GOP civil war comes to Texas

It is on like Donkey Kong.

Some of Texas’ biggest business trade groups are moving to counter tea party and anti-government forces that have dominated recent Republican primaries.

The Texas Future Business Alliance — a mix of 10 major business groups, including the chemical industry, bankers, builders and contractors — is sending out mailers and providing other support on behalf of GOP candidates who have supported water infrastructure development, highway construction and education spending.

Many of the incumbents have been pilloried as big government spenders and liberals by fiscal hawk groups.

The movement mirrors the schism happening nationally between hard right and establishment Republicans. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce recently pledged $50 million to back pro-business Republicans in U.S. Senate primaries and fight tea party insurgents. Republican leaders, such as House Speaker John Boehner, have castigated hard right groups, accusing them of wanting contributions more than solutions.

“It’s part of the same trend you’re seeing nationally. A lot of the business community is tired of people who don’t want to govern,” said a person involved in the Texas Future Business Alliance, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Guess who's mad, y'all?  "I'm Not a Lobbyist" Mucus.

Michael Quinn Sullivan, president of the fiscal-hawk group Empower Texans, said the Texas Future Business Alliance is nothing but a group of big-money interests wanting taxpayer dollars to flow into their pockets.

He described the consortium as a “fake group” of large trade associations masquerading as a grass-roots organization and sending out leaflets that give incumbents “A Rated” report cards.

“This is what we’ve come to expect coming out of the Washington, anti-Ted Cruz movement,” Sullivan said. “They want people who will vote for cronyism and corporate welfare.”

Sullivan said he did not see the business interest as a battle against tea party groups. Instead, it’s about a divide that’s been in the Republican Party for a long time, he said.

You need enough popcorn to last all the way into March, and then the runoffs in April.  And while the Democrats have their own problems, the Republicans have much, much bigger ones.  Such as the Neanderthals who are their primary-voting base.

The business community is concerned that the Legislature, pushed by tea party groups, “is swinging too far” against government and is unwilling to make even sensible, modest investments. As for corporate contracts, Hammond said, the state has to pay someone to build highways.

“If you cannot advocate for more roads when they’re desperately needed without being accused of being in the pocket of road builders, then there’s no room for honest debate,” Hammond said.

Sullivan countered that fiscal hawks do not oppose investments. “That’s ridiculous,” he said. But they want the money spent carefully, and they are not convinced that is happening.

Rep. Jim Keffer, R-Eastland, is one of about two dozen Republicans the business alliance is backing so far.

He said its support is vital to balance groups “that set themselves up as judge, jury an executioner of all things conservative... They just want to purify the party over and over again where they have only their people doing what they say all the time. That to me is just power, and it’s dangerous for our future,” Keffer said.

Keffer said he is a conservative who wants the state to keep pace with the crush of its huge population growth. The trade coalition is welcomed as a group willing to “support those people who are trying to govern.”

“I’m very glad the business group is standing up,” Keffer said. “It’s about time.”

Watch carefully how this plays out.  It won't just be about who has the most money or the best (sic) consultants.  It may break along a similar fault line as the Ted Cruz-David Dewhurst 2012 primary for the US Senate.  In fact, the lieutenant governor primary battle among the Four Stooges could be a microcosm.  Republican candidates jostling to get furthest to the right may well carry the day in the spring, but perhaps not with the country club conservatives -- desperate to rein them in -- writing big checks to the lesser of two (or three or four or twelve) kooks.

And the open question remains: can Texans finally see through the crazy and vote for sensible candidates of any of the four parties on the ballot in the fall, thus turning back the Tea tide, as has been happening for a couple of cycles in other states?

A stay-tuned development for sure.

Sunday Funnies

How you can be certain that the United States will be attacked again by al-Qaeda:

We have our first flashpoint in the Texas governor's race

And it's the loansharks.  The El Paso Times -- you know, the city that has all those Latinos and statewide Democrats running in 2014 -- continues to lead the reporting.

