Matt Angle sticks up for David Alameel

The Lone Star Project defends the dentist's contributions... by not mentioning his large checks to Republicans.

As many people know, David Alameel, who is currently running for the Democratic nomination to oppose US Senator John Cornyn, has been a generous contributor to the Lone Star Project. As a result, a number of people have asked us questions about his political contribution history.

The Lone Star Project reviewed the Alameel contributions to Democrats since 2008. As you can see from the chart below, Dr. Alameel has been very supportive and generous to Democratic candidates and organizations and certainly ranks as one of the largest Democratic donors in Texas.

We hope this information is helpful to individuals and members of the press as they follow the Alameel campaign.

Thank you, Matt.  That thick layer of gloss was helpful.  But Maxey Scherr's e-mail, detailing Dr. Alameel's contributions to John Cornyn -- and David Dewhurst and Mitch McConnell and Orrin Hatch and the National Republican Senatorial Committee and about a hundred other Republican politicians and organizations for several years prior to 2008 -- was more helpful.

Normally I would be supportive of any Republican who came to their senses and abandoned the party, especially one who has done so since Barack Obama was first elected.  That is a trend line -- particularly in Texas -- which has creeped in the opposite direction, as both polling and election results over the past five years have revealed.  And David Alameel's campaign donations since 2008 have been large, frequent, and to Democrats everywhere.  But in 2012 he decided that he wanted not to just own the team, but play quarterback.  (Not even Jerry Jones, Alameel's Dallas neighbor, is that stupid.)  Angle is hoping for a repeat of the last cycle, where the good doctor spends lots of money trying to secure the Democratic nomination, and after he fails, continues to sign lots of big checks to many other Democrats.  Alameel has bragged about his magnanimity to the foe who vanquished him in the Congressional race two years ago, Marc Veazey.

And while an e-mail from Alameel's campaign sent recently to the TDP database of of potential D voters contains a strong declaration of support for Roe v. Wade, Dr. Alameel 's actions suggest a conflict with full support for a woman's right to choose.  I am much more concerned with Alameel's involvement with "pro-life" (sic) organizations and state representatives than I am with how many months Wendy Davis lived in a trailer park, or whether she was 19 or 21 when her first divorce was finalized.  Perhaps someone working for Texas media can write a penetrating expose' about that. (Watch the ten-minute video at that link, please.)

But the bigger problem is that the Texas Democratic Party has affixed their blinders so that they see "mo' money", and not the issues and their policies, as key to victory in 2014.  I disagree with that.  I'm not a big fan of Dr. Alameel's lingering duplicity on abortion, but I'm even less fond of oligarchs, no matter which of the two major political parties they belong to.

The money needs to be removed from our political system.  Full stop.  But like crack to an addict, getting the junkies to voluntarily kick the habit is the hardest part.  The best way -- the only way, for the immediate future -- that I see to move the needle is not to vote for the rich people, or the people the rich people write checks to.

Yes, there will be lots of sulking consultants and pouting politicos.  To paraphrase Mayor Annise Parker, they can get over it.

A furiously busy week to be a political pundit

And not only if you're trying to keep up with all the bilge being spewed at Wendy Davis by Republicans.  But since nobody in Texas wants to hear anything about Chris Christie and his Texas prison deal, or Bob McDonnell, or Mike Huckabee, or even Dinesh D'Souza, then let's go with the (septic tank's) flow.

Peggy Fikac swallows the same GOP hook, line, and sinker that Wayne Slater bit on, and now she's flailing around in the bottom of the bucket with him.

Sen. Wendy Davis was back on defense Thursday after a conservative group released a video purportedly showing her supporters making disrespectful comments about her expected general-election foe, Attorney General Greg Abbott, using a wheelchair.

Davis, D-Fort Worth, quickly released a statement condemning as "abhorrent" the language in the video distributed by controversial conservative activist James O'Keefe, known for selective editing of videos critics call deceptive. The footage appeared to include a meeting of volunteers for Battleground Texas, a group closely tied to the Davis campaign.

It was another day of Davis responding to criticism in a week that started with intense scrutiny of her background, which she has described in shorthand fashion as a journey from a 19-year-old single mother in a trailer park to graduation from Harvard law school.

You would also have expected the Texas Tribune to take this bait.  And the pushback is under way.  It's a pity that anybody is willing to believe anything on a video submitted by James O'Keefe at this point,  but hey, the corporate media hates being called 'librul' just as much as conservatives enjoy calling them that, so whaddya gonna do?

I'll say it again: this right-wing bullshit avalanche is not doing much of anything to sway independents to vote Republican.  It is meant to plant seeds of doubt in the mushy minds of low-information voters.  It may succeed in that endeavor.  What we once assumed about vile personal attacks depressing voter turnout turns out not to be the case.  But if Republicans can fling everything they can think of at the wall, and have some of it stick, thus keeping Texas voter turnout at abysmally low levels... they can prevail.  As they have in Texas for a generation.

This once again demonstrates the steep hill Battleground Texas must climb.  And while there are some Republicans who understand where this is leading their party, they're deep in the closeted minority.

