Juan Percent

"Pathetic" moves forward to "absurd".

Mitt Romney appeared on Univision Wednesday alongside Jorge Ramos and Maria Elena Salinas, but something was a little peculiar about his appearance -- his skin tone. Looking back at the hundreds of photos logging his every moment on the campaign trail, the Republican presidential nominee is usually not so shockingly tan.

While his orangey-brown appearance on Univision could have been the result of bad lighting or a makeup mishap, left-wing blog the Democratic Underground concluded that Romney "dyed his face brown for his Univision interview."

The claim is not completely out of the ballpark. After all, as Gawker points out, Romney did say "it would be helpful to be Latino," in a video secretly recorded at a campaign fundraiser earlier this year.

It would be an appropriately sensitive response at this point to feel sorry for the guy, but his acute disingenuousness makes that impossible.

Only the George McGovern campaign of 1972 rivals Romney's in terms of self-destructiveness in the modern era. I see no way for the Republicans to regain any kind of momentum at this point, no matter how much money they raise and spend, no matter how nasty their attacks get.

The debates are going to be pure comedy gold. You can just feel it, can't you?

Update: Nobody skewers it like Esteban Colberto.

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Brainy Endorsements: David Collins

David B. Collins is the Green Party's candidate for US Senate, running to replace the retiring Kay Bailey Hutchison. The Republicans have tapped Ted Cruz, of course; Paul Sadler is the Democratic nominee. (Cruz and Sadler are scheduled to debate twice, on Tuesday, October 2 and on Friday, October 19.) The Libertarian Party's pick is John Jay Myers.

As you perhaps recall from some of my earlier posts, I have never been inclined to support Sadler. While he may be experienced and even competent if elected, his values are simply too conservative to be a match for mine. He went past the point of no return when he declared in a debate with Grady Yarbrough prior to the runoff election in June that "the people of this country are not ready for" the decriminalization of marijuana, despite the Texas Democratic Party's platform position and all polling evidence to the contrary.

Never mind conservatism. This demonstrates, to me, a cluelessness of Romneyesque proportions.

I perceive that a prospective Senator Paul Sadler would be the Bluest of Dogs, in the Joe Lieberman/Ben Nelson of Nebraska tradition. And I'm sorry, Democratic pals, that's just not enough of an improvement over Cruz for me to be able to vote for.

You may remember that Sadler entered the contest very late, after the withdrawal of presumptive Democratic annointee Ricardo Sanchez. I suspect this happened at the urging of newly-appointed TDP official Bill Brannon, like Sadler an East Texas conservative Democrat. There is, as I referenced here, a mildly delusional school of thought that Texas can be turned blue by working the Big Thicket a little harder for votes. My humble O about that premise: they must have found some of the marijuana fields in the woods while they were looking for Democrats.

You'll have better luck going after Bigfoot, boys.

Charles Kuffner, bless his heart, has pimped Sadler hard, particularly for fundraising purposes, but the reality of Texas is what it is. Despite the slivers of hope expressed elsewhere online for each man, Sadler has even less chance of winning Texas than does Barack Obama. Ted Cruz will draw more crossover votes from Latino Democrats who will split their tickets based on surname alone than the Democrat will capture of the mythological Republican ticket-splitters.

This is getting really embarrassing for Sadler, frankly. If you've been reading the campaign's e-mail, you know what I'm talking about.

When the Texas TeaBagger goes to Washington next January, he will join Rand Paul's caucus of kooks to defy, deny and obstruct everything that comes before the upper chamber -- no matter how despicable -- just as they have for the past four years. Texas is the primary reason why the Senate Republicans, led by John Cornyn, can do things like filibuster a jobs bill for veterans. And no amount of money is going to do anything to change it.

So given this sad set of circumstances, only a Pyrrhic victory is possible... which is to say that if Cruz fails to reach 60% of the November 6th tally, everyone who is not beet red all over their body can cling to some hope for sanity for the future of Texas.

As with the presidential contest here in the Lone Star, because the outcome is foreordained voters can free themselves from obligation to their respective tribes, and in the secrecy of the ballot booth can -- and are encouraged -- to vote their consciences. Republicans: if Cruz is just too crazy for you, cast a vote for the Libertarian. To Democrats, especially those in the Democratic wing of the TDP: you have a better, more progressive option. As Collins says: "No STDs, please" (straight-ticket-Democrat).

I have to say: as much as I know it is going to piss off my Democrat friends -- maybe former friends at this point -- I just love that.

Here's a bit on Collins from the San Antonio Current in the summer, at the Greens' state convention.

David Collins walked to the front of the Hill Country cabin with a green toga draped over shirt, tie and slacks, a throwback, he said, to mankind's first republic: the Roman Senate. "The toga has great symbolic significance for me," he said, "and I've felt myself to be politically and spiritually green for a long time." Staring down at the getup, Collins laughed. "I would run for office naked if I thought the Green Party would benefit from it."

And here's the video of that.



