Honor the dead, heal the wounded, stop the wars

On a makeshift stage outside the NATO summit in Chicago, antiwar veterans fold an American flag that flew over NATO operations from Bosnia to Libya and which represents the flag that is “draped over the coffins of thousands of Americans killed in combat and thousands more who have committed suicide after they returned from service." They present the flag to Mary Kirkland, mother of Derrick Kirkland, who joined the military in 2007 and committed suicide in March 2010 after his second tour of duty in Iraq. "I am not ashamed that I have to tell people that my son committed suicide. I am ashamed of the military for failing to give him proper mental health treatment," Kirkland says. The military originally reported that her son was killed in action.

The news at Sine Die

Lawmakers moved to restore cuts made two years ago in public education and health care Sunday by sending a $197 billion, two-year state budget to Gov. Rick Perry, defending it against both those who call it too costly and those who say it shorts state needs.

"We've got to educate our children," said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jim Pitts, R-Waxahachie, applauding the restoration of some school funding. It was approved 118-29.

Senate Bill 1 is the centerpiece of a spending package hammered out in tough negotiations over how to appropriately fund key state programs, deliver tax relief demanded by Perry, reduce budget gimmickry and create a $2 billion infrastructure fund to address long-neglected state water needs.

Perry could veto bills in the package, and he has the power to kill particular spending items through a line-item veto. Many elements of the package were on his desk or on their way by late Sunday - although Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, briefly threatened to kill a tax break for businesses with a filibuster, in which he would talk until the deadline passed to consider it. Ellis has pushed for the Legislature to review existing breaks to gauge their value to Texas.

More about my senator's involvement:

A high-profile bill to give a $711 million business-tax break passed at the stroke of midnight Sunday with a House vote of 131-14.

House Bill 500 by Rep. Harvey Hilderbran, R-Kerrville, had been approved by the Senate on Sunday after surviving the brief threat of a filibuster by Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston.

Also...

A conference committee report for a proposal that criminalizes the use of drones for surveillance and permits Texans to document the activities of law enforcement personnel was adopted by both the Texas House and Senate late Sunday.

House Bill 912 carries more than 40 exemptions, including one that permits members of the media to use drones to photograph and record breaking news activity. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, more than 30,000 unmanned aircraft are expected to be in use in the U.S. by 2020. It now heads to the governor’s desk for approval.

One exemption will need further clarification, said the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Craig Estes, R-Wichita Falls, before the Senate approved the measure 26-5: as it’s written now, one exemption states that the ban does not apply to residents who live within 25 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border.

“Our legislative intent was to have law enforcement be able to use drones,” Estes said, and he added that “we don’t want private citizens to be able to use drones at the border, either.”

A call to special session -- as referenced last week -- remains imminent.

As the Legislature's regular 90-day session winds to an end, state lawmakers are girding for Gov. Rick Perry to call a special session that could start as early as Tuesday on congressional and legislative election maps.

Meanwhile, a federal court is putting its gears back in motion to again take up a lawsuit by minority and voting rights groups challenging Republican-drawn redistricting maps passed by the Legislature in 2011. A hearing scheduled for Wednesday in San Antonio will mark the first time the three-judge panel weighs in on the case in about a year. The flurry of action on the state level on redistricting comes as the U.S. Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling next month on a case involving Section 5 of the federal Voting Rights Act.

Texas Republicans already are coming off a court-issued setback revolving around their 2011 voting maps. A D.C. federal court last August threw out the state GOP's redistricting plans on the basis that they discriminated against minority voters.

It's up to the judges, who had to draw temporary maps as a last-ditch effort to ensure Texans could vote in 2012 primaries, to resolve the fate of Texas' redistricting skirmish.

Before the federal court potentially pens new maps that chip away at a GOP stronghold, Republicans are expected to cement as permanent those provisional maps drawn up in San Antonio during a special session.

And not just redistricting, either; the pet projects of the TeaBags are likely on the docket.

(Lt. Gov. David) Dewhurst told the Star-Telegram’s Dave Montgomery last week that he had asked Gov. Rick Perry to call lawmakers back for another round before they could skip town once the 83rd regular session ends Monday night.

According to Montgomery’s report, Dewhurst wants a full plate of conservative red meat: drug testing for welfare recipients (already done), concealed handguns inside campus buildings (only in locked cars for now), a package of abortion restrictions, political redistricting, school choice and a more restrictive constitutional cap on state spending.

Redistricting is a favor of a kind to Greg Abbott. The rest is a favor to Dewhurst, which the governor may not be willing to grant.

"He (Dewhurst) is not concerned about what Texas values are," state Sen. Wendy Davis (D-Fort Worth) told KVUE. "He's concerned about an extremist right wing agenda that will serve a feather in his cap as he goes forward in a future possible primary election to regain his seat."