As far as Wendy Davis supporters saying mean things about Greg Abbott being confined to a wheelchair goes, I've got all you could ever want.  I'm just disappointed that little douchenozzle O'Keefe can't find the stones to link to me.  But then doctored video seems to be his fairly exclusive thing.  Poor dumb Greg has tried to draw attention to those posts, but nobody pays him any mind.  (Greg: try #tcot. I understand that helps sometimes.)

And I'm going to keep plugging away at the despicable sociopath and modern-day fascist that is Wheelchair Ken (or Coathanger Ken, if you prefer) just as long as RWNJs keep saying things like "AB", "golddigger", and "liar".  And I doubt that the legacy media is ever going to write a story about all the nasty shit the right-wing freaks have already said and written about Wendy Davis, and I doubt that Davis will have to disavow my support, since I'm kind of a Greenie anyway.  And if there are any Democrats who think it's mean to say that Greg Abbott's conscience and empathy are as withered and useless as his two legs, then they don't remember the lessons Lloyd Bentsen taught them.

If there are any cringing liberals who don't want to play politics the way conservatives play it, then they can go play Candy Crush.  I'll punch back for them.

Update: Nobody does it like Wonkette does it.  And Socratic Gadfly has more on the week in Texas politics that was.

Keystone XL lets it flow

It was declared dead, it came back to life.  Let's call it Zombie Pipeline.

The Keystone XL Pipeline runs under Julia Trigg Crawford’s North Texas farm. It’s been carrying crude for over a month. But (this past Wednesday) business is scheduled to open in earnest on the controversial pipeline, with oil flowing from Cushing, Oklahoma to refineries in Texas. That’s why she’s worried about an “unusual flurry of activity” she noticed over the weekend.

“Track hoes, skids, water trucks, electrical trucks and construction crews showed up,” Crawford tells StateImpact Texas. “They unearthed the pipeline, attached wires and sensors, wrapped it in something and then covered it up.”

She says TransCanada  — the company that owns the pipeline — later told her it was installing heat sensors. (Representatives from TransCanada did not respond to an interview request by deadline). ...

[...]

At peak capacity, the pipeline will deliver 830,000 barrels of oil per day to Gulf Coast refineries. Supporters of the project argue that pipelines are the safest means of transporting oil, and say it will provide a boost to the economy. Opponents have fought it over concerns for the environment and land rights issues among other things.

Now, as the Obama administration continues to consider whether to allow the northern leg of the project, which crosses an international border and is subject to presidential approval, the perception of how the southern pipeline operates may be of even greater importance. Crawford hopes the president is now looking at “data” on the pipeline and saying, “‘Wait a minute, there aren’t as many jobs that are being generated, this is an export pipeline, there are threats to our waterways,’” Crawford says. “You know, we need to see what significant impacts to our environment it has.”

Despite the stalling by he Obama administration, the filthy dirty tars sands oil has been coming anyway to the Texas refineries, the only ones that can process it into marketable petroleum products.  It's been coming by rail from Canada -- along with highly volatile Bakken shale oil from North Dakota -- then offloaded at Cushing's vast storage facilities, and now it's moving into the pipeline, oozing its way south and then out of it in Houston and Port Arthur.

The dangers associated with the rail shipments, which have made a lot of headlines recently, is ironically brightening KXL's future.  If you're inclined to believe a bought-and-paid-for US Senator, that is.

A government warning about the dangers of increased use of trains to transport crude oil is giving a boost to supporters of the long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline.

U.S. and Canadian accident investigators urged their governments Thursday to impose new safety rules on so-called oil trains, warning that a "major loss of life" could result from an accident involving the increasing use of trains to transport large amounts of crude oil.

Pipeline supporters said the unusual joint warning by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and the Transportation Safety Board of Canada highlights the need for Keystone XL, which would carry oil derived from tar sands in western Canada to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast. Oil started flowing Wednesday through a southern leg of the pipeline from Oklahoma to the Houston region.

Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., said the yearslong review of Keystone has forced oil companies to look for alternatives to transport oil from the booming Bakken region of North Dakota and Montana to refineries in the U.S. and Canada. A planned spur connecting Keystone to the Bakken region would carry as much as 100,000 barrels of oil a day.

"Clearly because this project has been held up, that is creating more (oil) traffic by rail," Hoeven said Thursday. "Those companies are being forced to deliver their product by rail because they don't have the pipelines."

Clearly not, Senator.

"It's disingenuous for supporters of Keystone XL to suggest that if we (open) Keystone, we won't have safety risks posed by crude-by-rail, and if we don't built the pipeline we will" have those risks, said Anthony Swift, an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council who has studied the Canadian tar sands.

Shipment of oil by train is likely to continue, whether or not Keystone XL is approved, Swift and others said, as companies seek to capitalize on an oil boom that has pushed North Dakota to become the second-largest oil producing state after Texas.

So there you have it. "Fuck you America, we got money to make selling gasoline to China, so we're jamming this pipeline through, and your kids can just get leukemia and die.  Oh, and fuck Al Gore and his climate change, too."

"We don't care about your protests, we don't care about no laws, and we damn sure don't care about no stinking environment.  We got quarterly projections to meet and bonuses to make and stockholders to be accountable to, and besides the price of politicians is going up.  So there's all that.  Now GTF out of our way; we're the oil bidness.  Nobody jacks with us.  Nobody."