Sunday, May 05, 2019

Sunday Funnies





North Korea billed Trump $2 million for Otto Warmbier's hospital bills





'Recipe for Disaster': Trump guts offshore drilling rules put in place after Deepwater Horizon spill


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Friday, May 03, 2019

The Weekly Twenty Twenty Update

Let's open the Update with some Texas events happening this weekend.  First:


Mayor Pete is also holding a Houston fundraiser Saturday night (the cheap seats are all sold).

Update: The TexTrib, via Progrexas, covered Buttigieg's address to Dallas County Democrats at their Johnson-Jordan dinner as well as Beto's Friday night rally in Cowtown.  Excerpts:

Before launching into his 2020 stump speech, O’Rourke addressed a more urgent matter: the mayoral election Saturday in Fort Worth. Deborah Peoples, the chairwoman of the Tarrant County Democratic Party, is challenging incumbent Betsy Price, one of the few remaining GOP big-city mayors. She is vying for an unprecedented fifth term.

Bernie Sanders has also endorsed Peoples.  And Julián Castro will appear at a GOTV rally alongside the challenger Saturday morning.

From the start of his speech, Buttigieg emphasized the need for Democrats to be able to express their values in a way that wins over Republicans. Democrats in red states have an advantage, he explained, saying they often have developed “a better vocabulary for making those values better understood and making those values understood by more people, and I believe that is especially needed in (this) moment.”

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

With Sen. Mike Bennet's declaration -- he is the second Coloradoan conservaDem, tailing former Gov. John Frackenlooper -- the field is up to ...


Squishy centrist/solid establishmentarian Jonathan Capehart of the WaPo polled his Twitizens and found they prefer two of the front-running women.


On we go to FiveThirtyEight.com's wrangle, augmented by yours truly.


Stacey Abrams

Abrams announced Tuesday that she would not seek the Democratic nomination in Georgia’s 2020 Senate election, prompting increased speculation that she could mount a presidential bid, particularly after she said in a radio interview that day that she “keeps giving thoughts to other opportunities.”

Abrams spoke in Houston on Friday, at a luncheon sponsored by Annie's List.

“I’m here to tell you a secret that makes Breitbart and Tucker Carlson go crazy: We won,” Abrams said to loud applause before teasing a potential second bid for governor. “I am not delusional. I know I am not the governor of Georgia -- possibly yet.”

Abrams is one of several high-profile Democrats (as we finally learned here in Deep-In-The-Hearta, Joaquin Castro is another) taking a pass on '20 US Senate bids.  This still-unfolding development bodes poorly for retaking the upper Congressional chamber next year.  By extension, items of Democratic criticality such as impeachment, blocking undesirable SCOTUS and other federal judicial appointments, honoring international treaties, and so forth would be nullified -- as they are presently -- should Democrats fail to nominate a candidate who can defeat Trump.


Joe Biden

After entering the presidential race last week, Biden appeared on ABC’s “The View,” was interviewed with his wife, Dr. Jill Biden, by Robin Roberts of “Good Morning America,” and then held his first campaign event Monday in Pittsburgh before continuing on to Iowa for a two-day tour of the Hawkeye State.
 In Pittsburgh, Biden courted union voters and earned the endorsement of the International Association of Fire Fighters, a decision met with derision by President Donald Trump, who launched a tweetstorm Wednesday in the wake of the announcement.

During the interview that aired on “Good Morning America” Tuesday, the Bidens addressed issues from the former vice president’s past that have drawn criticism, including the treatment of Anita Hill during Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ 1991 confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee in which Biden said she wasn’t “treated well.”

“I apologize again because, look, here’s the deal. She just did not get treated fair across the board. The system did not work,” he added.

That's an understatement.  Biden's entry has been greeted with a host of prior questionable remarks, videotaped for posterity.  Here's one.


 Anita Hill isn't accepting Joe Biden's apology

Joe Biden's promise to Make America Great Again

Biden launches bid with fundraiser filled with corporate lobbyists and GOP donors

All this doesn't seem to be affecting his popularity much in the early going.


Cory Booker

The New Jersey senator wrapped up his 'Justice for All' tour last weekend before heading back to Washington to take part in the Senate Judiciary Committee questioning of Attorney General William Barr.

During the hearing, Booker took issue with the language Barr used in his press conference the morning of the release of the Mueller report, saying his remarks were “alarming” and called “into question (his) objectivity when you look at the actual context of the report.”

