Can we really measure the economic impact of sports events?

Posted on March 23, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

I don’t know, but they’re going to give it a try in Dallas.

Spending in the region on mega sporting events since the Dallas Cowboys moved to Arlington could top $1 billion when next month’s Final Four and next year’s college football championship are played.

Those numbers — a combination of spending projections for eight past and future events — are highlighted by boosters and treated with suspicion by some scholars. But supporters and skeptics partly agree on the long-term benefits of events from the Super Bowl to NBA All-Star Game. They conclude it’s extremely difficult to quantify, if that’s even possible.

John Crawford, president and CEO of Downtown Dallas Inc., said he’s certain there’s a lasting and significant benefit to hosting these mega events, one after the other. But he said the only research he’s seen focused on short-term effects.

“I’ve never seen anything to quantify the indirect returns on investment,” he said. “I don’t even know how they would go about doing that.”

[…]

Victor Matheson, economics professor at College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., said researchers pursued these types of questions without much luck.

“A lot of people have tried to look and see whether there is any long-term impact [of sports mega events],” he said. “We’ve never been able to pick up any. … I can’t even think anecdotally of an example about a business that relocated a corporate headquarters because the CEO had such a great time at the Super Bowl or Final Four.”

Officials in Dallas and Arlington said they couldn’t point to many specifics. However, the Arlington Convention & Visitors Bureau hopes to fill that research gap.

Decima Cooper, a bureau spokeswoman, said the bureau is talking with unnamed Arlington partners about conducting extensive research on the impact of large tourist events. If possible, they want to look at everything from mega events at AT&T Stadium to the much smaller Art on the Greene festival and calculate the benefits beyond the initial spending.

“What we’re trying to find out is exactly the impact of the events that happen in our city, not only the obvious impacts,” Cooper said.

She said she couldn’t be more specific since this is still in the planning stages. The scope of the research is expected to be finalized this year.

The CVB previously looked at the overall economic impact of tourism on Arlington but did not specifically single out AT&T Stadium events.

Matheson said any benefits would likely be so small that they would be lost in the region’s huge economy.

“No one has been able to identify these lingering impacts, especially from these short events where you don’t build anything new,” Matheson said. “It’s bad enough when you’re trying to quantify a bunch of people coming to town for one weekend. But then looking two or three years and seeing if you can see a bump, that’s a really small needle in a really big haystack.”

As you know, this is a subject that has long been near to my heart, going back to the halcyon days of the 2004 Super Bowl in Houston. It’s easy enough to visualize what a short-term economic effect of a big sporting event is – number of visitors, money spent on things like hotels, bars, taxis, etc – even if it’s difficult to separate it from normal activity. As Prof. Matheson says, I have no idea how you’d define, let along measure, a long-term effect. But I’m glad they’re trying! More data is good, even if it’s little more than fodder for mockery. Maybe the Arlington Convention & Visitors Bureau will find something interesting, even if it’s not what they were looking for. I can’t wait to see what they come up with. ThinkProgress has more on a related matter.

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We have our first HFD rolling brownout

Posted on March 23, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

And nothing bad happened.

Three Houston firetrucks were pulled from service Friday morning, the first “brownout” in the city’s fire fleet since the Houston Fire Department’s budget struggles came to light in early February.

In keeping with a plan Fire Chief Terry Garrison announced last month that called for trucks in areas with lower call volumes and more nearby stations to be idled first, department brass decided to park Engines 45, 77 and 78. In all, 15 positions were left vacant Friday, including one of the five spots on the department’s heavy rescue truck and a district chief post.

“Our firefighters will continue to do the best job they can and they’ll ensure firefighter safety and customer service to the best of their ability, but … the quicker we get to an incident, the quicker we can start stabilizing that incident, whether it’s a house fire or a heart attack,” Garrison said. “We wanted to make sure we had the least amount of impact, but there will be a slight impact.”

Mayor Annise Parker said she expects the fire department will effectively handle the situation.

“We have every faith in the Houston Fire Department that they will be able to make the necessary adjustments and handle each call efficiently and effectively,” she said.

[…]

Councilman Oliver Pennington, whose District G is home to Station 78, said he was disappointed.

“Everyone knew spring break was coming up when this agreement was made,” Pennington said. “Any time you run short of money, there’s always a chance for crisis. People really need to pay attention. Hopefully, we can plan better for the next holiday.”

When the city-union deal was approved, officials said all trucks would remain in service as long as HFD averaged fewer than 35 unexpected absences, such as sick days and emergency leave, per day. Friday, there were 42 such absences, including 28 sick days.

“We feel like people are going to think we’re browning out because too many people called in sick,” Executive Assistant Fire Chief Richard Mann said Friday. “Well, today I had 927 people that were assigned, and only 28 called in sick. That’s 3 percent. So, it’s more a factor of we’re just short-staffed. We need to get our staffing levels up.”

See here for the background. I’m a little surprised that this happened since everyone wanted to avoid it, but the personnel issue is a factor, as is HFD’s previous management of overtime. As noted, nothing bad happened, which is good, not surprising, and no guarantee of anything going forward. I hope this isn’t a common occurrence, but there’s no guarantee of that, either. Texpatriate has more.

Posted in Local politics | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

Saturday video break: Amazing Grace

Posted on March 22, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

This may be the most covered song of all time. Here’s a traditional rendition from The Rogues:

I once said on Facebook that all bagpipes come with three songs preinstalled: Scotland The Brave, The Minstrel Boy, and Amazing Grace. Hearing this tune on the pipes always gives me a chill.

For a slightly less traditional but still stirring rendition, here’s Chris Squire of Yes doing it on his bass guitar:

Both of these are in my collection. I could find a zillion more that aren’t, and I could go on the usual tangent about how you can sing this song – and many others – to the tune of the Gilligan’s Island theme song, but I’ll refrain. Instead, here’s a song inspired by Amazing Grace by Texas celtic band Jiggernaut called Amazing Grace (Again):

I think that’s a good way to wrap this up.

Posted in Music | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Michigan, come on down

Posted on March 22, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

You are the next state to have your anti-same sex marriage law thrown out by a federal judge.

RedEquality

In a historic ruling that provided a huge morale boost to the gay-rights movement, U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman today struck down Michigan’s ban on same-sex marriage, making it the 18th state in the nation to allow gays and lesbians to join in matrimony, just like their heterosexual counterparts.

And unlike other federal judges who have decided similar cases across the country, Friedman did not stay his ruling, prompting Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette to file an emergency stay request to prevent gay couples from marrying right away. That includes the two plaintiffs in the case: Hazel Park nurses April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse, who fought for the right to marry and adopt each other’s special needs children.

“It’s just amazing,” said DeBoer, who wiped tears and hugged her parnter after learning of Friedman’s ruling. “This is what we’ve wanted for our family and families like ours…we are just so happy … We got our day in court and we won.”

Rowse was overwhelmed.

“We’re going to actually be a legalized family, a recognized family by everybody,” she said.

In his 31-page ruling, Friedman heavily criticized the state’s position that the will of the voters should have been upheld, noting that just because voters approve something doesn’t make it right, especially when it violates the Constitution.

“In attempting to define this case as a challenge to ‘the will of the people,’ state defendants lost sight of what this case is truly about: people.

“No court record of this proceeding could ever fully convey the personal sacrifice of these two plaintiffs who seek to ensure that the state may no longer impair the rights of their children and the thousands of others now being raised by same-sex couples,” Friedman wrote.

“It is the court’s fervent hope that these children will grow up to ‘understand the integrity and closeness of their own family and its concord with other families in their community and in their daily lives.’

“Today’s decision is a step in that direction, and affirms the enduring principle that regardless of whoever finds favor in the eyes of the most recent majority, the guarantee of equal protection must prevail.”

[…]

Unlike most federal judges who have taken up the gay-marriage issue, Friedman opted last fall to hold a trial and give both sides the chance to present their arguments and scientific evidence – the bulk of which focused on same-sex parenting studies and child outcomes of children raised in such family structures.

The state’s experts said that their studies show that children of same-sex couples have poorer outcomes than kids raised by married moms and dads.

Friedman didn’t find the state’s experts credible, stating in his ruling that the testimony of one state witness was “entirely unbelievable and not worthy of serious consideration.” He said the states four witnesses “clearly represent a fringe viewpoint that is rejected by the vast majroity of their colleagues across a variety of social science fields.”

You can read a copy of the ruling here. You may have heard of one of the state’s witnesses:

University of Texas sociologist Mark Regnerus, who authored a 2011 New Family Structures Study, testified during the trial that children are better off being raised by a mother and father. Regnerus testified that the “odds are against” gays and lesbians raising children and that the state of Michigan should be “prudent” before changing its law because research into the area is too new.

This is why you might have heard of Mark Regnerus.

Opponents of same-sex marriage say [the Regnerus study is] the best evidence yet that children raised by gay parents suffer a disadvantage. Most experts take a different view—like Darren Sherkat, the sociologist who was tasked with completing a definitive review in 2012, they think “It’s bullshit.”

The study’s formal title is “How Different Are the Adult Children of Parents Who Have Same-Sex Relationships?”—and it set off a storm of criticism almost immediately upon publication in 2012. The New York Times’ Erik Eckholm summarized it neatly on Friday, but the story is worth revisiting here—primarily because, no matter how many times and ways other scholars try to discredit the study, it continues to shape policy in state legislatures and amicus briefs. Michigan is only the latest example.

It’s been the same bullshit used by defenders of these awful laws in case after case, and in case after case they’ve gotten their rear ends handed to them. Couldn’t have happened to be a better bunch of people. As this ruling wasn’t stayed, expect a whole lot of couples to show up at their county clerks’ offices on Monday seeking marriage licenses. I wish them all the very best. Daily Kos and Freedom to Marry have more.

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So you want the federal government you keep suing to enforce that law you don’t support?

Posted on March 22, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

That would be Greg Abbott’s position on equal pay.

Still not Greg Abbott

Attorney General and Republican gubernatorial candidate Greg Abbott has let himself be out-wrestled on the sensitive issue of equal pay for equal work by Texas women.

His answer, according to a statement Wednesday from his campaign staff, is that women in the Lone Star State who are victims of employment discrimination can turn to the federal government for help.

As governor, he would veto any bill to provide as much help through state courts.

Abbott, remember, is “one of the nation’s leading advocates for stopping the federal overreach of the Obama Administration.” That’s the administration responsible for passing the law that helps victims of pay discrimination recover damages in federal court.

Now Abbott has made himself look like someone who either doesn’t care about Texas women who are paid less than men for similar work or who believes that his federal arch-enemy has done such a good job that Texas can’t make things any better.

I suppose Abbott’s still slightly better on this than Dan Patrick, who thinks that the ladies should just suck it up and trust the magic of the free market to ensure they get paid what they’re worth. Because that’s been such a great strategy for them historically. It sure has been marvelous watching the Abbott campaign squirm this week, hasn’t it?

