Still on the case of the mysterious rift

Not me. Patti Kilday Hart.

Houston attorney Debra Norris, who aspires to run for judge someday, received a tantalizing phone call from a local political consultant last October. The caller, Justin Jordan, told her that leaders in her neighborhood recommended her as a judicial candidate. Furthermore, he assured her if she ran against a particular incumbent, State District Judge Steven Kirkland, Houston attorney George Fleming would provide sufficient campaign contributions.

Intrigued, she met both Jordan and political consultant Bethel Nathan, whom Jordan identified as his former employer, at a Starbucks. Their message to her was "we have funding, we're looking for the right candidate and you are it." Though she was "flattered," Norris said she decided against the race. "I talked to other people and everything I learned is that he (Kirkland) is an outstanding judge."

The story provides important context as the May 29 Democratic primary approaches. Kirkland, a Democrat first elected in 2008, finds himself battling a well-funded opponent, Elaine Hubbard-Palmer. In her last financial report, her sole contributions, totaling $35,000, came from Fleming's law firm or the political action committee he funds. 

Do go read the rest. Attorney Fleming is both coy and oily about his intentions regarding his challenge to Kirkland. Two prominent Democrats get it (my emphasis is in bold):

State Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, fears the inter-party fight will ultimately harm Democratic unity. He notes that Jordan has publicly worked for Republican candidates and causes. And Fleming, he said, "minces no words when it comes to Steve and his desire to defeat him." The winner of the Democratic primary will face Republican Ken Shortreed in the November election.

At the time of the deadline for her January campaign contribution report, Palmer had received $35,000 in contributions from two sources: $7,000 from the Fleming law firm and $28,000 from a political action committee named Texans for Good Leaders. Fleming, it turns out, is the chief contributor to Texans for Good Leaders: He dropped the group a $25,000 check on Dec. 14 - the day before it wrote Palmer a check for $23,000.

The size of those contributions exceeded the limits of Texas' Judicial Fairness Act. As a result, the Texas Ethics Commission issued an order permitting all candidates to raise unlimited funds. 

"Oh well, somebody broke the law, so we'll just let everybody break the law." See, that's how it works in Texas politics.Try that at the bank today and see what happens. Update: Don't everybody test the theory at once.

That's small consolation to Kirkland, who said he expects to raise and spend $150,000 to remain competitive with Palmer. She's been running radio ads and sending expensive direct mail pieces across the county. "A countywide race in a contested primary is expensive," he noted.

I could not reach Jordan or Nathan, but Jordan's Linked-In profile mentions Republican affiliations, and says he is an employee of Bethel Nathan Communications. Harris County Democratic Chairman Gerry Birnberg sees the Kirkland-Palmer race as disheartening on two levels. It is sapping limited resources. And it demonstrates the inherent flaws in the election of judges.

Unlimited campaign contributions allow individuals to "get rid of a judge" because they have a "personal stake," Birnberg noted. "Welcome to the election of judges."

We will never have representative government until we get the money out of our politics. One way to begin to slow down the gravy train of corruption is to stop evaluating candidates on the basis of how much money they can raise.

Another way is to support candidates and parties who support the separation of corporate and state.

At least it was nice not to have to mention Kirkland's sexuality or Hubbard-Palmer's race, wasn't it?

Update: John is a little more coarse and one-sided.

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is happy to contribute its fair share towards the maintenance of our great nation as it brings you this week's roundup.  

TruthHugger is appalled that the same old lies keep working on Americans. Whatever happened to "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it" (George Santayana). BossKitty has a ringside seat to watch Mother Nature bite the ass of clueless politicians, and is so grateful that God has different plans for Rick Santorum.  

BlueBloggin is very skeptical that the enforcement efforts of the Texas Ethics Commission will actually work: Texas Wants Ethics? ROFL 

Planned Parenthood gives Texas a taste of its own litigious medicine. Off the Kuff has the details.

