As a member of the temporary rules committee, I was present at the meeting R. G Ratliff describes in today’s Houston Chronicle.
The hybrid system of awarding some presidential convention delegates through a primary vote and others through a series of caucuses held on primary night became contentious in the contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Clinton won the primary vote, but Obama outmaneuvered her in the caucuses and walked away with the most pledged Texas delegates to the national nominating convention: 99-94. The state fight over those delegates continued from the March primary until a week before the 2008 state convention when Clinton conceded the nomination to Obama.
In some ways, the fight reignited Thursday morning during a pre-convention meeting in Corpus Christi in a sometimes-heated discussion over whether to keep the system or start allocating presidential delegates based only on primary results.
The temporary rules committee voted unanimously to recommend the adoption of the West Commission report, which keeps the allocations of national delegates’ presidential preferences based up on the combined results of the primary and caucuses. In the interests of full disclosure, this reporter served on the Temporary Rules Committee and authored a supplement to our report on the issue.
Now the work passes to the permanent Rules committee in the morning, where I believe the committee will vote to allow the full convention an opportunity to vote on a simple question: “Should Presidential Delegates’ presidential preference be determined exclusively by Primary election results?” If the full convention agrees with me and the rest of the Temporary Rules Committee, then the answer to this question will be no.
The concerns of those who would prefer we changed to a conventional primary are currently being addressed by the Texas Democratic Party. With improved and secured record-keeping, participant credentialing, improved training and certification, the scenes of chaos that made the national news in 2008 won’t be repeated. We can retain the precinct conventions as a party-building exercise in the long Presidential nomination process, honoring the tradition of the Texas Democratic party, and keep our unique process. It is going to take work.
My hope is that the convention will commit to completing this task and saving this critical organizing tool for future presidential elections.
For Democrats to retake Texas they have to show that they’re for common sense public policy changes, that most Texans are for, but Republicans will shun. I think these simple steps laid out by state Sen. Kirk Watson (D-Austin), as reported today by Jason Embry in the AAS, are a great example.
Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, gave a pretty thorough critique Wednesday of how the Legislature writes the state budget, saying he wouldn’t vote for tax increases or taking money out of the Rainy Day Fund until the budget-balancing gimmicks end.
For some time now, Watson has been one of the Legislature’s most outspoken critics of the practice of collecting money for one purpose and then spending it on something else — a practice that has become a cornerstone of the budget-writing process in Texas.
“My vote will not be there for taxes, my vote will not be there for the Rainy Day Fund, until we have real budget reform,” Watson said at a breakfast event hosted by the Texas Tribune.
He said the budgeting process in Texas has become about debt, diversions and delay. “Over and over again, it’s about how we can kick the can down the road,” Watson said.
He said state leaders are focusing too much on one piece of the economic-development puzzle — low taxes — while neglecting to “invest in Texans,” through, for example, higher education.
Asked about Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst’s claim that stimulus dollars weren’t necessary to balance the budget, Watson said, “I could be playing in the NBA Finals right now if I weren’t four feet tall.”
(As I have written before, yes, you could balance a state budget without stimulus dollars, but not one that spent as much as lawmakers spent last year, and isn’t that the only thing that matters?)
Finally, he said it could work to Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bill White’s advantage that he’s a details guy. “Bill White’s a nerd. But that’s a good thing. Bill White is going to be the kind of governor that will take the time to get the details.”
Go the this BOR post, Sen. Kirk Watson on an Open, Honest Budget, to see Watson explain this, in the form of a series of bills he files during the 81st legislative session.
Today, I’ll file a package of reforms designed to make the Texas budget more sensible, open and honest. These bills are about making a positive change and putting the Legislature more in touch with Texans.
The bills will help citizens see how legislators are spending their money. They’ll also create checks and balances to ensure public funds are going toward things Texans want and expect the state to invest in.
My package would require the state to spend money in ways that legislative leaders have always promised – and it would block those leaders from diverting the same money into what amounts to a hedge fund.
It would create unprecedented public access to the budget-writing process so people can get answers to their own questions, not just those questions that budget writers choose to answer.
