Sunday Funnies

Texas GOP quarreling over "sanctuary cities"

I have blogged previously about the ridiculousness of Mark Jones' premise that the defeat of "sanctuary cities" legislation in the regular session was a 'strategic victory' for Rick Perry. It seems that there are some prominent Republicans who are trying desperately to validate Jones' argument. Read this from Julian Aguilar at the Texas Tribune:

A series of email exchanges between Republican Party boosters and the office of Gov. Rick Perry indicate some conservatives believe passing the contentious “sanctuary cities” bill may cripple efforts to recruit more Hispanics to their ranks.

The correspondence signals a potential rift between Perry, who appears intent on addressing immigration issues during the current special session, and some of the party’s backers as rumors surrounding a possible Perry presidential run continue to swirl.

“At the end of the day you should understand that Hispanic voters will not support a party that wants to deport their mother and father,” Norman Adams, the co-founder of Texans for Sensible Immigration Policy and a member of Texas GOP Vote, a conservative website, wrote to Ray Sullivan, Perry’s chief of staff. The messages are part of an email exchange that began June 2 and were obtained by the Tribune.

Dr. Steve Hotze, the chairman of Conservative Republicans of Texas, is included in the exchanges and urges Perry and Sullivan to reconsider. Hotze contributed at least $60,000 personally and at least $640,000 via his PAC to GOP House and Senate candidates in the last election cycle.

“It seems that we should focus on recruiting Hispanics to the Republican ranks," he wrote. "It appears this bill might accomplish just the opposite.”

Clicking on Dr. Hotze's name above will carry you to his immigration video, where he makes the case against harsh anti-immigrant rhetoric by the GOP. You should go and watch it. Here's a brief excerpt:

We cannot turn our back on immigrants and their families with anti-immigration rhetoric and legislation. If we do so, then we're not just sending the wrong message to the Hispanic community, but we're also denying our own conservative values and beliefs.

It's difficult to believe that Hotze is a voice of reasonable moderation in this regard. More from Aguilar at the Trib ...

“When it comes to the Sanctuary City bill, we believe you should thank God for the opposition from our police chiefs and sheriffs across the state. Its failure to pass was a blessing for you and for Texas Republicans,” Adams wrote Perry on June 2, before the governor added the legislation to the call. Speculation that Perry would add the item had already gained momentum by then, however, and it is also the day state Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, filed SB9, which includes the legislation.

“The irony of this whole thing is that the governor had a winning ticket if he wants to run for president" with the success of the regular session, Adams said today in an interview. “He avoided Arizona-style legislation, which has caused nothing but an economic disaster [there], in his own state.”

The problem with that, of course, is that no single issue -- not the state budget cuts, not abortion, nothing -- incenses the Texas TeaBagging base like non-citizen immigrants. You don't have to listen for very long to hear it: Ill Eagles are responsible for everything that is wrong in the world: the budget shortfall, exploding Medicaid expenditures, overcrowded school classrooms, global warming, the Astros' losing season, you name it. And any public forum that includes Texas conservatives commenting on current events quickly reveals this weird alternate reality where only mass deportation of all undocumented people will solve every single problem facing the Great State.

It is an unrelenting, unyielding caterwaul.

Dr. Hotze speaks an inconvenient truth for Texas Republicans, but as an electorate they are no more likely to heed his warning than they were to split their tickets in 2010. They will only support candidates that demand the borders sealed by the federal government as well as deportation. Not so much penalties for employers who hire the undocumented, mind you; that goes against the governor's "Texas Miracle" economy (as well as the wishes of his megadonors Bob Perry and Bo Pilgrim).

Anyway, that's Rick Perry's stated strategy, and he's sticking to it. Today. Keep in mind that these are also the people telling us he's not running for president.

Sullivan said today that Perry will not get distracted from what he views as political theater.

“What Dr. Hotze and Mr. Adams talk about is politics. We are talking about public safety and policy,” he said. “We are not looking at this through a political lens. This is ‘How do we make Texas streets and neighborhoods and individuals safer?’”

