The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance sends warm thoughts to everyone who's digging themselves out from under the snow again as it brings you this week's roundup of the best of the Lone Star lefty blogs from last week.

Off the Kuff reports on opposition to the proposed high speed rail line.

Libby Shaw, writing for Texas Kaos and contributing to Daily Kos, is appalled by efforts to pass an open carry law in Texas. What should Texans fear the most? ISIS or Open Carry?

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme is tired of Republicans using hurtful, hateful tactics to appease their racist base and cause harm to the people in the Valley.

Neil at All People Have Value wrote about the ongoing federal cover-up of a plot to kill members of Occupy Houston in 2011. Occupy Houston protestors were peaceful people. APHV is part of NeilAquino.com.

WCNews at Eye on Williamson notes that the Texas GOP plans to give the wealthy in Texas a tax cut, no matter what. The cost will be high for everyone else: The Cost of Tax Cuts.

Texas Leftist reports on the most significant changes to the Houston region's public transit infrastructure since the creation of METRO. With System Reimagining now approved and the final route maps in selected, transit in Texas' largest city will never be the same.

Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein is coming to Denton this weekend, and Houston next week, as part of the kickoff to her bid for the presidency of the US. PDidddie at Brains and Eggs has the details.

The Lewisville Texan-Journal updates the list of events for the area this coming week.

Egberto Willies reminds us not to overlook that 'atheist' part about the man who shot three Muslim honor students in North Carolina.

Dos Centavos was on the scene for the Americans United presentation on "The Bible in Texas Schools? Why Not?"

And jobsanger emphasizes that Dan Patrick's desire to keep Texas National Guard troops on the Rio Grande border is butting heads with fiscal responsibility.

=======================

And here are some posts of interest from other Lone Star bloggers.

The Anti-Media has a list of the ticking time bombs in Texas.

Moving forward after the jury verdict in Houston's equal rights ordinance trial, Free Press Houston says that we still need a HERO.

Socratic Gadfly points out that state Rep. Molly White is one of the many reasons that we just can't have nice things in Texas.

Lone Star Ma calls on doctors to do a better job explaining the need for vaccinations.

Texas Vox would like you to tell President Obama to veto the Keystone XL pipeline, while Tar Sands Blockade wants us to remember that KXL South is already fully operational.

Jef Rouner and his five-year-old daughter encounter an open carry demonstration.

Purple City sees cultural undertones in the opposition to the proposed high speed rail line in Texas.

Texans Together reports on the State of Black Houston 2015.

Jeff Balke goes back to high school to explore when kids and faith collide.

Grits for Breakfast is encouraged by the possibility of grand jury reform.

Austin Contrarian demonstrates how street design can lead to major traffic problems.

Joe the Pleb at BOR takes a look at the Texas rebels who are up in arms about a 13-year-old boy's plan to rename "Confederate Heroes Day".

Finally, Fascist Dyke Motors is welcoming our new aquatic overlords in her post entitled "Phantom Fins of Pharmacology".

Jill Stein in Denton and Houston later this month

*Updated schedule of events with dates in College Station and Laredo below.

The presumptive Green Party presidential nominee knows that the Lone Star State is the cradle of all of the worst of conservative experiments incubated, cultivated, and then exported nationally, and she has a base of support here (however nascent it may actually be).  Which is why Texas is at the top of her list for this early campaign tour, following last week's announcement of her intent to seek the presidency of the United States.

Next weekend in Denton, the first Texas city to ban fracking:

The South by Southwest Ecosocialist Conference will take place beginning Friday, February 20 at 5 pm and lasting through Sunday, February 22, at Wooten Hall, on the campus of the University of North Texas in Denton. The event is sponsored by System Change Not Climate Change; coalition partners include the Ecosocialist Coalition, of which Solidarity, the Socialist Party-USA is a member, along with ISO, DSA, and others. SCNCC currently has Texas chapters in the DFW Metroplex and Houston.