Posted in Election 2014 | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Tesla and Texas

Posted on March 22, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Tesla Motors currently can’t sell its cars in Texas via its preferred model of direct sales to consumers. Its attempts to modify state laws to allow for direct sales went nowhere last session, blocked by fierce opposition from the Texas Automobile Dealers Association. They’re now looking for a place to build their new batteries. Why would they choose to do that in Texas given all that?

Now, those restrictions, which rank among the country’s strictest, could harm Texas’ chances of landing the $5 billion lithium-ion battery plant Tesla plans to construct by 2017.

In late February, the company announced that Texas was one of four states — along with Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico — in the running to house the wind- and solar-powered “gigafactory,” which Tesla says would span as many as 1,000 acres and employ about 6,500 people.

[…]

Tesla officials, however, have indicated that Texas’ tough restrictions on the company’s sales do not help the state’s case.

Alexis Georgeson, a company spokeswoman, said she could not specifically address how Tesla would weigh various factors in its selection process, but she said comments from Diarmuid O’Connell, Tesla’s vice president of business development, properly sum up Tesla’s view of Texas’ restrictions.

“The issue of where we do business is in some ways inextricably linked to where we sell our cars,” O’Connell told Bloomberg this month. “If Texas wants to reconsider its position on Tesla selling directly in Texas, it certainly couldn’t hurt.”

Texas laws prevent car manufacturers from selling directly to Texas consumers, and they require manufacturers to sell their cars through tightly regulated franchised dealers.

[…]

Tesla currently showcases vehicles at “galleries” in Austin and Houston, but state law prohibits employees from discussing the price or any logistical aspect of acquiring the car. That means prospective buyers in Texas must order the car from Tesla’s headquarters in Palo Alto, Calif. The cars are then delivered in a truck with no company markings, per Texas law, and customers even have to unwrap their new automobiles themselves, because the law prohibits Tesla’s in-state representatives from doing, saying or touching anything related to selling or delivering cars.

“It’s incredibly inconvenient,” Georgeson said. “Really what they are doing is making it tougher for customers.”

See here, here, and here for the background. I drew an analogy to microbreweries and their multi-session fight to get antiquated beer distribution laws changed. I still think that’s an apt comparison, but if it takes Tesla as long as it took the microbrewers to achieve their goal, it’ll be well past the time Tesla intends to have that factory up and running before they succeed. My guess is that they’d like some assurance of a quicker resolution before they’d be willing to commit to building here. To his credit, Rick Perry supported HB3351, the bill that would have done the overhaul Tesla wanted. Wendy Davis did not say she would support such a bill in 2015 – I seriously doubt she’d veto it if it passed on her watch – though she supported the general idea. Greg Abbott typically had nothing to say. So we’ll want to keep an eye on what individual legislators and candidates are saying. My guess is that Tesla is in for a fight that will take more than one more session to resolve. Whether that affects their decision about where to put that battery gigafactory remains to be seen.

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Friday random ten: I’m an old cowhand

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

We went off to see the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo yesterday, so here are ten songs about cowboys and horses.

1. The Cowboy Song – SixMileBridge
2. Bring On the Dancing Horses – The Picture
3. Cowboys Are My Weakness – Chris Difford
4. Horse – Eddie From Ohio
5. I Want To Be A Cowboy’s Sweetheart – Mutual Admiration Society
6. A Horse Named Bill – Flying Fish Sailors
7. Cowboy Lips – The Bobs
8. A Horse With No Name – America
9. Sinaloa Cowboy – Bruce Springsteen
10. Whole Heap Of Little Horses – The Chieftains

I’m heading off to ride into the sunset, which is an hour later these days thanks to daylight savings time. Have a good weekend, y’all.

Posted in Music | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Pot polling

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Our favorite pollsters aren’t optimistic about pot legalization despite some good looking poll numbers for it.

In the February 2014 University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll, we asked respondents for their opinions on marijuana possession and gave them four options to choose from:

  • “marijuana possession should not be legal under any circumstances;”
  • “marijuana possession should be legal for medicinal purposes only;”
  • “possession of small amounts of marijuana for any purpose should be legal;” and,
  • “possession of any amount of marijuana for any purpose should be legal.”

Overall, just under a majority of Texans, 49 percent, said that possession of either a small amount or any amount of marijuana should be legal for any purpose. When combined with those who think marijuana should be made legal for medicinal purposes, 28 percent, it’s clear that the vast majority of Texans think that marijuana should be legal in some form. These results are comparable to national numbers, which show a slim majority of Americans favoring legalization.

But the overall results cloud the distinct ideological and partisan divergence over marijuana. Overall, 23 percent of Texas voters think that marijuana should be illegal in all circumstances, but opposition grows to 32 percent when we focus on Republican voters. Conversely, 77 percent of liberals think that small or large amounts of marijuana should be made legal for any purpose, but among conservatives, that support drops to 35 percent. Add the 32 percent of conservatives who would only legalize marijuana for medicinal purposes, and you see that the majority of the voters who drive elections in Texas remain clear-eyed in their opposition to recreational pot use.

This configuration of public opinion illustrates one reason (among the many possibilities) for some Democratic elites’ harsh attitudes toward Kinky Friedman’s candidacy for agriculture commissioner. However much potential there may be for the Democratic — and especially the liberal — grassroots to respond enthusiastically to Friedman’s emphasis on marijuana decriminalization, moderates and independents are evenly divided between those who are relatively restrictive (favoring, at most, legalization of medical uses) and those who are permissive (supporting legalization of some amounts for any use).

In the midst of a campaign in which Democrats need to persuade at least some non-Democratic voters in addition to mobilizing their own homegrown base, the talk about marijuana is at best a mixed bag, offering Republicans the opportunity to tar Democrats as cultural liberals among the far more numerous conservative and moderate voters.

This divergence of opinion between the different ideological poles is not as strong as we’ve seen in many other policy areas (abortion, for example), but there is a real distinction. This polarization in attitudes — along with the general trajectory of public opinion and the revenue that states like Colorado are pulling in — means there is reason to believe that this issue will be around for a while: There are political and policy reasons for even conservative leaders to consider some form of legalization, but also ideological points to be scored in public opposition.

Like other policy areas that have a potential moral component, such as gay marriage, opposition to decriminalization may turn out to be significant, particularly because it is concentrated in the very constituencies that buttress Republican dominance of elections and the legislative process in Texas.

I would look at it this way. There was widespread public support for changing Texas’ laws about beer distribution to allow microbreweries and brewpubs to sell their wares directly to the public and in retail outlets, but it took several legislative sessions for a bill to finally pass, and even then it was nearly derailed. What it took was mostly a matter of organization and lobbying, with some scaling back of the original legislation to earn enough support from former opponents. Though the opposition was limited to one lobbying group for the beer distributors that had no real argument for maintaining the status quo, they had money and power and it took a large show of force to overcome them.

In the case of pot legalization, we have decent public support but a fiercely determined opposition that likely won’t go away when they find themselves badly outnumbered, and as yet there’s no organization pushing legalization, just one renegade candidate that still has to win a runoff and a general election, and isn’t particularly well-liked in his party. There’s a decent chance that advances will be made to further decriminalize pot, as treatment and alternative forms of sentencing are much more popular these days than jail time, and there’s a conservative push for de-incarceration as a matter of fiscal policy. That’s not the same as legalization, of course, but it’s a large and solid piece of middle ground with a less determined opposing faction. When there’s a commercial interest in favor of pot legalization, that’s when we’re likely to see some real action, assuming such an interest is shown by the Colorado and Washington experiences to be viable. But as with casinos, that’s no guarantee, either. My advice to those interested in advancing this cause is to work on decriminalization. It gets you most of the way there, it’s achievable, it will keep people out of jail, and it will make it easier down the road to take the next step when and if public opinion becomes more firmly in favor. Advocating for medical marijuana is also probably a decent bet. But in the absence of even a rudimentary grassroots movement for legal pot, I wouldn’t expect anything more than that to be possible.

Posted in Show Business for Ugly People | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

No pay equity problems here

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

No sauce for the gander, either.

Sen. Wendy Davis

Sen. Wendy Davis

Women in Democrat gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis’ Senate office last year averaged about $3,000 more in earnings than the male employees, according to data acquired by Austin bureau chief Peggy Fikac.

Out of 12 employees in Davis’ office, women averaged $43,050 and men averaged $40,378. There are six men and six women who work in Davis Fort Worth and Austin offices.

[…]

Equal pay for women has been the focus of the Texas governor’s race this week and the issue has placed the two candidates on starkly different sides of the issue. Abbott said as governor he would have vetoed the equal-pay legislation sponsored by Davis last year.

See here for the background. Davis has only 12 employees in her Senate office, while the AG’s office has over 7,000, so it’s not really a direct comparison. But it does nothing to derail the story line, and that’s the big thing. Abbott can strain to reach for a counter-argument, but he’s fighting on inherently hostile turf, and he’s his own worst enemy with his admission that he’d have vetoed the Ledbetter bill. He needs to change the subject, but this won’t go away. It’s a key difference between the two candidates, and it’s a relevant, resonant issue.

By the way, I’m sure you’ll be unsurprised to learn that Dan Patrick opposes the Ledbetter bill, too. “Women should be should be paid the same as a man, but I don’t believe government should enforce it,” Patrick said. You’re on your own, ladies! I recommend taking negotiation classes, if you can find the money to pay for them. Also, too, David Dewhurst doesn’t oppose Ledbetter, but he’s too wishy washy to come out and say it. Honestly, it’s like they’ve got Democratic saboteurs writing their position papers for them.

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Another same sex divorce case

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

In Bexar County. And with it comes another opportunity for Greg Abbott to demonstrate his commitment to non-equality.

RedEquality

The Bexar divorce case was filed Feb. 18, eight days before U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia ruled that the state’s ban on same-sex unions and its refusal to recognize out-of-state marriages are unconstitutional. The judge stayed his ruling, though, so the ban remains in effect until a higher court rules on the matter.

The women in the Bexar case, Allison Leona Flood Lesh and Kristi Lyn Lesh, were married on Aug. 13, 2010, in Washington. Their names appear on a copy of their marriage license, which was recorded last fall in Bexar County.

Their divorce has the makings of being a messy split because a child, identified only as K.A.F.L., was born during the marriage in San Antonio. Flood wants to share custody of the nearly 13-month-old girl, but Lesh claims in a court filing that Flood isn’t the child’s biological or adoptive parent.

“This illustrates what Judge Garcia identified as (what) same-sex couples are deprived of,” said Neel Lane, one of the San Antonio lawyers for the gay couples who sued the state over the same-sex marriage ban. “First, they are deprived of the benefits of an orderly dissolution of a marriage. Second, their children are denied the benefit of the many laws to protect their interests in the event of a divorce.”

Those benefits include child support and shared custody, Lane said.

[…]

A spokeswoman for the Texas attorney general’s office, which opposes gay marriage and divorce, declined to comment on the Bexar case. Instead, she provided the office’s legal brief submitted in the Supreme Court case.

“Marriage in Texas can only be between a man and a woman, and courts may not give effect to any legal claim asserted as a result of an out-of-state same-sex marriage,” the document states. A same-sex couple can sue to have the marriage “declared void,” though.

