Susan Combs is sorry.

Very, VERY sorry.

Taking "full responsibility" for the inadvertent online exposure of the personal information of 3.5 million Texans, Comptroller Susan Combs on Thursday said her agency would pay for free credit monitoring and Internet surveillance to those affected, and her campaign fund would provide identity restoration services for anyone whose personal information is misused.

"I am deeply sorry this incident occurred and I take full responsibility for it," Combs said. "This incident has affected the lives of Texans that I have dedicated my life to serving and I am determined to restore their faith in the Comptroller's Office."

While her office's initial explanation for the incident blamed three other state agencies for failing to send encrypted filed, on Thursday, Combs called the finger-pointing "irrelevant."

"We had the last clear chance to make it right and we didn't," she said.

The comments at the link are running pretty much against her apology.

She also defended her office's hiring of two campaign contributors as consultants to review her office's Internet security, saying state procurement policies limited her choice of technology firms who could immediately begin work on the project.

Because "speed was important," she said she hired Deloitte Consulting and Gartner, Inc., rather than going through the competitive bidding process, because those firms already had contracts with the state.

She declined to comment on a court filing this week in Austin by attorneys who are seeking to take her deposition to get to the bottom of what they called the "most massive and far-reaching invasion of privacy in the history of Texas."

Those lawyers called on Combs to resign, saying she should take responsibility for her office's role in the incident.

Apparently she's going to try to ride the storm out. Good luck with that, Susan. In the meantime the millions of Texans affected by your criminal negligence can take advantage of that discount credit monitoring service, graciously paid for by your political campaign.

Combs had her sights set on moving up from comptroller to something bigger and better someday, just like Todd Staples and Greg Abbott and David Dewhurst and all the other ladies-in-waiting behind Governor Suckseed. There will now be a little less competition in the shark tank.

And I'm certain the pup sharks in the RPT are already sharpening their teeth in anticipation.

Texas House passes redistricting bill

It will soon go to the Senate.

The GOP-led Texas House approved a redistricting plan early Thursday that would all but guarantee a continued Republican majority — albeit a smaller one than the party has now.

The map was approved on a 92-52 vote after a marathon debate that dragged into the wee morning hours Thursday. It would pit several Republicans against each other, the natural result of an unsustainably large super-majority.

Some Republican members and activists wanted to make the map a much bolder grab for conservative seats and limit the number of losses. But House leaders easily beat back those attempts. Either way, there is only so much they can do given the constraints of federal anti-discrimination laws and shifts in population away from conservative rural areas and toward the suburbs that have seen explosive and diverse population growth.

The emotional and heated debate ended up dragging on for some 16 hours, the longest single session in the House so far this year and testament to the importance lawmakers place on their own futures. The map faces a final procedural hurdle before it can move to the Senate.

Once again, if you follow "Inside Baseball" on this sort of thing, then Greg (who live-blogged it yesterday) and Charles have been keeping you up to the minute. If you have only been keeping track via my executive summary, then you will note the following revision affecting one pair ...

Republican Reps. Jim Landtroop and Charles Perry, both from West Texas, would get separate districts under the proposal that would take a single seat out of the region for redistribution elsewhere. Perry and Landtroop called the new proposal a victory for the rural region.

There was some speculation that Charles Perry might try for the Senate against Robert Duncan, but this development likely negates that. Houston's Scott Hochberg, on the other hand, is getting as royally screwed as Kate Middleton.

Two Democrats would also be paired in the Houston area. One of them is Rep. Scott Hochberg, who said map drawers creatively split the 5401 Chimney Rock apartment complex, hoping for his demise. If the map became law, inhabitants of the complex could be in different state House districts depending on which unit they live in, Hochberg said.

I would prefer that Hochberg and Hubert Vo not run against each other; indeed, that one of them moves into Jim Murphy's district and knocks him out. We'll see. There's also the possibility that former state rep. Kristi Thibaut mounts another challenge to Murphy as well.

Paul Burka speculates that this map endangers Speaker Straus -- now, and in the future.

Once again, Straus’s speakership is at risk. This is what happens when you come to the critical moment of the session with no team in place, no plan, and brush fires of discontent among the members. I have to say, though I like Straus personally, he is sowing what he reaped. He has spent the entire session kowtowing to the far right, so that the inmates are running the asylum, and it has gotten him nowhere. He was never going to win them over, and now he has the worst appropriations bill in modern history to show for his efforts, and a potential redistricting revolt on his hands. His speakership is at risk–if not now, then in the Legislative Redistricting Board. Rick Perry will likely send redistricting to the board, probably with whispered instructions to draw a map that pairs Straus loyalists and insulates the conservatives from potential challengers. This could get really bloody.

And Scott at Grits notes that if incarcerated people were assigned accurately in the redraw, then Houston would not have lost a seat. Prisoners don't get representation? That's the Republican way.

Update: Via Eye on Williamson, both the Observer and the Tribune have more on last night's marathon debate.

What's next?

Now that the birthers have been slapped down ...

Update: Never mind. I overestimated the intellect we are dealing with.

Combs under pressure to resign over exposed data

Suggesting that Comptroller Susan Combs should resign for her role in exposing the personal information of 3.5 million Texans, two Austin lawyers have petitioned a state district court for permission to question Combs as part of their investigation into the incident.

Calling the data exposure “an egregious example of incompetence and hypocrisy,” attorney Chuck Herring, representing teacher Sarah Canright, and Jim Harrington of the Texas Civil Rights Project, filed court documents seeking Combs’ deposition.

“Petitioners desire to investigate potential claims concerning the most massive and far-reaching invasion of privacy in the history of Texas,” the court filing stated. “The incomplete, misleading statements issued by Comptroller Combs and the Comptroller’s Office to date raise more questions than they answer. Texans deserve to know the truth concerning how this illegal and unconstitutional invasion occurred.”

Herring noted that Combs has fired four employees but has not personally accepted responsibility for the exposure of the information, which was transferred to the Comptroller’s office by the Teacher Retirement System, the Employee Retirement System and the Texas Workforce Commission.

“If this was the private sector, would she still be CEO?” asked Harrington.

Combs' political career is over, whether or not she is eventually forced to step down. The problem, of course, is that she was just re-elected last November, so there's plenty of time for the people who voted for her to forget all about this. But if she decides to hang on, she'll get a TeaBag primary challenge ... and maybe this time the Democrats will run someone against her (or the TeaBagger) in 2014.

Personally, I wish she would go back to writing those steamy paperback novels.

Update:

Looking for ways to cope with inadvertently exposing the personal data of 3.5 million Texans, the state’s comptroller has retained the services of two firms whose leaders or political committees contributed over $50,000 to her campaign.

Using your political contributors to help hide your crimes. It's just the Texas Republican way.