Davis argues such an effort would put a damper on a legislative session that has been largely marked by bipartisan cooperation, and worries that Republican leaders are anxious to use the special session to bypass the two-thirds majority required to pass legislation during the regular session.

"I'm very proud of the way Republicans and Democrats have come together this session to reflect the values of people who live in Texas. Lieutenant Governor Dewhurst's actions threaten to poison that as we go into a special session," said Davis. "He's going to spend hundreds of thousands of thousands of taxpayer dollars in a special session for purposes that serve his interests alone."

Dewhurst has at least one and maybe two downballot TeaBaggers drooling for a shot at him.

Dewhurst, who’s held his current office for a decade, is expected to announce re-election plans shortly after the regular session ends. But he’s almost certain to face challenges from Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson and Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples, both Republicans with solid conservative credentials.

Uh huh. Back to that "do-me-a-solid" business.

The Austin American-Statesman’s Jonathan Tilove wrote on the “First Reading” blog that “the operative question” is whether Perry sees the special session Dewhurst wants as helping the governor should he run again or try another bid for president, and “how much he wants to do Dewhurst a [favor] by calling a session that would help burnish his conservative credentials.”

So much for the greater public good.

Much more of interest in that Statesman link. And Paul Burka piles on the lieutenant governor. Winners and losers to be revealed later today... or maybe tomorrow, depending on how late they go.

Update: It's worth mentioning that 64 House representatives sent a letter to the governor asking for four anti-choice pieces of legislation to be added to any special session call. And Eye on Williamson has some good links as well.

Sunday Funnies

"If you watch the news like I do, you know the Obama administration is embroiled in so many scandals that trying to pick which one to report on is like trying to pick which of your children to impeach. For the record, it’s the one who ate chips in Daddy's den."

-- Stephen Colbert

"If they don't fix these crises pretty soon, honest to God, it could bring gridlock to a screeching halt."

-- David Letterman

Headline, money graf

And my bold emphasis.

The Future of the Astrodome Finally Has Some Direction:

"If there's no private interest that has a reasonable financial backing, then on June 25th, the Harris County Sports and Convention Corporation is to present their best idea of public use of the Dome to Harris County Commissioners Court and our capital improvements planning session. From that point, it will be in the hands of County Commissioners Court. It's very likely to require a bond election. That would be  presented to the voters, but I'm told we're not allowed to put options, so it will be a real clear, this is the best idea of what to do with the Dome. If you're not agreeable to this, then the Dome comes down. And all of that will be occurring in the next year or two years."

A Newspaper Monopoly That Lost Its Grip:

The much ballyhooed unmaking of daily newspapering seems to be unmaking itself, and there’s a reason for that. Most newspapers have hung onto the ancient practice of embedding prose on a page and throwing it in people’s yards because that’s where the money and the customers are for the time being. 

The industry tried chasing clicks for a while to win back fleeing advertisers, decided it was a fool’s errand and is now turning to customers for revenue. But in order to charge people for news, you have to prosecute journalism. 

 [...]

Newspaper publishing will never return to the 30 percent plus margins it once had, but some people believe there is a business model. Warren E. Buffett thinks that a 10 percent return is reasonable, now that sale prices have sunk.

No deaths reported in Washington state bridge collapse:

The collapse will require a detour, making travel between Seattle and Vancouver more difficult. But as we know from experience, it's unlikely to make Republicans in Congress say anything much more about infrastructure investment than "we can't afford it."

Why A Houston Leukemia Doctor Is Calling Out Drug Companies:

Q: Why is chronic myeloid leukemia a good example of a disease that could really benefit from affordable drugs?

A: Chronic myeloid leukemia was a fatal disease in the past. The average survival of patients was about three years. With these new drugs, chronic myeloid leukemia changed into an indolent disease, similar to diabetes. If the patients take the oral medicine on a daily basis, they could live their normal life. The problem is they have to spend $100,000 a year to stay alive.

Q: What should be done?

A: I think what we need to do is start a national discussion on this issue. Drug prices and cancer drug prices are the big elephant in the medical room. If cancer research is paid 80 percent by taxpayers’ money, and if most of the discoveries in cancer drugs are made in the United States, why is it that the U.S. patient pays almost twice the price of a cancer drug as they pay in Europe?

Voting is Not a Right:

Not according to the Supreme Court. In Bush v. Gore (2000), the Court ruled that “[t]he individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for electors for the President of the United States.” That’s right. Under federal law, according to the Supreme Court, if you are a citizen of the United States, you have a right to own a firearm that might conceivably be used in overthrowing the government. But you have no right to wield a vote that might be used to change the government by peaceful means.

Atlas Shrugged Off Taxes:

In the past twenty years, corporate profits have quadrupled while the corporate tax percent has dropped by half. The payroll tax, paid by workers, has doubled.