He later called for Barr’s resignation, tweeting that “it’s become clear that (Barr) lied to us and mishandled the Mueller report.”

Booker's moment seemed a bit more glorious than suggested here.  Look here:

When Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., brought up how then-Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort shared polling data in August 2016 with his former business associate, Konstantin Kilimnik -- identified by prosecutors as having ties to Russian intelligence -- Barr struggled.

"What information was shared?" Barr asked, prompting Booker to reply, "Polling data was shared, sir. It's in the report."

"With who?" Barr followed up.

Pete Buttigieg

The South Bend, Indiana mayor and his husband Chasten are featured on the cover of Time Magazine this week, and the pair’s relationship and Buttigieg’s recent rise in the presidential field are featured in a profile.

Buttigieg calls himself a “policy guy” in the story, elaborating, “Every good policy that I’ve developed in my administration happened not because I cooked it up on the campaign, kept the promise intact and then delivered it, but because I stated a priority in one of my campaigns, ­interacted with my legislative body and my community, and developed something that really served people well.”

Chasten Buttigieg was the focus of his own Washington Post profile, in which his coming-out story, bout with homelessness and popularity on Twitter were detailed.

The corporate media is still fawning, but the bloom is coming of the rose elsewhere.


'Zero policies'?  What 'zero policies'?


Vox's guide to where 2020 Democrats stand on policy

Ted Rall: The Democratic candidates on foreign policy


Julián Castro

Castro was one of the first presidential candidates to call for Barr to resign from his position.
 In an interview with CNN, he explained that he believed Barr was “completely compromised,” having “actively tried to mislead the public and Congress.”

The former Housing and Urban Development secretary toured tunnels beneath Las Vegas last weekend that have been used by some of the city’s homeless population as shelter, described later by a spokesperson it as an “eye-opening” experience.

Tulsi Gabbard

Gabbard’s focus on foreign policy continued this week, including in a Fox News interview in which she expressed concern over how the conflict in Venezuela would affect the U.S. and Russia.

“Any time we are in this situation where you have tensions being ratcheted up and this conflict being pushed closer and closer between nuclear-armed countries like the United States and countries like Russia and China, this is something that poses an existential threat to the American people,” the Hawaii congresswoman said.

Kirsten Gillibrand

The New York senator announced a 'clean elections' plan Wednesday, calling for public campaign financing to replace the “corrupting influence of big donors and special interests on politicians,” her campaign said in a press release.

The initiative would provide $200 to every adult U.S. citizen to allocate to the federal candidates of their choosing in order to fund campaigns. In order to be eligible to receive such donations, candidates would not be allowed to take contributions of over $200, according to the plan.


Kamala Harris

After Harris’ questioning of Barr during Wednesday’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, the California senator was singled out by Trump who said she was “probably very nasty” to the attorney general, during an interview with the Fox Business Network.

Harris joined with several other Democratic candidates in calling for Barr’s resignation, saying in an MSNBC interview that he was aware he was misleading the public and tweeting that his responses to her questions at the hearing -- including his acknowledgement that he did not review all of the special counsel’s underlying evidence prior to writing his summary of the Mueller report -- were “unacceptable.”

Seth Moulton

In an interview with Reuters, Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., criticized his fellow 2020 presidential candidates Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren for pushing America “too far left,” and for being just as “divisive” as Trump.

“The problem with some of the candidates in our party is that they’re divisive in the same way that Trump has been so divisive,” Moulton said. “They are pitting different parts of America against each other.”

I sincerely hope that the next time I include Moulton in a weekly update, it is to reference his withdrawal from the race.

What does it mean to be a 'Centrist' if you never attack Republicans over botched foreign policy?


Beto O’Rourke

O’Rourke released his first major presidential candidacy policy proposal outlining what he would do as president to combat what his campaign calls the “existential threat of climate change.”

The $5 trillion plan calls for federal investment to “transform” the nation’s infrastructure “and empower our people and communities to lead the climate fight,” according to a campaign memo released Monday.

O’Rourke also signed a “No Fossil Fuel Money pledge” to reject and return donations by oil and gas executives.