The state’s highest civil court took up the matter after different rulings in lower appellate courts. They involved two couples who were married in Massachusetts and later moved to Texas.

The particulars of this case aren’t important. The point is that same sex marriages are taking place all over the country, and some of these couples live in Texas. Until such time as Texas’ anti-same sex marriage law is invalidated, the state is going to have to deal with issues like these. Sticking our collective head in the sand and slow-walking the process does no one any good. The courts, in Washington and here in Texas, will eventually sort all this out. In the meantime, real people who were legally married are being needlessly harmed. We should face up to reality sooner rather than later.

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Pearland Presidential Head Park gets different development

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

What could have been, Pearland. What could have been.

What could have been

A 48-acre swath of land that once was envisioned as a park to showcase oversize busts of U.S. presidents has attracted a Chinese developer to Pearland.

Beijing-based Modern Green Development, an international company and one of the largest green building developers in China, hopes to build a large-scale mixed-use project on the site west of Texas 288 and south of Beltway 8.

The planned development would be its first in the United States and second in North America. The company has constructed 15 million square feet of mixed-use space around the world.

[…]

A similar mixed-use project was previously planned for that site around 2007, before the economic downturn stalled the idea and the property was taken over by a bank.

That project, to be called the Water Lights District, was to include a park to display 43 presidential busts by local artist David Adickes.

In Pearland, a suburb where farmland has rapidly given way to residential development in recent decades, the busts were meant to welcome visitors and give the area character.

Only six busts were installed in the Presidential Park & Gardens, and Barack Obama had yet to win election before the project stalled.

Adickes said the busts are now sitting in the yard near his studio in Houston. He said he did not know whether they would be utilized for the new plan.

“The set does exist and is waiting for a final home,” Adickes said. “Theoretically, they would do well there.”

See here, here, and here for the background, because OF COURSE I covered this obsessively. I’m sure this new project will be great and will be needed to deal with the demand of people wanting to live in Pearland. But seriously, you missed out on being the long-term home of the giant Presidential heads. That’s worth way more than any boring old residential development.

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It’s as much about Leticia as it is about Dan

Posted on March 20, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Sen. Leticia Van de Putte has been getting some love from the national press.

Sen. Leticia Van de Putte

Sen. Leticia Van de Putte

But increasingly, on the ground in Texas, attention is shifting to San Antonio’s Van de Putte, who is running for lieutenant governor, a position that is in some ways the more powerful one in Texas, because that official presides over the Senate. Van de Putte is quietly emerging as a favorite among some Democrats, who see the Hispanic businesswoman and mother of six as the more likely candidate who could help revive her party’s chances.

San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro, himself a rising Texas Democratic star, is among her most vocal supporters.

And Van de Putte has also found some unlikely Republican allies in her bid, which will pit her against either state Sen. Dan Patrick or current Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst in the general election. The primary runoff is May 27.

“I am part of Greg Abbott’s finance team and John Cornyn’s fundraising team. I am a Republican fundraiser and bundler, but I am hosting a fundraiser for Leticia,” said Louis Barrios, a Texas restaurant owner. “I have switched sides on this race because it is the most important race that we have had in Texas and I am leaving my Republican credentials at the door on this race.”
At issue for Barrios is what he sees as a harsh and alienating approach to immigration and Hispanics from both Patrick, who likened immigration from Mexico to an invasion, and Dewhurst, who has said that he will focus on securing the border.

E-mails to both campaigns were not returned.

“If anything is going to bring out the Latino vote, it’s going to be a Dan Patrick,” Barrios said. “He is waking and kicking a sleeping giant. Leticia’s race, this is one that can really be won.”

Barrios has been making phone calls for Van de Putte, trying to generate support among Republicans and business leaders in Texas, and others have gone public with their preference.

Barrios said he can imagine Republicans voting for Abbott and Van de Putte, which is possible in Texas because the governor and lieutenant governor run separately. George W. Bush had a Democratic lieutenant governor.

“I am not going to compare and contrast candidates but she brings qualities that are appealing to all sides and genders and races,” said Marcie Zlotnik, who started two retail electricity providers and describes herself as an independent who leans Republican. “She has Republican support and nobody is afraid to say it either.”

As I noted before, it’s not hard to imagine a scenario in which LVdP wins. It won’t take all that many crossover voters, especially if Democrats finally manage to get their base turnout level up. LVdP will be a big asset in that. As Molly Ivins would have said, she has a lot of Elvis in her, and she has the experience and sensibleness to be an acceptable choice to the kind of Republican that can’t bear the thought of voting for Dan Patrick. The main thing she needs right now is financial support so she can get her name and her message out. If you’re supporting Wendy Davis – which of course you should be – you also need to be supporting Leticia Van de Putte. We’ve been waiting for an opportunity like this for a long time. Let’s not let it go by without giving it all we’ve got. BOR has more.

Posted in Election 2014 | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

Abbott comes out for inequality

Posted on March 20, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Turns out he’s been a practitioner of it for some time.

Still not Greg Abbott

Equal pay for women is in the spotlight of the Texas governor’s race, and figures from Attorney General Greg Abbott’s state agency show most female assistant attorneys general make less on average than do men in the same job classification.

Abbott’s office said the difference is explained by the amount of time that the men have been licensed as lawyers and have served at the agency.

But drilling down into different classifications of assistant attorney general, the figures provided by Abbott’s office show there isn’t always a direct correlation between such experience and pay.

And of the top 20 highest-paid employees at the agency, just three are women, February salary figures provided to the San Antonio Express-News show. Of the 100 top positions, 37 are held by women.

Abbott’s office said that since he became attorney general in December 2002, the number of female lawyers in his office has increased by 71, or 23 percent.

[…]

The Texas attorney general’s office has more than 4,000 employees, nearly 2,900 of them women. The office defends state laws, serves as legal counsel to state agencies and provides legal opinions, including hundreds of open records requests every year. The office also oversees the collection of court-ordered child support and administers the state crime victims compensation fund.

Overall, male employees make an average of $60,200 a year, and women make $44,708. Those averages, however, don’t take into account differing job classifications.

Looking at the 722 assistant attorneys general under Abbott, the average salary for 343 men is $79,464 while the average salary for 379 women is $73,649.

Abbott’s office said the men on average had more than 16 years of being licensed, while the women had nearly 14 years. The men had an average of nearly 104 months of service, while the women had more than 92 months, his office said.

Of seven different classifications of assistant attorneys general, the average salary for men is higher than the average salary for women in six of them, with the difference ranging from $647 to $4,452. In one category, the average salary for women is $3,512 higher than that for men.

In three categories, the women on average either had more years of service or had been licensed longer, or both, despite being paid less, according to figures from the attorney general’s office. In the latter case, the attorney general’s office noted the salaries were almost identical — the men’s average salary was $122,528, while the women made $647 less while having more experience.

In the one category of assistant attorney general in which women were paid more than men, the women on average had more years of service at the agency, but fewer years licensed.

[…]

Katie Bardaro, lead economist for Seattle-based PayScale, cautioned that a number of factors go into setting pay, even for people with the same job title. PayScale collects data from employees and people with job offers and conducts studies that include a look at men and women in the workforce.

“Even though they have the same title, it doesn’t mean they have the same characteristics. They might not have the same day-to-day responsibilities. They might not have the same years of experience, the same education, the same management responsibilities,” she said.

There’s something to what Ms. Bardaro says, but 1) if the male attorneys generally have the kind of duties and responsibilities that come with higher pay, that in itself is telling, and 2) one might expect there to be more examples of women having higher pay if this were just a matter of chance and distribution and not something systemic. Clearly, there’s a bunch of bad negotiators in that office. The bottom line is that this is a pretty inconvenient set of facts for a guy who’s trying to say that no, really, he does support equal pay.

And then there’s this.

Republican Attorney General Greg Abbott would have vetoed the equal-pay measure sponsored by his Democratic opponent for governor, state Sen. Wendy Davis, his campaign said Wednesday.

Abbott’s answer meets a key Davis campaign issue head on and puts the candidates squarely on opposite sides of it.

[…]

Davis has been pressing Abbott to say whether he would have vetoed the state version of the federal Lilly Ledbetter law if he were governor, just as GOP Gov. Rick Perry did last year.

The federal law, named after a woman who sued over pay discrimination, changed the statute of limitations in federal cases so that allegations could be brought 180 days after the last alleged discriminatory paycheck was received. Previously, the clock started running in federal cases when the discriminatory payments began.

Davis’ bill would have made the same change in state law. Backers said that would allow people to bring their cases in state court, a potentially quicker and less expensive avenue.

Abbott spokesman Matt Hirsch said in a statement, “Because wage discrimination is already against the law and because legal avenues already exist for victims of discrimination, Greg Abbott would have not signed this law.”

Asked whether Abbott would have vetoed the measure, Hirsch said yes.

Because why should they make it a little easier for someone who’s been getting screwed to seek justice? And to think, a few hours earlier Abbott was distancing himself from Republican Party of Texas Executive Director Beth Cubriel and her “women are bad negotiators” remark. Honestly, I don’t know what there is to say. PDiddie, BOR, Texpatriate, the Feminist Justice League, and the Observer have more.

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CCA to review dismissal of DeLay conviction

Posted on March 20, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

The criminal justice system isn’t done with Tom DeLay just yet.

Do YOU feel safe with me out on the streets?

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on Wednesday agreed to review whether a lower court correctly decided last fall to toss out the prison sentence handed to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on money-laundering charges.

The state’s highest court on criminal matters announced that it would accept a petition asking it to consider whether a 2-1 decision by the Third Court of Appeals overturning DeLay’s criminal case conviction was appropriate.

The appellate court in September 2013 tossed a high-profile jury verdict, ruling that “the evidence was legally insufficient to sustain DeLay’s convictions.” In a dissent, the lone Democrat on the three-judge panel argued the evidence for a conviction was sufficient enough to convince a rational jury that criminal conduct had taken place.

Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg, whose office had prosecuted DeLay, had appealed the appellate court’s decision. They had no immediate comment to the morning decision to review the case.

No date for the hearing before the state Court of Criminal Appeals was set. Both sides will have time to file briefs outlining their arguments in the case.

Brian Wice, a Houston attorney who represents DeLay, said he looked forward to arguing again that the conviction should remain overturned. “We are confident,” he said, noting that he was at the Court of Criminal Appeals to argue another case when he was advised that the court would review the Third Court’s ruling.

See here for the last entry in this saga. We always knew that the Travis County DA would appeal that ruling, it was just a matter of time. The CCA has previously ruled against DeLay, but this is a different ballgame. We know that as a rule, the CCA is fairly hostile towards defendants, but not always. We’ll see if they follow their instincts or not. Juanita, who is practically dancing in the street at the news, has more.

Posted in Crime and Punishment | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Texas blog roundup for the week of March 17

Posted on March 20, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

The Texas Progressive Alliance is ready to bust some brackets as it brings you this week’s roundup.

