Tuesday, April 21, 2020

TexProgBlog Wrangle, Tuesday Edition

With many updates and developments since yesterday.

The Fifth Circuit blocking women's right to choose was not shocking.


The future price of West Texas Intermediate crude oil falling to a negative value was.


After the story broke that Houston and Harris County officials pooh-poohed concerns about the coronavirus in February, allowing RodeoHouston to go on ...


... both County Judge Lina Hidalgo and Mayor Sylvester Turner announced their czars for restarting the local economy.  State Representative Armando Walle was selected by the judge:


While the mayor picked ... wait for it ...


Turner and Hidalgo are under tremendous pressure to reopen Houston for business.


And the Texas Railroad Commission -- the state's oil and gas regulatory body -- is scheduled to convene again after yesterday's steep drop in the commodity's future price contracts.


Lots of Texans still need lots of help as the COVID-19 fallout ripples outward.




There are some very easy steps that could be taken, but we're not waiting solely on Texas Republicans to lead ...



Lone Star Blue Dogs are sitting around at home with little to do and not doing it as well.


With accurate stats still lacking, we know that minority communities are being impacted greatly, mostly due to poverty.  San Antonio is working to increase awareness.


But Governor Abbott still doesn't get it.


There's always time for another conspiracy theory, though.


A number of anniversaries this week:




The Austin Police Department still has tremendous issues, but some of the local reporting has been a whitewash.


And this Wrangle can wrap up with some softer news.

Pam LeBlanc at Texas Monthly has some great ideas about getting your social distancing on outdoors.  Darian Mendez at the San Antonio Current links to The Alamo's livestreaming event this afternoon, marking San Jacinto Day.  Bob Ruggerio for the Houston Press reviews a book detailing the long-awaited justice for the US Army's First Battalion, 25th Infantry, aka the Black Battalion stationed at Brownsville in 1906.


And Major League Baseball is discussing a plan to start their season where teams would be stationed in one of three hubs, with Texas being one.

On Monday, multiple league sources informed CBS Sports about a different idea that has been discussed in recent days. In this arrangement, the league would have teams stationed in one of three hubs: Florida, Arizona or Texas. The clubs would then make use of the local major- and minor-league (or spring training) facilities.

One source even expressed guarded optimism about the idea's chances of coming to fruition.

Ballparks in St. Petersburg (Florida), Phoenix (Arizona), and Arlington (Texas) each have roofs, retractable or otherwise, that would safeguard against rainouts and other extreme weather, allowing for multiple games to be hosted at those sites per day. Theoretically, MLB could also ask teams stationed in Florida and Texas to drive three-plus hours to other MLB parks (Houston's Minute Maid Park and Miami's Marlins Park).

It's unclear if MLB would assign 10 teams to each metropolitan area, or if it would opt for an unbalanced approach that would see 12 teams in one area and eight in another.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has tweeted about his attempts to get professional sports back in the state amid the pandemic, including NASCAR.
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Monday, April 20, 2020

The Weekly "It's Safe to Go Back in the Water" Wrangle

With the best of the left from around and about Deep-In-The-Hearta from the past week, the Texas Progressive Alliance isn't so sure that Mayor Vaughn is correct about there being no more sharks at Amity Beach.


Meanwhile, in Reality:


Nevertheless, the capitalists persist.



The displays are tapping into Trump’s main message on the coronavirus pandemic: governors are to blame for the crisis, not him. As the president ratchets up his re-election efforts, his argument is an effort to simultaneously put the brunt of responsibility for the coronavirus catastrophe on the shoulders of his political opponents while also maintaining that he holds “total authority” over the pandemic and the states facing it.

It’s an argument that resonates best in rural, redder parts of the country, which have not been hit as hard by the pandemic as blue, urban areas. Trump himself has said, “We’ll be opening some states much sooner than others,” despite pushback from legislators and business leaders alike about the current lack of mass testing.

And it’s a message of division, designed to pit Republican-voting areas of states against their Democratic-voting neighbors, even rural Republicans against urban Republicans. All this to activate white rural voters who supported Trump in 2016 and whom he’ll need again in 2020.

That's how it plays out here.  Greg Abbott's juggling act, with safety and science battling Dan Patrick and the pastors, has him spinning.  RG Ratcliffe at Texas Monthly was also unimpressed with Abbott's press conference about restarting the state's economy.


In times of personal crisis, Abbott always turns to Gawd his donors.


And demonstrates his inner Trump.


Shutting down government transparency has become a coronavirus symptom.



With the latest on voting-by-mail ...


Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican, vowed to appeal the ruling, arguing that mail voting could lead to fraud. Many states rely heavily on mail-in ballots and have had no significant issues with voter fraud. Five states already plan to run all-mail elections this year, and 28 other states allow voters to request a mail ballot for any reason. The Brennan Center for Justice found that the threat of voter fraud is “infinitesimally small.”


Kuff also looked at the initial ruling in the TDP's lawsuit to expand vote-by-mail access.  And via Rick Hasen at Election Law Blog, Chad Flanders and Kristen Spina write in Slate that the Texas courts should use the “democracy canon” to interpret excuse restrictions in absentee ballot laws.

As the ACLU stated it in its motion in the case, though, it’s arguable that everyone now has a “physical condition” that increases the “likelihood” that going to the polls might “injure[] the voter’s health.” (New Hampshire has interpreted its analogous “physical disability” provision in precisely this way) Paxton’s construction of the statute, meanwhile, also might mean that someone who actually tests positive for COVID-19 but is asymptomatic may not qualify for an absentee ballot, which seems absurd. As Vox’s Ian Millhiser wrote: “Either one of these interpretations of the Texas law is plausible, and a judge could reach either conclusion using methods of statutory interpretation that are widely accepted as legitimate.”

This is where Texas’ judges should turn to the so-called “democracy canon,” a method of interpreting statutes that is tailor-made for cases like this one. In his 2009 Stanford Law Review article about the method, University of California, Irvine law professor Richard Hasen offered a case citation that perfectly captures the heart of the democracy canon: “[a]ll statutes tending to limit the citizen in his exercise of [the right of suffrage] should be liberally construed in his favor.” In other words, when there is a “tie” in how to interpret the statute, the tie goes to the voter.

The case Hasen cited -- Owens v. State ex rel. Jennett -- was, in fact, a Texas Supreme Court case. Indeed, Texas historically adopted a fairly strong version of what Hasen called the democracy canon. In one appeals court case from the 1950s on the very subject of absentee ballots, Sanchez v. Bravo, a Texas court established a “clear statement” rule regarding restrictions on the right to vote. If a state is going to prevent someone from voting, the court ruled, they have to say so in “clear and unmistakable terms.” Otherwise, courts must read the law in a way that promotes “the right of the citizen to cast his ballot and thus participate in the selection of those who control his government.”

The Texas Green Party held their state convention over the weekend, and Howie Hawkins won the majority of presidential delegates.

The convention affirmed statewide candidates kat gruene for Railroad Commission, Charles Waterbury for Supreme Court Position 1, and (David B. Collins) for US Senate. None of us three paid the new filing fees to run, so under current law we will not appear on the general election ballot. As we have noted previously, a pending lawsuit may yet overturn the filing fee provision of HB 2504.

[...]

Based on the polling at countywide precinct conventions, GPTX will have 20 delegates for Howie Hawkins, 3 for Dario Hunter, 2 for Kent Mesplay, and 1 for Susan Buchser-Lochocki.


Some environmental developments include ...


The next Census -- whenever it takes place -- could well determine a future for Port Arthur as maintaining semblance of a city ... or not.


Trump's EPA rollbacks are punishing Port Arthur's residents as well.

Danielle Nelson’s best monitor for the emissions billowing out of the oil refineries and chemical plants surrounding her home: The heaving chest of her 9-year-old asthmatic son.

On some nights, the boy’s chest shudders as he fights for breath in his sleep. Nelson suspects the towering plants and refineries are to blame, rising like a lit-up city at night around her squat brick apartment building in the rugged Texas Gulf Coast city of Port Arthur.

Ask Nelson what protection the federal government and plant operators provide her African American community, and her answer is blunt. “They’re basically killing us,” says the 37-year-old, who herself has been diagnosed with respiratory problems since moving to the community after 2017′s Hurricane Harvey.

“We don’t even know what we’re breathing,” she says.


And like air pollution from fossil fuel producers, gun nuts aren't taking any time off, either.


Food concerns are moving to the forefront; Texas Standard reports that a statehouse committee chairman thinks that the meat packers are manipulating the price of beef.

State Rep. Drew Springer, chair of the House Agriculture and Livestock committee, has called for an investigation into the pricing practices of meat packers. Just four companies control 85% of the U.S beef market.

SocraticGadfly looked at restaurants by type and class, and wonders which will do better, which worse on surviving coronavirus.  The Lunch Tray noted a somewhat favorable ruling in a lawsuit over USDA school nutrition rollbacks.




And an Austin landmark loses its life to the coronavirus.


With all of this grim news, finding a bright spot somewhere can be difficult.  The Bloggess shares how she is coping.

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Sunday, April 19, 2020

Sunday 'COVID Darwin Winners' Funnies


Many thanks to the inimitable Clay Jones!