Collins is pragmatic about his chances, which is what I like about him as much as his stand on the issues. The US Senate race, even more than the presidential one, is a referendum on how more or how less Tea-drunk our state is at this moment. The choices, again, are:

1. Batshit conservative (overfunded and overpublicized)
2. Moderately conservative (underfunded and under-publicized, the usual circumstance for Democrats running for statewide office in Texas)
3. An unknown progressive candidate
4. And an unknown Libertarian (who seems both less crazy than Ted Cruz at times and more so at others)

So what do you have to lose by not following the herd? The two races at the top of your ballot represent the best chance to send a protest message to the two major parties in a long, long, time.

So send it.

Collins is in the DFW area today for two events and back in Houston on Friday to join a protest against the Keystone XL pipeline. Find him also on Facebook here. You can watch more video of Collins here and also on the Greenwatch channel here, along with SD-17 senatorial candidate David Courtney and Harris County constable candidate Carlos Villalobos, about whom I will post in the future.

Personally I would like to see Collins and Myers debate each other if they wind up being excluded from the Cruz-Sadler matches. How about you?

Brainy Endorsements so far include the following...

Nile Copeland for the First Court of Appeals
Alfred and GC Molison for HD 131 and SBOE, respectively
Henry Cooper for HD 148
Keith Hampton for Presiding Judge, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
Barbara Gardner for the Fourteenth Court of Appeals
Don Cook for Congress, 22nd District
Max Martin for Congress, 36th District
Remington Alessi for Harris County Sheriff
David Courtney for Texas Senate, District 17
Ann Harris Bennett for Harris County Tax Assessor/Collector
Ann Johnson for HD-134
Mike Engelhart, Larry Weiman, and Al Bennett for the Harris County bench
Mark Roberts for Congress, 2nd District

Brainy Endorsements: Mark Roberts

Mark A. Roberts is the Green Party's nominee for US Congress, District 2. The GOP incumbent is Ted Poe; the Democratic nominee is Jim Dougherty, and the Libertarian candidate is Kenneth Duncan.

This map shows the gerrymandering performed on CD-2 by the Republicans, after all of the court wrangling. The district is commonly referred to now as "The Giant Shrimp", and as you can note, it lost all of the area of Southeast Texas (Jefferson and Liberty counties) and was moved entirely into Harris County, and now includes inner loop -- and bright blue -- neighborhoods of Montrose and West University, immediately west of the Texas Medical Center (recall we had a discussion previously about district lines in the TMC when James Cargas -- and subsequently Evan Mintz of the Houston Chronicle''s editorial board -- got confused). The district's PVI is R+13 according to the Cook Partisan Voting Index Wiki page, but that data is aged. I suspect --without being able to confirm -- that the new district has gotten a bit more purple.

Dougherty, an attorney and CPA, filed to run almost on the deadline last December, and told me he felt like 'somebody had to challenge' Poe. I like Jim Dougherty personally, and have supported him in his previous bids for public office (HD-134 in 2004, Harris County DA in 2000), but when I learned he excoriated Rachel Van Os in her recent bid for TDP chair -- publicly, and to her face -- essentially for being a progressive, I was forced to step away from endorsing his candidacy.

I am capable of supporting a few moderate and conservative Democrats -- like Max Martin for one, and Nick Lampson for another -- but I cannot do so when there is a better progressive running, and especially not when it's a candidate as solid as Mark. From his Amazon.com authors' bio page...

Roberts is a husband, a father, and a grandfather. He has been teaching full-time and part-time for twenty-five years. Currently he is a social studies and language arts instructor for a small private school in Houston, TX. Chinavare's Find began as a character sketch in a creative writing class in the early 90's, and gradually morphed into a novel.

Here's Mark's introductory video.



Roberts makes as clear and obvious an elucidation of what Greens feel are the problems -- and their solutions to them -- as you will find. If you don't know or understand what the Green Party is all about, then watch this video. If you still don't understand after watching, then you probably won't ever get it. That's okay, because you still have the option of voting for the same old corporate thing and expecting a different result.

Mark's campaign has some cute slogans:

If the Republicans have your seeing red,
and the Democrats leave you feeling blue,
Vote Green!

and...

 If you believe in the proper removal and disposal of petrified dead wood clogging the community, then remove Ted Poe and vote Green!

Roberts is, in short, exactly the kind of "Mr. Smith" we need more of in Washington. The voters of Texas' 2nd Congressional District would be well-served by replacing Ted Poe with Mark Roberts.

Find Mark also on Faceboook here.

Prior Brainy Endorsements have included the following:

Nile Copeland for the First Court of Appeals
Alfred and GC Molison for HD 131 and SBOE, respectively
Henry Cooper for HD 148
Keith Hampton for Presiding Judge, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
Barbara Gardner for the Fourteenth Court of Appeals
Don Cook for Congress, 22nd District
Max Martin for Congress, 36th District
Remington Alessi for Harris County Sheriff
David Courtney for Texas Senate, District 17
Ann Harris Bennett for Harris County Tax Assessor/Collector
Ann Johnson for HD-134
Mike Engelhart, Larry Weiman, and Al Bennett for the Harris County bench

Ed Emmett, Don Sumners, and "esperanza"

Harris County Judge Ed Emmett has brokered a deal with the Texas secretary of state to restore about $700,000 in funding the state had cut off after the county tax assessor said he would not purge presumed-dead voters from the rolls before the Nov. 6 election.