And it would help small businesses, kids and the economy by bolstering programs that everyday Texans need and support.
These changes make sense, and make our state’s budget process more open and transparent. Why would anyone be against them?
This week it’s the Democratic candidate for Texas Land Commissioner Hector Uribe.
Also from last week Democratic candidate for Texas Agriculture Commissioner Hank Gilbert.
Anyone can view the previous Meet the Statewides pages, in English and Spanish, via the links from the “Statewide Candidates” section of the candidates page.
The Williamson County Democratic Party Executive Committee passed a resolution last week condemning the recently passed Arizona immigration law (SB 1070). Stating that the Democratic Party, “..believes in the dignity of all, regardless of immigration status, and recognizes the importance of everyone’s contributions to the social, religious, cultural and economic life the United States”.
I stopped by the TxDOT Open House-Style Public Meeting in Austin yesterday. It was an opportunity to look at some maps, population estimates, and make sure our state’s transportation planners were aware of my 2 cents, (I was nice, but direct), regarding what I would like to see in the future. My message could be boiled down to , “Let’s stop the neglect and get back to building and paying for roads the way we used to in Texas, when we were the envy of many”.
Population growth estimates predict the number of people living in Texas will double by 2040.
On Thursday at the Brazos Center, residents were invited to give their input as to how the Texas Department of Transportation should manage long-term plans to accommodate the expected boom of new motorists, pedestrians and bicyclists flocking to the state.
About 50 people either stopped by the open house Thursday or gave input Wednesday at the Brazos Valley Council of Governments meeting.
“Instead of having a project-specific plan, this will be more of a visionary document to tell us what direction to head in,” said Bob Appleton, director of transportation, planning and development for TxDOT’s Bryan district.
Residents were encouraged to fill out surveys that will be used to craft the long-term plan. Questions on the form ranged from asking what types of transportation participants use to asking for a ranked order of transportation-related problems and solutions.
Appleton said the agency received criticism recently for not having updated its long-term plan since 1994. Now, the long-term plans for 2035 and beyond, he said, will be reviewed and updated every four years.
The good news is that other then the freebies that were available at the hearing, (pens, notepads, and rain gauges), everything else can be seen and done online. At TxDOT’s web site there is a page that has all the Meeting Handouts, as well as maps, which can be viewed online. But most important of all is this link where anyone can submit their own comments to TxDOT regarding the long range plan.
Let them know what you would like to see in the future. If you don’t tell them then how will they know? It’s your duty as a Texan.
• Texas Lobby Spending Dipped in 2009.
• But Top Hired Guns Not Tightening Belts.
Austin—Special interests spent up to $344 million on Texas state lobby contracts in 2009, dipping below the $348 million that they spent in the previous legislative year (2007). This marked the only time in a decade when lobby spending did not skyrocket from one legislative year to the next, according to a new edition of Austin’s Oldest Profession, Texans For Public Justice’s biennial analysis of the Texas lobby.
By the end of 2009, 1,690 lobbyists reported that 2,866 different clients paid them up to $344 million to execute 8,166 paid lobby contracts. Despite the rare contraction in lobby spending, the state’s top lobbyists reported that they are raking in more money than ever before.
As usual, Ma Bell’s reincarnation—AT&T—trounced all comers, spending up to $9.3 million on 117 lobbyists. Energy Future Holdings Corp. came next. Together with three of its subsidiaries, this energy giant spent up to $7.3 million on the lobby.
Bob Moser at the Texas Observer wrote a must-read article last week, Populism vs. WASPulism..
Lord only knows what these folks would do if we had an actual populist in the White House. “We believe that the power of government—in other words, of the people—should be expanded,” declared the original 1892 platform of the People’s Party, “as rapidly and as far as the good sense of an intelligent people and the teachings of experience shall justify, to the end that oppression, injustice and poverty shall eventually cease in the land.”