Continue reading →

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How I’ll be voting in the runoffs

Posted on March 19, 2014 by Charles Kuffner
David Alameel

David Alameel

This is pretty straightforward, as there are only two races in the runoff for me to consider.

Senate – This is the definition of a no-brainer. David Alameel wasn’t my first choice. I voted for Maxey Scherr, and didn’t recommend a vote for Alameel in March because of questions about his past (and possibly present) political activities that I didn’t have the chance to ask and didn’t see get answered elsewhere. None of that matters now. Alameel’s ubiquitous web ads have put him firmly on the right side of issues I care about, and while there are still questions I’d like to ask Alameel – and I plan to try again to set up an interview with him – I’m satisfied with that. Just as I didn’t believe Mark Jones when he tried to convince me there were stealth moderates in the GOP primaries, I will take Alameel at his word on these issues. And not to belabor the obvious, but the alternative is unthinkable. I speculated before that perhaps the reason the establishment all lined up with Alameel early on is because someone foresaw the Kesha Rogers problem and reasonably concluded that Alameel and his bankroll were a solution to it. Whether that was by accident or design, it seems to be working pretty well and almost closed things out in the first round. I’ll be voting for David Alameel in the runoff.

Ag Commissioner – I feel terrible for Hugh Fitzsimons, who was clearly the best and most qualified candidate running in either party. I wish I had an answer to that; I do have a couple of thoughts that I’ll get back to later. I think I’ve been pretty clear about my view of Kinky Friedman and the pros and cons of his candidacy. I ultimately voted for Fitzsimons because I wasn’t fully sold on Kinky and his one-note crusade, but at least Kinky can articulate a reason why he’s running and is actually trying to win. That’s more that can be said for Jim Hogan. Here’s Hogan in his own words in the Trib:

Hogan said he did not spend money during the campaign because “it’d be silly to raise money.” He added that there was no need for a campaign website, which he doesn’t have, because “somebody’s going to Google you anyway.”

And in the Observer:

I talked to Hogan today, and he attributes his victory to the Almighty.

“It was a miracle and only God could’ve pulled it off,” he told me. “That doesn’t sell papers and you may think that’s corny but I truly believe it.”

I can understand why God wouldn’t want the atheistic Kinky Friedman representing God’s Party but what about Fitzsimons, who actually campaigned?

Hogan scoffs at the idea that “the Establishment” has anything to teach him.

“When I called Democrats and told them I was gonna be on the ticket first thing they said was, ‘How long you been in politics?’ I said, ‘I’m not no politician.’ They said, ‘Let me tell you something: It takes a lot of money to win a state race and you can’t win.’ I said, ‘Let me tell you something, y’all haven’t won since 1994.’”

And that’s true enough. Democrats have lost every single one of the last 100 or so statewide races since 1994. Hogan thought he’d try something a little different: He wouldn’t really campaign.

“Basically I run on the internet and a phone,” he said. “My motto is: My phone and Internet can outrun any jet plane or car across the state of Texas. I don’t have to be there.”

But how did voters know about him at all? Details about his candidacy only appear in a handful of small-town papers.

“All you gotta do is Google my name—’jim hogan ag commissioner’—and there’s enough on there.”

Sorry, but I refuse to vote for someone who doesn’t campaign. If Hogan wants to be the next coming of Gene Kelly, he can do it without my help. If the result of the Ag Commissioner primaries has you looking elsewhere or sitting it out, I understand. But you can’t beat something with nothing, and Hogan is nothing. I’ll be voting for Kinky.

As I said, I’m sad this happened to Hugh Fitzsimons. Frankly, we’re lucky it didn’t also happen to Steve Brown, but one random result is enough. Someone needs to be thinking how to deal with this in 2018, because unless everyone is running for re-election, Dems are going to have to try to fill out another slate with quality candidates. Getting such people for the top of the ticket shouldn’t be too hard (we hope), but we still need those Commissioners and Supreme Court/CCA justices, and raising statewide money for those offices is a huge challenge. It shouldn’t be that expensive in a primary to establish enough name ID for someone to avoid this scenario. Some targeted mail, some online ads, maybe a spot of cable TV – I saw plenty of ads for Nathan Hecht and Glenn Hegar on ESPN and CSN-Houston during early voting. Maybe if some people would quit screwing around with Republican primaries and questionable PACs they might realize such a thing wouldn’t be all that expensive and it might just help the next Hugh Fitzsimons make it through to November. Our bench isn’t nearly deep enough to burn candidates like that, and it won’t be deep enough in four years’ time. If we can’t figure out a way to invest in these guys, we’ll face the same problem then. BOR has more.

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The “grassroots” Republican Ladies Against Wendy movement

Posted on March 19, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Christopher Hooks asks and answers a good question.

Who the heck are RedState Women? So far, they appear to be a motley collection of politically-connected lobbyists, ex-lobbyists and staffers of legislators who haven’t exactly distinguished themselves on women’s issues.

This morning, the Dallas Morning News‘ Wayne Slater noted the connection between RedState Women, Mike Toomey and Dave Carney—the latter two being longtime GOP insiders. But the RedState Women’s staff and board feature an even more eclectic crew.

There’s Lara Laneri Keel, the president of the group’s board, who writes in her bio that she’s “regarded as one of the top female lobbyist (sic) in Austin.” One of her clients: the private prison industry. Keel is a partner at the Texas Lobby Group, whose most prominent member is Toomey, a former Perry chief of staff and one of the governor’s closest associates. Keel is the cousin of Terry Keel, a former state representative and House parliamentarian, and wife of John Keel, former head of the Legislative Budget Board and current state auditor. Both Terry and John Keel were close associates of former House Speaker Tom Craddick.

There’s Cristen Wohlgemuth, a former lobbyist who now serves as chief of staff to state Rep. Craig Goldman (R-Fort Worth), a tea party rep who voted against last session’s equal pay bill and co-sponsored the sweeping abortion restrictions that passed the Lege last summer. Wohlgemuth, the daughter of former state Rep. Arlene Wohlgemuth, worked for famously fundamentalist former state Rep. Warren Chisum before Goldman. Both Chisum and Arlene Wohlgemuth were top Craddick lieutenants. Arlene Wohlgemuth is now executive director of the corporate-funded Texas Public Policy Foundation.

And there’s Mia McCord, a former fundraiser with the state GOP who’s the current chief of staff for state Sen. Kelly Hancock (R-North Richland Hills).  As chairman of the Republican Policy Caucus in 2011, Hancock played an important role in decimating state funding for women’s health care programs.

Christman herself is the chief of staff to state Sen. Larry Taylor (R-Friendswood) who was a key supporter of the effort to “defund Planned Parenthood” that ended up capsizing the whole system of women’s health care in the state.

Then there’s Tony Hernandez, the group’s treasurer, according to the only financial report. Hernandez is another lobbyist (he works with Keel at the Texas Lobby Group) and the only XY chromosome in the bunch. Hernandez has an even more eclectic past—before he came to Texas, he worked for Andrew Laming, the bro-tastic Australian politician, most famous for calling out Aborigines and Pacific Islanders for an addiction to “welfare on tap” and chugging beers while doing handstands for Australia Day this year. (“This is the way I chose to celebrate Australia Day,” Laming said, Australian-ly. “I chose to drink my beer upside down.”)

It’s a strange group—not the dream team you might have assembled for a Texas women’s advocacy group. But they’ve been earning a lot of headlines. RedState Women launched its website on Wednesday after giving Politico a sneak peek, and earned a cameo in a recent Wall Street Journal story about women voters. As a PAC, the group will presumably be raising and spending money on candidates. But the most important role RedState Women will play this election cycle, it seems, will be in messaging.

“Christman” is Cari Christman, of “ladies are too busy for equality” fame. Between that and the “ladies should learn to be better negotiators” claim, the more messaging we get from folks like this, the better. Be that as it may, the point here is that this isn’t some genuine movement by real people who feel their voices aren’t being heard. It’s the usual assortment of privileged and connected people claiming to speak for people whose interests they don’t actually represent. In the meantime, we still don’t know what Greg Abbott himself thinks about this; he’s been too busy to speak for himself. Keep trotting those surrogates out there, Greg, they’re doing a heck of a job for you. Daily Kos has more.

Posted in Election 2014 | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

The backlash to marriage equality

Posted on March 19, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

It’s been almost two weeks since a federal judge struck down Texas’ anti-gay marriage law. The sky hasn’t fallen, rivers continue to run downstream, dogs and cats are not cohabitating, and strangest of all, the Republican Party of Texas has not gone into full freakout mode. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a backlash coming, of course. The Observer gives us a preview.

RedEquality

To say the gay rights movement in the United States is experiencing a period of success is an understatement—even if the blowback to that success poses risks. Yet here in Texas, where you might expect more conflict about what remains a momentous social issue, you haven’t seen much yet beyond grandstanding. That’s partially a result of the fact that the Texas Legislature won’t meet again for another nine months. Texas groups agitated about the ruling haven’t had any space to float policy proposals or legislation.

But I was curious about what anti-gay marriage activists might have in store. So I called Jonathan Saenz, the president of Texas Values, the group which says it stands “for biblical, Judeo-Christian values by ensuring Texas is a state in which religious liberty flourishes, families prosper, and every human life is valued.”

Saenz, who responded to activists trying to strip anti-sodomy provisions out of Texas law last week by arguing that gay people only want gay rights because they’re gay, flatly denies the “homosexuals” are making any progress at all, and says his movement and Christians in the state won’t give up without a fight. What’s more, he left the door open to pushing for a bill, like the one recently vetoed in Arizona, that makes it legal for businesses to discriminate against gay people if serving them conflicts with a “deeply held religious belief.”

“This is the beginning of an epic battle,” Saenz told me. “There’s a strong likelihood that the Fifth Circuit [Court of Appeals] is going to overturn this decision. If Texas’ gay marriage laws are not constitutional, there’s no guarantee that the court won’t open up marriage to polygamy and polyandry.”

There’s definitely a chance the traditionally conservative Fifth Circuit overturns the Texas decision, but gay rights lawyers in Texas and elsewhere know these cases will be appealed and are laying the groundwork for the Supreme Court to take up the issue. That’s the reason U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia stayed his own ruling, as has happened in many states. It puts the ruling on hold until a higher court can weigh in. But even in that, Saenz sees encouragement.

The fact that Garcia stayed his ruling, Saenz says, “shows some hesitation on his part. I think the homosexual advocates were ready to go on down to the clerk’s office” and get married, he says cheerily, “and he put a stop to that.”

Link via Lone Star Q, who has another example of how obsessed Saenz is about this. I don’t know when the courts will take action again, but with Wendy Davis officially supporting same sex marriage while Greg Abbott files an appeal with the Fifth Circuit, there’s no escaping this issue, and the broader issue of equality, this election. I will be shocked if we don’t hear about some legislators and candidates proposing laws like the one that passed in Arizona before getting vetoed by the governor, and I will be shocked if the culture warriors of education don’t turn their gaze to the gay curriculum as they did a couple of years ago with social studies and its lack of sufficient-to-them deference to white people. Despite galloping advances in public opinion about gay rights and marriage equality, people often have a skewed view about how other people think, leading them to believe that the pro-equality side is a minority when in fact it is not. Things may be quiet on the surface now, but don’t let that fool you into thinking that the resentment and the resistance aren’t there.