Inslee hits O'Rourke: 'He did not lead on climate change in Congress'

"Beto O'Rourke will need to answer why he did not lead on climate change in Congress and why he voted on the side of oil companies to open up offshore drilling,” the Inslee campaign wrote. “We look forward to a climate debate — where voters will have the opportunity to hear about which candidates have a strong, extensive record of fighting climate change and which candidates have a record of siding with fossil fuel companies."

I think Beto will be an afterthought by the fall, and if I'm right, it wouldn't surprise me a bit to see him enter the race against John Cornyn.


Bernie Sanders

In response to Barr’s Senate testimony on the Mueller report, the Vermont senator appeared on Sirius XM radio and called his actions “outrageous,” but did not go as far to call for his resignation as some of his other 2020 presidential competitors have.

Sanders will be in Iowa this weekend and is set to deliver a major agriculture policy address in Osage.

How Bernie Sanders Missed the Mark at She The People

This is the best analysis I have read on this topic.


Eric Swalwell

The California congressman officially qualified for the Democratic presidential primary debates after polling at at least 1 percent in three polls recognized by the Democratic National Committee.

Following the deadly shooting at the Poway, California synagogue, Swalwell was the only presidential candidate to directly mention Trump, saying in a response to Trump’s tweet, “Spare us your thoughts and prayers. It’s an alibi for inaction. You told the NRA yesterday you’d keep dangerous guns in the hands of dangerous people. We will take it from here with action.”

Elizabeth Warren

A Quinnipiac University poll published this week showed the senator from Massachusetts up eight points and ranked second behind Biden.

Warren, in an Essence Magazine op-ed, rolled out her latest policy proposal announcements, on how she intends to improve the structure of the country’s health care system when it comes to the “epidemic” of maternal mortality rates of women of color.

Warren also found herself in a Twitter back-and-forth with Amazon after she described the company as a giant corporation that’s using it’s influence to stomp out the little guys, saying sellers who use their marketplace are seeing “record sales every year.”

Bill Weld (R)

The former Massachusetts governor penned an op-ed weighing in on Barr’s Senate testimony on the Mueller report.

While Weld has stopped short of calling for Barr’s resignation, he did target the attorney general in his New Hampshire Journal op-ed saying, “Barr’s own remarks make clear that his review of the Mueller Report was limited to whether to seek criminal charges against the President or members of his campaign on the issue of collusion.”

Socratic Gadfly reviewed Weld's chances.

Read about the candidates I left off here.
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Monday, April 29, 2019

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance needs to remind you that not all Democrats qualify to be called progressive.  Don't be misled by brand new blogs that conflate the two.



Our Great State figured large in presidential aspirations last week.  The #SheThePeople forum featured eight candidates speaking Wednesday at Texas Southern University, and the African American Mayors Association, convening in town at the same time, also received visits from some of those same men and women.  Bernie Sanders held a rally in downtown Houston after his appearance and the following day in Fort Worth.  (Oh, and Joe Biden finally jumped in, though he hasn't had anything to do with the Lone Star State as yet.)

PDiddie at Brains and Eggs had his weekly 2020 update while two Texas bloggers, Somervell County Salon and Pages of Victory, clarified their stances on who they would -- and would not -- be voting for.  Carl Davidson and Bill Fletcher Jr. of the Rag Blog offer a strategy for the left in 2020 and beyond.  And with Bill Weld now officially in, SocraticGadfly has his first take on the now-contested GOP primary.

With respect to the Texas Senate contest, John Cornyn finally got what he wanted: a high-profile challenger.  And he promptly made an ass of himself on Twitter.  A fresh poll reveals that the front-runner in this contest still has not decided whether to join the fray, and some people grow impatient waiting for him to do so.

Much Lege news as bad bills are moving quickly: Ed Espinoza at Progress Texas calls us to action to stop SB9, the latest anti-voting effort from Dan Patrick and the Republicans.  Equality Texas also wants your assistance in blocking SB17, the 'religious exemption' bill, and other proposed legislation that would overturn local non-discrimination ordinances.  Texas Freedom Network notes that the House is advancing a bill on posting the Ten Commandments in public schools.  And the most important legislation of the session, funding public schools by shifting the burden to sales taxes from property taxes, is not just punitively regressive but points to the failure of the state's leaders to compel large corporations to pay their fair share.


