Today the Chron gives its most puzzling endorsement of the cycle. Not because Rep. Kevin Brady is an oddball choice for re-election - frankly, given what a nut Brady's opponent is, I'd be pushing the button for him if I lived in Montgomery County. What's odd about this is the timing of the endorsement - why not include Brady in with the Harris County Congress endorsements; surely it didn't take this much extra time to arrive at the decision to recommend him - as well as the choice to make a recommendation in this particular race. If the Chron is going to venture outside of Harris County - something they really ought to do, as both the Morning News and the Star Telegram endorse in races from multiple counties - then why pick this uninteresting and uncompetitive race (Brady got 69% against the same nutty opponent in 2004) instead of the much more compelling and potentially competitive race in CD14?
Maybe the Chron is going to pick a side between Shane Sklar and Rep. Ron Paul. Good for them if they do, but c'mon already. There's only three days of early voting left. The more they wait, the less it matters. I admit that how much it matters regardless is an open question, but the principle remains.
Finally, if the Chron is going to venture outside the Harris County borders, there are a number of hot races in Galveston and Fort Bend Counties in which they could endorse. Again, if they were going to do this they should have done it weeks ago, but better late than never. In the end, though, if CD08 is the only exclusively non-Harris County race in which the Chron makes a recommendation, then I will remain puzzled as to why they bothered. We'll see what happens.
Is today the last you'll see Chris Bell on TV? Maybe, maybe not.
At least two Houston television stations - KPRC and KHOU - have no Bell campaign commercials booked or paid for to air after today. Two of Bell's rival campaigns say that is true at television stations across Texas.Bell said late in the day that Houston trial lawyer John O'Quinn had given his campaign another $300,000 to keep his advertising on the air.
[...]
Bell's campaign reports showed that as of Saturday he had only $84,106 in cash available for the final drive. And Bell lamented to reporters early Monday that all the money he had received from O'Quinn was gone.
When reporters asked Bell if his campaign was about to go off network television, he replied: "We'll see today." Bell spent the afternoon in Houston trying to raise more money.
Bell campaign manager Jason Stanford said rumors of Bell going dark on TV are premature.
"We have substantial new money that will keep us up as we are now currently. Not going dark. It's late-breaking. ... Scout's honor," Stanford said.
However, Bell's campaign staff on Oct. 17 told reporters that O'Quinn had guaranteed a $1.5 million bank loan for Bell. The campaign finance report released Monday showed O'Quinn actually guaranteed a loan of $1 million on Oct. 18. That was in addition to a $1 million donation he made Oct. 12.
In addition to O'Quinn's money, Bell raised another $790,000. The money was spent on heavy network television advertising during the past two weeks.
Given that a month ago, nobody thought Bell would be on TV at all, I can't say this is the worst news I've ever heard. And it's interesting that both the Perry and Strayhorn camps saw fit to point this out to reporters. Maybe they're breathing a sigh of relief.
Meanwhile, Paul Burka looks at the latest Zogby Interactive poll for Governor, which as previously noted paints a picture of a much closer race than the Chron Zogby poll does, and he comes up with another reason why not.
The bad news for Bell is that his success seems to have come not at Perry's expense but at Strayhorn's.
Dude. All campaign long you've said that the reason why Rick Perry is unbeatable despite poll numbers in the 30s is because none of his opponents have been able to coalesce the anti-Perry vote. Now we see Chris Bell doing exactly that - this is what it means when some of Strayhorn's support migrates to Bell, as was the case when Friedman started losing voters to Bell - and it's still bad news? Is there anything that could happen in this race that would constitute good news for Bell by your reckoning?
I'm not saying that Bell is suddenly a favorite to beat Rick Perry. Heck, if he does go dark over the next week, he could very easily slip back to the pack and be in danger of falling behind Strayhorn. And yes, Perry's numbers have ticked up a bit from the shockingly (improbably?) low 30s to the 37-38 range, where even I will concede he's approaching nigh-unbeatable territory, though quite clearly Bell's upward mobility has been faster. All I want is a little consistency. Is that so much to ask?
What is there to say about the third Chronicle poll, which shows Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison winning by a 61-27 margin over Barbara Radnofsky? Well, that poll was done by Zogby, which as it happens just released its latest batch of Zogby/WSJ Interactive polls. That poll pegs it as Hutchison 55, Radnofsky 36. Zogby says his interactive polls are valid, so it'd be nice to see him explain the differences between the two.
That same Interactive poll, by the way, has the Governor's race as Perry 36.7, Bell 28.5, Strayhorn 15, Friedman 14. Like I said, it'd be nice to have Zogby explain why one set of results is so different from the other.
As with the CD22 poll, 90% of the respondents said they were "very likely" to vote, with the rest claiming to be "somewhat likely". Either this means they also talked to a bunch of non-voters, whose results they then excluded, or it's as much BS as the CD22 sample was. Whatever the case, taking the respondent's word for it is highly suspect. You could screen by past voting history instead, for instance.
One interesting thing from the crosstabs, which are in popup windows that I can't link to: The respondents were asked whether the US was going in the right direction or the wrong direction. By a 47.9-43.7 margin, they said "wrong direction". Hutchison gets nearly 80% of the "right direction" voters, but Radnofsky wins the "wrong direction" folks by a slim margin, 41.6 to 40.9 (the Lib candidate gets 8.9% of these, with the rest being "other" or "not sure"). I didn't see where they asked the same question for Texas, but they have data on that. People are more sanguine about Texas, with 52% percent saying "right direction" and 40% saying "wrong direction". KBH gets 75% of these "right direction"ers, with Randofsky taking 45% of the "wrong"ers (to 39% for KBH). It'd be useful to know which of these groups is really more likely to vote, but alas, we don't.
Take a look at this last mailer that Jim Henley is sending out to district residents this week. The top bullet point for Henley is his promise to "secure funding for Houston's light rail", while the top point for John Culberson is taken from the recent Chron non-endorsement lecture which notes Culberson's opposition to Metro's proposed routes and his unwillingness to help fund the Universities line. I believe that given the high profile Culberson has had on this issue, the two candidates' stances on rail will be a factor in the election. What I don't know is in what fashion it will be a factor, and by how much.
I drive around the Inner Loop portion of CD07 almost every day. There's an incredible number of Henley signs in that area - more than for any other campaign, as far as I can tell. The one place where you don't see a bunch of Henley signs, in fact where you see visible support for John Culberson, is on Richmond, especially east of Kirby and west of Weslayan (which is to say in Afton Oaks). I got to wondering recently how these folks voted in the past, and whether we may see a difference this year.
With an assist from Greg Wythe, who figured out which precincts I needed to check, I can answer that first question, and be prepared for the second. Here's the relevant data for the 2004 election, and for the 2003 Metro referendum:
Pcnct Culberson Turnout Pct Metro Yes Metro No No Pct
===========================================================
39 473 1809 26.15 740 243 24.72
60 422 1625 25.97 612 201 24.72
123 236 866 27.25 333 117 26.00
139 773 1688 45.79 556 322 36.67
177 635 1024 62.01 291 254 46.61
178 905 1346 67.24 346 412 54.35
233 837 1597 52.41 448 303 40.35
802 46 237 19.41 59 11 15.71
Total 4327 10192 42.45 3385 1863 35.50
You can see a map of the precincts here. Basically, precincts 39, 60, 123, and 802 are east of Kirby. Precincts 139 and 233 are the Greenway Plaza area, and numbers 177 and 178 are Afton Oaks. Obviously, this covers more than just Richmond itself, but this is as fine as I can slice it.
Not too surprisingly, Culberson was unpopular in the Montrose-y areas east of Kirby, and well liked in Afton Oaks. Also not too surprising to me was the fact that Culberson was more popular than the anti-rail vote in Greenway Plaza. The relative level of support for the rail referendum in Afton Oaks was interesting, but one could take that as their belief in the line being on Westpark if one wants to.
Bottom line is that overall, more people liked the rail proposal in 2003 than Culberson in 2004. Note that Culberson's percentages are measured against total ballots cast, not just ballots cast in his race, so his actual level of support is slightly higher than that. I did it that way to give a comparison to the other Republicans on the CD07 ballot. I've got a spreadsheet with the full details here.
As for part two of my questions, give me a couple of weeks and I'll let you know. For now, at least, we can ponder about whose stance will resonate more among the people in the area. I look forward to seeing what the precinct data ultimately says.
Did you know that the old American Basketball Association has been reincarnated as a regional minor league, with a total of 53 franchises across the country, including a new one here in Houston? Me neither, but it sure sounds like owner Larry Leonard has got the whole loose, fun-loving thing down.
"I was on the Batman ride at Six Flags and we went over the cemetery," he said. "That's when it hit me - the Undertakers. That's who we had to be. People will remember us. Especially when we bury them."To that end, Leonard has purchased a coffin and plans to have pallbearers on hand to carry it onto the court late in the game each time the Undertakers have wrapped up a win. Call it a ghoulish version of Red Auerbach's old victory cigar.
[...]
"We're definitely not trying to compete with the Rockets or any other sports franchise in Houston," Leonard said. "We're looking to provide an entertainment alternative and a fun, exciting kind of basketball. That's why we've gotten the legendary Jackie Carr to be our head coach. Our goal is to win games and make headlines with our style of play, which will be all about putting points on the scoreboard."
Who is Jackie Carr, you ask?
The first time they met as a team, the coach gathered his players all around and asked them a simple question."What wins championships?"
The hands shot up immediately, and a dozen heads nodded with confident smiles.
Easy question.
"Dee-fense!" they all shouted.
The coach threw back his head and laughed.
Trick question.
"How many of y'all ever seen them put defensive points up on a scoreboard? You win games, you win championships, by scoring more points than the other guy.
"Anybody know another way?"
Not Jackie Carr.
The Wizard of Wheatley High won four state championships, eight city crowns and 11 district titles and rolled up a 532-112 (.826) record in 17 seasons from 1969 to 1985 doing things his way.
Now, at 77, he's back out on the court in charge of a minor league team called the Houston Undertakers that will play this season in a resurrected version of the old American Basketball Association.
"I was sitting around, just playing checkers, when the young fella who owns the team came and asked me if I wanted to coach again," Carr said. "It wasn't really something I was looking for. But I thought for a minute and figured maybe it would be fun."
[...]
Carr is to fast-break basketball what a microwave oven is to rubbing two sticks together. A quantum leap.
His 1973 Wheatley team that featured Eddie Owens, Steve Jones, Michael Long, Willie Davis and Robert Jammer went 43-1 and captured the state title while averaging just over 110 points. That's in just 32 minutes on the high school clock.
Back in the day, Carr even had a rule for his Wildcats. If they failed to break the 100-point barrier in a game, they faced a five-mile run the next day at practice.
"I laugh when I hear coaches say their players won't run," Carr said. "What do you mean 'won't run?' Then get new players.
"I hear coaches talking about how they need a center or a point guard or a power forward or something. I hear kids come in now and tell me they play the 'three' or the 'four' or the 'one' position. I don't know anything about any of that. Just give me some boys with two legs, and I'll get them up and down the floor."
Somewhere, Jeff Van Gundy just lost another hair. Gotta admit, this sounds interesting. I'll have to check their schedule and see if I can catch a game.
Houstonist guest writer Crystal lays down the law for Trick or Treating at her house: You must be old enough to walk, but not old enough to shave, and you must be in costume. Fine rules, and not too much to ask in general, but here in the Heights, there's just too much traffic to enforce such a thing. I'll try to get a picture or two so you can see what I mean, but we see something on the order of 400 or 500 Trick or Treaters in the course of the evening. It's just crazy. We're giving out Mardi Gras beads as we usually do - they're cheap, the kids like them, and it eliminates the temptation to eat half the stash before anyone shows up. What are you giving out this year?
I can't talk about Trick or Treating without mentioning the Candy Man, also known as Ronald Clark O'Bryan, who murdered his son by giving him poisoned Halloween candy in 1974. That took place in Deer Park, which is about 20 miles southeast of here, and effectively ended the Trick or Treat tradition for a whole generation of kids in Houston. The memory of that event still lingers - last week KACC radio advertised its annual Fall Festival as (among other things) a "safe alternative" for kids. They didn't mention Ronald Clark O'Bryan, but I was pretty sure that whoever wrote the ad copy had him in mind.
I loved the Houston Press cover story on the business of haunted houses (the HouStoned blog has more). The one question I wish they'd addressed is what do the owners do with the houses for the rest of the year? The article certainy makes it sound like this is a lucrative business (once you recover the surprisingly high startup costs), but can you make a living on six weeks of shows? Alas, it doesn't say. Read the sidebar piece about the actors, too. You'll never wear flipflops to a haunted house again.
Christof reads the environmental assessment for the proposed Intermodal Terminal (formerly known as the Northern Intermodal Transit Center) so we don't have to. He summarizes the most interesting bits, which are worth reading to see what Metro is up to with this project. For example:
5. It's intended to create a new neighborhood.METRO's site plan shows a grid of streets between the railroad tracks and White Oak Bayou. Those streets aren't needed to access the transit station, and most won't carry through traffic. Their purpose is clearly to be the "bones" of a new neighborhood. METRO isn't saying much about that - the site plan shows these as on grade parking. But they've clearly though about it. Most significantly, the streets are connected southwards, not northwards, directing traffic from new development towards Downtown, not residential neighborhoods. METRO has already acquired much of this land because it needs parts of it for the transit facilities; presumably it would either sell or lease to developers. Were we in a city that wasn't planning-phobic, there would already be a process underway to figure out what kind of place this would be. Instead, we're letting the transit agency figure it out.
Check it out.
Here's one last entry in my series of Q&As with local candidates: Jim Sharp, running for the First Court of Appeals. This one runs a little long, so I've put it in the extended entry.
1. Who are you and what are you running for?Sparing you the existential but reciting far more than the essential:
Jim Sharp, nominee of the Texas Democratic Party for a seat on Texas' First Court of Appeals.
I'm 54 (and I've earned every one of them), married 16 years (ditto), no kids. Grew up in Dallas where I attended Catholic schools...and anyone who did so during that era knows that means my entire world was centered around the parish Church - indeed, the school I attended K-8 was physically attached to the Church... the Boy Scout troop was sponsored by the parish; clergy attended all athletic events; from the age of nine I served as altar boy several days a week at Masses, funerals, weddings, etc.; as a member of the boys choir, I was excused from school early three days a week to attend practice in the Church's choir loft (we walked through the doors next to the principal's office and we were in Church behind the sanctuary!); we practiced every Saturday morning and one night a week (or more, depending upon the Liturgical Season, the number of concerts, "appearances", operettas, etc. scheduled) We also cut three records, two of which employed a brand new technology called "stereo"... all-in-all a very dedicated commitment and an extraordinary experience.
So when I claim to have "grown up in the Church", I am not speaking metaphorically...a great percentage of my waking hours as a child were spent within that sacred House of God. I remain a practicing Catholic today and serve 2-3 times a month as a lector at Mass in my current parish on Sunday evenings.
Please do not interpret any of the above as a characterization of myself as some holier-than-thou sinless being. God's forgiveness and mercy is key (and therein lies any slim measure of hope there is for me!!) ;-)
Graduated from Jesuit High School in Dallas where I served in student government two years, the Lone Rangers (a spirit club), had parts in a few drama productions, won a district-wide competition in duet acting (channeling Clarence Darrow, of course) and was a cheerleader my sophomore and junior year (about which I never had second thoughts until I learned both Bush AND Perry were also cheerleaders); then to University of Texas at Austin where I logged sufficient English and Government classes to claim a major in either (I went with English) while working fulltime in the Texas Capitol. During my many years as an undergrad I won a University-wide election for a seat on the Board of the Texas Student Publications...upon which victory it was quickly determined the election was actually no more than a preference poll and the position to which I was rightly entitled by virtue of more votes than any other was given to another…a young man who just so happened to be the Editor of the student paper's pal. Thus, I suffered the bile of corrupt Texas elections early in my life.
Prior to completion of my degree's last six hours, I left Austin for Washington D.C. to work for Matt Reese's consulting firm as a writer/planner/campaign coordinator. (Matt was a legend in his time and one of the founders of the electoral consulting industry). From there I was dispatched to U.S. Senate races in Alaska, Iowa, New Hampshire and gubernatorial races in Kentucky and Louisiana. I also wrote various plans, documents and correspondence for both mayoral and corporate clients' interests in electoral referenda in Washington, D.C., Cleveland and Atlanta.
Following the '80 election season I returned to Texas, completed the last few hours of 17th C. and medieval lit classes while serving as legislative/administrative director for a state rep during the legislative session and was graduated with a BA.
Thereafter I coordinated a campaign for a school board candidate in Dallas and then served as Director of Public Relations for the American Income Life Insurance operations in New Mexico and Massachusetts. I then returned again to Texas (Ft. Worth) and worked for Champion Paper Co., an international paper manufacturer for which both my grandfather and father had each worked for 50 years.
Although the job with Champion was perhaps the easiest and best-paid I'd ever held, I felt my contribution to my fellow sons and daughters of God was best met in an arena other than sales, so after a little more than a year, I quit to move to Houston to attend South Texas College of Law where I earned my degree while clerking fulltime for some of the very best firms in Houston at the time - Reynolds, Allen and Cook; Butler & Binion; Fulbright & Jaworski; Hardy, Milutin & Johns and the Chaffin Law Firm.
Since securing my bar card, I have practiced as a solo attorney in the general practice of law. I have litigated cases everywhere from municipal court to federal court. I have represented small business owners, injured workers, law enforcement officers, single mothers, artists, teachers, truckers, physicians, probation officers, retirees, victims of nursing home neglect, surviving spouses and children in wrongful death cases as well as many other civil and criminal cases before courts throughout Texas.
2. What kind of cases does this court hear?The Courts of Appeals hear all civil and non-capital criminal appeals from the trial courts. Capital death penalty cases are appealed directly to the Court of Criminal Appeals in Austin.
3. What are your qualifications for this job?The very best!
The Court of Appeals grapples with both statutory and common law and publishes written opinions intended to fully and clearly explain the applicable law, how it applies to the facts of the case under consideration and the reasoning upon which the court bases its decision. Clear written communication is a baseline requirement for this position.
For most of the decade of the 70's and into the early 80's I worked in the Texas Legislature where I served on staff of the House of Representatives; and as a Legislative and Administrative Aide to two State Representatives (one from Corpus, the other from Greenville, TX). Additionally, I served on the staff of the Senate Education Committee, where I analyzed legislation, authored committee reports and performed other research and writing responsibilities. Thereafter, I worked as a writer for a Washington D.C. firm that counseled elected members of and candidates for the U.S. Senate as well as Governors, Mayors, corporations and industry associations.
I do not believe there is a single appellate court justice sitting on the Houston area appeals courts with as an extensive legislative background and coupled with my seventeen years as a practicing attorney spanning a broad spectrum of legal areas, I believe I am the best qualified.
4. Why do you believe you would do a better job than the incumbent?The breadth of my experience in the arenas of law, legislation and business afford me a far broader...and firmer...perspective on the myriad of issues that manifest themselves as cases before the court. The task is to "do justice" and despite the too-clever claim of one of this Fall's network TV lawyers, it is NOT just "God's business"....Unlike the incumbent Gov. Bush/Perry appointee, my legal experience has not been limited to eight years as a practicing attorney in the comparatively narrow spectrum of criminal prosecution. I've litigated cases from municipal court to federal court; and represented clients in probate, civil, criminal, juvenile and family matters in courts across Texas. And while I will readily concede that the skill set one brings to court as an advocate/litigator does not necessarily transmogrify itself into excellence on an appeals bench, I believe my prior experiences in legislation, writing, providing counsel to elected officials and business entities and officers in addition to my day-to-day practice of law these past seventeen years makes for a particularly valuable ‘training' for an appellate court justice.
5. Why is this race one we should care about?Texas voters in general and the voters of Harris, Ft. Bend, Galveston, Brazoria, Grimes, Colorado, Washington, Waller, Chambers and Austin counties in particular, are subjected to the jurisprudence, our law...the law of "we the people"...determined daily by these nine justices of Texas' First Court of Appeals. The decisions of this court directly affect your life and the lives of your family and friends.
If you are a firefighter, in law enforcement or otherwise employed by a government entity such as the city, county or state, your status as an employee and rights attendant thereto are governed by statutes, any one of which could become the basis of a case that arrives in the Appeals Courts. If you are a divorced parent and believe your child/children's best interests are not being served by your divorce decree, your dispute may appear in the Appeals Courts. Indeed, in any case in which one party disagrees with the result the trial court, there is a right to appeal that case to the Courts of Appeals seated here in Houston (whether to the 1st or 14th is determined by the district clerk of the county from which the appeal originates…usually by lot). Thereafter, should one of the parties believe justice unmet, the only recourse is to petition one of the two courts of last resort in Austin: the Court of Criminal Appeals (if a criminal matter) or Supreme Court of Texas (if a civil matter), but the grant of your petition is at the complete discretion of the members of these courts and they are under no obligation to accept your petition. (except in Capital Punishment cases…which cases are automatically appealed from the trial court to the Court of Criminal Appeals in Austin). There are fourteen Courts of Appeals throughout the State of Texas and they serve as the "intermediate" appellate courts.
6. What else do we need to know?You need to know the score. 118 to 0.
Of the trial and appellate courts before which a Harris County resident may find him/herself, 100% are Republican. Allow me to repeat: every single judge in a court of record for which Harris County voters elect the judge are Republican.At a recent candidates' forum in Sharpstown, my mention of these numbers was met with the applause of a 60-something year old man. I spent the remaining 120 seconds of my allotted time explaining that such a scheme was the very tyranny the genius of the United States' Constitution sought to avoid (quoting Federalist Papers No. 47 - "The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive and judiciary, in the same hands...may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." James Madison, 4th President of the United States; principal author of the U.S. Constitution). Upon uttering the word ‘tyranny', there was an audible gasp in the room….as if my quote was original and I was the wildest of wild-eyed radicals. Suffice to say I was the one who departed the gathering in shock….that voting citizens are so dangerously unaware of fundamental principles of democratic governance.
Sadly, Texas voters seem to be applauding the fact that our constitutional government is being hi-jacked by partisan zealots. A recent Zogby International survey reports that more Americans can name the original Three Stooges (Larry, Curly and Moe) than can name the three branches of government. There are three co-equal branches of government: the executive (which entails the administrative); the legislative and the judiciary….with the judiciary being the final arbiters of what passes constitutional muster and what amounts to over-reaching by the other two branches. Presently in Texas the Republicans own the Governor's Mansion, the majority of the Legislature and 86% of the Appellate courts statewide and 100% of all the courts of record which residents of Harris repeat: the Texas Appeals Courts with oversight over the ten counties of are an almost wholly owned subsidiary of the Texas Republican Party.
Voters really need to know the score.
Thank you, Jim Sharp. Here are all my previous interviews with Harris and Fort Bend countywide candidates:
Richard Garcia - Interview
Leora T. Kahn - Interview
Chuck Silverman - Interview
Bill Connolly - Interview
James Goodwille Pierre - Interview
Albert Hollan - Interview
Neeta Sane - Interview
Rudy Velasquez - Interview
Veronica Torres - Interview
Farhan Shamsi - Interview
Obviously, the big news today is the Chron poll of CD22 (reported last night on KHOU), which claims that the race is a lot closer than anyone thought it would be. Here's how the Chron puts it:
Thirty-five percent of respondents said they would vote for a write-in candidate, a statistical tie with the 36 percent support for Democrat Nick Lampson, according to the poll of more than 500 likely voters in the 22nd Congressional District.Most who say they will write in a candidate plan on naming Shelley Sekula-Gibbs, the Houston city councilwoman backed by the Republican Party. Two lesser-known candidates also are running as write-ins.
One voter in four is still undecided.
Libertarian Bob Smither, the only person besides Lampson on the general election ballot, drew 4 percent support.
"Most" means about 80%, according to the poll's internals, which you can see here and here (both PDFs). Which in turn means that Lampson leads the written-in Sekula Gibbs by a 36-28 margin. Not quite as sexy as 36-35, but there you have it.
There are many points to discuss in this poll. Most of what I'll be referring to comes from one of the two PDFs linked above.
- The poll sampled 504 registered voters, of whom 450 said they were "likely" to vote this year. I'm here to tell you, ain't no way in hell any random sample of 500 registered voters contains 90% likelies. SurveyUSA has been pegging about 58% of its samples as likely voters, presumably based on past voting history. That's too high as well for a non-Presidential election, in which 35-40% turnout is the norm. In this case, it appears the voters self-identified as likely. And a lot of them fibbed about it.
- Where that may make a difference of course is in its mix of partisan identity. The sample is 32% Democratic, 52% Republican, and 16% Independent. But how many of each of those groups is really likely to vote? That matters quite a bit. This is a weird year in many ways, so any method for determining voter likelihood is not much more than a guess. Are the Democrats more fired up here, as is the case around the country? Or are the Republicans excited about maybe winning a race they're supposed to lose? I don't know how you can judge from this poll.
- Forty percent of poll respondents say they normally vote a straight ticket; the rest say they do not. I've looked at straight ticket voting several times, and in 2004, over 70% of the votes Tom DeLay got in Harris County came from straight tickets. As with the likelihood question, I think some of these respondents are not answering truthfully. Most people don't want to admit they don't vote, and most people don't want to be thought of as rigid partisans (this is why there are more self-identified "independents" than there are people who genuinely vote both parties).
- About half of Democrats in the sample say they'll vote a straight ticket; for Republicans it's 42% straight, 56% not straight, 4% not sure. The Dem numbers are in line with historical patterns, the Republicans are a bit low, but understandably so given the advertising telling them to not vote a straight ticket.
- A total of 149 Republican repondents said they would not be voting a straight ticket. A total of 146 Republicans said they'd vote for a write-in candidate. To say the least, that's a high concentration. It suggests that this may be Sekula Gibbs' ceiling of support.
- Conversely, 108 of 161 self-identified Democrats said they were voting for Lampson, with an additional 35 saying "not sure". This suggests that Lampson's support may be understated.
- 26% of Republicans (69 out of 262) and 24% of Independents (19 out of 81) say they're not sure who they're voting for. It's hard to judge what they might eventually do. In a subsequent question that named Sekula Gibbs on the ballot, the 61 "not sure"s were pushed, but only 18 then identified a candidate. No such pushing was done for the Lampson/Smither/Write In question, where there were twice as many (123) "not sure"s. One might surmise that these are the people least likely to vote.
- It's hard to believe that Bob Smither will get only 4% of the vote. Past history suggests that Libertarian candidates, when they share a ballot with only one major party contestant, get 10-15% of the vote. My guess is that Smither will pick up a number of the not-sure voters, probably more Republicans since those are the ones he's specifically targetting.
- One last point to note is that the war in Iraq was by far the most important issue cited by the respondents, easily beating terrorism, the economy, and immigration. Nearly half of Democrats listed it first, as well as neearly half of Independents, while it trailed only terrorism among Republicans. I point this out mostly because it jibes with the recent poll in CD04, where the question wasn't asked but the pollster reported that almost everyone wanted to discuss it.
The bottom line is that I think this article makes the race sound tighter than it is. I do think it's tighter than I thought it would be - while it hasn't spent $3-4 million, the NRCC has spent over one million dollars, and that's had an effect - but to characterize it as a tossup between Lampson and Sekula Gibbs at this point is an overstatement. Kos, Juanita, Vince, and MyDD also discuss this.
Mother Jones has a profile of Martha Wong that's worth reading. There are a few things to discuss in it, starting with the headline "Deep in DeLay Country, a Backlash Takes Shape". Personally, I think of Fort Bend as "DeLay Country", not HD134, but maybe that's just me. I also think an article on the feisty countywide campaigns being waged by the Fort Bend Democrats might have been more illuminative of the backlash effect, but whatever.
Right off the bat, we get this:
Until recently, few people in Houston would have called Martha Wong conservative. She was the first Asian American elected to the city council in this blue-collar town and was a champion of immigrant workers; once in office, she fought for hiring more Chinese-speaking police officers, funding low-income housing, and preserving the bus system. Urban voters sent the Republican to the state Legislature in 2002, believing she was a political moderate.
I guess that's a matter of perspective. I've thought of Martha Wong as a conservative ever since the thong incident while she was on City Council. I can't speak to the items cited during her term on Council, as I wasn't paying particularly close attention back then, but her campaign slogan for State Rep has been "Be Right, Vote Wong" all along. Frankly, I think that's a pretty sizeable clue as to her true nature.
As Wong climbed the rungs of power at the state Capitol, however, she seemed to cast aside many groups that define her district. For example, environmentalists have been drawing attention to extraordinarily high ozone levels in the part of Houston that Wong represents, yet Wong voted against five separate clean air measures. Schools are a big issue in the highly educated district, yet Wong, a former elementary school principal, opposed a bipartisan proposal to raise teacher salaries. Wong acknowledges that voters in her district are independent-minded yet in an interview couldn’t cite a single instance in which she’d voted against her party. The closest she came was on a proposed constitutional amendment banning gay marriage: She supported defining marriage as a union "between a man and a woman" but opposed a ban on civil unions. "Since voting either for or against the bill would have put me in conflict with my beliefs," she wrote in a statement, "I abstained.""We might as well have a mannequin in the chair," says Jeffrey Dorrell, a precinct chair in Wong’s district for more than a decade. Dorrell supported Wong over a more conservative Republican in the 2002 primary and then watched with chagrin as she scrambled once in office to demonstrate GOP bona fides. Dorrell, who is gay, is so angry about Wong’s stance on the marriage amendment - which was opposed by nearly 60 percent of District 134 voters - that he has resigned his post with the party and is organizing "Republicans for Cohen."
The ironic thing, of course, is that an abstention on HJR6 really was as good as a No vote, since it needed 100 Yes votes to pass. That said, Wong voted yes in committee, which allowed HJR6 to come to the floor. That's where she really could have made a difference, and she chose party loyalty over her district. I'm not exactly shedding a tear for her as a result. The fact that she couldn't think of a single example beyond that of bucking her leadership tells you everything else you need to know.
The rumors that I hear say that the Republicans expect to lose this race. That stuff comes to me at least second hand, so take it for what it's worth. I've thought all along that Ellen Cohen was the candidate to take Martha Wong out, and I see no reason to change that assessment. I will be surprised if this isn't a pickup for the Dems next week.
NBA legend and Boston Celtics fixture Red Auerbach passed away over the weekend at the age of 89.
Arnold Jacob Auerbach was born on Sept. 20, 1917, the son of Marie Thompson and Hyman Auerbach, a Russian immigrant. Red grew up in the familiar and hardscrabble Brooklyn neighborhood called Williamsburg, where his father ran a dry cleaners. Red helped out with some of the pressing duties and also earned nickels washing taxi cabs. He was a teenager during the Depression, when unemployment in New York rose as high as 50 percent."I appreciated the fact that my father was a hard-working man," Red once recalled, explaining his father's influence. "Also that he was well liked."
Auerbach gravitated to basketball because that's what he had.
"In my area of Brooklyn there was no football, no baseball," he said. "They were too expensive. They didn't have the practice fields. We played basketball and handball and some softball in the street."
[...]
In 1943 he enlisted in the Navy. By the time Auerbach was discharged in 1946, Walter Brown had helped start the Basketball Association of America. Mike Uline, owner of the Washington Caps, wanted to hire Auerbach as coach.
But Auerbach was married and soon to start a family, so the move was risky for him.
"I had a permanent job already, but I felt I could always get a job if it didn't work out," he recalled.
He took the job, filling a roster with the names of players he remembered from his days in the Navy. Red was only 29.
"Some of the guys on the team were older than me," he said. "I just sold the guy a bill of goods to get the job. A lot of guys had better credentials."
He paid no one on the team more than $8,500 and insisted on defense and conditioning from his players. In the 1946-47 season, his team finished 49-11. After three years of coaching the Washington Capitols and the Tri-Cities Blackhawks of Iowa in the BAA, and winning 143 of 225 games, he was hired by Brown to coach the NBA's Boston Celtics. Brown was in debt and looking for a head coach for one last go-around with Boston.
Fortunately, Auerbach had Bob Cousy during his first year at the helm, helping him turn the Celtics from a 22-46 team in 1949 into a 39-30 team in 1950. Cousy was good right out of the box, scoring 15.6 points and averaging nearly five assists a game in his rookie year. But Auerbach almost didn't get him.
Auerbach wasn't short on opinions about who should play on his team.
"Am I supposed to win here, or take care of local yokels?" he asked, suggesting that Cousy was touted merely because he played at nearby Holy Cross.
Auerbach passed on Cousy in the draft, instead selecting 6-11 center Charlie Share. Local fans were irate. Due to outrageous fortune -- several teams had folded -- Brown offered Cousy $9,000 a year. He signed. Had Cousy taken umbrage at Auerbach's "local yokel" remark and not signed, things might have turned out very differently. Celtic luck may have been born right there.
As former Celtics and Rockets coach Bill Fitch said, Auerbach was one of a kind. They don't make them like him any more.
I grew up a Knicks fan, and though I've since adopted the Rockets as my team, to this day I despise the Celtics. It was ingrained with me as a kid. The reason why they're worth hating after all these years is because of the success and the stature of Red Auerbach. It doesn't matter that their last title was 1986. You just have to respect everything he did. I'll always have some awe of that franchise because of him.
This Bill Simmons piece from 2002 gives you a great flavor of the man. He will indeed be missed. Rest in peace, Red Auerbach.
Here's the first of three promised Chron polls, this one for the Governor's race.
Perry leads a five-person field with 38 percent support, according to the survey. Democrat Chris Bell has 22 percent support, and independent Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn has 21 percent - a statistical tie. Independent Kinky Friedman trails badly at 10.5 percent, and Libertarian James Werner has just 1 percent support.Disapproval of Perry's job performance is almost universal across Texas' demographic groups, according to the survey. Perry still has solid support from conservatives and Republicans.
"Could this have been a competitive two-person race? Absolutely. But it was never a competitive two-person race," said pollster John Zogby. "You get back to that one point: Bell and Strayhorn are blocking one another."
Bell - despite a saturation television-advertising buy paid for by $2.5 million in donations and loans from Houston trial lawyer John O'Quinn - remains largely unknown to four of every 10 voters. And Bell has yet to consolidate even his own Democratic base.
Strayhorn shows strength among women, blacks and self-identified independents, but she has failed to make significant inroads with Democrats or Republicans.
[...]
"The difficulty here is Perry has solidified in the high 30s," Zogby said of the challengers. "It would take two candidates to implode, and the odds of that happening are very, very nil."
The Zogby International telephone survey of 1,003 likely voters was conducted between Oct. 23 and Oct. 25. The margin of error in the survey is plus or minus 3.2 percentage points. The sample was 63 percent white, 23 percent Hispanic, 12 percent black and 2 percent other.
Perry spokesman Robert Black said the survey did not reflect a large Republican turnout that the campaign is expecting.
"The governor believes that the Texas voters are going to prove the national pundits wrong. They're going to turn out, and they're going to re-elect him by an overwhelming margin," Black said. "This poll confirms that those two campaigns (Bell and Strayhorn) are getting awfully close to throwing in the towel."
[...]
Perry's greatest weakness is that 54 percent of those surveyed said his performance as governor has been fair or poor. Among independent voters, 62 percent disapproved of Perry as governor.
Of those who say Perry has done only a fair job as governor, a third are supporting Strayhorn and a quarter are voting for Bell. Among those who say Perry has done a poor job, 45 percent are for Bell and 30 percent back Strayhorn.
Slightly more than half of those surveyed said Texas is headed in the right direction, but 40 percent said the state is off track. Out of wrong-track voters, Zogby noted, 39 percent favor Bell; 23 percent Strayhorn; and 15 percent Friedman.
[...]
Bell holds 53 percent of support among Democrats, but 18 percent say they will vote for Strayhorn and 10 percent for Friedman. And 29 percent of the Democrats surveyed said they are too unfamiliar with Bell to have an opinion about him.
"There's no way a Democrat can win getting just 53 percent of the Democrats, and that's where Bell is," Zogby said.
And the two ethnic groups that usually provide strength to Democratic candidates are divided. Blacks typically vote almost exclusively Democratic, but this year 43 percent say they support Bell and 35 percent name Strayhorn.
Hispanics typically throw three-quarters of their vote to Democrats, but only 25 percent said they will vote for Bell. Perry has the strongest showing among Hispanic voters, netting 37 percent.
My comments:
- This poll stands in contrast to three others released recently (SurveyUSA, Rasmussen, and Zogby's own WSJ/Interactive) that all have Bell at 25 or 26, and Perry at 36 or 37. I have an easier time believing Perry at 38 than I do Bell at 22 at this point.
- Similarly, whatever this poll says, I don't believe that Bell will only collect half of the self-identified Democratic vote. Until proven otherwise, about half the Democratic vote will be straight ticket. I expect Bell's share will ultimately be in the 75-80% range.
- I note with interest Robert Black's statement about Republican turnout. Maybe he's right and Texas will defy national trends, I don't know. But I do know that we can do better than guess at this point. We've got at least five days of early voting data available, and we can tell which precincts are turning out relative to others. That's a question the Chron could have investigated.
- On a related note, early voting turnout itself may be up relative to 2002 around the state, but I don't think that's necessarily indicative of an overall boost in turnout. I think more people are voting early these days - in Harris County at least, more people voted early in 2004 than in 2000, and more voted early in 2002 than 1998. I'm not confident of any formulae to project overall turnout from early voting.
- Finally, even if you believe everything about this poll, then even with only half the base in his corner, with so many people still not knowing who he is, and with underperformance among black and Hispanic voters, Chris Bell is still ahead of Carole Keeton Strayhorn, as he is in those other polls I listed (Strayhorn claims second place in an internal poll). For what I hope is the last time, I'm going to say that the idea that only Strayhorn could beat Rick Perry is thoroughly discredited. Why it ever gained currency in the first place will forever be a mystery to me.
And another story you may not have seen, via Ramblings of an HHSC Employee: Health and Human Services Commissioner Albert Hawkins has failed to disclose his ties to a non-profit that has received millions of dollars from the state of Texas.
Democratic candidate Chris Bell is raising ethical concerns about one of Perry’s top appointees. Bell says Hawkins--the executive commissioner for Texas Health and Human Services is on the board of a non-profit organization that's received more than a million dollars in state contracts.State lawmakers and heads of state agencies control billions of taxpayer dollars and to make sure the public knows if one of the decision-makers benefits from any of the state contracts, officials are required to file personal financial statements with the Texas Ethics Commission.
They must disclose if they have a relationship with any business or organizations.
CBS 42 pulled commissioner Hawkins filings for the past three years and found he did not disclose his position as a member of the board of trustees for the Texas Institute of Health Policy Research.
In the past couple of years, the group has been awarded more than a million dollars in consulting contracts by the state.
Hawkins is listed on the group's Web site and in the group's IRS tax returns. He was appointed to the position by Governor Rick Perry.
CBS 42 caught up with Perry on the campaign trail.
"Number one that's news to me," Perry said. "If that's a conflict we'll get it addressed quickly."
Of course it's news to Rick Perry. He doesn't concern himself with this kind of trivia.
"The problem you have with this kind of behavior is people in power can steer state contracts to organizations and charities they are involved in and can influence state policy," said Public Citizen spokesman Tom Smitty Smith. "It's a double edge sword."Failing to disclose such relationships is both a civil and criminal violation.
Commissioner Hawkins spokesperson released this statement, "commissioner Hawkins considered this as an honorary position and never attended any meetings. But, nevertheless, he will file a corrected financial statement."
CBS 42 will let you know what happens.
I'll tell you what has happened so far: No news stories have yet reported Commissioner Hawkins's compliance with state law. The Statesman picked up the story yesterday, with both Hawkins and Perry spokesman Robert Black whining about how mean it was of Bell to point out Hawkins' ethical lapse. Strangely, neither one of them mentioned this fact:
According to state law, Hawkins should have disclosed the board affiliation to the state ethics commission. He said Monday he will amend his personal financial statement.
Emphasis mine. Hawkins failed to live up to his responsibilities. He can complain about the timing of the revelation all he wants, but the fault is his. If Rick Perry cared about this sort of thing, if it were a priority for his administration, maybe Hawkins would have been in compliance all along and we wouldn't be talking about this. But he doesn't, and Hawkins didn't. They can blame Bell all they want for their own shortcomings, but it doesn't change the facts.
Here's a story out of Dallas you might have missed: Attorney General Greg Abbott is using videos shot with equipment paid for by taxpayer money in his campaign ads.
Earlier in his term, Abbott spent $66,000 on video equipment and hired a special photographer at a salary of $70,000 a year, Dallas television station WFAA reported in a story aired Friday night."The TV crew works with us as we go out, and on occasion to expose wrongdoing," Abbott told the station when he was asked about the expenses three years ago. "We consider it to be a critically important function of our office. We use them for a variety of purposes."
Now they are aired as part of political commercials and can be viewed on his political Web site, the station reported.
"It is representative of how Abbott has used his position for four years, and that is to promote himself," Abbott's Democratic opponent, David Van Os, a San Antonio attorney, told the station.
But Abbott's campaign director told The Associated Press on Saturday night that the video used by the campaign was obtained through an open records request.
"Any individual or organization may obtain records or video from the office of attorney general by filing an open records request, which is exactly how Texans for Greg Abbott obtained the video," Hodge said. "Doing so is completely appropriate. We are proud of Attorney General Abbott's record of arresting sexual predators and will continue educating Texans about his strong record protecting Texas children."
Mighty convenient, that. I'm sure it never crossed Abbott's mind when he spent that money that the footage captured might come in handy down the line. Just serendipity, I suppose.
PDiddie has more, including a link to the WFAA report.
Want to know what beer to try at the local pub? Look for the most interesting tap handles.
Breweries have tried for decades to attract attention by making tap handles larger and more colorful, but the microbrewery movement has brought a proliferation of artsy and exotic ones. Some are full-fledged artwork, a small brewery's main advertising and a way to entice beer drinkers to sample a specific brand in the competitive craft market - specialty brews typically made in small regional or local breweries - that grew 11 percent in the first six months of this year.You name it and it's been fashioned into a tap handle: Orca. Saxophone. Bloody hatchet. Pelican. Lightning bolt. Rocket ship. Hockey glove. A turtle floating on a raft. Frog leg. Lighthouse with working light. Lobster claw.
With so many craft beers available, breweries are designing the tap handles to distinguish themselves from their peers in some bars that can feature 20, 50 and even 100 or more different beers on draft.
About 10 percent of all beer sold in the United States is on draft, including kegs sold retail.
"When I sit at the bar and watch people come in, the first thing they look at are what taps you have," said John Lane, a partner with the Cleveland-based Winking Lizard Tavern, which has 12 locations in Ohio. "The tap handle is like a trophy."
[...]
[T]ap handles really got inventive with the craft beer movement in the late 1980s and 1990s when microbreweries and brew pubs popped up across the country. Knowing they didn't have the advertising budgets of major brewers that produce Budweiser, Miller and Coors, the craft brewers tried to attract attention anyway they could, including making unusual tap handles.
Today 1,371 craft breweries are operating in the country, with annual retail sales of craft beer hitting $4.3 billion last year, according to the Brewers Association in Boulder, Colo.
I usually just look for the tap handle that resembles this guy, but checking to see what stands out is a good strategy when one feels adventurous. Some of these things could probably be sold separately as souvenirs - they really are cool looking. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm feeling thirsty.
State Democrats said today they want prosecutors to charge Republican congressional candidate Shelley Sekula-Gibbs with a misdemeanor, claiming she broke state election laws by campaigning inside a Sugar Land polling location on Thursday.Chad Dunn, general counsel for the Texas Democratic Party, said Democratic poll watcher Jane Borden Matcha watched Thursday as Sekula-Gibbs wandered through the early-voting location at First Colony Conference Center and introduced herself to voters.
"She committed a crime yesterday by campaigning within a polling location," Dunn said. "It's a play out of the (former House Majority Leader) Tom DeLay playbook of winning at any cost."
Dunn and Mustafa Tameez, a Democratic political consultant, said Matcha signed an affidavit and planned to ask the Fort Bend County Attorney's Office to prosecute.
Sekula-Gibbs acknowledged visiting the polling location to campaign Thursday, but said she stayed at least 100 feet from the door, as required by law. She went inside briefly to use the rest room, she said, and inquired about voter turnout.
"I just said to the person there, 'I'm Shelley Sekula-Gibbs. How's turnout?'" she said. "I did not approach any voters. I was not campaigning, and once again Nick Lampson is attacking me because he's afraid to tell the voters about his stands on the issues.
She said that to which person where? From context, I'd say she means a poll worker. At least, if she means one of the people sitting behind a computer, checking voter's reg cards and generating the eSlate access codes, then I'd say she has a defense against this charge. If it was anybody on the other side of the table, then I'd say she should be in trouble.
Dunn said he also would ask the Texas Secretary of State's office to assign inspectors to other polling places.Matcha told Dunn and Tameez that she saw Sekula-Gibbs enter the polling place and introduce herself. Matcha said Sekula-Gibbs peeked inside a voting booth, spoke with voters and introduced herself to Matcha. Matcha said she complained to the election judge about Sekula-Gibbs' actions, but the judge chose not to respond.
"He said he didn't see it as real campaigning, so he was going to let it go," said Dunn.
One of these two accounts cannot be true. And this doesn't sound to me like a problem of interpretation, either. Someone needs to talk to the other people who were there and find out whose story can be confirmed. The Stakeholder has more.
And speaking of the Bolsover project, there's an update in the Examiner on the reaction to City Council's decision to let it go forward.
At the annual meeting of the Southampton Civic Club, Councilwoman Anne Clutterbuck said she supported the Lamesa Properties development that on "first glance" she considered "ugly" and "high.""It was a really tough decision," she told fellow residents, later adding, "Make no mistake about it, this project will be built" with or without the abandonment.
Clutterbuck said she believed the development would satisfy market demand for both upscale retail shops and condominiums, thereby keeping out "another, say, 27-story project."
It would also include green space, better flood-control measures and 53 more parking spaces than required by city ordinance. Of that, it would add 19, most likely metered spots on Kelvin and Morningside streets that would be available to the public, she said.
However, the Public Works recommendation requiring the installation of left-turn lanes on both streets where each intersects with Rice Boulevard would appear to eliminate an equal amount of street parking.
I wonder what the alternative is to Weingarten's River Oaks shopping center makeover. Could it be worse than what is currently planned? At least for Council Member Clutterbuck, that's not her problem - the River Oaks shopping center is in Ada Edwards' district.
Via Houstonist, the latest news on the eventual River Oaks shopping center redevelopment.
Cynthia Rice has lived in her home for 18 years, and on clear nights, she said she likes to look at the sky. But that might change. If Weingarten Realty goes through with its current plans for the River Oaks Shopping Center, she could soon be faced with a three-story parking garage seven feet from her property line.Rice and about a dozen other residents of Brentwood Drive, behind the center’s north side, recently met with Weingarten. And several said they were told not to disclose details of the meeting.
But Rice was not happy to hear the news. She said she was told that part of the center from the Black-Eyed Pea to Jos. A. Bank would be redeveloped into a two-story structure with a parking garage behind it.
"Being one of the people to have a three-story structure on the back of my property line, I can't say they really care whether I like it or not," she said. "That leaves our property wide open to people jumping over the fence and breaking into our houses."
[...]
John De Meritt, a vice president of leasing for Weingarten, said the neighborhood association had contacted Weingarten in regards to the property, but because many residents had questions about rumors they had heard, the center was also discussed.
"We did give them an update on where we were," he said. "But I told them this is all preliminary, and when we do have final plans, we will let the public know."
De Meritt dismissed rumors that the space would be used for high rise condominiums.
Yet, an employee at Jos a Bank, who asked to remain anonymous, said that is what he had heard. However, he added, "the plans change every time."