Speakers at the conference will include Green Party 2014 presidential candidate Jill Stein and ecosocialist author Chris Williams, as well as panel discussions featuring a broad spectrum of Metroplex activists. Panels will include intersectionality between the climate and environmental crises and social and economic justice issues. The conference will also include nonviolent civil disobedience training and a "World Cafe" small group discussion session.

Cost is $50 for standard registration, $25 for low income, and $75 for supporters wishing to make an additional donation to support the cause.  Registration is now free, as fundraising has exceeded expectations.  Donations remain welcome.  Please register online at this URL: http://www.southbysouthwestecosocialistconference.com

The website also provides detailed location info for persons unfamiliar with the UNT campus and a daily schedule for the conference. The facility can accommodate up to 120 attendees, so please register now.

And following that, in Houston. 

She will likely meet with striking USW members on the picket lines at area refineries, with some additional speaking engagements at community colleges in the suburbs in the days following.  Details on those appearances to come later.

Gallup poling has revealed for several years now that Americans want other options besides the Democrats and Republicans.

A majority of U.S. adults, 58%, say a third U.S. political party is needed because the Republican and Democratic parties "do such a poor job" representing the American people. These views are little changed from last year's high. Since 2007, a majority has typically called for a third party.

The results are based on Gallup's Sept. 4-7 (2014) Governance poll. The first time the question was asked in 2003, a majority of Americans believed the two major parties were adequately representing the U.S. public, which is the only time this has been the case. Since 2007, a majority has said a third party is needed, with two exceptions occurring in the fall of the 2008 and 2012 presidential election years.

Italicized emphasis at the end of that excerpt is mine, because you may recall that -- among many similar electoral results -- Kenneth Kendrick, the only sane candidate running for Texas Agriculture Commissioner in 2014, polled as high as 9% in mid-October... but received just under 2% of the vote.

Maybe this is obvious already, but I'll let Sudden Clarity Clarence underscore it.

Wake up and smell the coffee, y'all.  Get yourself out to one of the events above and see if Jill Stein's words and actions are what you've been looking for.  If they do, then follow through on that the next time a presidential election rolls around.

Update (2/23): Stein's itinerary now includes a speaking engagement at Texas A&M in College Station on Tuesday the 24th and a trip to the Rio Grande Valley on Wednesday the 25th.  Find all the details -- times, locations, etc. at the calendar posted here.

#HERO trial goes into overtime

Charles is on this case, so just know that -- in the immortal words of Senator John Blutarsky -- "nothing's over unless WE say it is".



Applicable to both the pro-HEROs and the cons.  And then on to the next, whatever this forthcoming ruling presents.

The city claimed victory Friday when the jury in the trial surrounding Houston's equal rights ordinance found that the law's opponents submitted a repeal referendum petition that contained forgery and other flaws.

However, it issued a series of decisions that were far from a clean sweep for either side.

The ruling is not final, and a judge will now consider the jury's findings about the work of more than 100 circulators of the petition that the city rejected last summer, citing overwhelming notary and signature-gatherer errors.

District Judge Robert Schaffer was not present for Friday's ruling after nearly six days of jury deliberation. Attorneys on both sides said he will now begin counting which signatures are valid to see if opponents have reached the needed 17,269-signature threshold. Schaffer retains wide legal discretion in what he deems valid.

The jury's ruling Friday will trigger a series of legal dominoes that, eventually, will yield a definitive answer: The judge will count the signatures, issue a decision on whether the petition is valid and then the case will almost certainly go to the appellate courts.

If the legal battles carry us through most of 2015, then there may be no referendum on November's ballot, and that's IF there are enough good signatures, as determined by Judge Schaffer and then decided again by one of the two Courts of Appeal with jurisdiction over Harris County (Republican-dominated).  From there to the SCOTX, on some indeterminable timeline.  Harris County's conservatives will make every effort to turn the November '15 municipal elections into a referendum on HERO anyway, regardless of which court decides what and when they do so.

As Charles has also detailed, we have better things to discuss in this year's city elections.

Oops pushes all in on Iowa, and more Sweet '16

The consultants must laugh behind their hands.  It's like taking candy from a baby.  (A Downs Syndrome baby; if I wanted to be mean).