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How much will science advance in the courts?

Posted on March 19, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

It’s up to the CCA to decide.

Texas’ highest criminal court will hear arguments Wednesday in a case that could affect how evolving scientific evidence is used in courtrooms across the state.

For Neal H. Robbins, the high court’s decision will determine whether he gets another shot at arguing his innocence.

In 1999, a jury convicted Robbins of killing his girlfriend’s 17-month-old infant. A key witness in the case was Patricia Moore, a Harris County medical examiner who ruled the child’s death was homicide by asphyxiation.

But in 2007, after a different medical examiner reviewed the original findings and disagreed, Moore recanted her trial testimony. In a letter to the district attorney, she wrote that while the infant’s death remained “suspicious,” she had come to believe that “a cause and manner of death of ‘undetermined’ is best for this case,” rather than homicide.

Robbins appealed, but in 2011, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state’s highest criminal court, denied a new trial by a vote of 5-4. In the majority opinion, Justice Larry Meyers wrote that despite her recantation, Moore’s original trial testimony had not been “proven false.”

Now, Robbins is hoping a new law passed by the Legislature in 2013 will cause the court to change course and give him another shot to prove his innocence. The law, Senate Bill 344, by Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, allows courts to grant post-conviction relief in cases where scientific testimony that was essential to a conviction has been contradicted. A lower court judge has recommended that Robbins be granted a new trial, but the CCA will make the final call.

Scott Henson, who was quoted in the story, adds some context.

[I]t was the CCA’s ruling in exactly this case that caused prosecutors to back off and agree to the bill’s passage. The court’s ruling in Ex Parte Robbins made clear the CCA would allow convictions based on junk science to stand if the Legislature didn’t change the law. After Robbins, the Harris County DA’s office (which had been the only significant opposition) acquiesced and helped negotiate the final language that’s now in the statute. It would be ironic if Robbins did not now prevail, since this particular case was the one that pushed the bill over the finish line at the Lege.

This is the same new statute under which the San Antonio Four and Fran and Dan Keller were released – they’re now out on bail though the CCA hasn’t given final approval in those cases yet. Those junk science cases are considered more likely to be easily approved, while the Robbins case – which involves an ME who gave erroneous testimony and changed her opinion after she learned more science – is considered the first test case that will provide an indication how the CCA will interpret the new writ.

He has more links and information in his post, so go read it. It’s clear what the CCA needs to do in this case, it’s just a matter of them doing it. I’m not sure what else the Legislature could do if they don’t do their job here. Hair Balls has more.

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GOP primary turnout comparison

Posted on March 18, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

There’s been plenty of focus on Democratic turnout in this past primary, and while Republican turnout gets a nod in there, I haven’t seen it be the focus of any stories yet. In part, I suspect that’s because Wendy Davis and Bill White are a ready-made comparison, but Greg Abbott was essentially unopposed while Rick Perry had to claw his way to 50%, making a direct comparison between the two of them meaningless. Overall turnout was close enough that we can see how things went in each county for the two primaries, however. So with that in mind, I put the two county by county canvass reports for the Governor’s race into a spreadsheet and calculated the differences from 2010 to 2014. Here are the 20 counties in which GOP turnout dropped the most from 2010:


County     10Votes    Voters TurnOut  14Votes    Voters TurnOut   Diff  Ratio
=============================================================================
HARRIS     158,130 1,889,378   8.37%  135,717 2,006,270   6.76%  22,413  0.81
TRAVIS      50,427   586,882   8.59%   32,779   627,040   5.23%  17,648  0.61
TARRANT    108,605   924,682  11.75%   92,879   969,434   9.58%  15,726  0.82
DALLAS      97,058 1,129,814   8.59%   83,472 1,170,598   7.13%  13,586  0.83
COLLIN      56,934   413,772  13.76%   44,621   466,533   9.56%  12,313  0.70
WILLIAMSON  33,657   230,122  14.63%   24,150   259,878   9.29%   9,507  0.64
LUBBOCK     31,184   147,809  21.10%   22,497   153,165  14.69%   8,687  0.70
MCLENNAN    18,234   125,886  14.48%   11,076   125,559   8.82%   7,158  0.61
BRAZOS      16,549    86,359  19.16%   10,658    89,674  11.89%   5,891  0.62
EL PASO     15,386   375,128   4.10%    9,783   390,949   2.50%   5,603  0.61
WICHITA     13,703    78,977  17.35%    8,116    70,537  11.51%   5,587  0.66
BRAZORIA    23,175   168,097  13.79%   18,197   179,266  10.15%   4,978  0.74
DENTON      42,261   355,340  11.89%   37,657   388,608   9.69%   4,604  0.81
BEXAR       66,768   891,082   7.49%   62,395   915,839   6.81%   4,373  0.91
FORT BEND   32,101   300,777  10.67%   28,277   349,550   8.09%   3,824  0.76
GREGG       11,448    68,043  16.82%    7,771    66,539  11.68%   3,677  0.69
PARKER      15,407    72,005  21.40%   12,741    76,037  16.76%   2,666  0.78
NUECES      14,781   188,165   7.86%   12,399   184,789   6.71%   2,382  0.85
JOHNSON     13,470    79,862  16.87%   11,725    81,869  14.32%   1,745  0.85
WASHINGTON   6,076    21,635  28.08%    4,406    21,915  20.10%   1,670  0.72
TOM GREEN    9,944    61,983  16.04%    8,278    60,462  13.69%   1,666  0.85

“10Votes” and “14Votes” are the total votes cast in the Governor’s primary race for each year. We don’t get actual turnout figures from the SOS webpage – that is, we don’t know how many undervotes there were in this race – but the Governor’s race had the highest total each year and it’s the best we can do. “Voters” is the number of registered voters in that county each year, and “Diff” is the difference in turnout from 2010 to 2014. Overall, turnout declined by about 150,000 votes. “Ratio” is the ratio of 2014 turnout to 2010 turnout. I put that in because overall statewide turnout in 2014 was 86% of 2010 turnout, which is to say the Ratio for the state as a whole would be 0.86. This means that counties with a Ratio of less than 0.86 had a larger decline in turnout there than in the state as a whole.

With all that out of the say, it’s not a surprise that the counties that had the largest absolute drop in turnout included a lot of counties whose decline in turnout was greater than the decline in statewide turnout. For all the fuss about how Wendy Davis did in certain counties, perhaps someone might want to ask Dave Carney why so many people in places like Williamson, Collin, and Lubbock couldn’t be bothered to come out for Greg Abbott. All of the biggest counties are here, with Travis showing a notable decline in Republican participation, and only Bexar – which also had a number of hot local races, in particular in SD25 – bucking the trend by having a more gentle decline than the state overall. I’m not going to make too big a deal about this – I really don’t think primary turnout levels are predictive – but let’s do be consistent about this. Multiple Republicans spent tens of millions of dollars combined to push people to the polls. The whole Ted Nugent affair was at least partly about juicing turnout for Greg Abbott. For the first time since 2002 there will be mass turnover in statewide offices, and for the first time ever there were multiple high-profile statewide Republican primaries. And in the end, turnout declined by almost 15% from 2010. You’d think that might be worth mentioning.

Anyway. As there were counties where fewer Republicans showed up, so were there counties in which more of them came out. Here are the top 21 counties for turnout increases.


County     10Votes    Voters TurnOut  14Votes    Voters TurnOut   Diff  Ratio
=============================================================================
HIDALGO      5,015   290,097   1.73%    5,850   307,426   1.90%    -835  1.10
MILAM        1,667    14,101  11.82%    2,522    14,156  17.82%    -855  1.51
LAMAR        4,521    28,821  15.69%    5,421    28,754  18.85%    -900  1.20
TERRY          806     7,382  10.92%    1,717     7,055  24.34%    -911  2.23
HILL         4,711    21,893  21.52%    5,630    21,760  25.87%    -919  1.20
SHELBY       2,022    14,002  14.44%    2,972    14,287  20.80%    -950  1.44
STEPHENS       773     5,561  13.90%    1,849     5,506  33.58%  -1,076  2.42
TYLER        1,311    12,772  10.26%    2,495    13,014  19.17%  -1,184  1.87
ANDERSON     4,516    26,461  17.07%    5,739    26,394  21.74%  -1,223  1.27
SMITH       19,431   119,789  16.22%   20,875   123,615  16.89%  -1,444  1.04
PANOLA       1,947    15,643  12.45%    3,438    15,702  21.90%  -1,491  1.76
MONTGOMERY  40,690   243,027  16.74%   42,230   270,019  15.64%  -1,540  0.93
TRINITY        747    11,284   6.62%    2,308    10,853  21.27%  -1,561  3.21
JEFFERSON    8,933   144,112   6.20%   10,512   143,616   7.32%  -1,579  1.18
CASS         1,356    17,904   7.57%    3,418    18,911  18.07%  -2,062  2.39
HARDIN       5,281    33,991  15.54%    7,379    35,454  20.81%  -2,098  1.34
BOWIE        6,726    55,944  12.02%    9,005    55,988  16.08%  -2,279  1.34
HAYS         6,097    93,561   6.52%    8,515   100,715   8.45%  -2,418  1.30
GALVESTON   15,797   179,928   8.78%   18,420   185,850   9.91%  -2,623  1.13
ANGELINA     5,053    46,864  10.78%    8,447    48,789  17.31%  -3,394  1.61
ORANGE       4,445    49,664   8.95%    8,092    49,460  16.36%  -3,647  1.83

As this is from the same spreadsheet where I subtracted 2010 turnout from 2014 turnout, a negative number means 2014 was higher. Sorry for the confusion, I didn’t feel like redoing the formulas. I had this list go to 21 for the specific purpose of including Hidalgo County, which I noted was an exception for the Republicans among heavily Latino counties. Turnout was up for the GOP there, but it’s still pretty darned small in absolute terms. Montgomery is your Exhibit A for counties that had an absolute increase in turnout but a drop in the turnout rate due to an even bigger increase in the population of registered voters. The drop in turnout rate was still less than the drop in turnout rate statewide, however. Overall, these counties are pretty small – fifteen of them are smaller than Tom Green, the second-smallest county on the first list, and nine are smaller than Washington, the least populous county on that list. The gain in all 21 of these counties is less than the loss in just Harris and Collin. Again, you’d think this might merit a mention somewhere.