Tax Assessor-Collector Don Sumners on last week said he would delay the purge after hundreds of very-much-alive voters called his staff, upset about a letter they had received from his office saying they may be dead and would be removed from the rolls if they did not act within 30 days.

Those voters were on a list of about 9,000 names generated by the Secretary of State's Office using data from the Social Security Administration's master death file, as mandated by a new state law.

State officials, saying the purge is required by law, accused Sumners of jeopardizing the integrity of the election and cut off his voter registration funding. Sumners had received about $31,000 of an expected $732,404 this year before being shut off, secretary of state spokesman Rich Parsons said. 

When this news broke last week -- along with the subsequent developments -- my first reaction was the same as everyone else's: "I'll be damned; Don Sumners did the right thing". As I thought about it some more -- given Sumners' inherent Tea Party bias -- I began to wonder if this wasn't some kind of three-dimensional chess game, where Sumners would be able to disenfranchise last-minute registrations, hang a 'Mission Accomplished' banner at the King Street Patriots' headquarters, and avoid being seen as the bad guy. (Texas SOS Esperanza "Hope" Andrade is, after all, appointed by the governor and thus unaccountable to public opinion.)

But then I remembered: this is Don Sumners. He can't be trusted to pull on his boxers with the snap in front. Even Ed Emmett knows this.

Emmett blamed Sumners for the mix-up, revealing the tax office had been sent two lists by the secretary of state, but only acted on one. One list included 9,000 names the state considered "weak" matches to death records. The second list was composed of about 1,000 names considered "strong" matches to death records.

Sumners' office only sent letters to voters on the "weak" list. Sumners, who serves as the county's chief voter registrar, acknowledged his office erred, believing until late last week that the 1,000 names on the "strong" list were among the 9,000 on the other list.

Emmett's deal is based on the "strong" list. The secretary of state has agreed to restore Sumners' funding if the taxman sends letters to the names on the strong list, canceling those whose relatives confirm they are dead and removing from the voter rolls those for whom there is no response after 30 days, Parsons said.

Everybody -- yes, even Democrats -- believes the deceased ought to be removed from the voter rolls. Only a few people who drink too much tea and watch too much Fox News believe it's a good idea to do it the way Sumners did it, especially less than two months before Election Day. He must have gotten a lot of calls from allegedly dead Republicans to have reversed himself so quickly.

To the larger issue of voter disenfranchisement generally -- and the growing franchise operated by Catherine Engelbrecht -- here's an example of what KSP thinks is happening... and what's really happening.

In Houston, the group targeted the Congressional district represented by Sheila Jackson Lee, a Democrat who is black. Ms. Engelbrecht said the group settled on Ms. Lee’s district because thousands of addresses there housed six or more registered voters, which it took as an indication of inaccurate registrations. The methodology, which the group still uses, could disproportionately affect lower income families. 

Volunteers spent five months analyzing 3,800 registrations in Ms. Lee’s district, discovering more than 500 voters that the group said were problematic. More than 200 voters were registered at vacant lots, prompting Ms. Engelbrecht to later remark that those voters had a “Lord of the Rings Middle Earth sort of thing going on.” 

The reality was far less interesting. 

“They had one particular case I remember very well,” said Douglas Ray, the Harris County assistant attorney who represents the election registrar. “They had identified an address where eight or 10 people were registered to vote. There was no building there.” Mr. Ray found out that the building had been torn down and that the people simply moved. 

This would be another example of conservatives really having no understanding -- and even less empathy -- of how the poverty-stricken live their lives.

My feeling is that most independent voters are as sick of sneering plutocrats and oligarchs as the the rest of us. But we'll have to wait and see what the poll that concludes on November 6 says.

That's moving from esperanza and toward surety every day.

Happy 225th birthday, Constitution

A message from Move to Amend.

Today is Constitution Day, the anniversary of the day the US Constitution was ratified in 1787.

Breaking from the tyranny of the British Empire was an important victory. Most of us have seen the paintings of the Founding Fathers in that historic moment, and heard stories about how our country came to be.

But there’s a problem with those paintings and stories: there are a lot of people missing.

At the time the Constitution was ratified, only about 8% of people living in America qualified as “legal persons.” That means that 92% of people didn’t qualify for those inalienable rights that are supposed to be innate to all human beings – they were too poor, the wrong sex, or not white enough.

That’s a whole lot of people to leave out of a democratic republic.

Today's also the the one-year anniversary of the Occupy movement. On a day when percentages like 47% are all the news, it's important to be reminded that if the 99% all went to the polls in 50 days, the 1% wouldn't matter.