Former Gov. Rick Perry has brought on board four longtime Republican operatives to help him assemble a likely 2016 presidential campaign in Iowa.

RickPAC, Perry’s political action committee, announced Sunday it has hired Robert Haus, Andy Swanson, Dane Nealson and Kip Murphy.

[...]

Haus co-chaired Perry’s 2012 campaign in Iowa. Since then, he has been informally guiding Perry’s political travels to the Hawkeye State, accompanying him on swings through the state and connecting him with local power-brokers.

Nealson and Murphy were also involved in Perry’s 2012 bid. Nealson served as Central Iowa field director for Perry’s campaign, while Murphy was Western Iowa coordinator for a group that encouraged Perry to run. Also during the 2012 cycle, Nealson worked for Tim Pawlenty and Murphy for Rick Santorum. Swanson was the top organizer in Iowa for Pawlenty’s 2012 bid as well as John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign.

In recent weeks, Perry’s potential rivals have made serious moves to lay the groundwork for Iowa campaigns. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has hired David Kochel, an Iowa-based strategist who advised both of Mitt Romney’s bids for the White House, while Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s PAC has leased office space in a Des Moines suburb.

The Iowa hires come days after Perry announced another addition to the team he has in place for a 2016 run: Greg Strimple, a Republican pollster who will serve as a senior adviser to RickPAC.

Perry rolled out the Iowa recruits a day before he heads to the state for a town hall meeting at Morningside College in Sioux City. The hires were first reported in local media, including the Des Moines Register and Iowa Republican blog.

Walker has gone to Texas seeking help.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has hired Austin-based fundraiser Susan Lilly for his likely presidential campaign, according to two Republican sources.

Lilly, who got her start as a staffer for Texas Railroad Commissioner Barry Williamson, is a player in both Texas and national Republican politics. In 1997, she started Lilly & Company, the chief fundraiser for several high-profile officeholders, including House Speaker Joe Straus, Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Hecht and Justices Phil Johnson and Jeff Boyd. 

She also counts U.S. Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana, U.S. House Speaker John Boehner and 11 members of the Texas U.S. House delegation as clients, according to her company website.  

She is not the first Texan to join Walker's team. Rick Wiley, an Austin-based former Republican National Committee political director, was one of Walker's first hires.

Is Ted Cruz misunderestimated?  Some who won't let their names be used say yes.

A prominent Republican consultant who isn't working for any of the 2016 presidential candidates and who has been right more times than I can count said something that shocked me when we had lunch recently. He said that Texas Sen. Ted Cruz had roughly the same odds of becoming the Republican presidential nominee as former Florida governor Jeb Bush.

[...]

The combination of (Cruz's) running room as the race's one true tea-party candidate, his debating and oratorical skills and his willingness to always, on every issue, stake out the most conservative position make him a real threat.

Go read it, as much for the laughs (Bobby Jindal is ranked ahead of Huckabee) as for the acorn occasionally found by the blind hog.  Perry's early salvos comparing Cruz to Obama are being launched for a reason; probably that high-dollar pollster is telling him to do it.

We breed these conservative mutants like rabbits down here in Texas.

Update (2/16): GOPLifer also thinks Cruz is being overlooked.  I enjoy Chris Ladd's blog because he is fearless about criticizing the Republican party, but if he's right and Americans are as stupid as Ted Cruz is about net neutrality, then we're all in deep shit.  That contains the proviso that Cruz is not dissembling.

I'll go out on a very thin, early limb, with barely a bud on it, extending the horse race prognostications I posted just a few days ago.

Perry's best possible finish in Iowa will be third, ahead of Cruz but behind Mike Huckabee and Scott Walker.  What to watch for: if Cruz finishes ahead of Jeb Bush.  That's all any talking head will yammer about if it happens. And if I'm wrong and Cruz actually wins Iowa, no matter the margin, he's instantly the golden child.

Bush comes back in NH, but whoever finishes second wins the spin game.  Update: Perry's also putting a lot of effort into the Granite State.

