The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance welcomes Donald Trump to Austin this week with a collective raspberry as it presents the best Texas lefty blog posts from last week.

Off the Kuff examines which legislative races could get interesting if the poll numbers get closer in Texas.

Socratic Gadfly looks at Hillary Clinton naming Ken Salazar as her proposed transition head, and shows his long history of anti-environmental stances go far beyond the fracking that many first noticed.

Texas Republicans' war on women has cost hundreds of mothers their lives. CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wants you to know that this is no joke and no exaggeration.

The US Senate looks ripe to flip from red to blue, says PDiddie at Brains and Eggs.

Texas Vox reposts the Texas Energy Report article referencing Railroad Commissioner Ryan Sitton's response to Public Citizen's comments about the agency's competence as part of its sunset review.

Neil at All People Have Value has freshened the look of his blog and updated the "Pictures I Have Taken" pages.

John at Bay Area Houston has the latest news from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which is that a public comment period is open on their proposal to ban pre-dispute arbitration clauses in consumer financial contracts.

Feeling scammed by a Houston Cadillac dealership, Egberto Willies sought and found relief from a small local auto repair shop.

The city of Lewisville is accepting applications for its next poet laureate, reports the Texan-Journal.

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More Texas blog posts!

Honorary Texas blog-for-a-week Heat Street covered the "White Lives Matter" rally outside Houston's NAACP headquarters in the Third Ward.

Better Texas Blog examines the impact of fewer insurers in the Obamacare market.

Texas Election Law Blog took note of the state law that limited interpreters at polling places biting the dust.

Texas Moratorium Network reported the latest regarding Jeff Wood and the efforts of his family to halt his execution.

Grits for Breakfast wonders how much money the state could save if arrests for petty misdemeanors were eliminated.

Pages of Victory has the latest on the Political Revolution, with Bernie Sanders' announcement details this week.

And via CultureMap Houston, A Night with Janis Joplin starring Kacee Clanton is now performing through September 18 at the Alley Theatre.

Sunday Funnies

You will have at least two...

2017 US Senate: D-52, R-48

Still basking in the glow of last night's Green Town Hall on CNN, and not ready yet to crown another Jackass O'Day, let's check in for the first time this cycle on the latest US Senate projections.

Not burying the lede: it's a very tight contest.  Electoral-vote.com, my personal favorite, and Election Projection both give the GOP 51 states for a slim margin to hold control.  The difference in methodology is that E-v.com doesn't have any toss-ups; they jut throw the states up daily based on the very latest polling.  (Only if a poll shows a tie do they acknowledge that in their revised projection.)  They also count the Senate's two independents, Bernie Sanders and Angus King, as Democrats because that's who they caucus with.  So today they rate it 51-49 while E-P has it a more accurate 51-47-2.

Update (8/19): Note how E-v.com changes day-to-day.

Larry Sabato has it tied 47-apiece, with 6 states -- NV, IN, OH, PA, NH, and FL -- going either way.  Charlie Cook thinks it's 47-45 Republicans, with 8 tossups.

Harry Enten at FiveThirtyEight.com has projections from early June that give the Ds "three to four seats", and they need four to wrest the majority away from the Republicans (on the increasingly-safe assumption that Hillary Clinton is the new president).  His latest report, still two weeks old, is more encouraging as the polling suggests that a few Senate Republican candidates are in danger of being caught in Trump's undertow.

Update (8/19): Enten's piece from 8/16, titled "GOP's chances of holding Senate following Trump downhill" eluded me, but reinforces his and (and my) premise.

Several of the links above profile the specific state races and link to polling and such.  I'm not ready to get that granular; there'll be plenty of time in September for things to flesh out a little more clearly in many of the states where it's close now.  Ohio is going right down to the wire in both the White House and Senate contests anyway.

Your interactive toy is at 270towin.com, and here's my best guess today: D-52, R-48 with NV staying blue and WI, IL, IN, PA, NH, and NC flipping blue mostly on the strength of Clinton's surge in the swing states, and AZ, MO, OH, and FL remaining red.  (Wisconsin's and North Carolina's Dems should also benefit a couple of percentage points from the court-ordered relaxation of their restrictive voter/photo ID laws, as is the case in Texas ... subject to last-gasp litigation outcomes.)

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

The real people's mandate for President Clinton will be if she has a blue Senate and a blue House to work with, as Barack Obama did in his first two years.  The crisis exacerbated by one of the nation's five largest health insurers removing itself from the state-mandated Obamacare exchanges suggests a simple fix: the public option.  But history tells us that Clinton will not fight any domestic battle she cannot be assured of winning.

Excessive gerrymandering means a Democratically-controlled House still looks just out of reach.  But due to the Trump Train's derailment, Dems are dreaming big.  Good on 'em for that, but some swift and direct action will be necessary if their dreams come true.