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Thursday, April 16, 2020

Race for the White House Update: All Aboard

-- Bernie went first ...

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders on Monday endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden for president, pledging to help him defeat President Donald Trump in the general election as the two agreed to launch a series of task forces to work jointly on policy matters.

"We need you in the White House. I will do all that I can to see that that happens, Joe," Sanders said to Biden during a livestream broadcast by Biden's campaign on his website and on social media.


And following our refusals to get in line behind him, began the early recriminations.

Bernie Sanders said Tuesday that it would be “irresponsible” for his loyalists not to support Joe Biden, warning that progressives who “sit on their hands” in the months ahead would simply enable President Donald Trump’s reelection.

That might appear to be more directed specifically at those who would be planning on not voting, as opposed to those of us who will be voting for someone other than Biden or Trump.

I'm rolling with the old Bernie anyway.


He built a movement for a political revolution and then, when it was sabotaged again by the establishment, trudged back to rejoin them.  That is, after all, what he said he would do, repeatedly; support the nominee.  A lot of people felt surprised, disappointed, let down by that (not me).



-- Obama came out second, with the best gaslighting ever.

"The Democratic Party will have to be bold," he added, arguing that Biden has the "most progressive platform" of any Democratic nominee, even though many progressives who supported Sanders remain skeptical of Biden.

Not that.  This.

It becomes more adorable with each passing day to reminisce about how we spent a year following the twists and turns and what-ifs of a Democratic presidential primary between 20-some candidates. After all the noise, Joe Biden just had to hold on to South Carolina to get Democratic voters to effectively nominate him by acclamation. Cool. So much of that time, too, was spent debating whether Democrats needed a return to the halcyon days of the Obama administration or a bolder agenda of structural overhaul. Did Barack Obama go far enough? was a fundamental question of the primary. It was mostly unspoken, as answering with the negative risked taking the most popular Democrat’s name in vain.

And then, the day after the last remaining competitor drops out and endorses the presumptive nominee, Obama himself comes out with the answer: Hell, I certainly wouldn’t run on the Obama platform.

“You know, I could not be prouder of the incredible progress that we made together during my presidency,” Obama said in a video released Tuesday morning, in which he endorsed Joe Biden. “But if I were running today, I wouldn’t run the same race or have the same platform as I did in 2008.”

What refreshing candor bullshit.  I can't wait for the "I exerted no influence on the candidates who all quit their campaigns simultaneously just prior to Super Tuesday" tell-all interview/book.




-- And in a small plot twist, Elizabeth Warren -- coming in from her sabbatical -- makes it a three-for-three for Rapey Joe.

Was this orchestrated also by Maestro Obama?  Does it presage Liz as VP?  That's going to enrage the K-Hive if so.  And perhaps miff Stacey Abrams, who's taking her campaign for the job public.

-- So ... keep revolting inside or outside?


Personally I have gotten the most satisfaction from doing both, strategically and each at the proper time.  So for the moment, voting for Bernie in remaining primaries will give him delegates to go to the convention and influence DNC rules in the future (as in the past; restricting the votes of superdelegates to the second round, for example).

But after that, it's time to #DemExit.



Here are some of your options at the top of your November ballot.






Don't write Bernie's name in, please.


This is exactly what happens in Harris County; I've seen it.  It may be what happens in every Texas county.  Some states do allow write-ins, like California (I am told); you should check with your state's elections administrator and find out.



I'll post more later about other minor leftist parties that don't have a presidential candidate this cycle -- building the movement in-between presidential cycles is critical -- and how to address accusations of "privilege" from duopolists.

-- The Libertarians lost Lincoln Chafee last week, so Michigan Congressman Justin Amash is considering leaping in, and Jim Gray (former CA Superior Court judge and the party's 2012 vice-presidential nominee) has already taken the plunge, adding a little excitement to that primary.
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Tuesday, April 14, 2020

The TexProgBlog Wrangle, Part 2

Part 1 is here.


The COVID-19 pathogen will likely put off the US Census.


TXElects parses the meaning of the delay for us.

The Trump Administration may be seeking to delay key Census deadlines as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Commerce Secretary Wilber Ross said in a call with several members of Congress that Census field operations would be suspended until June 1, according to a statement issued by U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), chair of the Committee on Oversight and Reform.

Maloney said Ross would seek federal legislation to delay the deadline to deliver apportionment counts to April 30, 2021, from December 31, 2020, and to deliver redistricting data to the states to July 31, 2021, from March 31, 2021. Those deadlines are set by federal law and would require congressional approval.

[...]