The lies we've been told for the last 40 years are simply not true. We can't have it all and low taxes. WCNews at Eye On Williamson points out that taxes are the solution.

The Harris County Democratic Party's dirty laundry spilled out of the basket and blew all over the neighborhood this past week. PDiddie at Brains and Eggs spent some time wrangling it, but finally... uh... tossed in the towel.  

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wants everyone to know that the batsh*t crazy states have higher rates of teen pregnancies. Republicans ARE waging war on against women.

Neil at Texas Liberal posted about a petition drive in Houston to put two anti-immigrant ballot issues up for a vote in 2012.

Harris County Democrats' rift between blacks, gays boils over

This is another reason why I had to take off my Crips gang colors.

A political whodunit, in the most unlikely of races, is creating chaos and divisiveness in the Harris County Democratic Party. Or perhaps I should say it is creating more than the usual chaos and divisiveness that exists like a constant low-grade fever (on a good day) throughout Democratic Party operations every­where in Texas these days.

Monday afternoon, a mysterious electronic message blew up in Houston political circles, purportedly sent by a Rev. Willie Howard on behalf of attorney Keryl Douglas' campaign for chairperson of the Harris County Democratic Party.

Douglas, who is African-American, is challenging interim chairman Lane Lewis, who is openly gay - a fact that the probably fictitious Rev. Howard finds disturbing.

The purported pastor claims to be organizing African-American ministers to support Douglas because "her opponent is openly Gay and has already told supporters behind closed doors that the Democratic Party will endorse a Gay Marriage agenda in November … If the gays take over we are poised to lose everything we have worked for during President Obama's historic win. The Republicans will rally their troops behind a united front of making sure this push for same sex marriage is defeated."

The enigmatic email closes with a particularly offensive observation:

"How will Democrats look electing a man who sales (sic) perfume for a living and lays up with another man?"

So if you are a member of the Whitmarsh listserv, you already know all about this. Likewise if you've read Kuffner or Stace. Digital trails have been sluiced out to track the offensive message as coming directly from the Douglas campaign, Douglas held a presser to deny all, the progressive Democracy for Houston club has called for her to quit the race, on and on like that. Kilday Hart for the coup de grace:

Will a wedge be driven between Harris County's African-American and gay communities? Unfortunately for Democrats, there's another local primary race indicating the answer is yes. State District Judge Steven Kirkland of the 214th District Court is being challenged by an African-American attorney, Elaine Hubbard Palmer. Stay tuned for more on that race.

But once again, we can thank Democratic politics for our daily dose of comedy and tragedy. Comedy, because any plot to de-stabilize the local party seems on its face unnecessary. And tragic, since two communities that have both faced insidious discrimination are being pitted against each other.

Do you think any of this is going to be good for Democrats in the May 29th primary elections, this rending of two key constituencies asunder? (The good intentions of African-American Democrats like Egberto Willies who spoke out against the e-mail aside, of course.) What about any lingering implications for November? If it's any consolation, Big Jolly reports that the Harris County Republicans are an even bigger clusterfuck.

Can you think of a better time to send a message to the two-party duopoly by voting for some Greens (or for that matter, Libertarians)?

A contest for Texas Democratic Party chair

As some Democrats prepare to bid a fond farewell to Mr. Potato Head (I will simply say "don't let the door hit ya where the Good Lord splitcha"), the race to replace him heats up. My colleague Ted at jobsanger has already noted the development:

My name is Rachel Barrios-Van Os, and I'm a candidate for State Chair of the Texas Democratic Party. I am running for this office for each and every Democrat and future Democrat to come because we need real leadership and we need to start fighting to win.

It's a sad day knowing that our Democracy is on the line everyday while the Republicans are in power. We have to start fighting harder, we have to fight for our rights and as your new Chairwoman, I promise that I will fight for you.

It has been way too long since the Democrats have rallied together for a statewide victory. I believe I have the progressive vision, integrity, experience and energy that it's going to take to do just that.