It's all speculation now, though frankly I tend to disbelieve anything that a Weingarten shill says, as they've not exactly been straight shooters during this saga. Far as I'm concerned, this aspect of Weingarten's master plan for the center is of a piece with the Bolsover story, which is to say it'll be a lot of really dense development in an area that already is over-trafficked. I don't drive on that stretch of West Gray for the same reason that I avoid the Rice Village. The streets there just can't handle the volume of cars as it is. Whatever Weingarten ultimately decides, it's unlikely to make that situation any better, and unlike the Rice Village area, there's no way that a crazy light rail shuttle scheme could help out. It's just a mess, and I'm not sure what can be done about it short of enough obstacles from City Council to frustrate Weingarten out of whatever they have in mind. I'm not holding my breath for that to happen.
I have to wonder: Has the Victoria Advocate always hated Ron Paul, or is this a more recent development?
Gov. Rick Perry publicly expects to win re-election comfortably. Even so, he agreed to participate in a debate with his rivals.U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison publicly expects to win re-election comfortably - more so than the governor. Even so, she agreed to participate in a debate with her rivals.
U.S. Rep. Ron Paul publicly expects to win re-election comfortably. So why will he not debate his Democratic opponent for the 14th Congressional District seat?
"Civic organizations throughout District 14 have created numerous opportunities for libertarian Congressman Ron Paul and Democratic candidate Shane Sklar to appear together in public and speak on the issues that matter most to Texas' Gulf Coast families," a news release from the Sklar campaign notes.
But "Ron Paul has refused all of these generous invitations, turning down at least six such opportunities," the news release continues.
Paul is far from shy when it comes to circulating his famous cookbook.
Paul is far from shy when it comes to taking credit for getting funding for programs and projects in the 14th District, even though he has secured passage of no legislation in the past six years specifically benefiting this region.
Paul is far from shy when it comes to voting no against all manner of legislation - some of which would directly aid his constituents.
Paul is far from shy when it comes to introducing legislation that has no chance whatsoever of passage by Congress.
Paul is far from shy when it comes to trashing the United Nations and President Bush.
So why has Ron Paul all of a sudden developed a debilitating case of stage fright that keeps him from appearing with his opponent to discuss how their respective programs would benefit the residents of the 14th Congressional District?
Is it because he has nothing worthwhile to say?
Is it because he knows anything he does say will underscore for voters just how out of touch he is with the real needs of working people and families in this part of Texas?
Is it because he is too busy touting his odd libertarian agenda to pay attention to what really matters to voters in the 14th District?
Is it because he believes voters somehow owe him yet another term, despite the little he has done for the district?
Time is running out for Paul to do what incumbent Sen. Hutchison and incumbent Gov. Perry - both his fellow Republicans - understood voters had the right to expect of them.
Time is running out for Paul to face off against his opponent and give voters this opportunity to compare the two side by side and decide which could better represent the 14th Congressional District. What is he so scared of?
If this were a football game, they'd have been flagged for piling on by now. In case you're keeping score, that's one, two, three strikes he's out (if you don't mind my mixing sports metaphors). And while Paul may be publicly confident of his re-election, not everyone would agree with that. Not that anyone will get the chance to debate that point, or any other, with him.
I had some kind of problem with comments starting last night. I'm not sure what it was, and it seems to have magically cleared itself up today, but when I first discovered it, one of the things I did to troubleshoot was try to leave a comment myself. That comment never made it into the blog, which means it's possible that other people's comments got lost in a similar manner. Thus, if you commented here last night and don't see that comment now, it's because I never saw it. Please leave it again, and my apologies for the inconvenience.
This is the worst campaign ad I've ever seen. Words like "clownish" and "amateur night" don't do it justice. Just watch, and try to keep your jaw from hitting the table. And remember, this ad was produced and approved by an incumbent state representative. One who is obviously very, very desperate.
On a lighter note, check out the Worst Political Websites, featuring two Texans.
At long last, the Chron has finished its endorsements, at least of State Legislature races. I've kind of lost track, but offhand I can't think of any other races that they haven't touched on yet. The final four contained a few surprises, two good and one bad.
- State representative, District 126, Chad Kahn - A Democrat running for this open seat in the Texas House, Khan wants to focus on serving the FM 1960 area district by improving education, public safety and mobility. He supports a significant pay raise for teachers and believes creation science has no place in the public schools. The owner of a travel agency, Khan says the new business tax falls heavily on small-business owners without providing the support public education requires. He wants Texas to make maximum use of the federally subsidized Children's Health Insurance Program to reduce the number of uninsured children.
- State representative, District 127, Diane Trautman - The holder of a doctorate in education, Trautman is a former teacher and principal who now trains teachers who want to be principals. The Democratic nominee and a professor at Stephen F. Austin State University, Trautman wants to make education state government's first priority, followed by greater access to health care and protection of the environment. Trautman, who lives in Kingwood, pledges to work to make government more ethical and transparent to voters.
- State representative, District 129, John E. Davis - The Republican incumbent of this Clear Lake-Pasadena-La Porte district, Davis holds a seat on the important House Human Services Committee. While Davis at first defended cuts in the Children's Health Insurance Program and the hiring of a private company to determine eligibility for state health services, he subsequently worked to restore full services to CHIP. Davis also acknowledges that the private company has underperformed, is liable for financial penalties and must swiftly correct its shortcomings.
- State representative, District 150, Dot Nelson-Turnier - With a background in international banking and financial consulting, Nelson-Turnier is well-suited for service in the Texas House. The Democratic nominee, she is disturbed that Texas is at or near the bottom in almost every measure of society. If elected, she wants to focus on what she calls the "killer E's," education, the economy, the environment and equality. The Republican incumbent in this race, state Rep. Debbie Riddle, believes that state government should shrink and invest even less in social services than it does now, even as the state's population doubles.
Let's start with the non-surprise, which is to say the one out of these four I called correctly: Diane Trautman, whose endorsement was easy to see partly because she's such a good candidate, and partly because the Chron endorsed the Democratic challenger in this race last time. I get the feeling that once you lose the Chron endorsement, it's gone for good. Check back in 2008 (if necessary) to see what happens to John Culberson for a test of this hypothesis.
The two good surprises were the selections of Chad Khan and Dot Nelson-Turnier. I had thought the Chron would pick one from each party in the two open seat races, and I had thought their usual pro-incumbent preference would be enough to carry Debbie "Pit of Hell" Riddle over the finish line. (This may be another future test of my Once You Lose The Chron, The Chron Is Gone For Good thesis.) I am more than happy to have been wrong in both cases. Congrats to Chad and Dot for getting the nods.
The bad surprise is mystifying. Sherrie Matula is as good a candidate as you'll find in any race this year. I think the key is in the reference to Davis' "hold[ing] a seat on the important House Human Services Committee". I don't have the time to trawl through the archives right now, but that reminds me of the language they used in endorsing Talmadge Heflin in 2004 - as the chair of the Appropriations Committee, they didn't want to lose his influence. Fair enough as a consideration, but frankly if the editorial board really believes that Davis has worked or is working to "restore full services to CHIP", then they must have also believed Little Bunny Foo Foo when he promised the Good Fairy that his field mice-bopping days were over. If Davis actually did work on this, he failed miserably, and unless he intends to fire Accenture, he's still part of the problem. Maybe if the Chron had sent someone to cover the Matula-Davis debate, they wouldn't be so easily fooled.
So there you have it. I got 21 out of 25 right, and I'm happy to be wrong about three of those four. Anyone else surprised by these picks?
UPDATE: Once again, I forgot to link to the interviews I did with these candidates. Here they are:
Trautman
Nelson-Turnier
Khan
Matula
Dwight reports that the city has narrowed its search down to two vendors to provide its wireless Internet service. They expect to pick the winner by the end of the year. Dwight also says that there are more access points visible around downtown.
The RFP itself is here (PDF), with Dwight's comments here. I was thinking about this, and took a few minutes to review the RFP after reading this MIT Technology Review article about the San Francisco/Google/Earthlink WiFi experience. To put it mildly, the author is not impressed at how the Golden Gate City is managing this process.
San Francisco's specs for the network were forbidding. The city's request for proposals insisted that the network function seamlessly for users traveling at 30 miles per hour, a trick Wi-Fi engineers haven't quite perfected. The city also called for 95 percent outdoor and 90 percent indoor coverage citywide, which would require an unusually large number of Wi-Fi access points in any city, let alone one as hilly as San Francisco.In their proposal, Google and EarthLink strove to meet these expectations. Google would foot the bill for free Wi-Fi service, which would run--or crawl--at 300 kilobits per second, about five times the speed of a dial-up modem connection. EarthLink would build the network hardware and offer, for $20 a month, a megabit-per-second service with customer support. The proposed network would require at least seven Wi-Fi access points per square kilometer, mounted on city property such as light poles and traffic lights. At this density, the network would meet the city's coverage goal but would not be guaranteed to reach above the second floor of buildings. In April, San Francisco provisionally accepted the Google-EarthLink proposal, pending successful contract negotiations.
In May, however, when I sat through a LAFCO meeting (California's Local Agency Formation Commissions handle county contractual service agreements like the proposed Google-EarthLink Wi-Fi deal) at San Francisco City Hall, I got the impression that city managers remain either deliberately indifferent to or clueless about fundamental aspects of the Google-EarthLink proposal. Of the three commission members present, one remained silent throughout. A second--Tom Ammiano, a former stand-up comic who once ran for mayor--admitted that he was still using dial-up. Otherwise, the meeting was uninterruptedly run by Chairperson Ross Mirkarimi.
Mirkarimi, a Green Party member sporting a modish soul patch and representing District 5, which includes Haight-Ashbury, at least posed some of the right questions. Would users of the ad-supported Wi-Fi simply go through a Google portal page, he asked, or would they also have to suffer through pop-ups? And since Google said that its technology could "target advertisements to specific geographical locations and to user interests," what would prevent users' locations from being tracked? To such questions, the response from the bureaucrats at the city's Department of Telecommunications and Information Services (DTIS), and from the private consultants they'd hired, was essentially, "Wise up and quit griping--the city is getting a great deal for free."
The DTIS officials were equally unforthcoming when asked whether it made much sense for San Francisco to effectively grant Google and EarthLink a monopoly on wireless Internet service for the proposed 10-year term of the contract, given how rapidly information technology advances. As Ralf Muehlen, director of the nonprofit Wi-Fi network SFLan, pointed out, "In 2021, 300 kilobits per second is going to seem a bit ridiculous. [...] it's a great solution for, like, 1996."
The good news is that this experience seems to be anomalous - the author singled out Philadelphia as an example of how to do this in a thorough and thoughtful manner. It's something to keep an eye on as Houston's project progresses.
Via BOR, a letter from a former Friedman supporter to his erstwhile candidate's camp on why he pushed the button for Chris Bell.
He had my vote until his abysmal performance in the debate. He articulated no policy and no numbers and no plan, other than testy sound bites. And he capped it that night with his asinine statement about the Internet being the "work of Satan." Well in one sense, it is - from your perspective. Your fervent net.supporters feel betrayed, and are turning away from your foolishness in droves.Now I see that he voted at the Kerrville court house - for Lamar Smith and Kay Bailey Hutchinson. And then he went outside and said, and I quote, “It was a time for change. I’m very excited.”
Change?? Holy Mother of God.
Listen folks, I was a true believer. I've played benefits for Kinky. I knew about the campaign months before it was publicly announced. I (among others) suggested him for the keynote addresses at more than one music festival. I've blogged about him. I talked him up. I made phone calls on his behalf. I "saved myself" for the campaign and signed the petition.
He had two years to get his act together and study the issues and formulate policy. He didn't. And he does not deserve my vote.
[...]
If the Kinky campaign wants to make a difference and be more than a laughingstock, it can pull out of the race now and endorse Chris Bell -- and the then-former candidate can spend the last two weeks of the season campaigning his ass off for Chris Bell.
There are times when I would have said something sarcastic about how long it takes some folks to realize certain things, but this isn't one of those times. Getting it is what matters, and this guy clearly does. Read the whole thing, he does a better job of dismantling most of Friedman's arguments than any hostage of the "two party system" such as myself ever could.
And truthfully, it's not so much the regular voter types among those who could or should be supporting Bell that bother me. Candidates matter, and if you can say that Friedman or Strayhorn speak to you in a way that no one else in the race does, well, that's democracy. However much I may disagree with or despair at that choice, I can respect it. What I'll never respect is the mentality of surrender that has so thoroughly permeated the so-called movers and shakers within the Democratic Party for their abandonment of Bell from the get go. SMU poli sci prof Cal Jillson sums it up in this excellent AusChron piece on Bell.
Is it too late for Bell to narrow the distance to catch Perry? Even with things looking up for Bell, the odds still heavily favor Perry, says Cal Jillson, a political-science professor at Southern Methodist University. The problem for Bell, he said, is the crowded field. "All three of them [Bell, Strayhorn, and Friedman] know that if each of them takes 15 to 20 percent of the vote, they're all going to lose by 15 to 20 points. The question is whether anybody is going to fade fast or drop out," he said, suggesting that Strayhorn and Friedman would be the likely fade-outs. "That leaves Bell, whom people wrote off for most of the race." Still, Jillson believes that despite the campaign's recent momentum, the window of time is too short for Bell to close the gap. "After the debate, a lot of Democrats were saying, 'You know this guy isn't as pitiful as we thought, so maybe we ought to get behind him,'" Jillson said. "But I think it's going to be too little too late."Jillson lays the blame squarely on Bell's party. "You just want to look at these guys who are supposed to be the brains of the Democratic Party in Texas and say, 'What were you guys thinking when you abandoned your own nominee to get behind a Republican who's now an independent? How did you think this is going to work?' So now, late in the game, they're coming back to their nominee."
Had Bell the financial means to get his message out earlier, voters would already be familiar with him. Instead, the refrain from voters for most of the year has been, "Who is Chris Bell?" Said Jillson: "He was always a name that sort of mystified people, and they didn't know enough about him to form an opinion. And when that's the case, the opinion can't be positive."
Yeah. What has Bell lacked all through this campaign? Not experience, not a message, not a plan to win, not anything to make a like- or open-minded voter reject him. Just one thing: the money to get his message out. It's no surprise that his support in the polls has risen, surely in tandem with his name recognition, as the money has finally rolled in. People like what they see when they see him. He just hasn't had the resources to give enough of them the opportunity to let them see him. There's no justifiable reason for that, and every single check that every high-dollar Democratic supporter handed to Strayhorn will serve as a shameful lesson in self-marginalization.
One more thing, for Paul Burka's benefit. Here's Burka's words of wisdom:
Can he beat Rick Perry? I think the answer is no. There is a difference between Rick Perry's being beatable, which any candidate with just 34% of the vote surely is, and actually figuring out a way to beat him. Bell needs just over half of the anti-Perry vote to win. There are three ways for him to get it:(1) Take votes away from Perry. Forget it. Republicans will not vote for Democrats (although the reverse is not true).
Oh, really?
Since the debate, Bell's blog (www.chrisbell.com/blog), which had languished in cyberspace for most of the year, has been running at full throttle. He's even won over a good many Republicans. In one e-mail to Bell, Ray Hunt, a Houston police officer who had served on then Gov. Bush's law enforcement commission, wrote that he had planned to vote with his union's endorsement of Perry - until he watched the debate. "I am a life long Republican and have never voted for a Democrat in a state wide election," he wrote, "but I AM VOTING FOR YOU FOR GOVERNOR!" He concluded with an offer to assist Bell in the campaign and says it will be the first time he's ever voted for a Democratic statewide candidate."There've been a lot of e-mails like that," Bell said, as he scrolled his Blackberry for more Republican converts. I've always felt that Rick Perry was vulnerable, and that was my original inspiration for running."
Take that!
It's from Tuesday, but Kriston Capps wins the Quote of the Day award:
More Americans believe that they have personally seen or felt the presence of a ghost (22%) than approve of the job Congress is doing (16%).
I'm not sure which of those two groups is scarier.
First, the good news: The Chron endorsed Bill Moody for the State Supreme Court.
Texas Supreme Court, Place 2, William E. "Bill" Moody - A former prosecutor and an experienced trial judge with a focus on civil cases, Moody won the State Bar's judicial poll - significant for a Democrat running in a Republican-leaning state. Moody recently worked to persuade the Legislature to increase jury pay, causing more summoned jurors to report for duty. Moody's Republican opponent, incumbent Justice Don Willett, has little experience handling the type of cases that come before the Supreme Court and has produced little since being appointed.
The Chron joins the Morning News in making the right call on this race. Well done. More about Moody is here.
Now, the bad news: The Chron not only endorsed Sharon Keller, they seem to think she's getting better as a judge. Admittedly, it'd be hard to see how she could get worse, but given how historically bad she is, she's got a long way to go before she could even be considered fair to middling.
And then the Chron endorsed Annette Galik:
Judge, 245th Family District Court, Annette Galik - No stranger to controversy, Judge Galik has grown in her 12 years on the job and has acquired the skills and experience she needs to excel at this difficult and sometimes dangerous post that must deal with families at their most stressful moments. Galik prides herself on being fair to both parties and favoring no lawyer over another.
That would be this Annette Galik.
Annette Galik has been a most unconventional family law jurist since she was elected as a reform candidate in 1994. She campaigned on a commitment to cleaning out a court system known for its incestuous ties between judges and the lawyers who practiced there. She has been backed consistently by Republican morality crusader Dr. Steven Hotze, who is again endorsing her in the current election.But after elected to the bench, reformer Galik took thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from lawyers whose firms had cases in her court.
Court observers began questioning Galik's judgment early on, when she accepted free plane tickets, hotel lodging and meals from Hotze to attend a prayer breakfast he sponsored in Austin for the gubernatorial inaugural of George W. Bush.
Just as quickly, Galik had problems in her relationship with fellow family court judges. Shortly after assuming the judgeship in 1995, she was elected by the nine-judge group as their administrative judge. Within months, five of the judges signed a letter asking for her resignation. They claimed that Galik had excluded the other jurists from deliberations about court matters, and had taken actions without consulting them.
Judge Jim Squier told commissioners court Galik had requested the remodeling of several floors of the Family Law Center unilaterally, without consulting fellow judges who worked on those floors. Other judges complained that Galik had lobbied the Legislature to get a change in state law that would allow her to hire a person who lived outside the county as associate judge in her court. In the process, Galik told legislators she had the approval of other judges to lobby for the change, when she had never consulted them. It turned out that Galik had already appointed an out-of-county associate judge, in violation of the existing state law.
Under pressure, Galik resigned as administrative judge and Squier was unanimously elected to replace her.
And this Annette Galik.
It's not often a member of the Harris County judiciary gets to make local legal history, but Family Court Judge Doug Warne just might have done it last month. He issued an order temporarily restraining a fellow family court judge from overnight stays at her oilman boyfriend's River Oaks mansion when the man's daughter is there.Warne presides over a marathon four-year divorce donnybrook in his 311th District Court, which pits 64-year-old multimillionaire Hal G. Kuntz against his remarried ex-wife Vesta Frommer. The divorce was granted three years ago, but the continuing legal struggle centers on the division of a sizable oil and gas fortune. It's now further complicated by the awkward involvement of Family Court Judge Annette Sanderford Galik, 53, who's romantically linked with Kuntz.
The Kuntz proceeding is similar to cases Galik rules on every week in her own 245th District Court, but since her election to the judiciary she's shown a penchant for getting snared in such personal entanglements herself.
[...]
Galik's relationship with Kuntz had previously caused problems in Warne's court. The case mediator, former judge Ruby Sondock, had to recuse herself two years ago after revealing a conflict of interest. It turned out she was Galik's morning gym workout partner.
No stranger to controversy indeed. Galik's opponent is Mary Kay Green, who was the only Democratic challenger this year to win the Houston Bar Association Judicial Preference Poll. This one has to be a strong contender for the goofiest endorsement of the year for the Chron.
Oh, and we're now four days into Early Voting, and there's still no recommendations for the last four State House races. Tick tock, fellas, tick tock.
John Cobarruvias attended last night's debate between Sherrie Matula and Rep. John Davis, and gives a report of what happened. Doesn't look like there was any media there, so this will probably be all you get. Check it out.
Jay Johnson-Castro's walk along the border has come to an end.
Johnson-Castro, the owner of a bed-and-breakfast in Del Rio, set out on his walk Oct. 10 from the main square in Laredo. He ended it in Brownsville with Mayor Eddie Trevino escorting him into the palm-shaded Dean Porter Park shortly before 5 p.m. They were accompanied by Brownsville police and met by 30 enthusiastic supporters.''He's become a symbol of the voices who are opposing this whole idea of a fence," Trevino said. ''His walk has worked to garner attention that this isn't wanted by the people of South Texas."
Johnson-Castro, tanned and visibly leaner, said the mostly Hispanic border residents were both insulted and offended by the proposed fence.
"Most people relate to it as a Berlin Wall," he said.
President Bush today is expected to sign a bill authorizing the fence, which could cost more than $6 billion.
Actually, what Bush will sign is a symbolic gesture designed to rally the base. But hey, it's an important symbolic gesture. We wouldn't want an unimportant symbolic gesture, would we?
Remember back in May, after the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (THHSC) had to bring back workers it had let go to keep things from completely falling apart on Accenture, when three lawmakers (Democratic Sen. Eliot Shapleigh of El Paso, Democratic state Rep. Carlos Uresti of San Antonio, and Republican state Rep. Carter Casteel of New Braunfels) asked Comptroller Strayhorn to do an audit on Accenture's contract and performance? Well, yesterday she released the results of that audit. (Never let it be said that Carole Keeton Strayhorn lacks a sense of timing.) And it's brutal.
Dear Senator Shapleigh, Chairman Uresti and Representative Casteel:In May 2006, you requested my assistance in researching the Integrated Eligibility and Enrollment contract between the Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) and Accenture LLP. I have completed this research.
At this writing, the project is behind schedule and $100 million over budget, without a revised plan to get the project back on course. Accenture has not met its performance requirements and has not been held accountable for its failure. Clients are still reporting delays and inaccuracies in processing their applications. HHSC has proven it cannot manage Accenture and the contract.
My conclusion is that this project has failed the state and the citizens it was designed to serve. The contract with Accenture must be ended. I recommend the Legislature pass emergency legislation that removes HHSC’s direct management of the project and places the responsibility with a turnaround team composed of experts who can effectively manage state resources and stop the drain on tax dollars. And, most importantly, make sure children receive the health insurance for which they are eligible. In addition, the Legislature should review this administration’s 27 major policy changes that have resulted in even more children losing health insurance.
[...]
The state’s automated eligibility determination system, the Texas Integrated Eligibility Redesign System (TIERS), has cost taxpayers $279 million to date, and despite this expenditure, is being used in just four state offices in Travis and Hays counties after three years. Both HHSC and Accenture have hired hundreds of additional personnel to address a myriad of costly problems with TIERS.
As of August 31, 2006, HHSC has paid Accenture more than $123 million to process eligibility for a fraction of Texas’ applicants, and the project that was intended to save the state’s budget will end up costing the budget $100 million more. This project is over budget and under performing.
There's quite a bit more - the whole report is 171 pages. I've got a summary document here and a statement from Rep. Garnet Coleman about this report here (both Word docs).
There is one more thing that needs to be highlighted:
Some of the key fi ndings that my staff uncovered in their exhaustive review of the program include the following:[...]
2. The contract provides Accenture with perverse incentives to process applications inefficiently.
- Accenture’s payments are based on a complex combination of more than 70 prices for transactions processed per application. This payment structure gives Accenture the incentive to process as many paper-based “touches” to the client as possible, when the intention of the call center model is to make the process simpler, more customer-friendly and cost-effective.
- Accenture is paid when applications are completed and ready for the state’s final determination. Accenture also is paid, however, when applications “time out” because clients have not submitted sufficient information for processing. These applications are sent to the state for denial, and Accenture is paid the same rate as for completed applications. This payment structure does not provide Accenture with any incentive to seek necessary information from clients before their applications time out.
- The contract specifies that Accenture is to be paid only for completed and “appropriate” transactions, but HHSC has not established any effective mechanism to determine whether transactions are appropriate before paying Accenture. It can only recoup inappropriate payments after the fact, not prevent them.
In other words, the structure of Accenture's contract along with the needless and punitive eligibility requirements for CHIP combine to create a strong mechanism for reducing CHIP's enrollment numbers. You want a good argument against privatization of this sort of government activity, there it is.
The bottom line is that the whole reason to privatize THHSC was to save money. That hasn't happened, it isn't going to happen, and along the way the people who need the services that THHSC provides are getting hurt. What more do you need to know? It's way past time to fire Accenture and fix THHSC while we still can.
UPDATE: Almost forgot to include this SEIU-produced ad about CHIP that's running in the D/FW media market right now. Check it out.
UPDATE: Here's the Chron story on Strayhorn's report. I'll highlight some of the responses, none of which are surprising to me.
The comptroller's report found that since Accenture took over the CHIP eligibility program in December, enrollment had fallen by 8.5 percent, or 27,567 children, through August.CHIP enrollment began to rise this month, and HHSC officials cited more and better trained call center workers, as well as policy changes that allow families to provide some missing data over the phone instead of requiring documentation to be mailed or faxed.
Stephanie Goodman, a spokesman for HHSC, said Strayhorn's report is based on outdated information.
"It's pretty clear the report is based on a lack of understanding about the contract. The findings don't appear very relevant," Goodman said.
As we saw before, this is tinkering at the edges. It's policy that is mostly responsible for the CHIP enrollment reductions, policy that was specifically designed to reduce that enrollment. Accenture's incompetence helped, to be sure, but firing Accenture will only get you so far. The policies have to be changed so that a competent implementer of those policies can make a real difference.
Kathy Walt, a spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Perry, said the governor expects "Health and Human Services Commissioner Albert Hawkins to give the report all the attention it merits."Goodman said the commission's legal staff is preparing a recommendation to Hawkins that could include fines against Accenture for not performing to some contract standards.
[...]
An Accenture spokeswoman echoed the commission's criticism of Strayhorn's report.
"We have worked diligently for months in areas such as staff training, application processing and call center operations and have seen significantly improved performance," Jill Angelo said. "Unfortunately, the comptroller's report ignores the progress we have made."
[...]
Strayhorn's report said that instead of saving money in this biennium, the contract will cost the state almost $100 million more than budgeted.
The costs include expenses related to the state hiring more than 1,000 temporary workers to help process applications.
But Goodman said that $100 million will be offset by reductions in payments to Accenture due to the delayed rollout of the integrated eligibility centers.
[...]
Goodman said Accenture is paid based on its workload.
"The contractor has no motive to either approve nor deny" benefits, Goodman said.
I'm sure there will be more on this, and I'm sure the subject will come up again in the 80th Lege. If we cut CHIP to help fix a $10 billion deficit in 2003, and we have a "so friggin' big" $15 billion surplus now, we have no excuses for not fully restoring what was lost.
There's another poll that's got people buzzing, and it comes from CD04, home of dinosaur and former DINO-turned-Republican Ralph Hall. The particulars are here, which I'll summarize:
(Registered voters, sample size = 403)
If the election were held today, for whom would you vote?Ralph Hall - 49%
Glenn Melancon - 39%
Other - 2%
None/Undecided - 10%(Self-reported likely voters, sample size = 354)
Ralph Hall - 48%
Glenn Melancon - 41%
Other - 1%
None/Undecided - 10%
More bloggage on this poll can be found at Kos, Capitol Annex, and Annatopia.
Needless to say, this is a stunning result. There are several things that need to be discussed.
- It's not directly noted in the survey results, but according to the pollsters (both of whom I've spoken to via email and/or phone), the partisan mix was 40% Republican, 36% Democrat, and 18% Independent, 6% other/no answer. I told them that I thought this was too few Republicans for this district. This was the data they got, they told me. They also said they seemed to reach more older respondents, who might be disproportionately from the old school Southern Democrat tradition, as Hall himself was until 2003.
If you go through Table 3 and multiply the number of respondents for each candidate by the percentage of that candidate's vote based on party identity, you get 150 Dems, 182 Republicans, and the rest independent/no answer. That's a 55/45 split of Rs to Ds, which again seems a little low on the Rs to me, but it's what they got. Hall did draw slightly more support among self-identified Democrats than Melancon did among Republicans, but those numbers are relatively tiny to be predictive.
- The phone call started with a recording announcing that this was a survey and asking the recipient to press 1 to continue. Those who chose not to continue had the call ended. It's possible that Republican voters were less interested in participating in a poll, which in turn may be an indicator that they're less interested in voting this year. That could bias the result, or it could be some solid evidence that the disparity in voter intensity we've seen in poll after poll at the national level holds true for Texas as well.
If this is evidence that Democrats are about to turn out at higher levels than usual, while Republicans will turn out at lower levels, then this is very bad news for Rick Perry and the like. CD04 is solid Republican turf - President Bush got 70% of the vote in 2004. If they're staying home, look out. This is of course far from conclusive, but it's another straw in the wind.
- One point that might bias the result a little towards Hall comes from the order of the questions asked (see page four). Just before the "who will you vote for" question is a question asking if the respondent knew who their representative was. Normally, following such a question with a "who will you vote for" question tends to favor the person they just named. Interestingly, Hall did measurably worse among those who knew he was their rep (51/49) than among those who did not (59/41). Perhaps this is a measure of anti-incumbent sentiment, or perhaps more Democrats knew who Hall was.
As I suggested with the Ankrum poll, I believe that anti-incumbent sentiment is at play here as well. I am told that Melancon has a strong campaign sign presence, so maybe by now his name recognition is reasonable, but I still think this is as much about incumbents as anything. I think the higher percentage of Melancon voters among those who knew who Ralph Hall was supports this hypothesis.
- On the other hand, CD04 is one of many places this year where the Democrats are running a much more vigorous campaign than they did in 2004. After that election was over, Ralph Hall held a fundraiser to help retire the debt of his opponent, Jim Nickerson. That's one of the nicer ways in which Hall is a throwback, but how tough a campaign would you be waging if you knew that the guy you were running against would be picking up the tab afterwards? Glenn Melancon, who's young, dynamic, and forward thinking, provides a very sharp contrast to Hall. It's not at all hard to imagine that this has had a positive effect for him.
- One thing that pollster Bigelow told me on the phone that I thought was highly interesting was that a lot of the respondents wanted to talk about Iraq, even though that was not part of the poll. He said that while there were some people who expressed a strong "stay the course" message, by far more people spoke about how bad things were and how they couldn't believe things had gotten. Again, this is in tune with national polls, and again this suggests bad news for incumbents, in particular Republican incumbents.
At the end of the day, I find this result encouraging, even as I'm not sure how much faith to put in it. If I had my way, there'd be five current polls for every contested race so we could get a better feel for what's what. This poll is at least consistent with those in other Texas Congressional districts that have suggested a slackening of Republican support. This one has more slack than those do, but the previous polls are several months old by now, so things may well be worse for the GOP. All I can say is we'll see what happens.
Finally, I did an interview with Melancon while we were at the Dem convention in Fort Worth in June. The Morning News, who declined to endorse anyone in CD04, might not like some of his positions, but I liked what he had to say just fine. Listen and judge for yourself. Thanks to TPM Election Central for the heads up.
Do you get the impression that someone in Victoria just doesn't like Ron Paul? Not that there's anything wrong with that, mind you.
During the past six years, Paul sponsored 223 measures, according to the Library of Congress' THOMAS online service for tracking legislation.The vast majority of Paul's proposals were referred to committee or subcommittee, never to be heard of again. A handful actually got to the floor of the House in the form of amendments to other legislation. Of those, the House passed only three.
[...]
Another measure of Paul's ineffectiveness is how little success he typically had over the past six years in recruiting co-sponsors for measures he carried.
Very rarely was he able to persuade even 20 of his more than 200 fellow Republicans in the House to sign on to back his proposals. In most cases, he secured only handfuls of co-sponsors. And in more than a few, he could not get even one colleague to support his legislation.
Most members of the House of both parties, including his own, recognize that supporting Paul's proposals is toxic to their effectiveness.
Yet another measure of Paul's ineffectiveness on Capitol Hill is that the only leadership position his colleagues entrust to him is the vice chairmanship of an obscure subcommittee that has little to do with the many needs of the 14th District - the Oversight and Investigations Committee of the House Committee on Financial Services.
[...]
Ron Paul has a long record of being all but useless in meeting the legislative needs of the district he seeks to continue representing. The 14th Congressional District of Texas can do better.
Indeed they can.
UPDATE: Via Dennis in the comments, I see that the Galveston Daily News has endorsed Sklar.
In the race for U.S. House of Representatives District 14, we recommend Shane Sklar, a Democrat. He's running against Republican Dr. Ron Paul, one of the most principled political figures in Washington.There is much to admire about Paul. Whether you agree with him or not, it took enormous courage to oppose the war in Iraq.
His voting is scrupulously in line with smaller government, reflecting the views of a man who was once the Libertarian Party's presidential candidate.
He votes consistently against expenditures of federal money, whether that be for funding to NASA or for aid to hurricane victims.
He's argued forcefully that money now being spent on bridges in Baghdad should be funding public works in Texas.
While admiring his idealism, we believe that Paul's district gets punished, even with a GOP majority, when federal dollars are divided.
Paul disputes that and points to federal grants for the Galveston airport, for the University of Texas Medical Branch and for port security as examples.
But we just don't believe that the constant no votes are the most effective way to secure the funding that the district obviously needs.
When congressional district boundaries were redrawn, Galveston County became part of Paul's district.
Now the district needs federal money for dredging projects in Texas City. It will need money for the Galveston National Laboratory on the campus of the University of Texas Medical Branch.
Sklar's campaign has been about putting ideology aside and focusing on the financial needs of the district.
He points out that Galveston County has a tradition of representation by strong congressmen, such as Jack Brooks and Tom DeLay, who disagreed wildly on political philosophy but who were aggressive in pursuing federal dollars for the district.
This is a choice in approaches to government.
Our view is that Galveston County's interest would be best served by Sklar.
I'm not sure how much of their praise of Ron Paul is based on reality - what "public works projects in Texas" has Paul "argued forcefully" for? And how does that jibe with his "voting consistently against expenditures of federal money"? - but the point here is that you can admire Ron Paul, you can like Ron Paul, but if you want someone to actually represent your district instead of his own ideology, you need Shane Sklar. On that, we agree completely.
They also endorsed Nick Lampson:
[Lampson is] familiar with the area and its needs. He was also far more interested in serving his constituents than in political ideology.Longtime readers will recall that we sometimes disagreed with Lampson. But we do not see a serious challenger on the ballot.
On the ballot or not on the ballot, as the case may be.
Oh, well. Paul Burka, who had heard about the same poll that I had, now says it didn't happen. Well, mostly.
Earlier in the day I mentioned the rumor that the Bell campaign had a poll showing their candidate just five points behind Perry (32%-27%). Not so, says Jason Stanford with the Bell campaign. He did state his belief that Perry's ceiling has dropped to 35% of the vote.[...]
There's no love lost between Hutchison and Perry, as everyone knows, but I can't imagine that Hutchison would implant that dagger between Perry's shoulder blades (as much as she might like to), or that Bryan Eppstein, who does almost all of his political work for Republicans, would release a poll that hurts Perry and possibly the entire GOP ticket.
Burka had heard the poll in question was a Bell poll, whereas I had heard it was a Hutchison poll. (Why would Hutchison also poll in the Governor's race? As a sanity check. Quite a few of the State Rep and Congressional polls of which I'm aware have done similar things.) The fact that Bryan Eppstein would be reluctant to release such a poll doesn't mean it didn't happen, but I've since heard from another person, whom I trust, who says that he didn't conduct any such poll. So, that's all there is to it. I ran with a rumor and it bit me. My apologies for the confusion. I will update the earlier post to reflect this.
Of course, the reason why I was willing to believe this is that this mythical poll was in fairly close agreement with polls that we do know about, one from SurveyUSA and now another from Rasmussen. SUSA has Bell at 26, and Rasmussen has him at 25, in each case in second. They have Perry higher, at 36, but a third result pegging him at 32 would not have been ridiculous. It was believable and I believed it, but it didn't exist. Sucks to be me, but there you have it.
I trust that nobody is surprised to see the Chron endorse all eight ballot propositions. They're good on the merits, and they're utterly consistent with recent Chron editorializing. No surprise at all.
What is a surprise is that three days into Early Voting, there are still four unendorsed State Rep races - HDs 126 (Khan/Harless), 127 (Trautman/Crabb), 129 (Matula/Davis), and 150 (Nelson-Turnier/Riddle). I know that some incumbents have been skittish about making the trek to 801 Texas this fall, but what in the world is the holdup here? Let's get this done before Early Voting ends, okay?
I don't know about you, but I got three pieces of mail relating to the propositions yesterday, two in favor and one opposed. The latter, plus one of the former, were addressed to Tiffany, who apparently once voted in a Republican primary and thus gets all of the really interesting campaign mail here. The pro-prop G mailer to Tiffany was headlined "Why Proposition G Is Fiscally Conservative" and featured the faces and endorsements of 5 out of the 7 City Council Republicans - Berry, Lawrence, Clutterbuck, Khan, and Holm. I think that will be an effective piece of mail. What have you been getting in your mailbox?
I've spent a lot of time bashing the contract Accenture received to privatize services that were formerly provided by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (THHSC). And they richly deserve it, as their performance has sucked, with none of the exuberantly optimistic savings panning out amid lost forms, unanswered calls, untrained staff, and so forth. Even some Republicans have called for Accenture's contract to be revoked.
The thing is, though, that firing Accenture would only fix a small part of the problem of drastically reduced CHIP enrollment. The real reason why CHIP's rolls have dropped 40% since 2003 is structural. The Legislature and Governor Perry, in passing HB2292, deliberately made it harder to apply and qualify for CHIP, and they did so for the express purpose of reducing its beneficiaries.
Rep. Garnet Coleman put together an information packet that puts all the pieces together. I've got a copy of it here (Word doc), and I strongly encourage you to read it. I'm going to highlight a couple of points from the section entitled "Changes in CHIP Enrollment Policies Made in 2003" to show you what HB2292 has done to the people who need help getting health insurance for their kids.
Prior to 2003, renewal forms were pre-populated with previously submitted information and only required the family to cross out inaccurate information and make corrections. Now, renewal forms are blank so the entire application must be completed anew every 6 months, including income, vehicle information, and bank balances. I just did my annual re-enrollment for benefits where I work. All of my information was pre-populated with the bennies I had this year. I only had to make updates where needed. If I did nothing - if I failed to even log onto the web page and click OK - I'd have gotten the same benefits in 2007 as I got in 2006. No such luck if you're on CHIP. You have to start from scratch every six months, and if you forget or screw up, you automatically get kicked off.
The point of CHIP is to provide a benefit for lower-income working families. It's not Medicaid. It's a program to give health insurance to the children of people who couldn't otherwise afford it. Before HB2292 in 2003, it didn't have an asset test, which means that those families could try to put some money aside to save for their kids' future college educations without it costing them their CHIP eligibility. Not any more: As of 2003, CHIP families with incomes at 150% of the federal poverty level can have no more than $5000 in total assets before losing CHIP. That includes savings, and most frustratingly, automobiles. There's a $15,000 exemption for a first car, and a $4650 exemption for a second, meaning that a family in which both parents work, one of them had better be driving a junker (or not driving at all) or it'll go against their ability to get health insurance for their kids. And you better hope your kids qualify for scholarships some day, because you can't save for their tuition costs. And this is what Rick Perry thinks about that:
He doesn't mince words when asked about matters such as Children's Health Insurance Program rules that count assets such as autos in deciding eligibility."If someone thinks that their car is more important than their kids, we're going to try to teach them a little personal responsibility here," said Perry.
Too bad if you need to get that car to get to work. You've got to choose: Food or CHIP? Rent or CHIP? How personally irresponsible of you to not want to face that choice.
Oh, and the income requirements for CHIP are now based on net income, not gross. Meaning that if you have to pay for child care while you (and your spouse, if you're married) are out working, there's no deduction for it. Too bad you weren't responsible enough to have a parent nearby that could mind your kids for free. That'll teach you.
I could go on, but you get the point. There's one other point that needs to be made, which is that we already have the money we need to get everybody who's lost CHIP coverage since 2003 back on. Go down to page 5 of that document I linked, and see about the $400 million in funds that were allocated for Medicaid and CHIP but never spent. That money has carried forward into 2007, and it would not only cover the 200,000+ former CHIP enrollees, it would leave almost $250 million still unspent. Since CHIP is insurance rather than coverage for actual health services, it's actually pretty cheap - $450 per child per year. (How much does your insurance cost you to cover your kids?) We could cover all thes kids and more if we wanted to. But we don't, and it's by choice.
And let's remember why we pared the CHIP rolls so vigorously:
In Texas, where more than 20 percent of children are uninsured, the highest percentage in the nation, officials in 2003 imposed new premiums, eliminated dental coverage and began requiring families to re-enroll their children every six months rather than yearly."There was a $10 billion [state] budget shortfall," said Stephanie Goodman, a spokeswoman for the Texas Health and Human Services Commission.
That was then. And now?
Gov. Rick Perry, who is seeking re-election, predicted that the Texas Legislature will soon be sitting on its largest budget surplus ever, and he said he would like to use some of that money to cut state business taxes before they take effect.During a campaign swing through deep East Texas, Perry said a booming Texas economy has caused the state Treasury to swell from growing sales tax collections, permit fees and other sources of revenue. He predicted the surplus would exceed $8 billion, taking much of the pain out of the appropriations process and making a business tax cut possible. Some Capitol insiders suggest the surplus could top $15 billion.
"Our budget surplus is going to be so friggin' big," Perry said. "So why not lower the [business] tax rate down to three-fourths of a cent, or a half-cent?...I'm all for that."
Why not restore CHIP to the way it was in 2003 when our deficits were "so friggin' big?" It's a choice. Rick Perry would rather spend that money elsewhere, even though CHIP costs would be a tiny piece of that so-friggin'-big surplus. Those are Rick Perry's priorities.
Vince is on this as well, and he has some extra linkage. The bottom line is that we're letting kids go without health insurance because Governor Perry isn't interested in fixing a problem he himself created. He's made his choice. And you can make yours.
Houstonist has added the cause of the West 11th Street Park in Timbergrove to its list or preservationist crusades. It's definitely worthy - there's nothing like this park anywhere in the area. I need to drive by it and take some pictures so you can see what it looks like. Trust me when I say that if it gets sold off, it will be razed and McMansioned before you can say "floodwater retention capability". And that would be bad.
This recent Chron story has more info. I think they're going to need a rich person to step in and pony up the cash to save the place, but maybe they can swing a loan. Whatever the case, please follow some of the links at Houstonist and help out this effort if you can.
UPDATE: See Jeff Balke for more.
Like Muse, I voted yesterday. I blogged a bit about it at Kuff's World. Who here votes early, and who doesn't?
BOR is following the early result totals in various counties. I think turnout will actually slightly exceed 2002, but not by much and I wouldn't bet my own money on that. I'd peg it between 34 and 38 percent - 2002 was 36%. Up to 40 wouldn't shock me, but it would surprise me. We'll see.
This may be hyperbole, but I'll take it anyway.
State Rep. Tony Goolsby, in his ninth term as the Republican from the 102nd district, bounced in [to the Norwood Republican Women's Club at the Fretz Park Library in North Dallas], seized the podium and made what I would have to say was a pretty impassioned speech, at least for a North Dallas Republican.[...]
Goolsby had been across the parking lot at the Fretz Park Rec Center since 7:30 a.m., working the first day of early voting. He told the Republican ladies that the Republican turnout so far was pathetic, a few dozen, while the place was being mobbed by Democrats! In front of a group like that, he might as well have said the park was being overrun by camel-back Mussulmen. I imagined an inaudible gasp running through the room!
For what it's worth, I heard similar things at the West Gray multipurpose center, though that one ought to be reasonably Democratic. Goolsby is running against one of many fine Dem contenders this cycle, Harriet Miller (whom I interviewed at the Dem convention in Fort Worth). I sure hope he's right about how things are going and not just exaggerating for effect. Go Harriet!
Just a reminder that the debate between Sherrie Matula and Rep. John Davis for HD129 is today at 7 PM at UH-Clear Lake. Houston Dems has the directions. And don't miss the after debate party, either.
Here's a press release from the Bob Smither campaign:
SUGAR LAND, TEXAS - Bob Smither, the Libertarian candidate for Congressional District 22, announced that former Republican Congressman Bob Barr will keynote an upcoming campaign rally. Barr is best known for his leading role in the 1999 impeachment of Bill Clinton, and for his leadership on issues such as tax reform and the 2nd amendment.SPEAKER: The Honorable Bob Barr (R-GA), former member of Congress
DATE: Saturday, October 28, 2006
TIME: 12 Noon
LOCATION: Sugar Land Marriott Town Square
16090 City Walk
Sugar Land, TX, 77479
No RSVP necessary - this event is open to the public.
Barr’s speech coincides with the launch of a new Smither for Congress campaign commercial. The advertisement, which features Barr’s endorsement of Smither, will begin airing on local radio stations in the 22nd District.
In the advertisement Barr acknowledges that Smither - the only candidate on both the Special and General Election ballots for CD 22 - is the best shot the conservative voters of the district have at defeating liberal Democrat Nick Lampson. Smither is running on a platform of tax reform, reduced government spending, and constitutional integrity.
Barr is, of course, a certifiable wingnut, but better to have him in your corner than scandal twins Roy Blunt and Denny Hastert. And I'll say it again - Smither is a bigger threat to Shelley Sekula Gibbs than anything else. No wonder she wants so badly to deny his existence.
Houtopia has the best news I've heard this week.
Word is, the Dallas Morning News will report tomorrow on a statewide poll conducted by Brian Epstein for Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. The poll will show Rick Perry is in deep trouble -- garnering just 32% support of those sampled -- with Chris Bell nipping at his heels at 27%, Carole Strayhorn trailing with 20%, and Kinky Friedman cratering in single digits. This is huge news, folks.
The most important number in the Governor's race (to us) has always been Rick Perry's. We figured that if Perry looked vulnerable down the stretch, the anti-guv vote would begin to coalesce around a single candidate. We also figured that candidate was likely to be Bell, considering he has a solid base of about one-third of the electorate. Well, Perry's in deep doo-doo. If he runs at 32% on Election Day he will likely be retired from his current position.
Not unrelated, there was also word flying around late this afternoon that uber-trial lawyer John O'Quinn has pumped another $2 million into the Bell campaign. This flamboyant, successful attorney is serving as a one-man IV for Team Bell. Can you imagine the kingmaker's bragging rights if his bet pays off?
Finally, Governor Perry has apparently bought a staggering $6 million worth of television for the final two weeks. Question: since apparently no one has been buying his message these last few months, why will things be any different now? Perry obviously senses he is in danger of losing this election. Look for him to go savagely negative against Bell.
Wow. A poll conducted on behalf of Kay Bailey Hutchison, meaning even Paul Burka will have to accept that it might possibly be valid. Combine that with the just-released SurveyUSA poll that has Perry at 36 and Bell at 26, plus the WSJ/Zogby poll that pegged it at 37.5/26.2, and we've got ourselves a race. How about that? Time to update that Governor forecast, fellas.
One thing to keep in mind: As Houtopia points out, Perry's recent ad buys have not really improved his numbers much. I believe that he may have a hard time depressing Bell's numbers, even with an astounding $6 million buy (as I understand it, one million is enough for a week's worth of ads statewide, so that's a triple-decker two-week block). Perry's problem isn't swing voters. They're already supporting Strayhorn and Friedman. What Bell has, what he has always needed to have, is the core Democratic constituency. How likely are they to run away now, in the face of a full-bore slime attack by Perry? I'd say it's at least as possible that this fires them up.
Remember what that Chron story today said:
In the current race, Bell's campaign is counting on getting a very basic Democratic turnout. The Democrat who did the worst statewide in 2002 got 1.4 million votes, or 33 percent of the turnout. If Bell could match that, his campaign believes it would put him in the running to dislodge Perry in a five-way race.
That goal is looking more and more reachable, and if Perry can't get it up past 35%, it's looking more and more like it might be sufficient. The choice it clear: If you don't want four more years of Rick Perry, vote for Chris Bell.
UPDATE: I don't see anything in the DMN this morning, so who knows? Stay tuned.
UPDATE: Unfortunately, it seems I posted too soon. This poll apparently did not take place. See this later post for details. My apologies for the confusion.