Then you have caucuses in CO (perhaps Perry's best shot to break through with a win, but his main competition is Rand Paul and, by extension, weed) and MN (Walker), and primaries in NY (Bush, followed by Christie) and Utah (Huckabee or Cruz).  Then there are the Nevada caucuses (whomever has established the most momentum from among Bush, Walker, or TeaBagger Twins Cruz/Huckabee, the frontrunners by this time next year).

And then it's on to SC, where Miss Lindsey Graham is the favorite son.  No line here, but the ones who act the freakiest have the best shot -- I'll take Huckabee, Cruz, and Perry.  The Palmetto State is the last stand for the fuzziest of fringe radicals like Carson and Santorum and other wannabees like Jindal and John Bolton and like that.

Hopefully we get lots of those wonderful debates. ;^)

GOP primary schedule still subject to change, as they say, so besides unpredictable developments and a foggy crystal ball, that's my only disclaimer.  I'm usually better at picking Kentucky Derby contenders.

Sunday Funnies

Markos Moulitsas reads Brains and Eggs

Him, today:

There is no sense in continuing to push for something (Warren for president) that simply won't happen. It's setting up people for failure, disappointment and disillusionment. But yes, a contested primary would be good. So if the draft people are serious, why not find a candidate that will make that statement run? Sen. Bernie Sanders appears ready and willing. Why not him?

Me, three days ago.

If the dumb asses that keep trying to draft Warren would give that up and throw their allegiance to Sanders, then the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party (sans Howard Dean, who has already endorsed Hillary) might have somebody and something they could all get behind. 

Thanks, Kos.  Leave a comment next time you check in.  Oh, and it's okay if you want to support the only progressive woman who has declared she's running for president, even if you can't be out about it because she's not a Democrat.

And if you want to know why, at this point, I would support Jill Stein over Bernie Sanders -- who has simply dithered for too long now -- then here you go.

The permanent Republican majority in Texas

Ten years after Tom DeLay proclaimed his vision, it is fulfilled.  If you haven't read Dave Carney's big brag in Politico, better do so.

Turning the Democrat dream of a blue Texas into the nightmare of a massive loss happened because we ran a campaign that used every tool and strategy a modern campaign has at its disposal, and did so in the most efficient and effective way possible.

Too often campaigns try to fight the last winning war. For Texas Democrats that meant trying to remake their campaign in the shape of Barack Obama’s successful 2012 re-election. And we saw the results.

[...]

With that in mind there are certain principles on which successful campaigns like (Greg Abbott's) can build. We were guided by three basic principles that every Republican running for President needs to apply to their campaign: (1) talk to one audience; (2) measure outputs, not inputs; and (3) test and retest.

I'll let you geek out on the rest.  The point I wish to make is that for all of these analytics, Abbott's colostomy bag could have burst onstage during one of the debates with Wendy Davis and he still would have won.  Carney may think he's that good, and his advisory fees are probably the highest in the nation right now despite being the one whose head went on the chopping block after Rick Perry's 2012 clusterfuck.  But it's also accurate to say that Abbott, et.al. wouldn't have won so convincingly without Carney's software, algorithm, and database schemes.  Abbott -- and the rest of the downballot TXGOP ticket, as well as across the nation -- would not have crushed the Democrats in such humiliating fashion were it not for the successful execution of metrics like these.

Of course, the most severe efforts to suppress minority and working class voters helped tremendously.  Defense wins championships, as they say, and there is nothing approaching the work of King Street Patriots/True the Vote on the left.  The historical slump in Democratic turnout in midterm election years is also part of what Carney claims credit for.  But remember as you read Carney's goals in the link -- 'identify 250 Abbott supporters every week' -- while Wendy Davis' team was bragging about the number of phone calls they made, numbers of door knocked.  Not how many people they actually talked to or persuaded.  Because, sadly, they weren't and didn't.

Here is a personal anecdote I wish to share in regard to database analytics.

In 2004 I made a bet with a Republican I knew online only, never met (and since deceased) that John Kerry would defeat George W. Bush for re-election.  Our bet was $50, payable to the winning party's national committee by the loser.  Shortly after the election I paid off.