Luckily, though, the 92% weren’t about to take this sitting down. From the Constitution’s adoption, our forefathers and mothers spent decades organizing and agitating to make the promise of American democracy a reality.

Ordinary people are the ones who gave us the political rights that we associate with the Constitution today – they insisted the Bill of Rights be added, and they fought for the additional amendments to secure equality. They also realized that they would not be free until they secured economic democracy as well.

That’s why many states set up laws to hold the most powerful form of concentrated capital in check: the corporation. They legally required that corporations serve the public good, that charters expire after a short period, that yearly revenues be capped, that shareholders be local, and that corporations couldn’t spend a single penny in elections!

These folks were on their way to political and economic equality!

But the wealthy elite fought back too. The Supreme Court made corporations legal persons – before they would acknowledge women’s right to vote and while they approved Jim Crow laws that denied African Americans their rights to equal protection.

So on this year’s Constitution Day, we at Move to Amend ask you to imagine what it would look like if the picture had been different. What if women, the poor, the indigenous and people of color had written the Constitution? What kind of country would they have created? And what would democracy look like if it actually represented all people?

Join Move to Amend in our struggle to amend the Constitution to return human rights back to real people, not corporations – find your local group or start one near you. And then join us as we embark on the even bigger task of creating the kind of democracy we have never actually seen in this country: one where "We the People" – all people – create the world that we want to see.

Local blogger Egberto Willies can answer any question you may have about the Houston effort.

Update: Only tangentially related, PBS has a lengthy interview and video excerpts with former Supreme Court Justice David Souter on the occasion. Here's just one piece, from the end.

The greatest threat to America's republican form of government won't come from foreign invasion, or military coup, he said, but from what he described as "the pervasive civic ignorance" of Americans today.

Because of cutbacks in civic education from the 1970s onward, and exacerbated by the No Child Left Behind law, two-thirds of Americans today don't even know that their country has three branches of government, he said. So they don't know whom to hold accountable for the country's festering problems. "What I worry about is that when problems are not addressed, people will not know who is responsible," he said. "And when the problems get bad enough -- another serious terrorist attack, another financial meltdown -- some one person will come forward and say, 'Give me total power, and I will solve this problem.' That is how the Roman republic fell....That is how democracy dies. And if something is not done to improve the level of civic knowledge, that is what you should worry about at night."

Hoping against hope to end on an upbeat note, I asked: "Do you think we're losing our ability -- which has always animated our belief in the Constitution and our country -- that we are always perfecting our democracy?"

His reply was anything but hopeful. "I don't think we have lost it. I think it is in jeopardy. I am not a pessimist, but I am not an optimist about the future of American democracy," he said. "We're still in the game, but we have serious work to do, and serious work is being neglected right now."

Does he think we still have the capacity to do what the Framers did over the hot Constitutional Convention summer 225 years ago, which was compromise to overcome our differences? Souter paused. "I would like to think that enough examples of non-compromise are going to start people thinking that there must be a better way to try to govern the country," he replied. 

Brainy Endorsements: Engelhart, Weiman, Bennett

Mike Engelhart, Larry Weiman, and Al Bennett are three Democratic jurists who are all worthy of re-election to the Harris County bench.

Engelhart is a fairly hilarious stand-up comedian and clever blog commenter in addition to his various social media skills (blog, Facebook, Twitter). He's also the only judicial whose bumper sticker currently rides on the back of my truck. Engelhart is hosting a fundraising event for his campaign on September 20 at Hotel Icon. More details on that are here. And here's a video he made for his campaign from '08.



Weiman, also first elected in the 2008 blue wave, has nearly quadrupled the resolution of jury trials for cases in the 80th District Court in which he presides. He earned Democracy for America's endorsement that year. Two items of note from that link...

It is also my goal to eliminate the practice of judges soliciting or accepting campaign contributions from attorneys or parties with active cases before that court.

Finally, it is my goal that after serving my first 4 year term that people from every party as well as independents consider me to be a fair and impartial judge who is courteous, professional, compassionate and decisive.

Indeed you have met those goals, Judge Weiman.

I first met Judge Bennett in 2006, when he contended for HD-146 against Borris Miles and Al Edwards in their first matchup (he finished third). Bennett asked me for my support but I had earlier committed to Miles. I told him than that I was impressed with him and would look forward to supporting his future candidacy in some capacity. That opportunity for me came in 2008, when -- along with Engelhart and Weiman and others -- Bennett joined the group of the first judicial candidates elected to the bench in Harris County since 1992.

Bennett is so highly regarded by his peers that he was elected unanimously by them to serve as administrative judge over all of Harris County's 24 civil courts.

Bennett is holding a fundraiser on September 27 at Farrago (details as they are available). There's little my endorsement adds to his record of accomplishment at this point. I'm just pleased to count him as a friend.

Mike Engelhart, Larry Weiman, and Al Bennett have earned the respect of the attorneys who have practiced in their courts, and they merit return to the Harris County bench by the voters.