The Chron has a nice article (front page, even) on the recent rise of the Chris Bell campaign, which has had its share of tough times along the way. How bad did it get?
Democratic leaders and financial donors dodged his calls. The news media cast him as an underfunded also-ran. By his own admission, Bell was almost ready to give up in late June. [friend and political adviser Jeff] Steen said the fight to keep hope alive was bitter." 'Disappointing' might be the wrong adjective. 'Discouraging' might be a better one," Steen said.
Then a psychological turn occurred.
The July campaign finance reports showed Bell keeping up with independent Kinky Friedman. Polls had him running about even with Friedman and independent Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, while incumbent Republican Gov. Rick Perry was vulnerable. Libertarian James Werner trailed badly.
Then Bell made an impressive showing in the only gubernatorial debate of the fall, followed by a $1 million campaign donation from Houston trial lawyer John O'Quinn with a promise of more. Bell's campaign got a new burst of life with television advertising that moved beyond cable.
The improbable suddenly seemed possible.
"If I win this race for governor, you're going to have a lot of people saying, 'Damn, I wish I'd gotten in,' " Bell said.
The Bell campaign has done some things that I disagreed with. I still think they didn't take the threat of progressives falling for Kinky Friedman seriously enough. But I'll tell you what, I respect the hell out of him for running this race when nobody else wanted to (up till Bob Gammage's late entry into the primary) and when a lot of people who should have known better looked to the Strayhorn campaign for a sign of hope. (For the same reason, I respect Barbara Radnofsky, who unsurprisingly didn't get the Chron endorsement but at least got a request to run for something else (*cough* *cough* CD07 if Jim Henley loses *cough* *cough*) in the future, because you know that there would have been a lot more entrants into this race had KBH decided she wanted to move back to Austin. Only BAR had the guts to run regardless.) Let's just say that my memory will be long on this one, no matter what happens.
Bell's opponent in the [2002] Democratic primary [for the 25th Congressional District seat being abandoned by U.S. Rep. Ken Bentsen], former Houston City Councilman Carroll Robinson, had nothing but praise for his former colleague."He's a hard-working and determined guy who focuses on innovative solutions to problems," Robinson said. "He's well-suited to be governor."
But Republican Tom Reiser, whom Bell defeated in what local observers called Houston's nastiest race of 2002, was less magnanimous.
"Chris is what he is. He is pretty much willing to say or do anything to get a job as a politician," Reiser said. "I can't remember Chris saying anything of weight or importance."
Poor baby. Nobody remembers a thing you ever said or did, either, Tom. Thanks for playing.
Bell's tenure in Congress was short-lived. DeLay pushed a redistricting plan through the Legislature that left Bell unable to win the Democratic nomination for his own district. Bell said he did not expect to lose to Al Green."We never realized we were swimming uphill, and it was a complete total gut punch," Bell said.
I can't say that Al Green is my favorite Congressman, but he's been solid for Chris in the Governor's race, and that goes a long way. He seems to be the guy who introduces Chris at events they both attend, or at least he's done it at the events I've also attended.
One of his last major acts as a congressman was to file the ethics complaint that led to a public reprimand of DeLay for unethical behavior.It started a series of events that resulted in DeLay leaving Congress, and it made Bell a hero with Democrats.
"I always thought that was about building his profile in the party," Blakemore said. "He made a lot of friends by doing that."
DeLay declined to comment for this story.
Just as well, since I doubt he'd have had anything more insightful to say than Tom Reiser. Was he in Virginia or Sugar Land when you reached him, RG? Enquiring minds want to know.
Anyway. Good story, nice background on Bell, and a little hope for the final stage of the race. About all one could ask for, really.
Astros owner Drayton McLane and Rockets owner (soon to be former Comets owner) Les Alexander did a Q&A session at Rice last night - it was supposed to be a trio along with Texans owner Bob McNair, for whom the room in which it was held is named, but he couldn't make it. I didn't see anything terribly surprising in the story about the nature of their businesses and how they run them, but I did see the one thing I fully expected to see:
"Drayton and I would like to have $100 million a year coming in," Alexander said in response to a question about how national and local revenues vary between the teams in the different sports. "I can speak for Drayton on that."The football franchises, of course, divvy up football's huge television revenues equally, something baseball and basketball only dream about. McLane called the NFL model "socialism" but wistfully admitted, despite his being a "complete free-enterprise guy," he'd embrace the system in a heartbeat.
"If you purely wanted to see the best return for your investment," McLane said, "it would be the NFL. They have almost complete revenue sharing over 80 percent I believe is shared equally. Baseball has 29 percent, so the big (city) teams have a distinct advantage."
McLane, who has owned the Astros since 1992 and contends he has lost millions on them, said: "I thought our system would change more than it has."
He called the push to bring more financial parity to baseball "a slow, tedious process" but expressed optimism the game will survive its financial ills, saying the economics are "improving."
It's not an article about Drayton McLane and the Bidness of Baseball if it doesn't include his whining about what a moneyloser it is for him. At least this time, unlike some other times I could name, his statement about losing money is taken as exactly that, and not as gospel truth.
I wish someone had asked him about the new CBA that has been tentatively reached, but perhaps that news was not widely know last night. I'm sure we'll hear McLane's opinion on this soon enough, but it would have been cool if someone who isn't a sportswriter had brought it up. Oh, well.
And so the Enron saga more or less comes to a close, pending appeals and the ongoing civil suits.
Former Enron Corp. CEO Jeff Skilling took the blow of a 24-year prison sentence the same way he took a jury's decision that he's a felon: Dry-eyed and calm.Standing alone before U.S. District Judge Sim Lake to make a statement at his sentencing hearing Monday, Skilling insisted before he learned what his punishment would be that he is remorseful about Enron's 2001 demise and its devastating fallout to employees and investors.
"I will live those days and everything that happened subsequently for the rest of my life," he said.
[...]
"All that being said, your honor, I am innocent of these charges. I am innocent of every one of these charges," the 52-year-old former business titan said with a bit of defiance in a hearing that capped an era of fraud that prompted Congress to pass sweeping reforms and stiffen white collar penalties.
Unmoved, Lake imposed a prison term of 24 years and four months — the bottom of a possible range that stretched to 30 years and five months.
He will also fork over $45 million in restitution should he lose his appeal.
Skilling's term is just a few months shy of the 25-year sentence former WorldCom CEO Bernie Ebbers began serving last month for orchestrating the $11 billion fraud that drove his company into bankruptcy.
"It's difficult to understand how 24 years for a nonviolent crime can be the low end of anything," said David Berg, a Houston civil litigator.
But others, including nine of the 16 jurors and alternates in Skilling's trial who attended his sentencing, approved.
"Judge Lake knows the law. He stood firm where the sentence will be served and when lenience was allowed, he considered that," said jury foreman Deb Smith.
Philip Hilder, a former federal prosecutor who represents several Enron defendants and witnesses, said Skilling's punishment was fair.
"It's not one that's out of the ordinary," he said.
Outside the courthouse, Skilling said with a shrug that he was disappointed, but called Lake a "fair guy" and said he would appeal.
"This is no act or anything. I believe that I'm innocent," he said.
For better or worse, that's the difference between what Skilling got and what Andy Fastow got. I have little sympathy for Skilling and believe he got a fair trial and an appropriate sentence, but the difference is striking. I'll be thinking about it for awhile.
There are still Enron issues to be worked through: restitution for former employees, and more trials, sentencings, and lawsuits. But between the death of Ken Lay and the sentences meted out to Skilling and Fastow, it's hard not to think of this as largely finished. Easy for me to say, I know.
If you've been following this at all, you'll know that Loren Steffy approved of Skilling's punishment, while Tom Kirkendall did not. What do you think?
Shirley Cato, the widow of former Harris County Treasurer Jack Cato, that is. She wrote a check for $250 to Richard Garcia's campaign. You can see it here. Just so you know.
Rep. Ralph Hall attempts to clear up all those reprehensible things he said about an underage Filipino sex slave at Jack Abramoff's behest back in 1997. He fails miserably. Thanks to TPM Muckraker for the heads up. Those of you in CD04, you have a better choice.
Meanwhile, via Vince, it looks like Speaker Hastert will be coming to Texas to help raise funds for a Congressional campaign after all. No, not for Shelley. For Rep. Sam Johnson, he of "Nuke Syria!" - "Just kidding" fame.
Other Republicans across the country have distanced themselves from Mr. Hastert - some even calling for him to resign - as scrutiny intensifies over how he and his aides handled reports that former Rep. Mark Foley of Florida made sexual overtures toward teenage congressional pages.But Mr. Johnson, 76, in office since 1991, said he's thrilled Mr. Hastert will be his guest of honor at an Oct. 30 re-election luncheon in Richardson.
"Those guys in New Jersey and elsewhere that [scrapped Hastert events] are what Lyndon Johnson used to call nervous Nellies," Mr. Johnson said. "Denny Hastert is well thought of in our district and in this area, and I had no idea of cancellation at all."
A day after a House ethics panel explored whether Mr. Hastert or his aides knew about Mr. Foley's actions before they became public, Mr. Johnson said he's confident the speaker had no prior knowledge.
"If he knew about Mark Foley and what he was doing, Foley would have had to have police protection from Denny Hastert, because Hastert would have blasted him out of the House so fast it'd make your head swim," Mr. Johnson said.
[...]
Mr. Johnson has called Mr. Foley's behavior "despicable" and said he doesn't expect a backlash from constituents.
"We haven't heard much of anything about the Foley thing," Mr. Johnson said. "We're getting a terrific response. ...We'll have a pretty good group down there."
I don't think I can add anything to that. Except to say that Dan Dodd is running against Johnson.
Johnson doesn't just have Hastert's back. He's also right there for Dog the Bounty Hunter, along with Ted Poe and Ron Paul. Because Mexicans breaking the law in America and Americans breaking the law in Mexico are two totally different things.
Houstonist has the details about the River Oaks Theater's upcoming birthday celebration.
River Oaks Theater turns 67 years old next month, and to celebrate, they are throwing two parties and inviting everyone. Landmark Theaters, who owns the property, will feature two nights of double features. All four movies were filmed (at least in part) in Houston and the surrounding areas:Monday, October 30th, 7 p.m.: The critically acclaimed, off-beat comedy Rushmore with Bill Murray (filmed mostly at St. John's School and Lamar High School), and the now classic Apollo 13 with Tom Hanks.
Monday, November 6th, 7 p.m.: The drama-filled, 1984 Cannes Film Festival winner Paris, Texas and the star-filled tear-jerker, written by Larry McMurtry and James Brooks, Terms of Endearment.
The main reason you need to celebrate with the theater is because all proceeds will go towards the Greater Houston Preservation Alliance, the nonprofit organization that's fighting to keep the historic theater (and the surrounding River Oaks Shopping Center and nearby Alabama Theater) alive.
What, no RoboCop II? Yes, kids, the hipster area we now call Neartown once cinematically stood in for post-apocalyptic Detroit. I think even the fine folks at ttweak might have a hard time polishing up that one.
If you want to lament the other overlooked choices, see this HAIF thread or this IMDb page. If you just want to see the movie, click over to Houstonist and see what you need to do.
UPDATE: The Houstonist post has been corrected to note that Terms of Endearment will now be shown first, at 7PM, then followed by Paris, Texas. This is because Friend of Shirley MacLaine Lynn Wyatt will be on hand to talk about Terms.
Following nearly a quarter century of labor wars, baseball players and owners will have 16 years of peace.They set aside their long history of bitter negotiations to reach a tentative agreement on a five-year contract, the first time the sides have achieved labor peace before their current deal expires.
The agreement was struck during bargaining in New York on Friday night and Saturday, and is subject to the sides putting the deal in writing, a person with knowledge of the negotiations told The Associated Press on Sunday. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the agreement had not been finalized.
The current deal, set to expire Dec. 19, was agreed to on Aug. 30, 2002, just hours before players were set to strike. That contract was the first since 1970 achieved without a work stoppage, and this marks the first time the sides reached agreement before the expiration of the previous contract.
"Baseball is at an all-time high point right now," Detroit left fielder Craig Monroe said before Game 2 of the World Series. "You've got low-market teams doing well and different teams winning every year. Getting this done couldn't have come at a better time."
Lawyers were working on drafting language for the new deal Sunday, and hoped to put the finishing touches on it Monday or Tuesday. Once that happened, commissioner Bud Selig would announce it in St. Louis at the World Series.
I'll wait to see more analysis of this before I judge the deal, but it looks at first blush to be nothing terribly different from what's there now. As someone who's been blogging long enough to recall the previous agreement, I'm just happy everyone else is happy, even if I still think that last deal was based on faulty premises. I can't argue the point that the game is fundamentally healthy now, and much as it kills me to say it, I've got to give Bud Selig some credit for getting this done. He's still got a lot to answer for, but at least we've got five more years without having to worry about the collective bargaining agreement. Kudos to all for a job well done.
I know it feels like the 2006 elections have gone on forever. The end is now officially in sight as early voting begins today. Whatever else you may do this election season, nothing is more important than that. Vote, and bring a few friends to vote with you. Click the More link for full details.
Schedule
Harris County early voting schedule:
- Today through Friday: 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
- Saturday: 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
- Sunday: 1 to 6 p.m.
- Oct. 30 through Nov. 3: 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Inside Loop 610
1. County Administration Building, 1001 Preston, 1st floor
2. Moody Park Recreation Center, 3725 Fulton
3. Kashmere area: Kashmere Multi-Service Center, 4802 Lockwood
4. Ripley House, 4410 Navigation
5. HCCS Southeast College, 2524 Garland at Rustic, East Campus Annex
6. Palm Center: Justice of the Peace — constable entry, 5300 Griggs
7. Fiesta Mart, 8130 Kirby
8. Metropolitan Multi-Service Center, 1475 W. Gray
Outside Loop 610
9. BeeBe Tabernacle Methodist Church, 7210 Langley
10. Galena Park Branch Library, 1500 Keene, Galena Park
11. I.B.E.W. Hall No. 66, 4345 Allen Genoa
12. Sunnyside Multi-Service Center, 4605 Wilmington
13. The Power Center, 12401 S. Post Oak
14. Bayland Park Community Center, 6400 Bissonnet
15. Tracy Gee Community Center, 3599 Westcenter
16. Harris County Courthouse Annex No. 35, 1721 Pech, 2nd floor
17. Acres Homes Multi-Service Center, 6719 W. Montgomery, 2nd floor
18. Hardy Senior Center, 11901 W. Hardy
Outside Beltway 8
19. Octavia Fields Branch Library, 1503 S. Houston, Humble
20. Fire Station 102, 4102 Lake Houston Parkway, Kingwood
21. North Channel Library, 15741 Wallisville
22. Remington Park Assisted Living, 901 W. Baker, Baytown
23. Harris County Courthouse Annex No. 25, 7330 Spencer Highway, Pasadena
24. Freeman Branch Library, 16616 Diana, Clear Lake
25. Alief Regional Library, 7979 S. Kirkwood
26. Lac Hong Square, 6628 Wilcrest
27. Courtyard by Marriott, 12401 Katy Freeway at Dairy Ashford
28. Franz Road Storefront, 19818 Franz
29. Bear Creek Park Community Center, Bear Creek at Patterson
30. Jersey Village City Hall, 16327 Lakeview
31. Tomball Public Works Building, 501 B James, Tomball
32. Barbara Bush Library, 6817 Cypresswood, Spring
33. Ponderosa Fire Station No. 1, 17061 Rolling Creek
More information
- Harris County: 713-755-6965; www.harrisvotes.com
- Brazoria: 979-864-1371
www.brazoria.tx.us.landata.com/elections.asp - Chambers: 409-267-8309
www.co.chambers.tx.us - Fort Bend: 281-341-8670
www.fortbendvotes.org - Galveston: 409-766-2200
www.galvestonvotes.org - Liberty: 936-336-4670
www.co.liberty.tx.us - Montgomery: 936-539-7843; www.pleasevote.us
- Waller: 979-826-7643
Last week, Chris Bowers put out a call to action.
Today, I am asking you to call the unopposed, or barely opposed, Democratic Representatives in your home state with more than $200,000 in their campaign bank accounts and ask them to donate 30% of that cash directly to Democratic House challengers and / or to party committees. Along with the help of several outstanding volunteers, I have put together a webpage that details the 69 Democratic House incumbents who we need to target. It tells you who these Democrats are, what districts they represent, and how much money they have in their campaign accounts. It also provides you with phone numbers to contact their campaign offices. If no one is answering there, it provides you with backup phone numbers for their Washington D.C. offices. If no one is there as well, one of those two numbers should provide you with a district office number to call.Use this webpage to call each of the representatives in your state that appear on this list, and ask them to use 30% of their campaign funds in order to take advantage of this remarkable political landscape. You can see the list here:
When you call, make sure you are polite. You can also expect to receive pushback when you call, because many of these Democrats has already given to both the DCCC and / or directly to Democratic challengers. However, make it clear that because we have put so many seats in play, we all need to give far more than usual. This is a conservative ask, only 30%, and it will be used to fund a once in a generation opportunity. Thirty percent of more than $200,000 won't cripple anyone. Some have already given much more. It won't make anyone more vulnerable in 2008. It won't require anyone to lay off staff. It won't present serious obstacles for the Representative if s/he runs for higher office. It will, however, allow us to fully fund competitive challenges in districts where we may not be competitive again for years. We need to use this money, or lose this opportunity.
While I agree completely with the goal of this plan, I'm not interested in seeing Texas money go outside of Texas when we have a slew of outstanding candidates, including two DCCC Emerging Races, right here that need our support. I would like to see Texas Democrats help their fellow Texas Democrats, especially this year when the possibility of real gains is more than wishful thinking.
Therefore, I and my fellow Texas progressive bloggers are asking everyone to call their favorite Democratic Congressperson, State Senator, and State Representative and talk to them about doing what they can to help their ballotmates. I suggest following the MoveOn template, with some slight modifications:
1. Be polite2. Be prepared for pushback - they'll likely say they already gave to some Democrats, but they need to do more.
3. Tell them this is an extraordinary situation because so many seats are in play--and they will get public credit for doing the right thing.
4. They can legally give unlimited amounts to the DCCC or $2000 to candidates.
5. Mention the DCCC Emerging Races, mention the ParentPAC candidates, mention whoever you want to see them support.
6. Ask them to call you back when they decide how much to pledge. Get their name.
Please give me some feedback, via comments or email, as to whom you contacted and the response you got. With Early Voting now underway, time is extremely tight. Changing the perception about Democrats in Texas starts with working towards a shared goal. If we don't use all the resources available to us for this opportunity, we'll all lose out. That's what this is all about.
Poor Shelley. She's still not coping with the fact that the only two people on the ballot for the general election are Nick Lampson and Bob Smither. Juanita has a recording of another special Shelley poll that tries to deny that reality. Unfortunately for her pollster, the person on the receiving end of the call knew what was what. Here's a statement from the Smither campaign, taken from their press release about this:
This incident represents the latest in a pattern of deceptive polling by the Sekula-Gibbs campaign. Much like the closed-door meeting that anointed her write-in candidacy, Sekula-Gibbs seems to be intent on denying the fact that Bob Smither is actually on the ballot and she is not.In early September, Sekula-Gibbs deceptively claimed an 11-point lead in her latest polling. We learned later that the poll in question intentionally excluded Smither from the choices and dishonestly implied she was on the ballot. Despite repeated requests that she conduct her future polls within the ethical standards of the scientific polling profession, Sekula-Gibbs has obviously chosen to continue the deception.
The full transcript of the call is beneath the fold. It's pretty funny.
Transcript of Sekula Gibbs push poll call.
VOTER: Hi.GIBBS POLLSTER: Hello.
VOTER: Hello.
GIBBS POLLSTER: Yes, this is "name of pollster" calling from Southern Research to ask you one question about the November election for U.S. Congress. If the election were held tomorrow would you vote for
- Shelley Sekula-Gibbs, the Republican, or
- Nick Lampson, the Democrat.
VOTER: Um, who's calling and who are you sponsored by?
GIBBS POLLSTER: This is "name of pollster" and I'm calling from Southern Research.
VOTER: And who is paying the bills for this advertisement, or this poll?
GIBBS POLLSTER: This is Southern Research - I'm calling on behalf of Southern Research.
VOTER: What about the other candidates in the race? My understanding is that Bob Smither is on the ballot also, and that Shelley Sekula-Gibbs is a write-in. And that there are two other write-ins. Is that correct?
GIBBS POLLSTER: I know Shelley Sekula-Gibbs is a write-in.
VOTER: Okay, so. So I'm curious as to who is funding this research because it seems the question you are asking is biased.
GIBBS POLLSTER: Well, I only have two additional candidates here, which are Nick Lampson and Shelley Sekula-Gibbs.
VOTER: Well, and what I'm trying to indicate is that, uh, it sounds like your poll is biased. So I'm curious as to who is the, um, who is driving this poll.
GIBBS POLLSTER: (Pause) Uhhm. One moment and let me get that information for you, okay?
VOTER: Super.
GIBBS POLLSTER: Just one moment. (Pause)
GIBBS POLLSTER: Sir. Hello?
VOTER: Yes.
GIBBS POLLSTER: Okay, it's being funded through Sekula-Gibbs.
VOTER: Ah, it's being funded by Shelley Sekula-Gibbs. Okay that's, that's interesting, and what's most interesting to me is, you know, how it's worded. Because the way it's worded is not a scientifically valid poll. So, did, what was the name of your organization again?
GIBBS POLLSTER: Southern Research.
VOTER: Southern Research. So does your, um, are you a partisan political organization?
GIBBS POLLSTER: Yes.
VOTER: Okay. So you are not a scientific polling organization?
GIBBS POLLSTER: No.
VOTER: I see. So basically this is a political call and not a research call.
GIBBS POLLSTER: Pretty much, yeah.
VOTER: Okay. Well that uh, that basically does answer my questions.
GIBBS POLLSTER: Okay.
VOTER: Thank you for your time.
GIBBS POLLSTER: You're welcome.
As noted before, one of the DCCC's new Emerging Races involves CD32's Will Pryor. I really don't know all that much about the guy, so I'm grateful that DallasBlog has done an interview with him. Check it out.
Has anyone ever seen a team kick off from its own five-yard line before, as the Redskins were forced to do after a series of penalties in yesterday's game against the Colts? I can't say that I have. For that matter, on the previous attempt from their ten-yard line, I don't think I've ever seen a kickoff done as a punt, not counting post-safety free kicks. And since these things tend to come in threes, I can't recall the last time I saw a kicker/punter flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct. Anybody else?
It's not a surprise that the Chron endorsed all incumbents plus Nick Lampson in the Harris County Congressional races. For better or worse, that's exactly what I expected. The one race that for which I wasn't fully confident of this prediction was CD07. Indeed, the Chron did not have the guts to endorse Jim Henley, but neither did they endorse Culberson. What we got instead was basically a big lecture to Culberson, sort of a Festivus-like airing of the grievances, in which they list all of the things that Culberson has done to disappoint them, presumably in the hope that he'll come to understand the error of his ways and reform himself. As I recall, that was the basis of their 2004 re-endorsement of President Bush. I'm not sure why they see fit to take this approach - as a famous philosopher once said, "That trick never works!" - but at least they didn't give Culberson their stamp of approval as they patted him on the head and told him to go and sin no more. I suppose that counts as progress. If nothing else, you can bank on Culberson never getting an endorsement from them again, because (and I hate to be the one to point this out to them, but someone must) like the scorpion in the river-crossing fable, he's just going to keep on doing what he has always done. It's his nature. Either the Chron approves of that or they don't. I say they should endorse accordingly.
(Hey, if they can lecture, so can I.)
Elsewhere, the Star Telegram became the only one of the five major metro dailies to endorse Chris Bell.
Texans should elect a new governor: Democrat Chris Bell.Bell, 46, is a seasoned public servant, with five years on the Houston City Council before his election to Congress in 2002. The 2003 redistricting spearheaded by Tom DeLay, then U.S. House majority leader, targeted Bell and other Texas Democrats by placing them in new GOP-dominated districts. Bell lost his bid for re-election.
The governor of Texas does not have much power -- just enough to make the Legislature think twice about what it is doing. That's exactly what today's monopolized state government needs.
Electing Bell would give Texas a taste of two-party government again, although this time dominated by Republicans instead of Democrats, as was long the case.
What power the governor has derives from the bully pulpit that the office provides, the ability to veto legislation and the power to make appointments -- with the approval of the Senate. Used judiciously, these can be great powers. If overused, they can become inadequate and ineffective. Even a speech from the governor can be ignored, and a veto can be overridden -- but each still makes the Legislature think just a bit harder before it acts.
At least they recognize the need for a change. Even the Abilene Reporter-News called for a change in the Governor's mansion, though by leaving it up their readers to choose between Bell and Strayhorn they didn't exactly choose an optimal strategy for making that happen. They're still better than the Morning News, the Statesman, and the Express News, all of whom call for staying the course and damning the torpedos. When they start complaining about all the bad things that will certainly occur during the 80th Lege, remember that they endorsed the status quo. Shame on them all.
Take a look at this clip from a recent campaign mailer and tell me if you can see what's missing:
Here's the full thing if you need more context, and here's the full quote from Greg in TX22. Can't imagine why Shelley doesn't want to mention Tom DeLay on her mailers. I mean, she wouldn't be running for Congress if it weren't for DeLay. You'd think she'd show a little more gratitude than that.
On a related note, anyone want to guess if DeLay will be in attendance for this event? Or have the FBGOP officially whited out his name in their history books by now? Personally, I'm amused that they feel the need to bring in the President to rally the troops in Fort Bend. Wasn't that once considered a strong Republican county? How the times do change.
Via Eye on Williamson, an article about the ins and outs of ducking debates.
At present, none of Austin's congressional incumbents are planning to debate their challengers. Not Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin; not Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio; not Michael McCaul, R-Austin; and not Carter."There's nothing good that can happen as a result of debating your opponent when you're an incumbent," said Sean Theriault, an assistant professor of government at the University of Texas. "The only thing you do is give your challenger a chance to appear on the same stage as you, which equalizes the playing field."
Equalizing the playing field is not something incumbents are interested in. Two of them, Smith and Doggett, already have to make sure their new constituents know them after a court shifted their districts this summer. McCaul's campaign officials say they are still looking for an opportunity to debate even though the campaign has not proposed a date and has turned down several offers to face off with Democrat Ted Ankrum and Libertarian Michael Badnarik on local TV and radio stations.
The League of Women Voters offered to hold debates in Austin and Houston, the two major cities at either end of the district. McCaul accepted neither. Those venues were "two weeks in the making," Ankrum said. "So if McCaul couldn't find time in his schedule for it, it was because he didn't want to."
Local TV stations offer airtime as a public service, but when the incumbent refuses, that offer is often withdrawn, costing the challenger potential TV exposure.
When Carter declined to debate Harrell at a recent PBS forum, it was canceled, she said.
Instead of at debates, Carter's campaign is communicating with voters at town hall meetings and on telephone calls, campaign spokesman Jonas Miller said. "A debate does not fit into his campaign strategy at this time," Miller said. "Carter strongly believes that there are more effective ways for him to reach out to constituents, rather than debates."
Harrell said that tactic costs voters.
"It tells you everything you need to know about my opponent," Harrell said. "They're saying they think he can't win if he shows up at a forum. It's not about what's best for voters, it's all about winning."
Both Smith and Doggett's offices released statements on their debate decisions.
"When the congressman's opponents are so far behind, there is no reason to give their campaigns any help," campaign spokesman Gerardo Interiano said. Smith, who is in a special election because of redistricting, faces six opponents including Democrat John Courage and Libertarian Jim Strohm for his 21st District seat.
Doggett, who is also in a special election and faces three challengers, including Republican Grant Rostig and Libertarian Barbara Cunningham, said in a statement that "since I haven't seen my opponents as I crisscross the new parts of this district, from Flatonia to Kyle, from Wimberley to Halletsville, nor have I met anyone else who has, I've made no final scheduling decision."
Since I've been hard on various Republicans for their achievements in debate ducking, I'll say that Lloyd Doggett shouldn't be doing it, either. I agree that he's got no-profile opposition, but democracy demands participation. Frankly, the fact that he and Lamar Smith are in largely new districts puts a bigger onus on them to engage in candidate fora and debates, especially in the new areas where they haven't served before. I would not say that the onus is on Doggett (or any incumbent) to organize such events - if his opposition is so amateurish that they can't at least make contact with the League of Women Voters or a campus political group, then it becomes harder to criticize him for ducking - but if such things are out there, he owes it to his constituents to show up. Incumbents get a zillion advantages. This is the least they can do.
(Obviously, everything I said I the paragraph above, other than the remarks about Doggett's opposition, go for Lamar Smith as well. He does not have the excuse of there being no organized debates for his district.)
And I do think that every once in awhile, not debating becomes a bigger negative for an incumbent. I think Carter's silly excuses have worked against him in an election cycle where his buffoonery has been on display multiple times. I think a nontrivial number of voters will agree with Harrell's reasoning for his actions. I suspect the reason John Davis has agreed to debate Sherrie Matula is precisely because he recognizes that she's being taken more seriously than he is right now. I just think it shouldn't be about the calculations but about what's best for the voters. That means giving them every opportunity to see what their choices are and make the best decision they can. Idealistic of me, I know, but every once in awhile you've gotta believe in that. Is this really so much to ask?
Let me belatedly throw in my support for John Nova Lomax's Westheimer Walk for charity concept. I've never had any interest in the MS150 - I don't own a bike for starters - but this has appeal and feels like something I could conceivably do. It won't take a whole weekend, I'd have more control over what I got to eat and if I needed to drop out, and it might finally be the excuse that compels me to buy that damn iPod already. Judging by the comments, he's getting a good response. Let us know what you've got in mind, Lomax, and I'll do my best to be there.
Have we seen the last of the TV theme song?
TV themes, from The Beverly Hillbillies to The Brady Bunch to Cheers to Friends, conjure up memories of cozy nights, childhood bliss and a universal nostalgia for bygone days. But today, show themes are doing a fast fade as the networks crunch their programming budgets.Are they about to join the variety hour in the TV graveyard?
"It's a rarity today," TV historian Tim Brooks said of the catchy, tuneful opening. "It's kind of like the Broadway musical producing hit songs - it just doesn't do that anymore."
Back in the day, even into the '90s, shows usually had a "main title," a 40- to 60-second opening montage that introduced the cast and was often set to music written by a composer, said Jon Burlingame, author of TV's Biggest Hits, a history of themes.
But now many sitcoms and one-hour dramas dive straight into the action, sometimes flashing the show's title or logo at various points throughout an episode.
[...]
Tara Ariano, co-founder of the blog Television Without Pity, isn't sweating it. She thinks a "full-on opening credit (and) theme song is kind of a waste, from a business perspective."
"The networks sort of assume we watch the show, so we don't need to have the premise explained to us each week. ... In the era of the DVR, half the people watching the show are just fast-forwarding that anyway," she said.
Depends on the show and the theme. I never skip past the "Sopranos" theme song because it's so damn catchy, and because you miss who's in and not in that particular episode if you do. Surely people still watch the "Simpsons" credits to see what variations they have in it. I see no reason why a little creativity and thinking outside the box can't revive this concept in the way that much of episodic TV itself has been revived. I wouldn't go writing the theme song obituary just yet.
Did you know, by the way, that the theme song to "Cheers" had more than one verse? It got a fair amount of airplay on the radio back in the early 80s. Again, I don't see any reason why that could never reoccur. What do you think?
The DCCC's new batch of Emerging Races finally contains a couple of Texans, Shane Sklar and Will Pryor. As someone who's been complaining quite a bit lately about the lack of national attention for our many good candidates down here, I'm quite heartened by that. As I understand it, that may or may not translate into tangible DCCC support (monetary or otherwise), but it serves as a kind of guidepost for people looking to direct whatever resources they still have into races they may not have known about before. I'll let you know what I hear about the actual effects of that.
One thing I can say: I was at the Begala Gala last night, and the guest of honor said that he'd put a bug in DCCC Chair Rahm Emanuel's ear to do something for Sklar. Begala, who of course worked with Emanuel in the Clinton White House, said that he'd been travelling around the country speaking for free at a lot of different campaigns, and getting some support for a candidate in his back yard would be his price for that. I sure hope he comes through.
(In case you're wondering what I look like in a suit and tie, here I am last night with Tiffany and Sherrie Matula. As they say, I clean up pretty good, if I do say so myself.)
I'm not exactly sure why the Chron endorsements for two noncompetitive State Senate races takes up as much space as their gubernatorial endorsement and way more than their recommendations for State House races that will actually be closely contested. Maybe they just found the subject matter sufficiently interesting and had nothing better to write about today, I don't know. I'll say this - thanks to reading that editorial, I now know that Sen. John Whitmire has an opponent in his race. I was going to call him unopposed, but figured I should check first. So at least I learned something.
On a side note, I totally agree with Karl-Thomas regarding some of the endorsements in the Ag Commissioner race. It's clear that whoever wrote these two pieces has not been following that campaign at all. For shame.
Aaron Pena gazes into his crystal ball and predicts the items that will be atop the agenda for the 80th Lege. You might want to consider asking your Rep and/or your candidate for Rep where he or she stands on some of these things, because they will definitely affect all of us. Of course, who gets elected to serve and cast votes on these issues can make a big difference as well. Just something to think about.
Not too surprisingly, the last chapter of the new anti-smoking ordinance has not yet been written.
"Exemptions are never clear," said Joe Cherner, founder of a group that advocates smoking bans. "That's why in most cities there are regulations put out after a law passes, which clear up the confusion."Some questions raised this week can be answered by carefully examining the ordinance. Bingo halls, gaming facilities, billiard halls and sports arenas are among the list of public places where smoking is banned.
But others are not as clear-cut: What about hookah bars? Private clubs? Could bars declare themselves private to sidestep the ban?
In other smoke-free cities, lawsuits have settled some of those questions.
"We wrote it as clearly and tightly as we could," said Elena Marks, White's health-policy director. "If in practice it doesn't do what we intended it to do, then we will rework it."
The new ordinance specifies what qualifies as a cigar shop: an establishment that brings in at least 60 percent of its revenue from tobacco product sales.
It also defines a tobacco bar, where sales of smoking products for use at the establishment must exceed 20 percent of revenue. To qualify, tobacco bars must use an air-ventilation system, buy a permit from the city and offer health insurance for employees. They also must have been in operation by Sept. 1 of this year, which prevents bar owners from changing the nature of their business to qualify after the ban goes into effect.
Hookah bars, Marks said, would have to comply with the same rules to allow smoking.
Hotels and motels, too, have their own restrictions; no more than 35 percent of rooms in a hotel can be designated for smoking.
But the exemption for "designated enclosed meeting areas in convention centers, hotels, motels and other meeting facilities, only during times the meeting areas are in actual use for private functions" is a bit murky, some council members said.
Under the ordinance, a meeting facility is defined as a building that's used primarily for private functions, and a private function is a gathering to which attendees receive an invitation.
"Nothing here is clear," said Councilwoman Addie Wiseman, who argued that public events could pass as private so long as the organizer sent out some sort of invitation.
Private clubs will have to prohibit smoking just like other workplaces, Marks said. And one room within a public restaurant or bar cannot qualify as an exempted meeting place.
"If we see that somebody is flouting the intent of the law, then we'll deal with it," Marks said.
Frankly, I think Council Member Wiseman is protesting too much. All laws are subject to interpretation. Is this law clear for the majority of cases and just fuzzy around the fringes? If so, then I fail to see why it's any more problematic than most. Is there a lawsuit in the works to overturn the ordinance, as there was in Austin? If not, then what are we worried about? And if there is, did we address the issues Judge Sparks highlighted or not? I'm not really sure what the fuss is right now.
At long last, the construction on Studewood between White Oak/6th and Cavalcade/20th has been completed, and the orange traffic barrels are scheduled to disappear. The following is an email from City Council Member Adrian Garcia:
Dear Friend:As we have heard from time to time, street reconstruction projects are important and necessary but they do cause a bit of hardship in the areas where the project is taking place.
In 2004, a long anticipated street reconstruction project was approved on Studewood in the Heights and neighbors and area small business owners have been extremely patient to see this project completed, and that time is finally here!
Please join State Representative Jessica Farrar and I this Saturday, October 21st at 10:30a for a ribbon-cutting to celebrate the re-opening of this important passage way through one of our most historic communities.
Area businesses between 6th and 20th on Studewood are anxious to get re-acquainted with old customers and meet new ones. Also, some of them will be offering discounts for folks who come by to celebrate the re-opening.
To do my part, my staff and I will be enjoying lunch at the 11th Street Cafe!
Come one, come all and please come make a purchase this Saturday!
Sincerely,
Adrian Garcia
Council Member
District H
www.adriangarcia.com
The ceremony itself is at Studewood and 11th. Once that's done, Houstonist has some suggestions for where to go. Enjoy!
The Statesman makes the right call in endorsing Mary Beth Harrell for Congress.
U.S. House District 31Republican incumbent John Carter, a former Williamson County district judge, is running for a third term from this district that meanders from Williamson, Bell and Coryell counties through Milam, Falls, Hamilton and Erath counties.
Carter has stumbled, his gruff and arrogant manner not going down so well. He took hard shots when he held up approval of the Voting Rights Act and argued for English-only ballots. His comments about racism being behind us betray either naivete or denial.
Carter's Democratic opponent is Mary Beth Harrell, a Killeen lawyer, military wife and mother. Carter has refused to debate her, saying she hasn't earned the right to face him. With two sons in the military and one serving with the 4th Infantry Division in Iraq, she has earned that right.
Harrell is a moderate Democrat who has good ideas on the Iraq war and health care, and sensible positions on immigration and federal spending. District 31 voters should send a message to Carter about arrogance and insensitivity and elect Harrell.
Link via Eye on Williamson. If you haven't watched Mary Beth's TV ad yet, take a look and see for yourself why she's the clear choice. And consider helping her keep that ad running.
It's not on YouTube yet that I know of, but you can see Diane Trautman's new TV ad, now running on cable, here (WMV file). This is the power of support from Texas Parent PAC and the Texas Classroom Teachers Association. Check it out.
Previously, I had noted a new mixed residential/commercial development in the Rice Village called The Piazza. The impression I had gotten from the Chron article in question was that this would be a one city block project:
The proposed seven-story Piazza will feature six stories of residential space, retail, a public plaza at street level and underground parking.La Mesa plans to break ground in early 2007. The Piazza will be bound by Bolsover, Morningside, Dunstan and Kelvin. Many retail spaces on the block already have been vacated. Tysor said she is working to put Thai restaurant Nit Noi and Walgreens in the Piazza and helping other tenants relocate.
Look at a Google map and you'll see what I mean. However, when I came across this Chron story about the project, I see that my initial impression was mistaken. The Piazza goes from Dunstan to Rice Blvd, with Bolsover from Kelvin to Morningside slated to be closed off to vehicular traffic and turned into a pedestrian plaza.
The project on Bolsover between Kelvin and Morningside streets would have retail stores facing into the plaza. Above the shops would be 230 to 250 condo units costing about $500,000 each.Julie Tysor, vice president of developer The Appelt Co. and of the general partner of Lamesa Properties, described the plan as, "a true mixed use development similar to East Coast and West Coast developments you've seen in dense urban areas."
Parking would be hidden behind the stores and underground with 500 spaces for residents and 400 spaces for retail visitors. There also would be some street parking.
As the plan stands, Lamesa is creating 160 more parking spots than what is required by city ordinance.
"We are long-time owners and landlords in the village," Tysor said. "It is a unique community in Houston that isn't replicated anyplace else. It is ripe for redevelopment to benefit the surrounding residents as well as the University and Medical Center. The current trends in Houston all call for a development like this."
[...]
Lamesa hired Traffic Engineers Inc., a 35-year-old Houston company, to perform a study as part of the abandonment request. The Department of Public Works and Engineering asked for a supplemental study, which was done.
After reviewing both studies, the department recommended abandonment, given several conditions.
The conditions include:
- Installing left-turn lanes on Kelvin and Morningside at the Rice Boulevard intersection;
- Adding right of way space to the east side of Kelvin Street and west side of Morningside Street, where angled parking spaces would be added; and,
- Constructing a four-foot wide sidewalk on Kelvin and Morningside between Bolsover and Dunstan streets to comply with American with Disabilities Act standards.
District C council member Anne Clutterbuck said not closing Bolsover Street would make for a very different development without green space.Of the study she said, "I'm satisfied the counts were accurate. Traffic is always going to be a problem in the village and it will continue to be whether we approve the abandonment or not."
That's why City Council was involved - Lamesa is buying Bolsover for that one block stretch. Well, buying it with some conditions.
Bolsover would not be the first street in Rice Village the city has abandoned to a developer. Part of Amherst Street was ceded to Weingarten Realty for parking.Clutterbuck cited the Amherst Street abandonment Tuesday in promoting her amendment to the motion for abandonment, which allows council to specify the approved use of Bolsover. The amendment passed.
"We have been burned in the past," Clutterbuck said of Amherst Street.
She said Weingarten originally told council the parking garage would be free to the public, but it is now paid parking.
Clutterbuck said there also would be provisions in the contract for the sale and abandonment, saying if Bolsover Street were not used as specified, the city would get to keep the money from the sale and get its street back.
"This amendment amplifies that," she said.
Tysor said the amendment is fine with her.
"We intend to build what we've proposed to the community so this doesn't present a problem to me," Tysor said.
I think that's a creative approach, and should serve to protect the city's interests. Kudos to Council Member Clutterbuck for addressing that concern.
While there's plenty of space for parking, the real issue as raised by residents who spoke against the Bolsover closing at the Council meeting was traffic overall.
Clutterbuck said the issue was of particular interest to her not only because Rice Village is in her district, but also because she lives five blocks from the proposed development."I have put more time into this particular issue than probably any other since I've been on City Council," she said. "When I look at this project, I look at what is in the best interest of not only Rice Village, but also adjoining communities and the city as a whole."
She explained why she supports the project saying City Council cannot regulate the height or density of developments, but it can regulate parking, green space and setbacks.
Given those limitations, Clutterbuck said this proposal exceeds the city's requirements for parking, meets the setback and "I like that it's going to turn a large portion back into green space."
Clutterbuck said density is coming to the inner core.
"(The development) will satisfy an increasing need for density and may forestall additional development," she said.
Perhaps. But whether it does or doesn't, we will have a situation where an awful lot of people will be living, working, and shopping in a tight space. Given how busy that area is to begin with, and how crowded traffic is on Kirby Drive, there's no question in my mind that this will exacerbate things. It's a matter of whether or not you think the other possible alternatives would have led to any less congestion.
I still think that a shuttle service of some kind that looped around the Rice Village area from the Dryden light rail stop to the Museum District stop would go a log way towards solving some of this. Someday, when we get the Universities line built, whether on Richmond or Westpark or floating on antigravity platforms above the Southwest Freeway, that would tie in nicely to this concept. It's great that people will be able to park and walk at The Piazza. It's the getting there that's going to give everyone a migraine. I know there are obstacles to what I'm proposing, some of which emanate from Metro, but I don't see any way around the fact that alternatives are needed. Who's going to make something happen about this?
UPDATE: Bill Pribyl of Morningside Place makes a suggestion in this week's West U Examiner.
Let's agree to close the street - with the condition that the traffic gets no worse than the study predicts. Do a new traffic study every few years, and if we ever need the street back for area mobility, it will revert back to the taxpayers. Hey, we can even give the developer the right to propose alternatives, as long as they provide at least as much mobility as reopening Bolsover.
Again, I say the answer is to find ways to move more people in and out of the area without cars, but it's hard to argue the point that periodic checkups of the traffic studies would make sense.
See also this letter from the Public Works Department (PDF). Note that coordination with the construction on Kirby Drive (which as of this month has progressed north of Holcomb) is mentioned as a requirement for the developers.
Want to buy a WNBA team? Here's your chance, as long as you promise to keep them in Houston.
"After a lot of discussion and trying to figure out what's best for the Comets organization, [owner Les] Alexander has decided to put the team up for sale and see if there are any local buyers out there who might be interested," said Tad Brown, senior vice president of sales, marketing and broadcasting for the Comets and NBA's Houston Rockets. "Ideally, (the sale) would be (to local investors)."There are a few people who have expressed interest, and we'll continue to talk with those people. We're going to evaluate each opportunity on its own."
Brown said Alexander wants to concentrate his efforts on the operation of the Rockets. Once they're sold, the Comets will follow a trend in the WNBA, disassociating themselves from the NBA franchise that had facilitated their existence.
Brown wouldn't divulge the potential local investors or price tag. Recent sales of some WNBA franchises have netted as much as $10 million.
"We haven't set any deadline," Brown said. "We're going to look at it over the course of the next few months to see what shakes out."
I've been a Comets season ticket holder for seven years. I got an email about this Wednesday afternoon, which I've reprinted beneath the fold.
The Comets won the league's first four championships from 1997-2000 and remain the only dynasty in the league's 10-year history.But since joining the parent Rockets in a move from Compaq Center to Toyota Center three years ago, the Comets have seen ticket sales dwindle and 20-win seasons cease.
The good news for the Comets and their future owner is that the fans they have are loyal and rabid. The souvenir shop sells plenty of Comets merchandise, and the fans really get into the game. It's a fun atmosphere to be in. I've taken Olivia a few times, and plan to continue to do that as she gets older. She definitely enjoys herself at the games, even if she doesn't quite get what they're all about yet. But believe me, you ain't seen cute till you've seen Olivia cheer "Go Comets, go!"
The bad news, of course, is that there just aren't as many fans as there used to be. Maybe too many people wre spoiled by the four straight championships, maybe the novelty factor for women's basketball was higher than we thought, maybe people don't like the Toyota Center experience as much as the old Compaq Center; I don't know why that would be the case, as I think the Toyota Center is a vast improvement, but maybe that's just me. I see no reason why the Comets can't contiue to be viable - the basic product is good, the overall experience is enjoyable, and the price is right. Maybe new ownership will market them more aggressively, I don't know. I do know that I want them to succeed, and I believe they can. I'm reasonably optimistic here. We'll see who steps up to make the purchase.
Email to Comets season ticket holders:
Dear Charles,In recent days you may have read or heard through various published media reports about a potential sale of the Houston Comets. As one of our most valued customers, it is important to us that you know that this is a decision made after much discussion and consideration as to what is in the best interest of the entire Comets organization, including our fans.
In recent years, the WNBA has begun to trend towards independent ownership models most notably in markets like Chicago, Connecticut, Washington and Charlotte. It is our feeling that an independent ownership group will be able to provide the appropriate amount of resources, focus and energy to make the Comets and the women’s game in Houston successful. We are proud of what we have accomplished both on and off the court over the past ten seasons and we are hopeful that, as a season ticket holder, you will be impacted as little as possible should a change in ownership occur.
Currently, there is no timeframe for a potential transaction, but we assure you that when we are in a position to share more we will. As things stand, nothing has changed for you or your season tickets. The Comets will need the support of their season ticket holders to be successful regardless of the owner. It is our intention to have the Comets stay in Houston and also at Toyota Center.
We thank you for your ongoing support of the Houston Comets. Please do not hesitate to call our offices at 713-627-WNBA should you have any questions or concerns.
Sincerely ,
Andrea B. Young
When the new smoking ban was passed, a fellow identified as "an expert on the smoking-ban movement" predicted that the State of Texas would follow suit within a year. I wondered who might spearhead such an effort. Via Houstonist, I now have my answer: State Sen. Rodney Ellis.
Talking with the American Cancer Society and checking laws around the country, we found out as of today 11 states are considered smoke-free.Louisiana and Hawaii have passed smoke free laws that will soon go into effect. And Puerto Rico falls into that category as well.
“So we ought to do it. I am going to be aggressive with this legislation. I think it should have strong bipartisan support. I hope it gets generated in the debate in this election cycle, in the race for governor,” said Sen. Ellis.
Ellis says tobacco lobbyists will put up a fight.
I'm sure they will. The next question is whether or not the folks who opposed the Houston ban on the grounds that it would make it harder for bars to compete with nearby non-Houston venues will get behind Sen. Ellis' effort. We'll know in a few months.
Here's the longer version of the original Chron story.