A public option is one thing that could make me feel encouraged about Clinton's first term.  The other would be more diplomacy and peace and a lot less war.  (I probably shouldn't dream too big.)

Stein rises, knives come out

The reason the smear got called out early is because the smear, sadly, got traction.   CNN, hosting tonight's town hall with the Green Party ticket, had to do the responsible journalistic job and report on it and the other silly attacks listed there.  But if this is the best Jill Stein's detractors -- most of them being the crappiest of conservative corporate Democrats, mind you -- can do, it's a pretty weak case against voting for her ... except in the vanishing number of swing states.  Which Texas will not be (sorry, Charlie).

What we see here with the 'cranks' and 'kooks' business is the logic dictating that Hillary just might need that 2% to carry Texas, so we'd better beat harder on the Greens.  (Two percent is about six times the amount that Stein drew here four years ago.  Democrats have a better shot at peeling off Harambe's 2%, or Deez Nutz's 3%.  I'm just saying.)

Downballot digression: throughout the Lone Star State we see the lousiest of the lousy who show on our ballots representing both sides of the conventional aisle, as we believe and as we know.  It took them over a dozen years and a few election cycles, but the TDP finally figured out that if they just fill up the all the lines, the ignorance of straight-party voting would enable them to stand the best chance of knocking the Greens off the ballot and absorb what is left of the actual left in Texas into their collective.  Consequently you have a circumstance this cycle where an appellate court candidate who is all but invisible makes a stand against the Green who got the most statewide votes two years ago, 10.45% (without a D opponent).  Neither of the two women -- Betsy Johnson (D) and Judith Sanders-Castro (G) -- are exactly favored in their respective bids for the Texas Criminal Appeals Court against Scott Walker.  No, not that one.

Scott Walker, the failed presidential candidate and Wisconsin governor, wasn't on the (Texas GOP primary) ballot. But Dallas-based criminal defense attorney Scott Walker is vying for a seat on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. The Republican barely campaigned before the March primary. His opponents weren't even sure he was running, and he didn't give any interviews. But he still dominated the first round of voting, winning 41 percent in the four-person race. Many credit that to his recognizable name; voters who make it that far down the ballot sometimes pick a name that sounds familiar. But Walker sees it differently. He told The Texas Tribune (after he won the runoff in May) that he spent "a lot of time praying about this election."

“I believe God heard my prayers," he said. 

Glowree Be!

So watch the CNN town hall tonight whether you have an open mind about an alternative to "lesser evils" or not, livestream or in the company of others, follow the Twitter feed -- look for a hashtag like #GreenTownHall or something similar -- and laugh at the putzy snark attempts by Democrats who can only win something every four years (fortunately for them it's the big enchilada; you know, "SCOTUS" and all that), then try to imagine what it would be like electing a female president who would stave off our looming environmental apocalypse, stopped our country's all-but-endless wars, eliminated student debt by telling the Big Banks to eat it, and advanced a jobs program based on an update of FDR's New Deal.  Then ask yourself how crazy that would really be.

Why, it's almost as crazy as this.

PPP has Trump leading Clinton by just six points in Texas

This will buoy the hopes of Lone Star Democrats.

Hillary Clinton is within 6 points of Donald Trump in Texas, according to a new poll released Tuesday, as the Democratic presidential nominee continues to make inroads in traditionally red states.

Trump, the Republican nominee, has 44 percent support in the state to Clinton's 38 percent, according to a survey by the liberal-leaning Public Policy Polling (PPP).

[...]

Libertarian presidential nominee Gary Johnson had 6 percent support, and Green Party nominee Jill Stein had 2 percent. Evan McMullin, the former GOP House staffer who just announced his independent bid, polled at 0 percent.

My sense is that it's better news for down-ballot Dems, especially in Harris County, and probably for Pete Gallego in CD-23 in his bid to usurp Will Hurd in their biennial game of musical chairs.  Will the flow of money out of Texas be reversed?  Doubtful.

The CNN town hall with Stein and running mate Amaju Baraka tomorrow evening might be the Greens' last shot at lifting these numbers into a range where she qualifies for the CPD-sanctioned debates.  Those parameters have been released, and they give the appearance that only Johnson/Weld has a chance at reaching them.

(In Houston your watch party is at Midtown Bar and Grill.  Other locations in Texas -- El Paso, Laredo, Austin, and two in the DFW area are listed here.)

Charles will have a sunny take posted in the early morning darkness tomorrow, as he's been cautiously optimistic about the prospects of Texas turning blue in 2016 for some time now.  Hey, it's nice to dream big and all, like he's said before, but I have a standing bet for anybody who wants to take that it that it ain't hap'nin.  Love to be wrong more than I'd like to take anybody's money ...