Update: The Houston Chronicle joins me in endorsing Weiman and Bennett. And also Engelhart, with this high praise:

Since his election in 2008, Judge Mike Engelhart has been a leader within the Harris County Civil Courts, spearheading e-filing initiatives that save time at the courthouse and money for taxpayers. Inside the courtroom, this Democrat has stood out as one of the hardest-working judges, writing thoughtful opinions where many others would issue quick rulings. Board-certified in personal injury law and fluent in Spanish, Judge Engelhart is among the top judges in the county, if not the state, and deserves another term on the bench. 

Well-earned.

Earlier Brainy Endorsements include...

Nile Copeland for the First Court of Appeals
Alfred and GC Molison for HD 131 and SBOE, respectively
Henry Cooper for HD 148
Keith Hampton for Presiding Judge, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
Barbara Gardner for the Fourteenth Court of Appeals
Don Cook for Congress, 22nd District
Max Martin for Congress, 36th District
Remington Alessi for Harris County Sheriff
Ann Harris Bennett for Harris County Tax Assessor/Collector
Ann Johnson for HD-134

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is still on a post-convention bounce as it brings you this week's roundup.
 
Off the Kuff analyzed the latest poll of Texas and its implications.  

BossKitty at TruthHugger is suspicious about the timing of that horrid film clip using the name of Mohammad as a fuse to global meltdown against all things western. She really wants to know WHO is responsible for Opportunistic Sadism and the US Election. But she would rather complain about why America's leaders are so slow to address more imminent hazards to America's children: Half Truths Don’t Protect Our Children From Dirty GOP Toxic Trash.

Paul Sadler, the Democratic candidate for US Senate in Texas, is making the right argument; the question is: will enough voters hear it? WCNews at Eye on Williamson makes it clear: Sadler painting Cruz as an extremist in US Senate race.

Libby Shaw reminds us that Women Will Remember in November . Check it out at TexasKaos now.  

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wants you to know polluters like Exxon and Citgo do harm to real people and our environment.

A point about money and politics had to be made by PDiddie at Brains and Eggs, and so he made it.

Neil at Texas Liberal posted that where the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers meet at Cairo, Illinois is the place where he was created. Neil said his point of origin was based on 3 factors. He was looking for creation as a whole. A place where the culture and society he lives in is expressed. And for a place that has been part of his own life. This junction of two great American rivers meets these tests.

Brainy Endorsements: Ann Johnson

Ann Johnson is the Democrat running to represent HD-134, the district I lived in a few years ago, in the Texas House of Representatives. She is challenging a one-term incumbent Republican named Sarah Davis, who barely managed to defeat former state representative (and now Houston councilwoman) Ellen Cohen in 2010. There is no Libertarian or Green candidate competing in this district.

Johnson is both a cancer survivor and an out lesbian as well as an attorney and former prosecutor. From her profile in OutSmart...

Johnson supports Obama’s Affordable Care Act, and points out that the LGBT community would greatly benefit from healthcare reform. “I oppose discrimination in any form,” Johnson says. “Texas, right now, is at the bottom of the barrel, dead-last in the nation for being able to provide care to its citizens. Our governor has taken a position to say that he’s going to keep it that way. I don’t agree with that. Texas has to evaluate whether or not it’s in the best interest of our state, our citizens, and our economy to turn down $76 billion that we have already paid [for our Medicaid program]—money that’s due to come back to the state. Making sure we have healthcare is a benefit to everyone, and that is an equality issue for everybody.” 

Davis, a cancer survivor herself, has shockingly voted against much of the women's health legislation that came before the Texas House in the last session, save the bill mandating transvaginal sonograms for women prior to their choosing to end their pregnancies. Blogger nonsequiteuse has the best interpretation of that dichotomy.

Davis likes to call herself a moderate because that's what HD-134 reflects. The truth is that she is more like Greg Abbott: a person who advocated to change Texas law concerning the health crisis he suffered, and has done all that he could to deny others that which he benefited from.

Meyerland Democratic Club president Art Pronin also notes today on his Facebook page...

TX State Sen Joan Huffman (17) is fundraising for Rep. Sarah Davis. Sen. Huffman is the #1 rated anti-choice senator. She authored the sonogram bill in the Senate and is a key ally of Dan Patrick. She also sponsored the (bill) to defund Planned Parenthood. We must inform the voters of 134: Davis is no moderate and the people surrounding her prove it.

Savvy readers will recall that one of my previous endorsements included the Green running against Huffman in SD-17, David Courtney. So with no alternate candidate in this race, I encourage Greens to support Johnson, and likewise for Democrats, Courtney in SD-17 against Huffman.

This is how we build progressive coalitions, folks.

Charles Kuffner has blogged extensively about the race, including this recent interview with Johnson as well as this post last spring signaling the Davis-Johnson tilt as a bellwether for Democratic House prospects.

Update: The NYT -- via the TexTrib -- has a bit about the contest today.