The 13-2 vote was a victory for Mayor Bill White, who wanted to extend the ban while leaving some locations available for public smoking."I think the public was heard loud and clear that we need to better protect the rights of our employees," he said, noting that the ordinance will reduce workers' exposure to secondhand smoke.
[...]
The council had been divided on the issue since White proposed his ordinance two weeks ago, with some members calling for a stricter ban and others pushing to exempt bars.
But the council members, though tense at times during Wednesday's debate, united behind what the administration said was a compromise, with some members saying that any extension of the ban was better than none at all.
"I think a whole lot of people held their nose," said Councilwoman Anne Clutterbuck. "It's not the best in any one person's opinion, but it's the best we could come up with."
[...]
The council rejected several amendments that would have weakened the ordinance or extended its reach.
An amendment the council approved expands the ban to include meetings of nonprofits at their own facilities. Such functions would have been exempt under White's original proposal, and the approval of the amendment marked the first vote White has lost since he became mayor in 2004.
"Emotions ran strong," White said, "because there are some citizens who think there should be no exceptions."
He said he hopes the Legislature will enact a statewide ban or at least give authority to counties to put smoking restrictions in place.
Councilwoman Carol Alvarado said she was surprised so many members ended up voting for the proposal.
"It wasn't everything, but at least it took us further than we were before," she said.
[...]
The panel voted against almost all of Councilwoman Pam Holm's amendments, which would have eliminated the exceptions included in White's proposal - but the votes were close.
The amendment that would have extended the ban to hotels, designated meeting rooms in convention centers and other private functions narrowly failed with a vote of 8-7. The amendment to ban smoking at bars that derive significant revenue from tobacco sales - only a handful of establishments within the city qualify - was rejected 9-6, and the amendment to ban smoking on outdoor patios failed 11-4.
The council also rejected, 11-4, an amendment offered by Councilwoman Toni Lawrence that would have exempted bars from the ban. Councilman Jarvis Johnson submitted an amendment to allow voters to decide the issue next year, but the panel did not consider it because the suggestion was made too late in the process.
I think what we got was pretty reasonable, and I think it says something that after all the debate and delays the final vote was 13-2 in favor. For what it's worth, I would have voted against all three of the amendments that would have extended the ban further, I would have voted against the Lawrence amendment, and I would have voted for the final ordinance. I also would have voted against the amendment to include meetings at nonprofits.
Another day, another big endorsement for Ellen Cohen, as the Houston Police Officers Union (HPOU) gives her the nod. From the press release (Word doc):
"I am humbled and honored to receive the support of the men and women who help keep our streets safe," Cohen said. "I have been proud to work with the Houston Police Department as President and CEO of the Houston Area Women's Center, and I look forward to being an advocate for them in the Texas Legislature."HPOU President Hans Marticiuc said of Cohen, "Ellen knows what it takes to bring people together. I know that she will represent the residents of District 134 as a consensus builder, and we look forward to seeing her serve in the Texas Legislature."
As President & CEO of the Houston Area Women's Center, Cohen as been a leader in the prevention of sexual and domestic violence in the Houston area. A $5.5 million organization with over 120 staff, HAWC has been honored as one of the most efficient and well run non-profit organizations in the country by the Houston Chronicle.
"A number of politicians like to talk about public safety, but very few have experience in working with law enforcement. Ellen has experience in working with HPD on the issues of sexual and domestic violence, and we look forward to working with her in Austin," Marticiuc said.
The Houston Police Officers' Union endorsement adds to a growing list for the Cohen Campaign, including the Houston Chronicle, the Houston Federation of Teachers, the Sierra Club, and the Houston GLBT Political Caucus.
Excellent. The one thing I'm not sure about is what the HPOU's endorsement history is. I've got a call in to find out who (or if) they've endorsed in HD134 in the past. I'll update this post when I hear back.
UPDATE: I have spoken to Mark Clark of HPOU. He informed me that they endorsed Wong in 2004 (they had endosed Debra Danburg in 2002; he said they generally favor incumbents). He told me that a number of their board members knew Cohen well from her time with the HAWC, and they called in to stump for her. There were no such calls in support of Wong. He also alluded to a perception that HPOU members got of antagonism in Wong's manner and tone when dealing with them. He said they couldn't put their finger on what it was exactly, but the feeling was common inside HPOU.
Meanwhile, via South Texas Chisme, Democrats Solomon Ortiz, Jr, and Juan Garcia picked up the nod from the Corpus Christi Caller Times.
[It's not an easy call] in District 33, where voters face a tough choice between Solomon Ortiz Jr., a Democrat, son of the congressman, and Joe McComb, a Republican. McComb is a former member of the Corpus Christi City Council and Nueces County Commissioners Court. He has a long record of involvement in community projects, including his "Operation Paintbrush."Both have obvious strengths. McComb is committed to the progress of the area. Ortiz is knowledgeable about local issues and has shown leadership skills as chairman of the Nueces County Democratic Party. A key question is which candidate has the greatest potential to grow in office.
The Editorial Board recommends the election of Solomon Ortiz Jr. He is young and enthusiastic. He understands the key issues for this district are education, health care and economic development. He understands that when state funds have been ladled out, this area has been left with table scraps.
Voters should also vote for Ortiz in the special election to fill the two months remaining of Luna's unexpired term. With the Legislature not in session until January, this special election is a useless exercise, but it would not serve the district's interests to elect one interim representative to serve in name only for two months.
Voters also have a tough call in District 32, which in this election may be the best show in town. The incumbent Republican, Gene Seaman, has five terms in office. He has fought to pass a career technology bill, an issue he's passionate about, but the one time it passed it was vetoed. Despite the fact that his party has been in power, he has not been close to the leadership. No one questions his commitment, but questions can be raised about his effectiveness.
The Editorial Board believes a change is needed. Juan M. Garcia III, the Democratic challenger, is a former Naval aviator and a former White House Fellow, a program that provided him with the same leadership training once afforded Henry Cisneros and Colin Powell. Garcia knows the issues and district needs. A third candidate, Lenard Nelson, a Libertarian, is also in this race.
One factor weighs heavily in Garcia's favor. He is earnest about changing the way the House records votes. While Seaman says he supports recording all votes, he gives excuses for why it would be impractical. Yet 40 other state legislatures have no trouble recording all legislative votes. The attitude that the Texas House belongs to its members, rather than its citizens, must be changed. New leaders like Juan M. Garcia will help to bring that about.
Juan Garcia, I think you know about. I (and Muse) had the pleasure of meeting Ortiz last night, as he was in town for a fundraiser hosted by Reps. Ana Hernandez and Jessica Farrar. I was impressed - he was sharp, funny, and knowledgeable. He'd be a nice step up from Craddick-crat Vilma Luna, that's for sure. He has to overcome some lingering resentment from replacement wannabee Danny Noyola, who's running in the pointless special election, but anyone who can charm Paul Burka like that has got it going on. More about HD33 is here.
The plague of debate-ducking incumbents is reaching epidemic proportions. The latest contestants in the I Won't Talk To My Constituents If My Opponent Is There sweepstakes are Joe Crabb and Mike McCaul. Here's a press release from Diane Trautman.
Dr. Diane Trautman [Wednesday] said she is still waiting for her opponent to agree to participate in a candidate forum scheduled for Thursday in Kingwood.
“I understand that it might be hard for my opponent to explain his support for private-school vouchers and soaring college tuition rates, but it’s disappointing that he doesn’t respect voters enough to at least try to defend his positions,” Dr. Trautman said.Dr. Trautman said she is looking forward to Thursday’s candidate forum sponsored by two local chapters of Delta Kappa Gamma, a professional honorary society of women educators. The event is slated for 5:30 PM, Thursday, October 19, in the Humble ISD Instructional Support Center just off Lake Houston Parkway in Kingwood.
“When it comes to the challenges facing our communities, we deserve a representative in Austin who is willing to be part of the solution, not part of the problem,” Dr. Trautman said.
Now I admit, that's a crowd that's likely to favor Trautman. But, to put it delicately, so what? Has Crabb never had to face a non-sycophantic room before? He's a big boy, and he's been around the block a few times. If he can't handle a few pointed questions, what's he doing in Austin? The floor of the Lege is surely tougher than this.
And from Ted Ankrum:
The Republican incumbent in US Congressional District Ten, Michael McCaul, has no space available in his schedule for a League of Women Voters-Austin debate, causing the debate to be cancelled. The debate was to be held on Monday, October 23, on the first day of early voting, and was in the planning stage for the past two weeks. "If I had McCaul's voting record and the policies of the current administration and House leadership to defend, I wouldn't want a debate either", said Ted Ankrum, the Democratic Party Candidate.Ankrum, with a distinguished military record and years of engineering experience in energy, environmental protection, as a Diplomat, and as assistant to the head of NASA in Washington, is eager to have the voters see the differences between him and Mr. McCaul and let them decide in November.
"An unbiased debate such as those sponsored by the League of Women Voters is the kind of forum that allows voters to get to know the candidates and their positions. It's too bad that Mr McCaul has chosen to hide. Does he think the kitchen is too hot?", Ankrum asked.
McCaul doesn't even have the tough-crowd dodge that Crabb might claim, and he never had to campaign for a general election last time. This would be the first opportunity that most voters would ever have to see him speak, and it's in a nice, neutral environment. What's the problem?
I understand the politics behind debate ducking, but it's still a cowardly thing for any candidate to do. How hard is it to engage in debates and the like during the real campaign season? Note how many actual incumbents turned up at this recent candidates' forum that Hal attended. The people who were there and got to see and hear them are the better for it. Kudos to them all, and boo to Crabb and McCaul for forgetting that real democracy requires real participation.
And finally, what's a post about debate ducking without a few words about John Carter, the undisputed champion of such avoidance? If there's a Hall of Fame for this sort of thing, he's a first-ballot inductee, no doubt about it.
I'm not sure what to say about the Chron's endorsement of Strayhorn for Governor. The two things that pop to mind are "Have these guys been watching the same campaign as I?", and "Well, at least that keeps intact their string of always endorsing a Republican for Governor". It's rather amazing to me that after all this time and all these polls, anyone could still fall for the "only Carole Keeton Strayhorn has the experience and savvy to win election to the governorship", but there you have it. Talk amongst yourselves here, I got nothin'.
(On a side note, the Chron did at least give us this sidebar with three reasons "why the hell not". So they haven't gone completely insane, which just makes the Strayhorn choice that much odder to me.)
UPDATE: Via Greg, the Caller Times makes the right call and goes with Bell.
Bell - thoughtful, open-minded and determined - will face formidable challenges in Austin should he prevail. As noted, he would be a governor from the minority party, and would have to work hard to gain traction and credibility.However, given Perry's lackluster record, and given the relative strengths and vulnerabilities of the four candidates, Bell seems the most likely to grow in office - and to address effectively the multiple challenges facing Texas.
That's more like it.
It probably doesn't sound like much to say that the Austin Chronicle has endorsed Chris Bell for Governor. As they themselves note, they "almost always endorse Democrats". The reason why this is noteworthy is that their readership is at the forefront of Kinky Friedman worship. Take a look at the "Politics and Personalities" section of their Best of Austin awards. Friedman wins for Best Citizen, Best News Story, and Best Visionary. Now look at what they have to say about him in endorsing Bell:
As Bell pointed out at the opening of the only televised debate, he in truth faces three Republican opponents (plus one). Like many Chronicle readers, we initially welcomed the anti-Bush novelty of maverick Kinky Friedman. But however entertaining as a candidate, if Friedman were actually elected, the joke would be on everyday Texans. He has no real interest in the crucial details of governance. He has chosen positions out of whim and ignorance (such as martial law on the border, or quickly dissipating a budget "surplus" visible only to him). Along the campaign trail, he has made no effort to learn anything new or from his mistakes. (The last denizen of the Mansion with Friedman's Know-Nothing approach to governance is now in the White House.)
Ouch. Bell needs to run up a decent margin in Travis County if he's going to have any hope of winning. If Friedman has lost the AusChron crowd, the odds of that happening are better today than they were a week ago.
More good news for Bell: the WSJ/Zogby Interactive poll now has him at 26.2%, his best showing ever, with Strayhorn and Friedman each down at 13%. Perry is up as well, to 37.5%, but Bell is showing signs of consolidating the anti-Perry vote. According to Bob Ray Sanders of the Star Telegram, there's real enthusiasm for Bell now. As noted by BOR, the Texans for Insurance Reform PAC did a followup to its pre-debate poll in which Bell placed fourth, and now has him in second, gaining almost six points. The Cook Political Report has changed the race from "Solid Republican" to "Likely Republican".
All of this is tempered for me somewhat by the Houston Chron's odd endorsement of Carole Keeton Strayhorn (as I blog this, the chron.com site is down), which I'll get to shortly. But still, this has been a good week for Chris Bell.
UPDATE: Edited to reflect that the AusChron's Best of Austin awards were given by their readers and not the paper's editors, and to clarify that while the AusChron endorsed Bell, the HouChron went with Strayhorn.
Add another local Republican incumbent State Rep to the list of questionable expense report filers, as Dot Nelson-Turnier has raised the issue regarding Debbie Riddle. You can see the press release at Stace's place, and you can see the questioned items here. Dot is not filing an official complaint at this time, but we'll see what happens.
I knew she had a TV ad in the works, but this effort by Mary Beth Harrell has exceeded my expectations.
Very well done. If you like what you see, you know what to do. If you want to see more, check out this News8 Austin Q&A, with video, of Harrell and Carter, the Debate Decider/Ducker. As Eye on Williamson sys, it's pretty obvious why Carter doesn't want to get on the same stage as Harrell.
I like the fact that the DCCC will borrow money in an effort to maximize the potential gains it can make this year. I just wish they weren't so myopic about Texas. A couple hundred grand split among Harrell, Sklar, Will Pryor, Jim Henley, and maybe a couple of others could help generate a real surprise on November 7. Even with the DCCC joining its counterparts in the NRCC and pulling money out of CD17, that sadly ain't gonna happen, but you can still help Mary Beth keep landing punches on Carter. You want to make a difference, that's a good place to start.
From Capitol Inside, a charge by Rep. Hubert Vo that the Talmadge Heflin campaign is breaking the electoral code by making a phony robocall:
The attorney who defended State Rep. Hubert Vo in an election contest that Heflin filed after a close loss the last time they met has asked the Harris County District Attorney's office to investigate automated phone calls that invited some House District 149 voters to block-walk for the Democrat.The caller or callers claimed to be representing the local gay caucus. But caucus officials say they never authorized the robo-calls or had anything to do with them. While Vo's campaign had planned to have volunteers going door-to-door through neighborhoods in the district to promote his re-election bid on the same day and time that the recorded message mentioned, the legislator and his team say they did not place the calls, authorize them or know about them until contacted by supporters who'd been on the receiving end.
In a terse letter to Donna Cameron Goode, the public integrity division chief in Harris District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal's office, Houston lawyer Larry Veselka requested an investigation into possible violations of Texas Election Code provisions pertaining to political advertising . Veselka specifically pointed to sections in the law that prohibit campaign-related communications that disguise or misrepresent their true source.
"Since these are ongoing violations of the law, I ask that your office investigate and take all necessary action to prevent any further political dirty tricks violating Texas law attempting to interfere with the re-election of Rep. Vo," the lawyer wrote.
Vo's allies suspect the Heflin campaign of being behind the auto-calls as part of a push to make the incumbent look out of step with district residents who voted by a substantial margin for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriages in Texas last year. Vo voted against the measure that authorized the statewide vote on the constitutional revision - and his opposition to the gay marriage ban has been an issue in the rematch with Heflin.
But Heflin's campaign denied having any advance knowledge of the calls in question and suggested that the incident was the result of a miscommunication between Vo's campaign and some of its supporters. Heflin Campaign Director Court Koenning suggested that the GOP nominee is too busy noting Vo's votes on issues such as education, immigration and crime to spend time cooking up schemes like Democrats envision.
You can hear the call here. The text of the robocall is as follows:
Hi this is Richard with the Hubert Vo campaign. I'm calling on behalf of the Gay Lesbian Bisexual and Transgender Political Caucus. This weekend we'll be walking door to door in your neighborhood for Hubert Vo. We want to thank Hubert Vo for voting for gay rights in the last legislative session. If you would like to join us in walking for Mr. Vo please call us at 713-521-1000. If you see us in your neighborhood come say hi. If you can't join us this weekend, we hope you will join us in voting for Hubert Vo because Vo votes for gay rights. Thank you. Bye-bye.
There's two reasons why I think this is bogus. The first and most obvious is the articulation of the full name "Gay Lesbian Bisexual and Transgender Political Caucus". I've never heard anyone, inside the caucus or out, refer to it that way. It's always "the GLBT Political Caucus", or just "the GLBT". Why say all those extra syllables when everyone knows what GLBT means? And if you are going to spell out the acronym, it's really the "Houston Gay Lesbian Bisexual and Transgender Political Caucus". I have a hard time believing an actual Houston GLBT person made this recording.
That leads to reason number two, which is that if the GLBT Caucus were organizing a blockwalk, they wouldn't do it via a shotgun robocall. They'd most likely do it via email, but even if it was a robocall, it'd be to a very targeted list. You want to have some idea of who you're getting for a blockwalk. It's not at all the same as a get-out-the-vote call.
All of that is suggestive, but certainly not conclusive. Surely the Harris County DA's office, if it cares to take any action, will be able to determine the origin of the call, and from there the rest will follow. This is the relevant statute.
§ 255.005. MISREPRESENTATION OF IDENTITY.(a) A person commits an offense if, with intent to injure a candidate or influence the result of an election, the person misrepresents the person's identity or, if acting or purporting to act as an agent, misrepresents the identity of the agent's principal, in political advertising or a campaign communication.
(b) An offense under this section is a Class A misdemeanor.
We'll see what the DA does. As is the norm, I expect any action they do take to be after the election.
Vo was one of only 29 no votes on the emotion-charged proposal, which seven other Democrats and one Republican refused to touch while registering as present but not voting when it came up. The constitutional amendment was approved by 76 percent of Texas voters statewide including 72 percent of those who cast ballots in Harris County. The ban passed in every county of the state with the exception of Travis County where state government is based. Voters in only one state House district in Houston and one in Dallas turned thumbs down on the measure. Those districts are represented by Republican State Reps. Martha Wong of Houston and Dan Branch of Dallas. Wong punched a white light to signify that she was present but not voting while Branch was in the majority that voted to send the question to voters. While Vo opposed the gay marriage prohibition as a representative from a district that favored it, Wong's decision to not vote against it has come back to haunt her in a part of Houston where the gay population is concentrated.While Vo doesn't go out of his way to trumpet his support from gay groups, he doesn't try to hide it either. The first-term lawmaker lists the Houston GLBT Political Caucus as one of about two dozen organizations that have endorsed his re-election campaign. The list includes representatives for teachers, doctors, police officers, realtors, labor, Latinos, the Farm Bureau and other Democrats.
Well, Heflin has said that he'd make an issue of Vo's vote on HJR6, and here we are. Obviously, I hope that the people of HD149 have their priorities more in order than Heflin does. We'll see.
In the end, the vote wasn't close.
The City Council voted today to extend Houston's indoor smoking ban to bars but to continue allowing smoking in outdoor patios and in bars that promote cigar smoking and derive significant revenue from tobacco sales.The 13-2 vote was a victory for Mayor Bill White, who wanted to extend the ban while leaving some locations available for public smoking. The only dissenters were council members Addie Wiseman and Michael Berry, who had said previously that they opposed any extension of the ban and that the decision on whether to allow smoking should be up to individual businesses.
The council rejected several amendments that would have weakened the ordinance or extended its reach. The only amendment approved expands the ban to include meetings of nonprofit organizations at their own facilities. Such functions would have been exempt from the ban under White's original proposal.
The new rules take effect next September.
Given how contentious this all seemed a week ago, that's a pretty big win for Council Member Carol Alvarado and Mayor White. Whatever they did to build consensus on this, it worked.
The council had appeared divided on the issue since White proposed his ordinance two weeks ago, but united behind it after a week of lobbying and testimony from interests on both sides, notably anti-smoking activists and bar owners who feared a ban would hurt their businesses.
I got several pieces of mail about the new ordinance this week, all from different groups, and all in favor of expanding the ban. If the anti-ban folks had a lobbying effortm going, they didn't see fit to stuff my mailbox. Anybody else get mail on this?
Full voting on the ordinance and related amendments is here. This sidebar story on national trends makes an interesting point.
Houston's decision could affect how state lawmakers approach the issue, said Joe Cherner, an expert on the smoking-ban movement and founder of BREATHE - Bar and Restaurant Employees Advocating Together for a Healthy Environment."If Houston passes a strong law, Texas will pass a law within a year," he predicted, based on how other states have reacted to bans by their largest cities.
Council Member Jarvis Johnson mentioned a statewide ban when he spoke to me about this last week. I'll be interested to see if any member of the Lege champions this next year.
Now see, this is what happens when you talk about serious issues instead of silly romance novels: You get relegated to page B3, where that sort of thing belongs.
The U.S. military presence in Iraq serves only to destabilize the country and plunge it further into civil war, Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Barbara Ann Radnofsky said Tuesday, renewing her call for a timetable for withdrawal.Only when the United States leaves Iraq will conditions permit the creation of an international coalition that can press for peace in a country ravaged by war and sectarian violence, Radnofsky told the Houston Chronicle editorial board.
"Our presence is destabilizing that country and creating a national disaster for Iraq, but worse, creating an international disaster," the Houston attorney said.
She cited conclusions in the recent National Intelligence Estimate declassified by President Bush that the U.S. occupation has given the global jihadist movement a boost.
Radnofsky, who is seeking to unseat Republican incumbent Kay Bailey Hutchison in the Nov. 7 election, drew a sharp distinction between their stances on war policy.
On the assertion by Hutchison and the Bush administration that keeping solders in Iraq prevents terrorists from attacking the United States, Radnofsky said, "It's reprehensible to have a concept that we ought to keep our U.S. soldiers as the targets to avoid fighting terror everywhere it exists."
Well, at least Kay Bailey's never written a bodice-ripper. That we know of, anyway.
I'm not going to waste any more time talking about Fred Head and Susan Combs. Go read about Radnofsky, who impressed Cragg Hines enough to get this written about her.
Barbara Ann Radnofsky is an ideal candidate - intelligent, articulate, energetic and clearly not afraid of long odds. In many races against an incumbent this year Radnofsky would be a formidable opponent.But Radnofsky, a Houston attorney, is not in a race against just any incumbent. She is challenging a politician whose very mortality sometimes seems in question. Radnofsky is the Democrat running against one of the biggest vote-getters in Texas history, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, a two-plus-term Republican.
[...]
"She just can't get any traction," said an Austin Republican operative who believes Radnofsky, given her bare-bones funding, has run about as good a campaign as possible.
[...]
You can see the only scheduled Hutchison-Radnofsky face-off in a debate Thursday from San Antonio that will be broadcast on Houston's KUHT, Ch. 8, and C-SPAN at 9 p.m.
In the debate, Radnofsky may question what might be considered Hutchison's overstaying her political visa. Hutchison promised in her first campaign and early in her Senate career to serve only two terms.
Term limits stink, but candidates who have rashly volunteered that they will leave the stage must defend casting the pledge, however silly, aside.
Hutchison says she still believes in term limits, but: "Texas would be disadvantaged if its most experienced legislators stepped down while other states were not subjected to the same requirements."
Funny how the erstwhile term-limits proponents never thought that issue was worth worrying about when it was Democrats who had experience and seniority. For thee but not for me and all that.
Though I doubt she'll get the financial windfall that Chris Bell has gotten in the event she mops the floor with KBH in tomorrow night's debate, I still hope Radnofsky does well enough to be widely declared the winner. She ought to at least be prepared in case someone asks her who the President of Mexico is.
(Side note: I presume someone has pointed this out to Hines, but Bush lost Wisconsin by 10,000 votes in 2004, not win. Oops.)
I suppose I should congratulate Fred Head for getting a story about his campaign for State Comptroller on the front page of the Chronicle. I'm not sure this is the kind of story one wants to have written about said campaign, however.
Since the Texas Democratic Convention in June, Head has repeatedly attacked a steamy romance novel Combs published in 1990, and even features excerpts from it on his campaign Web site. Head says it was hypocritical of her to write such a book and then support abstinence education as a Republican politician.Once word of Head's attacks hit the romance trade press, cyberspace buzzed with the news.
"Out of the blue I had e-mails from England, Canada, California, all over Texas," said Combs, Texas agriculture commissioner and author of the 1990 romance, A Perfect Match. "Women all across the United States and foreign countries are very angry at what they see as an attack on women."
Combs launched a $3.2 million political advertising blitz Tuesday. The TV spots, which end with the words "experience we need, values we trust," stress Combs' roles as a small-business owner, former state legislator, agriculture commissioner, wife and mother.
Head, with $0 in campaign money, remained defiant, repeatedly calling Combs' book pornographic.
"I think the romance novelists should endorse my opponent," he said in response to their criticism of him. "That could probably get me elected. I just don't agree with writing what I believe is pornographic and not good for the young people."
Outraged romance writers first flooded Head's campaign in-box with angry e-mail.
This week, they vowed revenge at the ballot box.
"I told him I was a Texan, a Christian, a voter, a grandmother and I have written 46 novels," said Houston romance writer Patricia Kay. "I said, 'You are not going to get my vote.'
"The truth is," added Kay, 69, "I probably would have voted for him because I'm a registered Democrat."
Mission accomplished, I guess.
It's not really clear to me why anyone would care about Susan Combs' sideline as a romance novelist. I don't really understand how that affects her fitness to be Comptroller, even if you think there's a moral issue at play. (As Tiffany has a fondness for the occasional "trashy romance novel", as she likes to call them, I'm certainly not going to go along with Head's characterization.) If Combs had made a career out of moral crusades, then I could see the salience, but if there's anything in her legislative history to suggest such proclivities, then at the very least Head has done a poor job of connecting those dots into a coherent argument. I find myself puzzled as to why he thought this was anything more than a laugh line during his convention speech.
I also find myself annoyed that a campaign for Comptroller has been reduced to this foolishness when there are real issues that should be brought up. Like the fact that Combs sees the Comptroller's office as little more than another step towards the Governor's mansion, or the fact that she'd be a rubber stamp for Rick Perry if he wins again. Say what you want about Carole Keeton Strayhorn's flipflops, opportunism, and showboating, she at least provided some kind of counterweight to Perry over the past four years. I guarantee you that Combs won't rock the boat in any meaningful way, but will instead be a good team player, at least for as long as she thinks that's advantageous to her next campaign.
But alas, talking about that sort of thing doesn't get you on the front page. Talking about sex does. For what that's worth in this case.
Grits reads the staff report and the self-evaluation (both PDFs) from the Texas Sunset Commission on the Department of Criminal Justice so you don't have to. For those of you who think that the answer to our current crime problems is to lock up more bad guys, consider this:
Recruiting, hiring, and retaining enough employees to run several new prisons will be difficult for TDCJ. Currently, TDCJ faces significant staffing shortages at many prisons. In July 2006, the TDCJ officer shortage was 2,746 officers, down from a high of 3,406 in October 2001. TDCJ’s LAR anticipates that the State would operate two of the three new prisons and contract with a private vendor for the third. If the State runs two of the three new prisons, it will have to hire an additional 1,050 employees. Since TDCJ cannot fill existing vacancies, the agency would likely have difficulty filling newly created positions.
When you can tell me how the state can address that problem, then we can talk about building more prisons. Until then, maybe we ought to think about some alternate solutions that would incarcerate the right people and cost a lot less money. The choice is yours.
Those of you living in CD14 may soon get to see one of the following ads on cable TV from Shane Sklar.
Ron Paul has raised a lot of money (some of which was used in his primary), but he's had to spend a bunch to raise what he's gotten. I'm told he hasn't done much in the way of advertising, and I wouldn't expect the NRCC to come riding to his rescue if it comes down to it. Sklar's campaign may not be registering on the national scene, but it's been noticed in the district. If you're looking for a good home for a few extra campaign contribution dollars, consider Shane Sklar.
UPDATE: You might notice that both ads prominently refer to Ron Paul as a "Libertarian". I wondered about this, and asked the Sklar campaign. This is the response I got:
We polled the political label "Libertarian" as part of the polling we did at the end of April. In CD14, Democrats felt overwhelmingly negatively about "Libertarian". And Republicans liked it even less.
So there you have it. There's more about the ads here.
Kenny Boy Lay's criminal record has been officially wiped clean.
Former Enron Chairman Ken Lay's criminal conviction was vacated and his indictment dismissed by a judge today.U.S. District Judge Sim Lake granted the request by Lay's estate to vacate the conviction, an outcome that was widely anticipated given legal precedent. He also dismissed the indictment used to bring him to trial earlier this year.
Lay died July 5, just weeks after a jury found him guilty on six charges of conspiracy and fraud and Lake found him guilty on four charges of bank fraud.
In his decision, Lake cited a decision in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals that makes death, before the appeals process has been exhausted, grounds for throwing out a conviction and dismissing an indictment.
I totally understand the rationale behind this, and even though I don't like the fact that the main effect will be to screw the civil suit plaintiffs, I can't say I disagree with it. That's the way it goes.
The Department of Justice tried to trump that precedent, however, when it asked Congress in early September to pass a law that would essentially prevent courts from vacating criminal convictions if a defendant dies before going through the entire appeals process.The government asked Lake to at least wait until Oct. 23, when Lay was scheduled to be sentenced.
The proposed law does not appear to have been picked up a sponsor in Congress.
This was a two-bit maneuver by the prosecutors, and it deserved to be ignored. Tom called it for what it was last month. I don't agree with his overall evaluation of the prosecutors and their methods, but another stunt like that and I'll give it some serious consideration.
Jeff Skilling will be sentenced today. Tom has a preview of that, and he contrasts it to the fate of Andrew Fastow and Rick Causey.
UPDATE: More here.
I would have blogged about John Lopez's latest comic masterpiece before now, but I kept laughing too hard every time I tried to set fingers to keyboard. Honestly, the man is funnier than Robin Williams at the Metropolitan Opera House.
The first Bowl Championship Series poll was released Sunday and while we won't go into the whole playoff discussion - I think you know I stand firmly behind the idea - clearly the BCS brought to light a bigger, more pressing problem.It's all a lie.
The BCS standings include the appropriate No. 1, Ohio State, and much-deserved acclaim for Michigan at No. 3. But after that, the standings reflect the misguided belief that the Big 12 is down, and the best football is played elsewhere.
It took seven weeks and a number of enlightening moments involving alleged superpower conferences and teams. But the BCS standings have it all wrong, and the Texas Longhorns - ranked No. 9 in the first poll - are the unfortunate victims.
I think what he's saying here is that he loves the BCS as long as it ranks the teams the way he thinks they should be ranked. Otherwise, it's a piece of junk.
Most of the rest is his subjective opinion about how Texas and the Big XII is so much better than anybody else. He's entitled to all that, of course, and frankly I don't care if he's right or not. What amuses me is that the whole point of the BCS system was to produce a reasonably objective ranking of all the teams, so as to overcome the subjective, regional, and structural biases of the polls and give the real title contenders their due. And here's Lopez, who's a faithful defender of the BCS, saying it's all a lie because any fool like him can plainly see that Texas and the Big XII are getting shafted. In his opinion.
I say live by the convoluted ever-tweaked ranking system, die by the convoluted ever-tweaked ranking system. I'm a playoff proponent, so the annual BCS bitchfest always warms my heart. But what really takes this column over the top, from the usual Lopez stylings to all-time unintentional comedy masterpiece, is the final paragraph.
But in the BCS, Texas has a formidable hill to climb from No. 9, and other deserving Big 12 teams won't even get a sniff. Everyone who believed the hype should think again. Others have foundered, but the little league that couldn't has proved it deserves better.
"The little league that couldn't"? He's not really referring to the Big XII, is he? The made-for-ESPN/ABC, ultimate Big Conference, insiders' dream that is the Big XII? Wow. This would be like Tom DeLay claiming that his demise was caused by "entrenched Beltway interests". Next he'll tell me that Mack Brown is a "scrappy underdog" who's "speaking truth to power". I think I need to lie down, I'm feeling lightheaded.
UPDATE: Just to prove that Lopez is a man for all conferences, here he is calling for Miami president Donna Shalala's head for her lack of satisfactory-to-him action in the aftermath of the brawl against Florida International, yet never mentioning another ugly brawl that happened to involve his alma mater. I largely agree with the point he's trying to make, but he could at least acknowledge that.
No surprise here, given the Chron's usual preference for incumbents. I suspect there will be a few cracks in that wall this time around in legislative races - we've already seen some examples - but not for judges. The one Democrat they recommend is running for an open seat; otherwise, it's all Rs, including a couple of appointees. Can't say I'm surprised, but I am disappointed. If you want to know something about the folks they passed over, I did Q&As with three of the Democratic candidates:
Leora T. Kahn - Interview
Chuck Silverman - Interview
Bill Connolly - Interview
Amazing. Just amazing. Here's a video clip of Martha Wong on KUHT's "The Connection", which was done last week after the debate at Rice. My quick transcription of what Martha says here:
Wong: "I'm going to tell you that Carolyn Boyles (sic), who is the President of the Parent PAC, has sent me a personal email that told me 'thank you for helping the children of Texas, and thank you for what you will do in the future for children'. I think that tells you that she thinks I am going to win this election."
To which Ellen Cohen replies "Except that what she said at the press conference (at which ParentPAC endorsed Ellen Cohen) was that Martha has been totally against public education."
I asked Carolyn Boyle about this. Here's what she said to me:
I listened to a recording of the Houston PBS debate between Ellen Cohen and Martha Wong. When Ellen Cohen mentioned Texas Parent PAC had endorsed her, Wong retorted that she had received an email from "Carolyn Boyles" thanking her for all she had done for public education. As soon as Ms. Wong made that statement, Ellen Cohen fired back, "Well that's not what Carolyn said in our press conference when she said you've done nothing for public education."
Here's the rest of the story. I was told by a friend in Houston Martha Wong was disappointed that Texas Parent PAC endorsed Ellen Cohen without talking to her. I wanted to explain to Ms. Wong how the PAC board made its decision. So I called and had a 10 minute conversation with her. I said the PAC board did not need to meet with her because we were able to review her voting record on public education, education bills authored and sponsored, and comments in committee and on the House floor. Plus, we interviewed over the phone a number of parents, educators, and public education advocates who had tried to get Ms. Wong to listen to their pro-public school positions on various bills. Ms. Wong told me her voting record did not reflect her strong support for public education, so we should have talked to her. Huh?
Ms. Wong concluded the conversation by saying something like children were #1 with her, not protecting the education bureaucracy. I told her I would email her the Parent PAC eight guiding principles and she could see children were #1 with our board of directors. So then I emailed her the principles and concluded with a nice throwoff line (see below). I try to be a gracious person--particularly when I just told someone over the phone that Texas Parent PAC did not endorse her because of a consistently poor voting record on public education.
Because I knew the context in which that email was sent, I was really surprised Martha Wong would mention my line from an email in the campaign debate, implying that I thought she was doing a good job at the Capitol!
Carolyn Boyle, Chair, Texas Parent PAC
****************************************************************From: Carolyn Boyle
Sent: Tuesday, September 12, 2006 11:37 AM
To: martha@marthawong.com
Subject: Texas Parent PACRepresentative Wong:
Thank you for taking the time to visit with me this morning. Attached are the "Guiding Principles" of Texas Parent PAC that I mentioned. You'll see that children are #1 with us, too!
We appreciate all you have done and will do for the children of Texas.
Carolyn Boyle
So Martha Wong took a generic pleasantry and turned it into a formal endorsement. Where have I heard that before?
If you really want to know what Carolyn Boyle and the Texas Parent PAC think about Martha Wong, here's an excerpt from Boyle's statement at the August 29 press conference at which Cohen got their endorsement:
Ellen Cohen will be a terrific state legislator. Unlike the incumbent, Ellen Cohen will listen to the folks in her legislative district and always vote in the public interest. Unlike the incumbent, Ellen Cohen will be part of the solution instead of part of the problem.Over the past several days, I’ve been talking with parent and school leaders in this area about their experiences with Martha Wong since she was elected in 2003. Everyone I talked with said disappointing things.
Martha Wong rarely votes as public school parents and teachers urge her to vote. For example, the Texas Classroom Teachers Association posts on-line how legislators voted in 2005 on 17 public school matters, and Martha Wong voted wrong on all 17.
Several local leaders told me they just quit talking to Martha Wong about public education bills, because she never wanted to help, was abrasive, and often said things to discredit public schools.
There have been many “line in the sand” votes at the Capitol to determine legislators’ support for public education; Martha Wong rarely votes on the side of educators and public school parents. For example:
* In 2003, Martha Wong voted to cut funding for new textbooks, the math/reading/science initiative, after school programs, teacher health insurance, and teacher training.
* In the recent special session, Martha Wong voted to keep all revenue from Governor Perry’s business tax from ever funding public education.
* In 2005, Martha Wong supported a bill that would take away $600 million from public schools to pay private school tuition.
I observed Martha Wong at the Capitol in 2003 speaking in favor of the first education bill she ever filed as a legislator. It was an irresponsible bill with a blank check from the taxpayers. H.B. 2101 would have allowed any certified teacher or administrator in Texas to open an unregulated private school funded by taxpayers. Martha Wong’s private academies would be publicly funded at a cost of $175 million per year but have no accountability to the public - no TAKS testing, no curriculum requirements, no required teacher qualifications. Fortunately, fellow legislators recognized the many problems with Martha Wong’s bad bill and it died in committee.
Texas Parent PAC cares about many issues that affect parents and children, but our primary focus is high quality public education. Martha Wong has earned a grade of "F" for her leadership and voting record on public education.
I don't think it could be any less equivocal than that. I don't know what Martha Wong is thinking when she tries to claim that somehow Carolyn Boyle supports her, but whatever it is, she's wrong. Just plain wrong.
Houston's new downtown park has a name.
Houston's showcase downtown park will be called Discovery Green, officials announced at a groundbreaking ceremony today.The name was selected from among 6,200 entries in a public contest, said Guy Hagstette, park director for the Houston Downtown Park Conservancy.
Eh. Not particularly zippy, but not embarrassing. At least they didn't call it Houston 1836. Nobody else seems terribly impressed, either: Katya would have chosen "The Big Howdy" (can't say I agree with that, but I'll stiplulate to its zippiness); Houstonist says "it sounds a lot like one of those stores that sells educational toys for kids"; Lair calls it "Mean Joe's nerdy younger brother"; and HouStoned was pushing for it to be named after Lightnin' Hopkins. There's a choice I could've really gotten behind.
Oh, well. Like I said, boring but not embarrassing. What were you expecting?
One more thing:
The conservancy has raised most of the projected $81 million cost of the project, mostly from private sources. Parts of the park are scheduled to open next fall, with the entire park open by January 2008.
I don't suppose it would be possible for them to loan a couple of those millions to help out this park, would it? Alas.
He trails badly in cash on hand. He gets no love from the newspapers. He's 20 points down in the polls. And now Van Taylor can say bye-bye to NRCC support.
The Republican Party’s national campaign organization appears to be yanking major financial backing from Taylor’s race to focus instead on incumbents who face serious Democratic challenges.An advertising campaign costing more than $1 million - similar to one benefiting the last Republican nominee to challenge Edwards two years ago - has been pulled, according to Edwards’ sources at five Dallas TV stations.
A Dallas-area TV station confirmed that the National Republican Congressional Committee canceled a large advertising buy apparently intended for Taylor.
[...]
The NRCC appeared to be pulling away the same day The New York Times, in a front page story, reported that the group is shifting its cash to 26 Republican-held seats and just three Democratic ones in a bid to hold on to the U.S. House of Representatives by winning at least 218 of the 435 seats.
The Edwards-Taylor race didn’t figure into the top 20 races garnering the bulk of GOP money, according to the Times and Federal Election Commission filings. The national party’s change in tactics comes amid discouraging news from Iraq and several scandals involving Republican lawmakers.
[...]
In the Dallas area, Steve McDonald, sales manager for KDAV-TV, said the NRCC had reserved a block of political ads for late in the campaign season but recently declined the order. He said he did not know who the candidate was, but Taylor had been identified as the candidate in an Associated Press report.
To cancel the ads would signal a different strategy from two years ago, when state Rep. Arlene Wohlgemuth, R-Burleson, was the GOP nominee. In the end, however, the advertising blitz on Wohlgemuth’s behalf failed to topple Edwards.
“I think it means they are writing (Taylor) off,” Tom Myers, a Baylor University associate professor of political science, said of the latest developments involving the NRCC.
“They have good polling data and I would suspect that their data indicates that he’s not within striking distance and so they want to put their money in races where they think there is greater chance of a positive pay-off,” Myers said.
Taylor’s personal wealth - he has contributed $575,000 to his campaign so far - makes the economic hit less severe, Myers said, but the perception his campaign is viewed with less optimism by party leaders could still hurt.
He can always call up Shelley Sekula Gibbs and commiserate with her. She's been there. Thanks to Kent for the tip.
Say Hello to the three hundred millionth American.
When America passed 300 million in population this morning, according to at least one expert, the milestone may well have been reached by a baby boy born to a Mexican immigrant at a Los Angeles hospital.In 2043, when the U.S. population is expected to hit 400 million, Hispanics will figure even more significantly in Texas and across the nation, according to projections.
By then, Texas promises to be utterly transformed as it contributes significantly to national trends.
The state will more than double its population, to 45 million from 22.8 million, by 2040, according to the Census Bureau projections
[...]
By 2040, Texas will have about two Hispanics for every Anglo, according to state demographer Steve Murdock. Blacks will make up 8 percent to 10 percent of the population, Asians and other ethnic groups 6 percent to 8 percent.
[...]
Murdock, who heads the Texas State Data Center at the University of Texas in San Antonio, said anyone curious about what the nation will look like with 400 million people should examine Texas. When it comes to demographics, he said, the United States tends to follow the state's lead.
He pointed out that the Census Bureau projects that ethnic minorities will make up 47 percent of the country by 2040, with Anglos comprising the remainder. Texas looked like that six years ago, Murdock said.
"The Texas of today is the U.S. of tomorrow," he said.
I just hope I live long enough to see it. To #300,000,000, whoever and wherever you are, welcome. Make yourself at home.
The revised city ordinance on smoking in bars, which was put off for a week, will come up again tomorrow. The Austin attorney who successfully sued to have parts of that city's anti-smoking law overturned has sent a letter to Council asking that they make some more changes before they vote again.
Attorney Marc Levin, who represented bar owners and smokers in a lawsuit that prompted a judge earlier this month to rule that Austin bar owners can't be held liable if a customer refuses to stop smoking because the city's law is too vague, said in a letter that Houston's proposal has its own problems."I very much hope that you postpone voting on the proposed smoking ordinance until its economic and legal implications can be more fully evaluated," wrote Levin, who also said he believes restaurant and bar owners will lose business if a stricter ban is implemented in Houston.
City Attorney Arturo Michel said his staff is considering Levin's suggestions, but he believes the wording of the ordinance is sufficient.
"I didn't see anything in that letter that caused me to think we'd have to rework (it)," he said. "I think our ordinance is fine in terms of being upheld in court."
[...]
Houston's proposal would require a "person in control of an area where smoking is prohibited" to ask a customer to stop smoking. The owner could not be held liable if the individual did not comply.
Levin suggested the vague nature of that wording could cause problems.
"Would that be the owner, a manager, a bartender or doorman?" he asked. "It seems that the person would have had to have seen the person light up. If this is indeed the case, working-class bartenders are going to bear the brunt of this ordinance."
Michel said he did not believe it was too vague. "It's drafted to try to capture the different types of people who would be (enforcing the law) in a bar at that time," he said.
It was the enforcement provisions in Austin's law, which was approved by voters in a referendum last year, that caused problems there. U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks said that owners must post "no smoking" signs and remove ashtrays but do not have to enforce the rule beyond that, according to an online copy of the ruling.
Based on what I'm reading here, I tend to think Michel is right, and that the Houston ordinance does not have the same flaw that doomed Austin's law. I'm not an attorney, and I'm not reading from the original source here, so take all that with an appropriate level of salt. All I can say for sure is that I'm not getting slapped in the face by something that's obviously got the same issues as the Austin statute. Whether that's sufficient to keep the lawyers happy is up to them.
Get ready for a debate in Clear Lake between Sherrie Matula and Rep. John Davis for HD129. From the press release:
Houston, Texas - October 16h, 2006 -- Students for Political Debate, an independent student group in the Clear Lake area, is set to host a debate between Representative John Davis and Sherrie Matula in the District 129 congressional race on Wednesday October 25, 2006. The event will be take place in the auditorium of The University of Houston Clear Lake. The auditorium is located on the second floor of the Bayou Building, maps and directions are available at uhcl.edu. There will be a "meet the candidates" session from 6:30-7:00 PM before the debate. The actual debate will start at 7:00 and will end at 8:30. The audience will be allowed to submit questions before the debate. This debate format will allow voters to determine the issues which are important to them.Students for Political Debate is a group of high School students committed to providing the public with the opportunity to hear from the candidates vying to represent them.
"It is wonderful, high school students are getting involved with the politics that will affect their schools, their community, and their future. As a former teacher, I am honored to accept the invitation and look forward to the event." said Sherrie Matula.
"I am very proud of these students for taking the leadership to organize this event. It is very important that the citizens of Clear Lake hear the issues." said Rep. John Davis.
Kudos to Davis for having the guts to actually debate his opponent in a public venue that's open to the press. Too bad John Carter and John Culberson don't have that kind of faith in their own constituents.
For a preview of what to expect from Sherrie Matula, read what she has to say about the recent voucher hearings. For more background on Davis, the Muse is your source. See here, here, and here.
When I was growing up in New York, the guy who owned the Syms men's clothing franchise was their main advertising pitchman. His catch phrase (which is still the company's motto, apparently) was that "An educated consumer is our best customer." Here in Texas, an educated consumer is exactly what the homebuilding industry does not want.
Used to be, diligent consumers would check out complaints against builders at the attorney general's office, look for major lawsuits at the courthouse, and investigate credentials.But now that's getting harder to do because the Texas Attorney General's Office stopped processing all consumer complaints three years ago, and there are fewer homeowner lawsuits at the courthouse because of binding arbitration clauses in contracts.
And, a new state-mandated credential - a registration with the Texas Residential Construction Commission - doesn't carry as much weight as some consumers may think, consumer advocates say.
[...]
If the [Attorny General's] office thinks it can help consumers, it will, but if it deems another agency may be more helpful or that the consumer needs legal representation, it refers the complainant out.
So consumers investigating a builder may request all complaints filed with the attorney general's office and information on any actions taken against someone. But if the complaint was farmed out, it could be difficult to learn how the complaint was resolved or if it was justified.
Consumers should note that the attorney general's office keeps count of complaints going back several years, but physical records are kept for just two years.
Consumers also used to be told to go to the courthouse to check for any major lawsuits against a builder.
But, that's getting harder because most builders have mandatory arbitration clauses in their contracts, restraining homeowners from suing, said Janet Ahmad, a San Antonio-based consumer advocate who heads HomeOwners for Better Building.
There are few homeowner lawsuits because many builders, with the exception of KB, require binding arbitration, she said.
[...]
[T]rying to learn the outcome of an arbitration is difficult.
That's because arbitrations, by their nature, are secretive and their results tend to be sealed when they are filed with the court.
Plus, even though the Texas Residential Construction Commission allows companies and consumers to report arbitration awards to the agency within 30 days of filing it in court, the commission has received only eight filings in its three-year existence.
Ahmad said that may be because some cases take considerable time to resolve and some companies probably just do not want the information to be public.
And on and on. Remember that in order to be allowed to file a lawsuit against a builder, where the outcome is public record, you first have to go through the aforementioned TRCC, one of whose members is the right-hand man of zillionaire homebuilder Bob Perry. Hey, the game may be rigged, but it's the only game in town, you know?
I'd have pointed you to this Express-News story about blogs no matter what since I'm quoted in it, and the rules of blogging state that any media mention must be trumpeted, but there's an angle here that fascinates me.