Like the tea partiers, populists have always railed at Washington—not for doing too much, but rather too little. The original populists worked for democratizing reforms—women’s suffrage, direct elections of U.S. senators (long chosen by state legislatures), getting rid of literacy tests and poll taxes—that would make government more responsive to the people and less the tool of the moneyed elite. And while plenty of racist Southern politicians later espoused economic populism, the real deals were dedicated to empowering blacks and whites alike. So what can we accurately call the tea partiers? Kevin Baker, in Harper’s, suggests “counter-populists.” I think “anti-” might work—as in “anti-populist Gov. Rick Perry.” That has a bell-clear ring of truth to it. Then again, so does a term I spotted in a cartoon on the web site of Texas’ best-known living populist, Jim Hightower: “WASPulist.”
Beinart has another suggestion: “What kind of adjective suits older, grumpy, well-off Americans who believe Democrats are communists, the poor have it too easy and white people are oppressed? The term ‘Republican’ comes to mind.”
Call them what you will; just don’t call them populists. Why does it matter? Because, no matter how much it’s been distorted, there is serious power in owning the word. That’s why the right has fought so hard to claim it. And why the left needs to reclaim it—not only in name but in spirit.
“Populists have always been out to challenge the orthodoxy of the corporate order,” Hightower writes. That’s a far cry from the liberalism embodied by Obama. “Classic liberalism,” Hightower notes, “seeks to live in harmony with concentrated power by regulating its excesses.”
That’s the liberalism that creates health-care reform that delivers millions of new customers to private insurers—rather than a single-payer system. Contemporary liberals work to make things better, not to bust them apart and reinvent them for the people’s benefit. And that’s partly because we’ve swallowed the notion that populism is the property of the right—that the American people, at their core, are fundamentally and unshakably devoted to small government and big money.
Obviously the title of this post is the goal for Bill White to win in November. How he gets there has been, and will continue to be, the subject of much debate until election day. It’s not going to be one thing that gets Bill White over the hump but many things. Several recent articles have highlighted a couple of areas that Bill White will seek to exploit. Using multiple tactics to siphon off a percentage point or two here, and a percentage point of two there, and hopefully when it’s all said and done he’s amassed enough to get over the hump.
One tactic that I’ve heard from reliable GOP voters in Texas is that Rick Perry has just been in office too long, Why Bill White can win. It’s out of a sense of fairness, and they think it’s time for someone else to be governor. But we will just have to wait and see if Perry fatigue is real.
Claudia Stravato, a political science instructor at Texas A&M University and an Amarillo resident, echoed Brown’s assessment. “Most statewide (Democratic) candidates don’t waste their time up here,” she told me when I reached her by phone a few minutes ago, “but I think that a lot of people have had it up to their nose with Rick Perry.”
According to Stravato, old-line Republicans in the Panhandle, many of whom backed Kay Bailey Hutchison in the GOP primary, believe Perry’s been in office too long and has amassed too much power. “The fact that he literally controls the state really bothers them,” she said. “If there’s one thing they don’t like up here, it’s government.” [Emphasis added].
Of course, a Republican feeling Perry fatigue won’t automatically medicate him- or herself with a plain White pill. (The Democratic label itself could cause adverse side effects.) Instead of voting for the Democrat, they may resort to simple bed rest on election day — perhaps consoling themselves with the hope that if Perry wins, he’ll resign to run for president.
One theme I see a lot on the right wing Texas blogs is that he’s using the same attacks that Hutchison did, and they didn’t work in the GOP Primary. Well they worked enough, along with Debra Medina’s campaign, for Perry to barely break 50% in the GOP primary. And the electorate in November will be entirely different from the GOP Primary. If using Hutchison’s line of attack can siphon off several percentage points then why not use them?
And White, a former Houston mayor, has been courting Republicans aggressively. A recent campaign swing through Dallas included meetings with GOP business leaders and potential donors. Last weekend, he campaigned in the Republican strongholds of Sweetwater and Abilene, where he discussed energy issues.
A smattering of Republicans across the state is with White, including some well-known friends of vanquished Perry rival Kay Bailey Hutchison.
Dallas businesswoman Lucy Billingsley, a statewide leader in Hutchison’s campaign for governor, calls White a “strong fiscal conservative.”
“He’s smart, and the job he did as Houston mayor was fantastic,” she said.