Representative Sarah Davis, Republican of Houston, is running in a district where both Mr. Obama and Mr. Perry were on the short end. That result for Mr. Perry had something to do with his 2010 opponent — former Mayor Bill White of Houston — but almost everybody thinks she has a race this year against Ann Johnson, her Democratic foe.

Previous Brainy Endorsements include the following:

Nile Copeland for the First Court of Appeals
Alfred and GC Molison for HD 131 and SBOE, respectively
Henry Cooper for HD 148
Keith Hampton for Presiding Judge, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
Barbara Gardner for the Fourteenth Court of Appeals
Don Cook for Congress, 22nd District
Max Martin for Congress, 36th District
Remington Alessi for Harris County Sheriff
David Courtney for Texas Senate, District 17
Ann Harris Bennett for Harris County Tax Assessor/Collector

Sunday Funnies

About that money and politics thing

Charles rejoined today to this post of mine yesterday a few days ago.

I maintain that money is a key part of the equation here, and I find myself puzzled at the animus that some folks have to this. If we believe that doing the same thing over and over again in hope of a different result is ill-advised, then I would maintain that trying to win elections while hopelessly outgunned financially is something we have already decisively shown to be a bad idea. The hard work of organizing, identifying and registering new voters, then getting them to the polls, is not going to be done by an army of volunteers. It’s going to take permanent, paid, professional staff to do that. Communicating a message takes money, too. I’m fully aware of the corrosive effects of money in politics. I’d love to see more public financing available for qualified candidates, and I’d love to see far more restrictions on PACs and corporate contributions, but as long as Citizens United is the law of the land I have no idea how to achieve that, and I refuse to unilaterally disarm in the meantime. Last I checked, even Green Party candidates were holding fundraisers – I know, because I’ve been invited to at least two of them – so it’s not really a question of whether or not money is needed. I want the national Democratic party to spend money in Texas, which some people think may be on the horizon, and I make no apologies for that. 

Kuff's points are well-taken, and he's my friend, so let me first declare that it's not my intention to start a blog war with him. He would bury me in spreadsheets, anyway. ;^)

I thought it might be useful, though, to speak to some of his remarks above in the hope that our common Democratic friends understand my POV and personal evolution in this regard. Who knows, it might even make sense to some of them.

-- Let's begin first with the very last sentence in that TexTrib article Charles linked to.

"The thing people have to understand about the people who write big checks is that they look strategically," (Michael Li) said. "They look for a return on investment."

What ROI do you, dear reader, think that Bob Perry -- of Swift Boat infamy -- expects from the following Democrats in the Texas Legislature just this year alone (thanks to John Coby for the data):

• Carol Alvarado, $10,000
• Rafael Anchia, $2500
• Garnet Coleman, $5000
• Harold Dutton, $1000
• Al Edwards, $20,000
• Rodney Ellis, $5000
• Mario Gallegos, $80,000
• Ryan Guillen, $1000
• Tracy King, $5000
• Eddie Lucio, $50,000
• Trey Martinez Fischer, $5000
• Armando Martinez, $2500
• Rene Oliviera, $5000
• Carlos Uresti, $7500
• Royce West, $2000
• John Whitmire, $20,000

Al Edwards, of course, failed in his repetitive bid to unseat my state representative, Borris Miles, but we should still list him as ex-officio Lege member (he certainly holds himself out in the community as such). The Texas delegates at the Democratic state convention just recently managed to replace him on the DNC, after all. And D-to-R turncoats JM Lozano ($65,000), and Allan Ritter ($2500) probably represent the best investment Perry made, if you count party-switchers as a payoff. Chuck Hopson ($65,000), though, was a waste; he lost in the GOP primary.

Hey, some investments don't pan out.

I'm fully aware of the humorous bromide Molly Ivins repeated and is generally credited to either Sam Rayburn or Jesse Unruh. That's a clever dodge considering the money being invested these days. But is Gallegos really worth 8 times more than Alvarado, who is wagered at twice the value of Coleman and Martinez Fischer? I don't actually expect anyone to explain the political calculus of Bob Perry to me; he's got his own logic. And I'm certain he paid a lot of money for it.

-- Charles' POV on Citizens United is likewise valid, and no, nobody in their right mind expects unilateral disarmament on the part of Democrats. Extending the nuclear analogy a step further, the Democrats are in the unenviable position of the former Soviet Union in this regard. Barack Obama in 2008 is the exception, however, and CU's influence in 2012 is a topic written enough about elsewhere that it doesn't need to be emphasized here by me.

What do you think the future holds for money in politics if we simply throw up our hands and say we can't change the rules, so we need to keep playing by them? I don't consider politics a sport no matter how many sporting analogies are constantly thrown out. It is possible to change the rules, even if the institution itself inhibits and discourages change.

What those of us who believe as I do think is necessary is nothing short of a constitutional amendment overturning CU, and there's a strong movement working toward that. It of course has powerful and well-funded opponents, and they naturally tend to support the most vile of political candidates.