During the recent gubernatorial debate, independent Kinky Friedman cast the Internet as "the work of Satan." Considering the swipes bloggers have taken at his campaign, his stance may be understandable.Last month, a Democratic-leaning blog called the Burnt Orange Report posted audio of a racially charged joke the satirist made during a 1980 performance he later said - in news reports that followed the posting - was packed with material to offend everyone.
The blog and others also recycled an excerpt from a cable news interview a year ago in which Friedman said sexual predators should sit in prison with "a Negro talking to himself."
The online snippets emerged shortly after a TV news interview in which Friedman had referred to some Hurricane Katrina evacuees remaining in Houston as "crackheads and thugs."
The resulting uproar put Friedman in the uneasy position of denying he was a racist.
[...]
Despite Friedman's distaste for the Internet, his spokeswoman, Laura Stromberg, said she reads as many as a dozen blogs per day - not that she often likes what she reads about her candidate.
"The blogs do tend to break a lot of stories," Stromberg said. "These blogs - the mainstream media monitor them to some extent. That's why I never underestimate them."
But unlike newspapers, most political blogs, which often swap information with one another, make no bones about their leanings.
"These blogs all have an agenda, and they have no accountability," Stromberg said.
Of course we have accountability. You should see the status reports that Kos makes us all fill out on a daily basis. Dude makes us document our time in six-minute intervals. You don't want to know what happens if we take too many potty breaks during the day.
Just kidding. But when someone writes the postmortem of this election, I'll want to know why it is that an outsider campaign like Kinky's didn't leverage blogs to its own advantage from the beginning. Friedman in particular could have gotten national coverage of his campaign this way, and it would have been more than the same old "hey look! he's a comedian! and he's running for governor!" puff pieces that have plagued us since 2003. It's a bit mindboggling to realize that the two independent candidates - the people without any built-in political infrastructure to depend on - had easily the crappiest online presence in the race. Obviously, both Friedman and Strayhorn built enough of a community to easily clear the petition requirement to get on the ballot. Maybe I'm myopic, but I don't see that they've done all that much with that community since then.
What blogging can do for a campaign, as much as anything, is help establish a narrative - about the candidate, about the opposition, about the campaign and the people involved with it. Distributed opposition research is an added bonus. I think a lot of what's dogged Kinky Friedman, Gene Seaman, and Martha Wong would have been in the news without blogs, but it's clear that blogs have driven a nontrivial amount of that coverage. Friedman hasn't been able to do anything about it but play defense. That just feels like a lot of lost opportunity to me.
Bottom line is that I don't know why any campaign wouldn't want to actively engage potential allies via blogs. I really don't know why a so-called "outsider" campaign wouldn't want to do that. Maybe some day someone within the Friedman campaign will articulate the logic behind that decision.
Finally, if you want some more evidence of how blogs can affect campaigns and how a good candidate might try to avoid the Friedman mistake and engage them, Mark has a long and thorough post on the subject. Check it out.
Here's Shane Sklar getting endorsed by the Victoria Advocate.
"Dr. No" is a joke in Washington. At no time was this more obvious than in May 2004, when he was the lone House member to vote against a nonbinding resolution protesting the Vietnamese government's human rights abuses.The House urged Hanoi to release a Roman Catholic priest who was detained three years earlier because he had written a report describing the lack of religious freedom in that country. Only Ron Paul voted no.
Retiring him from Congress for a third - and final - time is long overdue. Fortunately, voters in the 14th District have an intelligent, articulate, energetic, native Texan alternative to represent them in the House.
Shane Sklar was born in Victoria into a multigeneration Texas ranching family. Although he is only 30, the Edna resident has an impressive record of effective service in both the public and private sectors.
[...]
The young Democrat is as sensibly moderate as the Republican incumbent is wackily libertarian. Because of that, Sklar garnered endorsements from organizations across the ideological spectrum, from the conservative National Rifle Association to liberal teachers and other unions.
Economic development, agriculture, national security, health, energy, ethics and fiscal responsibility are issues Sklar believes are important. He knows, as his opponent does not, that reflexive no votes are not the right way to address these issues, either on a regional basis for the 14th District or on a national basis for the country as a whole.
We do not fully agree with Sklar on his approach to all the issues he has identified as important. But we agree with him on more than enough of them to believe he is a far better alternative than the incumbent.
More important, the young Edna rancher has demonstrated that he has the ability to think through issues carefully and making sensible, informed decisions that would benefit this part of Texas in concrete ways.
The 14th Congressional District needs to be represented by a real leader, not an ineffective ideologue.
Voters should bring Ron Paul home for the last time and send Shane Sklar to Congress to provide that much-needed real leadership.
Now that's what I'm talking about. More like this, please.
Elsewhere, Robert Ricketts gets a nice endorsement from the Star Telegram for CD19.
Ricketts, 45, is a certified public accountant with bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees in accounting. He teaches tax courses. He has an excellent grasp of the long-term funding crises facing the Social Security and Medicare programs and the need to reduce the heavy federal budget deficits of recent years. He favors a return to the responsible bipartisan tax-and-spending policies of the late 1990s that produced budget surpluses and reduced wasteful spending.Ricketts, who lives just north of Lubbock, strongly favors developing alternative energy technologies such as wind power and raising federal fuel economy standards for passenger vehicles.
He wants to curb illegal immigration by developing a reliable system whereby employers could verify that job applicants have valid Social Security cards. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 failed because it wasn't enforced in the workplace, Ricketts said.
Put simply, Ricketts is a more impressive candidate than the incumbent, Rep. Randy Neugebauer, R-Lubbock, who has held the seat since 2003 and previously was a Lubbock developer. Neugebauer, 56, declined to meet with or be interviewed by the Star-Telegram Editorial Board.
CD19 is not high on my list of potentially competitive seats - frankly, if Charlie Stenholm couldn't hold it, there ain't much hope - but Ricketts has run a spirited campaign. Anyone who can do so in such unfriendly territory deserves respect.
The Statesman follows the lead of the Morning News and endorses Bill Moody for the Texas Supreme Court. They also join with the DMN in lamenting the lack of serious opposition to Court of Criminal Appeals jurist Sharon Keller.
Unfortunately, the Express News chose George Antuna over Joe Farias in HD118. They redeem themselves somewhat by slamming Kinky Friedman.
Kinky Friedman's gubernatorial candidacy is the mirror image of his musical career. He's a novelty act.Like novelty songs, the one-liners are funny at first, but the Kinkster doesn't wear well on repeated listenings.
Take the away the edginess and the hipster veneer, and Friedman is just another Ray Stevens. Nobody is particularly interested in hearing Stevens sing "The Streak" again, and Friedman's stock phrases - such as "How hard can it be?" and "Why the hell not?" - have worn out their welcome, too.
Friedman's been repeating the same jokes for almost three years now. But hey, as long as people notice.
I've got to give ol' Shelley some credit. She did a decent job raising money last quarter. I'm sure there was some pent-up demand for a Republican candidate in CD22, and I know for a fact that Nick Lampson eased up on the accelerator a bit, but still, she had a decent haul. Too bad for her that the NRCC has already written her off.
Some other observations from the September 30 FEC filing:
Chet Edwards has $1.5 million on hand. Van Taylor has $100K, plus a $250K loan to himself. Any questions?
Shane Sklar and Will Pryor are the two top non-Lampson Democratic challengers in terms of fundraising. Each will have collected about $500K total when all is said and done. I still think the DCCC would have been better off taking that $850K it has reserved for Lampson and spreading it around other districts, like these two. But that's just me.
No clue yet how the CD23 challengers are doing. Only Ciro Rodriguez has a current report, and his totals are skewed by the amount he raised during the primary. He has very little on hand, though. I'll be very interested to see how Lukin Gilliland and Albert Uresti have fared.
Netroots favorite John Courage has acquitted himself well in fundraising, which is all the more impressive given how much steeper the hill he has to climb is post-SCOTUS. The ActBlue Netroots candidates page accounts for a little less than 10% of his total take, with another $22K coming from elsewhere on ActBlue.
Mary Beth Harrell ($155K) and Jim Henley ($95K) will each raise over $100K by November 7. The top five non-Lampson Democratic challengers have combined for over $1.4 million in fundraising, with more to come. The difference between this year's crop of challengers and 2004's is night and day.
Note, by the way, that neither of Harrell nor Henley's opponents (the Debate-Ducking Duo, if you will) has all that much cash in the bank right now. How far do you think $200K or so from the DCCC might go in CDs31 and 07? We'll never know.
I wonder how much those billboards Culberson rented are setting him back. (I could probably try to figure it out from the FEC page, but I'm rather hoping someone will do it for me now that I've asked.) I certainly don't recall him spending so obviously in 2004.
The Chron continues its long, slow march through the endorsement process with three more recommendations in State Rep races. Two of their endorsements went to Democrats, one for an open seat and one for a GOP-held seat.
State representative, District 133, Kristi Thibaut - A former legislative aide, Thibaut has the knowledge and experience to represent her constituents effectively. The Democratic nominee, Thibaut recognizes that Texas cannot afford to shortchange its schools. Her Republican opponent, Jim Murphy, opposes promising embryonic stem cell research and a woman's right to choose abortion.[...]
State representative, District 138, Mark McDavid - The Democratic nominee, McDavid seeks needed change in Austin. He favors stricter regulations to reduce pollution in air and water, as well as adequate funding for schools and state parks. He faces an uphill battle against long-serving Republican incumbent Dwayne Bohac, but the Chronicle believes McDavid is the better candidate. In the last session, Bohac inexplicably resisted reasonable efforts to reform the school finance system and reduce industrial pollution in Houston.
The third endorsement was for incumbent Republican and TRMPAC errand girl Beverly Woolley. If you're keeping score, that's two out of three I called correctly this go-round, and 20 out of 21 in State Rep races so far. Four more to go, in HDs 126 (Khan/Harless), 127 (Trautman/Crabb), 129 (Matula/Davis), and 150 (Nelson-Turnier/Riddle).
As a reminder, you can listen to my interviews with the candidates here:
Thibaut
McDavid
Scott Brann, Woolley's opponent in HD136.
The announcement of the winner of the contest to name the new downtown park has been postponed until tomorrow due to the nasty rain in the Houston area. Not clear to me that tomorrow will be better, but you can't do it today, that's for sure.
For all I know, it may be just one person, but what the heck. That'd still make it bigger than "Democrats for Culberson". Somebody alert Paul Burka.
The sign is on the north side of Westheimer and Maconda (between Weslayan and Buffalo Speedway), facing eastbound traffic. A view from across the street is here.
I've got a full transcription of my recent interview with Rice computer science professor and electronic voting machine expert Dan Wallach over at Kuff's World. If you'd prefer to download it in Word doc format, you can get a copy here. My eternal thanks to Andrea for her excellent work in producing this for me.
Via Eye on Williamson, I see that the Statesman endorsed all Republicans in the non-gubernatorial non-judicial statewide races. The one that is boggling me is this one:
Agriculture commissionerThis race pits two men who live within 30 miles of each other in deep East Texas, Republican state Sen. Todd Staples, 43, of Palestine and Democrat Hank Gilbert, 46, a Smith County rancher and former agriculture teacher. Staples is a two-term state senator making his first run for statewide office.
Interestingly, his campaign opposes the Republican-supported Trans Texas Corridor, at least in its current form. Thousands of Texans with roots in agriculture oppose the superhighway that bisects the state because it requires so much private property and takes so many acres out of crop production.
Wait a minute. Todd Staples' campaign opposes the Trans-Texas Corridor, in any form? You're telling me that the guy who wrote this is trying to claim that he somehow opposes the TTC? This is like saying that Donald Rumsfeld opposes the Iraq War in its current form.
Opposing the TTC means you don't want to see it built because you think it's bad policy. It does not mean you want to see it tweaked around the edges. Todd Staples is an enabler of the TTC. To call it anything else - to let him call it anything else - is just plain dishonest. How can they not even acknowledge the disconnect?
And this is the guy the Statesman endorsed for Ag Commissioner. Unbelievable. "Liberal media", my rear end.
I've been attending Rice football games since 1988, my first season with the MOB. Yesterday's game was the first time I've seen the Owls come from behind in the fourth quarter to win. I've seen plenty of come-from-ahead losses, enough to haunt my dreams into the next lieftime, and more than one comeback attempt that fell short, but never before a game-winning drive. On the Rice fan forum, someone suggested the 1992 win over Baylor as the previous instance, but that game would have ended in a tie had Rice failed in its last chance. This one would have been a loss, a loss in a game that Rice had led throughout. I can't begin to tell you how sweet that is.
And if Rice receiver Jarrett Dillard (11 TD catches this season and counting) doesn't get serious consideration for All America honors, then something is very wrong. Watch this guy play - he's something else.
There was a story in yesterday's Chron about a State Senate hearing on "school choice", which is the euphemism given for vouchers. I think there are two points that need to be made.
Much of the public testimony Friday centered on the success of the privately funded voucher program that's been operating in the San Antonio-area Edgewood school district for eight years. Hundreds of students there attend the public or private school of their choice because of the initiative."My future is bright because I had the opportunity to learn more than I ever would have at my neighborhood school," said Casandra Juarez, 17, a senior at the Christian Academy of San Antonio.
The effort is partly funded by San Antonio businessman James Leininger, who has spent millions of dollars trying to unseat elected officials who have voted down legislative attempts to create a state-funded pilot voucher program.
The inequities and funding shortages in Texas' public school system are driving the move toward school vouchers, advocates said.
"School choice is the civil rights issue of the 21st century," said Isabel Santa, spokeswoman for the Hispanic Council for Reform and Educational Options. But the legal and political roadblocks of using tax money to offset private school tuition are tremendous, some said.
"It violates the concept in our U.S. Constitution of separation of church and state," said Robert Schaffer, a member of the regional board for the Anti-Defamation League.
Channeling tax money to private schools will only worsen the problems plaguing public schools, voucher critics said.
Rather, they said, state money should be spent reducing class size, improving teacher quality and expanding magnet, charter and other offerings.
If you know anything about James Leininger, you understand that his support of vouchers is primarily about moving children away from secular public schools and into Christian private schools. His is a mission of evangelism. He may well believe that this is a better way to provide education, but the bottom line is that he wants that education to be Christian, and by that I mean his form of conservative Christian. Everything else flows from that.
(By the way, when you hear Carole Keeton Strayhorn claim to oppose vouchers, remember that she wouldn't be where she is now if it weren't for James Leininger.)
Point two is that this really is all about money. There's a reason that the best schools are usually expensive private schools. Schools that have all the resources they need are going to be able to provide a better environment for their students. How much improvement do you think we could get if we ensured that every school had a modern physical plant, adequate security, up-to-date textbooks, lab equipment, musical instruments, and other materials, and a full complement of teachers and support staff? I'll tell you what - if we ever do meet that baseline and there are still schools that fail to produce a satisfactory level of successful students, then you can talk to me about vouchers. Until then, I say we haven't addressed the real problem.
Kimberly sat through this meeting and gives a report on who said what. Check it out.
Via TPM Muckraker, here's a list of big expenditures by the NRCC, all of which were made on Friday the 13th. Notice anyone missing?
In case you haven't figured it out, here's all the dough that's being spent in CD22 as of this round of expenditures:
FEATHER LARSON & SYNHORST DCI
2401 W. BEHREND DRIVE SUITE 7
PHOENIX, Arizona 85027Purpose of Expenditure: Phone Banks
This Committee SUPPORTS The Following Candidate: SHELLEY SEKULA-GIBBS
Office Sought: House of Representatives
State is Texas in District 22
Date Expended = 10/13/2006
Person Completing Form: CHRISTOPHER J. WARD
Date Signed = 10/13/2006
Amount Expended = $383.76
Calendar YTD Per Election for Office Sought = $373021.61FEATHER LARSON & SYNHORST DCI
2401 W. BEHREND DRIVE SUITE 7
PHOENIX, Arizona 85027Purpose of Expenditure: Phone Banks
This Committee OPPOSES The Following Candidate: LAMPSON FOR CONGRESS
Office Sought: House of Representatives
State is Texas in District 22
Date Expended = 10/13/2006
Person Completing Form: CHRISTOPHER J. WARD
Date Signed = 10/13/2006
Amount Expended = $383.76
Calendar YTD Per Election for Office Sought = $373021.61FEATHER LARSON & SYNHORST DCI
2401 W. BEHREND DRIVE SUITE 7
PHOENIX, Arizona 85027Purpose of Expenditure: Phone Banks
This Committee SUPPORTS The Following Candidate: SHELLEY SEKULA-GIBBS
Office Sought: House of Representatives
State is Texas in District 22
Date Expended = 10/13/2006
Person Completing Form: CHRISTOPHER J. WARD
Date Signed = 10/13/2006
Amount Expended = $1832.64
Calendar YTD Per Election for Office Sought = $373021.61FEATHER LARSON & SYNHORST DCI
2401 W. BEHREND DRIVE SUITE 7
PHOENIX, Arizona 85027Purpose of Expenditure: Phone Banks
This Committee OPPOSES The Following Candidate: LAMPSON FOR CONGRESS
Office Sought: House of Representatives
State is Texas in District 22
Date Expended = 10/13/2006
Person Completing Form: CHRISTOPHER J. WARD
Date Signed = 10/13/2006
Amount Expended = $1832.64
Calendar YTD Per Election for Office Sought = $373021.61
I'm not sure if that represents four separate expenditures or just the opposite sides of two buys, but whether it's $2K or $4K, either way it ain't much. I presume the $373K refers to the total amount spent by Feather Larsen this cycle - feel free to chime in if you can clarify further.
One of the things that I love about the Heights is that there's interesting and odd stuff to see everywhere you look. Yesterday, I was driving along 14th Street when I passed by the International Order of Odd Fellows lodge, and decided I needed to take a few pictures.
Click the photo to see the larger size, or click here to see the set. I took a few other photos of interest yesterday and will have more posts about them soon.
In other hot debate action, Gene Seaman is still complaining about that truthful ad that's being run against him.
State Rep. Gene Seaman told a crowd of 200 Rockport-Fulton Area Chamber of Commerce members that a series of ads paid for by supporters of his opponent are hurting his family.
"Shame on the people who run those kinds of ads," he said, his voice cracking.Juan Garcia, the Democrat trying to unseat Seaman, also addressed advertising against him, which paints him as a "liberal" and a lawyer trying to repeal tort reform.
Garcia defended his law practice saying that he is not the kind of lawyer who files frivolous lawsuits; he is a defense lawyer who fights them. His focus would lie in reducing property taxes, promoting stronger ethics and making sure that the votes legislators make are recorded, he added.
Garcia also said ads paid for by his campaign, rather than those paid for by pro-Garcia lawyer Mikal Watts, have focused on issues, not personalities.
Watts' ads criticize Seaman for using campaign funds to pay rent on an Austin condo owned by Seaman's wife, Ellen, and for dual homestead/over-65 exemptions granted on the condo when the couple's primary residence is in Corpus Christi.
Poor Gene. Here's the ad again, so you can judge for yourself whether it's in bounds or not. Remember that none of the facts are in dispute, just how one might interpret them.
As South Texas Chisme reminds us, Seaman's first response to this story was to blame the whole thing on his wife. What a stand-up guy. PinkDome has more.
Hal brings word of a party.
The Fort Bend Democrats and The Fort Bend Democratic Party are having one . . . a party, that is. Well, in this case, given the guest speaker is Paul Begala, they're having a gala.Where: Quail Valley Country Club - 2880 La Quinta Drive, Missouri City, Texas
When: Friday, October 20th, 6:30-9:30 PM[...]
Paul Begala grew up in Stafford, Texas, and attended Dulles High School. So Begala will be back home next week helping to raise money for our Democratic candidates.
There'll be no tickets sold at the door, so you need to get up off your heinies and get advance tickets to the Begala Gala.
Thanks to the miracle of in-town grandparents, Tiffany and I will be able to make it to this event. If the chance to hear Begala speak and help raise a little dough for some excellent folks isn't enough to make you want to join us, consider this: It will be a rare opportunity to see me in a suit and tie. Who knows when that will come around again? Click on Hal's link or go here for ticket info.
Everybody knows about the Google/YouTube merger. Did you know about the unintended consequences that had on YouTube's homophonic predecessor UTube?
[L]ike a lot of folks -- millions of them, in fact -- you might have accidentally gone to UTube.com, the site for the Ohio machine company (specializing in used tube mills, pipe mills and rollforming machines) that has suddenly vaulted ahead of Whirlpool to become the sixth most popular manufacturing site on the Web, according to Universal Tube & Rollform Equipment Corporation owner Ralph Girkins."We're not a Whirlpool or a G.M. We couldn't even keep the site up this week," said Girkins, who finally got the homepage of his 18-person company back online as of Friday morning (October 13) after major outages since the YouTube deal was announced. This unintentional traffic spike has been going on for awhile, but the billion-dollar buyout sent things through the roof (see "May We Suggest GooTube? Google Buys YouTube In $1.6 Billion Deal").
In August, the last month he kept count, Girkins said UTube got 68 million hits and by September the numbers were so far off the charts for his specialty site -- whose domain he has owned since the late 1980s, before the commercial World Wide Web even launched, he notes with pride -- that he stopped counting. "Before YouTube came around, the traffic was very low, but since they've been around we've just been trying to maintain it and this week it got impossible," he said.
Girkins said he'd consider selling the domain name and starting fresh, but so far no one from Google or YouTube has officially approached him with an offer, though plenty of calls have come in from third parties offering to take the domain off his hands for $1 million or more. "We'd consider selling it," he said, "But it would be a substantial amount. Definitely more than $1 million."
CNet reported there was an offering for his domain, sort of.
On Monday, Girkins told Reuters that an intermediary who said he was acting on behalf of YouTube had offered $1 million to buy the Internet address. Girkins said turned down the offer and was holding out for $2.5 million to $3 million.A YouTube representative said it had not made an offer and had no plans to do so.
On Thursday, Girkins said he had received about 20 phone calls from people who offered to sell his site for him. He has not been in contact with Google or YouTube, he said.
I think somone may eventually buy him out. If there's that much misdirected traffic, it'd be in Google's interests to do so.
NPR's Marketplace has a chat with Girkins. At least he's up and running again. I hope his provider was able to cut him a break on the bandwidth charges.
(I can't believe Dwight didn't spot this one.)
You've probably seen some billboards championing City Proposition G around town. One big supporter of Proposition G is Continental Airlines.
"If Prop G does not pass, our ability to grow at Intercontinental will be hurt," Larry Kellner, chairman and chief executive of the carrier, told employees in his weekly taped message.If passed, the ballot proposal would remove the city's enterprise funds from the cap known as Proposition 2 that was voted in by Houstonians in 2004.
Continental maintains that the cap should be eliminated because as landing fees and gate fees grow, there should be no limit on the city's ability to invest that money to maintain and expand the airports to bring in additional visitors and businesses.
The ballot item would have an effect on funding Houston's other airports. Dallas-based Southwest Airlines, which carries more than 80 percent of the passengers at Houston's Hobby Airport, also supports the measure.
Kellner and Southwest CEO Gary Kelly have signed a letter urging support for Prop G. You can read more about it here.
Propositions A through H propose issuing bonds to fund more police and to improve neighborhood drainage, parks and libraries. City officials say taxes will not be increased to pay for those programs.Proposition G applies to the city's enterprise funds, which rely on user fees, not property taxes, to pay for airports, water and sewer service and convention facilities.
Those against Proposition G contend the changes would impose economic burdens on residents. Among the opponents are former Councilman Carroll Robinson and local businessman Bruce Hotze. "Prop G is bad for taxpayers," Hotze said. "It will mean higher water and sewer rates and higher property taxes because much of the revenue will be excluded under Proposition G."
[...]
Continental said in a notice to employees that the exclusion of airport revenues from the 2004 ceiling is important because that money comes from airlines and their passengers, not property taxes, so it said that limits shouldn't be placed on them.
"An airport is an economic engine underpinning the community," Continental spokesman Dave Messing said. "So it is bad for the city to cap revenues like that. It is an engine for creating jobs and business activity."
I don't support revenue caps in general, so I definitely favor Prop G. It's not the only proposition on the ballot, though.
White is pushing for passage of Proposition G, and his political action committee, called Citizens to Keep Houston Strong, also is working on it and propositions A through H.The political action committee, which is run by the mayor, has by far outpaced a group opposed to the propositions in both fundraising and spending, according to the latest campaign filings.
White's group raised $421,000 from July 1 to Sept. 28 and spent $699,000, much of it on television advertising. As of the filing deadline this week, the committee still had $677,000 on hand, thanks to a $750,000 loan from Redstone Bank.
Continental, which this week began handing out thousands of yard signs, said its political action committee called the Committee to Save Houston Airport Jobs has spent $184,000 as of Sept. 28 on the campaign. It has contributions of $782,000, which include in-kind contributions such as billboards carrying its message.
The opposition committee, "Let the People Vote, Houston," raised just $500, but spent about $58,000 after $64,500 in loans by Hotze, its treasurer.
Heh. So in other words, it's Bruce Hotze Versus The World. A good rule of thumb is that if Bruce Hotze opposes something, it's probably worth supporting. In this case, that's certainly true.
Bob Ney: Not the first sitting Republican Congressman to plead guilty to felonies, but the first to plead to them in conjunction with Jack Abramoff.
Standing before Judge Ellen S. Huvelle, Ney pleaded guilty to conspiracy and making false statements. He acknowledged taking money, gifts and favors in return for official actions on behalf of Abramoff and his clients.
Not to rub salt into the wound or anything, but as recently as May 8, Ney was saying, via his spokesman, that he "is more confident than ever that he will be vindicated in this matter. . . . the congressman will not under any circumstances plead guilty to a crime he did not commit...Congressman Ney has said from day one that he has done absolutely nothing illegal, improper or unethical." TPM Muckraker has a nice timeline of Ney-related denials and outrage if you'd like to wallow in it a bit.
Ney did not immediately resign from Congress, and within minutes, Republican and Democratic leaders vowed to expel him unless he steps down. The White House also called for Ney's resignation.Beleaguered GOP leaders, struggling to overcome fallout from a separate scandal involving former Rep. Mark Foley and teenage male pages, said they would make Ney's ouster the "first order of business" in a postelection session.
"I never intended my career in public service to end this way, and I am ashamed it did," Ney said in a written statement issued moments after his plea.
The 52-year-old lawmaker faces a maximum of 10 years in prison. Huvelle said prosecutors had agreed to recommend a term of 27 months, and said federal guidelines suggest a fine of between $5,000 and $60,000.
Ney did not resign his seat. Several officials have said the congressman is financially strapped and needs his $165,200 annual paycheck and benefits as long as he can continue to receive them.
Ney's lawyer, Mark Touhey, told the judge he would resign before sentencing on Jan. 19. House Speaker Dennis Hastert and other Republican leaders said he would be gone far more quickly than that.
"It is long past time for a new direction that restores integrity and civility to the House," said Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader.
Yes, he's hanging on because he still needs the paycheck. Must really suck to have your flow of swag cut off. I'm sure his Republican colleagues will enjoy dragging his carcass around for the next few weeks. For sure, Ney is an issue in the race for his own seat, where he is being tied to another well-known scandal.
[T]here have also been attempts to take advantage of the [Mark] Foley episode to highlight corruption issues more broadly.For the Ohio seat to be vacated by indicted Rep. Robert W. Ney (R), the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) is blanketing the district with mail saying GOP candidate Joy Padgett, a state senator, is too "dirty" to clean up Congress. "You can't clean up Congress if you are covered in mud," the mailings say, drawing links between Padgett and Ney. The DCCC is also running television ads questioning her personal business dealings. The offensive coincides with Ney's expected guilty plea on Friday in the money-for-favors scandal involving convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
Seems to be working, at least according to recent polling, too. Maybe there is a price to be paid for corruption after all.
UPDATE: Mary Beth reports on a different branch of the Abramoff tree.
I thought the fine folks at the Texas Parent PAC were done with their endorsements, but they weren't. They have now added Diane Trautman to their list of worthy candidates. Here's the press release:
"Families in House District 127 need better representation in Austin, and it is time for a change," said Dinah Miller, a Texas Parent PAC board member. "Diane Trautman will have an immediate impact in the Texas House of Representatives, because she is a proven leader, energetic and intelligent, and totally committed to representing the people of her district.""Dr. Trautman is a fiscal conservative who will lead efforts to finally develop a long-term school finance plan that addresses the needs of our neighborhood schools while continuing to reduce property taxes," Miller added.
[...]
"Unlike incumbent Joe Crabb, Diane Trautman will be a partner with parents and will act on their concerns," said Texas Parent PAC chair Carolyn Boyle. Crabb has a reputation for not listening to parents, educators, and elected school trustees, she added.
Texas Parent PAC leaders said Dr. Trautman epitomizes the type of intelligent and dedicated public servant who should be elected to the Texas legislature. She will hit the ground running in the Texas House of Representatives due to her knowledge and life experience related to crime and law enforcement, health care, environment, public safety, and immigration.
Texas Parent PAC leaders believe families will be better served by a state representative with collaborative leadership skills who represents the mainstream views and values of the community. "Voters are tired of mean-spirited partisanship in Austin, and Dr. Trautman will be an independent voice representing her district instead of a mouthpiece for partisan power-brokers," Boyle added.
Dr. Trautman grew up in Houston where she attended Houston ISD public schools, and went on to receive bachelor of arts and master of education degrees at the University of Houston and a doctoral degree in education from Sam Houston State University. A woman of faith and integrity, she is an active member of Atascocita Lutheran Church.
Prior to her educational career, Dr. Trautman worked in energy lending at First City National Bank in Houston. One morning she read a headline in the Houston Chronicle, "HISD To Start the Year 3000 Teachers Short," which prompted her to change careers so she could make a difference in the lives of children and improve the educational system in Texas. She has been a classroom teacher, assistant principal and principal, and most recently an assistant professor at Stephen F. Austin State University where she trained teachers wanting to become school principals.
Diane Trautman is an excellent addition to the Parent PAC roster. You can listen to my interview with her here, and you can read more about this race here. As with Sherrie Matule, for Parent PAC to step up in this highly non-swing district says a lot about Trautman's quality as a candidate. Congratulations to Diane Trautman, who joins Phillip Shinoda, Sherrie Matula, Juan Garcia, Joe Farias, Valinda Bolton, Allen Vaught, Kristi Thibaut, Ellen Cohen, and Joe Heflin on the Parent PAC endorsee list.
I haven't seen a story in the Chron, and the webcast link that I was told about didn't work, so this morning I'm thankful that Kimberly attended the Cohen-Wong debate last night and blogged about it. Check it out if you want to know how it went.
UPDATE: PDiddie was there, too.
UPDATE: PinkDome weighs in.
I'm not exactly sure why Houstonist did a post about David Adickes and his forthcoming Beatles statues on I-10, since the Wall Street Journal story on this was back in January and there's no new links. But I'm not unhappy that they did, because in the course of searching around to see if there was anything new about Adickes and this project, I came across this Flickr page, which has multiple photos of the Fab Four statues in progress. Any effort that leads me to such a thing is time well spent. There are of course Giant Presidential Head photos there as well (mine are here), so take a moment to enjoy them.
There was a time when I was worried about Rep. Chet Edwards' chances of surviving a second election in the DeLay-drawn world. He ran a great campaign against the flawed former State Rep. Arlene Wohlgemuth, successfully attacking her on local matters like Waco's water quality, and pulled off a narrow win in a district that went for President Bush by a 70-30 margin. You need a lot of things to go in your favor to do that, and while they all start with being a great and well-funded candidate, they sure don't end there. I fretted that a Republican without Wohlgemuth's baggage, even one who wasn't all that strong overall, would be able to ride the district's red wave to a win.
And when the GOP nominated Iraq war veteran Van Taylor, I got really nervous. He was an ideal candidate on paper - a young vet, which would blunt Edwards' strength in military matters, with no record to weigh him down. As the last man standing from the DeLay gerrymander, in a district the Republicans viewed as theirs, and with fewer high profile races elsewhere to distract attention from CD17, things looked grim.
Now? I'm not so worried. Taylor has proven to have no grasp of the issues beyond boilerplate soundbites. Edwards has been successful in making an issue of Taylor's nonresidency in CD17 prior to 2005. The national mood is much more favorable to Edwards, he continues to enjoy a substantial fundraising lead, he's picked up endorsements (or at least avoided opposition) from former adversaries, and once again he's gotten the big newspaper recommendations. From the Morning News:
Mr. Edwards' steady, pro-defense record and years of dependable service to constituents are reasons enough to return the Democrat to Congress for a ninth term. The fitness of his Republican opponent, Van Taylor, is another reason.[...]
Mr. Taylor, 34, a Waco real estate investor and Iraq war veteran, is one of the GOP's top prospects for knocking off a sitting Democrat. A district newcomer - he says he moved to the district 16 months ago - he's received an infusion of outside money and fundraising help.
But that hasn't helped Mr. Taylor's grasp of the issues. In an interview, he stressed an urgent need to trim spending but was vague on where to start, despite several invitations to outline priorities. On immigration, he opposed "amnesty," yet lacked a thought-out proposal and was unclear about ideas on the table in Washington.
Credibility is another concern. Mr. Edwards, 54, of Waco, says his opponent has used Willie Horton-like ads, a charge close to the mark. The ads say one Edwards vote helped dangerous immigrants avoid deportation, including some who later committed "rape and murder." That's a stretch. The measure in question threatened Homeland Security money for cities; Mr. Edwards voted with most of the Republican-dominated House.
Mr. Edwards' centrist politics have helped him survive as a Democrat in GOP territory and build seniority that helps his district. His senior position on the House Appropriations Committee gives him muscle in the fight for Waco's threatened VA center.
And from the Star Telegram:
Chet Edwards brings experience, understanding and the closest thing to statesmanship one can find in Washington these days.In his more than 15 years representing Central Texas, Edwards has distinguished himself through his passion for the men and women who serve in the armed forces.
From championing investments in the nation's military infrastructure to voicing concerns about healthcare for veterans, Edwards has been a constant advocate for the country's military personnel. He is the senior Democrat on the Veterans Affairs and Military Quality of Life Appropriations subcommittee and co-chairs the bipartisan House Army Caucus. He also serves on the Homeland Security Appropriations subcommittee.
Van Taylor of West, Edwards' Republican challenger, is a personable and likable young man who deserves thanks for serving his country in the Marines, with duties in Iraq and along the Texas-Mexico border as part of Joint Task Force 6. Taylor, 34, should be encouraged to continue his education into the issues beyond the war on terror that are important to District 17 -- land and water use, agriculture, environment and education.
[...]
In the 2006 Voter's Self-Defense Manual published by PVS, Edwards received 100 percent ratings on educational issues from the National PTA, senior and social issues from the Alliance for Retired Americans and veterans' issues from Disabled American Veterans.
The conservative Eagle Forum rated Edwards at 53 percent; the liberal Americans for Democratic Action rated him at 85 percent. (For context, U.S. Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Dallas, rated a 20 percent from Eagle Forum and 100 percent from the ADA; U.S. Rep. Randy Neugebauer, R-Abilene, rated a 87 percent from Eagle Forum and 0 from the ADA.)
I certainly have issues with some of the votes Edwards has made, but on balance he's still strong, and when the choice is a Wohlgemuth or a Taylor, it couldn't be clearer. Thanks for making this less of a race, Chet!
UPDATE: Kos has some poll numbers that show Edwards leading by a 55-38 margin. Sweet.
Drilling down into the crosstabs, it claims a partisan split of 38R/32D/30I, which seems off to me. On the other hand, it shows Bush with a healthy 51/36 approve/disapprove rating. So who knows? I think Greg is right to suggest that the end result will be closer than that, but since he found a second poll that shows Edwards up 54-33, I'm still feeling good. Now if only we could get some polls in other districts...
With the vote on amending the city's anti-smoking ordinance put off for a week, it's time for the lobbyists who represent the interested parties in the debate to get to work.
The American Cancer Society hired Sue Walden, a consultant and political fundraiser. Mark Clark, executive director of the Houston Police Officers' Union and a police officer, was hired by a company that owns pool halls. And Al Luna, a lawyer and lobbyist, is working for the Greater Houston Hospitality Association.Perhaps the more significant factor, though, is the citizens who have showed up at City Hall for public comment in the past few months. Hundreds of restaurant and bar owners and health advocates have spoken before the council.
Generally, the city requires that anyone who expects to spend money or be paid to directly influence city ordinances register as a lobbyist. City rules don't require that lobbyists disclose how much their clients are paying for the service.
"Organizations frequently hire people who have good relationships with legislators so that their issue is heard, and that legislators get relevant information to help them make their decision," Walden said.
Clark said he's primarily concerned about the stricter ban because he thinks it could cause bar owners to lose revenue, putting the off-duty security jobs held by about 400 fellow officers at risk. He said that could lead to increased criminal incidents in bars.
But he also represents ROI Entertainment, a pool hall operator, in a separate capacity from his union job. He hasn't yet been paid for the work, and said he hasn't met with council members on behalf of the company.
[...]
Luna said his client - a consortium of bar owners - was concerned about the ordinance's effect on business.
"I've been over there lobbying and helping bar owners meet with council members to express their concerns," Luna said.
It's unclear what effect such lobbying efforts might have on the outcome. [Mayor Bill] White, whose legal department crafted the ordinance, and whose administration sets the council agenda, has said he resists overtures from lobbyists.
I guess we'll know if the lobbyists had an effect if someone on Council changes position on the issue. Beyond that, it's hard to say.
I did get a call back from Council Member Jarvis Johnson yesterday, and we discussed the recent action by Council on the smoking ban. He stressed the need for a "level playing field", which meant treating all bars the same instead of fashioning a bunch of narrow exceptions. He expressed concern about bars near the city's borders, and agreed with Council Member Toni Lawrence's statement that they stood to lose a significant amount of business under the proposed ordinance. He thought that the issue would have to be dealt with at the state level to ameliorate that situation. Finally, he suggested that it might be best if the decision were ultimately made by the citizens via a referendum. I did not ask him how likely he thought that was to happen; my guess is he'd agree that it was unlikely, given the timing of the vote and the presence of other ballot propositions this year.
I missed this KTRK story from Tuesday about Martha Wong's phantom endorsement, in which she claimed that some generically nice things said about her by HISD Superintendant Abe Saavedra constituted an actual statement of electoral support. Seems Martha really really doesn't want to recognize the obvious here:
There is a piece of mail at the center of the debate. Inside the brochure touting Martha Wong's support for education is a quote from HISD Superintendent Abe Saavedra stating "Martha has always been supportive of our needs in HISD and an advocate for us."Wong says it's perfectly appropriate.
"We didn't ask for an endorsement," she said. "He stands by his quote."
But last week, after the brochure hit mailboxes Dr. Saavedra issued a statement to the contrary, saying, in part, "it is unfortunate that a misunderstanding may have occurred, but I have not authorized my name to be used in campaign materials. I have not endorsed a candidate."
Wong says the mailer simply used a quote, not an endorsement.
"We have worked with Dr. Saavedra. He knows us," Wong said.
When asked if it is a misunderstanding, Wong answered, "That's something you should ask Dr. Saavedra."
That's quite the intriguing response. Dr. Saavedra is quite clear about what his words mean. Martha Wong refuses to acknowledge that and implies that Dr. Saavedra is the one that's confused here. Does that really seem like a smart approach to take with this?
Political science professor Michelle Carnahan says while one brochure may not mean the difference between winning and losing, Wong's campaign staff should not have made such a rookie mistake."Ellen Cohen's campaign, part of her being not being the incumbent is that she doesn't have a record to stand on, but Martha Wong does," Carnahan said. "She's defending her record, and this is something she should've known."
"Rookie mistake" is a good way to characterize this, but given Martha Wong's response I'm beginning to wonder if this is more of a deliberate choice than a bobble. I'm really stunned that she hasn't backed down and moved on. Is she trying to force Dr. Saavedra into issuing a more strongly worded refutation of her endorsement claim? Maybe she thinks if she holds firm people will believe her, I don't know. Weird, just weird.
Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle was killed yesterday when the small plane he was piloting crashed into a highrise in Manhattan.
Moments after passing above the 59th Street Bridge, Lidle's single-engine plane disappeared from the radar. And just 13 minutes after takeoff, it slammed into a 40-story condominium tower above Manhattan's tony Upper East Side - filling luxury apartments with flames and scattering burning metal below.Five years and one month after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, New Yorkers felt a shudder of fear with word that a plane had crashed into a building.
President Bush was alerted to the crash, and Pentagon officials said that within 10 minutes, fighter jets were sent aloft over several cities, including Washington, Los Angeles and Seattle.
Two Texas Air National Guard fighter aircraft patrolled the Texas Gulf Coast on Wednesday afternoon after the crash, according to the Guard.
New Yorkers would later realize the crash more closely resembled another tragedy, much smaller but still keenly felt: the 1979 death of Yankees captain Thurman Munson, in a small plane he was piloting.
Munson's catcher's gear still hangs in a special spot in the Yankees' clubhouse.
That was my first thought when I heard about this, too. I'll never forget that day in 1979, and I'm heartbroken that history has repeated itself. My prayers go out to the Lidle family as they cope with this tragedy.
David Pinto and Jay Jaffe have more. Rest in peace, Cory Lidle.
From the David Van Os campaign:
Harris County Whistlestop Rally
Wednesday, October 18 @ 4:00 PM
Harris County Courthouse
1001 Preston Street @ Main
Houston, TX 77002Followed by a
Meet and Greet Reception
Chatter's Cafe and Bistro
140 South Heights Blvd.
Houston, TX 77007
5:30 PM - 7:30 PM
Chatter's is where Star Pizza in the Heights used to be before it moved over to Washington Avenue. PDiddie has more about the Whistle Stop Tour.
The debate at Rice University between Ellen Cohen and Martha Wong is today. (Yes, the Libertarian candidate will also be there, but let's get real - this debate is between Cohen and Wong.) It's at 8P in McMurtry Auditorium in Duncan Hall - here's a map of the Rice campus if you need help finding that. If you can't make it there will be a live webcast, and I'm willing to bet a video on YouTube shortly thereafter. Enjoy!
Meet Jay Johnson-Castro.
And with little fanfare or planning, Johnson-Castro began a quixotic trek from Laredo to Brownsville. During the next 15 days or so, he's hoping to rally border residents and topple Washington's plans to erect a controversial security fence along 700 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border."This is my personal expression against an idea that is as ugly as a wall," said Johnston-Castro, as he walked south on Chihuahua Street toward Laredo's city limits. "Think of how we rejoiced when the Berlin Wall came down. It separated families.
"And we're going to do the same thing? We can't allow it."
Hey, the Berlin Wall involved Communists, so it's totally different. I suppose you could argue that its purpose was to keep people in, not keep them out. Like that really matters, I guess.
Though Johnson-Castro said he had the support of many border politicians, none showed up to support him as he started out.But that doesn't mean they want the fence.
"The fence ain't gonna work. It's a silly, silly idea," said Laredo Mayor Raul G. Salinas, a veteran FBI agent. "At the time we're knocking down walls all around the world, and we're building new ones? Why don't we just close the (international) bridges?"
Don't give them any ideas, Mr. Mayor.
The walk along the border is being filmed by Jesse Salmeron, a 28-year-old Houstonian who directed a documentary called Undocumented, an account of the pro-immigration protests that took place earlier this year.Salmeron said he came illegally to Houston from El Salvador as a child.
"There is kind of a lull in the immigration movement right now, so when I read the story in the Houston Chronicle, I packed my bags and came down here," the filmmaker said.
Stace noted this earlier. He has contact info for Salmeron if you want to assist with his effort.
The Chron reports on campaign finances for two State House races, HDs 134 and 149.
Democratic incumbent Hubert Vo has nearly $52,000 available for his race against Republican Talmadge Heflin, whom he narrowly defeated in 2004. Heflin was not far behind, with about $42,000 left to spend.And Democrat Ellen Cohen has roughly $181,000 available in her bid to unseat Rep. Martha Wong, R-Houston, whose report was not available by mid-evening Tuesday.
It's available now. Wong raised a ton of money, $291K, spent nearly $270K, and has $401K on hand. If you live in HD134 and watch cable TV, get ready for a lot of Wong ads.
Vo raised $99,000 and spent $59,000 during the July-September period. He got $500 from the Association of Texas Professional Educators PAC, $1,000 from the Texas Federation of Teachers COPE, $2,000 from ACT for Texas Classroom Association and $5,000 from the Texas State Teachers Association PAC.The Trial Lawyers Association PAC kicked in another $5,000.
[...]
Most of Heflin's money came from home builder Bob Perry, who contributed $40,000 over two weeks. Heflin received $9,000 from Texans for Lawsuit Reform and paid that lawsuit-limitation group $5,000 for "consulting," according to his report.
Heflin raised $80K total, so more than half his money came from Bob Perry (I'm counting the TLR money as Perry money, since it's all one big donor circle). That's some grassroots outreach.
In case you ever wondered why Democrats held the thankfully-departed Vilma Luna in such contempt:
Heflin also got $1,000 from a Democrat, former State Rep. Vilma Luna of Corpus Christi, who resigned earlier this year and is now a lobbyist.
Good riddance.
BOR has some more numbers from 20 high profile races, which they helpfully put in this Numsum spreadsheet. A few more Houston races of interest:
HD126
Chad Khan: $55K cash on hand
Patricia Harless: $59K cash on hand
HD129
Sherrie Matula: $10K cash on hand, plus $30K in Unitemized Pledges
John Davis: $30K cash on hand
HD133
Kristi Thibaut: $63K cash on hand
Jim Murphy: $55K cash on hand
I'm 40 years old. I own a house and make a decent living. I haven't been a student since Bush 41 was in the Oval Office. And yet I totally related to this comic. All I can say is that the graduate student experience is a powerful one.
(Found in the comments to this Chad Orzel post.)
Dwight has spotted a WiFi access point on a downtown traffic signal, and reports that it's intended for use by the new high-tech parking meters, which in turn will be part of the public WiFi network. Still not clear what the timeline on all this is, but it's nice to see visible proof of progress.
Dan Wallach is a computer science professor at Rice University who has become a leading expert on electronic voting machines and their flaws. With the recent news about more serious vulnerabilities in Diebold machines and open questions about eSlate machines, I wanted to ask him some questions about what we know about these things, and what we should do about them. I think you'll be very interested in what he has to say.
Here's the interview:
Link for the MP3 file is here. There's more information about the Webb County case he references here (PDF). Let me know what you think.
UPDATE: I have been asked about getting a transcription of this interview. I am working on finding someone to do that (I don't have the time to do it myself, unfortunately). If you can assist, please leave a comment or drop me a note to kuff - at - offthekuff - dot - com. Thanks.
First, some good news for Chris Bell: It looks like John O'Quinn will follow through on his post-debate promise to give his campaign a financial boost.
After Friday night's see-saw gubernatorial debate, Houston personal-injury lawyer John O'Quinn gave Democrat Chris Bell a potentially record-breaking lift, promising to give his campaign $1 million now and to give or raise $4 million more later.Bell's campaign picked up the million-dollar donation Monday amid plans to shoot fresh TV ads. If O'Quinn's offer plays out, Bell could compete with GOP Gov. Rick Perry and independent Carole Keeton Strayhorn in prime-time advertising through the Nov. 7 election. It costs an estimated $1 million weekly to reach every media market in Texas.
"Chris is not going to lose because he doesn't have the money," O'Quinn said Monday. He called the $5 million figure "my goal."
"They tell me that's what they need," he said.
As I said before, I just hope it's not too little, too late. I can only wonder how this campaign would have gone if folks like O'Quinn had been there earlier. I'm not ungrateful for the support, mind you, just a little frustrated at what it's taken to get it.
Bell also sent out a press release yesterday saying he'd raised almost $1.5 million last quarter, which is more than Strayhorn's total. He still trails significantly in cash on hand, though at this point that matters a lot less.
The not-so-good news is that an attempt by Bell to get Kinky Friedman to drop out was unsuccessful.
Mr. Bell left a voice mail message on Mr. Friedman's personal cellphone Tuesday, asking for a meeting at the mystery writer and former bandleader's ranch near Kerrville, Mr. Friedman said.Mr. Bell later confirmed he sought a meeting so he could try to talk Mr. Friedman into dropping out of the four-way race, which is in its home stretch. The election is Nov. 7.
