The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance thinks that watching football this past weekend -- in particular the Houston Texans' victory over the Cincinnati Bengals -- was a much better use of your time than watching the 388th and 389th Repubican presidential debates. Here's this week's roundup.

Off the Kuff discusses the state's appeal of the injunction granted against the horrible sonogram law.

WCNews at Eye On Williamson posts on the fact that our politics can't be fixed until the money is taken out of our political process: It's the money.

The case against the Texas Republicans' redistricting argument (beginning before the SCOTUS on January 9) rests almost entirely on two generations of legal precedent. And with a Court that has indicated an interest in eviscerating the Voting Rights Act, precedent doesn't mean diddly, either. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs elaborates.

BossKitty at TruthHugger has had enough of the religious bullying by the 2012 Republican presidential candidates, specifically Rick Santorum. Why do we need a Jesus candidate?

At TexasKaos, Libby Shaw explains why Romney's "job creator" lies are, well ... lies. Check it out: Mitt Romney: A Job Killer, Not Creator.

From Bay Area Houston: The Texas Ethics Commission, Jerry Eversole, and the GOP. Texas sized embarrassments.

BlueBloggin sees the consequences of not paying attention when corporate-funded American politicians make it easy to break environmental rules, ruin natural resources and not be held accountable to the human victims.

Neil at Texas Liberal noted a certificate he received in the mail from the Department of Veterans Affairs that noted his recently deceased father's military service. Neil's dad, a Korean War combat veteran, would have been glad that the certificate was signed by Barack Obama and not by a draft-dodging liar like George W. Bush.

Sunday Funnies

This post was almost comprised completely of Rick Santorum quotes as captions for New Yorker cartoons. But after yesterday's takedown, I didn't want you to think that I was being overly harsh on the man.

Rick Santorum on pre-existing conditions

Falling ill because you did "things wrong" seems to be in complete contradiction to what Jesus actually said about pre-existing conditions.

Rick Sanctimonious is really not just the worst kind of Republican or even the worst kind of Christian; he's the worst kind of human being. Because he either willfully ignores the teachings of Jesus for the sake of political expediency, or he's a bald-faced liar and prevaricating ass masquerading as a pious man.

But more importantly this reveals in its purest form the rationale (sic) of the ultra-conservative Christian. If you are healthy God has blessed you because you are a devout Christian, if you are sick God is punishing you for something. In this delusion you may also substitute for healthy/sick the words rich/poor -- this particularly is the gospel of Joel Osteen -- and white/any other skin color, etc. Consequently ... why should I pay more in taxes because you sinned?

Understanding it is really as simple as this: My Faith is Better and Stronger Than ANY Science. This in turn explains their disbelief in evolution, climate change, the Frankenstein-like transformation of women's reproductive choice into "baby-killing", and so on and so forth.  When Pat Robertson says that New Orleans was flooded by a hurricane because God perceived the city as full of sin, that's part of it. When Rick Perry says that the nation is in crisis and the only thing that can save it is thousands of people gathering in a football stadium to simultaneously pray, that's part of it too.

This is plain old Christian Science. Most Christians don't want to admit that.

The worst part is that this is not the kind of thinking that can be improved with education. This is chosen ignorance; a lucid rejection of facts and logic. I'm using the word 'lucid' in its most generous definition (#2, here).

I almost want to avoid exposing this charlatan in the hope that the GOP presents him as their presidential nominee -- almost as much as I do Ron Paul -- but rarely does a man this vile provide such an opportunity to crucify himself with his own words.

Just couldn't let that pass.

Texas redistricting case hinges on legal precedent

The case is as cut and dried as the beef jerky at Buccee's.

The U.S. Supreme Court would have to close its eyes to precedent if it agrees with the state of Texas regarding disputed redistricting maps, a voting rights expert said Thursday.

The court will hear arguments Monday on efforts by the state of Texas to stop interim maps drawn by a federal court in San Antonio. The state wants to use maps drawn by the Republican controlled Legislature, which minority and civil rights groups contend discriminate against minorities.

The legislative-drawn maps have not been cleared by the Department of Justice or, alternatively, by a federal court in the District of Columbia. Because the state’s map has not been pre-cleared, it can’t be used for the 2012 election, said Pamela S. Karlan, co-director of the Supreme Court Litigation Clinic at the Stanford Law School. She also made the short list of candidates to replace Supreme Court Justice David Souter when he retired.

[...]

“This case, as a sheer matter of law, is such a straightforward case under the Supreme Court’s existing precedent,” Karlan said in a conference call with reporters. “It’s pretty clear what they have to do here.”

We already know that this Court has a fondness for disregarding precedent, between Bush v. Gore and Citizens United.

The state’s map also has a serious flaw in the congressional district (No. 23) stretching from south San Antonio into far west Texas. The court struck down the drawing of that district in a 2006 ruling when (Supreme Court Justice Anthony) Kennedy said it denied Latinos an opportunity to elect a candidate of their choice.

An expert witness for the state conceded during a trial last fall that the 23rd Congressional district was not a minority-opportunity district, which the law required.

“This time around the state has gone back and done it again – in exactly the same district,” Karlan said, suggesting the replay could have a powerful effect on the court.

“The Supreme Court, for all the other things it doesn’t like, one of the things they really don’t like is when states disregard the Supreme Court’s own decision,” she said. “And the Supreme Court’s decision was Texas had denied Latinos on the border an opportunity to elect candidates of their choice, and now we see Texas doing it again.”

Let's back up in the article and pull out the specific legal precedent the SCOTUS -- more specifically Justice Kennedy -- would have to overturn:

In a 1991 redistricting case (Clark v. Roemer) Kennedy, writing for a unanimous court*, said: “Section 5 requires States to obtain either judicial or administrative preclearance before implementing a voting change… Failure to obtain either judicial or administrative preclearance 'renders the change unenforceable.'”

Simply stated, the State of Texas, Attorney General Greg Abbott, and his hired gun Paul Clement do not have a case ... unless Anthony Kennedy has changed his mind 180 degrees from Clark v. Roemer twenty years ago. *Note in that link that even Justice Antonin Scalia voted in favor. For many reasons, this one among them, it wouldn't be hard to imagine that either man would reverse himself.

And on the chance that Kennedy has changed his mind, that would represent the epitome of a flip-flopping judicial activist. And the only good thing about that outcome is that we won't have to endure Republicans' cries of agony if Kennedy decides to put on the robe emblazoned "I busted up the Voting Rights Act".

Their confidence in this outcome may have been tipped by Abbott's taking a few days off last week from preparing for the case and rolling up to Iowa to campaign for Governor Oops.

The trial begins Monday and will conclude before the end of the month, with a swift decision expected, possibly by January 31st.

Update: Via Michael Li, from Facebook...

The State of Texas keeps hinting in various courts that there are constitutionality problems with section 5 of the Voting Rights Act (the so-called preclearance provisions). However, in Gov. Perry's Virginia ballot access suit, he argues that Virginia's ballot access rules are not legal because (wait for it) they have not been pre-cleared under the Voting Rights Act.