(T)he state’s top three politicians -- Governor Greg Abbott, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and House Speaker Dennis Bonnen -- provided Big Business with a useful smokescreen earlier this month. The Texas troika unveiled a proposal to enshrine a 1 percent sales tax rate increase in the state constitution as a means to buy down homeowners’ ballooning property taxes. It’s a regressive ploy that would help only the wealthiest homeowners while leaving the vast majority (80 percent) of Texans paying more in overall taxes.

Meanwhile, corporations continue to plunder the state and local communities. In the last year alone, property owners (almost entirely businesses) used a loophole in what is known as the “equity appeals” system to wipe out an estimated $44 billion in value from the tax rolls in the state’s five largest counties, according to an investigation by the San Antonio Express-News. That costs local school districts and governments roughly $1 billion in lost property tax revenue each year.
Nobody benefits more from the broken property tax system than the state’s powerful oil and gas industry, which has the resources to inundate county appraisers with appeals and legal threats challenging their property values. In 2017, property owners filed more than 5,000 lawsuits in Harris County alone, 90 percent of which came from businesses, the Express-News found.

“The only public policy reason behind [the equity appeals process] is to enrich commercial land owners at the expense of residential ratepayers,” Jeff Branick, the county judge in Jefferson County, told the Express-News. “If I had all properties being appraised at true fair market value, I could lower the tax rate.”

Jefferson County is home to one of the Gulf Coast’s largest oil and gas hubs. The fossil fuel giants located there run roughshod over the property tax system. That’s been devastating for Port Arthur, one of the most impoverished and polluted cities in the state.

But there are some encouraging developments: Texas Standard saw the statehouse approve an extension of beer and wine sales on Sundays, and the authorization of craft breweries to sell beer to-go.  A federal judge blocked the state's anti-BDS law.  And Charles Kuffner celebrated the settlement agreement in the lawsuits over that bogus SOS advisory.

Meanwhile Houston's city council, led by Mayor Sylvester Turner, voted to lay off 220 of the city's firefighters in order to pay for Proposition B, the voter-approved 'pay parity' resolution.  Court-ordered mediation on a gentler (fewer or no layoffs) settlement will continue.

A hodgepodge of other legal matters worth noting happened last week: the state's AG, Ken Paxton had the city of Edinburg's mayor, Richard Molina, and his wife arrested on voter fraud charges.  Dallas County DA Percy Creuzot has been one of the state's leading advocates against mass incarceration, and 'lawn-order' Republicans like Greg Abbott have decided to re-label the effort "legalized theft" and "soshulizm".  And Sanford Nowlin at the San Antonio Current reports on the effort to push bail reform in Bexar County.

Some climate news: Abbie-Louise Lord and Jenn Char, for the Houston Chronicle, documented their efforts to give up single-use plastic for Lent.  Pasadena, Deer Park, and other east Harris County residents sought answers about the #ITCfire at a community town hall hosted by Rep. Sylvia Garcia.  EARTHblog noted, in brief coverage of three incidents this spring, that the Houston area suffers a petrochemical disaster, on average, once every six weeks.  And DeSmog reported on an ethanol train that derailed, exploded, and burned near Fort Worth on April 24, killing three horses and forcing the evacuation of nearby homes.

Jef Rouner at the Houston Press argues that you cannot be "pro-life" if you are anti-vaccine.

Daniel Williams presents his research on how conflicts in policy positions between special interests may be analyzed.

A new exhibit at UT-El Paso displays artwork created by children held last year at Tornillo's immigration detention center.


And in Galveston, the Tea Kettle House gets a makeover for the DIY Network's "Big Texas Fix".

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Sunday, April 28, 2019

Sunday Funnies






Washington Examiner's Philip Klein: "Elizabeth Warren's plan to cancel student loan debt is a slap in the face to all those who struggled to pay off theirs"



Sri Lankan churches, hotels bombed on Easter Sunday; San Diego synagogue shooting suspect linked to unsolved mosque arson


Stop & Shop Strike ends as employees and company reach agreement

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Friday, April 26, 2019

The Weekly Twenty Twenty Update


Former Vice President Joe Biden’s presidential announcement wasn’t the only big 2020 news this week: According to our research, 16 Democratic candidates have now qualified for the first two primary debates this summer, counting Biden, who only needed to enter the race to qualify, and Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, who was put over the top by a new survey from Reuters/Ipsos.

[...]

With the first two debates capped at 20 slots each, the stage is quickly filling up. The DNC plans to split up each debate over two consecutive nights to accommodate up to 10 candidates per night; if more than 20 candidates qualify, it will choose qualifiers based on a ranking system that incorporates both thresholds.

Second, because Ryan qualified for the debate stage (he was already a major candidate under FiveThirtyEight’s guidelines), one more person has now entered the ranks of our “major” candidates: Marianne Williamson, an author and spiritual adviser who launched her bid back in January.

[...]

Even though she’s major to us, Williamson does not seem to have qualified for the debate stage yet, as far as we can tell. She hasn’t hit 1 percent in any qualifying polls so far, but she still might be able to reach the donor threshold -- as of Thursday afternoon, her campaign website claimed she was about 9,000 donors shy of 65,000. Williamson raised a little over $1.5 million in the first quarter of 2019, but the Federal Election Commission data can’t tell us how many individual donors that money came from. We’ll just have to see where things stand in June.

There was a lot more going on this past week, particularly in Texas.  But since I crib from Adam Kelsey and Elizabeth Thomas, let's go in alphabetical order like they do.

Michael Bennet 

The Colorado senator tweeted last Friday that he “underwent a successful surgery” to treat his prostate cancer and “requires no further treatment.” Bennet previously said that he had been ready to announce a presidential run until he received the cancer diagnosis, but would still enter the race if he was ultimately declared cancer free.

There's just no point in you jumping in, Senator.  Unless you want to try to spoil the first ballot at the Milwaukee convention, like a lot of these others.

Joe Biden 

The former vice president announced the launch of his presidential campaign Thursday after months of build up, releasing a video in which he said that “everything that makes America, America, is at stake” in the upcoming presidential election.

Too much pimping by supporters and snark by non- to mention.  Okay, one mention.


Biden’s first television interview will take place on ABC’s “The View” on Friday and then he will hit the road, making trips to Pittsburgh Monday, Iowa and South Carolina later next week, then Nevada, California and New Hampshire before mid-March.

He and his wife Dr. Jill Biden will also sit down with Robin Roberts, co-anchor of ABC’s “Good Morning America,” ahead of his Pittsburgh event. The interview will air on GMA Tuesday.

Biden’s campaign was immediately endorsed by Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., and all three members of his home state of Delaware’s congressional delegation, Sens. Tom Carper, Chris Coons and Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester.

Something else:

While many of Biden’s fellow Democrats openly welcomed him to the race, behind the scenes several -- including Sen. Cory Booker, former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro, Sen. Kamala Harris and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke -- began to fundraise off of the news, showcasing an awareness that (their) path to the nomination just became all the more difficult.

Cory Booker 

Booker became the latest Democratic presidential candidate to release his tax returns Wednesday evening, posting 10 years’ worth to his campaign website.

Though the New Jersey senator made only $152,715 in 2018 -- on which he paid $29,446 in taxes and donated $24,000 to charity -- he revealed himself to be relatively wealthy from years of accumulated speaking fees and royalties nearing $3 million total. The returns also showed fairly substantial charitable giving, with over $20,000 in contributions every year since 2012, including two years that topped $82,000 and $240,000, respectively.

At Wednesday’s #SheThePeople forum in Texas, Booker again pledged to select a female running mate should he be the Democratic presidential nominee.

Pete Buttigieg

Buttigieg earned his first endorsement from a member of Congress this week, with Rep. Don Beyer of Virginia releasing a statement saying that he was backing the South Bend, Indiana mayor and comparing him to former President Barack Obama.

“I endorsed Barack Obama early, having been moved by both his intelligence and his political capability. I am similarly inspired by Mayor Pete,” Beyer said. “With him, I feel the promise of a new generation, and I see a way out of the darkness.”

I owe a post dedicated to Buddyguy next week, seeing as how he's about to be exposed as a flash in the pan because of his lack of appeal to African American women voters.

Julián Castro

In an interview with The New Yorker, Castro outlined his position on immigration, which has been the centerpiece of his campaign, explaining that he doesn’t believe those attempting to cross the southern border “are a national security threat” and that he found it “beautiful” “that people still see this country as a place of opportunity and safety.”

Speaking with BuzzFeed News Tuesday, Castro pushed back against the idea that Congressional impeachment proceedings would backfire on Democrats, saying that it was possible for the party to “walk and chew gum at the same time” -- holding Trump accountable while pitching their strengths ahead of the 2020 election.