Bell campaign aides said that Mr. Friedman performed poorly in Friday night's candidate debate and that Friedman supporters have told the Democrat that they'd support him if he could persuade Mr. Friedman to step aside.
Mr. Bell said he placed the call at his staff's request. He acknowledged that Mr. Friedman is siphoning votes away from him and Republican Gov. Rick Perry.
"He's taking from both," Mr. Bell said. "But he's taking more from me."
Mr. Friedman, campaigning in Brownsville, said of Mr. Bell and his advisers: "They're desperate and scrambling."
Asked whether he would consider the Democrat's arguments for stepping aside, Mr. Friedman said: "No. You're kidding, for Chris Bell. What do you take me for?"
A bad candidate with no chance of winning? I totally understand what Bell did, but I don't know what kind of response he expected. Friedman has made his contempt for the entire process and the people involved in it very clear from the beginning. Maybe he got a tip that Friedman was getting wobbly after the debate, and maybe he tried this on his own, I don't know. Either way, while it makes theoretical sense, I don't see how it was going to succeed. I just don't see Friedman as perceiving himself in a position where he'd be better off conceding. Friedman is running for himself, not for any principle that I can discern. It's all about him, so he has nothing to gain by dropping out. Which is a shame, but that's how it is.
Anyway. Via Vince, here's Bell's statement on what happened. We'll see how this plays out.
Here's the Chron story about what happened regarding the draft ordinance to strengthen Houston's smoking ban for bars and restaurants.
Bar owners who oppose expanding the city's smoking ban may have garnered enough support among City Council members to derail a proposal by Mayor Bill White that the council will consider today.[...]
White, who rarely puts an item on the agenda when he's not sure he has enough votes for approval, said Tuesday he expects the vote to be close.
"I think the majority on council wants to provide more smoke-free areas for employees. I think the majority of council also thinks there ought to be some limited number of places where people can smoke outside their home," he said. "But coming up with that limit has been the thing that's hard to build consensus on."
[...]
An informal Houston Chronicle poll Tuesday showed members are split: six members, including White, said they plan to vote for the proposal as submitted, and four said they'll vote against it or try to amend it. Five said they were undecided.
If the majority of council can't settle on a plan, the proposal could be sent back to the administration, where it could die or be tweaked and placed back on the agenda later.
Several council members said they would consider exempting bars - establishments that draw at at least 60 percent of sales from alcohol - by backing an amendment that Councilwoman Toni Lawrence said she plans to offer at the meeting.
"I just don't want to overregulate something that's legal in the United States," she said.
The amendment would allow bar owners to permit smoking as long as they use a ventilation system and post a sign near the entrance letting potential customers know smoking is permitted there and can be a health hazard. It would only apply to bars in operation Sept. 1; bars opened after that date would have to be smoke-free.
Lawrence said she also would like to require bar owners to provide health insurance for employees, but it is unclear whether that would be legal.
Councilwoman Carol Alvarado, who supports a total ban, said the amendment takes the teeth out of the proposal. "If we exempt bars, then why do anything?" she said.
Of those who said they were undecided, council members Adrian Garcia and Sue Lovell said they were considering supporting the amendment that exempts bars because they worried the ban would hurt those businesses. Council members Pam Holm and Jarvis Johnson expressed the opposite concern: They want the city to go smoke-free but aren't sure they can support the proposal because it allows for too many exceptions.
Those include outdoor patios; hotel or motel rooms designated for smoking, as long as no more than 35 percent of rooms in a hotel have that designation; private rooms in nursing homes; tobacco shops and cigar bars that meet certain requirements; certain meeting rooms in convention centers, hotels and motels when they're used for private functions; and private functions held by nonprofit groups in their own facilities.
"We're not being fair here," Johnson said. "You're going to make an exception for some companies but you're not going to make it for others?"
Council members Addie Wiseman and Michael Berry said they plan to vote against any extension of the ban. Whether to allow smoking should be the decision of the business owner, not the government, Wiseman said.
Here's the report I wrote yesterday about this. I never did hear back from Council Member Johnson, but will update if I do. A couple of points:
- Council Member Lawrence's proposal is more clearly defined as "establishments that draw at at least 60 percent of sales from alcohol". Now that I read that, I wonder if that would cover strip clubs. Assuming they still exist after that lawsuit is decided, of course.
- Based on what's being said here, I think Council Member Alvarado's prediction that this will be tagged for a week is accurate. I'll be a little surprised if something passes today. We'll see what happens.
UPDATE: As expected, the vote has been delayed for a week.
The WaPo has a nice story about a border fence we already have, in San Diego.
In the mid-1990s, the city was awash in illegal immigrants. Hundreds would gather by a soccer field near Otay Mesa, east of San Diego, and rush into the United States on what the Border Patrol termed "banzai runs." During those years, Border Patrol agents routinely apprehended 200,000 illegal entrants a year in the sector. Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) got funding to build a fence and thousands more Border Patrol officers were dispatched to the area. The number of crossers plummeted.But the fence, originally estimated at $14 million, incurred huge cost overruns and logistical and legal hurdles. It took $39 million to build the first nine miles, and the fence has yet to be finished. For a decade, litigation has delayed construction of 3.5 miles of the structure because environmental groups have opposed a federal plan to lop the tops off two mesas and pour 5.5 million cubic feet of dirt into a valley, called "Smuggler's Gulch," to flatten the terrain. Environmental groups lost the case when the Department of Homeland Security invoked a law exempting it from federal and state regulations in the interest of national security. DHS recently appropriated an additional $35 million to complete the fence -- for a total of $74 million, or more than $5 million a mile.
The fence in San Diego forced illegal traffic into the deserts to the east, leading thousands of migrants to their death. In response, the Border Patrol shifted thousands of agents to Arizona to deal with the flow. But many of those agents came from the San Diego and El Centro sectors. So once again, the number of crossers in San Diego and El Centro is increasing even though the two sectors are the most heavily fenced in the nation.
"Tucson now has 2,600 agents. San Diego has lost 1,000 agents. Guess where the traffic is going? Back to San Diego." said T.J. Bonner, the president of the National Border Patrol Council, the main union for Border Patrol agents. "San Diego is the most heavily fortified border in the entire country, and yet it's not stopping people from coming across."
Who cares? Don't you know it's all about making important symbolic gestures? It's not whether or not you solve a problem, it's whether or not you look tough. Just don't pay any attention to the man behind the curtain.
On a much brighter note, I'm pleased to pass along the following press release from Lt. Col. and State Rep. Rick Noriega:
The family of Lieutenant Colonel (LTC) Rick Noriega wishes to announce that he has returned from service on the Texas border as Sector Commander for Operation Jump Start, the National Guard effort assisting the US Border Patrol with drug interdiction and border operations. LTC Noriega came off active duty orders October 11, 2006, and he resumed his House seat to stand for re-election in November and to prepare to return to Austin for the 80th Legislative Session in January, 2007.LTC Noriega commanded approximately 300 troops in Laredo, one of the nine sectors of the US-Mexico border, five of which are in Texas. LTC Noriega left Houston in May to assist in the stand-up of the effort out of Camp Mabry in Austin and has been on orders in Laredo since June. During his time in Laredo, the joint effort seized hundreds of pounds of cocaine and marijuana, as well as assisting in other border operations.
"I am once again grateful to be home with my family, first from Afghanistan and now from the border; I am honored to have served with the Texas Guard and the Border Patrol. It was a privilege to get to know the Laredo community - it is a city like no other in Texas. At the same time, there is no place like home," said Colonel Noriega.
The family will be celebrating the representative's return in the next few weeks, and wishes to thank all the Members of the Texas House, the folks of the East End, CenterPoint Energy, their family and others who have once again supported Melissa and the Noriega family through another military deployment.
Welcome home, Rick Noriega. I know I speak for everyone here when I say we're very glad for your safe return.
I will be sitting down with Rep. Noriega in the near future to interview him about his experiences in Laredo. I look forward to bringing that to you.
I got an email about the anti-toll road San Antonio Toll Party endorsing David Van Os for Attorney General, which got me to wondering about a question I'd asked before, namely "How successful will some of the downballot Democrats be in getting Strayhorn Republicans to split their tickets more than once?" I don't have an answer to that, but if you look at their complete list of endorsed candidates, you'll see that it's fairly bipartisan, with Democrats Hank Gilbert and VaLinda Hathcox being listed as Good Guys, and Barbara Radnofsky getting an A to Kay Bailey Hutchison's C. If nothing else, that will give me a starting place for future precinct and county vote comparisons.
While I believe that toll roads and the Trans Texas Corridor will be an issue that will work against candidates like Rick Perry, I don't have a handle on how much influence groups like SA Toll Party actually have. They claimed credit for Nathan Macias' GOP primary win over State Rep. Carter Casteel, but it's a little hard to separate their influence from James Leininger's kilobucks, so who knows? Like I said, I'll be sifting through the data once it's available.
Click the More link for some press releases by Van Os, Gilbert, and the Texas Democratic Party regarding the Trans Texas Corridor.
Van Os press release:
"If elected to serve as Attorney General of Texas, I solemnly promise that I will use every legal means available to me by that office to bring to a halt and/or invalidate the unconstitutional and illegal project known as the Trans-Texas Corridor." ~ David Van Os, from written oath filed in public records at county courthousesDavid Van Os' candidacy for Attorney General has been endorsed by the San Antonio Toll Party, a leading non-partisan grassroots citizens' organization in the statewide efforts to stop the state government's current plans to seize Texans' private lands and property through forcible eminent domain for the construction of giant toll roads that will be operated by wealthy private companies from Spain.
Toll Party Regional Director Terri Hall of San Antonio stated, "Mr. Van Os is committed to stopping the Trans Texas Corridor and urban toll road debacle. He sees the total disconnect between government and those they're charged with representing. He's a fighter and has filed sworn affidavits vowing to fulfill his promise to stop the privatizing and tolling of our public infrastructure. ... Mr. Van Os is featured in a documentary film "Truth Be Tolled" http://www.truthbetolled.com where his comments at TxDOT public meetings brilliantly codify everything that's wrong with this Governor's transportation policies and how we the PEOPLE can stop it."
Van Os has completed 247 of his planned campaign stops at every one of Texas' 254 county courthouses. He files in the public records in each courthouse a written oath of his intention to stop the Trans-Texas Corridor. He began his 254-county trek in April.
Van Os stated, "The Trans Texas Corridor is a monstrous explosion of greed and arrogance. It represents a profound disrespect for Texans' lands and properties. It is an insult to the very character of our beautiful state, and Texans everywhere are outraged."
Van Os continued, "Article 4, Section 22 of the Texas Constitution mandates that the Attorney General shall do everything necessary and proper to prevent any private corporation from demanding or collecting any species of toll not authorized by law. The contemplated magnitude of forcible eminent domain, coupled with the magnitude of the billions of dollars of profit for the European companies, in my opinion makes this abominable project unconstitutional in Texas. If elected to serve as Attorney General I am going to use every legal means available to me by that office to bring this unconstitutional project to a halt."
"I'm placing my intentions in the public records, in writing and under oath, because I want my fellow Texans to know exactly what I intend to I want them to know that I mean what I say," Van Os further noted.
Hank Gilbert press release:
Hank Gilbert, Democratic Candidate for Agriculture Commissioner, joins with Texas Democratic Party leadership to bring the issue of the Trans-Texas Corridor to the forefront of campaign issues.Gilbert attended more than 20 of the 55 TXDOT (Texas Department of Transportation) meetings speaking about the negative effects of the Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) on agriculture, "The worst thing is the initial phase of the Trans-Texas Corridor, TTC-35. Under its recommended route, it is going to take over 100,000 acres of the best growing soil we have--blackland soil. This is where we grow corn, milo and cotton. It is also good grassland that is essential in the production of beef cattle. TTC-35 will take a lot of that grassland out of production, which hampers our overall beef market."
Gilbert emphasized, "The eminent domain legislation that enables the state to take land for the TTC was sponsored by my opponent who was in the senate. His legislation provides for the state to take land by eminent domain when the state and the landowner cannot agree on an appraised value." The land taken for the TTC will be leased for 50 years to a foreign company who is partnered with Zachry Construction of San Antonio.
Gilbert has traveled extensively across Texas attending TXDOT meetings regarding the TTC. He shares the frustration of many landowners who have tried to get answers at these meetings.
"I have posed many questions to TXDOT in the meetings dealing with their 4,000-page study. TXDOT spent millions of dollars on environmental impact studies for this project. And they ignored every one of those studies. I have a problem with that. Every Texan should have a problem with that."
Gilbert also expressed concerns about water rights connected with the TTC. "There are big water transmission lines within this corridor. When the state takes the land it will also get the rights to water under the land. What's going to happen to this water?" Gilbert said, "Is this water going to be sold or bargained to the highest bidder? This is the best-kept secret of this corridor and one subject TXDOT is not talking about at all."
TDP press release:
Today, Texas Democratic Party Chairman Boyd Richie called for an investigation into a possible sweetheart deal involving the Trans Texas Corridor and a well known Republican insider, former Railroad Commissioner Barry Williamson. Chairman Richie called on Attorney General Greg Abbott and the appropriate bipartisan legislative committees to investigate information that indicates Williamson may have received inside information regarding the Trans Texas Corridor that directly profited his land acquisition company, Wilson Holding Co."The more we find out, the more Rick Perry's Trans Texas Corridor appears to be a money-maker for foreign companies and Perry's campaign contributors, and a bad deal for Texas taxpayers," said Texas Democratic Party Chairman Boyd Richie.
"Texas taxpayers deserve to know who is profiting from the TTC and how much they stand to gain," Richie added.
In 2005, Barry Williamson established a land acquisition company, Wilson Holding, Inc., to profit from the development of Rick Perry's much-touted Trans Texas Corridor. In documents filed with the SEC, Wilson Holding, Inc. cited specific highways that are expected to become part of the TTC. However, those plans have not yet been made public by the Texas Department of Transportation, meaning Williamson apparently had inside knowledge of the TTC construction path.
Additionally, Williamson's PAC has contributed tens of thousands of dollars in campaign cash to Rick Perry, Tom Craddick, David Dewhurst and a number of other Republican candidates. Furthermore, Barry Williamson once lobbied for the Texas Energy Center, funded in part by Rick Perry's slush fund—the Texas Enterprise Fund.
"What exactly did Barry Williamson know and when did he know it? How many other Perry contributors are receiving similar information? Texans deserve an independent, bipartisan investigation to get to the bottom of these unanswered questions," said Richie.
Now that people are focusing on the AL Championship Series between Detroit and Oakland more than they are on Detroit's Division Series win over the Yankees, I'm going to let Joe Sheehan speak for me in the matter of The People Vs. Alex Rodriguez.
What concerns me isn’t that the Yankees lost. What concerns me is that they and their manager set themselves up for a free ride going into the playoffs. After a season of laying all failures at the feet of Alex Rodriguez, and going so far as to inspire and participate in a Sports Illustrated story that furthered that storyline, the Yankees absolved themselves of responsibility. Complicit with the media, they washed their hands and let Rodriguez carry the water for their performance.At just about any point along the way, one of the two most visible Yankees - Joe Torre or Derek Jeter - could have come forward and said what should be obvious: Alex Rodriguez is a great, great player, and in the worst season of his career he’s a star. Defining his season by his lowest points is doing him a disservice, and the constant focus on his play is an insult to the other members of the team. Whatever Rodriguez’s performance issues, such as they were, his overall contributions were valuable. Beyond that, he’s one of the game’s model citizens, with barely a controversy to his name in a time when so many others have been tainted.
That statement, completely true, would have done more to alleviate the pressure on Rodriguez than anything else. They didn’t do so, instead allowing petty nonsense like his desire to please people (heaven forfend) and his performance in varied subsets (in Boston, in the playoffs, against a small handful of pitchers, in 20 at-bats in July) to substitute for real information. They didn’t defend their teammate, and by allowing, even stoking, the situation, they absolved themselves and every other Yankee of blame for their fortunes. If they lost, it would be Rodriguez’s fault, no matter how the rest of them played.
Torre’s handling of the Rodriguez situation is perhaps the blackest mark on his record. Going so far as to bat him eighth in a playoff game, a move guaranteed to make him a point of discussion, would have been the nadir if he hadn’t already reached that in the pages of SI. Torre made his bones in New York by keeping controversy out of the clubhouse; he committed a boner by turning his clubhouse into a circus this year.
As far as Jeter goes, any claims to a captaincy or leadership skills are and will remain in doubt. His refusal to provide a full-throated defense of the player whose willingness to take his Gold Gloves to third base allowed the illusion of Jeter’s defensive prowess to grow to a point where he could get his own hardware is as much to blame as Torre’s sudden open-mouth policy. He could have stopped this with 50 well-chosen words. He didn’t, and it’s fair to wonder why.
Nobody is a bigger fan of the Yankees and of Joe Torre than my mother, and she just about ordered me on the phone Monday night to write something about how ridiculous the whole A-Rod situation had become. I have no idea what was going through Joe Torre's head this season, but I cannot fathom how he lost his instinct to defuse clubhouse personnel matters. Torre is nobody's idea of a tactician, and his roster management sucks, but the one thing you could count on was that the focus would be on the field and not in the sports pages. Not this year. If he doesn't learn from this, then as much as I hate to say it, he deserves to be let go. It's really that simple.
As for Derek Jeter, I'm more forgiving, but only because this really should have been his manager's job. Jeter shouldn't have needed to come to Alex Rodriguez's defense any more than A-Rod should have. That said, given that Torre was asleep at the switch, Jeter is the one guy who could have defused the whole situation. Nobody else would have gotten the respect of the media, the fans, and the howler monkeys on sports talk radio that Jeter would have if he had he told them all to get a grip. He may not be the manager, but he can and should have been a standup guy. I hope that he too learns from this.
As to whether or not the Yankees should trade Alex Rodriguez, ask yourself one question: When was the last time a team got equivalent value for a superstar player? Never mind the fact that there's no halfway decent third base option for the Yankees if they let A-Rod go. I can't imagine a trade that would actually go through, especially in the current poisoned environment, in which the Yankees don't come out a big loser. If the Yankees pursue this option, they've officially reverted back to the stupid, directionless franchise that plagued its fans from 1982 to 1993. Enough said about that.
Finally, if you really want to understand why the Yankees lost to Detroit, let Jay Jaffe explain it to you. Now let's all enjoy the rest of the playoffs and move on to better things.
Also via Houstonist, the downtown development known as Houston Pavilions has taken another step forward.
Developers of the Houston Pavilions downtown mixed-use project have secured $140 million in construction financing from North Houston Bank.The transaction makes it possible for construction to begin on the ambitious three-block development bounded by Dallas, Polk, Main and Caroline. Groundbreaking is set for Nov. 6.
It will take two years to build the $200 million project, which will contain roughly 800,000 square feet of retail, office and high-rise residential space.
Here's a Google map of the area. I've also created this JPG image of the area, with the three blocks that comprise Houston Pavilions in red. The blue square in the middle bottom is the Toyota Center. There's a light rail stop at Main and Bell, one block south of the western end of the Pavilions.
Via Houstonist, KTRH is reporting that there are two more proposals to modify the city's smoking ban for restaurants floating around City Council.
City Councilwoman Toni Lawrence's office has begun circulating a petition asking her colleagues to support a ban which would keep people from lighting up in restaurants, but would still allow them to smoke in stand-alone bars and clubs."My thoughts are to draft an amendment which would exempt ... bars from the proposed ordinance," Lawrence wrote in the petition. "I am concerned we are putting too many regulations on certain establishments, to the point of running them out of business."
Lawrence said eight colleagues, a majority of council, have agreed to support the proposal.
Meanwhile, Councilman Jarvis Johnson advocated making bar owners pay a yearly permit fee to the city, and accept more stringent health requirements, in exchange for being allowed to take down the "no-smoking" sign.
"I want Houston to go smoke-free," said Johnson, "but if an establishment wants to be a smoking establishment, that is their right."
The proposed smoking ban has been placed on City Council's agenda for Wednesday, but it's likely the measure will be delayed. The city's current plan would allow smoking in outdoor restaurant and bar patios. It would not allow smoking inside those businesses, unless they were designated as a tobacco or "cigar bar" before Sept. 1.
It wasn't clear to me from this story how exactly Council Member Lawrence's proposal differed from the current statute, so I called there and spoke to a gentleman in her office named Darrin Hall. He told me the following:
- What Council Member Lawrence is proposing is an amendment to Council Member Alvarado's current draft ordinance. It would extend the smoking ban to restaurants that include bars, whether or not they have a physical separation between the two. It would exempt "stand alone" bars, which is to say bars that don't serve food. I didn't get into the specifics of that, so there may be some wiggle room on that end, but that's the basic thrust of the amendment.
- Council Member Lawrence would also add language to ban minors from being inside a bar where smoking is permitted, and would require that such bars post warning signs similar to the Surgeon General warnings about smoking.
- Two reasons were cited for Lawrence's action. One was that in the Willowbrook area on 1960 (which is in Lawrence's District A) there are places where one side of the street is inside Houston city limits and the other side is not. She felt it would be a competitive disadvantage to the bars inside Houston to be forced to ban smoking when smoke-friendly options were so close by.
- Reason number two was that there weren't enough votes to pass Alvarado's ordinance. Lawrence believes her amended ordinance can be passed, and that's why she was circulating the petition about it to other Council members.
After speaking to Hall, I spoke to Council Member Alvarado. She told me she opposed both the Lawrence and Johnson amendments. This is a workplace health issue, which is why she does not want to see any more exemptions added to the ordinance. She did not comment specifically on Lawrence's statement that her ordinance did not have enough votes to pass as it is, but said that the matter was expected to be tagged tomorrow, to be voted on in a week. She also expected a lot more amendments to be proposed, some that would make the ordinance tougher, and some that would scale it back.
Finally, I also placed a call to Council Member Johnson's office. He was not available, and at the time I hit publish on this post, I had not heard back. When I do, I will add an update with his comments.
Man, this has been going on for so long I'd forgotten that it was still pending.
City of Houston attorneys and lawyers for many of the city's adult businesses both expect a Dec. 4 trial over "distance requirements" for businesses like strip clubs and adult video stores.In 1997, Houston City Council passed several revisions to city laws governing the adult industry. Several of those controversial issues have since been resolved. But the city law requiring sexually oriented businesses to be at least 1,500 feet away from a school, church, daycare, park or residential area has faced repeated court challenges and has never been enforced.
The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals sent the issue back to the trial court for a final resolution.
Judge Nancy Atlas' decision could maintain the "status quo" in Houston, if she sides with strip club owners who have argued that the city's 1,500-foot rule is "unconstitutional." The judge could also force dozens of adult businesses in the city to close or change their trade if she sides with the city.
This week, City Council could vote on another $130,000 in attorneys fees to get the city through the trial. That would bring the total tab for defending the sexually oriented business law to nearly $600,000.
The last update that I knew about for this story was over three years ago, when Council again voted to spend more money defending the suit. That was before the Fifth Circuit sent it back to the trial court. I still think this sucker should have been settled ages ago, and that the new distance requirement, which was to shut most of the city's sexually oriented businesses down, was wrongheaded and deserved to be thrown out in court. I'd be willing to bet that the city has taken in far more in taxes and fees from the various strip clubs since 1997 than it has spent to defend this lawsuit. Wherever you are, Helen Huey, I hope you're satisfied with the mess you've made.
Today the Chron gives its recommendations for candidates who face only Libertarian Party opposition. For the State House, that's the following:
State representative, District 130 - Corbin Van ArsdaleState representative, District 131 - Alma A. Allen
State representative, District 132 - Bill Callegari
State representative, District 142 - Harold V. Dutton Jr.
State representative, District 146 - Boris L. Miles
State representative, District 148 - Jessica Cristina Farrar
Candidates who are totally unopposed, and therefore presumably do not go through the endorsement interview process, are Wayne Smith (HD128), Gary Elkins (HD135), Sylvester Turner (HD139), Kevin Bailey (HD140), Senfronia Thompson (HD141), Rick Noriega (HD145), and Garnet Coleman (HD147). Of the remaining contested races, the Chron made five endorsements over the weekend, and has seven more to go: HDs 126 (Khan/Harless), 127 (Trautman/Crabb), 129 (Matula/Davis), 133 (Thibaut/Murphy), 136 (Brann/Woolley), 138 (McDavid/Bohac), and 150 (Nelson-Turnier/Riddle). My guesses for how they'll go in those races are here.
David Van Os had a plan to visit county courthouses in each of Texas' 254 counties. He's coming to the end of that task, with stops in Fort Worth, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin. Here's his schedule, and more background is here. Catch him on the tour if you can.
Look what they found in the Rio Grande.
Mexican fishermen captured a 7.5-foot-long crocodile in the Rio Grande, the river that divides Mexico and the United States, and turned the animal over to a local animal shelter, authorities reported on Sunday.The animal was caught on a fisherman's line on Saturday in a sparsely populated stretch of the river on the outskirts of Nuevo Laredo, across from Laredo, Texas.
The crocodile weighed about 130 pounds and appeared to be in good condition, said Jose Moreno Araiza, a commander of the Nuevo Laredo fire department, where the fishermen first brought the animal in the back of a pickup truck.
It was then turned over to the local Animal Protection Society, whose president, Gina Ferrara, said the croc would be kept for the time being in improvised holding area complete with a pool of water. Federal environmental officials were informed of the capture, and will eventually decide what is to be done with the animal.
Crocodiles do not normally inhabit the Rio Grande, and authorities believe it may have been brought to the area as a pet and then released into the river by its owner.
Undocumented migrants frequently swim or ride inner tubes across the Rio Grande to reach the United States.
Mmm hmm. I'm not the only person thinking this isn't a coincidence, right? I mean, who needs a non-existent fence when you can have a moat? It can't be any less effective than the fence would have been.
As noted before, there's an article in Capitol Inside that discusses some "sleeper" races for the State House and for Congress.
The list of potential sleepers in Texas House races includes Democrats Diane Trautman of Kingwood, Sherrie Matula of Houston, Phillip Shinoda of Dallas and Karen Felthauser of Round Rock. Several more sleeper campaigns are starting to percolate in other parts of the state as well.Trautman - a former teacher, principal and college professor - has been running an aggressive campaign against Republican State Rep. Joe Crabb in a bid for the House District 127 seat that takes in part of Atascocita and Channelview and a slice of Houston in northeast Harris County. Trautman has rallied teachers behind her campaign while taking Crabb to task for his vote in support of school vouchers and his role as the chairman of the House Redistricting Committee that drafted the congressional map that Tom DeLay inspired and the Legislature approved in 2003. Trautman has support from some Republicans in the suburban district as well.
[...]
Shinoda and Matula received a boost last week when they were endorsed by the Texas Parent PAC, which had a successful debut earlier this year with primary victories on both sides of the aisle including several key upsets. Shinoda, an Asian-American Democrat, is competing against Republican State Rep. Will Hartnett for the HD 114 seat in a north central Dallas district where GOP voters have outnumbered Democrats by almost two to one in elections held during the past few years. Shinoda, who opened his own consulting firm last year after a stint as a University of Texas at Arlington official, would become the Legislature's third member of Asian descent if he could find a way to beat Hartnett. Shinoda was born in Colorado after his parents had fled California to avoid being sent to internment camps where Japanese-Americans were being detained during World War II. He spent most of his childhood in Dallas and has been heavily involved in civic activities there as an adult.
Matula - a retired teacher and former school board member - is challenging Republican State Rep. John Davis of Houston in HD 129 in southeast Harris County. A longtime Democratic activist, Matula is a member of the Texas State Teachers Association board and a Clear Lake Area Symphony Society member who's in line to be president. Matula had raised about one-third as much money as Davis and had less than half as much cash on hand at the end of June. But Matula's fundraising fortunes could take a turn for the better if she can continue to rally education interests and others behind her campaign in the final four weeks of the race. Matula is pushing ethics reform amid questions that have been raised about Davis' campaign spending. But HD 129 - like the districts represented by Hartnett and Crabb - has a substantial Republican majority that will be difficult for a Democratic contender to overcome.
Felthauser is challenging Republican State Rep. Mike Krusee of Round Rock in a district where Republican statewide candidates received six out of every 10 votes in 2004. That makes it a tough district for a Democrat to win but not insurmountable. Felthauser, a substitute teacher who's a member of the TSTA and the Texas Federation of Teachers, is one of several sleeper candidates who have significant support from education forces unhappy with House members who supported the leadership's school finance plans. But Felthauser and her fellow Williamson County Democrats are hitting Krusee hardest for his role as the sponsor of the transportation package that included toll roads that have proven to be controversial and unpopular in some areas of the state.
Houston businessman Mark McDavid is a potential sleeper candidate in a race against second-term Republican State Rep. Dwayne Bohac in HD 138 - a west Houston district where the minority population outnumbers white residents. Republican statewide contenders garnered 60 percent of the vote in Bohac's district two years ago. McDavid, nonetheless, raised slightly more cash for his campaign than Bohac reported during the first six months of the year - and now he's planning to file an ethics complaint against the incumbent in connection with a fundraising mailer that he says didn't meet disclosure requirements. McDavid's grandmother, Constance McDavid, was a longtime Harris County treasurer and leader in the County Treasurers ' Association of Texas.
Several more educators - Sharon Cade Davis of Palestine, Scott Cornuaud of Quinlan and Ernie Casbeer of Oglesby - could be considered potential sleeper candidates at this point in the competition in races against State Reps. Byron Cook of Corsicana, Dan Flynn of Van and Sid Miller of Stephenville respectively. Cornuaud, who practices law in Greenville, has been a member of the Quinlan school board for the past five years. Davis is a Democratic activist who's been campaigning full time since retiring from the Region VII Education Service Center earlier this year. Casbeer teaches government and history at McGregor High School near Waco. Casbeer, Conuaud and Davis still face uphill battles in districts that have been voting about two-to-one Republican in recent years.
Some of these battles are more uphill than others. Here's a comparison of the statewide numbers for each of these districts for 2004:
Dist Democrat Bush Carillo Brister Keasler Incumbent
=======================================================
2 Cornuaud 73.1 64.5 69.0 68.2 100.0
8 Davis 68.7 56.8 63.8 62.4 100.0
52 Felthauser 61.3 59.1 60.8 59.6 100.0
59 Casbeer 74.5 64.3 69.8 67.9 63.9
114 Shinoda 59.9 62.0 62.0 61.9 100.0
127 Trautman 73.0 71.8 72.4 71.7 70.4
129 Matula 67.8 67.1 67.6 66.6 100.0
138 McDavid 60.3 59.5 60.0 58.9 63.8
Felthauser, Shinoda, and McDavid are clearly in less hostile districts than the others; I at least wouldn't call HD114 a two-to-one district. Matula and Trautman have strong organizations and along with Casbeer have backgrounds as teachers in a year where that's a plus. Sid Miller, Casbeer's opponent, significantly underperformed, as did Crabb (who was the low scorer in HD127) though not by as much. Matula and Shinoda have the ParentPAC endorsement, while Felthauser has Krusee's close ties to the toll road industry as a club to hit him with.
While conditions might be more conducive for Democratic longshot contenders this year, the GOP might have a potential sleeper candidate in Ted Kenyon, a San Antonio attorney who's challenging State Rep. David Leibowitz in the November election. HD 117 had been represented by a Republican for two years until Leibowitz won it by less than 500 votes in 2004. Leibowitz, who's also an attorney, has been considered relatively safe in his first bid for re-election. But the state House district overlaps with a congressional district where Republican U.S. Rep. Henry Bonilla will be turning out votes in a special election for his seat. A big turnout for Bonilla could give Kenyon a boost.Republicans two years ago had high hopes for a challenger who took on State Rep. Scott Hochberg in a Houston district where the GOP candidates won half the votes in statewide races in 2002. But John Kerry won 55 percent of the vote in HD 137 two years ago - and Hochberg did even better than that. This year's Republican nominee, Sylvia Spivey, is viewed as a longshot at best as a result. Other Democrats who might have distance chances are Dan Barrett of Fort Worth in a race against State Rep. Anna Mowery and Chris Youngblood of Burleson against State Rep. Bill Zedler of Arlington. A backlash against Republicans might also put Byron Sibbet of North Richland Hills within striking distance of favored Republican Kelly Hancock in a race for an open seat in HD 91.
Given how close Leibowitz's win was in 2004, it's a bit odd to see that race listed as a sleeper, but between the re-re-redistricted Congressional seats and the open HD118, this one has definitely been below radar. I can't dismiss such a purple district (only Leibowitz, JR Molina, and Bexar County Sheriff Ralph Lopez won it as a Democrat), but for what it's worth I've not heard any concern about this one. Kenyon had no cash on hand reported last quarter. Neither did Leibowitz, but he's a self-funder, so that doesn't tell you much. I'm not much worried about this one, and even less worried about Scott Hochberg. I wouldn't bet on any of these races, but I'd bet on one of the Democratic sleepers winning before I bet on Kenyon or Spivey.
More numbers for the other Dems named:
Dist Democrat Bush Carillo Brister Keasler Incumbent
=======================================================
91 Sibbett 68.4 66.1 67.1 65.9 100.0
96 Youngblood 62.7 60.6 61.2 60.0 60.3
97 Barrett 64.2 63.8 64.5 63.1 63.2
More or less in the middle of the pack above. I don't know enough about any of them to assess their odds beyond that.
As for the Congressional races:
To be a real sleeper with any chance whatsoever at this point in time in the election season, a candidate must have made some sort of impression with the voters even if they haven't been well-armed compared to a favored opponent. The congressional districts in Texas will be harder to crack for challengers as a result of the way they've been drawn to prevent upsets from happening. Democratic challengers Shane Sklar of Edna, Mary Beth Harrell of Killeen and John Courage of San Antonio have formidable budgets despite being substantially outfunded in races against Republican U.S. Reps. Ron Paul, John Carter and Lamar Smith. They're still underdogs, but their chances for upsets appear to be better now than they were three or four weeks ago.The same goes for Will Pryor as he takes on Republican U.S. Rep. Pete Sessions in a Dallas district where the incumbent outdueled Martin Frost in one of the most expensive race for Congress in the nation in 2004. While the incumbent has had four times more money to spend on the campaign than Pryor, the Democratic challenger has still had sufficient resources to establish communication with voters and the benefit of being able to reassemble Frost's old organization that was in place less than two years ago. Pryor's best shot could come if Sessions takes the race for granted during the final month.
Courage's chances were made worse by the Supreme Court decision. Harrell has gotten a fair amount of decent press (though nothing nearly as sweet as this mash note) and could get some traction in that military-heavy district. Pryor has decent fundraising and is in the least red of the districts, but I've heard very little about him.
Still not registered to vote in Texas? Tomorrow's your last chance to fix that oversight.
Tuesday is the last day to register to vote for the November general election.Registration forms can be picked up at local Department of Public Safety offices, local libraries and at the Secretary of State's office. Residents also can sign up at a local voter registration office.
Applications are available online at www.sos.state.tx.us/elections as well.The applications must be either hand-delivered to the county voter registrar by Tuesday or postmarked that day.
Remember, if you don't vote, you don't get to complain about the outcomes.
Overall, there's been a lag in voter registrations in Harris County.
A new state database required by federal law has made it easier to track people moving around Texas.When a voter registers in a different county, the database flags the duplication and allows the old county to remove the name.
The system was activated in January, and about 5,000 names have been removed from the Harris County roll so far, said Paul Bettencourt, Harris County tax assessor-collector, whose office handles the local voter roll.
It's a small number in a county with nearly 2 million voters, but it's still more than 12 percent of all voter purges since last November.
The main reason fewer people are registered now is that fewer are signing up, Bettencourt said. Tuesday is the last day to register for the Nov. 7 election.
"We've been flat as a pancake. This is a really weak year," Bettencourt said, despite an abundance of voter-registration drives.
[...]
In Harris County, officials have been busy pruning invalid names even as they urge new voters to sign up.
More than 40,000 names have been chopped from the roll since last November, typically in a process that begins when new registration cards mailed to voters every two years are returned undeliverable.
Such registrants are removed from the roll if they don't vote in one of the next two federal elections, conducted in even-numbered years.
Voters who don't change residence stay on the roll and receive a new card every other year, even if they don't vote.
Bettencourt also scours driver's license records, the U.S. Postal Service change-of-address database and the Social Security office's list of the deceased.
[...]
About 1.91 million voters are registered in Harris County, down from 1.95 million in 2004, or about 80 percent of those eligible to register.
Voter registration, along with voting, always peaks in presidential election years.
About 55,000 people have registered in Harris County since March this year. That compares with 155,000 for the same period in 2004, when President Bush and Sen. John Kerry were in a tight election battle.
This year's number also is much smaller than the 92,000 registrations in 2002, the last nonpresidential election year for federal offices such as the U.S. House and Senate.
I don't quite understand the math here. Forty thousand deletions plus 55,000 new registrations sounds like an increase to me, not a decrease. Even if you assume that the new county-comparison database effect is separate, that's only 45,000 removals. Either the other factors (such as deaths) are included but not enumerated or something doesn't add up.
Be that as it may, there's a separate point to highlight:
Although the hottest national voting issues involve the security of electronic voting systems and what identification should be required for voting, a third issue is emerging along with the fierce debate about illegal immigration.In testimony before Congress earlier this year, Bettencourt said nothing prevents potential voters from falsely indicating they are citizens on their registration cards.
Well, there is the state law against making a false statement on a registration application:
§ 13.007. FALSE STATEMENT ON APPLICATION.(a) A person commits an offense if the person knowingly makes a false statement or requests, commands, or attempts to induce another person to make a false statement on a registration application.
(b) An offense under this section is a Class B misdemeanor.
(c) For purposes of this code, an offense under this section is considered to be perjury, but may be prosecuted only under this section.
A Class B misdemeanor can mean a fine of up to $2500 and up to 180 days in jail. I'd say that's not nothing, but maybe Paul Bettencourt has a different definition of the word in mind. His suggestion of "some sort of national database of citizens that local voter registrars could use" is one that might have merit, but given the aggressive campaign against voting rights by Republicans here and elsewhere, I'm not at all inclined to accept this as a good faith proposal on his part.
There's a long article in the Chron today about the electoral battles in the State House and how that may shape the 80th Legislature. A couple of points of interest leap out, starting with this:
Democrats need only to pick off three or four Republican House members to leave Craddick, a Republican from Midland, vulnerable to a challenge from his own party, they say.
Craddick's firm leadership style, described by some as autocratic, has created an undercurrent of discontent, and Republican losses of House seats in the Nov. 7 election could inspire a challenge, said House Mexican-American Caucus Chairman Pete Gallego, D-Alpine."There's a sense of, would they rather lose the whole chamber (eventually) or would they rather jettison the speaker, and I think most of them would rather jettison the speaker," Gallego said.
At least four Republican House members are quietly sending signals of their interest in challenging Craddick if Republicans fare poorly in the election, Gallego said. He declined to identify the possible challengers, who don't want to alienate Craddick prematurely.
I'm moderately amazed that Rep. Gallego is saying all this. Not because I don't think that Craddick needs to watch his back, but because this is a rather enormous thing to say for the record. Even picking up four seats would leave the GOP with a solid 82-68 advantage, and even with the departures of Al Edwards and Vilma Luna there's quite a few Dems who are on Craddick's leadership team. If that's not a big enough margin for him to hold on as Speaker, that's really saying something. Maybe this is more of a tactical maneuver on Gallego's part, I don't know. The fact that he said it to a reporter is striking.
Republican campaign experts expect the GOP to keep its 86-64 margin in the 150-member House but concede the potential loss of one seat in a worst-case scenario.Democrats expect to gain at least two seats and as many as five.
For Democrats, the key races involve an open seat for retiring Rep. Terry Keel, R-Austin, and challenges against incumbents, Rep. Martha Wong, R-Houston, and Rep. Gene Seaman, R-Corpus Christi.
"If (Craddick) loses all three of those, it's possible that he loses his speakership," said Kelly Fero, an Austin-based Democratic campaign consultant.
Republicans counter that several rural Democratic incumbents are vulnerable, along with freshman Rep. Hubert Vo, D-Houston, and that GOP wins in those races would offset Republican losses elsewhere.
"I don't see much change during an off-year election," said Republican campaign consultant Royal Masset of Austin.
Democrats and Republicans each have a half dozen seats that are equally vulnerable, said Bryan Eppstein, a Fort Worth-based GOP consultant.
"For every Republican that loses, there will be a Democrat that loses," Eppstein said.
Republicans concede that changing demographics in the Dallas-Fort Worth area will create tougher than normal re-election campaigns for GOP incumbents Rep. Toby Goodman and Rep. Tony Goolsby.
But they consider rural Democratic incumbents - including Rep. Chuck Hopson, D-Jacksonville; Rep. Mark Homer, D-Paris; Rep. Robby Cook, D-Eagle Lake; and Jim McReynolds, D-Lufkin - as vulnerable targets for GOP gains. And they expect to win the seat of retiring Rep. Pete Laney, D-Hale Center, in West Texas.
However, Democrats counter that former Crosby County Judge Joe Heflin is in good shape to keep Laney's seat in the Democratic column because of his close ties to rural communities and his support for their public schools. Republican nominee Jim Landtroop sends his children to private schools and is backed by school voucher supporters.
I've said this before and I'll say it again: If the rural Dems like Hopson and McReynolds can survive 2002 and 2004, what reason is there to think they'll do worse in 2006? There are no guarantees, of course, and for what it's worth I've heard concerns on the Democratic side about Hopson, but I just don't see what would make this election any tougher for them. Quite the reverse, in fact.
I'm among the people who basically wrote off HD85 when Pete Laney announced his retirement, but since then I've heard all kinds of good things about Joe Heflin, including a lot of optimism about his chances to retain that seat. I'm still not convinced that he can overcome the partisan lean of that district, but he's certainly putting up a good fight. Call me pessimistic but hoping to be surprised.
I note that the other high profile Democratic-held open seat - HD118, formerly occupied by Carlos Uresti - was not mentioned in this article. Given that it's a 55-45 Dem district and that the Republican challenger has a pretty good resume, that's remarkable. If that was an oversight, it's sloppy; if it's a deliberate omission, it's telling. I believe the dynamic of the CD23 special election helps Democratic hopeful Joe Farias more than it helps Republican George Antunya - maybe that has something to do with it. In any event, if this one is not being discussed in the same breath as the others, that's good news for the Dems.
As for the Hubert Vo/Talmadge Heflin rematch, I just don't see it. Heflin had no money as of the June 30 reporting deadline. The district isn't any friendlier to him in terms of demographics. He's no longer the Appropriations chair. It's only recently that he's started any real campaigning, from what I hear. About the only favorable thing I can think of for Heflin is the overlap of HD149 into SD07, where Dan Patrick may have some coattails. But if Republicans are hanging their hats on this sort of analysis, they're sadly mistaken.
In 2004, President George W. Bush took 61.5% of the district vote against John Kerry. And in the only other local race where the entire district voted between Republican and Democratic candidates, Harris County Sheriff Tommy Thomas defeated Democrat Guy Robert Clark by nearly eleven percentage points.
Those of us who can read charts will know that the 61.5% for Bush is his statewide share. He got 53.4% in HD149. Tommy Thomas was one of a dozen or so countywide Republicans in contested races, and as with Bush he scored lower in HD149 than he did overall - 53.9% in the district versus 55.4% overall. Frankly, I feel better about Vo's chances after reading this.
There are other races the article doesn't mention as being potential swings. Republicans will be aiming for the other two freshman Dems, Mark Strama in Austin and David Leibowitz in San Antonio, plus Yvonne Gonzalez Toureiiles and the open seat left behind by Vilma Luna, both in South Texas. Democrats have quite a few other prospects besides the three named above - Kristi Thibaut in Houston and a raft of Dallas/Fort Worth candidates: Paula Hightower Pearson, Harriet Miller, Katy Hubener, Allen Vaught (who picked up a nice DMN endorsement to go with his ParentPAC nod), and Phillip Shinoda. Capitol Inside has a list of some "sleeper" races that I'll get to in a subsequent post, almost all of which are Democratic opportunities.
Bottom line as I see it is that the Dems are very likely to pick up seats. I'd call one a disappointment rather than a best case. I don't know if they can get enough to put Tom Craddick in danger of becoming an ex-Speaker, but I do believe he will have a smaller circle of lieutenants to command. We'll know soon enough.
And here it is, my final interview with a Harris County State Rep candidate. Today's subject is Scott Brann, the Democratic candidate for HD136 against Rep. Beverly Woolley, who is a member of the House leadership and a main player in the TRMPAC scandal.
Here's the interview:
Link for the MP3 file is here. Just because I've run out of candidates to interview doesn't mean I've run out of subjects. I've got more in the works, including one I think you'll really like for later this week. I hope you've found this series to be useful, and I hope I can build on that for the future.
Here are my previous interviews:
Gary Binderim - Interview
Glenn Melancon - Interview
Jim Henley - Interview
David Harris - Interview
Ted Ankrum - Interview
Shane Sklar - Interview 1, Interview 2
John Courage - Interview
Nick Lampson - Interview, Interview about space
Mary Beth Harrell - Interview
Bob Smither - Interview
Hank Gilbert - Interview
Joe Farias - Interview
Harriet Miller - Interview
Ellen Cohen - Interview
Diane Trautman - Interview
Rep. Scott Hochberg - Interview
Kristi Thibaut - Interview
Rep. Hubert Vo - Interview
Dot Nelson-Turnier - Interview
Sherrie Matula - Interview
Sammie Miller - Interview
Mark McDavid - Interview
Rep. Ana Hernandez - Interview
Chad Khan - Interview
Scott Brann - Interview
There's not been a lot of local news coverage of State Rep campaigns so far. One way to get covered is to spend lots of campaign money without documenting what it's for.
Republican state Rep. John Davis has represented the Clear Lake area for eight years, but there are questions about what happened to nearly $100,000 in campaign donations.Like every member of the Texas House of Representatives, Rep. Davis collects campaign donations and is required to report them to the Texas Ethics Commission.
11 News tracked Rep. Davis's campaign finance reports for the last six years and found that unlike most members of the Texas House, Rep. Davis is unusually vague about what happens to much of that money.
Most of his reports are specific and follow the rules: $50 for the electric bill in his Austin apartment; $300 for a sponsorship of the NASA area little league team.
But there were also entries such as, $5,490 for "miscellaneous expenses," paying of an American Express bill. In fact, credit card charges that contained no explanation as to what the card actually purchased total $48,734 in the last six years.
After receiving a citizen complaint about that, the Texas Ethics Commission sent Rep. Davis a letter announcing an investigation and asking him to provide copies of the American Express bills.
Rep. Davis says he is complying.
More entries included John Davis paying John Davis with campaign donations. He lists them as reimbursements for "out of pocket expenses," but the ethics commission rules are clear on that: Politicians need to specifically say what they're purchasing, and why they need to be reimbursed with campaign donations. And Rep. Davis never does. In six years, those out of pocket reimbursements add up to $50,135.
Rep. Davis told 11 News by phone, "I made a mistake, and we'll get it corrected. It's incumbent on me to know what the rules are."
He said all the expenses were for legitimate campaign or legislative purposes.
I'm sure you didn't need another reason to vote for Sherrie Matula, but here it is anyway. Much of the legwork (though not the actual complaint) on this has been done by Muse - well done! PinkDome provides some artwork for the story (there's video at the KHOU link above), while John Coby and PDiddie join in.
I think when all is said and done I'm indifferent to the question of whether or not Houston eventually annexes the Woodlands. From a strictly Houston perspective, I can see pros and cons to either outcome, as I'm sure our neighbors to the north can based on the Kingwood experience.
I don't know what will ultimately happen. I do know that whoever wants to be Mayor of Houston after Bill White leaves office in 2009 should be spending all of his or her spare time thinking about how to handle this, because it will all happen during the next Mayor's three terms. We'll have a better idea what the possibilities are by then, probably after this next legislative session.
The road to self-governance won't be easy. Several political and legislative hurdles must be cleared.To become a city, The Woodlands must get Houston's approval or seek a change in the state's annexation law.