Those opponents might include the electronic media and direct mail companies -- extending all the way down to our nation's local markets -- who make big profits on political advertising and, at a time of crisis for mass media advertising generally, could be expected to have their corporate overlords oppose restrictions on campaign financing, along with all of the bought-and-paid for Republican legislators from the statehouse to the Congress. And many of the Democrats, as I have previously noted.

This is to say nothing of the consultant class, which is a cottage industry in and of itself. Many of my blog brethren in Texas have gone into that business. Some political advisors have turned to blogging, of course, I suppose as a way of 'enhancing their brand'. I have no idea how well this line of work pays but it appears that the compensation is secondary to the career fulfillment aspects. Certainly the potential ones.

Good on anyone who finds a job that they love, I suppose. For me personally, I'm not ever going to look for a job in politics, even under the cloak of non-partisanship.

-- Yes Charles, Greens do raise money from small contributions from individuals in order to fund their campaigns. Money that is spent on gasoline for the car to drive to public events, the occasional yard signs, and even *gasp* VAN access. Don't exaggerate the false premise that Greens -- or any progressive candidate, for that matter, including Democrats -- are averse to fund-raising.

(It's important here to note that I have seen and heard this sneer at least since I worked David Van Os' campaign for Texas attorney general in 2006. Even unpaid, volunteer Democratic activists have been inculcated to believe that a candidate who can't raise money is a campaign not to be taken seriously. See this from a paid political consultant for the latest demonstration of this attitude.)

If you have twenty-four minutes, watch the Bill Moyers video below of Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala as they explain precisely why the millions of dollars in our one-party corporate political system is, and has been, a road to ruin.



If you don't want to take their word for it, then try on  Bernie Sanders' take. And if you don't have time to watch the video then peruse the transcript at your leisure. Here's a short excerpt from the beginning.

BILL MOYERS: I first heard of you about ten years ago when the Clean Elections Law -- public funding for state elections was up in Massachusetts where you were living at the time. And the people in Massachusetts voted two to one for clean elections, for public funding of state elections. And yet sometime later the Massachusetts legislature, a Democratic legislature, on an unrecorded vote overturned that judgment. They vetoed the public will.

JILL STEIN: It was that fight that really catapulted me into the world of political battle. I had not been a member of a Party, I had never been to a political meeting before then. And you know, to see that all these groups which had joined together, and I came to it as a mother and medical doctor, very concerned about our health care system falling apart and also about an epidemic of chronic disease descending on our kids which as a mom I took really, really seriously and as a doctor was fighting it tooth and nail, saw that money was always taking over.

A number of groups got together across labor, environment, health care, you name it, and all of us said we've got a common predator here, it's money in politics. Let's get it out. We actually passed that referendum by a two to one margin.

BILL MOYERS: It's amazing actually.

JILL STEIN: Huge. And the minute we passed it the legislature began to resist it, to try not to fund it. And then finally they wound up repealing, as you said a legislature that was about 85 percent Democratic. So it could have, you know, overridden any veto and so on. It had the power to actually clean up our political system.

And that said to me the fight here is much bigger than any one issue. It's really about a political culture. If we want to fix what ails us we need to fundamentally fix the political system. At that point I was recruited to run to office and I did it as a desperation move. Everything else was failing us and I realized it was time to fundamentally transform our political system and work with a party that was actually committed to getting money out of politics.

So Charles, we can keep playing by the rules -- especially here in Texas, where there are no limits to campaign contributions -- and expect a different result someday, or we can work to change the game.

Everybody hopefully understands which side I'm on now.

Republicans declare war on themselves

Bombing the shit out of people on false pretenses is what they're good at, after all, but this is ridiculous. First it was El Rushbo, as part of a larger rant on The End of the World as They Know It (i.e. when Obama is re-elected)...

(Limbaugh) went on to refer to MSNBC host Chris Matthews saying last week that an Obama re-election would mean the end of conservatism. “Nope,” Limbaugh disagreed, “if Obama wins, it’s the end of the Republican Party.”

“There’s going to be a third party that’s going to be orientated towards conservatism — or Rand Paul thinks libertarianism,” he continued. “If Obama wins, the Republican Party will try to maneuver things so conservatives get blamed. The only problem is right now, Romney is not running a conservative campaign.”

“But they’re going to set it up, ‘Well, the right sat home, the right made Romney be other than he is.’ They’ll try to deflect the blame, but they got who they want,” he said of the Republican Party’s selection of Mitt Romney for president.

Then it was Laura Ingraham...

During her syndicated radio program on Monday, conservative host Laura Ingraham had harsh words for the Republican Party and the way Mitt Romney‘s campaign has underperformed despite a flailing economy and high unemployment figures.

[...]

“If you can’t beat Barack Obama with this record, then shut down the party,” she said. “Shut it down, start new, with new people because this is a give-me election, or at least it should be.”

Ingraham added that part of the blame lies with political consultants who get re-hired after each failed presidential bid. She lamented the “millions and millions of dollars that are paid to these political consultants election after election. We hire people who have lost previous campaigns, that run campaigns that have failed, who have message campaigns where the message fell flat. And they keep getting rehired. I don’t understand that. I don’t know why those are the people you hire.”