Castro was the center of a humorous moment at Wednesday’s 'She the People' forum, when he revealed that the event’s program featured a photo of his twin brother Rep. Joaquin Castro and joked that his brother “would say that’s a good thing because he’s better looking than I am.”

Julián is continuing to make lemonade out of lemons, and good on him.  I think he'll be a sturdy candidate for Texas governor in 2022.

Tulsi Gabbard

The Hawaii congresswoman shared her belief that “it’s time for the country to focus on the issues that matter most to Americans” in lieu of the investigation into the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia after the Mueller report revealed “no collusion.”

“The conclusion that came from that Mueller report was that no collusion took place,” Gabbard said on Fox News Sunday. “Now is the time for us to come together as a country to put the issues and the interests and the concerns that the American people have at the forefront, to take action to bring about real solutions for them.”

Gabbard was heckled rudely at SheThePeople.


Kirsten Gillibrand

In an appearance on 'The View' Wednesday, Gillibrand was supportive of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats’ efforts to subpoena key figures named in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report, despite Trump’s insistence that they should not have to testify before Congress.

“The Mueller report was very damning,” Gillibrand said, adding, “If President Trump takes on Nancy Pelosi over whether he’s going to respond to her subpoenas, I will put my money on Nancy Pelosi every time.”

(Gillibrand also) said (Biden is) “going to have to directly answer to voters” on allegations of inappropriate touching.



Kamala Harris

Harris received some criticism that she was too cautious during a CNN town hall on Monday, during which she repeatedly called for “conversations” and “debate” about a number of issues, including felon voting rights, the voting age, slavery reparations and student debt forgiveness.

The California senator did signal her support for impeachment during the event, arguing that the Mueller report presented evidence that Trump engaged in obstruction of justice, but said she was a “realist” about the whether the efforts would ultimately be successful, given Senate Republicans’ support for the president.

Harris is already being talked up by Biden supporters as his running mate.

Jay Inslee
The Washington governor penned an open letter on Earth Day to his fellow 2020 candidates urging them to support his proposal for the Democratic National Committee to dedicate one out of 12 planned primary debates to solely focus on climate change.

Amy Klobuchar

In the CNN town hall hosted earlier this week, the Minnesota senator said that Trump should be held accountable following the Mueller report, but she stopped short of calling for impeachment.

Klobuchar also hosted a meet-and-greet event in Lexington, South Carolina to talk with local residents about her positive economic agenda to move the country forward.

Klobuchar had a handful of odd moments during her town hall.


Wayne Messam

Miramar, Florida Mayor Wayne Messam’s presidential campaign was undergoing allegations that his campaign staff isn’t getting paid.

According to a report published by the Miami New Times, an anonymous former campaign staffer said that a campaign team member sent an email to staff with the subject line “Notification of hold on paychecks,” which blamed the failure to disburse checks on Messam’s wife, Angela.

Messam, whose lawyers are reviewing the allegations, told ABC News that “an unnamed staffer making a claim like that can’t be validated.”

Perhaps not quite ready for prime time.

Beto O’Rourke

Former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke, while speaking to the press at the “She the People” forum in Texas, joined some of his fellow 2020 presidential candidates by stating that he is willing to “rethink” the voting rights of non-violent prisoners.

O’Rourke will also be returning to Nevada for his second trip since announcing his candidacy for president to participate in various grassroots events across the state.

With mixed reviews at SheThePeople, Beto's week got saved with a piece of good news yesterday, as a Change Research poll reveals he has a nice (yes, early) lead at home.


Tim Ryan

Ryan, who as a sitting member of the House would be in a position to vote on impeachment, said this week that he doesn’t believe his chamber should begin proceedings against Trump, telling CNN that the House Judiciary Committee should continue to investigate.
“Let the Judiciary Committee look at this. There’s a process in place here. I trust (committee chair Rep.)Jerry Nadler, he’s one of the smartest guys in the United States Congress, I think that’s the natural next step and let’s see where that leads,” Ryan said.

Bernie Sanders

During a CNN town hall Monday, Sanders shared his opinion that incarcerated felons should be allowed to vote, a stance that was met with immediate backlash from Republican Party officials.

“I think the right to vote is inherent to our democracy -- yes, even for terrible people -- because once you start chipping away … you’re running down a slippery slope,” Sanders said. “I do believe that even if they are in jail paying their price to society, that should not take away their inherent American right to participate in our democracy.”