During the last redistricting cycle, the U.S. Census Bureau delivered its 2010 state population totals for apportionment on December 21, 2010, and the block level population data on February 17, 2011. In the prior redistricting cycle, the totals for apportionment were released on December 28, 2000, and the actual Census 2000 enumeration data was sent to the states on March 6, 2001. Only the first of those two events would occur during the 2021 regular session under the Administration’s proposed timeline.

If the total state population for apportionment is sufficient to trigger “publication” of the census, then the Legislature could take up redistricting in the regular session. If “publication” is triggered by the block-level detail, then the next regular session would be 2023.

Update: Scott Braddock at Quorum Report has some thoughts about this.  My best guess is that a special session to tackle redistricting in 2021, or waiting to do so until 2023, depends on whether the state's Republicans feel their opportunities to control the outcome are better sooner ... or later.  Expect litigation aplenty either way.

With respect to legal action ...


The Lone Star State is indeed a loner in one regard, according to an April 11 filing by Planned Parenthood in the US Supreme Court.

Texas, like other states, has declared an emergency due to the coronavirus crisis, halting nonessential activities. But it’s gone further than any other locale in limiting family planning services, leaving women with no choice but to remain pregnant or travel out of state instead of sheltering in place, even to seek nonsurgical abortions that simply involve swallowing “two pills.”

Over the weekend, the healthcare providers turned to the highest court in the land for help, saying that “Texas has exploited the Covid-19 crisis as a pretext to target abortion.”

Again, the only thing we can be sure of is more lawyers filing more lawsuits.

In spite of the shattered state (and national and global) economy, there are doubts as to whether restarting it now is the right idea.


Coronavirus grifters are gonna grift.



Update: A Texas Railroad Commission hearing yesterday was, in Trump's words, 'a ratings hit', but once again Texas Republican elected officials chose to do nothing.  Quorum Report:

Texas energy sector appears to reject the idea of state intervention in production

All-day RRC hearing draws 20,000 viewers online; it became clear a Texas-only decision could lead the nation but without a national strategy the needle would only be moved marginally

Two of the state’s energy producers have proposed a return to a limitation on oil production in Texas for the first time in almost 50 years as a way to stem the economic hemorrhaging of the oil & gas industry.

The idea got a lot of attention.

Today’s virtual hearing of the Texas Railroad Commission – with only proration on the agenda – drew more than 20,000 viewers. Statistics were so startling that AdminTexas.com posted that the hearing -- still going (late last) evening -- had significant viewership from Korea, Canada and Russia.

The proposal, in short, would be to cut Texas energy production, by possibly as much as 20 percent, to push up the sagging price of oil. Pioneer Natural Resources and Parsley Energy want it. Marathon Oil Corp. and many others pressed against it even with the promise that the cuts on production would be limited to top pumpers.



Kuff has an update to that weird "ghost candidate" story from the HD142 primary.


Housing news had several Texas bloggers' attention.


"A massive wave of evictions is coming":

(The COVID-19) crisis has struck the United States at a moment when millions of people were already living perilously close to eviction. Because of stagnant wages and rising rents, one out of four renters spent over half of their income on housing. Among rent burdened households -- defined as those that spend more than one-third of their income on housing -- half have less than $10 in savings.

Nearly a third of the American workforce -- some 41.7 million people -- earns less than $12 per hour and has limited access to health care, paid sick days and paid family and medical leave. The mandatory stay-at-home orders and forced closing of business will force much of this population, even with the help of unemployment insurance, to choose between paying rent or buying groceries.

Some landlords have delayed eviction and even canceled rent for their tenants. Others, however, have been less sympathetic. The Daily Beast recently reported on the case of a Las Vegas nurse who was evicted because her landlord worried she might potentially spread covid-19.

The problem is simply too consequential to be left up to landlord discretion. And if evictions are merely delayed, not permanently stopped, that could lead to a resurgence of the virus, after stay-at-home measures "bend the curve" of infection. Evicted families end up in homeless shelters, where people eat and sleep next to each other -- the opposite of social distancing.

People experiencing homelessness are particularly vulnerable to upper respiratory illness including to covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. Well before the pandemic, sprawling tent encampments had experienced outbreaks of medieval diseases like typhus and trench fever.


Last year, the Current and the San Antonio Heron collaborated on a lengthy analysis of gentrification's sweep across the West Side, including the scheduled demolition of the Alazán-Apache Courts.

In a couple of follow-ups to postings from last week's Wrangle, Rice University's ventilator is all ready to go ...


... and Half Price Books is about to go out.


In the wake of furloughs ordered by parent company Gannett, and with print media facing a troubled future, the Austin American Statesman turns to ... radio.


And to conclude another week of the best of the left of Texas, here's few lighter-side pieces.


Save Buffalo Bayou is enjoying tending their garden during this self-imposed spring exile.
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