I am the loving wife of three-time statewide Democratic candidate David Van Os, and a mother of four beautiful children: Jay, Kay Cee,  Leya and Maya. I have been an activist for the Democratic Party my entire voting life. In my favorite Democratic Party moment in life, I was an active volunteer that helped during the 1980's to bring Ann Richards to victory. I became a Union Member in 1980 nad have always stayed active in the labor movement. I was campaign manager and treasurer for David Van Os, twice for Texas Supreme Court (1998 and 2004), and for Attorney General (2006). I was a candidate for Bexar County Clerk (2010).

During the 2006 Attorney General run, I felt like we needed to do something different  because I didn't think that the party could help us, so I recommended to David that we go to each and every courthouse (all 254 County Courthouses) in the state of Texas and give stump speeches from the steps of the courthouse and we did it. We took the campaign to the people and I believe that 's how we should start doing things again. The people/voting citizens do not feel connected to the Democratic Party anymore and so they choose to stay home.

Well it's time to change that and I'm here to offer my leadership, I'm ready, willing and able. 

Currently, I am the administrator, bookkeeper and litigation assistant for a law firm representing labor unions and civil rights. I wear many hats, but I always make sure that the job gets done. When I'm elected to be your next State Party Chair, I will make myself available to work full-time in the office of the Texas Democratic Party. I'm ready to start the job as your next State Party Chair immediately.

Regarding the state of the Party, I believe that something is very wrong when we cannot get one statewide candidate elected into office since 1994. Let's not wait another 18 years to start winning; let's make it happen now. I'm ready to take on that challenge.

Her opponent is Gilberto Hinojosa, generally regarded (until now) as the heir apparent. A third candidate, Fidel Acevedo, awaits confirmation of his candidacy because it may not have been filed in time to meet the deadline.

Barrios-Van Os is, as Ted states, the true progressive in the race (although Acevedo has bonafides as well). Hinojosa is -- probably -- the conservative establishment's choice. Thus we have set up the classic liberal-wing-versus-conservative-faction battle once again. I don't have as much invested in the contest as I would have in years past. I just don't consider myself a member of the Blue tribe any more, mostly because of internecine squabbles like this. But if anyone can turn the TDP back from the right and more toward the left, where it belongs, it's RBVO.  

Buena fortuna, Rachel (from a safe distance away, sadly).

Sunday Funnies

BREAKING NEWS: With his campaign rapidly dying, Newt Gingrich chooses to divorce it. Sources say he had already begun seeing the Mitt Romney campaign on the side.

Of dressage horses and working women

Isn't it remarkable how the Right can contrive an outrage out of thin air?

Ann Romney fought back Thursday against a Democrat who suggested she’s no economic expert because she “hasn’t worked a day in her life.” Raising the five Romney sons, she said, was such a full-time job that her husband, Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney, considered it more important than his work as the family breadwinner. “He would say, `My job is temporary…Your job is a forever job that’s going to bring forever happiness,” Ann Romney told Fox News, wading into a multimedia furor over comments by Democratic consultant Hilary Rosen. “Mitt respects women that make those different choices.”

Rosen apologized to Ann Romney later Thursday for her “poorly chosen” words. “As a mom I know that raising children is the hardest job there is,” Rosen said in a statement. “As a pundit, I know my words on CNN last night were poorly chosen.” “In response to Mitt Romney on the campaign trail referring to his wife as a better person to answer questions about women than he is, I was discussing his poor record on the plight of women’s financial struggles,” Rosen said.

First lady Michelle Obama, a working mother of two, even jumped into the fray with this tweet: “Every mother works hard, and every woman deserves to be respected. – mo.” 

Sometimes you just have to marvel at the ability of conservatives to hold onto each other and march and kick like that, all in perfect synchronicity.

For the record, Ann Romney -- stay-at-home mother of five boys (work if there ever was any for sure) -- rides Austrian Warmbloods, a dressage horse. And makes sure you use the French pronunciation of the word. That would be 'dress-SAHJ', rhymes with 'massage'.