Finally, a look at the 20 counties with the smallest ratio of 2014 turnout to 2010 turnout:


County     10Votes    Voters TurnOut  14Votes    Voters TurnOut   Diff  Ratio
=============================================================================
FRIO           122     9,914   1.23%        0    10,142   0.00%    122   0.00
REEVES          44     6,170   0.71%        0     6,368   0.00%     44   0.00
ZAVALA          16     8,250   0.19%        0     8,623   0.00%     16   0.00
DIMMIT         124     7,215   1.72%       33     7,066   0.47%     91   0.27
REAGAN         634     1,872  33.87%      296     1,769  16.73%    338   0.49
KARNES         667     7,841   8.51%      332     7,740   4.29%    335   0.50
STARR           41    28,421   0.14%       24    29,809   0.08%     17   0.56
GLASSCOCK      389       741  52.50%      223       746  29.89%    166   0.57
BAILEY         835     3,624  23.04%      470     3,499  13.43%    365   0.58
GRIMES       2,700    14,171  19.05%    1,686    14,976  11.26%  1,014   0.59
DEWITT       2,443    11,827  20.66%    1,458    11,788  12.37%    985   0.60
MOORE        2,318     9,524  24.34%    1,339     9,120  14.68%    979   0.60
HOCKLEY      2,973    13,544  21.95%    1,784    13,409  13.30%  1,189   0.61
TRAVIS      50,427   586,882   8.59%   32,779   627,040   5.23% 17,648   0.61
MCLENNAN    18,234   125,886  14.48%   11,076   125,559   8.82%  7,158   0.61
EL PASO     15,386   375,128   4.10%    9,783   390,949   2.50%  5,603   0.61
CALDWELL     1,997    20,157   9.91%    1,233    20,357   6.06%    764   0.61
PRESIDIO        25     4,932   0.51%       16     5,149   0.31%      9   0.61
BRAZOS      16,549    86,359  19.16%   10,658    89,674  11.89%  5,891   0.62
GRAY         3,399    13,283  25.59%    2,076    13,007  15.96%  1,323   0.62

Where there are some small counties in the second table, there are some tiny ones in this table. I don’t really have anything to add here, I just figure that any list that includes Glasscock County is worth printing.

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Equality is just too much work

Posted on March 18, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

It’s spring break, I have family in town, so I’m just going to outsource this to Team Wendy:

On equal pay, Texas GOP PAC sends a “busy” signal

Houston Chronicle // Siobhan O’Grady
Just one week after Greg Abbott, Texas’ attorney general and the GOP’s nominee for the state’s gubernatorial race, skirted around a question on equal pay, the executive director of the Lone Star State’s newest Republican PAC stumbled through her response to a similar question in a television interview on Sunday.

Red State Women Director: Texas Women Too ‘Busy’ For Equal Pay Law

Talking Points Memo // Catherine Thompson

Cari Cristman, the executive director of Red State Women PAC, was asked in an interview with Dallas TV station WFAA about Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott’s (R) position on equal pay laws. Abbott, who is running for governor against state Sen. Wendy Davis (D), previously told the news station that existing law was sufficient to protect women’s pay.

Are Ladies Just Too Busy for the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act?

Jezebel // Kelly Faircloth

Salon reports that this fascinating line of argument comes via Cari Christman, who heads Texas’s Red State Women PAC. Local ABC affiliate WFAA asked whether her organization believes Texas needs an equal pay act. This has become an issue in the state gubernatorial race, as Wendy Davis faces off against former attorney general Greg Abbott. In his last gig, he convinced the Texas Supreme Court that the Lily Ledbetter Act-which gives women longer to file gender discrimination claims after leaving a job-didn’t alter Texas’s statue of limitations.

Head of GOP PAC targeting women: GOP doesn’t support equal pay laws because “women are busy”

Salon // Katie McDonough

As Laura Bassett at the Huffington Post points out, Texas gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis has been making Republican opponent Greg Abbott’s record on equal pay a focus of her campaign. As attorney general, Abbott successfully argued before the Texas Supreme Court in a lawsuit brought by a female professor that the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which extended the statute of limitations in such cases, didn’t change Texas’ state statute of limitations.

Awkward: GOP women’s PAC leader says women too “busy” to need equal pay laws

Raw Story // David Edwards

During a Sunday interview with WFAA’s Inside Texas Politics, host Jason Whitely told RedState Women Executive Editor Cari Christman that Democrats had accused Republicans of “hitting the panic button” and launching the PAC in the final months before the 2014 elections after gubernatorial candidate Greg Abbott was criticized for campaigning with Ted Nugent. Whitely also pointed out that Abbott had recently said that Texas did not need new laws to protect women against pay discrimination.

Red State Women leader says Texas doesn’t need equal pay law

Dallas Morning News // Christy Hoppe

Last week, on the same show, GOP nominee Greg Abbott declined to answer whether he also would have vetoed the equal pay act, called the Lilly Ledbetter Act, named after the federal version of the law. Three years ago, Abbott’s office successfully argued before the Texas Supreme Court that federal equal pay protections do not apply in Texas. The 2012 decision determined that a female college professor did not have the right to sue because she discovered the alleged discriminatory pay more than 180 days after she was hired. The Lilly Ledbetter Act provides that a suit can be filed within 180 days of a woman discovering the pay discrepancy.

Head Of GOP Women’s PAC Flubs Equal Pay Question

Huffington Post // Laura Bassett

Democratic candidate Wendy Davis has been going after Abbott on equal pay in recent weeks. In addition to dodging the question of whether he supports equal pay, the Davis camp points out, he actively fought against it during his career as Texas Attorney General. Abbott successfully argued before the Texas Supreme Court in Prairie View A&M University vs. Chatha that federal equal pay protections did not apply in Texas, so a female college professor who was paid unfairly did not have the right to sue more than 180 days after the discrimination began.

So yeah. Not a good day for Team Abbott and their outreach to the women.

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What anti-gay bills?

Posted on March 18, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

From Lone Star Q:

RedEquality

Ken Paxton, the odds-on favorite to be Texas’ next attorney general, says he isn’t familiar with recent “license to discriminate” bills in Arizona, Kansas and other states even though he co-authored a similar measure in 2013.

Gay Realtor and LGBT activist Bob McCranie asked Paxton about his position on the anti-gay bills during a meeting of the Women’s Council of Realtors of Collin County on Wednesday.

[…]

It seems strange that Paxton doesn’t know anything about these bills, given that he authored a  similar measure during the 2013 session. In fact, the bill by Paxton and fellow tea party Sen. Donna Campbell, called the Texas Religious Freedom Amendment, went a step further. It  would have enshrined the right to discriminate against gays or any other group based on religious beliefs into the Texas Constitution. The bill was backed by anti-gay groups including the Liberty Institute and Texas Values, but it died amid opposition from groups like Equality Texas and concerns about unintended consequences. Namely, critics questioned whether the amendment would strengthen Westboro Baptist Church’s right to picket funerals or establish abortion as a religious right.

It makes you wonder whether Paxton even considered the ramifications of his own bill, or if he was just blindly marching behind the banner of “religious freedom” to score political points.

LSQ has a transcript and recording of the conversation, so go check it out. The bill in question is SJR4, which thankfully never made it out of committee. The critical bit from the text of the joint resolution is “The right to act or refuse to act in a manner motivated by a sincerely held religious belief may not be burdened unless the government proves it has a compelling governmental interest in infringing the specific act or refusal to act and has used the least restrictive means to further that interest.” I think we all understand what that means. Well, all of us except Sen. Campbell – seriously, click that Texas Monthly link and get an appreciation of just how dim a bulb she is. In any event, Paxton needs to be pinned down on this. Sam Houston, please pick up this ball and run with it.

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Game room injunction lifted

Posted on March 18, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

The temporary reprieve that Harris County ganerooms got from the courts has been lifted.

Houston and Harris County moved one step closer Friday in their quest to crack down on illegal game rooms after a judge threw out a restraining order which had blocked new regulations due to come into effect this month.

Game room owner Altaf Makanojiya, 31, had sought the restraining order and a permanent injunction against the new rules which his lawyers say are a “transparent attempt to outlaw game rooms.”

According to City Attorney, David Feldman, the judge flatly denied the injunction, just one week after the restraining order halting the new laws had been put in place.

Attorneys for the county confirm the ruling saying they believe the judge agreed with their claim that Makanojiya had no legal basis for his suit because his primary business is supplying poker machines, not operating game rooms.

First Assistant County Attorney Robert Soard said his team are awaiting final clarification early next week but stated that if they are correct, the suit against them will now be dismissed entirely.

Even without a full dismissal, this means the new regulations go into immediate effect in Harris County with City officials looking to adopt them all across Houston as soon as paperwork can be finalzed.

“County to approve interlocal (agreement) in short order so enforcement within City can then begin,” Feldman said via text message.

See here for the background. Harris County was given extra powers by the Legislature last year to regulate game rooms, and Houston contracted with them do enforce the new regulations rather than amend their own ordinances. It will be interesting to see how well this experiment works.

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No love for Dan

Posted on March 17, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Here’s one vote he won’t get.

“Oozing charm from every pore I oiled my way around the floor”

Whether incumbent Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst can make up for a big primary night loss to challenger Dan Patrick in a May runoff may depend on if he can successfully court the supporters of his two former opponents.

But in interviews on Tuesday, neither Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples nor Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, who earned a combined 30 percent of the vote in the March GOP primary for lieutenant governor, were ready to come out in favor of Dewhurst.

Staples said outright that he had decided not to give a nod in the race.

Patterson said he was still making up his mind about whether to endorse Dewhurst, but forcefully attacked Patrick, saying the Houston state senator would take the state backward as lieutenant governor.

“He will wholly be bad for Texas, bad for the Republican Party,” Patterson said of Patrick. “We have two choices, and I will categorically tell you I’m not voting for Dan Patrick either in the primary or the general election. I’ll vote Libertarian in November if I have to.”

I’ve noted before how Democrats are rooting for Patrick to win the runoff since he is viewed as being more beatable in November. Some people have expressed skepticism of this, partly on the belief that there are no ticket-splitters any more. I get that, but there are plenty of such people left in Texas. We saw a great example of it in 2010. Bill White received over 387,000 more votes than Democratic Lt. Governor candidate Linda Chavez-Thompson, while Rick Perry collected over 311,000 fewer votes than David Dewhurst. That’s nearly a 700,000 vote swing towards White. People often don’t realize how big the swing was towards White because the Republican tidal wave of 2010 was too big for it to matter, but in a more normal year, 700,000 votes is more than enough to make a difference.

Consider this scenario: Turnout in November is 4.9 million voters – a bit less than 2010, but more than any other off year. The average statewide Republican wins with a 57-43 margin, which I think we can agree is healthy enough to invite plenty of post-electoral scoffing at Battleground Texas and any thought of a blue state in the foreseeable future. Well, in this scenario a Bill White-sized swing is just about what it would take to tip an election, since the average vote tally would be 2.8 million to 2.1 million. If there’s any Republican candidate capable of inspiring that kind of disloyalty among his fellow Republicans, it’s Dan Patrick.

Maybe you think my scenario is too optimistic, maybe you think Leticia Van de Putte won’t have the resources to compete the way White did (you know you have the power to help with that, right?), or maybe you have some other reason to be skeptical. I’m just saying we’ve seen the kind of crossover voting needed to make a VdP win happen in very recent memory, so don’t say it can’t happen because it already has.

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Residency is hard

Posted on March 17, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Fascinating story about residency and elections in Galveston.