He also said the issue would not damage the party’s efforts to recruit Hispanics.

“There is a broad agreement throughout the state, regardless of geography and political persuasion, that law enforcement should be encouraged to do their jobs to the best of their abilities,” he said. He added that a lot of the criminal activity the bill seeks to address occurs in “urban centers and minority communities,” and pointed out that every Hispanic Republican in the Texas House supports the sanctuary cities legislation.

Sullivan also dismissed Adams’ emails that insist a majority of law enforcement officers are opposed to the bill.

“We have been hearing for well over a year from police officers and police associations who have seen their colleagues killed by individuals in the country illegally,” he said.

My first observation here is that Aguilar has an extraordinary and unusual amount of back-channel access here: the e-mails, the lengthy response from the governor's spokesperson. That's an awful lot of on-the-record commentary. If GOP legislators actually don't want to pass this bill they will have an extremely difficult path to walk to do so; for one thing they are much more vulnerable to backlash in 2012 from the base than is Perry.

Paul Burka has previously documented Rick Perry's flip-flop on sanctuary cities -- he was for them before he was against them -- as well as the odd sight of Republican legislators celebrating after the legislation's demise in the regular session.

How is the GOP going to defeat sanctuary cities again in the special, thus preserving the 'strategic victory' for Perry and saving the long-term future of the RPT, mollifying Hotze and Adams but enraging the base? Or does Perry just intend to go for the short-term political gain, exerting his will to get the bill okayed and damn the long-term consequences?

It looks to me like he's betting on the latter, and so am I. But I cannot say I will be surprised if the bill dies another strange procedural death at some point, enabling every Republican except the Teas to breathe a sigh of relief.

How do Iowa Republican primary voters poll on illegal immigration? That might tell us a lot about whatever hidden agenda the governor is operating from in this regard.

Update: Related reading ...

Hotze: Hispanic Christians Will Be "Our Natural Allies Against the Democrats and Muslims" (Right Wing Watch)

Should Perry be thankful for unanswered prayer? (Lisa Falkenberg, Houston Chronicle)

Newt loses campaign staff (they're going to work for Rick Perry)

Though they aren't saying so yet. A summary of the reports:

In a major blow to Newt Gingrich's presidential hopes, senior advisers to his 2012 campaign resigned en masse today, citing strategic differences.

The staffers include Rick Tyler, a longtime political adviser and close friend to Gingrich who has worked for the former House speaker for years, as well as Rob Johnson, a former longtime aide to Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who had been hired to manage Gingrich's campaign. [...]

"When the campaign and the candidate disagree on the path, they've got to part ways," Tyler told the Post.

Gingrich campaign manager Rob Johnson, who ran Perry’s wildly successful 2010 re-election race, and New Hampshire political consultant David Carney, who has been a close Perry adviser throughout the governor’s rise to power, were among the Gingrich aides leaping off his tempest-tossed presidential campaign ship. [...]

If you remember our recent “Perry Watch” post entitled “Some important clues that will tell you whether Rick Perry is serious about running for president,” we wrote:

Watch Dave Carney and Rob Johnson. Unless you’re a political junkie, you probably don’t know those names. But Carney is Perry’s canny political guru and Johnson managed the governor’s wildly successful 2010 re-election campaign. Both are now working for GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, Johnson as campaign chief. Carney “is from New Hampshire, and he knows presidential politics as well as anyone in his party,” says Democratic consultant Paul Begala, a Houstonian and longtime Bill Clinton adviser who says he has “a high degree of respect for Carney.” If Carney and Johnson leave Gingrich while the Georgian’s struggling presidential quest continues, it’s a sign that Perry is reassembling his campaign brain trust.

During their time with Gingrich, Johnson and Carney have been able to tap into Gingrich’s national network of supporters and his fundraising machinery — two tools that could become invaluable in case Perry decides to go for the gold in 2012.

Yes, Rick Perry is definitely in. His Christian Ramadan scheduled for August is just days prior to an Iowa straw poll. Iowa's Christian conservative primary voters are key to any success Perry might have in the early going.