In making that payment to the RNC, I used my own credit card but listed the contribution in the name of "Saul Relative", and the credit card I used was at least ten cards ago, having also changed banks twice and addresses three times in the decade since.  For years after that, I got e-mail and postal letters addressed "Dear Saul:", etc.  My favorite was one that began "Frankly, we're puzzled..."  I wrote on their letter with a black marker: "Stop calling me Frankly.  My name is Saul".  And returned it to them postage paid.

Over time the letters and e-mails diminished to a trickle and then down to nothing; consequently I had not thought about this circumstance for quite some time.

On November 20, 2014, I got Dave Wilson's appeal on his anti- HERO mailer (I posted on FB about it, with pictures).  Though it was addressed to "The Dorrell Household", and my wife did serve briefly as a GOP precinct chair during the 2000 election, her voting history since that time is the same as mine (DDD for over a decade).  So I thought it both odd and amusingly wasteful that Wilson was casting such a wide net looking for supporters.

About a month after that (Dec 29th), I received a nice letter from Reince Priebus, addressed to me and enclosed with my 2015 RNC membership card and a gracious appeal for continued financial support.  Within the body of the letter there was this phrase:

"That's why I'm concerned that we have not heard from you since 11/16/04. I know how generously you have helped our Party in the past.  We need you on our team if we are going to win in 2015, 2016, and beyond."

Read Dave Carney's article again, and think about Tom DeLay's mission a decade ago regarding a permanent Republican majority.  Scott Braddock has neatly brought it up to the present day for us.  Then take a look again at Jeremy Bird, Battleground Texas, the hits their reputation has taken in the wake of November 2014, and the extensive, assorted, mostly backchannel conversations within the various metropolitan county party's players as they coordinated with BGTX (a term I use loosely here) to turn the tide -- or stem the tide, as was the case in Travis and Dallas County.  You know who you are and what's been said.

If you really want to understand why I have given up hope for Democrats in Texas in my lifetime, I think you have all the datapoints you need.  If you are the kind of person who remains committed to turning Texas blue during your lifetime, you have all of the blessings and strength of conviction that I could wish to give another person.

I feel compelled to spend my fruitful hours, days, months, years, whatever is left in another endeavor.  Long after Dave Carney dies and goes to Hell, the future of Texas is all but chiseled into the pink granite walls of the state Capitol.  I think this understanding is why you see LVDP quitting the Senate and running for mayor, along with state legislators like Mike Villarreal and Sly Turner doing the same.  They see the future as clearly as anyone, and it reveals a few Democrats in cities and a couple of blue counties and a handful of statehouse and Senate districts that are gerrymandered minority blue in perpetuity.  And that's pretty much it.

Unless a meteor or a frackquake or a measles contagion takes out millions of Republicans in rural, exurban, and suburban Texas, the TDP will simply not have much influence at all regarding state affairs for at least another generation.  That means good young Democrats like this fellow and others in their 20's and 30's are going to wake up one fine morning on their 50th, or 55th or 60th birthday, with children their own ages now, never having witnessed a Democrat elected to a statewide office.

And no quantity of ten-grand-a-month consultants, advisers, pollsters, and strategists with terabytes of demographic data and direct and e-mail lists and six-inch thick Rolodexes is going to make one iota of difference.  Those people have never been in the game to win it anyway; their victory was getting hired and paid.  They either take both sides or avoid taking a public one at all politically: they're just mercenaries.  (Note the names and bios listed under Billl King and Stephen Costello for the most recent example of how these prostitutes trade jerseys.)  This is one more reason why fewer and fewer people have enough confidence in a system that is so broken, so dysfunctional that most of them can't be bothered to participate in it.

Maybe something will reset the chessboard and the Dems can rebound, but I can't see over the horizon.  I'd rather bet on a old-fashioned torches and pitchforks revolution, especially since the conservatives already have such a large head start on guns and ammo, but that's just me.  Noah's only a little less pessimistic than I am.

I'd like to be wrong about all this.  Hell, I'd just like to be wrong about some of it.  Short of self-immolation, the Republicans are large and in charge for as far as the eye can see and the mind can comprehend.  Like it, lump it, it is what it is.  And will continue to be.