And today it's the political advisor to Todd Akin (who was the advisor to Newt Gingrich earlier in the year)...

(Rick) Tyler replied that, if Obama wins and the GOP fails to retake the Senate, “I think that this Republican party will have to completely, utterly and totally revamp its thinking, its strategy, what it stands for, how it trains, what it speaks about, how it recruits and the total abandonment – actually the professionalization of the party – and the abandonment of the grassroots.”

“If we lose the race, we only have ourselves to blame and I think there will be a revolution in the Republican party,” Tyler concluded.

So the talking points went out first thing Monday morning. Everybody outside of the establishment is on board. And the message is the same old, same old fear and loathing.

I'd like to pop some corn and just watch the implosion, but as much as I want it, it's not going to happen. This is just how the GOP motivates its base.

They have to stoke the xenophobia every week -- preferably every day -- and as ignorant as the people who listen to Limbaugh and Ingraham are, even they occasionally get wise to the manipulation. Besides that, it's difficult to come up with a new conspiracy theory every week.

"Pallin' around with terrists like Bill Ayers and Saul Alinsky", Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the birth certificate, no hand over his heart as the National Anthem is played, bowing before other world leaders, Fast and Furious, Soshulist/Muslim/"Arab"/Kenyan/Marxist/Communist and back to the start again. Did I leave anything out? Oh yeah, un-American, destroying this country, and worse than Jimmy Carter.

It's tiresome just typing that. Imagine how you'd feel constructing a rant around it every single day for the past four years. From the aspect of repetition, it's amazing that it's not winning.

That has to do mostly with the quality of Obama's competition.

Sheryl Harris, a voluble 52-year-old with a Virginia drawl, voted twice for George W. Bush. Raised Baptist, she is convinced -- despite all evidence to the contrary -- that President Barack Obama, a practicing Christian, is Muslim.

So in this year's presidential election, will she support Mitt Romney? Not a chance.

"Romney's going to help the upper class," said Harris, who earns $28,000 a year as activities director of a Lynchburg senior center. "He doesn't know everyday people, except maybe the person who cleans his house."

She'll vote for Obama, she said: "At least he wasn't brought up filthy rich."

White lower- and middle-income voters such as Harris are wild cards in this vituperative presidential campaign. With only a sliver of the electorate in play nationwide, they could be a deciding factor in two southern swing states, Virginia and North Carolina.

Reuters/Ipsos polling data compiled over the past several months shows that, across the Bible Belt, 38 percent of these voters said they would be less likely to vote for a candidate who is "very wealthy" than one who isn't. This is well above the 20 percent who said they would be less likely to vote for an African-American.

The above is not just the last nail in the coffin of Romney's presidential hopes, it's also why the GOP isn't going anywhere, IMHO. Oh, they'll fuss and fight and scream and cry 60 days from now just as loudly as they did in mid-November of 2008, but they will always have Texas to fall back on.

John Cornyn won't even get any blowback from screwing up a Senate capture. He'll just pivot right with the rest of the establishment and blame Romney for being a weak-as-rainwater candidate.

He'll be correct.

If this nation survived George W Bush, it can surely survive Barack Obama. Besides, the decline is incremental no matter who gets elected. You know, we're all frogs in the boiling pot, anyway.

Now, if the Republicans nominate Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich in 2016... then we can talk about the end of the GOP.

Nine Eleven Wrangle

On the 11th anniversary of the national tragedy, The Texas Progressive Alliance stands in solemn remembrance of the fateful events of that fall day in lower Manhattan. Here is a selection of photographs and a panaromic slideshow that display the area we call Ground Zero, as its transformation into a open-air shrine to those who were lost is nearly complete.

Here is this week's roundup of blog posts from the best of the left of Texas from last week.

Off the Kuff says that the state of Texas has clearly demonstrated the ongoing need for Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.

BossKitty at TruthHugger sees this election year faced with critical health issues hurting working class people, when bubonic plague and Legionnaire's disease and hantavirus still occur in America: are we Unprepared, Careless and Incapable In 2012?

The GOP's plan may have backfired; by intentionally discriminating they may have actually saved the Voting Rights Act. Because, as WCNews at Eye on Williamson shows, The Voting Rights Act is still working as designed.

Neil at Texas Liberal saw Mitt Romney's jet plane in Cincinnati last week. Neil offered up his view of what the letters on the tail of the plane were meant to convey.

Lightseeker at Texas Kaos reminds us that it is easy to throw the low-level supervisors to the wolves when scandal strikes, but we should not forget where the fundamental problem lies. Are you listening, Rick Perry and Republican legislators? Check out Behind the Drug and Rape Kit Scandals.

Rick Perry wants Texas women to get pap smears at colonoscopy clinics.  CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme didn't think that even Rick Perry was that stupid.

Update: Here's my post from last year, on the tenth anniversary. It does seem as if the raw sensations have ebbed since then.