Forming a public service district with taxing powers also would require legislative approval, but it would be a much easier task to accomplish than incorporation. Lawmakers routinely pass bills to create the special districts.
It's possible the community could end up relying on both options, using a management district while leaders work toward incorporation, which could take longer.
Both options require time to study and implement, and that is what's behind the sense of urgency, Deretchin said. The Legislature meets only every two years, which means The Woodlands has just two sessions, 2007 and 2009, to try to get a governance bill passed, he said.
But the time and money spent on exploring becoming a city could be moot if Houston refuses to allow the community to incorporate or it decides to annex.
I think if something doesn't happen this session, you can just about count on Houston annexing the Woodlands on schedule. Keep an eye on Rep. Rob Eissler, and tune into my interview with his opponent Sammie Miller, who has some things to say on this subject.
One more thing, from this sidebar piece on the ins and outs of annexation:
Q: Is any other Texas city as aggressive as Houston has been with annexation?A: It's a fascinating subject, because Houston is a unique case in Texas. Other cities are pretty aggressive, but Dallas-Fort Worth got surrounded and shut down. San Antonio pretty much dominates the metropolitan area there. Austin has some cities to the north that are constraining them.
When I first moved to Houston in 1988, I made regular excursions back to San Antonio to visit college buddies. I was always amused at how the city limit of San Antonio was reached almost immediately after crossing the Bexar County line, which was about ten miles before you reached any real population center. At least now I understand why that is.
Chevron continues its push to occupy all available downtown offie space.
After remaining a dark spot on the Houston skyline for the past few years, the former Enron headquarters will be coming to life again next year.Chevron plans to lease the glass tower at 1400 Smith St., which has 1.3 million square feet. The California-based company said it plans to bring the majority of its local work force downtown.
The 50-story tower was sold in 2003 after Enron's collapse in 2001. The building has remained vacant ever since.
New York-based Brookfield Properties Corp. said Thursday it purchased the building, now known as Four Allen Center, for $120 million and leased the entire property to Chevron USA.
When I worked downtown at 1600 Smith Street, we referred to our next-door neighbor as "the Speed Stick building". My most vivid memory of it is from after a tornado touched down and passed over it in 1993, blowing out a huge number of its windows. That took a couple of months to fully repair.
Last February, in its effort to bring most of the operations together, Chevron leased 465,000 square feet in the Continental Center I building at 1600 Smith. It also owns and occupies 1500 Louisiana, another former Enron tower that Chevron purchased in 2004.
As noted in February, there were a few bumps in the road for Chevron in its attempt to lease the new Enron building. I blogged about that here, here, here, and here.
The first batch of Chron State Rep endorsements goes as I expected, with four incumbents plus Ellen Cohen snagging recommendations.
House Dist. 134, Ellen Cohen - Cohen is the Democratic challenger to incumbent Martha Wong in this race. The outpouring of Cohen support by area voters signals a desire for leadership change in this district. Cohen is superbly qualified. As head of the Houston Area Women's Center since 1990, Cohen has brought needed attention to domestic and sexual violence while managing a multi-million-dollar organization serving some 6,000 clients a year. She says she'll work to put more money into public education and ensure it is well-spent.
"Zero experience", indeed.
The incumbents getting the nod are Scott Hochberg, Ana Hernandez, Hubert Vo (someone needs to check spelling on these things), and sadly, Crazy Bob Talton. You can listen to my interviews with these fine four candidates here:
Cohen interview
Hochberg interview
Hernandez interview
Vo interview
There are seven other contested State House races in Harris County, plus two in Fort Bend and two in Montgomery, so I'm sure we'll see the rest of these soon. Stay tuned.
A federal lawsuit by Steve Stockman to force his way onto the general election ballot for CD22 has been rejected.
U.S. District Court Judge Sam Sparks issued an order on Monday denying Stockman's motion to recall absentee ballots in the four counties the district represents. Those counties are Galveston, Fort Bend, Brazoria and Harris.Election officials in all four counties testified in Sparks' Austin courtroom last week. All said that they would incur costs, confusion and delays by resending absentee ballots with Stockman's name on them.
In his ruling, Sparks noted that Stockman had only filed his federal suit on Sept. 19, even though the rejection by the secretary of state he was appealing had occurred three months earlier.
On June 22, Texas Secretary of State Roger Williams rejected Stockman's candidacy after finding his petition was 17 names shy of the 500 valid signatures required for an independent candidate.
Stockman challenged the constitutionality of Williams' requirements for valid signatures. However, Sparks ruled that the secretary of state's requirement of either a voter-registration number or a date of birth was not an unfair burden because "most people can readily give their birth date."
Although Stockman has produced 21 affidavits from disqualified voters asserting they were legitimate, Sparks ruled that he could only rule on constitutional law, not on facts that should be evaluated under the state's election law.
"A federal court simply cannot tell a state official, such as the Texas Secretary of State, how to conform his actions to state law when there is no constitutional violation at stake," Sparks wrote.
Judge Sparks sure is busy, isn't he? You may wonder why Stockman was suing in federal court, and why he took so long to file such a suit. Apparently, it's because he had previously sued in state courts, and was rejected by the State Supremes a month ago.
Former Congressman Steve Stockman sued to force the Texas Secretary of State to put his name on the ballot for the 22nd Congressional district general election. The Texas Supreme Court late Friday denied Stockman's request to be heard.That was good news for Galveston County Clerk Mary Ann Daigle, who warned Stockman's lawsuit could have delayed mail-in ballots as well as ballots for military personnel.
Stockman's lawsuit alleged Secretary of State Roger Williams improperly denied a petition by Stockman to have his name added to the ballot as an independent for the congressional general election in November. Williams had ruled that Stockman's petition did not contain enough valid signatures to have his name added to the ballot.
"The state statute outlines certain requirements for valid signatures that were not met on the petition filed by Mr. Stockman," said Secretary of State spokesman Scott Haywood. "We appreciate the fast ruling by the Texas Supreme Court, which allows our counties to move forward with their preparation for November."
While early voting does not begin until late October, Daigle worried that the ballots would not be ready by Monday, which she said was the last date available to mail them to military servicemen and women, as well as other county residents overseas.
And to think that all this could have been avoided if Stockman had put as much effort into collecting signatures as he did into filing lawsuits. Better luck next time, Steve.
Buck O'Neil, one of the best ambassadors the game of baseball has ever had, passed away on Friday at the age of 94.
A star in the Negro Leagues who barnstormed with Satchel Paige, O'Neil later signed Hall-of-Famers Lou Brock and Ernie Banks as a scout. In July, just before he was briefly hospitalized for fatigue, he batted in a minor league All-Star contest and became the oldest man ever to appear in a professional game."What a fabulous human being," Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson said. "He was a blessing for all of us. I believe that people like Buck and Rachel Robinson and Martin Luther King and Mother Teresa are angels that walk on earth to give us all a greater understanding of what it means to be human. I'm not sad for him. He had a long, full life and I hope I'm as lucky, but I'm sad for us."
[...]
Always projecting warmth, wit and a sunny optimism that sometimes seemed surprising for a man who lived so much of his life in a climate of racial injustice, O'Neil remained remarkably vigorous into his 90s. He became as big a star as the Negro League greats whose stories he traveled the country to tell.
He would be in New York taping the "Late Show With David Letterman" one day, then back home on the golf course the next day shooting his age, a feat he first accomplished at 75.
"But it's not a good score any more," he quipped on his 90th birthday.
Long popular in Kansas City, O'Neil he rocketed into national stardom in 1994 when filmmaker Ken Burns featured him in his groundbreaking documentary "Baseball."
The rest of the country then came to appreciate the charming Negro Leagues historian as only baseball insiders had done before. He may have been, as he joked, "an overnight sensation at 82," but his popularity continued to grow for the rest of his life.
"He brought the attention of a lot of people in this country to the Negro Leagues," former Washington Nationals manager Frank Robinson said. "He told us all how good they were and that they deserved to be recognized for what they did and their contributions and the injustice that a lot of them had to endure because of the color of their skin."
Excerpting doesn't do him justice. Read the whole thing, then put Burns' "Baseball" documentary on your Netflix list. And hope that someday the Hall of Fame corrects its past oversight and puts O'Neil in Cooperstown where he belongs. Rest in peace, Buck O'Neil.
I managed to not see the debate last night. Bad political blogger, no biscuit. I'll try to make it up to you by linking to a boatload of other people's reactions to it.
Based on what I'm reading, the winners last night were Chris Bell and Rick Perry, though they're measured on different things. The expectations for Perry were low enough to make Dubya blush, but he did manage to exceed them. He needed to not say or do anything stupid - as Paul Burka put it in declaring Perry the winner, he "did nothing that would lose votes".
Bell, on the other hand, needed to gain voters. It helped that by every account I've read, Friedman and Strayhorn were awful. Looking around, I see a lot of indications that Bell didn't just do well among the people who already supported him, but that he also did well among people who had at least been considering one of the indies. For example:
I flirted with Friedman and signed for Strayhorn, though I admit I lost the petition before I could mail it back.[...]
Friedman was all over the place. Willie Nelson in charge of energy policy? Come on. He’s running against politics and while he's passionate about changing Texas, he has no idea how to do it. My brother said he doesn't think we need a comedian as our governor. I agree, but I'd still take him over the clown we have. Comedians are funny. Clowns are scary.
I had high hopes for Strayhorn; however, she came off flat and uninspiring. I'd take her over Perry, but only since I know she really is committed to education. She sounded desperate, which is probably what happens when you're fourth in the polls.
The best line of the night was from Chris Bell when he referred to the competition as his "three Republican opponents." Bell was knowledgeable and he seemed to have a strong grasp of the issues. At times, Friedman even helped him out, though probably unintentionally. Bell has solid positions on education and has made transparency and clean government one of his signature issues. He gets points for being one of the first to file ethics complaints against Tom DeLay. He's smart, witty and competent. Call me convinced.
The Star Telegram's J.R. Labbe:
Wow. Perry doesn't even acknowledge that Kinky and Grandma are in the race much less in the studio. "There's a clear choice between me and Bell."Not sure how that will play with some voters if my 81-year-old mom's reaction is any indication. "Dismissive is not an attractive characteristic," Mom declared in a phone call immediately after the debate.
And for the first time in her life, she's thinking about voting for a Democrat. Bell scored at least one point.
Let's hope there's more where those two came from. I'll continue beneath the fold, but first, the best news of the evening for Bell comes from the Quorum Report:
Houston Attorney John O'Quinn, prominently featured tonight in Chris Bell's post-debate appearance, said he would do whatever it takes to raise Bell's profile in the race. Pressed by Wayne Slater of the Dallas Morning News in a post-debate press gaggle, O'Quinn said he was ready to put at least a million dollars into the Bell campaign, if not more."Chris Bell will not lose because of a lack of resources," O'Quinn said.
Better late than never. I just hope it's not too late.
RealGOP for Strayhorn in a comment at Burka's blog:
Perry did fine, but Bell clearly won (to my disappointment).[...]
Bell was unexciting (as expected) but articulate and knowledgeable. I disagree with the direction he wants to lead Texas, but even his critics must concede that he has a vision (which we don't share) and a firm grasp of the issues. Bell managed his time well and answered most questions directly and with substance. Bell demonstrated a grasp of the issues which I expected from Strayhorn.
Bell's performance wasn't any more proficient than Perry's, but it was better calculated. Every statement where Bell demonstrated that his vision for Texas differs from mine was a statement that united Democrats behind his candidacy in a way that Perry's solid performance failed to unite Republicans.
Bell also positioned himself well to pick up the support of those who weren't too familiar with Kinky and dropped into the debate with an open mind about possibly supporting Kinky.
Importantly, this debate will most directly result in a flood of support away from Strayhorn, and Bell also positioned himself well to be the main recipient of those ex-Strayhorn votes.
Finally, this debate was the "last call" for the big money folks. From what I'm reading on the Quorum Report, Bell won this audience, too.
Perry did well, but Bell won the debate going away because he positioned himself to gain almost all of the voter support and campaign dollars which were up for grabs.
BOR's Karl-Thomas, a onetime Bob Gammage supporter:
I have to say, watching the debate tonight, I was proud of Chris Bell who performed beyond my wildest expectations delivering a clear message, positive solutions, and real reason for Democrats to stick together and elect him Governor.
BOR's Phillip Martin:
Seriously -- I'm realistic, I'm pragmatic, I can recognize good rhetoric and good reasoning, and folks that can avoid questions. But I swear -- Bell did everything I hoped for and ten times more in tonight's debate. The only other one who seemed even remotely competent was Governor Perry, and that's what years of experience and polish will do (and we all know how he really stands on everything).
PDiddie:
Chris Bell was poised, confident, and articulate. He never got cut off for time, and he answered the question he was asked and didn't just spout some talking point. It was such a strong performance in comparison to his inept three stagemates that he likely sent himself to the Governor's Mansion tonight.
Hal:
Who won the debate? Well let’s just say that the Republican gentlemen were full of ums, ers, pregnant pauses, and occasional looks of panic. When Grandma wanted to answer a question she would just open a file drawer and pull out a snippet from a speech or a campaign ad. Chris Bell was by far the best prepared, most spontaneous, and had the best tan of all of them
Muse:
I wish the Governor's debate was a reality TV show and that we'd get to see a new episode every Friday from now until the election. This was WAY, way, way more entertaining than the goofy reality TV shows the networks cook up.
Dallas Blog's Carolyn Barta:
If Texans were looking for the most viable alternative to jump out of the pack against incumbent Rick Perry in Friday night's debate, they were sorely disappointed. It turned out to be three other guys against the Republican, who's been in office long enough to have arguably good answers to every question he was asked. The biggest losers, however, had to be the independents -- Carole Keeton Strayhorn and Kinky Friedman, neither of whom made a case for their election over either of the traditional party candidates. Democrat Chris Bell held his own, showing himselves to be a smart guy who understands government and has substance. He and Perry appeared to have the best grip on state government and the issues.
Dallas Blog's Will Lutz:
The only televised gubernatorial debate just ended. My initial impression is the debate helped the two major party candidates -- Rick Perry and Chris Bell, while the two independents -- Kinky Friedman and Carole Keeton Strayhorn -- did not have a very good evening. Here are some other observations I had during the debate:* Chris Bell did a reasonable job contrasting himself with his opponents and driving home his themes on ethics in government. He was able to portray himself as someone who had a different philosophy from the other three. He gave thoughtful answers to the questions, and was the only one who got both questions right during the quiz portion of the debate.
The Star Telegram's Bob Ray Sanders:
In the live televised debate among Texas gubernatorial candidates Friday night, Democrat Chris Bell was by far the most informed, prepared, articulate and poised of the four candidates who want to lead the Lone Star State for the next four years.For those who say they didn't know Bell, and for those who do know him and have thought him to be too "dull," the appearance Friday evening should have convinced them that Bell is the most qualified candidate for governor of Texas.
Marc:
First, the bad news. Perry did well. His mission was to avoid any major gaffes. He did just that. I don’t think there is any doubt that Perry and his people are happy with Perry’s performance.Now the good news. Bell did well. Bell doesn’t have the most dynamic personality, but he was the best of the four when it came to content. And his performance improved as the debate progressed. My wife has never been enthusiastic about Bell’s candidacy, but Bell impressed her last night. I think he just may have connected with other voters who have been lukewarm about the Democrat, but who certainly don’t want to see Perry get reelected. He came across much better than Strayhorn and Friedman.
In fact, during the closing statements, Perry addressed Bell, but conspicuously ignored Strayhorn and Friedman. Perry views Bell as his chief rival. Can all of us progressives who want Perry out agree that Bell is our best bet?
The Statesman's Jason Embry:
The format was so all over the map that it was hard for anyone to stand out. But Perry and Bell seemed the most composed by far. As the candidate who was the least known to voters heading into the debate, it stands to reason that Bell gained the most.
Vince Leibowitz:
There was only one clear winner in tonight's gubernatorial debate: Democrat Chris Bell.While Carole Strayhorn dodged questions or simply failed to know the answers to them, as Kinky Friedman tried to convince the electorate he wasn't racist, and as Rick Perry tried in vain to appear as though his administration has made real accomplishments for Texas, only Bell offered answers that had both the sound and content of someone who should be Texas' next governor.
McBlogger, who was less impressed than most by Bell:
Only in a race like this can boring be considered good enough. The sad thing is that Chris is witty, quick and very personable none of which came across last night and all of which are endearing to voters. While it's a shame that Republicans and Independents didn't get to see that Chris Bell last night, I'm thinking enough D's saw it to close ranks and 'ring the Bell'. His policy was solid, he stayed on message and while he wasn't as pointed in his comments toward Perry (come on! If ever there was a time to call Perry a miserable failure it was last night. Chris, you missed an opportunity to dress down Perry and make him your bitch last night) he stood head and shoulders above the crowd as the voice of sanity.Why am I so dissapointed in Bell last night? He missed an opportunity to overwhelm these clowns. Last night he could have secured himself an unassailable lead. Instead, he'll edge ahead but it'll still be close. What Texans are hungry for is the one thing Bell has to offer... leadership. I've seen it in him when talks about education and stem cell research. Last night, that fire wasn't evident.
What he thought of everyone else was far harsher than that.
Rick Perry looked like a governor. The others didn't.
There are many favorable comments to the Bell blog, and some good ones at the Chron Texas Politics blog.
If after all that, you still want to see it (or parts of it), Somervell County Salon has clips, and KHOU has the whole thing till October 10.
Previously, Tom DeLay claimed that House Speaker Dennis Hastert would be coming to town for a fundraiser for Shelley Sekula Gibbs. Apparently, they can read poll numbers in the Gibbs camp, because Hastert has now been cordially uninvited to visit.
Meanwhile, in another sign that the Foley scandal is taking its toll on Republican House leaders, Houston City Councilwoman Shelley Sekula Gibbs, the GOP write-in candidate in the race to replace DeLay, has decided not to accept Hastert's offer to travel to Texas and help her raise money for her race against former Rep. Nick Lampson (D)."She decided it was best to wait until after the [Foley] investigation is complete," Sekula Gibbs campaign spokeswoman Lisa Dimond said Thursday.
Just last Sunday at a campaign appearance in Missouri City, Sekula Gibbs proudly told supporters that Hastert would be traveling to the district to help her raise some badly needed funds.
[...]
Sekula Gibbs, who didn't get into the race until late August, needs to catch up if she is to have a chance to win as a write-in. According to Sekula Gibbs, Majority Whip Roy Blunt (Mo.) is scheduled to raise money for her in Houston on Oct. 18 (Vice President Cheney hosted a fundraiser for her in downtown Houston on Wednesday).
Yes, that Roy Blunt. This is sort of like disavowing Clyde Barrow while embracing Willie Sutton. But I suppose in the circle of Republican electoral politics it counts as progress.
Can I just say that this "Lance Armstrong polluted our community swimming hole!" story is a little weird? It's also really long for what strikes me as more of a celebrity piece than anything else. On the other hand, when Lance runs for Governor in 2014, I'm sure it will become a campaign issue, regardless of how it gets resolved.
One sign of a campaign that's not doing as well as it might like is the Phantom Endorsement. That's when some generically nice things said about the candidate by a person of influence is touted in campaign literature as a genuine statement of support. This is usually followed by another statement from the person of influence in question saying that he or she did not in fact endorse that candidate. The point being that if the candidate who falsely claimed the endorsement wasn't at least a little desperate to proclaim some good news, he or she might have checked to make sure they had what they thought they had.
Such is the case in the HD134 race, where Martha Wong sent out this mailer, which contains a nice quote about Wong by HISD Superintendant Abe Saavedra. You may be asking yourself what a sitting school superintendant is doing getting publicly involved in a partisan legislative race. Turns out Superintendant Saavedra was asking the same thing, for he subsequently released this statement, which says in part:
[I]t is not my practice to make endorsements for any candidate. It is unfortunate that a misunderstanding may have occurred, but I have not authorized my name to be used in campaign materials. I have not endorsed any candidate.
Oops. Better keep looking, Martha. And if that's not enough, even Governor Perry has publicly questioned things Wong has said.
Gov. Rick Perry's staff took issue Friday with State Rep. Martha Wong's claim that her intervention was the reason he pledged $10 million in funds for Houston-Harris County last week to deal with violent crime."Even the governor listens to Martha Wong," she boasted to Bellaire High School students Friday morning during a campaign appearance with her opponent, Ellen Cohen.
Wong was referring to a letter she sent to Perry on Sept. 19, claiming her district was "under siege" and asking for state assistance, including troops, to fight crime.
"The governor has responded," she said. "He's going to send $10 million to Houston."
Kathy Walt, Perry's gubernatorial press secretary, said the assistance is modeled after a program the governor has implemented with the state's Homeland Security office along the Texas-Mexico border.
"The idea of expanding a similar program to Houston and other areas has been in the works for some time," Walt said.
"Rep. Wong certainly knew about it."She characterized Wong's remarks as being "of a political nature, something she's saying as a candidate."
Wong later acknowledged she had "talked to Homeland Security...and they were looking into it."
District 134, which Wong represents, is not experiencing an increase in crime, according to HPD figures and the Bellaire Police Department, which is also in her district.
How embarrassing is that? I mean, besides the idea of the National Guard patrolling the mean streets of West University Place, how often does a Republican State Rep in a tight election battle get slapped by Rick freaking Perry? Good grief.
And speaking of that debate at Bellaire High School, it's not on the Examiner web page yet, but a copy of an article recapping what happened can be found here. The good bits:
About 400 students - most of them seniors in college-level Advanced Placement courses - attended what was only the second joint appearance by the two candidates.The candidates' opening statements and the questions reflected issues of interest to young people - public education, college tuition, sex education, environmental matters.
In an uncomfortable moment, Wong mentioned that she sits on the board of the University of St. Thomas, adding, "so if any of you want to go there…"
Cohen drew cheers when she suggested abandoning the annual TAKS assessment test that determines grade promotions and graduation.
Those who wanted to ask questions had them screened first by teachers, and open displays of support or opposition to a candidate’s remarks were discouraged.
That didn't stop a regular chorus of cheers and boos. At first, the audience seemed to favor Wong, but by the end of the scheduled session, Cohen was being cheered more vigorously and Wong was being booed.
Oh, Martha, Martha, Martha. Anyway, here's Ellen Cohen's response (Word doc) to Wong's claimed support of Saavedra, which sets a few other things straight as well. At this point, it's practically piling on.
I had the pleasure of meeting Carolyn Boyle and Dinah Miller of Texas Parent PAC yesterday, as they were in town to publicize their endorsement of Sherrie Matula. They gave me a list of their endorsed non-incumbent candidates for the 2006 cycle, and the one name on there that I had not been aware of before now was Phillip Shinoda, who is running in HD114 up in Dallas against Rep. Will Hartnett. Here's the press release (Word doc):
"Phillip Shinoda has served Dallas for decades as a business executive and avid community leader, and he would bring fresh energy and innovative solutions to the Capitol," said Pam Meyercord of Dallas, a Texas Parent PAC Board member and resident of H.D. 114. "It's time for a change in Austin, and Phillip Shinoda will make us all proud. He is an open-minded man of faith and integrity who represents the mainstream values of our community."[...]
"Since 2003, whenever there was a critical 'line in the sand' vote about public education, incumbent Will Hartnett ignored the voices of parents and educators and voted as directed by the political leadership " said Dinah Miller of Dallas, Texas Parent PAC board member. "Dallas families deserve an independent representative who stands up for children and their neighborhood schools rather than a politician who falls in line and plays follow the leader." She noted that in the recent special legislative session, Hartnett voted to keep all revenue from Governor Rick Perry's new business tax from ever funding public education.
Shinoda is the only candidate in this race who has taken a stand to oppose siphoning money from public schools to fund private school tuition vouchers. In 2005, Hartnett supported legislation that would have spent hundreds of millions of tax dollars to enroll low-income and Spanish speaking students in private academies.Texas Parent PAC leaders said Shinoda epitomizes the type of intelligent and dedicated public servant who should be elected to the Texas legislature.
I'm going to skip the bio stuff from the press release because the first page I found when I googled Phillip Shinoda was this profile of him in Philanthropy World Magazine.
In life there are couch potatoes and there are tireless volunteers. Phillip Shinoda is the latter.For more than 20 years, Shinoda has devoted vast amounts of time to service for a plethora of high-profile boards and civic groups in Dallas. He has been instrumental in helping to plan a new addition at the Sixth Floor Museum, improving the Chamber of Commerce's leadership programs, and bringing together city leaders for dialogues on racial relations. He has worked closely with the prestigious Zale Lipshy University Hospital on its vision as well as the Dallas Children's Advocacy Center, an agency that serves victims of extreme child abuse.
As if all that weren't enough, Shinoda has been a spokesman for the Center for Nonprofit Management and the Asian American Forum, and has helped guide the United Way of Metropolitan Dallas' finances.
"Phillip has been in places of privilege, power and influence, but he has not forgotten his background. He uses that power to help those of lesser influence. That's a true leader," Suzanne Ahn, the late local Asian American activist, told The Dallas Morning News recently.
Shinoda is a modest, mild-mannered man who plays down his accomplishments, but his friends describe him as a driven intellectual who has risen to become one of Dallas' power brokers. Nevertheless, he maintains a strong tie to his Asian roots.
Ahn credited him with helping her and other Asian-Americans find their hereditary cultural identities. "But he's just as likely to help with the symphony as Asian-American issues."
Currently the director of corporate and community relations at University of Texas at Arlington, Shinoda has served on the boards of the Dallas Museum of Art, The Hockaday School, North Texas Public Broadcasting, the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza, the Better Business Bureau, Japan America Society, Zale Lipshy University Hospital, and the Leadership Dallas Alumni Association, and was a member of the Dallas Citizens Council.
[...]
His parents, Peter and Yoshiko Shinoda, a hard-working couple who owned a floral business, San Lorenzo, in Dallas' design district, influenced their son's desire to serve others. His father was active in the Lions Club and his mother with Zonta. Shinoda also cites his religious faith's obligation to tithe as strongly influencing him to give selflessly.
Shinoda's parents - both American citizens - fled California to avoid internment along with 120,000 other Japanese-Americans after the attack on Pearl Harbor at the onset of WWII. First living in a boxcar in Idaho where they were relegated to harvesting sugar beets, his parents later joined other family members in Grand Junction, Colorado, where they continued farming throughout the war. Although they escaped internment, they had family members in every camp.
Shinoda was born on March 22, 1944, in Grand Junction while his parents were fleeing persecution. In 1951, his parents moved to Dallas, where his father distributed flowers that his brothers grew. It was a difficult time for Japanese Americans. One wholesaler refused to "buy flowers from Japs," he recalls. And, his parents were also asked to leave a Dallas church because they were Japanese.
But his family never allowed their negative experiences to dissuade them from being part of their community. To the contrary, Shinoda became a devoted civic leader who works diligently to improve race relations.
"It's just part of the Dallas ethos - the importance of getting involved in civic affairs," he says.
This is one impressive dude, and both Boyle and Miller spoke highly of him to me after I said I didn't know anything about him. The district is redder than many of the ones in which ParentPAC is supporting a Democrat, but it's not impossible. The two Congressional races there in 2004 split 57-43 in favor of the GOP, which is not far from what Juan Garcia and Kristi Thibaut face.
I'll always have respect for Will Hartnett for the way he treated the Heflin/Vo challenge in 2005. That doesn't mean he doesn't have some way out beliefs, as the ParentPAC release notes, nor does it mean that I can't support a clearly outstanding candidate against him. Shinoda easily hurdles any bar you want to set, and now that I know more about him, I'm happy to see that ParentPAC is behind him. Congratulations to Phillip Shinoda, who joins Sherrie Matula, Juan Garcia, Joe Farias, Valinda Bolton, Allen Vaught, Kristi Thibaut, Ellen Cohen, and Joe Heflin on the Parent PAC endorsee list.
Apparently, the new proposals to strengthen Houston's anti-smoking ordinance do not go far enough for some people.
The draft ordinance released late Wednesday would extend the smoking ban to stand-alone bars and other public, enclosed workplaces but would allow smoking on outdoor patios, in cigar shops and at certain private functions.The ban does not extend to private residences unless they are used as day care or health care facilities.
"There's inconsistency in the logic," Councilman Peter Brown said during a meeting of the public health committee. "We're saying we want to protect the public and those who don't want to breathe smoke; we're going to protect you, except we're not going to do it in this case and this case and this case."
[...]
Elena Marks, White's health-policy director, said the proposal strikes a balance between the rights of smokers and nonsmokers.
"What we have tried to do is carefully craft an ordinance that would balance the freedoms of people, including employees, to be free of smoke, as well as allowing some places where people who do smoke can still congregate and smoke," she said.
But members of the Greater Houston Restaurant Association, which recently announced its support for a total smoking ban, said Thursday they oppose this specific proposal because it does not meet their expectations.
"There's just too many exceptions," said spokeswoman Sue Davis. The group agrees outdoor patios should be exempt from the ban but does not want to see any indoor exemptions, she said.
[...]
Besides patios, proposed exemptions include smoking-designated hotel rooms, tobacco shops, private functions held by nonprofit groups in their own facilities and private functions held in some rooms of hotels and convention centers.
Smoking would be banned in stand-alone bars, bingo facilities, pool halls, sports arenas and restrooms. It also would be banned at some covered-seating areas, including bus stops and outdoor sports stadiums, and within 25 feet of entrances to enclosed areas where it is prohibited.
"Why is it not a health issue on a patio, but it is a health issue everywhere else?" Councilwoman Pam Holm asked.
Better ventilation? With all due respect, I think that question answers itself, and is the reason why no one has seriously proposed banning smoking outdoors. I think the exceptions that have been proposed are very reasonable and narrowly tailored to situations that will likely never affect a dedicated smoke-avoider. I think the people who are objecting to this should take a deep breath (preferably in a smoke-free environment) and get a grip. I agree with what Elena Marks is saying, and I hope the holdouts will give her words some extra consideration.
One more thing:
The committee met a day after a federal judge struck down part of Austin's smoking ordinance, saying a bar owner can't be held liable if a customer smokes in a facility that has clearly posted "no smoking" signs.A Houston city attorney and a health official said since the ruling was based on the wording of Austin's ordinance, it was unlikely to affect how Houston enforces its ban.
"Austin's ordinance wasn't worded well," said Marilyn Byrd, chief of the Health Department's occupational health bureau, who oversees enforcement of the existing ordinance. "I'm hoping we won't have any trouble with the enforcement of this."
The Houston proposal would require the "person in control" of an area where smoking is prohibited to ask anyone smoking there to stop. The owner could not be held liable if the individual did not comply, as long as "no smoking" signs were visible.
"If the person fails to stop smoking, we don't put any additional responsibilities on the owner to kick them off the premises or stop serving them," said Kuruvilla Oommen, assistant city attorney.
Again, that sounds very reasonable, and in my non-lawyerly opinion seems to be in line with Judge Sparks' ruling. I say it's time for the people who want to advance this ball to recognize that they're getting just about everything they want and finish the job. The complaints that have been raised so far are not persuasive and just sound petty. Enough already.
Poor Gene Seaman. He can't get the local TV stations to stop running an ad that says nothing at all false about him.
Three local television stations have refused state Rep. Gene Seaman's request that they stop broadcasting a political commercial that he says makes false statements about him.All three stations, ABC affiliate KIII, NBC affiliate KRIS and CBS affiliate KZTV, said Wednesday they will continue to air the ad. Lawyer Mikal Watts, who paid for the ad, sent a letter to the three stations asking that they continue to air it, and disputing Seaman's statements that the ad contains falsehoods.
The ad, which started running this week during primetime, associates Seaman with former congressman Tom DeLay, who resigned in an ethics scandal. The commercial criticizes Seaman for using campaign funds to pay rent on an Austin condo owned by his wife, and for a homestead exemption granted on the condo when the couple's primary residence is in Corpus Christi.
[...]
Watts said in his rebuttal letter to the stations that unless Seaman proves otherwise, the condominium is not Ellen Seaman's separate property because Texas is a community property state.
[...]
[Seaman's attorney Lance] Bruun's letter threatens legal action if the ads don't cease. Watts said Seaman should address any legal action to Watts and his Good Government PAC rather than the three stations.
"He is threatening all three stations," Watts said. "He can sue me or the PAC or both. The problem is that truth is a defense under the statute.
"He is hoping that the stations would rather pull the ad than face meritless litigation."
Poor Gene. Here's the ad:
Let's be clear about this: Seaman took money from TRMPAC. He used campaign funds to pay rent on the Austin condo that was listed in his wife's name. The checks for that were written to a bogus holding company, whose address happened to be the condo. He and his wife claimed two homestead exemptions. Whatever his reasons for taking these actions, he took them. If he doesn't like the fact that the ad brings it all up, he should have taken different actions.
BOR, PinkDome, and South Texas Chisme also comment. Need I remind you that Seaman is running to be replaced by Juan Garcia? Feel free to help Juan out if you can.
I've blogged about AG Greg Abbott's highly partisan crusade against voting fraud, for which he's being sued, here and here. Now the Lone Star Project, which has done some exhaustive work on Abbott's questionable methodology, has done it again by showing that Abbott has failed to pursue a similar case of voting fraud that occurred in the wealthy and highly Republican area of Highland Park, even though it was referred to him for prosecution by the Dallas County District Attorney. Funny how Abbott is happy to tout examples of fraud that he alleges were committed by Democrats, but hasn't touched this one in months, isn't it? PDiddie gives an executive summary and some further background. Check it out.
And yes, we can do better than this for the position of the state's highest attorney. We deserve better than this.
Apparently, there was an odd double play in Wednesday's Mets-Dodgers game.
The Los Angeles Dodgers are accustomed to gridlock. They just never expected traffic congestion to doom them at Shea Stadium.With a chance to take an early lead against fill-in Mets starter John Maine, the Dodgers instead ran themselves into a double play at home plate as New York opened Division Series play with a 6-5 victory Wednesday afternoon.
Considering that the Dodgers scored a run with two outs in that inning and the Mets went on to win by one run, the second-inning blunders proved crucial.
"I've never seen that," Mets closer Billy Wagner said after collecting the save. "I mean, that pretty much changed the momentum of the game. They have a chance to go up at least 1-0 on that play or 2-0. Then J.K. (Jeff Kent) gets thrown out, and you're expecting J.D. (Drew) to stay at third base. You look up, and for him to be tagged out, that was something you don't see every day."
[...]
Kent led off the second with a single. Drew hit a dribbler to the left side for an infield single, and Russell Martin followed with a drive to deep right field. Shawn Green fielded the carom and delivered a perfect throw to cutoff man Jose Valentin.
"There's no outs in that situation for me," Kent said. "I'm standing on second base. You try to immediately read it. You don't know if he's going to catch it or not. If he catches it, you tag, and you're standing on third base with one out and in position to score.
"If not, you assume that if the ball drops, at least I score."
Third-base coach Rich Donnelly said he decided against stopping Kent when he saw Drew just a few steps behind him as they neared third base. Drew said he kept going because he noticed Donnelly didn't put up a stop sign.
Valentin's throw nailed Kent at home by a few feet. After catcher Paul Lo Duca showed the ball to umpire John Hirschbeck, he heard Maine alerting him that Drew was coming. Lo Duca responded by applying the tag for the second out.
Kent said he didn't notice how close Drew was until he saw him near home plate.
Unlike Billy Wagner, I have seen such a play. On August 2, 1985, in a game I watched on TV, Carlton Fisk of the White Sox tagged out both Bobby Meacham and Dale Berra of the Yankees at home. With Meacham on second and Berra on first, Rickey Henderson hit a long fly ball to center that eventually bounced off the fence. Meacham had tagged up, and by the time he realized the ball wasn't going to be caught, Berra was sharing second base with him. Both started running from a dead stop, and the relay home to Fisk beat Meacham by ten feet, Berra by twenty. To say that I, the TV announcers, and everyone not wearing a White Sox uniform at Yankee Stadium was stunned by this would be to understate. It was a tie game in the seventh inning when this happened; the Yankees failed to score and eventually lost in 11. The Yankees finished two games behind Toronto for the division title. Not that I was scarred by any of this, mind you.
Here's a list of all the times a catcher has made two putouts at home on the same play. Of the six times it occurred, the Yankees were the victims thrice. Make of that what you will.
I had reported on the Texas Parent PAC endorsement of Sherrie Matula before the official press release came out. Here it is (Word doc), and here's the gist of it:
"Sherrie Matula will have an immediate impact in the Texas House of Representatives, because she is experienced, energetic, and totally committed to representing the people of her district," said Manuel Rodriguez, Jr. of Houston, a Texas Parent PAC Board member. "The families of H.D. 129 need better representation, and it is time for a change at the Capitol."[...]
"Unlike her opponent, Sherrie Matula represents the mainstream views and interests of parents and children, taxpayers and businesses," said Carolyn Boyle, Texas Parent PAC chair.
"Bay Area families deserve an independent representative who will consistently stand up for their needs rather than a lawmaker who bends to the will of political leaders."
Matula is the only candidate in this race who has taken a stand to oppose siphoning money from public schools to fund private school tuition vouchers. "In 2005, incumbent John Davis spoke on the House floor in support of a tax-funded program for low-income and Spanish-speaking Houston students to attend private academies," Rodriguez said. "Davis was irresponsible in pushing a voucher scheme that could have taken away $200 million from Houston public schools." The voucher program Davis supported was defeated.
Texas Parent PAC leaders said Matula has a wealth of experience and leadership ability that will allow her to hit the ground running at the state Capitol in January. Matula will use her leadership and collaboration skills to solve problems affecting families, including escalating property taxes, traffic congestion, neighborhood and port security, and skyrocketing insurance and utility bills. As a fiscal conservative, she will work to balance Texas fiscal operations and attract new businesses.
Matula moved to the Bay Area after graduating from the University of Houston in 1974. For 25 years she taught in the Clear Creek and Pasadena school districts. She was elected to two terms on the Clear Creek ISD school board, gaining experience in budget management, constituent service, and public policy decision-making.
Throughout her career Matula has been recognized for exemplary teaching and leadership skills, including multiple nominations for Who’s Who of America’s Teachers, National Honor Roll of Educators, and Disney Teacher of the Year. Parents and teachers honored her with a Lifetime PTA Award in 1988.
Matula has been a strong advocate for public education as a board member of the Texas State Teachers Association and as a citizen lobbyist for children and schools at the Texas legislature since 1978.
She has been very active in her community for over 30 years, including being a charter member of St. Bernadette’s Church, board member and president-elect of the Clear Lake Symphony, as well as a board member of her community association, Bay Area New Democrats, and Clear Lake High School choir, soccer, and youth basketball associations.
Mark and Sherrie Matula have been married for 33 years, and they have two daughters who both graduated from Texas A&M with degrees in mechanical engineering.
As a reminder, here's my interview with Sherrie, and here's Vince's email interview with her. Congratulations, Sherrie Matula!
County Rents Judge's House For $56K A Year, Agrees To Water Cattle. Sometimes, you just know you're in Texas.
The story is an interesting little behind-the-scenes look at how county government works, in this case in Fort Bend. All I can say is that you just can't make this stuff up. Cliff Vacek, by the way, was Albert Hollan's opponent in 2004. Let's just say that Vacek is well acquainted with the folks who Get Things Done out there.
Mark has an appropriate graphic for the situation. Check it out.
Sometimes as I approach the I-45 South exit from I-10 during my morning commute, I run into a traffic jam that's caused by a long backup in the exit lane. Depending on where I am on I-10 and how bad it looks, I'll sometimes bypass the exit and continue on I-10 to US59 (my ultimate destination is SH288, which is accessible from either highway), or to the Smith Street exit to downtown, where I work my way over to Pierce and enter 288 directly.
I ran into that this morning, and wound up taking the Smith-to-Pierce route. I noticed the failed traffic lights, which had cops directing traffic at a couple of intersections, but didn't give much thought to it. I now know, of course, that there was a major blackout downtown, caused by a fire at a power substation, but as the traffic flowed quite reasonably smoothly, it just didn't occur to me that there was a problem. My compliments to HPD for keeping things moving efficiently. Let's nonetheless hope that a repeat performance is not needed any time soon.
UPDATE: HouStoned has a picture.
The proposed new anti-smoking regulations for Houston are getting closer to reality. One thing to note is that several previously-expressed concerns appear to be addressed in the new ordinance.
Houston's existing ordinance prohibits smoking in restaurants, but allows it in stand-alone bars. Smoking also is allowed in bars that are part of restaurants if the owners take steps to prevent smoke from drifting into dining areas.The broader ban would make it illegal to smoke in all bars, except those that qualify as "tobacco bars" because more than 20 percent of revenue comes from tobacco sales. Retail tobacco shops and all outdoor patios also would be exempt.
White said last week that he is working to persuade other mayors in the state to push similar rules in their cities. A regional smoking plan would ease concerns from some bar owners that customers would go outside city limits to find bars that allow smoking, he said.
"Somebody needs to go first, and it's Houston," White said.
So patios are exempt, as are cigar bars, and there's a push to draw other municipalities in so that local bars have less to worry about from smoke-friendly competition outside city limits. There are still other concerns, as noted in these previous posts, but that covers a fair bit of ground.
As the story notes, a ruling in an Austin lawsuit will likely also affect what City Council ultimately does.
A federal judge on Wednesday struck down part of Austin's smoking ban and found that some of its enforcement provisions were "unconstitutionally vague."The decision by U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks did not overturn the smoking ban, enacted by voters in May 2005. But Sparks did clarify what steps a business owner must take to be in compliance with the ordinance. Sparks was presiding over a lawsuit filed last year by a group of bar owners.
Sparks said the businesses must post "no smoking" signs and remove ashtrays and other smoking accoutrements. However, the owner can no longer be held liable for not taking additional steps if patrons continue to smoke, Sparks ruled.
[...]
Anne Morgan, chief of litigation for the city, however, said the practical effect of the ruling would be minimal. The overall ban is still in place, and most businesses are fully abiding by it.
But the focus of enforcement will now turn to the individuals smoking in public places rather than the owners of those establishments, Morgan said. The city has not cited individuals up to this point.
The city has not decided whether to appeal the decision, Morgan said. The ordinance, stemming from a citizen-initiated referendum, cannot be changed by the City Council for two years after its enactment.
Jennifer Riggs, a lawyer for the bar owners who sued, said her clients were delighted and relieved.
One plaintiff, Ego's owner Gail Johnson, is facing multiple criminal misdemeanor charges for allowing smoking in his bars. Riggs said those charges should be dismissed; prosecutors will have to review the cases based on this ruling, Morgan said.
Before this decision, the city's rules required the bar owner to take several "necessary steps" to enforce the ordinance, including posting signs; removing ashtrays; asking the patron to stop smoking or to leave if he or she refuses; and denying service to a person who is smoking.
Under those rules, Sparks found that bar owners could still be held liable, even if they followed the city's guidelines.
"The city persists in dodging the question and failing to give definitive guidance to business owners and operators about how they might avoid liability under the ordinance," the judge wrote in his ruling.
"Although the court suspects that there are some bar owners and operators purposely flouting the ordinance and/or enforcing it with a wink and a smile, this does not lessen the importance of the constitutional right of citizens to know what conduct is and is not prohibited by law," Sparks continued.
Link via McBlogger, who approves of the ruling. As do I, since ultimately a bar owner can only reasonably do so much, and the onus needs to be on the person who is smoking, as that's the actual illegal act. As the current version of Houston's revised ordinance is similar to Austin's, I trust this issue will be addressed before the law is passed.
The Dallas Morning News has an old-fashioned telephone poll of the Governor's race (for which you can see some not-terribly-informative crosstabs here in PDF form), and the results are quite similar to those newfangled robocall polls.
With just over a month to go until Election Day, 38 percent of likely voters back Mr. Perry's re-election, according to a statewide poll conducted for The Dallas Morning News.[...]
"There is an anti-Perry vote, and clearly somebody should have been able to beat him. But the anti-Perry vote is split three ways," said pollster Mickey Blum.
The top vote-getter wins; a candidate need not exceed 50 percent of the vote, and there is no runoff.
If the election were held today, independent Carole Keeton Strayhorn would get 18 percent of the vote, Democratic nominee Chris Bell would get 15 percent, and independent Kinky Friedman would get 14 percent, according to the poll.
As for Mr. Perry, his level of support has remained effectively unchanged through much of the political year, said Ms. Blum.
"He hasn't won anybody. He hasn't lost anybody. But he's likely to win because his opposition is divided unbelievably," she said.
The telephone survey of 828 likely voters was conducted by Ms. Blum's firm, Blum & Weprin Associates Inc., between Sept. 26 and Oct. 3. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points, meaning results could vary by that much in either direction.
So, Perry in the 30s but above the 35% danger zone. The other three bunched up, with Strayhorn doing better than she does in SurveyUSA and Zogby and about as well or a little worse than she does in Rasmussen. Friedman in last place.
And then there's Chris Bell.
Ms. Blum said Mr. Bell's problem is that most voters still don't know who he is. According to the survey, two-thirds of likely voters don't know him well enough to have an opinion.The Democratic nominee doesn't even have majority support within his own party. Mr. Bell, a former congressman from Houston, is attracting only 39 percent of Democratic voters and only 37 percent of black voters, the most reliable constituency within the Democratic Party.
Ms. Blum said she could not recall a contest "in any state, anywhere, anytime, that the Democrat is not [dominant] among black voters," she said.
Blacks were 8% of the sample, so we're talking at most 70 respondents. This could just be a weird result, especially given that Strayhorn had 26% black support. If there's a groundswell of black support for Strayhorn, I'm not aware of it.
As far as Bell's level of support among Democrats in this poll goes, we're back to some old familiar territory. I won't bore you with another retelling of my argument against this. I kind of wish they'd polled the Senate race alongside the Governor's race in this survey. If they had, and if they'd gotten a result that was equally similar for that race to the robocall/online polls, some 30-35% of respondents would have said they were voting for Barbara Radnofsky. Call me crazy, but I have a hard time believing that half - more than half, even - of self-identified Radnofsky supporters would then fail to push the button for Chris Bell. If you can explain that, by all means, knock yourself out in the comments.
I mean, I'm not so egotistical as to think that my assumptions about this race can't be wrong. I could certainly find out on November 7 that all my skepticism amounted to so much hot air. But if I'm wrong I want to understand why. I keep asking the same questions, and I keep not getting any satisfactory answers. I brought up the Senate race here because I don't think Radnofsky has a higher level of name recognition than Bell does. I figure that in these polls, what some people hear is "Radnofsky's the Democrat, I'm voting for the Democrat", and they answer accordingly. Do you believe Bell won't get some of that, in the voting booth if not on the telephone? I do, so I remain dubious of results like this. Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong. It's where I'm coming from, and you can take it for what it's worth. The only poll that matters is in 34 days, and at that time we'll know what's what.
As promised, Shelley Sekula Gibbs was the beneficiary of a Big Time Dick Cheney fundraiser.
Cheney spoke at the Hyatt Houston Downtown to about 200 Sekula-Gibbs supporters who paid $500 or more each for a sandwich, chips and a 15-minute speech from the vice president. She said she expects to raise $200,000 from the event.
For five hundred clams, I'd have at least demanded an open bar. Obviously, money's a bit tight in ShelleyLand.
Muse has more, including a caption-worthy picture and some musical accompaniment. One other highlight of the event:
DeLay, who attended today's fundraiser, said he'll do everything he can to help Sekula-Gibbs."There is a significant group in the district that are Tom DeLay supporters, and I want to make sure they know I support her," DeLay said. "Everyone thinks a write-in candidacy is difficult, but write-ins can happen in the right climate and CD 22 is the right climate.''
I'm guessing that the best thing he could do is shut up and stay far away, but hey, if she wants the Official Tom DeLay Seal of Approval, she's welcome to it. And there's more where that came from:
DeLay attended the fundraiser and told reporters that other key Republicans - including House Speaker Dennis Hastert - would be visiting Houston in coming weeks to raise money for Sekula-Gibbs.The campaign quickly denied any firm plans for a visit by Hastert, who has been battling calls for his resignation following revelations that he was told as long ago as 2004 about former Rep. Mark Foley's inappropriate contact with teenage pages.