Carney, you will recall, was a player in the Texas Green Party ballot qualification shenanigans in 2010, during the last Perry re-election campaign against Bill White.

Finally and FWIW there's also an online poll at the Austin Business Journal -- no bastion of liberal media -- you can click on. Currently the results don't look so good for the governor.

Update: All of Gingrich's paid staff in Iowa has also resigned.

The Redemption of Isiah Carey

Via Richard Connelly at the Houston Press. Just watch it.

Tosh.0
Tags: Tosh.0 Videos,Daniel Tosh,Web Redemption

Rick Perry's Ramadan *updates*

Reliant Stadium, Houston, August 6.

Gov. Rick Perry raised some eyebrows recently when he officially declared three "Days of Prayer for Rain in the State of Texas," which has been plagued by drought.

But now Perry, these days a pundit-approved Possible Presidential Contender, is taking his advocacy for public prayer a step further -- and in a distinctly non-inclusive direction.

Perry is the man behind a new conservative Christian event called "The Response: A call to prayer for a nation in crisis." It is a day of prayer and fasting to be held at Reliant Stadium in Houston in August. Says Perry in a letter on the front page of the event's website:

"Right now, America is in crisis: we have been besieged by financial debt, terrorism, and a multitude of natural disasters. As a nation, we must come together and call upon Jesus to guide us through unprecedented struggles, and thank Him for the blessings of freedom we so richly enjoy."
(Emphasis added.)

Perry adds that "there is hope for America ... and we will find it on our knees."

Here we go ...


The Response Promo from The Response USA on Vimeo.

So who else will be at The Response?

"Governor Rick Perry has invited all US governors as well as many other national Christian and political leaders," according to the event's website. "People of all ages, races, backgrounds and Christian denominations will be in attendance to proclaim Jesus as Savior and pray for America."

The Response is being organized at Perry's request by the American Family Association, a group that regular readers will recognize from our past coverage of a top AFA official's history of openly bigoted anti-Muslim rhetoric.

I'm going to have to resort to praying that God does NOT send a Category 5 hurricane to smite Rick Perry and this awakened sleeper cell of terrorists on that day.

I'm either leaving town or protesting the shit out of these people.

Update: The event doesn't seem to be going over well. Jason Embry:

(T)he Texas Tribune: “It’s billed as an ‘apolitical Christian prayer meeting,’ but on Tuesday the event drew heated rebukes from the Anti-Defamation League, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Sparking the controversy are the (American Family Association)’s views on Christianity, its staunchly anti-gay platform and the inflammatory statements of one its executives, Bryan Fischer. In an interview with The Texas Tribune on Tuesday, AFA president Tim Wildmon said Jews, Muslims, atheists or any other non-Christian would “go to hell” unless they accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. Wildmon’s father, Don, who famously took on iconic television programs like Three’s Company for promoting what he saw as an immoral lifestyle, is listed as one of the event’s chief organizers. ...

Go read the whole thing, including the reasons why GA Gov. Nathan Deal, FL Gov. Rick Scott, IN Gov. Mitch Daniels, and MI Gov. Rick Snyder have already RSVP'd "thanks but no thanks". And there is more about Goodhair's appearance this weekend at a Spanish-language anti-abortion event in Los Angeles (Perry will address the gathering in English). The governor, you will note, yesterday added his sanctuary cities emergency legislation to the special session call ... thus assuring himself of a strategic defeat.

Update II: Mayor Annise Parker endorses the governor's prayer meetin' ...

When asked if she considered the AFA holding an event in her city an insult, (Parker) said, “No, I’m glad to have anybody’s dollars coming to the city of Houston. They can come back on a monthly basis if they’d like as long as they spend money.”

“I don’t have any complaint with this event and certainly respect the value of prayer and believe that folks coming together for spiritual support is important under any circumstances,” Parker said ...

...but Westboro Baptist plans to picket. The Apocalypse is nigh, folks. The Dallas Voice observes...

(I)t’s pretty clear that Perry will have to do a better job of uniting homophobic bigots — and build a bigger tent of hate — if he wants to win the GOP presidential nomination.