Two of the three candidates for Galveston mayor are challenging the residency of front-runner Jim Yarbrough, the former county judge who was expected to coast to victory in the May municipal election.

An attorney for three-term Councilwoman Elizabeth Beeton and businessman Don Mafrige late Wednesday sent a five-page letter asking the Galveston city secretary to declare Yarbrough ineligible to be a candidate.

Mafrige, who financed the challenge, said it should not be viewed as a tactic to oust a popular candidate. “We didn’t take him out, he took himself out by not really being eligible to run,” Mafrige said.

Beeton said only another candidate can challenge a candidate’s residency.

Yarbrough disputed the challenge to his candidacy and said he would hire an attorney. “I’m glad they did it,” Yarbrough said. “We need to resolve the issue now before the election.”

[…]

The letter sent by attorney Mark Wawro on behalf of Beeton and Mafrige alleges that Yarbrough violated a section of the city charter that says a candidate must not claim a homestead exemption on property other than the candidate’s Galveston residence for at least a year before the May 10 election. Attached to the letter is a request by Yarbrough for a homestead exemption in Fayette County in March 2012 and a request to withdraw the exemption dated Sept. 8, 2013.

Yarbrough said that although he made his request in September for removal of the exemption, it was removed retroactively for the entire year and therefore enabled him to meet the charter provision requirements.

Jerad Nachvar has an in depth legal analysis of this that you should read. From my layman’s perspective, you’d think Galveston’s residential exemption standard would be fairly straightforward, but even that is subject to interpretation. I agree with Yarbrough that we ought to try to resolve this before the election – we know all too well what a mess it is to try and sort these issues out after the election – but it sure would be nice if there were a way to do that without having to go to court. I hope we get some clarity out of this.

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Perry’s No Jobs Tour continues

Posted on March 17, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

TrailBlazers takes the bait.

Corndogs make bad news go down easier

Corndog manufacturing is a growth industry

Rick Perry is on the road again. But then, he’s rarely off it these days.

This weekend, he’s in Western Kentucky at Murray State University to headline a Republican Party fundraiser.

Then, it’s off to California to talk to their businesses about uprooting and moving en mass to the Lone Star State.

The three-day trip to California is being paid for by Americans for Economic Freedom, a group Perry and his supporters helped establish. It emphasizes some of Perry’s fundamental tenets about helping create job growth, including low-taxes, low-wages and lawsuit limits.

The reported $300,000 radio and TV ad buy for the trip features Perry. It brags about 50 California companies moving to Texas over the past year or so and how Texas has surpassed Silicon Valley as the top exporter of tech products.

I’ve talked before about how the most notable thing about Rick Perry’s job stealing tours is how he never actually manages to steal any jobs while on them. This ad running in California – “running” is almost certainly an overstatement; given how it takes roughly a million dollars a week to run an effective TV advertising campaign for a statewide candidate in Texas, one can guess how many Californian eyeballs will actually view this latest piece of performance art from our Governor – may brag about “50 California companies moving to Texas over the past year or so”, yet Governor Perry’s press releases in that time frame makes no mention of any such relocations. You’d think if these company moves are worth bragging about in a TV ad, they’d have been worth mentioning in a press release or two. Maybe someone should ask him for the specifics. They might also ask about how miraculous things really are here. Or maybe we should all remember that the real point of all this is Rick Perry touting the virtues of Rick Perry. By that metric, it remains a success.

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Once again, the cost of not expanding Medicaid

Posted on March 17, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Short answer: It’s a lot.

It's constitutional - deal with it

It’s constitutional – deal with it

A team of Harvard researchers recently released a deeply sobering study quantifying how many Americans stand to die needlessly in the unflinching states hellbent on denying Medicaid expansion, as provided by the Affordable Care Act. The study singles out Texas:

“In Texas, the largest state opting out of Medicaid expansion, 2,013,025 people who would otherwise have been insured will remain uninsured due to the opt-out decision. We estimate that Medicaid expansion in that state would have resulted in 184,192 fewer depression diagnoses, 62,610 fewer individuals suffering catastrophic medical expenditures, and between 1,840 and 3,035 fewer deaths.”

Crunching the numbers, the study suggests that Texas could bear almost 18 percent of a potential 17,104 unnecessary deaths nationwide. The figures are stark, damning, and presented with dispassionate and clinical precision—and yes, the study was quickly subjected to right-wing critics arguing the math.

You can read about the study here. The Observer story goes on to carp about the lack of media coverage of this issue, and while I agree that there ought to be a lot more written about it, at this point it pretty much has to be a campaign issue to be news. I hate to be one of those people telling the Wendy Davis campaign what to do – in part because I think most of the “advice” given to her has been in response to trivial matters, and in part because I doubt any of us armchair quarterbacks have any idea how to win statewide races – but I’d really like to see her jump all over this. I see no real downside for her in going big on economic populism, which includes Medicaid expansion and raising the minimum wage. The latter is broadly popular, including in Texas, and the former will put her on the side of most doctors and hospitals, as well as county officials. It fits with her overall message of breaking from the Rick Perry past that Greg Abbott represents and it will help drive turnout from the Democratic base, which is job one for her. We need to be talking about this, and that means we need Wendy Davis talking about it.

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Weekend link dump for March 16

Posted on March 16, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Spring break! For the kids, anyway.

Blair and Tootie, together again.

Wait, I thought drunk people placing ill-advised bets was Vegas’ entire business model?

We really are making huge advances in the fight against HIV.

Want to be a better boyfriend, or at least make your girlfriend think you’re a better boyfriend? There’s an app for that.

South Carolina takes official state-sanctioned homophobia to the next level.

“Most preschoolers and kindergarteners can do some algebra before even entering a math class.”

“For the umpteenth time, then: PowerPoint is a tool, nothing more and nothing less.”

Raising the minimum wage would save billions in SNAP costs.

“In fact, 30 states have banned same-sex marriage in their state constitutions, according to the Human Rights Campaign.”

“Sure, Democrats do plenty for the poor […] But virtually none of this really benefits the working or middle classes except at the margins.”

“But the overall picture is an electorate that is growing steadily more liberal on both social and economic policy, and whose views Republicans will eventually have to accommodate.”

That moment you realize your kid has the same twisted sense of humor you have.

Fix or repeal? Republicans can’t have both.

New frontiers in verbing nouns. Even I think that one is icky.

Millennials are environmentalists even if they tend not to use that label for themselves.

New manufacturing jobs in the US don’t look much like the ones we used to have.

Julia Ruth Stevens reminisces about her daddy, Babe Ruth.

The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in the stars but in ourselves.

“Guys: The key to a healthy, happy, nurtured child is a parenting style that’s balanced, fair, educated, intuitive, loving, and realistic. Suggesting that we ban everything that may hint at a correlation with a negative influence or potentially hazardous outcome would mean we would have to BAN EVERYTHING.”

Happy 25th birthday, World Wide Web!

“Bigotry derived from religious principles is still bigotry.”

“I don’t really understand how any editorial by Condoleezza Rice on conflict in Ukraine can fail to directly address the failures of the Iraq War.”

“I really hope that this opens peoples’ minds that what you are wearing has absolutely nothing to do with whether you are assaulted.” Trigger warning for sexual assault, but very much worth your time to read.

And while we’re on that terrible subject, go read this, and be sure to click through to the responses.

RIP, Reubin Askew, former Governor of Florida.

“When you start off by basing your arguments around the work of Charles Murray you just lose your credibility from the start”. There’s more to that sentence, but honestly, what more is needed?

And speaking of awesome science-y things, go pre-order your What If book now.

“It’s a fascinating world we live in, where following the letter of the law is now considered “cheating” and “fraud” by Republicans (as long as you’re helping the disadvantaged, of course).”

A more accurate way to celebrate Pi Day.

RIP, Glenn Edward McDuffie, the sailor from Houston in Alfred Eisenstaedt’s famous photo of a kiss on V-J Day.

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ECPS: Abbott 49, Davis 42

Posted on March 16, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Via Texpatriate, the Emerson College Polling Society has a poll of the Texas gubernatorial race that shows Greg Abbott with a seven point lead.

According to a new survey conducted by the Emerson College Polling Society, Texas Attorney General Gregory Abbott (R) has a seven point lead over his Democratic opponent Wendy Davis (49% to 42%) in the upcoming gubernatorial election. The Polling Society is the first organization to look at the race since the March 6th primary. The survey was conducted from March 7th to March 12th, with a sample of 492 likely voters.

Abbott has a slight lead among independents and women, the two groups Democrats typically rely on in order to compete in the Lone Star State. Forty-two percent of independents currently support Abbott while 40 percent support Davis and 17 percent are undecided. Women voters are also more likely to vote for Abbott than Davis (46% to 42%).

Both candidates have wide support among their bases. Eighty-five percent of Republican say they will vote for Abbott while 8 percent prefer Davis. Similarly, Democrat voters support Davis overwhelmingly (84% to 9% for Abbott).

[…]

Data was collected on March 7th to 12th using an automated data collection system. The Texas sample consisted of 494 registered likely voters with a margin of error of +/- 4.4 percent at a 95 percent confidence level.

No, I don’t know why it says 492 voters in one place and 494 in the other. Be that as it may, their polling page is here, their questions are here, and the crosstabs, which are a bit hard to figure out, are here (Excel file). I’ve never heard of this outfit before so I have no idea how reliable they are, but they nailed the 2013 Virginia Governor’s race (their final poll had Terry McAuliffe up by two; he won by 2.5 and the 2013 Massachusetts Senate race (they had Ed Markey up by 10, and he won by 10). That’s a lot better than some other polls I could name. According to their Facebook page, they plan to follow this race till the end, so it will be interesting to see how their results move over time and how they compare to other pollsters’ numbers. I hope they add questions about the Lt. Governor’s race as well.

Because their presentation of crosstab data is so weird, I’m not going to try to interpret it. It’s too early to make much of that anyway. I will note two other results of interest from this poll, however:

United States Senator and Tea Party favorite Ted Cruz is viewed unfavorably in his home state– 43 percent view him favorably while 48 percent view him unfavorably. Cruz is particularly unpopular among women (39% favorable compared to 50% unfavorable).

55 percent of Texans are in favor of increasing the national minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour, while 44 percent are against it. However, 68 percent of women are in favor of the increase, while men are evenly split on the issue 50-50 percent. An overwhelming majority of African-Americans were in support of this increase (88% in support, and 12% against).

Perhaps a little food for thought for the Davis campaign. Anyway, I’ve added this result to the sidebar. I hope we get a wide variety of pollsters weighing in on this race. If nothing else, it would be a nice change from the usually barren polling landscape we face, and it might remind some folks that there is more to life than the UT/Texas Trib poll.

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Ramon Romero

Posted on March 16, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

The Fort Worth Business Press profiles Rep.-elect Ramon Romero and his winning race against longtime incumbent Rep. Lon Burnam in HD90.

Rep. Ramon Romero

Ramon Romero Jr. describes himself as “that poor boy from Poly,” one of eight children of immigrant parents who grew up in working-class southeast Fort Worth, started his first business when he was 20 and ultimately became an up-by-the-bootstraps success story.