Dressage is a sport of seven-figure horses and four-figure saddles. The monthly boarding costs are more than most people's rent. Asked how many dressage horses she owns, Mrs. Romney laughed. "Mitt doesn't even know the answer to that," she said. "I'm not going to tell you!"

Just your average stay-at-home mom, trying to juggle raising five boys, keep track of the help -- nannies, maids, butlers, chefs, gardeners, and the handlers, trainers, and veterinarians responsible for the stabling of her several $100,000-each horses at their four or five houses across the country -- and work in time for a ride every now and then.

However does she manage?

Mitt, however, rides a Missouri Foxtrotter... which of course makes him a man of the people. Cue Fanfare for the Common Man.



Would anyone like more whine?

Fifty years ago, and a hundred years ago

Fifty years ago yesterday, the Houston Colt .45s began major league baseball play in a rickety old stadium at the northwest corner of what is now called the Reliant Park complex (approximately where the Holiday Inn now sits).

A few years later the team's owner changed their name and moved inside a new ballpark a short distance away. Yesterday was also the 50th anniversary of the opening of Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, to accommodate a team that had moved out west from Brooklyn a few years earlier. In those days the park was often called Chavez Ravine after the geological formation that was there long before the field, and Sandy Koufax wrote about pitching there -- and the advantage the twilight gave him in the early innings over the hitters -- in one of the first baseball books I read as a kid.

Oh yeah, there was one other brand-new NL team taking the field that year.

I thought I would summarize for this posting, though, the legacy of the man who turned the Colt .45s into the Astros, built a ball field for them to play in that was called the Eighth Wonder of the World, and who accomplished a great deal as both mayor of Houston and Harris County Judge, and whose 100th birthday is celebrated this week: Roy Hofheinz.

Few politicians have shaped our area as much as Hofheinz, who was born 100 years ago (yesterday) in Beaumont. Sure, we all remember the Astrodome, the Astros, the Astrodomain and its surrounding environs, but his mark on this region isn’t limited to what rose out of the southwest Houston prairie in the 1960s.

Not many reading this were alive to remember Hofheinz’s controversial stint as Houston mayor in the 1950s. Even fewer alive today can recall his fast climb from state legislator to Harris County judge, which began in the 1930s.

During Hofheinz’s tenure as mayor, the city saw the completion of several public works projects: Memorial Drive and the Elysian Viaduct provided a fast way to get a growing number of residents out of downtown Houston, a new terminal at Houston International Airport was completed, and the Sam Houston Coliseum and Music Hall underwent renovations.

“He was one of the white progressives that helped change Houston from a Deep South, racially conservative community” to a more progressive town that reflected its growing minority community, said University of Houston political science professor Richard Murray.

For example, Hofheinz oversaw the removal of “white” and “colored” signs over water fountains on city property. Moves like that, that Hofheinz and other civic and political leaders put forward in the 1950s, set Houston apart from other Southern cities during the civil rights struggle.

Here's a excerpt from a biography of Hofheinz, entitled "The Grand Huckster", by Edgar Ray.

Black community leaders asked him to desegregate libraries in Houston. He agreed, but first he called in representatives of press, radio, and television and asked that they hold off any news about the upcoming change until librarians could determine how the mixing of races in their buildings would work. When word finally got around that black children and adults were going to “white libraries,” a woman, prominent in Houston society, complained to the mayor: “I won’t let my children sit by black children at the library,” she angrily told Hofheinz. “I don’t know what they’d catch!” Hofheinz solemnly replied, “Maybe tolerance.”

My first thought upon reading that was to point out to our current mayor what a progressive looks like. A brave one. A proud one. One never afraid to do the right thing, no matter who among the wealthy and powerful the doing of the right thing happened to anger.

As the Astrodome rots into ruin while today's elected officials dither, it is painfully obvious that this city, this county, this state, and even this entire nation cry out loud for visionary leaders like Hofheinz. I just hope there are some out there somewhere.