The Weekly Sweet Sixteen Wrangle

With the arrival of spring, a legislative session in Austin, municipal campaigns revving up around the state and Texas' primaries less than a year away, the blogs of the Texas Progressive Alliance continue to bring you insights from our members around the state. Here's a roundup of what we've been reporting:

The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas is now saying that the economic downturn has landed full force in Texas. Spared from the worst job losses during the first 6 months of the current recession, Texas is shedding jobs at an alarming pace. Wcnews at Eye On Williamson looks at the trends and offers a sobering assessment of the hard-line-let-'em-crash mentality of Gov. Rick Perry and the Texas GOP.

Off the Kuff points to a bill by state Rep. Dwayne Bohac to demonstrate that the push for voter ID really is about vote suppression.

If Republicans really cared about election integrity, then why do we still have non-auditable electronic voting machines? CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wants to know.

BossKitty at TruthHugger sees an opportunity to get a degree in the dark arts in If Texas HB-2800 Passes, I Want A Masters Degree In VooDoo.

In a post that took some work and came out well, Neil at Texas Liberal wrote about what Google searches miss. Also, Neil read the bird sermon of St. Francis to a dancing duck chicken.

John Coby at Bay Area Houston writes about Why Ethics Reform is Needed in Texas.

The Texas Cloverleaf looks at a few local Twits in the GOP. Twittering Republicans, that is.

Over at TexasKaos, Libby Shaw tells us that in Hutchinson's world, "It's All About Me". So she is going to run for governor, keep her Senate seat and give the people of Texas absentee representation. Whatever makes her happy. Heaven forbid she should put her constituents first.

WhosPlayin examined HB 4441, an attempt by Rep. Yvonne Gonzalez Toureilles to solve some problems related to pipelines.

nytexan at BlueBloggin is stunned that Obama Taps CitiGroup Economist For Treasury Spot. So, how does Washington's logic work? They offer a job, at the Treasury Department, to Lewis Alexander of CitiGroup. The Global Marketing Division that Alexander heads up was just fined $2 million by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) for trade-reporting violations, including publishing flawed quotations. Let me know how that works out for you!

Xanthippas at Three Wise Men has some thoughts on the goals of American foreign policy, and is wondering if the war in Afghanistan is winnable, at least as we appear to be defining victory.

Molly Ivins warned us years ago about AIG, "too big to fail", and Phil Gramm. So says PDiddie at Brains and Eggs.

McBlogger takes a look at the valuations being placed on the evil CDO's. Lots of laughs, of course, follow.

Sunday Spring has Sproing Funnies

Mudbug, brewdogs, and college basketball

The order of the day. In alternating importance. Appropriate self-indulgence should include a dash of schadenfreude at the plight of the Right these days, though:

-- The conservative hypocrisy reaches dizzying new heights with each passing week. If it's not Rush Limbaugh then it's Glenn Beck or Jim Cramer; if it isn't John Cornyn then it's Eric Cantor. This week, it's Sarah Palin following on the heels of Rick Perry, Mark Sanford, and Piyush Jindal in rejecting large portions of the federal stimulus funds apportioned for their respective states. From the Anchrage Daily News (emphasis is mine):

The biggest single chunk of money that Palin is turning down is about $170 million for education, including money that would go for programs to help economically disadvantaged and special needs students. Anchorage School Superintendent Carol Comeau said she is "shocked and very disappointed" that Palin would reject the schools money. She said it could be used for job preservation, teacher training, and helping kids who need it. ...

Sarah Palin, you may recall, has a special needs child of her own. And during the presidential campaign last year, she pointedly claimed that special-needs children would have an advocate in the White House.

But snce she didn't make it to Washington, I suppose that doesn't apply any more.

Acting Anchorage Mayor Matt Claman said he's disappointed Palin chose to turn down funding that would create jobs and maintain services. "Her rationale is like turning down a gift card because it expires in two years," Claman said in a written statement.

Palin is turning down money for weatherization, energy efficiency grants, immunizations, air quality grants, emergency food assistance, homeless grants, senior meals, child care development grants, nutrition programs, homeless grants, arts, unemployment services, air quality, justice assistance grants and other programs.

No surprise that Palin -- along with Governors Sanford and Jindal -- are whispered as aspirants for the Republican 2012 prez nom:

It's probably not a coincidence that each of the Republican governors who have showboated taken public stands on not accepting federal stimulus money are thought to be contenders for a future GOP presidential run. It's also true that the state legislatures in each of the states are able to overturn the governors decision.

Which, of course, would be the best of all worlds for these governors. They would get the Rush LImbaugh butt-kissing bonus points for claiming they will refuse the funds and later be able to claim the state legislatures overruled them. And everything worked out happily ever after.

Remind me again ...what was one of the conservative poutrages this week? Oh yeah, Obama said "Special Olympics" on Leno.

-- AIG bonuses ruled the airwaves all week long, but the GOP got confused over which direction they were supposed to scream about them. 87 of 172 House Republicans voted to tax the bonuses at 90%, but senators on the Right plan to slow-walk the legislation until the furor dies down. Very conflicting decision for the welfare-only-for-corporations representatives in the Congress.

-- Norm Coleman's lawyer says "I'm done":

According to a transcript of a radio appearance this week by former Senator Norm Coleman's attorney, Joe Friedberg, the Republican will most likely lose his election contest against Al Franken for the U.S. Senate seat in Minnesota.

Hotline's Jennifer Skalka quotes Friedberg as conceding that Coleman will "probably" lose when the 3-judge panel currently deliberating the case, which both sides rested last week, announce their verdict.

"I think it's probably correct that Franken will still be ahead and probably by a little bit more," Friedberg admitted, after announcing that he was "done" with the case.

Senator Al Franken will be seated as soon as the court issues its ruling. Suck on that, John Cornyn.

Molly Ivins warned us about AIG

More specifically, about Phil Gramm:

October 26, 1999

AUSTIN, Texas — I feel vaguely like Henry Higgins in "My Fair Lady," announcing with gleefully inhumane relish: "She'll regret it, she'll regret it! Ha!"

"I can see her now, Mrs. Freddy Eynsford-Hill, in a wretched little flat above the store!

"I can see her now, not a penny in the till, and the bill collectors knocking at the door!"

Which is to say, the new banking bill is a thoroughly lousy idea, and the party most likely to regret it is us.

The 1999 Gramm-Leach Act is about to replace the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act, with the result that bankers, brokers and insurance companies can all get into one another's business. It's a done deal except for the final vote on the conference-committee agreement. The inevitable result will be a wave of mergers creating gigantic financial entities.

"Too Big to Fail" will be the new order of the day. And guess who gets left holding the bag when they're too big to fail? One of these monsters goes down, and it will cost as much as the whole S&L debacle.

And Molly also warned us about Gramm's Commodity Futures Trading Act, a 262-page amendment which he slipped into an omnibus appropriations bill moving toward passage as Congress was preparing to head home for the Christmas recess in 2000.

December 24, 2000

Just before it left town last week, Congress passed a little horror called the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, brought to us courtesy of heavy lobbying by Wall Street banks and investment brokers.

Frank Portnoy, writing in The New York Times, describes the bill thusly: "First, it lifts a long-standing ban on futures trading in individual stocks, thus allowing investors to buy shares through brokers with very little money down. Second, it protects a lucrative business for bankers — the private financial contracts known as swaps — from being regulated. ... Investors are affected by swaps because they are ... used by many mutual funds and publicly traded companies."

*heavy sigh*

Third Appeals insists 'funds' aren't checks

This has to do with Tom Delay protectorates David Puryear and Alan Waldrop, whose sordid tales of corruption have been detailed previously. Harvey Kronberg, his emphasis:

In a 3-2 ruling (yesterday), Republican Justices Pemberton, Puryear and Waldrop prevailed over Democratic Justices Patterson and Henson.

At issue was whether or not to have the full Court of Appeals rehear a controversial decision late last year that ruled, among other things, that the Texas money laundering statute was unconstitutionally vague. Their argument was the statute used the term "funds" rather than "check"

Defendants John Colyandro and Jim Ellis have been in the soup because of their role in an alleged money laundering scheme in former Majority Tom DeLay's Texans for a Republican Majority. They were accused of sending unusable corporate contributions (illegal in Texas) to the Republican National Committee in DC and having identical amounts routed back as sanitized dollars.

After ignoring prosecutors request for an expedited review and sitting on the case for nearly three years, a three judge panel last year broke along party lines and raised questions about the legitimacy of the indictment.

In a scathing dissent, Democrat Justice Patterson pointed to last minute changes in court procedure and expressed amazement that the court resolved issues not before it -- like the vagueness of the money laundering statute.

Capitol Annex links to Patterson's dissent, and adds:

Perhaps the most interesting thing about the Court’s opinion is that it --until overruled -- sets a precedent under which the state district courts in the 24-county region that makes up the Third Court of Appeals District could throw out all money laundering convictions involving checks prior to the 2005 law change since the court has construed the meaning of “funds” not to include checks for the purpose of Texas’ money laundering statute prior to 2005.

That's worth repeating: corporate political contributions made by check -- laundered specifically to evade the law in Texas -- don't meet the definition of the word "funds", as defined by the three GOP judges on the Third Court of Appeals.

Presumably this case will now go to the Texas Supreme Court -- where Republicans have a 9-0 "majority".

Stanford Financial and Ben Barnes -- and the big picture

Truly remarkable how he is connected to all these scandals:

From the Sharpstown banking fraud that ended his political career to the current financial collapse of his lobby client Stanford Financial Group, former Texas Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes has played a constant character on the stage of state and national scandals. ...

Most recently, Barnes surfaced when the Securities and Exchange Commission last month filed a fraud lawsuit against his client Stanford Financial Group and its founder R. Allen Stanford. When Stanford was missing, Barnes was the person who confirmed that he had been served with the lawsuit.

Barnes’ lobby firm earned $1.8 million representing Stanford Financial between 2002 and 2008, working issues ranging from federal regulation of offshore banks to tax codes for the U.S. Virgin Islands. Barnes was surprised by the company’s collapse.

“It’s hard to believe. Our firm wasn’t hired to look at the books or do anything with the business,” Barnes said.

Over the years, Barnes has been associated with the 1971 Sharpstown scandal, the collapse of his real estate business with former Gov. John Connally, the GTECH lobbying controversy at the Texas lottery, and (Dan) Rather’s 60 Minutes report in 2004 on President George W. Bush’s service in the Texas Air National Guard.

Did you know that Barnes was once labeled the "51st senator" by Tom Daschle? I didn't:

Barnes is one of the top money-raisers for Democratic U.S. senators. He and his wife, Melanie, personally gave more than $600,000 to federal Democratic candidates and committees since 2004. Barnes last month donated $1 million to the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas.

When the U.S. Senate was evenly divided early in this decade, then-Majority Leader Tom Daschle called Barnes the “51st senator.”

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman Sen. Chuck Schumer at a New York luncheon for 250 committee donors last year singled out only two fund-raisers with exceptional praise. Barnes was one.

The clients Barnes has represented before Congress have paid his firm $24 million since 1999. They include:

• Texas top trial lawyers John Eddie Williams of Houston, Wayne Reaud of Beaumont and Harold Nix of Daingerfield.

• Ruth Parasol, an Internet gambling entrepreneur from California who first made a fortune off of Internet pornography, earning her the nickname of “Princess of Porn” in the British press.

• GloFish, an Austin company that markets genetically altered tropical fish that glow in the dark.

• The Huntsman Cancer Institute in Utah for which Barnes says he obtained a $100 million appropriation for cancer research.

• Moynihan Station Developer LLC, a company renovating New York’s Penn Station, tearing down Madison Square Gardens and renovating 16 blocks of Manhattan.

Financial corruption -- or at least his nearly constant association with those who are financially corrupt -- has been a hallmark of Ben Barnes' life.

If the Democratic party wants to avoid traveling down the same path as the Republicans, it needs to end its association with Barnes and his ilk.

(Yes, I hear the peals of laughter.)

Separating fact fom blarney

No, this is not a post about the latest conservative hypocrisy. Today I am Perry Hussein O'Reilly:

Up until the mid-nineteenth century, most Irish immigrants in America were members of the Protestant middle class. When the Great Potato Famine hit Ireland in 1845, close to a million poor, uneducated, Catholic Irish began to pour into America to escape starvation. Despised for their religious beliefs and funny accents by the American Protestant majority, the immigrants had trouble finding even menial jobs. When Irish Americans in the country's cities took to the streets on St. Patrick's Day to celebrate their heritage, newspapers portrayed them in cartoons as drunk, violent monkeys.

However, the Irish soon began to realize that their great numbers endowed them with a political power that had yet to be exploited. They started to organize, and their voting block, known as the "green machine," became an important swing vote for political hopefuls. Suddenly, annual St. Patrick's Day parades became a show of strength for Irish Americans, as well as a must-attend event for a slew of political candidates. In 1948, President Truman attended New York City 's St. Patrick's Day parade, a proud moment for the many Irish whose ancestors had to fight stereotypes and racial prejudice to find acceptance in America.

Watch "Gangs of New York" for another primer on the persecution of my people.

The Weekly Wrangle

Here's your Monday-morning-warming-back-up-to-spring roundup from participating Texas Progressive Alliance blogs.

Mayor McSleaze McBlogger returns from his holiday to post his thoughts on developments in the Wall Street infotainment industry.

Vince of Capitol Annex took a new look at the latest creationist attack on science in Texas classrooms in Bill Would Make "Strengths and Weaknesses" Teaching Of Evolution State Law.

State representative Wayne Christian has filed a bill that would scare Texas citizens from filing ethics complaints against elected officials, notes JohnCoby at Bay Area Houston.

Off the Kuff takes a look at who would be affected by the voter ID legislation that is being pushed in the Lege by Republicans.

WCNews at Eye On Williamson posts on the turmoil facing some inside Texas GOP regarding Gov. Perry's decision to turn down $555 million dollars of unemployment insurance from the stimulus money, in UI debate must be maddening for the GOP supporters of Hutchison.

Neil at Texas Liberal reads Malcolm X in a cemetery and says that Rick Perry has found his schoolhouse door to stand in and block.

The Texas Cloverleaf expands upon Capitol Annex's look at Garnet Coleman's proposed repeal of the anti-gay marriage amendment in Texas.

BossKitty at TruthHugger truly believes there is profit for everyone when wasteful and costly opposition to medical marijuana is brought in to the economy instead of keeping it out. The War on "Illegal Activities" should focus on smuggling heroin and human trafficking. Can Marijuana Rescue The Economy In 2010 Like Booze Did In 1933?

At Texas Kaos, Lightseeker highlights the Texas Shakedown for those who make the mistake of driving in Tenaha, Texas while not white.

CouldBeTrue at South Texas Chisme notes thuggery isn't the first choice for governing Democrats addressing drug cartel violence. Analysis and coordinated effort is.

nytexan at BlueBloggin is disgusted, but not surprised, by the new Republican strategy: as tent cities pop up in Sacramento, unemployment is at 10% in many states and the Wall Street continues a downward slide; the GOP response is to attempt to lower approval numbers for Pelosi and House Democrats.

WhosPlayin is focused on local races for mayor and city council in Lewisville. This week he interviewed Shelley Kaehr and David Thornhill, who are running for Place 2.

Xanthippas at Three Wise Men takes down the right-wing handwringing and disingenuous criticism over Obama's stem cell decision.

Easter Lemming finds that Pasadena has its first fantasy action candidate for city council. At least by the unauthorized t-shirts and caps of some supporters.

Sunday Ides of March Funnies

Cramer vs. Stewart

Here's the assembled coverage:

Sometimes listening to Jon Stewart is like what you'd imagine it would be like to listen to a great journalism professor... except you're laughing so hard you've fallen out of your chair.

In tonight's interview, Stewart makes the case for what CNBC should have been doing over the past few years: actual business reporting, instead of acting like they were an entertainment channel for the stock market.

Here's part 3 of the unedited and uncensored interview (warning: there's an F-bomb or two). You can also view part 1 and part 2 of the interview on DKTV. Here's the full episode.

Here's some analysis from David Bauder of the AP:

The feud between Jon Stewart and CNBC's Jim Cramer has been good for laughs — and ratings — but has also raised the serious question of whether the experts at TV's No. 1 financial news network should have seen the meltdown coming and warned the public.

Over the past two weeks, Stewart's "Daily Show" on Comedy Central has ridiculed CNBC personalities, including Cramer, the manic host of "Mad Money," by airing video clips of them making exuberantly bullish statements about the market and various investment banks shortly before they collapsed.

Stewart has charged that people at CNBC knew what was going on behind the scenes on Wall Street but didn't tell the public. He has accused CNBC anchors and pundits of abandoning their journalistic duties and acting like cheerleaders for the market.

"In a tremendous boom period, they covered the boom and people wanted to believe in the boom," said Andrew Leckey, a former CNBC anchor and now president of the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at Arizona State University. "They didn't uncover the lies that were told to them. Nobody did. But they should be held to a higher responsibility."

And though MediaBistro's TVNewser indicated MSNBC's evening political commentators would ignore the mash-up, Keith Olbermann refuted that contention, and Rachel Maddow reported on the affair, noting both the resignation of Cramer's website CEO as well as the ratings bonanza recorded by that episode of the Daily Show: the second-most watched this year and also in the top ten most-viewed shows.