Bernie obviously had a busier -- and better -- week than this sample indicates.








Nina couldn't let the rudeness at SheThePeople go by ...


It's accurate to say he should have answered the question -- you know the one -- better than he did, considering he was seventh to speak.

Elizabeth Warren

Warren was among the first presidential candidates to call for proceedings last Friday in the aftermath of the Mueller report’s release, tweeting that “to ignore a President’s repeated efforts to obstruct an investigation into his own disloyal behavior would inflict great and lasting damage on this country, and it would suggest that both the current and future Presidents would be free to abuse their power in similar ways.”

The Massachusetts senator released a proposal this week to wipe out student loan debt for millions of people and make public colleges free. Warren said that the plan would cost the federal government $640 billion, but be paid for by a tax increase on families with $50 million or more of wealth.

Warren drew the most raves at SheThe People, as well as for these stands listed.  As good a week as Bernie had, Warren might have had a better one.

There's more candidate news that I left out here, polling news at the bottom here and an aggregate of state polls here.
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019

Bombs away

-- MJ Hegar dropped hers yesterday morning.  John Cornyn dropped his on himself, with an assist from his Tweet team and standup comic Patton Oswalt.


Yes, Twitter was aflutter with better snark than Wonkette and PolUSA, but I got a lotta shit to do today.  Say this for Hegar: be it luck or something else, no one except Beto O'Rourke has gotten more glowing, free national media (and he appears to have finally reached his expiration date).

Still just one Texas Democrat in this race, AFAIC.


-- Joe Biden, after a false start, drops his tomorrow.


(I could have embedded meaner, and probably will later.)

-- Remains to be seen whether Sylvester Turner and his sycophants on City Council drop one on themselves today.


I need to post about this, and about the city's municipal elections soon.

Watch the Tweet feed, top right, for updates on #SheThePeople2020, #BernieinHouston, and whatever else breaks news all day and into the night.
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Monday, April 22, 2019

The Earth Day Wrangle

Today is Earth Day, a celebration of our home base that some in the ecological movement believe has lost meaning.


The Texas Progressive Alliance also acknowledges San Jacinto Day yesterday, but would prefer to remind readers about the full history ...


... and re-focus on the future of the Great State, as the Chronicle writes.

Here's the full edition of the round-up of lefty blog posts and news from around and about Texas from last week!

Starting with updates from the Texas Legislature, Luke Metzger at Environment Texas recaps how environmental issues are currently faring during the session.  Texas Vox reports that a bill sponsored by state Sen. Jose' Menendez would set standards for residential and small commercial solar users, giving them some assurances about distributed generation.   

With a few climate-related posts, LareDOS writes that on Texas farms and ranches (and across the US), every day is Earth Day.  And HPM asks if anything has changed in the nine years since the Deepwater Horizon environmental tragedy.

Progrexas blogged about the state's deleting thousands of children from Medicaid every month due to red tape, and even Politico has picked up on the Lege's Freak Right Wing Caucus working hard to outlaw abortion.

Texas and six other states are debating similar bills based on model legislation from National Right to Life that would impose fines and prison sentences on physicians and nurses who neglect an infant surviving an abortion. The Texas bill is on the verge of passage -- the state House and Senate must reconcile slightly differing versions of the bill before it's sent to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, who has tweeted his support.

These bills are designed, as everyone knows, to test the Supreme Court's new conservative majority on Roe v. Wade.

Better Texas Blog shows why a property-tax-for-sales-tax swap is bad policy, and as the Lege considers legalizing hemp production, Christopher Collins at the Texas Observer writes that it could be a real shot in the arm for the state's farmers.

One of the measures moving through the Capitol is House Bill 1325, by Representative Tracy King, a Batesville Democrat. Dozens of farmers, ranchers, hemp proponents and others testified in favor of HB 1325 in a House Agriculture Committee hearing earlier this month. So many people showed up to the usually quiet committee that some attendees were moved to an overflow room; no one testified against the bill. After passing in an 8-0 vote by the ag committee, the proposal is now at the mercy of the House Calendars Committee, which sets the daily agenda for the lower chamber. Lawmakers have until May 28 to pass legislation.

The Austin Statesman has details about a bill that would end partisan elections of judges in the state.  (Spoiler: It is not expected to pass.)  More election news from TXElects:

Early voting begins today in most jurisdictions for the May 4 uniform election.