Sekula-Gibbs said her campaign had spoken with Hastert's office, but she declined three times to say whether she would welcome a visit by the speaker.
Oh, please. Pretty please with sugar on it. I can't imagine a better symbol for the Sekula Gibbs campaign than a Very Special Visit by Speaker Hastert. DeLay can be the master of ceremonies. The only way it could be improved would be to have Tom Reynolds jump out of a cake. I'm telling you, this needs to happen. Thanks to the appalled Greg in TX22 for the link.
In case you missed Rick Casey's column from yesterday.
State Rep. Joe Crabb, like most of his GOP colleagues, has voted for legislation to limit lawsuit abuse.But when it came to his own law practice, it took the state Supreme Court to enforce the law.
I'm not going to excerpt, because you really should read the whole thing. You want to know why lawyers have a bad name, Joe Crabb's behavior in this case makes him the poster child.
If you've had enough of that sort of thing, I recommend a hearty dose of Diane Trautman. Her response to Casey's column about Crabb's avarice is beneath the fold. And as a bonus, here's one of my favorite stories about some previous misfeasance by Crabb.
According to Rick Casey in today's Houston Chronicle, incumbent state representative Joe Crabb overcharged for his legal fees as attorney ad litem for a brain-damaged infant and even sued to demand his excessive fees. The state Appeals Court ruled Crabb was only entitled to fees of $14,300, not the $117,150 he charged.Crabb's opponent in the November 7 election for Texas House District 127, Diane Trautman of Kingwood, said, "I am outraged by my opponent's lack of ethical behavior, especially where it concerns taking advantage of children." She said an initial search of public records at the Harris County Courthouse showed Joe Crabb has been appointed as ad litem attorney in more than 200 cases. "I'm afraid this could be just the tip of the iceberg," Trautman said.
The Appeals Court ruled that the bulk of Crabb's legal bills were for work that he was unable to show was necessary to represent his client. For example, Crabb charged $50 for reviewing any piece of paper, even if it included only one sentence. "It looks like old-fashioned 'bill padding,'" Trautman added.
Trautman is a former teacher, principal, and professor of education. She said, "I find it ironic that Crabb is not shy about charging exorbitant fees to make money for himself but pinches pennies and underfunds our children's neighborhood schools."
I agree 100% with Dwight. Websites that play music or other sounds when you start them whether you want them to or not are crimes against nature, and my instant reaction is to kill whatever it is that's making the noise; if that means closing the browser page, even before I've seen what I went there to see, then so be it. I avoid some sites altogether because of this sort of thing.
And let me add one more reason to avoid adding default sound to a webpage: I work in an open cubicle. If I click on a page that has sound, everyone around me knows about it. I'd just as soon not call attention to myself in that fashion, thankyouverymuch.
Grits got the ball rolling on a discussion about real criminal justice reform. A blog called The Wretched of the Earth, written by a public defender, picked it up and ran with it with these two posts about probation reform. Check them out.
The way I see it, the goal of probation should be almost entirely one of rehabilitation. It's not a deterrent, at least not in the way that incarceration is, and it's not really punitive, at least in theory. You don't want these people in prison, either during or after their probationary period, so it makes sense for the probation to be something that they want to see through. If there's a high rate of violations that lead to incarceration, or if people choose jail over probation when given the option because it's viewed as a less onerous sentence to serve, then something is very wrong, and as we've seen, the end result is that it costs more money and disrupts more people's lives than it should. We need to make sure the way we apply probation is in line with our intentions.
The season premier of Lost is tonight. I will not be answering the phone for the duration. And let us all once again give thanks for the bounty that is TiVo.
If you want to get an idea of what lies ahead for this season, check out these two stories. I didn't see anything in them that I considered to be true spoilers, but some people are more sensitive to that sort of thing than others, so surf carefully if you prefer to go into the season blind.
I guess I'm okay with the schedule they have for Lost where there's six weeks of new shows, followed by a 2 month or so hiatus, then 17 more weeks of new shows. I just hope I don't forget what happened in between. With that and 24 doing its usual post-Christmas-only season, I'll have plenty to watch for that duration.
I've not added any new shows to the TiVo schedule. Some of them look interesting, but not enough for me to invest the time, especially if I ever plan to try and catch up on Battlestar Galactica, a show for which I have no real good excuse for not watching. I removed the season pass for Desperate Housewives last week. Between the football-induced time period spillover for The Amazing Race and my own declining interest, it seemed like the right thing to do. If anyone who is still watching thinks I've blown it, let me know.
What new shows are you watching? What old ones have you dropped? Let me know.
Remember that 700-mile border fence that Congress just approved? Well, don't hold your breath waiting for it to get built.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-San Antonio and a key liaison to the White House on immigration, said Tuesday that 700 miles of fencing approved by Congress will probably not be built because of a lack of money and other practical considerations. "It's one thing to authorize. It's another thing to actually appropriate the money and do it," he told reporters.
Cornyn predicted that some fencing would be built as part of a comprehensive strategy that includes more Border Patrol agents, more technology, more detention facilities and various physical barriers."There's different kinds of fencing ... there's the old fence post and barbed wire, and then there’s the virtual fence which is a combination of physical barriers, people, and technology and I think, in the end, that will probably be how this is addressed," he said.
Cornyn added that 700 miles of fencing would not solve the problem of illegal immigration because it would still leave about 1,300 miles of unfenced border.
"I'm not sure that’s the most practical use of that money," he said.
[...]
Cornyn defended the Senate vote for the fencing, saying that it was an important symbolic gesture to show that Congress is serious about protecting the border.
What can I say? You have to admit, any time there's been a real need for serious thought and forward-thinking action to solve the tough problems that America faces, you can always count on the likes of John Cornyn to come up with an important symbolic gesture. Really, what more could you want?
Thanks to South Texas Chisme for the link.
The four former employees of the Mayor Pro Tem office have pleaded not guilty to charges related to their improper bonuses.
State District Judge Michael McSpadden read the charges to Rosita Hernandez, Florence Watkins, Christopher Mays and Theresa Orta, who have been released after posting bail. A Harris County grand jury indicted the four Friday on charges of theft by a public servant and tampering with a public record.They are scheduled for another court hearing on Oct. 24, prosecutor Terese Buess said.
"Truth is our defense," said Watkins' attorney, Emily Detoto.
I believe that's the first time someone other than Hernandez's attorney Walter Boyd has spoken to the press. Don't know if that means anything, but there it is. According to an earlier version of the story, Orta is representing herself.
If the matter goes to trial, Buess said, City Councilwoman Carol Alvarado, who was mayor pro tem when the payments were made, would be a "necessary witness." She declined to comment on the continuing investigation into other city departments.
The four former staffers obiously failed to land any really damaging blows to Alvarado during grand jury testimony, but as that's sealed we don't know what they tried. This will be their real chance to make something stick to her. I kind of doubt that they've got anything other than "oh, yes you did!", but we'll find out soon enough.
Julia very kindly rounds up the various state deadlines for registering to vote. Note that the Texas deadline is Tuesday, October 10, which is four weeks before Election Day. If you have not yet registered to vote, or you know someone who has not, your friendly neighborhood County Clerk can help you. In Harris County, go to http://www.hcvoter.net for all the relevant details. Remember, if you don't vote you don't get to complain about the results if you don't like them. Time is running out, so get a move on.
Jim Henley is hosting a volunteer rally this Sunday afternoon.
River Oaks Highrise in the
Claremont Room,
3435 Westheimer Road.
Houston, TX 77027Jim will reveal how we will defeat John Culberson! There will be music, food and entertainment. Bring your families and neighbors and have a wonderful time!
The press release I have says it will be from 3:00 pm - 5:30 pm. Assuming all goes well, Olivia and I will be dropping by.
The iconic Don't Mess With Texas anti-littering campaign (which recently turned 20 years old) won itself a nice award last week.
"Don't Mess With Texas," the 20-year-old public service campaign slogan created by Austin advertising firm GSD&M for the Texas Department of Transportation, has won the third annual Advertising Week Walk of Fame competition, sponsored by Yahoo! and USA Today."Don't Mess With Texas," which received more than 400,000 votes, beat high-profile slogans such as Nike's "Just Do It," Maxwell House's "Good to the Last Drop" and "Got Milk?" from the California Milk Processors Board.
Advertising Week, held in New York City, is North America's largest annual gathering of advertising and media industry decision-makers, according to event organizers.
As the winner of the contest, "Don't Mess With Texas" will earn a spot on New York's famous Madison Avenue, and receive a bronze plaque that will rest on Madison Avenue between 49th and 50th Streets, along with victory banners lining the famous street.
The heck with plaques. What they really should do is set up a couple of TVs and showcase some of DMWT's best spots. Like this one, from way back in 1986:
Man, if that didn't give you goosebumps, I suggest you see your doctor. Congratulations to all involved. Link via Houstonist.
During the summer, I actually toyed with the idea of writing up a report on every State House race, sorting them all into "likely this", "lean that", and "toss-up". I abandoned it when I realized just how much more time it would have taken me than I have to spare. As such, I'm genuinely impressed by the work that Phillip Martin has done in evaluating and prognosticating all the races, a task which covered more ground and was more thoroughly done than what I had in mind. Bravo, dude.
Here's the explanation of their methods, and here's a closer look at some of the State House races. This is going to be an excellent resource for anyone who wants to know how things may shake out. I'm looking forward to seeing more of it. Check it out.
Let's talk about Rep. Tom Reynolds for a minute. He's the chair of the NRCC. He's known about the Mark Foley's predelictions towards pages at least as far back as 2005 when staffers for Rep. Rodney Alexander, for whom one of the pages in question worked, complained about some of the email Foley sent to him. What did he do then? Not much.
Among those who became aware earlier this year of the fall 2005 communications between Mr. Foley and the 16-year-old page, who worked for Representative Rodney Alexander, Republican of Louisiana, were Representative John A. Boehner, the majority leader, and Representative Thomas M. Reynolds of New York, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee. Mr. Reynolds said in a statement Saturday that he had also personally raised the issue with Speaker J. Dennis Hastert."Despite the fact that I had not seen the e-mails in question, and Mr. Alexander told me that the parents didn’t want the matter pursued, I told the speaker of the conversation Mr. Alexander had with me," Mr. Reynolds said.
He didn't bother to look at the emails, so he had no idea what he was being asked to not pursue. But at least he had plausible deniability.
When the story first came out, and the much more explicit instant messages between Foley and the pages started to surface, Reynolds' chief of staff tried to cut a deal with ABC to suppress the story in return for an exclusive about Foley's resignation.
The unnamed aide who tried to get ABC's Brian Ross not to publish the salacious IMs from Mark Foley in exchange for an exclusive on Foley's decision to resign has now been unmasked as Kirk Fordham, the chief of staff to NRCC head Tom Reynolds. Ben Smith of The Daily Politics blog has just received an email from The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz, who originally wrote about the deal offered to Ross without identifying the aide by name. Now Kurtz has confirmed to Smith via email that he was talking about Fordham. Here's what this means: The chief of staff for the leader of the GOP's efforts to hold on to the House tried to prevent the public from learning the truth about a GOP Congressman who repeatedly solicited teenagers via the internet.
Reynolds now claims he did not know what his Chief of Staff was doing, though his denial is a bit murky.
According to a story just up on the Syracuse Post-Standard's web site, Reynolds has just said that he knew nothing about what his chief of staff Kirk Fordham did on behalf of GOP Rep Mark Foley. Reynolds also is quoted saying he didn't give his top aide permission to help him. But wait -- the chief of staff himself said publicly in the Palm Beach Post on Saturday -- three days ago -- that he was going to be helping Foley. So Reynolds knew Fordham was doing this without his permission -- and didn't care?
Stay with me here. At a press conference yesterday, Reynolds explained his lack of action thusly.
I found this moment particularly damaging, though, in which Reynolds -- the third-ranking Republican in the House -- says he did what any employee would do with the Foley case: "I took it to my supervisor."Because, you know, he only works here.
Maybe if he'd been the #2 Republican, he could have done something about this. Like blame Speaker Hastert.
At that same press conference, for which you can see video here, Reynolds was inexplicably surrounded by small children, which caused more than a bit of a distraction.
Reporter: Congressman, do you mind asking the children to leave the room so we can have a frank discussion of this, because it's an adult topic. It just doesn't seem appropriate to me.Reynolds: I'll take your questions, but I'm not going to ask any of my supporters to leave.
[...]
Reporter: Who are the children, Congressman? Who are these children?
Reynolds: Pardon me?
Reporter: Who are these children?
Reynolds: Well, a number of them are from the community. There are several of the "thirtysomething" set that are here and uh I've known them and I've known their children as they were born.
Reporter: Do you think it's appropriate for them to be listening to the subject matter though?
Reynolds: Sir, I'll be happy to answer your questions, I'm still, uh…
Why am I telling you all of this? Because of money, of course. Foley's money, Reynolds' money, the NRCC's money, and ultimately Shelley Sekula Gibbs' money. Reynolds has given $10,000 to Shelley's campaign. As the chair of the NRCC, Reynolds has benefitted from Foley's generosity, and plans to continue to do so.
One group that will not be returning money donated by Foley is the National Republican Congressional Committee, of which Reynolds is chairman. The committee has received $330,000 from Foley in less than three years. That includes $100,000 this summer, after Reynolds learned of the messages.Asked what effect the scandal might have on his re-election bid this fall, Reynolds replied: "I'm looking forward to finishing the final 30-some days of this campaign - I think it's going to be a great one. I'm running on my record. We'll have the people decide."
Emphasis mine. Shelley will be the beneficiary of a fundraiser by Big Time Dick Cheney tomorrow, and the NRCC is still claiming they plan to help her.
[NRCC spokesman Jonathan] Collegio said the NRCC considers DeLay's former district "a Republican district" and that the committee is "100% committed to Shelley Sekula-Gibbs and keeping it a Republican seat." He acknowledged, however, the committee had made no previous contributions. But the NRCC's Web site does not list Sekula-Gibbs as one of the candidates it is supporting. Collegio described Sekula-Gibbs' absence as "just an oversight."
Now that you do know all this, do you think Shelley should be taking the NRCC's money if they actually follow through with it? Or do you think that maybe she should do the right thing and donate it to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children? Do you think that at the very least enough facts have come out for her to express an opinion about whether or not she supports the current GOP House leadership and would continue to support them in the event she were to be elected? Remember that by their inaction, this is what they were protecting.
What's it going to be, Shelley? Do you have anything to say about any of this?
UPDATE: The Chron picks up the story. Does Shelley finally have anything to say about this? Not so much.
Sekula-Gibbs received Lampson's letter Monday but did not respond. She told the Houston Chronicle she is "waiting for the investigation to unfold."As for who knew what and when, "those questions have not been answered," she said. "That is part of the investigation."
No criticism of how the House leadership has handled this matter. What more does she need to know to comment on that?
John Culberson had his debate yesterday with someone who, while very knowledgeable on the subject at hand (more so than Culberson, I daresay), is not on the ballot against him.
"The immigration debate has to be defined in terms of the international war on terror. We are engaged in a long, brutal, ugly war with extremists," said Culberson, R-Houston. He said without citing a source that possible terrorists are crossing the U.S.-Mexico border and adopting Spanish surnames."Our border is undefended and not enforced," Culberson said. "As long as that exists we are under the threat of attack."
Emphasis mine. In less polite circles, we call that "making stuff up".
Immigration lawyer Charles Foster retorted that linking terrorism and immigration is a "disservice to the discussion.""Ninety-nine percent of these people take care of our kids and build our homes," said Foster, who heads the immigration section at the law firm Tindall & Foster, and who was a principal adviser to President Bush on the issue.
"Immigrants are a great asset to the United States. This wave of undocumented immigration is no different than waves of immigrants who have come throughout our history," Foster said.
[...]
Foster noted that of all the immigration legislation Congress considered this year, one of a few bills to pass was approval for 700 miles of fencing along portions of the U.S.-Mexico boundary.
"No wall in history has ever kept people out," he said. "Comprehensive reform is necessary. It can't be piecemealed."
Not that it will likely matter (since after all, when in the past six years have we ever taken into account what our allies think?), but Mexico has asked President Bush to veto the Great Wall of Mexico legislation. About the only people whose concerns are less likely to be heeded than the Mexican government are environmentalists. Sorry about that, butterflies and ocelots.
Anyway. Culberson still won't debate his actual opponent on the ballot, Jim Henley. Maybe debates are an overrated part of the campaign process, and maybe you could learn everything you need to know about Culberson from this $37-a-head event. He's still a wussy for going so far out of his way to make sure as few people as possible can hear him speak in a venue where his word can be challenged.
This is either the best news you'll read today or a sure sign that we're all doomed. You decide.
Hurricane expert William Gray downgraded his forecast for the 2006 Atlantic storm season again today, predicting one more hurricane, two more named storms but no intense hurricanes.The new report calls for a below-average hurricane season, with a total of six hurricanes and 11 named storms.
Gray and fellow Colorado State University researcher Philip Klotzbach cited El Nino conditions for the reduced number of storms.
"August was inactive, but September had above-average activity," Klotzbach said. "We expect October to have below-average activity largely due to developing El Nino conditions in the central and eastern Pacific. November activity in El Nino years is very rare."
Three cheers for El Nino!
In the comments to my earlier post on the Texas ParentPAC endorsement of Sherrie Matula, the following question was asked:
I was excited to see their endorsements and applaud them for the way they wrote the endorsements but if they are endorsing ZERO Republicans don't their endorsements become increasingly less news worthy?If everyone of their endorsements is the "D" then there is no suspense and may even be less inherent value to it, perhaps. Thanks!
I sent that comment to ParentPAC founder Carolyn Boyle. This is her response:
Texas Parent PAC endorsed and provided funding to 17 Republicans in the primary and special elections and 2 Democrats. We are trying to even it up now, as it is a bipartisan PAC, but it is doubtful that an equal amount of money will be spent on the endorsed Democrats (unless we have a ton of donations in the next few weeks). Next week we will be endorsing for the general election some of the Republican candidates endorsed in the primaries that have general election opponents: Drew Darby (H.D. 72), Jimmie Don Aycock (H.D. 54), Diane Patrick (H.D. 94), and Thomas Latham (H.D. 101). We'll also be endorsing some Republican and Democratic incumbents.
I hope that answers the question.
I'm down to my last two interviews for State House candidates in Harris County. Today's subject is Chad Khan, who's running for HD126, which was left open by Peggy Hamric's unsuccessful bid for the SD07 GOP nomination. It's one of two open seats in Harris County, the other being HD133.
Here's the interview:
Link for the MP3 file is here.
Here are all my previous interviews:
Gary Binderim - Interview
Glenn Melancon - Interview
Jim Henley - Interview
David Harris - Interview
Ted Ankrum - Interview
Shane Sklar - Interview 1, Interview 2
John Courage - Interview
Nick Lampson - Interview, Interview about space
Mary Beth Harrell - Interview
Bob Smither - Interview
Hank Gilbert - Interview
Joe Farias - Interview
Harriet Miller - Interview
Ellen Cohen - Interview
Diane Trautman - Interview
Rep. Scott Hochberg - Interview
Kristi Thibaut - Interview
Rep. Hubert Vo - Interview
Dot Nelson-Turnier - Interview
Sherrie Matula - Interview
Sammie Miller - Interview
Mark McDavid - Interview
Janette Sexton - Interview
Rep. Ana Hernandez - Interview
Chad Khan - Interview
By now I'm sure you've heard of the allegations by former pitcher Jason Grimsley that his onetime teammates Roger Clemens and Andy Pettite joined him in using performance-enhancing drugs. That's a charge both current Astros strongly deny.
"I'm stunned, obviously," Pettitte said about the Los Angeles Times report that was posted on-line late Saturday night. "I don't really know what to say. I played with Grimsley for a couple years in New York obviously. Had a great relationship with him."Obviously it's embarrassing any time your name gets brought up with something. It's embarrassing."
Clemens was equally adamant in his denial.
"I'm angry about it. It shouldn't happen," he said. "The assumptions that are out there, I just don't understand it. I don't understand how people can do that and get away with it. I really don't. I don't know how you can just on assumption or hearsay just throw it out there and it's fact."
Grimsley played with Pettitte and Clemens in 1999 and 2000 with the New York Yankees, but Pettitte and Clemens said they didn't work out with Grimsley other than if they were in the weight room together in the clubhouse.
Not long after federal agents raided Grimsley's home in June, rumors throughout baseball circulated that Grimsley had named Pettitte and Clemens in his affidavit.
After hearing the rumblings, Pettitte went on-line and read the 20-page affidavit. The names of the six players who were in the affidavit were blacked out when it was released to the public in June.
"I think that there is so much hearsay," Pettitte said. "Obviously these (affidavit) reports came out, I think, four or five months ago. I was able to go on-line and look at the affidavit. To tell you the truth, I would have bet my life that there was no way possible that my name could even be on the affidavit.
"As far as I'm concerned, there is so much hearsay it just to me doesn't hold a lot of water."
Richard Justice laments the fact that Clemens and Pettite will forevermore have a cloud hanging over their heads due to Grimsley's accusation, then goes on to demonstrate why he's a part of the problem.
That's the problem with the denials issued Sunday by Clemens and Pettitte. They sound a lot like the denials used by Bonds, Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire.
Sammy Sosa has failed a drug test. He has strenuously denied ever taking them. The only evidence that exists is an accusation by Jose Canseco, who was never a teammate of Sosa's and who is hardly more credible than Jason Grimsley. Yet there's Justice, blithley naming him along with Bonds, Palmeiro, and McGwire as non-believable in his denial. Quite the double standard you've got there, Richard.
I don't know any more than Richard Justice if Grimsley's charges about Pettite and Clemens are true. As a longtime Yankee fan, I fervently hope they're not. Pending any corroborating evidence, I'll continue to believe in their innocence. It would be nice if that courtesy could be extended to all players who are in their situation. Even the ones that sportswriters have decided they don't like.
Before he resigned his seat in disgrace, Rep. Mark Foley had $2.7 million in his campaign warchest. The NRCC, which is strapped for cash this year, wants to get its hands on that money:
Carl Forti, the communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said Sunday that the committee would gladly accept Mr. Foley’s money or part of it to devote to House races. Mr. Foley already gave $100,000 to the committee in July, campaign records show, as part of the party’s Battleground Program, to which members are asked to contribute.“The money is in the control of Mr. Foley,” Mr. Forti said. “Whatever he decides to do with it is up to him.”
Link via Josh Marshall. And let's remember why the NRCC wants that money, as Kos says:
Foley represented a moderately conservative district, FL-16. In 2000, Bush beat Gore 53-47. In 2004, Bush beat Kerry 54-46. It was a district which Foley had represented since 1994, with his worst showing his first election with a 58% victory. In 2002 he won with 79%, in 2004 with 68%. This was a safe Republican district. Foley also raised a lot of money, and as the recent $100K gift from Foley to the NRCC attests, the party needed his fundraising skills.Then 2006 rolls around. The GOP is facing a tough reelection with history, Bush, and their own incompetence weighing down their chances. The DCCC has had a banner fundraising and candidate recruitment year. And suddenly, Foley faces the GOP's worst nightmare in Tim Mahoney -- a Democratic challenger who 1) was a former Republican, and 2) is worth $8 gazillion and can self-fund his race. Mahoney announced his candidacy October 12, 2005, right around the time the House leadership was trying to figure out what to do about Foley's predatory practices.
Without Foley on the ticket, not only would the GOP suddenly face a competitive contest in a relatively safe district, but it would cost them $2-3 million to defend -- money that they no longer have available.
So they made a decision. They were going to look the other way despite knowing about Foley's predatory actions against the House's pages, and in return, Foley would keep them one seat closer to the majority and save them millions.
Forget about Foley. He's done. What's incredible about this scandal is the lengths this Republican Party will go to maintain their majorities. We already knew that power trumped everything for these guys. But coddling a child predator merely to save some cash and protect a single House seat.
They should've been protecting the kids working the House instead.
What should be done with Mark Foley's money? Nick Lampson, who founded and chaired the the Congressional Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children before being redistricted out of his seat in 2004, has the right answer:
Today, I sent a letter to my opponent asking her to join me in calling for the resignation of any member of the Congressional Leadership who had knowledge of inappropriate email and instant messenger communications between shamed Congressman Mark Foley and underage pages working at the House of Representatives. I urged my opponent to donate the funds she recently received from Congressman Tom Reynolds -- who has admitted he knew of the situation and did nothing about it -- and from any others in congressional leadership who had prior knowledge of Mr. Foley's actions to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.Now, we find out that the national Republicans are quick to condemn Congressman Foley, but are willing to accept the $2.7 million campaign war chest Mr. Foley has amassed. On Sunday, Carl Forti, the communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said "that the committee would gladly accept Mr. Foley's money or part of it to devote to House races." [New York Times, 10/2/06]
That's despicable.
Please join me in calling on Mr. Foley and the NRCC to donate his $2.7 million campaign war chest to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
http://ga3.org/campaign/donate_foley_money
I founded the Congressional Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children. This caucus helped create the National Amber Alert and the Customs Cyber Crimes Unit. Last week, we discovered that Congressman Foley hypocritically joined the caucus and even rose to be chair of the organization. Because of my involvement in that caucus, I feel utterly betrayed by these revelations. This is simply disgusting, and the fact that Congressional leaders knew about the allegations and actively worked to cover them up is an outrage. Any member of the Congressional Leadership who knew about these allegations and failed to act should resign from Congress immediately.
These emails and instant messages and the cover up that followed are worse than political corruption. Sitting members of Congress did nothing while a sexual predator preyed on minors working in the Capitol. This is a level of cynicism I never thought I'd see in government. It's enough to make one ill.
And now, the NRCC is publicly courting Mr. Foley's campaign funds in the New York Times. It's outrageous, and it's politics at its lowest.
Email the NRCC and Mr. Foley today! Demand that they donate his campaign funds to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
http://ga3.org/campaign/donate_foley_money
I can only hope congressional leaders in Washington do the right thing. Thank you for taking the time.
Sincerely,
Nick Lampson
The ball is in your court, Shelley. So far I haven't heard a peep from any local Republican Congressfolk or Congressional candidates regarding this matter. Even the Washington Times has called for Speaker Hastert to resign. What do you think needs to be done here, Shelley? John? Mike? Ted? Ron? Kevin?
I have to say, I think TxDOT did a pretty good job with the design of the West Loop. The new interchanges are a vast improvement, in terms of traffic flow and (I'd venture to guess) safety. There's still a few quibbles - for example, the exit to Westheimer southbound is so close to the intersection that gettting over to the right lane is a major pain. But I wouldn't trade what we have now for what we had before. It's not even close.
Which is not to say that what we have now couldn't have been better. Some fair criticisms are raised in this article, in particular:
Bill Ware and Carol Caul, who live about 750 feet from the Loop near its Katy Freeway interchange, have sued TxDOT, contending the agency should have performed an environmental impact study and taken steps to mitigate the additional noise from increased, faster traffic.Not only does traffic noise arrive in the neighborhood directly, it also is reflected downward off the bottom of the long Woodway-Memorial ramp," Ware said.
"It is definitely far louder now," said Caul.
She also said that noise levels across the Loop in Memorial Park and the Houston Arboretum and Nature Center are unlawfully high for such protected spaces.
That suit was filed in January. TxDOT really should have taken the noise factor into account and used better sound-absorbing technology in the ramps. I hope they agree to settle on this and solve the problem rather than dig their heels in and draw out the fight.
The bottom line, of course, is that however improved 610 is, that stretch of road is still going to be a parking lot for much of the day, and Christof is quite right to say it's just going to get worse as the I-10 and eventual US-290 widenings complete. Given that the other choices were doubledecking or cutting into Memorial Park, I can live with that. Sometimes the "cure" is worse than the poison. At least you can get on and off more efficiently now. Thanks to Houstonist for the link.
It's goodbye West Gray and hello Waugh for the Laff Stop.
The Laff Stop started looking at options when someone else expressed interest in its space. The lease with Weingarten Realty expires Dec. 31."If we wanted to stay at our location, our rent was going to go up," said Vanessa Carlson, who handles marketing.
The comedy club has been a mainstay at the center on West Gray for 28 years. Pictures on the walls of comedians who have performed include Jerry Seinfeld, Jay Leno and Ellen DeGeneres. The late Sam Kinison's piano is behind the stage.
"If you look at our walls, we have every legendary comedian you can possibly think of back when they performed at our club," Carlson said. "That's kind of the nostalgia that people have for the Laff Stop."
A high-visibility location near Allen Parkway in the Waugh Drive Retail Center at 526 Waugh Drive will open up an opportunity to market to area offices and residential developments. It is within two miles of the existing location. The main competitor - which also books talent with TV or movie credits - is the Houston Improv on the Katy Freeway outside Loop 610.
[...]
Weingarten Realty said a new lease has been signed for the space at the River Oaks Shopping Center but declined to disclose the tenant. Talk of possible negotiations with Barnes & Noble for a store at West Gray and Shepherd called part of the center's future into question, but a Weingarten spokesman said the company has no plans to redevelop the center at this time.
Waugh Drive between West Gray and Allen Parkway is another stretch of near-downtown real estate that's been pretty heavily underutilized in recent years. There's been a boom in townhouse development nearby, and a few new commercial properties, including the Laff Stop's new landlord, but given what an awesome location it is, there's still a lot of untapped potential. It's probably too much to hope that some of what eventually gets built there is pedestrian-friendly, but I'll say it anyway, just in case.
By the way, the old Laff Stop location is a block away and across the street from the River Oaks Theater. If that area is eventually subsumed by whatever grand designs Weingarten has for the River Oaks Shopping Center, then a fair amount of high-end retail and a couple of fancy-schmancy restaurants may be threatened as well. File it away for later and we'll see what happens.
Josh Marshall says:
In my post a short while ago, I wrote: "And what happens when Joe Sestak asks Curt Weldon whether he's lost confidence in Denny Hastert? How does that conversation go?"Let's make this more than hypothetical. What does your member of Congress think? It's no mystery what Dems think. But what about Republicans? Does the Republican candidate in your district believe that Denny Hastert should remain as Speaker? If they're elected on November 7th and the Republican retain their majority, will they vote for him for Speaker?
It seems like a pretty fair and germane question.
Ring up your Rep. Let us know what you hear. We'll share your results with the rest of our readers.
Damn fine idea. Lord knows, they've been trying to scare us with the prospect of Speaker Pelosi. How strongly will they be defending Speaker Hastert now that we know what a moral coward he is? If your Representative is a Republican, I think we need to know the answer to that question. Here are some relevant phone numbers for you:
Ted Poe - (202) 225-6565
Joe Barton - (202) 225-2002
John Culberson - (202) 225-2571
Mike McCaul - (202) 225-2401
Ron Paul - (202) 225-2831
Lamar Smith - (202) 225-4236
Henry Bonilla - (202) 225-4511
John Carter - (202) 225-3864
Pete Sessions - (202) 225-2231
Others not listed here can be found via this link. And we shouldn't give candidates a pass, either:
Van Taylor - (254) 759-2006
Shelley Sekula Gibbs - (713) 247-2005 (City Council office), or (281) 480-5633 (campaign office)
By all means, if you speak to someone about this, let me know what they say. Let's get these people on the record.
A couple of press releases of interest, one from CD23 candidate Lukin Gilliland and one from Rep. Dale Kildee (D-MI), the Democratic Member of the House Page Board, are beneath the fold.
Gilliland statement:
One day before embattled Vice President Dick Cheney stumps for his opponent in San Antonio, challenger Lukin Gilliland today called on Henry Bonilla to give back at least $40,000 in campaign cash he took from political action committees linked to Florida Congressman Mark Foley, who abruptly resigned his office last Friday in the midst of the latest Republican ethics scandal in Washington."Give the money back," Gilliland demanded. "Your poor judgment and questionable associations have polluted South Texas politics long enough. It's time for you to come clean."
Bonilla, already damaged by his close ties to disgraced former Congressman Tom DeLay, is scheduled to host a fundraising luncheon for himself on Tuesday with Cheney, whose standing in national polls is at an all-time low due to his botched handling of the war in Iraq and single-minded focus on pushing more tax cuts for the wealthy through Congress.
A reliable vote to rubber stamp Cheney's proposals, Bonilla took $10,000 from Freedom Project PAC, run by Republican Majority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio), who replaced indicted former Congressman Tom DeLay earlier this year. Boehner and other GOP leaders in Washington have admitted they knew for at least a year about improper emails sent by Foley to young male pages, including a 16-year-old.
Bonilla also took $10,000 from Keep Our Majority PAC, the funding vehicle used by Republican Speaker Dennis Hastert of Ohio. After denying that he had known of the Foley scandal until last week, Hastert was forced to acknowledge that he harbored the predator for more than a year before it became public.
In addition, Bonilla pocketed more than $20,000 from Americans for a Republican Majority, or ARMPAC, the political action committee of indicted former Majority Leader DeLay, who resigned his office earlier this year amid swirling corruption scandals and legal controversies.
"Congress is out-of-control," Gilliland said. "As a matter of principle, the very least my opponent can do is signal his disgust at the spectacle of grown men violating the public trust in this way. Bonilla should give back the money - now."
Rep. Kildee's statement:
"In my 21 years as a Member of the House Page Board, every decision has been made on not just a bi-partisan basis but on a non-partisan basis, with our main concern always being the safety and wellbeing of the young teenagers who serve the U.S. House as pages."I was outraged to learn that the House Republican leadership kept to itself the knowledge of Mr. Foley's despicable behavior toward the House Pages.
"I am now equally outraged to learn that Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert announced today that there will be changes in the policies of the House Page program. Once again, I was not informed of the meeting today, nor was I consulted in any way about any proposed changes.
"And once again, the House Republican leadership is following the same pattern of unilateral decision-making that caused this problem in the first place in the Mark Foley issue. Speaker Hastert's announcement this afternoon is yet another example of the House Republican leadership being more concerned with finding political cover for themselves than with the safety and wellbeing of the House pages."
It's buried at the bottom of Clay Robison's column, but Sherrie Matula is the latest candidate to get the Texas Parent PAC endorsement. I don't have a press release on this yet - the official announcement is slated for Thursday, so I'll let John Coby say a few words about Sherrie.
Great weekend for Sherrie. She had 18 teachers and students block walking for Sherrie then phone banking, then putting out signs in the district. Over 1200 signs have been distributed with 50 locations with large Matula/Lampson signs. House parties are also continuing.Color me stupid, but I don't see any activity from the other camp. Very few yard signs. No campaign Headquarters. No campaign phone number. No campaign staff. An ethics charge for hiding $100,000+ in expenditures. Is he that safe?
Objectively speaking, he's pretty darned safe. The best performance by any Dem in HD129 in 2004 was by Kathy Stone, with 35.1%. That's a very tall hill to climb. Not impossible - as the Lone Star Project notes, several Democratic state reps won in 2004 in redder districts. But tough - all of those guys were incumbents, generally long-term incumbents, and all of them had more money than Matula will have. You can only take a comparison to them so far.
That's what makes this endorsement all the more enticing. Every other race in which the Parent PAC has recommended a candidate so far has been in a swing district. Either the Parent PAC thinks this is a winnable race and is willing to put its money where its mouth is, or they just like Sherrie so much they're willing to overlook electability considerations. However you look at it, that says a lot about the kind of candidate Sherrie Matula is.
Congratulations to Sherrie Matula, who joins Juan Garcia, Joe Farias, Valinda Bolton, Allen Vaught, Kristi Thibaut, Ellen Cohen, and Joe Heflin on the Parent PAC endorsee list.
UPDATE: Muse has more, including a reminder about my own interview with Sherrie, and Vince's email interview with her.
By now, you know that poor Martha Wong had to resort to using campaign signs intended for use only in primary elections for her race against Ellen Cohen because (as her campaign manager claims) their stock of general election signs was depleted quicker than they expected. Well, I have a suggestion to Martha to help her overcome this critical shortage:
Don't put multiple general election signs in empty lots. Give them to the actual homeowners who request them for their front yard.
There were four signs like that in this empty lot at Kirby and Dunstan. I only got three in that shot, but you can see the fourth one here:
There's also a bigger sign, facing the southbound Kirby traffic, in between those two (follow the telephone pole down and you'll see it - it's perpendicular to Kirby, so it's not visible from directly across the street). Seems to me that one bigger sign would have been enough to convey the message without the need for all those smaller ones, but I suppose one just can't be too careful these days.
So: If you've got a sign shortage, don't waste signs. Simple problem, simple solution. I'll send you my bill.
Oh, and now that I've freed up the Wong campaign to think about weightier matters, may I suggest the next priority be to comprehend the severity of Houston's air pollution crisis. You're welcome.
Sadly, I was not able to attend the annual Johnson-Rayburn dinner on Saturday night. But thankfully Hal, Stace, and Muse were there, so I at least now know what I missed. If that goes for you, too, read 'em and see for yourself.
Tory notes the same Urban Land Institute event that I blogged about and comes out against their proposal, though for a different reason: He thinks keeping I-45 elevated over downtown Houston has value after all this time. I don't necessarily disagree with anything Tory writes in that post, but I'm less interested in that than I am in the shift-I-45-westward-to-Houston-Avenue part. Whether as a tunnel, an elevated, at-grade, or a wormhole through hyperspace, I oppose relocating that stretch of I-45. No way, no how.
Since the subject came up in Tory's comments, I should note that the I-45 Parkway proposal is about making a tunnel north of downtown. It would not affect the Pierce Elevated, as the scope of the TxDOT I-45 widening is strictly north of I-10.
I suppose I should be amused that the CD22 race is still being treated as one where there's any real doubt about who will win. It's interesting to me that in this story about how the name of a certain write-in candidate is characterized by its absence not just from the ballot but also from her opponent's campaigning, another thing that is missing is a quote from anyone besides said write-in candidate who thinks there's an actual race here. Where are the national boys like Carl Forti and Ken Mehlman? Cragg Hines actually gets a quote:
Republicans nationally are saying all the traditionally hopeful things, but until early last week, Sekula-Gibbs' race had attracted less than $50,000 in contributions and so-called independent spending by the National Republican Congressional Committee, the chief House GOP campaign funding mechanism.Most importantly, Democrats claim, the NRCC had, as the week ended, reserved no television time for any of its own ads to promote Sekula-Gibbs or, more likely, batter Democratic nominee Nick Lampson, who will actually be on the ballot.
"I don't dispute that," NRCC spokesman Carl Forti said midweek.
By contrast, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has booked an estimated $850,000 in TV time to bolster Lampson's campaign in the crucial two weeks before the Nov. 7 election.
A $99,465 NRCC check last week for some "door to door" get-out-the-vote activity indicated a slightly quickened national pulse regarding Sekula-Gibbs, but it's not the $1 million-plus in "independent" spending that could be expected for a race in which senior Republican strategists had more faith.
The NRCC paid for two recent polls in Texas 22 which left it not too inspired but also not ready to write off the race. If only for appearances, Rep. Tom Reynolds, R-N.Y. and chairman of the NRCC, gave Sekula-Gibbs' campaign $10,000 from his personal political action committee, TOMPAC. The Cheney visit is expected to add about $150,000.
"It's a district that wants to vote for a Republican," said the NRCC's Forti. With the "door to door" buy, the committee seeks to address Forti's caveat: "We need to make sure they know how to" vote for a write-in candidate.
Not exactly gung ho, eh? Let's go back to the original story for a minute, where you-know-who talks about her support from the nationals:
As the 22nd Congressional District goes, so go the midterm elections. Yet she acknowledges that the national Republican Party isn't sure about her chances as a write-in."We have support, attention and response from our national leaders," she said. "But Washington has to be convinced this is winnable."
Tell me again why this race is being taken as more competitive than any other in Harris or Fort Bend Counties? Seriously, someone help me out here.
One point to bring up, since it was raised elsewhere.
The Secretary of State's Office directed Harris County Clerk Beverly Kaufman to put the special election at the top of the ballot, ahead of the general election races, said Kaufman spokesman David Beirne.
I have confirmed this with both the Harris County Clerk's office, and with the Secretary of State: If you are in CD22, or any of the Congressional or State House districts in which a special election will be occurring, you will essentially see two ballots. One will be for the special election, and the other will be the general. You may choose to vote in the special first, then proceed to the general. When you get to the general election ballot, if you then choose to vote a straight ticket, you can do so without worrying about skipping the special, since you will have already voted in the special. As such, any worries you may have heard about straight-ticket voting can be safely ignored.
Finally, I have no provenance on this, but a comment to this Kuff's World post claims that a new poll shows the following:
Lampson 41%
Smither 25%
Undecided 23%
You-know-who 11%
I make no claims to the accuracy of this, as that's all the info I have, so caveat lector.
Seems the number of dry counties in Texas is, um, drying up.
Since late 2003, when changes in state law made it easier to put alcohol on local ballots, there have been 177 elections across the state to legalize some form of alcohol sales. A lopsided 82 percent have passed, according to the Texas Alcohol and Beverage Commission.Conversely, no wet areas have voted to go dry.
Today, only 42 of Texas' 254 counties are completely dry, fewer than half the number in 1975, when there were 87. And each year several more fall from the list. Located mostly in West Texas and the Panhandle, 28 of the state's dry counties have populations of fewer than 10,000.
Angelina County, with 82,036 residents, is the second-most-populous dry county in the state behind Smith County, population 188,122, and its chief city of Tyler.
"Beer and wine in grocery stores and the possibility of a drink with a restaurant meal is what's in demand with most Texans," said Glen Garey, general counsel for the Texas Restaurant Association. "We don't get much push-back on those options."
[...]
"Getting on the ballot is everything," said Oscar Dillahunty, 69, a retired beer distributor who is leading alcohol proponents in Lufkin, a timber and manufacturing hub 120 miles north of Houston. "We'll have a campaign, but I don't think it will matter. Our poll shows two-thirds of people here are for this."
Dillahunty, whose committee has gathered campaign money from an area beer distributor, a grocery chain and Wal-Mart, among others, said sales taxes on at least $15 million worth of alcohol sales a year are being siphoned off by neighboring Nacogdoches and Trinity counties.
"That's something when we have a sheriff's department that needs raises," he said.
Kip Miller, president of Angelina Savings Bank, said, "From a businessman's standpoint, this is going to make it easier for us to attract restaurants and maybe an upscale grocery store, where you can pick up a bottle of wine and some real Parmesan cheese."
Then there are proponents such as Sarah Strinden and her husband, Bill, who calls the county's dry status "silly."
Bill Strinden, a plastic surgeon, said he has watched Lufkin's medical community grow from about 40 doctors when he arrived 18 years ago to 150 today.
"You can see tremendous growth here. We have a lot of the same stores they have in Dallas," he said. "But being a dry county is a throwback to a time when we were a backwater, small Southern town."
I'm hard pressed to think of a valid non-religious reason to oppose alcohol sales in a county. Restrictions I can understand, and not wanting to bother with legacy rules in certain neighborhoods (such as the Heights) also makes sense, but a wholesale ban on beer and wine? I don't get it.
I kind of see dry counties as an inefficiency in the market, which quickly gets worked around by the easy proximity of wet counties. You see stuff like this all the time. Back in the early 80s, New York State's drinking age was 21, but New Jersey's was 19. It's very easy to get to New Jersey from much of New York, and any kid who wanted to drink did just that. Similarly, there was a long period where New York's sales tax was significantly higher than New Jersey's (8.25 for NY versus 5 for NJ). If you'd visited the Woodbridge Mall back then, you'd have seen quite a few Empire State license plates in its parking lot. I guarantee that the people who least want to see Angelina County change its rules are Nacogdoches and Trinity Counties.
It's certainly possible that some counties, in particular the smaller ones out in West Texas, will stay dry for the long haul. I can't imagine that Angelina and Smith will resist the trend, though. I think there's too many people who expect to be able to buy things like a six pack at the local supermarket or a glass of Chardonnay at a restaurant for it to be viable, and the revenue argument is hard to counter. The folks who oppose alcohol on religious grounds are a distinct minority, and I think they know it.
(The title of this post refers to an Austin Lounge Lizards song, for which you can hear a Windows Media sample here. I daresay they'll be glad to toss this one on their "made obsolete by future events" pile.)
Former House Majority Leader Dick "To the victor goes the spoils" Armey has apparently forsaken some of his old buddies.
Former Texas Congressman Dick Armey, once a stalwart ally in the culture wars, appears to be turning his back on Christian conservatives and their leaders.The former majority leader of the House of Representatives reportedly told Ryan Sager, author of a new book on the Republican Party, that values voters and their leaders - especially Focus on the Family Action Chairman Dr. James Dobson - are "nasty bullies."
In the interview, Armey responded pointedly when Sager asked why he thought Christian conservatives seemed more powerful now than in the 1990s.
"To a large extent, because Dobson and his gang of thugs are real nasty bullies," Armey said. "I pray devoutly every day, but being a Christian is no excuse for being stupid. There's a high demagoguery coefficient to issues like prayer in schools. Demagoguery doesn't work unless it's dumb . . . These issues are easy for the intellectually lazy and can appeal to a large demographic."
Schweeet. If you think there's some intramural vitriol being spewed now among folks like that, just wait till the Democrats take over Congress. Start buying popcorn in bulk now. Link via Pandagon.
Muse continues her investigation into the campaign finances of State Rep. John Davis (R, Clear Lake).
The gist of most of these problems is that you have to follow TEC rules and give an explanation of what the expenses were for. Here's what I have uncovered so far:In American Express expenses with no explanation: $43,243.78.
In reimbursements to himself with no explanation: $31,916.42.
Then of course, there is the boot issue.
And, now I bring to you his reimbursements to others with no explanation: $1471.28.
You just can't be doing these things. Read the TEC rules here. You cannot take your campaign cash and spend it without explanation.
Be sure to follow the links (especially the boot links) and see the details, or lack thereof as Davis would have it. An ethics complaint has been filed, and Davis has been notified about it, with a hearing to follow. Stay tuned.
The Democrats sure are feisty in Fort Bend these days. They take amusing pictures, too. And they attend candidate fora. Good times. Check 'em out.
(Oh, and I hope you were able to get some of that funnel cake, Hal.)
Congratulations to the League of Women Voters of Texas for arranging a Senate debate at which all candidates will attend.
U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and her two challengers, Barbara Ann Radnofsky and Scott Jameson, plan to take part in a debate Oct. 19, officials said Friday.Hutchison had agreed to the debate "verbally," but hadn't signed an official form, said Janet Imhoff, program vice president for the League of Women Voters, co-sponsor of the debate with San Antonio television station KLRN, a PBS affiliate.
Hutchison said she is in the final stages of setting up the debate.
Radnofsky, a Democrat from Houston, and Jameson, a Libertarian from Plano, had a debate Thursday in Houston and are planning another one Oct. 7 at Rice University. The San Antonio debate would be the first involving Hutchison, a Republican.
"The Senate campaign, being such a high office, deserved a debate as well," said Imhoff, comparing the race to the high-profile gubernatorial race, which has the four main candidates planning to square off Oct. 6.
The Oct. 19 debate will be taped at KLRN's studios and broadcast at 9 p.m.
Like John, I'm glad to hear this.
According to a Radnofsky press relase, the terms of the debate are as follows:
This debate shall:Be fair, impartial and nonpartisan.
Provide an equal opportunity for each candidate to address the issues
Keep the moderator, not the candidates, in control of the debate.
Provide information that will benefit the voters, not a particular candidate.
Use format provided as part of this agreement.
Be open to all media.As a candidate in the debate, I agree that:
There will be one nonpartisan moderator.
The panel will be nonpartisan.
The questions will be provided by the questioners.
The speaking order of the candidates will be determined by a draw as specified under the format rules.
The responses will be timed.
There will be no campaigning in the room where the debate is held. Buttons, signs, literature, banners, t-shirts, etc. will be prohibited.
The audience will not be allowed to use audio or video recorders during the debate.
Audio and/or videotapes of the debate, in part or whole, cannot be used by either candidate or party for any purpose.
The candidates can bring to their respective podiums only paper and pen for the purpose of making personal notes during the debate. Water will be provided.
See, guys? It's not that hard. Set your TiVos for October 19.