In effect, corporations have decided to let middle-class workers pay for national investments that have largely benefited businesses over the years. The greater part of basic research, especially for technology and health care, has been conducted with government money. Even today 60 percent of university research is government-supported. Corporations use highways and shipping lanes and airports to ship their products, the FAA and TSA and Coast Guard and Department of Transportation to safeguard them, a nationwide energy grid to power their factories, and communications towers and satellites to conduct online business.

Yet as corporate profits surge and taxes plummet, our infrastructure is deteriorating. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that $3.63 trillion is needed over the next seven years to make the necessary repairs.

States that rejected Medicaid also have most uninsured, poorest health:

Sadly, the states that have the greatest need to expand Medicaid also have the Republican leaders who are refusing to participate. ...

The residents of many of those states, those in the Deep South, would dearly love to see Medicaid expansion, a new survey suggests. Families USA polled in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina—all states where Republicans governors and legislatures have rejected the expansion—and found that 62 percent of respondents in those states support Medicaid expansion.

Nineteen House Democrats vote to take authority over Keystone XL decision away from the president:

Here are the Democrats who voted for pulling the president's authority to approve the Keystone XL pipeline.

John Barrow (GA-12) Blue Dog
Sanford Bishop (GA-02) Blue Dog
Cheri Bustos (IL-17)
Jim Cooper (TN-05) Blue Dog
Jim Costa (CA-16) Blue Dog
Henry Cuellar (TX-28) Blue Dog
William Enyart (IL-12)
Al Green (TX-09)
Gene Green (TX-29)
Ruben Hinojosa (TX-15)
Sean Maloney (NY-12)
Sean Matheson (UT-04) Blue Dog
Mike McIntyre (NC-07) Blue Dog
Patrick Murphy (FL-18)
William Owens (NY-21)
Colin Peterson (MN-07) Blue Dog
Terri Sewell (AL-07)
Filemon Vela (TX-34)
John Yarmuth (KY-03)

Time for Holder to go

Attorney General Eric Holder personally signed off on the warrant that allowed the Justice Department to search Fox News reporter James Rosen's personal email, NBC News' Michael Isikoff reported Thursday.

The report places Holder at the center of one of the most controversial clashes between the press and the government in recent memory. The warrant he approved named Rosen as a "co-conspirator" in a leak investigation, causing many to warn that the Justice Department was potentially criminalizing journalism. The warrant also approved the tracking of Rosen's movements in and out of the State Department, as well as his communications with his source, Stephen Kim.

The Justice Department later said that it did not intend to press any charges against Rosen.

The attorney general is usually required to approve requests to search journalists' materials, but that rule does not extend to email records.

(Holder recused himself from the investigation into the Associated Press, meaning that he absolved himself of that responsibility.) Holder has previously said that he was not sure how many times he had authorized the search of journalists' records.

Fox still isn't 'news', but that's not the point. The DOJ has been spying on critics of all political persuasions for some time now.

As the Obama administration faces criticism for the Justice Department’s spying on journalists and the IRS targeting of right-wing organizations, newly released documents show how the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and local police forces partnered with corporations to spy on Occupy protesters in 2011 and 2012.

Detailed in thousands of pages of records from counter terrorism and law enforcement agencies, the spying monitored the activists’ online usage and led to infiltration of their meetings. One document shows an undercover officer was dispatched in Arizona to infiltrate activists organizing protests around the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC),  the secretive group that helps corporate America propose and draft legislation for states across the country.

So as it happens, Eric Holder's Justice Department is an equal opportunity organization. If you're a-protestin', we're infiltratin'.

The mainstreamers are irate at the administration for this business and justifiably so. They are turning on Obama as a result. The long-awaited (by conservatives) end of the honeymoon is nigh. The fact that Medea Benjamin's protest during his drone clarification speech -- an attempt to distract from the week's bad headlines -- has been extensively covered is but one example.

I still encounter far too many Democrats who meet this description, but their fealty makes a difference to no one except them any longer.

The worst of the "scandals" swirling around the president goes away as soon as Eric Holder does. His departure is past due.

And the longer they wait, the worse it's going to get.

Update:

The left and the right now basically agree that Holder should go. The only reason I am not enthusiastically joining the chorus calling for Holder’s job is that I’m 90 percent certain that whomever replaces Eric Holder will be worse, both because of President Obama’s full support for Holder’s Justice Department thus far and because of the confirmation process. Obama isn’t going to nominate someone from the ACLU. Republicans (and hawkish Democrats) would block anyone who shows signs of being even slightly less awful on civil liberties.

Obama will still probably stand by his AG, who, let’s remember, was already held in contempt by the Republican House in a previous bit of GOP overreach that left Holder “zen-like” in his response to all criticism. The president has stood by Holder this long. We’ve seen how Barack Obama’s Good Liberal respect for the sacred craft of journalism left him once he had to deal with journalists. The president seems to value loyalty and discipline (including the discipline not to leak shit to the press) more than journalism. I wouldn’t mind being wrong, but Holder’s job is probably safe, as long as he wants to keep it.