SC7: McAllen attorney Brandy Voss amended her campaign committee for a potential challenge of Justice Jeff Boyd (R), likely as a Democrat.

CD24: Bedford neuroscientist John Biggan, who unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination in 2018 (22%), re-authorized his campaign committee for a second challenge of U.S. Rep. Kenny Marchant (R-Carrollton). Biggan is at least the sixth Democrat to take a formal step toward running in 2020.

HD47: Austin attorney Jenny Roan Forgey established a campaign committee for a potential challenge of Rep. Vikki Goodwin (D-Austin). Her personal social media posts suggest she would run as a Republican.

HD67: Dallas resident Anthony Lo established a campaign committee for an undetermined state office, but an ActBlue page indicates it may be HD67, which is held by Rep. Jeff Leach (R-Allen). Rep. Michelle Beckley (D-Carrollton) has a legislative director by the same name.

The Dallas News has updates on municipal elections in the Metroplex as early voting there gets under way, and the Houston Chronicle covers the Bayou City.  (Houston is not holding mayoral and city council elections until November, with the filing deadline in August.)  Meanwhile the San Antonio Current has a very brief rundown of voting info for the Alamo City, and Robert Rivard bemoans the continual lack of interest in San Antone's elections.  And Kuff reviews some Senate election data from 2018 to postulate about 2020.

A New Mexico militia says it is "holding" migrants for CBP agents, reports Texas Standard.

On Saturday, the FBI arrested a New Mexico-based member -- and possible leader -- of the self-styled militia group, United Constitutional Patriots, charging him with being a felon in possession of firearms and ammunition. The militia has allegedly been detaining migrants at the southern border in New Mexico, and the state’s governor, Michelle Lujan Grisham has said the militia has “no authority” to do so.

Angela Kocherga has been covering this story for the Albuquerque Journal, and says the militia has a camp in Sunlalnd Park, New Mexico, just across the border from Texas. The militia is still there, even after the ACLU tipped off New Mexico’s governor and attorney general about the group’s practices, which is what led to the FBI’s arrest of one of its members. Kocherga says the group’s current spokesman told her it intends to continue detaining migrants.

“He admitted to me they are detaining people, but he said legally they have every right, and New Mexico is an open-carry state so they can also carry weapons,” Kocherga says.

The person who was arrested, however, wasn’t allowed to carry weapons because of his criminal background.

Kocherga says it’s also unclear whether the group is legally allowed to detain migrants like it claims. She says the group said it’s “holding” migrants -- mostly children and families -- until Border Patrol comes. The militia claims it wasn’t arresting the migrants, but she says a video posted by the group shows that wasn’t always clear to them.

“They said people are free to leave … but the migrants seem very confused in the video, some are young children, and that prompted an outcry from the ACLU,” Kocherga says, “that this was akin to kidnapping, in their words.”

SocraticGadfly has a trifecta of posts about recent national developments.  When the Mueller report was released, he offered a non-twosiderism take about what it said and what it didn't.  When Beltway stenographers and The Resistance refused to let go of collusion, etc., he called them out in a follow-up.  Earlier, after Julian Assange's arrest, he gave another non-twosiderism assessment of the history leading up to that.

The Greater Houston metro area has reached seven million in terms of population, according to Tory Gattis at Houston Strategies.

It's the final few days of Houston Black Restaurant Week, through April 28, and special prix-fixe menus at participating eateries will donate a portion of proceeds to F.A.R.M.S., which provides legal and technical services to aging small farmers while alleviating hunger in their respective communities by helping them do what they love: grow food.



And LiveScience has the story about the thousands of fossils collected near Beeville by WPA workers during the Depression era that are finally being studied.

During the Great Depression, the Works Progress Administration paid folks to collect and preserve fossils in Texas. Here, Glen Evans (left), who managed much of this WPA project, 
is shown carrying a fossil in a field jacket with a worker.
Credit: The University of Texas at Austin Jackson School of Geosciences

The selection of animals is mind-boggling, revealing that rhinos, camels, rodents, 12 types of horses and five species of carnivores trekked across what is now the Texas Gulf Coast some 11 million to 12 million years ago.

"It's the most representative collection of life from this time period of Earth history along the Texas coastal plain," study researcher Steven May, a research associate at The University of Texas at Austin's Jackson School of Geosciences, said in a statement.

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