Center for the Study of Texas Politics at the University of Texas at Dallas.

Let's not overlook Mayor Republican Lite.

Whatever plans (Bill White) declares, a perhaps more burning question still looms large over his intentions: Can he actually win statewide office?

Among the chattering classes in Austin and Houston, and even some White lieutenants at City Hall, no one is quite sure. But they do agree on at least one thing: Whether he runs to replace Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison next year if she resigns to run for governor, or whether he seeks the state's top job himself in 2010, White may have an uphill battle ahead.

The chances for a Democratic governor in the next election "are more bleak than any Democrat honestly wants to admit," said Mark Sanders, a Republican consultant who ran Democrat Tony Sanchez's 2004 campaign against Gov. Rick Perry. "It's not going to happen in 2010. There are just too many factors working against that."

Chief among the challenges, according to Sanders and more than a dozen strategists from both parties, is a significant GOP advantage laid bare by the Nov. 4 election results, even in a contest that saw historic statewide turnout for Democrats. Political handicappers all over the state are still parsing reams of data, but many are putting the divide at between 8 and 10 percentage points, a daunting deficit in the near term. Some have even wondered whether 2014 would be a more optimal year.

"In a positive Democratic climate with a good candidate like White, you might bring that down to the mid-single digits," said Cal Jillson, a professor of political science at Southern Methodist University. "Whether you could bring it down to zero in 2010 — or in other words, win — is a tall order."

All of the above make me nauseous. SOS (as in "save our ship"). Won't a real Democrat consider running? I am NOT looking at you, Kinky Friedman.

Lt. Governor, Attorney General, Comptroller, Land Commisioner: SOS (as in same old shit). With the clash of the titans at the top, the Republican incumbents Dewhurst, Abbott, Combs, and Patterson are cockblocked. Nobody on the Democratic side seems willing to take on another uphill fight for the moment. Lots of rumors, though; Barbara Radnofsky for AG is a persistent one.

Agriculture Commissioner: Expect a rematch between Todd Staples and Hank Gilbert, the shining Democratic star for 2010.

Houston Mayor, 2009: Eugene Locke has apparently bumped Bill King out of the contest; Annise Parker will make the race, likely to do so as well is Peter Brown. Somebody mentioned the name of Roy Morales, the great GOP hope in a non-partisan affair. It is to laugh.

Political fortunes still to be determined: Rick Noriega, Nick Lampson, and a number of other Democrats who narrowly lost last month. Noriega and Lampson could lift their profiles with a stint in the Obama administration.

Whose names are you hearing bandied about?