Now, at 40, Romero is poised to become the first Latino state representative from Tarrant County after carving out an 111-vote Democratic primary victory over the dean of Tarrant County’s legislative delegation, Rep. Lon Burnam, a 17-year House member who is known as one of the chamber’s liberal firebrands.

The victory was widely seen as a triumph for Texas Hispanics, who have propelled much of the state’s population growth over the past 15 years, as well as perhaps an inevitable transition in House District 90, an inner-city Fort Worth district where Latinos constitute nearly 76 percent of the population and almost 72 percent of the registered voters.

Burnam took office in 1997, succeeding legendary State Rep. Doyle Willis, who served in both the House and the Senate for a total 42 years to become the second longest serving member in the Legislature.

During his time in the House, Burnam developed a reputation for passionately defending the interests of his district but acknowledges that as an Anglo lawmaker, he was becoming increasingly vulnerable to the rapid-fire expansion of the Hispanic electorate.

Burnam survived his first serious challenge in 2012 against school board trustee Carlos Vasquez. But he was unable to withstand the assault from Romero, a well-known member of the community who was fresh from a runoff bid for the Fort Worth City Council in 2012 and had the backing of prominent Tarrant County Hispanic leaders, including Councilman Sal Espino and Justice of the Peace Sergio De Leon.

Romero’s biggest financial backer was wealthy Dallas lawyer Domingo Garcia, who ran unsuccessfully for the 33rd District congressional seat in 2012 and has been a vocal advocate for expanding Hispanic representation in Congress and the Legislature. He donated a total of $35,000 to Romero.

[…]

Romero grew up in the Polytechnic neighborhood, graduating from Polytechnic High School in 1992. He was barely in his 20s when he started a swimming pool construction company and later developed a stone distribution venture. Although he vaulted upward on the economic ladder, Romero says he has never wanted to leave the neighborhood where he grew up and looks forward to serving those he grew up with.

“People in District 90 related more to Ramon Romero than they did to Lon Burnam,” he said. He acknowledged that Burnam “worked for the district and definitely fought for the district” but said the lawmaker didn’t face and understand some the same challenges as those “who face them on a daily basis.”

Romero said he began eyeing a run for Burnam’s seat “almost immediately” after his unsuccessful council bid against Kelly Allen Gray, who wonthe District 8 council seat. He said he consulted Espino, who helped him analyze his chances of mounting a successful campaign.

A major element in his strategy was to develop a tri-ethnic coalition composed of whites, blacks and Hispanics, Romero said, dismissing post-election talk that the campaign was designed solely to propel an Hispanic into office.

“I could not have won this by the Hispanic vote alone,” he said. “It’s time we get past that conversation. It’s about the person that related to the community.”

Although Garcia’s financial support raised claims of outside influence and prompted talk that the Dallas attorney was trying to build a base for a future congressional run, Romero said Garcia took no role in the campaign other than to offer encouragement and to “support me financially when I needed it.”

“Domingo really had no role,” Romero said. “He didn’t come out to campaign. He simply gave me support.”

Burnam largely attributed his loss to the “demographic shift” in the district, saying “people mainly tend to vote based on their own personal identity.” He said he recognized the “obvious trend” and was even prepared to ultimately to support an Hispanic “replacement” to take over the seat.

“I would have been perfectly happy to stand aside in 2014 had we found what I consider the person who is truly representative of the value system of the district,” he said. “I don’t think Mr. Romero is.”

During the campaign, Burnam depicted Romero as a Republican-friendly “fake Democrat.” Romero flatly dismissed the assertion and said he has never voted Republican.”

First, let me again congratulate Rep.-elect Romero on his victory. I join many others in saying I’ll miss Rep. Burnam, but Romero earned his win and I wish him nothing but success. It’s fair to say, as one commenter on his Facebook page noted, that he has “giant shoes to fill” and “will be watched like a hawk by many skeptics”. One hopes the latter is true of all elected officials. I didn’t follow this race but I look forward to seeing what Rep.-elect Romero brings to the Legislature.

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Still more from the Pratt files

Posted on March 16, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

What a mess.

Judge Denise Pratt

Embattled family court judge Denise Pratt, under investigation again this year by the Harris County District Attorney’s office, was removed from five more cases on Thursday by a visiting senior judge who criticized the freshman jurist’s recent decision to make a final ruling in a child custody case without hearing any testimony or evidence.

“It’s pretty fundamental for judges that, in order to rule, you must hear evidence,” retired Harris County Civil Judge Sharolyn Wood said during a hearing at the Harris County Criminal Justice Center. “I don’t know if that is due process under the Bill of Rights, but to me, it’s pretty durned important – OK? – that we in our system have judges that hear evidence before they rule.”

In the case in question, Pratt on Dec. 30 modified the terms of a temporary court order – to which both parties had agreed – without hearing any evidence, then finalized it by scratching out the word “temporary” with a pen and writing “final” above it. As a result, the case officially was closed and the 34-year-old mother effectively lost her right to visit her two children, something the opposing lawyer in the case acknowledged was not his client’s intention.

Houston lawyers Ed Chernoff and Anna Stool, who is representing the mother in the case, told Wood they recently had been interviewed by the district attorney’s office about the case as part of an ongoing criminal investigation into Pratt and expressed concerns about the impact that could have on her impartiality.

[…]

In a video on her campaign website, Pratt, who is running for re-election this year and will appear on the ballot in a May 10 runoff election, explains that “things are handled a little differently in the 311th court than any other family court. When someone files for divorce who has children and they request a temporary restraining order that orders that the parents not have their children around their girlfriend, boyfriend, lover or paramour from 10 p.m to 8 a.m., we changed that to read, ‘You are not to have your children around your girlfriend, boyfriend, lover or paramour at all.’ Not only are the parents still married, the children are not ready.”

Stool, though, said Thursday that she made it clear during a meeting last year with Chernoff and Pratt in the judge’s chambers that the mother and her fiancé were engaged and planning to marry soon, which they since have. The former federal prosecutor said barring the fiancé from seeing the children after that “implies terrible wrongdoing on my client’s part and on her now-husband’s part. So, now we have a husband that she lives with in a home where the two children can’t go.”

The runoff is May 27, not May 10 – that’s the date of the SD04 special election. I’ve noted this particular case before, and you can go here for the full Pratt experience. You lawyers out there – this isn’t normal, right? Surely Pratt is an outlier among judges. I have to believe that. Normally one would expect an incumbent that could only muster 30% in a multi-candidate primary would be in trouble for the runoff, but Pratt stil has plenty of establishment support, so who knows what will happen in May. Just remember that Democrat Sherri Cothrun will oppose whoever comes out of that race. One way or another, you’ve got a chance to vote Pratt out.

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Saturday video break: All I Want

Posted on March 15, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

Just because two songs have the same name it doesn’t mean they’re the same song. In theory there’s an unlimited number of possible song titles, but in practice there are a lot of reruns. Example #2 from my collection is “All I Want”. Here’s what Susanna Hoffs did with that song title:

Back in the day (and by “back in the day” I mean “back in the 80s, because what else would I mean?) I didn’t think much of the Bangles. They struck me as a disposable prefab pop group that disappeared after their first album. I was surprised to learn years later what a talented musician she is, both as a solo act and in tandem with Matthew Sweet. If you’re into covers, their three “Under The Covers” CDs are worth checking out. Now here’s Toad The Wet Sprocket doing a completely different song called “All I Want”:

I’m pretty sure I heard this song a bunch of times on the radio without ever knowing what its title was or who sang it. I don’t know why radio stations do that. Anyway, now I know. What songs did you hear on the radio for a long time before you found out what they were?

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Add Tennessee to the list

Posted on March 15, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

A partial win, but the rest will follow.

RedEquality

A federal judge here granted a preliminary injunction Friday against the state’s ban on same-sex marriage in certain instances.

In October three same-sex couples filed a lawsuit asking the state to recognize their marriages that had been performed in states where gay marriage is legal. The four couples taking part in the suit were living and had been married in New York or California but had moved to Tennessee.

“At this point, all signs indicate that, in the eyes of the United States Constitution, the plaintiffs’ marriages will be placed on an equal footing with those of heterosexual couples and that proscriptions against same-sex marriage will soon become a footnote in the annals of American history,” Judge Aleta Trauger wrote in the order.

Friday’s U.S. District Court ruling applies only to these three couples.

Nashville lawyer Abby Rubenfeld, who represents the couples, cheered the legal win and said it was a good first step toward total equality for all same-sex married couples in Tennessee.

Buzzfeed has the opinion, which leaned heavily on the one in Kentucky that made the same ruling. The Tennessean has more about the lawsuit and the couples that were the plaintiffs. The next step is a lawsuit to overturn Tennessee’s anti-gay marriage amendment, and there’s been no trouble recruiting more plaintiffs for that. Another step forward for equality, and another step towards the inevitable at the national level.

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The case for Kinky

Posted on March 15, 2014 by Charles Kuffner

The Trib sums up the reasons for voting for the Kinkster in the runoff.

Kinky Friedman

Kinky Friedman

The race for agriculture commissioner is far down the list, both in terms of voter interest and the interest of people who write checks to political campaigns. It is the backwater of state politics, which makes it a great place for a candidate who is well known and doesn’t need the help of the financial people to get the attention of voters.

Miller and Merritt have never run statewide races. Friedman ran for governor in 2006 in a pack that included Republican Rick Perry, Democrat Chris Bell and Republican-turned-independent Carole Keeton Strayhorn (who has since divorced and changed her last name back to Rylander). Friedman finished fourth.

Let us argue the case on behalf of the Republican candidates.

One, Friedman got decimated in the 2006 race even though — and perhaps because — the voters knew who he was.

Two, it’s a Republican state, and the Democrats are unlikely to win, especially with a candidate who can be difficult to take seriously.

Three, Friedman’s idea of legalizing marijuana and making it a cash crop in Texas is out of the mainstream and cannot possibly be a winning issue in a Texas election.

The other side? He is better known than either Miller or Merritt. They, like Friedman himself, have been rejected by voters, and the deficiencies that made their opponents successful are there for new opponents — like Friedman — to exploit.

It will be hard for all of the candidates to raise money — an advantage for the best-known candidate, as long as it’s not a bank robber.

Marijuana — if it doesn’t turn off the voters — sets Friedman’s campaign apart. It’s something for voters who are not otherwise interested in the Texas Department of Agriculture to talk about. Public opinion is shifting; the governor recently talked about decriminalizing pot. Perry is not for legalization, but decriminalization is a long way from the zero-tolerance policies that were in vogue a few years ago.

We’ve covered this before. Other than the Trib’s mention that Kinky could highlight his differences with the state Democratic Party as a general campaign theme, there’s nothing new there. Either you buy into the idea of Kinky as a viable and potentially successful candidate, or you’d sooner French kiss an electric outlet. I can’t say either of these views are wrong, but if you vote in the runoff – and you should come out to vote for David Alameel, because Kesha Rogers must be stopped – then you’ll have to decide how you feel about this.

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