Attorney General Greg Abbott on Thursday called state Sen. Wendy Davis a hypocrite for demanding that Gov. Rick Perry remove William J. White as chairman of the Texas Finance Commission.

In a statement, Abbott pointed out that Davis voted to confirm White after Perry appointed him in March 2009.

"Sen. Wendy Davis' statement is blatant election-year hypocrisy," said a statement by Abbott's press secretary, Avdiel Huerta.

Davis voted to confirm White on May 11, 2011 -- four months after she told the Texas Observer that White's presence on the commission was "the classic fox in the henhouse."

Abbott refused, however, to say whether he supports White, who heads the state agency responsible for consumer protection.

There's a hint at the real story in that last sentence. Not Davis' vote to confirm White...

Davis' press secretary, Rebecca Acuna, said that despite her opposition to White, Davis voted to confirm him because he was part of a large group of nominees and Davis didn't want to torpedo the lot.

"A group of 40, including White, were confirmed in a single vote," Acuna said. "The bigger issue is what he's done since. Our call for him to resign was made in light of recent developments."

Abbott and his spox appear to have preferred that Davis block the mass of appointments with a filibuster.  That would be SOP for a Republican obstructionist, and certainly closer to meeting the description of "political".  But we still haven't reached the moneyshot yet.

(Flack Avdiel) Huerta, Abbott's spokesman, was asked Monday -- and twice Thursday -- whether Abbott supports White, who said people get stuck in payday loans because they do things such as buy $6,000 TVs. Huerta didn't respond to those questions.

He also didn't respond when asked whether the slot on the finance commission for a representative of the consumer-credit industry must go to someone who works for a payday lender or if it could go to someone who works for a credit-card company or some other consumer-credit business.

Abbott has been a big beneficiary of political cash from the payday-lending industry, which the Texas Catholic Conference and Texas Baptist Christian Life Conference say needs tighter regulation.

Abbott received the fourth-most of any Texas politician -- $159,000 -- from the industry between 2009 and 2012, according to a March 18 report by Texans for Public Justice.

Davis, who has pushed bills that would place stricter regulations of the industry, does not appear on the list of big recipients.

According to the Abbott campaign, Davis has received $9,500 from the payday lending industry since 2007.

Huerta did not respond when asked if Abbott supports tighter regulation of the industry.

Let's review: Abbott's mouthpiece won't answer any questions about White or the shylock industry, contests the amount of campaign contributions Abbott received (a number easily verifiable* from required reporting), and then calls Wendy Davis a hypocrite.

You have to like how this is going if you're a Democrat.  Abbott and his people are again committing unforced errors that Davis and her team are capable of exploiting.  It's also moving the skirmish away from the "AB" smears and the moldy oldie of "Clinton Obama Wendy Davis is goin' to take yer guns".  Since the 'mental illness' angle isn't getting any traction either, it looks like Abbott is desperate to attack Davis on something, anything to distract from his abysmally failed record.

I just don't think "hypocrite" is a label any Republican is going to successfully hang on anybody who isn't a Republican.

*Update: Not so easily verifiable, it seems.  The Davis campaign's own unforced error seems to be the point of this piece by David Rauf of the HouCHron, and not that Abbott is on the take from the payday lenders.  Only this last sentence at the very end acknowledges the point...

In all, the Express-News/Houston Chronicle estimates those 13 entities gave Abbott between about $190,000 and $205,000.  

Everything above that (in other words, everything else) is some awfully favorable media spin for the AG from the Hearst flagship.  Abbott has to be pleased about that.

Update II: KHOU has a better version of the story.

Update III: Peggy Fikac at the SAEN/HC covers it a little better, but is still extending the non-story for Monday morning's assist to Abbott.  The trouble with this kind of reporting is not just that the reporters gulped the Abbott campaign spin, but that they continue to make the "gotcha" the news.  And that is a direction chosen by editors at the top of the food chain.