Saturday, October 17, 2020

Sunday "A Bigger Boat" Funnies


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Friday, October 16, 2020

Election 2020 Update: Town Hell, Dianne Resignstein, Senate flip-flop


But no fundraising chatter.  That's for the duopoly, the consultants, and the corporate media.  If we had an actual democracy, then news solely of interest to the plutocracy would not dominate the reporting at the end of the election cycle.  Especially when 900,000 Americans filed for unemployment this week, people without the money to buy insulin are trading it for free on the underground market, and those working three gigs still won't have health insurance after Amy Coathanger Barrett becomes a Supreme Court Justice this time next week.

The obscenities of our current political system are all these and more.  And electing Joe Biden -- and a slate of Blue Dog Democrats down the ballot -- are not going to fix any of them.

End of rant.


On NBC, an aggrieved president perched on a stool, fought with the moderator, refused to rebuke dangerous conspiracy theories and spewed misinformation about a deadly pandemic.

A click away on ABC, Joe Biden offered detailed if long-winded policy discussions as he issued calls for national unity to a deeply divided nation.

These weren’t just different channels; they were different worlds.

Sure, some news was committed. Biden promised George Stephanopoulos of ABC News that he would clarify his views before Election Day on expanding the size of the Supreme Court, a notable pivot for a candidate who has refused to get into the issue.

And in an unusual choice, Biden engaged in the theoretical exercise of what would happen if he lost the election. A candidate’s standard answer to that question is, “I’m not going to lose.”

Biden took a different approach.

“It could say I’m a lousy candidate and I didn’t do a good job,” he said. “But I think -- I hope that it doesn’t say that we are as racially, ethnically and religiously at odds with one another as it appears the president wants us to be.”

Archie Bunker and Mr. Rogers, when we could have had FDR.  Or even Henry Wallace.  Instead, Barack Obama decided we should have a brain-addled reincarnation of Harry MF'n Truman.

Trump, meanwhile, was grilled by Savannah Guthrie of NBC News over a series of his dubious and outright false claims. When he said that data showed that 85 percent of people who wear masks still catch the coronavirus, Ms. Guthrie noted that he had falsely characterized a study.

When he tried to dance around the date of his last negative coronavirus test before his diagnosis -- information that would clarify whom the president might have exposed and when -- Guthrie’s questioning made it clear he was dodging.

“Possibly I did, possibly I didn’t,” he said, when pressed on whether he took a test on the day of his first debate with Biden.

And he professed ignorance about QAnon, the sprawling pro-Trump conspiracy theory community whose bizarre claims that the world is run by a cabal of satanic pedophiles have been linked to real-world violence. This week, the president retweeted bonkers theories from several QAnon supporters.

His excuse boiled down to: Retweets don’t equal endorsements.

“I don’t get that,” Ms. Guthrie exclaimed. “You’re the president. You’re not like someone’s crazy uncle who can just retweet whatever.”


Yes, one of these is worse than the other.  And when the two choices are eating shit or drinking piss, I choose neither.


Biden is going to win in a landslide.  Don't get spooked.  Yes, there will be voting machine malfunctions, and poll workers contracting COVID, and excessively long lines, and all of the many and varied forms of vote suppression Republicans have made famous.  You shall overcome.

And Biden's coattails will be long, and they will be running both ways.

I still won't be voting for him, because Texas being in play means it's a wipeout for Trump pretty much everywhere else, from NY to CA, Seattle to Miami.

Senate control remains a very close question, with Georgia being the wildest of cards.  Don't waste any more time, effort, or money on Amy McGrath.  Please.  Grist says that the fate of the planet runs through four seats.  Two are all but certain to flip to blue, and the other two wouldn't surprise very many people if they did.

Those four Repukes -- Tillis of NC, Daines of MT, Ernst of IA, and Collins of ME -- are part of CNN's ten most likely swaps, with Doug Jones (D) of AL losing his, along with Cory Gardner (R) of CO and Martha McSally (R) of AZ.  That's a net gain for Team Donkey of four, maybe five.

I think Gary Peters in MI will survive, and Lindsey Graham was in serious danger prior to the Barrett hearings this week and the helpful assist provided by the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee.  He's been saved.


Appalling.


Not on anyone's list for flipping -- to be fair, it's been off, on, and lately off -- is Texas.  Though MJ Hegar won't be able to blame it on the wealthy making it rain on her.

I'll do another Texas round-up tomorrow before the Funnies on Sunday.
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Wednesday, October 14, 2020

Wednesday Wowza EV Turnout Wrangle


(Early) turnout is off to a torrid start. The Harris County Clerk’s office tweeted that 128K people voted in person today, plus 41K absentee ballots received to date, easily the highest single-day total in county history. In 2016, the first day of early voting saw 129K combined in-person and absentee ballots.

In Travis County, 36K voted in person (Tuesday), roughly the same as in 2016, and another 23K absentee ballots were received ... more than double the 2016 number.

Hidalgo County reported its first-day turnout exceeded 2016 by 1.5K votes. Denton County Judge Andy Eads tweeted in-person first-day turnout (36K) was more than double the first day of 2016 (17K). Turnout in Lubbock County was around 25% more than the first day in 2016.

In Dallas County, 58K people voted in person (actually over 59K)  roughly the same as the first day of 2016.

Same in San Antonio.  Same in El Paso.

Reform Austin provides the executive summary: a Texas House flip is within Democrats' reach; Trump's re-election chances -- and those of Republicans tethered to him -- are slipping in the suburbs, and Greg Abbott's popularity is rolling downhill fast.

So I feel very safe in voting a Green slate.

(I know I promised fewer election posts in this Wrangle, but hey, shit happens.)


Two breaking court rulings that aren't election-related:


Which gets us to the criminal justice news, full of "cops behaving badly" again.  Let's have a couple of bowls of Grits for Breakfast.

Overwhelmingly, most searches at traffic stops are fruitless fishing expeditions. At the Houston Chronicle, Eric Dexheimer and St. John Barned-Smith dug into the data on contraband hit rates, newly available from Texas' Sandra Bland Act, and took aim at trainers teaching cops "deception detection."

Ten people died in the Tarrant County Jail this year and a woman gave birth without the jailers noticing (the baby also died). Now Sheriff Bill Waybourn is up for reelection. Michael Barajas at the Texas Observer took apart his record.

The Sheriff in Fort Bend County is running for Congress and taking heat for his record of on-the-job misconduct.


The Observer's editor-in-chief has a follow-up.


Donald Neely, arrested by Galveston police on horses last year and then led by a rope through the city, has filed a lawsuit.

(Neely) seeks mental anguish damages on claims of assault, infliction of emotional distress, malicious prosecution and negligence. Both the city and its police department are named (.pdf) defendants.


The city has not formally apologized to Neely and no officers were disciplined for how they treated him, according to his attorney, who said he’s content to stay out of the spotlight, but he would like to get a decent settlement and to be the catalyst for Galveston police reforms.

And it seems as if I'll never be able to post another Wrangle ever again without mentioning Ken Paxton, whose latest fraud and corruption allegations have taken another odd turn.  Meanwhile, our governor gets it wrong again about crime in the capital city.


Concluding, the 21st Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty was a virtual event, and it featured Elsa Alcala, a former Republican judge on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

Now for environmental news ...

Naveena Sadasivam at Grist points out a Texas-sized loophole letting polluters off the hook.  "Enforce existing laws" is coincidentally the rallying cry for the Democratic candidate for the Railroad Commission, Chrysta Castaneda (she's miles better than the Republican with a dead Democrat's name, but I made a case for voting against both on Monday).  Bridget Thompson, a UT intern at Environment Texas, writes about the plastic she sees -- coffee cup lids, water and soda bottles, food containers, and the ubiquitous plastic bags and wrappers -- in Texas' creeks.  Bloomberg (via MSN) reports on a Permian Basin wellsite, abandoned by its bankrupt fracking company owner, that has been leaking gases for almost a year, despite being investigated by the TCEQ.

“TCEQ and RRC must properly address these intense emissions including, but not limited to, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), methane, and hydrogen sulfide,” Sharon Wilson, Earthworks’ thermographer, wrote in the letter {.pdf).

And Houston could be the low-carbon energy capital in thirty years (needs to be much sooner, of course)... but only if regional leaders begin taking the proper steps NOW (.pdf).


Only a few social justice headlines, primarily dealing with the economic blows being dealt to the poorest among us as a result of COVID, and the squabbling back-and-forth between our so-called leaders in Washington.


And former H-Town city council candidate Brad Jordan, better known as rapper Scarface, is in need of a kidney donor after having contracted the coronavirus.


And here's two stories from LareDOS I want to share: the Villa Antigua Museum has its "Cities of the Dead" exhibit of Laredo and Webb County cemeteries opening in November, and Luis Guerra updates another of his Cuentos de la Sierra, this one about la aguililla (the hawk).

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Monday, October 12, 2020

The Weekly Far Left Texas Early Voting Wrangle

Tomorrow is the day many of us will get this election started.


Mail -- aka absentee -- ballots have been flowing in, as you know.  I received my application for one between rounds of the ongoing boxing match between Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins and Governor Greg Abbott, but will avail myself of the in-person option once more, even though my disability enables a postal voting qualification.

There's lots of election news here, and my suggestions for your vote are down-post.


The two others are El Paso and Dallas.  According to the story, only one candidate who is not an incumbent is slated to appear with the presumptive First Lady: TX-24's Candace Valenzuela, in metro DFW.  Polling in the district is stale but shows the Democrat has the strength to flip it; the race is considered a coin toss.  Here's a good profile.

Donks don't want to leave anything on the Lone Star table, and good on 'em for that.  'E' for effort.


  The line at the Bexar County Elections Department Monday (October 5th) afternoon, hours before the close of voter registration for the 2020 elections. (Courthouse News photo / Erik De La Garza)

(Today) Texas Democrats will receive an assist from some of the biggest stars in the Democratic Party. Oprah Winfrey, Willie Nelson, Senator Bernie Sanders and (Julian) Castro are set to join (Beto) O’Rourke and his political action committee, Powered By People, to help run a massive phone bank operation being touted as the “largest single-day voter contact effort in Texas history.”

They understand there are even more hurdles to getting your democracy on than usual.


The stakes are exceptionally high, and Texas voters know it.  It's not just about Trump, or Cornyn, or even Congress.  It's also about the excessive over-reach by Abbott and his minions in the Lege.


Even the freakiest of the freak right get it, though for entirely different reasons.


It's enough to drive a person to drink.  And if you want to drink in a Texas bar, you might have to drive a little bit outside of town to do so.


Bud Kennedy at the Startlegram has some good advice for early birds, first-timers, and "occasional" *cough low-info cough* ballot-casters. The Texas Civil Rights Project reported about how Fort Bend ISD helped get its 18-year-old students registered to vote before the deadline.  And Vote 411 has the answers to all your voting questions.


So with all of this in mind, and with regular Brains readers acutely aware of my position on Joe Biden and MJ Hegar, here's the P Slate for all Texas voters.


That's it.  That's the whole thing.

I can't vote for all of 'em and neither can you, but vote Green where you can, including the all-important Railroad Commissioner's race.  Any Green is better than any Democrat in this contest, beyond the fact that the Donks tried to knock kat gruene off the ballot, that Chrysta Castaneda doesn't support a fracking ban as well as a host of other green (as in environmentally correct) initiatives, including, natch, the Green New Deal.  Essentially Castaneda is a "I'm not as bad as the Republican, let's enforce the existing laws, maybe consider a few very mild penalties for flaring, but emphasize incentives for oil companies to do better" kind of politician.  Maybe that's comforting for the few frackers waking up to reality, but it's a hard pass from me.


For the second consecutive cycle, I ain't voting for Lizzie Fletcher.  Just like two years ago, it does not look like she needs my vote.


Kuffner is fanboi-ing hard again.  That interview was a little too sticky for me.

Likewise for those of you in TX-21, where Wendy Davis has a puncher's chance to upend Chip "on Ted Cruz's shoulder" Roy.


Now I realize some of you would just like to see Texas turn blue.  Let's overlook the fact that too many of these Blue Dogs have mange, fleas, and ticks.


Yes it is, so let's ignore Joe's obsession with prepubescent girls, let's cancel Tara Reade, let's disregard Biden's palling around with racists and bigots all of his Senate career, his bragging about locking up every black person he possibly could, and yes, let's forget about his dementia.  At least he isn't Trump, the lowest possible bar imaginable.


Of these, I'd vote for Hank Gilbert (TX-1), and Sima (TX-2), and Lulu (TX-3), and Russell Foster (TX-4) if I lived in their district.  They're not the most progressive Dems, but I could make an exception.  The best Dems here are Mike Siegel (TX-10), Adrienne Bell (TX-14), Julie Oliver (TX-25), Donna Imam (TX-31), and Lloyd Doggett (TX-35).

 Follow Royce West's lead, or better yet, vote for David Collins.


And take Bernie's advice if you live in Travis County.


A forum for Austin city council candidates is tonight.



Want better endorsements than the daily papers give you?  Equality Texas has the five statehouse races for LGBTQ advocates to watch (or do something more for).  Gus Bova at the Texas Observer recommends the Austin Chronicle's endorsements.


Okay, this has gone on long enough.  I've plenty more for later, including the previously-promised environmental stories, criminal justice news, and some odds and ends.  Here's a few of the human interest tales to wrap this Wrangle.


More with less emphasis on politics coming.
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