Billingsley appeared to get off the Hutchison train before it came to a complete stop, holding a fundraiser for White in January, two months before Perry won the primary.
The real estate developer said she was born into a Republican family but leans independent.
White’s most provocative pitch has been his relentless mocking of Perry’s ultraconservative approach during the primary campaign, including the governor’s remarks after an Austin Tea Party gathering that seemed to legitimize the notion of seceding from the union.
Javier Joven, 44, the owner of a roofing company in Odessa, Tex., showed up at an event to meet Mr. White. He said that Mr. Perry had not taken the high school dropout rate and teenage-pregnancy problems seriously, and that Mr. White had. “His opportunity to win is just as good as Perry’s,” Mr. Joven said. “It’s just an anti-incumbent year.”
Mr. White has also caught the attention of independents who usually vote Republican, like Billy Munn, a close friend of Mr. Bush. Mr. Munn, who is in the oil business, helped host the event at the Petroleum Club. He said Mr. Perry’s talk of secession had turned him off, and he was worried that the state’s sorry schools were jeopardizing its economic future.
Some former Republicans who left the party over differences with the socially conservative wing are also gravitating toward Mr. White. Robert Volkmann, 62, said Mr. Perry’s decision to appoint a religious conservative as the head of the state school board was the last straw for him. “That lead me to realize the Republican Party is not fit to govern in the state of Texas,” he said as he listened to Mr. White in Odessa.
As Perry continues his right wing extremism, and is seen as having “taken over” our state’s government, hopefully more and more Texans will see that it’s time for a change. Another aspecte is that they see Bill White is not the other side of the spectrum, but someone who has worked with people of both parties over the years to get things done. The people of Houston overwhelmingly approved of Bill White’s leadership of their city for six years.
Bill White is more along the lines of the Democratic Governor’s Texas once had. More of a Conservative Democrat than a Liberal Democrat, but one that understands that government can work for the people and do things well if lead correctly, on issues like education, health care, and transportation. Many are looking for an alternative to Perry, and the more they get to know Bill White the more they will see he’s what Texas needs now. As long as he keeps chipping away, a percentage point here a percentage point there, he may just get to the goal of 50% + 1.
The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is asking for the public to cooperate with them in planning the Statewide Long-Range Transportation Plan 2035. It will be finalized in 2011 and will be the blue print for the “multimodal statewide transportation” in Texas for the next 24 years. There will be 26 meetings around the state of Texas, (From El Paso to Beaumont, and from Amarillo to Pharr), May 4th – 16th. (click here for the complete list.)
TxDOT has taken heat, and deservedly so, during it’s undertaking of the Trans-Texas Corridor for not involving the public and affected areas in the planning process. It looks like they’ve learned from that, and good to see that this time they are making a point of involving the public from the beginning. Here area few excerpts fromTxDOT Executive Director Amadeo Saenz words to the people of Texas:
The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is currently updating the long-range, multimodal statewide transportation plan, and I would like to personally invite you to participate in its development.
[...]
The Statewide Long-Range Transportation Plan 2035 is not a listing of projects (although it will include the project listing included in the Unified Transportation Program), but a “blueprint” for the planning process that will guide the collaborative efforts among TxDOT, local and regional decision-makers, and all transportation stakeholders to reach a consensus on needed transportation projects and services. This Plan requires a cooperative process among TxDOT, metropolitan areas, cities, counties, various public and private transportation organizations, and you – the traveling public.
[...]
I encourage you to participate in the planning efforts at both the state and local levels. We want to ensure that your voice is heard, and your ideas and concerns are taken into consideration as decisions are made with regard to your transportation system and the services you depend on for your quality of life. I invite you to provide written comments at an open house-style public meeting, by mail, or on the TxDOT website. Your input is essential to TxDOT’s ability to serve the citizens of and visitors to the State of Texas and to be responsive to your transportation needs.
All of us who complained now owe it to our state and TxDOT to get involved, one way or another, and be heard on the future transportation needs of our state. Get involved or don’t complain in the future. There are many ways to get involved, via the TxDOT web site: