Cannibals

Political cannibalism is a bipartisan activity.

Rep. Lon Burnam is the first (this year) to cross over (openly) and endorse challengers to some of his fellow House Democrats.

Burnam endorsed Sandra Rodriguez, Brian Thompson, and Armando Walle. Those are the challengers, respectively, to Kino Flores, D-Palmview, Dawnna Dukes, D-Austin, and Kevin Bailey, D-Houston.

Burnam, who was the first House Democrat to openly spurn Speaker Tom Craddick, voting against Craddick's first election in 2003, cited their support for the Republican speaker as the reason he's opposing the other reps.

He's never openly endorsed against an incumbent Democrat, he said: "But after five years in outer Siberia, it was time to change the way we do things."

He's not the first one to endorse challengers — five Republican members went against Rep. Charlie Geren, R-Fort Worth, in a previous election, and House Democrats have been purging their ranks of Craddick supporters for a couple of cycles. But he's the first to do it this year.

If all that's not In Your Face Enough, Burnam says he'll announce a new political action committee next week that could help fund his efforts. The name? "Too Close to Craddick."

On a semi-related note, Geren is holding an election event that's expected to attract several of his colleagues from the House (including just about everyone we've heard mentioned as a potential speaker candidate other than Craddick).

And if you catch yourself trying to think of past episodes of cannibalism, here's a start. The five who supported Geren's opponent in the 2006 GOP primary were Linda Harper-Brown of Irving, Bill Keffer of Dallas, Jodie Laubenberg of Parker, Bill Zedler of Arlington, and Mary Denny of Denton. Denny retired, Keffer got beat (though he's in a rematch against his former challenger this year), and Harper-Brown and Zedler have serious opposition this year.

On the other side, the Democrats have made a specialty of this over the last few cycles. Former Rep. Ron Wilson, D-Houston, lost to Alma Allen, a candidate recruited by Sen. Rodney Ellis and supported by Rep. Garnet Coleman, among others. Houston Democrats helped oust Al Edwards, who's back this year for another crack at Borris Miles.

And this year, several of the so-called Craddick Ds — Democrats who support the Republican speaker — are running against Democrats recruited by their colleagues in the lower chamber. And some of the ABC Republicans like Geren (it stands for Anybody But Craddick) have drawn opponents recruited by Craddick's allies inside and outside the House.

Watching the Pot Boil

Ballots are just about set — the parties have to tell the Secretary of State by next week what their lineups for state offices will be (you're likely to keep finding errors in everybody's lists — including ours — until that final set is complete).

The parties decide who's eligible and who's not, but candidates in some circumstances can still be challenged in court. We're catching some hints of challenges in the works, in races where city officials and school board members are challenging incumbents. It might amount to nothing, but it's one of the weapons open to the combatants.

The lists, in their current form, can be downloaded from our files section. We'll put up the finals when the parties provide them.

'Not' is a Taxing Word

This is arcane, unless you're an exec with a big company that has a lot of inventory and operates and pays taxes in Texas: "A taxable entity that elects to capitalize costs on its first report due on or after January 1, 2008, may not include any costs incurred prior to the accounting period upon which the report is based."

It's the kind of thing that puts humans to sleep and keeps tax people awake all night. And businesses are waiting to see whether Comptroller Susan Combs will change it before she sends notices to taxpayers later this month.

The rule jolts some high-inventory businesses — homebuilders, car dealers, retailers, and some manufacturers. Some would be forced to change the way they account for cost of goods sold, which is a key component in figuring the state's new margins tax. Others — homebuilders, already facing an economic slump, are at the top of this list — would have to pay a higher tax the first year with the rule than without it.

Taxpayers and lobbyists and some legislators have been talking (that's a mild term, in some cases) to Combs and her staff for weeks about the rule. They're hoping for a "letter ruling" that retracts it. We should know soon. The comptroller is publishing instructions for the new tax this month, and those will probably reflect whether they're sticking with the zero inventory rule or letting businesses compute it like they compute their other taxes.

Zaffirini Escapes a Primary

Rene Barrientos, the San Antonio lawyer who filed last week to run in the Democratic primary against Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, doesn't have the stomach for it. He dropped out, saying he didn't want to run the negative campaign he thought would be required.

Zaffirini will still face former Webb County Judge Louis Bruni Jr., who's running as a Republican, in November.

Barrientos apparently didn't want to run the negative campaign his consultants presented as the best way to defeat Zaffirini, a 20-year incumbent. "He's a good guy and a good Democrat... and he wasn't willing to run a campaign based almost entirely on negative attacks," said Colin Strother, who was going to be the campaign manager for the challenger.

The two had already traded some shots — if half of what has been hinted is true, this was gonna be a nasty fight on both sides — and Barrientos has been in the hunt for months. But he pulled up in the week before the parties give their official ballots to the Texas Secretary of State.

"I originally filed for public office because I strongly believe that our political system has been unduly influenced by special interests, that college costs have made higher education too expensive for middle class families, that teachers lack the funding and resources they need to educate our youth, and that we need universal health care," he said in a written statement. "... I do not wish to be involved in a campaign where important social and political issues take a back seat to heated, negative attacks. I just will not do it. There needs to be civility in politics and such a campaign would not be healthy or productive for this district or the Democratic Party."

Zaffirini, who's been running television spots since the week before Christmas, says she's not sure why her opponent decided not to run, but she's happy about it. "I thank Rene Barrientos for withdrawing and for his statement about his distaste for negative advertising," she says. "I agree that voters of Senate District 21 want to focus on issues, not on dueling messages."

The primary that disappeared promised to be a spirited one. Zaffirini started off with a fundraiser at the South Texas ranch owned by Boston Red Sox pitcher Josh Beckett. To get there, you have to drive by a ranch owned by Barrientos. His guys thought it would be funny to put a Bruni sign on the gate; sure enough, the Zaffirini crew stopped and took pictures. And then they used them in her announcement, making fun of Barrientos "confusion" over whom to support.

There's still plenty of vinegar left for the general election, though. She still has Bruni ahead, and he's also running commercials (they began nearly a year ago), most of them negative. You can find his spots here, and her TV commercial here.

Bruni accuses Zaffirini of pushing Barrientos out of the race and says he's not afraid of her. "She's met her match, and God bless her. She's the most vindictive person in the world, in my opinion, besides [Osama] bin Laden."

Bruni, a former Laredo city councilman and Webb County Judge, has run in the past as a Democrat. This time, he's running as "a non-partisan Republican."

Politics, Churches, and the IRS

An Austin group wants the IRS to investigate a Houston non-profit to see whether it helped get Gov. Rick Perry reelected in 2006.

The Texas Freedom Network is accusing the Niemoller Foundation of funding partisan political efforts, through the Texas Restoration Project, that were meant to help Perry mobilize churches and their congregations to vote.

Their logic: The Niemoller Foundation funded the Restoration Project, which held six events around the state with Perry as the only invited gubernatorial candidate (other speakers included Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and Railroad Commissioner Michael Williams, according to a Perry spokesman). The chairman of the Restoration Project, Rev. Laurence White of Houston, is a director of the foundation. We couldn't immediately reach him for comment. The foundation's tax reports say it raised more than $1.2 million, and name four "substantial contributors" — Jim Leininger of San Antonio, Bob Perry of Houston, Bo Pilgrim of Pittsburg, and Don O'Neal of Colleyville — who are all Perry contributors. And the foundation spent more than $470,000 on consultants who also did substantial work for the Texas GOP.

A spokesman for Perry says the Restoration Project did nothing overtly political, other than encouraging people to vote. "[TFN] is a secularist, leftist organization and does not like people of faith," said Robert Black. "Tough." Asked what he meant by "secularist," Black said the group "believes that faith should not be in the public square." He says the Restoration Project never told people who to vote for and didn't campaign for Perry.

The TFN complaint points to a list of pastors it says were used by the Perry campaign for mailings. The letter and the documents behind it are on the TFN website.

Flotsam & Jetsam

El Paso's HD-78 got a late addition to the ballot in Joe Moody, an assistant district attorney and the son of Bill Moody, the El Paso judge who led the losing Democratic ticket in 2006.

The elder Moody's results in each legislative district provide a rough measure of how the parties stack up in each locale (we even did a handy chart last year, which is in our Files Section). He's local, so the results are probably skewed, but Moody got 59.3 percent of the vote in that legislative district in 2006. But Republican Rep. Pat Haggerty now holds it. He frequently votes with the Democrats in the House and probably wouldn't see a full press if he wins his primary. But if his challenger, Dee Margo, is the Republican nominee, it's likely to be a district both sides move to the top of the target list next fall.

Rep. Dora Olivo, D-Rosenberg, will find some of her colleagues on the other side of the stage this year. One of her opponents, Ron Reynolds, was an intern to Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, at one time, and got in the race at a point when some members thought Olivo was going to retire. She had a primary challenge in 2006 and won with 60.4 percent of the vote.

Rep. Betty Brown, R-Terrell, got the season's first endorsement from Texans for Lawsuit reform. That group has been squiring some other candidates around — notably South Padre Island's Tara Rios Ybarra, who wants to replace Rep. Juan Escobar, D-Kingsville. Brown's in a March rematch with lawyer Wade Gent of Forney; the winner of that tussle will face Democrat Victor Morales in November.

Brian Klock, a Republican in that pack of ten candidates who want the nomination, says he'll eat military MREs — meals ready to eat — until the primary to show his solidarity with American troops. Klock's a commander in the U.S. Navy Reserve and gave up a job at Merrill Lynch to run for Congress. The winner of that ten-way primary will face U.S. Rep. Nick Lampson, D-Stafford, in November.

Gov. Rick Perry's On My Honor, Why the American Values of the Boy Scouts are Worth Fighting For comes out next month. The publishers are pitching it as a look at the battles between the values of the Boy Scouts (who'll get all the proceeds) and the "secular culture warriors of the left" — comes out next month. It's got a website of its own and you can order a copy in advance there. Dallas businessman Ross Perot Sr. wrote the foreward.

Department of Corrections: We squib-kicked a number last week. Democrat Rick Noriega, who's running for U.S. Senate, says he raised $968,000 through the end of last year. They worded their announcement oddly, and we reported that amount as the fourth-quarter total. No, no, no. He raised $581,000 of that total before the end of September. Campaign finance reports for the federales and the state candidates will be out next week. Sorry, sorry, sorry.

New Names at Sunset

Sens. Glenn Hegar and Juan "Chuy" Hinojosa and Houston businessman Michael Stevens are the newest members of the Sunset Advisory Commission. Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst named those three, and said Hegar, R-Katy, will also be the panel's vice chairman. He and Hinojosa, D-McAllen, will serve through September 2011. Stevens, one of the biggest financiers of Republican candidates in the state, will serve through September 2009. On the list of agencies Sunset will review this cycle: Transportation, Public Safety, Insurance, the Texas Youth Commission, the Racing Commission, and Parks & Wildlife. The newbies replace Sens. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, and John Whitmire, D-Houston, and public member Howard Wolf of Austin.

James Hull, the state forester and the director of the Texas Forest Service at Texas A&M University, will retire in June. He's been in that post for 12 years.

Charles Patton, president and COO of AEP Texas, is the new chairman of the Association of Electric Companies of Texas. Walt Baum and Russell Mullins got promotions from AECT. Baum, formerly the legislative director, is now an executive vice president. Mullins, who was helping with legislative duties, is now corporate secretary and legislative director.

Seven companies — three of them independent subsidiaries of the company formerly known as Dallas-based TXU Corp — have joined the Association of Electric Companies of Texas. That association represents the companies on industry-wide issues before state government. The new guys are Direct Energy, Exelon Generation, Luminant, NRG Texas Power, Oncor, Southwestern Electric Power Co., and TXU Energy.

Susan Barnes, associate commissioner for standards and programs at the Texas Education Agency, is retiring at the end of the month. She'll be replaced by her number two, Sharon Jackson, who worked as a teacher and a principal earlier in her career.

Chris Cronn, who worked for Gov. Rick Perry and then headed one of three temporary outfits formed to promote the cancer bond amendment approved by voters in November, will lobby for UnitedHealth Group here and in Oklahoma. That's a new position; he'll join Leah Rummel, who's already on that lobby staff.

Jess Calvert, a former analyst with the Legislative Budget Board and the House Appropriations Commission, is coming back, sort of. After four years with GMAC, he's joining the Texas Dental Association as director of public affairs.

Move three squares on the org chart at the Texas Department of Transportation. John Barton of Beaumont is the agency's new assistant executive director for engineering operations; David Casteel of San Antonio is the new AED for district operations, and Phil Russell of Austin is the new AED for innovative project development.

House Speaker Tom Craddick put the newest member of the Texas House, Dan Barrett, D-Fort Worth, on the Land & Resource Management and Pensions & Investments committees. Those assignments will hold until the Legislature meets in January 2009.

Gov. Rick Perry made some appointments:

• To the Sabine River Authority of Texas, including Don Covington, chairman of Beacon Marine in Orange; J.D. Jacobs Jr., a Rockwall farmer and rancher; David Koonce, an exec with General Shelters of Texas Ltd.; Cliff Todd of Carthage, executive director of the Marshall Economic Development Corp; and Earl Williams, an exec with Tool Tech Machining and two other companies in Beaumont. Koonce and Todd are new members; the others are reappointees.

• To the Texas State Board of Examiners of Marriage and Family Therapists, Edne Reyes-Wilson, a program director for the El Paso Center for Children.

• To the Texas Optometry Board, Larry Fields of Carthage. He's an attorney and a real estate broker, and a municipal judge in Tatum.

Quotes of the Week

Republican Kirby Hollingsworth, on why he filed at the last-minute for a third challenge to Rep. Mark Homer, D-Paris, in the Paris News: "I wasn't planning on signing up because I didn't know enough people were really interested in it. I got some phone calls that encouraged me I would have the support I needed."

NBC's Tom Brokaw, talking to the Washington Post about pundit's jumping from one Democratic ship to another on New Hampshire's election night: "The pirouettes are amazing. The utter confidence with which everyone had been wrong 20 minutes earlier, they have the same utter confidence about what produced this surprise. It's intellectually dishonest."

U.S. Senate candidate Rhett Smith, a former Republican now running as a Democrat, blasting conservatives at a Democratic luncheon in Austin: "We have no place in Texas for Redneckism or what I would call Redneck Religion."

Former U.S. Sen. Mike Gravel of Alaska, now a presidential candidate, talking to students in New Hampshire, quoted by the Chicago Tribune: "I'm sure a lot of you have tripped out on alcohol. It's a lot safer to do it on marijuana."


Texas Weekly: Volume 25, Issue 2, 14 January 2008. Ross Ramsey, Editor. Copyright 2008 by Printing Production Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher is prohibited. One-year online subscription: $250. For information about your subscription, call (512) 302-5703 or email biz@texasweekly.com. For news, email ramsey@texasweekly.com, or call (512) 288-6598.

 

The Week in the Rearview Mirror

A group of Fort Worth residents is suing to knock former City Councilwoman Wendy Davis off the ballot, saying she's ineligible to run for state office.Tarrant County's Democratic Party ruled earlier that she is eligible. This appeal to the Texas Supreme Court contends the party didn't have the legal right to do that and asks the court to knock the Democrat off the ballot. Davis resigned from the city council to challenge Republican state Sen. Kim Brimer of Fort Worth. She skipped the firefighters who filed the suit and blamed Brimer for prompting the legal fight to avoid an election battle with her in November. The three citizens are all firefighters, Democrats, and residents of the Senate district in question (SD-10). They're also members of a group that was on the prevailing side of a November ballot initiative, and the consultant that helped get that done — Fort Worth-based Eppstein & Associates — is also Brimer's political consultant. Officials at that firm say they're not directing this particular movie. They say in their lawsuit (here's a copy of it) that Davis' resignation from the city council wasn't completed before she filed for the Senate seat, negating her filing. Her successor hadn't even been chosen when she filed. But the replacement — the partner of one of Davis' campaign workers — was sworn in before the filing deadline. That was enough to convince local party officials that Davis was eligible. They tossed out the complaint. Now the firefighters have asked the Supremes to have a look. They contend she should be knocked off the ballot so that the Democratic Party can replace her with an eligible candidate before the November election. That prompted the Texas Democratic Party to say Brimer wasn't playing by the rules and that "he is trying to manipulate the ballot."

Bloggers this week are bandying about cognomens, aliases, handles, monikers, nom de plumes, pseudonyms, sobriquets and plain ol' nicknames. They're also discussing media news and firing off questions. And there are some amusements.

* * * * *

Synonymous with Pseudonymous

Chuck "Right Ear" Rosenthal "squandered" the public's trust, says blogHOUSTON, predicting that the Harris County D.A. "will almost certainly be leaving office before his term expires, voluntarily or involuntarily." According to Grits for Breakfast, "What may get Rosenthal in the most hot water, though, is evidence that he routinely, cavalierly used county employees to perform campaign work. And here's a "best of" Rosenthal pick-up lines from KVUE's Political Junkie.

"Isn't it ironic that tough-guy district attorney Chuck Rosenthal was ultimately brought down as a result of his refusal to stand up to the Harris County Sheriff's Department?" contemplates Houston's Clear Thinkers. Meanwhile Wilco Wise swoons that, "The Harris County District Attorney's race has become a target-rich race for sure. It's soooo great to be able to pick on those snooty big-city republicans." Here's the take by Professors-R-Squared: "Watermelon and KFC jokes from the guy who puts more blacks on Texas' death row than any other prosecutor in the country... Jackass."

Burnt Orange takes up the topic of the Texas Freedom Network's request for the Internal Revenue Service to investigate Gov. Rick Perry and the Texas Restoration Project, while Capitol Annex picks up the scent on a story first reported by Texas Weekly's Il Dulce about questionable campaign filing by state Rep. Dawnna "Drastic Plastic" Dukes, D-Austin.

The more talk about redistricting by challenger Al "Heeeeey, baby!!!" Edwards, the greater the margin of victory for Borris "Dead Eye" Miles, according to Greg's Opinion. "If you are done laughing yet," Annex has more on the same subject here. In this post, KVUE's Political Junkie ponders what Miles means when he says he "disagrees with" accusations of a stick'em-up/kiss'em-up (a twin mugging, in other words). And Off the Kuff points out that if Miles wins the primary, then is found guilty, then the Dems and the Reps would get a do-over for the HD-146 primaries.

Grits for Breakfast bids farewell to the Texas Youth Commission's "Bronco" Billy Humphrey and lends tentative approval to the first actions by new conservator Richard "Spray Later, Ask Questions First" Nedelkoff.

"Ham-handed... Overzealous... Stupid... " — a trio of adjectives appearing in a post by Texas Politics, the Houston Chronicle's blog, describing an ephemeral covert operation by a staffer for U.S. Senate candidate Rick Noriega. Political Junkie Facebooks "Jay Coxlie," and suggests that Coxlie, AKA Rick Cofer, could use nom-de-guerre lessons from Ron Mexico, AKA Michael Vick. And Postcards from the Lege, the Austin American Statesman's blog, chips in that Coxlie was claiming to write for mcblogger, who's irritated that Postcards can't get its URL correct. [PORN ALERT: mcblogger land-mined mentions of Cornyn's name and they link to porn sites, harpooning the blog's readers more than the senator.]

"Rocket" Roger Clemens has levied a defamation suit against former trainerBrian McNamee for saying that the former Longhorns and Astros pitcher used steroids, from Tex Parte Blog. And as for accusations concerning millions of dollars in drug money "Pretender" Mauricio Celis denies ever touching the stuff, also from Parte.

Walker Report's Steve Walker, a Bexar County Justice of the Peace candidate, KO'd his lone Democratic primary opponent through a successful challenging of petition signatures, while Trail Blazers, the Dallas Morning News' blog, relays a piece by The New Republic on a very old story about "angry white man" Ron Paul, a U.S. Rep. and Presidential candidate.

Here's an update on the case against "The Hammer" Tom Delay, courtesy of Texas Observer Blog, and also a profile by The Capitol Crowd of Charlie "Bonnie Bach" Schnabel, the ex-chief of staff for former U.S. Rep. Charlie Wilson (in the movie, Schnabel got replaced by a pretty redhead). And musings writes about the "Tancredo Ten" -- "the ten Republicans vying for the chance to run against Republican Congressman Nick Lampson," while CD-22 candidate Brian "I-Am-Not-A-Politician" Klock is on an MRE-only diet until the March 4 primary, according to cd22watcher.

* * * * *

Media Matters

On A Capitol Blog, state Rep. Aaron Peña, D-Edinburg, posts video of the Ron Whitlock Reports Show wherein he and Hidalgo County GOP chair Hollis Rutledge discuss presidential politics. Meanwhile, Trail Blazers comments on Fox's "out of sight, out of mind" approach to supporters of Paul's presidential aspirations.

BlogHOUSTON reports that InstantNewsNetwork.com has purchased FortBendNow.com, changing up the online news game in the Houston area, while North Texas Liberal (who was feeling the love during a press conference by Democratic CD-24 candidate Tom Love) proclaims the existence of a new blog called Castle Hills Democrats.

Via cd22watcher, blog Redstate takes CD-22 candidate Shelly Sekula Gibbs to task for abortion flip-floppery on a radio show. Meanwhile, Burnt Orange accuses Texas Monthly's Paul Burka of partisan flip-floppery due to a recent op-ed in the New York Times. And commentary on a BurkaBlog piece on House races appears in Kuff.

Muckraker relays kudos received "for being the only media outlet that I know of to write about the Sunset Advisory appointments." (Our story here, and here's one from Chronic, the Austin Chronicle's blog.) Memoirs from a young conservative appeared in an article for Townhall.com, she says. And Mike Falick's Blog was featured on the Municipalist Blog.

"Maybe the target audience [for Gov. Perry's new book 'On my Honor'] is former Boy Scouts who are now con men pretending to be conservative Republicans?" wonders muckraker. And Burnt Orange reports that Austin-based radio station KOOP will not be stopped by a recent act of arson. In other news, the South Texas Republicans Newsletter is up, via Walker Report.

Here's a report on a press conference by Travis County D.A. Ronnie Earle during which his endorsee to succeed him, Rosemary Lehmberg, was noticeably absent, by Political Junkie (Here are some thoughts on the race by Parte). And Dos Centavos whines about whining in the D.C. press corps here.

* * * * *

In the Interrogative

Why does the TAKS test fall on the same day as the March primaries this year? Half-Empty smells a rat.

Kuff has a Q&A with Texas Supreme Court Candidate Susan Criss, a Democrat, while Texas Blue questions Elizabeth Pearsall Lippincourt, Chief of Staff/General Counsel for state Rep. Juan Garcia, D-Corpus Christi, interviews state senate candidate Joe Jaworski and quizzes Joseph Vogas, president of the College Democrats at the University of North Texas.

"If Texas sustains high rates of incarceration growth seen in recent years, where would it ultimately lead?" asks Grits. (He answers himself: One million total prisoners by the middle of the century.) And also from Grits: What should Jesus' representatives do to reduce violent crime?

"Home sweet where?" wonders Vaqueros & Wonkeros, the El Paso Times's blog, about state Rep. candidate Dee Margo. Looking for a job? The Center for Public Policy Priorities is seeking a health care policy analyst, says Capitol Crowd. And "Mark McKinnon has a problem," says Trail Blazers: "Mac or Barack"?

* * * * *

Game Theory

"Forget Waldo, Find Phil," via Trail Blazers.

A Presidential picker based upon Harvard's Implicit Association Test, via Professors.

An Empirical Analysis of the Texas Lottery, from Professors.


This edition of Out There was compiled and written by Patrick Brendel, who hails from Victoria and finds Austin's climate pleasantly arid. We cherry-pick the state's political blogs each week, looking for news, info, gossip, and new jokes. The opinions here belong (mostly) to the bloggers, and we're including their links so you can hunt them down if you wish. Our blogroll — the list of Texas blogs we watch — is on our links page, and if you know of a Texas political blog that ought to be on it, just shoot us a note. Please send comments, suggestions, gripes or retorts to Texas Weekly editor Ross Ramsey.

The parties are supposed to have all of the county filings folded in with the state filings by, well, today. There are some laggards among the counties, but here are their latest lists...Texas Democratic Party Republican Party of Texas

Republicans looking to knock off a Valley Democrat went to the trial bar for a candidate.The billboard for the business of Javier Villalobos, the Republican candidate challenging Rep. Veronica Gonzales, D-McAllen.

A new report from Washington contains some incredibly short-sighted recommendations for solving our country's infrastructure challenges.

At a time of record high gasoline prices, the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Commission's ideas include tripling the federal gas tax from its current 18.4 cents to nearly 60 cents per gallon (through a series of five tax increases over five years). They also recommend curtailing states' ability to leverage the capital and innovation of the private sector. Congress must reject these recommendations.

Their recommendations prove the notion that the further someone gets from the actual location of a challenge, the less they know about it or how to solve it. Raising taxes is a surefire way to stifle growth, and limiting states' freedom to innovate will only make it worse. The federal commission further shows a weak grasp of economic theory by encouraging states to not only accept their proposed massive federal tax increases, but to follow suit and simultaneously raise our own gas taxes at an even higher rate!

Texas already sends a hefty share of gas tax dollars to Washington and we get less in return than we should. Among U.S. states, Texas is the second largest donor to the federal Highway Trust Fund and ranks 50th in rate-of-return for our federal gas tax dollar. For every dollar we send to Washington, only 8 cents in federal transit program funds and 70 cents in federal highway program funds make it back to Texas.

It's tough to get comfortable with sending even more of Texans' hard-earned dollars to Washington, D.C., knowing they'll only be earmarked, redistributed to other states and locked into programs that won't do much to relieve crowding on our roads. This is big government at its worst.

That crowding on our roads will only get worse if our population keeps growing at its current pace (about one thousand people per day). With our state's population expected to double in the next 40 years and 45 percent of our state's population already living along the I-35 corridor, we must have the freedom to innovate in solving these tremendous challenges.

About two weeks ago, I was shocked and saddened by a phone call telling me that my dear friend, Ric Williamson, had passed away. Those who knew the chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission were struck by his tenacious advocacy for ideas that have Texas, for the first time in decades, addressing transportation needs in a way that does not burden our citizens with higher taxes.

In the days since his passing, there have been calls from some quarters to abandon the forward-thinking initiatives we championed to meet our state's current and future transportation needs. That would be a big mistake. The federal commission's short-sighted recommendation to curtail our ability to partner with the private sector shows that Washington is still mired in old-school bureaucratic thinking. Washington may not want to change, but fast-growing states like ours simply don't have the luxury of waiting on the federal government to save the day. Texans must act to solve Texas problems.

Thankfully states have a champion in U.S. Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters who believes that Washington cannot keep doing things the same way and expect different results. She has been a strong advocate of innovation and outside-the-box thinking and has publicly disagreed with many of this commission's recommendations.

Public-private partnerships work because they offer the opportunity for a steady rate of return for their investors and the state while providing capital for the construction of much-needed roads and other infrastructure that otherwise wouldn't be funded. This infrastructure doesn't just get Texas moving, it bolsters our local economies, benefiting entire regions. Investing private capital in public roads (with business terms such as toll rates approved by local and state officials) and netting dollars that can be used to build more roads in that region is far better than sending more money in the form of higher taxes to Washington, D.C. through a current funding system that is clearly broken.

Critics who have fueled public hysteria over foreign firms' involvement in these partnerships have tried to sway public opinion with misinformation. It is ironic that we don't see the same reaction to similar investments in our state by foreign companies like Samsung in Austin, Toyota in San Antonio, or Ericsson in Plano. We welcome these companies to Texas because they invest in our state, employ thousands of Texans and improve the quality of life for countless Texas families. The thousands of jobs that will be created by private sector investment in our transportation infrastructure will do the same thing.

Washington is clearly incapable of meeting today's transportation demands, so why should anyone believe they can handle tomorrow's? If the federal government doesn't make serious changes in the size, scope and dependability of its support for the national transportation system, Texas and other states must have the freedom to seek our own solutions to transportation problems.

Tripling the federal gas tax while stifling states' abilities to fund improvements with private sector partnerships could be a crippling blow to our country's economic future and disastrous for a fast growing state like Texas. Rather than take more of our money and deliver less of what we need, I suggest the federal government step aside, let states retain their dollars, and give them the freedom to solve problems at the state and local level.

In the unfortunate event the commission's wrong-headed recommendations are adopted, Texans will have plenty of time to fantasize about their hard-earned money making its way back home, since they will be sitting still in traffic congestion for a long time to come.

Rick Perry is the Governor of Texas.

The release of a national transportation commission report has Gov. Rick Perry crying foul over proposed gas tax increases and federal encroachment upon what he sees as states' business.

While some are siding with Perry in his argument in favor of state control of roads, folks from the agribusiness industry, an environmental watchdog group and the legislature say raising gas taxes might be the most practical way to help pay for future transportation needs. And one legislator poses a $3 billion question for the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT).

The 258-page (full-color glossy) report from the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission, available here, contains a grocery list of problems, a buffet of recommended solutions and a smorgasbord of payment options, most of which have shown up from time to time on state lawmakers' menus.

Two years in the making, it represents the first major development in roadway politics since the death of Texas Transportation Commission Chair Ric Williamson. (Like the ghost in Hamlet, though, Williamson's voice echoes from the Undiscovered Country, in the form of a quotation — critical of how transportation projects are prioritized — from the commission's field hearing in Dallas: "Our revenue expenditure system is focused on road construction, which is a process, as opposed to reducing congestion, improving air quality, or transferring the movement of hazardous materials away from our urban center.")

The country's population will increase by 50 percent in the next 50 years, the report says, and transportation needs will grow even faster. The commission recommends further federal support of road and highway projects and a greater focus on alternative modes of transportation for people and goods, such as railroads and waterways. To pay for it all, the commission advocates hiking the federal fuel tax by 25- to 40-cents-per-gallon over the next five years and afterward tying the tax rate to inflation. The commission says that states should follow the feds' lead and raise state fuel taxes as well. Currently, the federal gas tax rate is 18.2 cents per gallon. Texas' is 20 cents per gallon.

The commission also recommends increasing taxes on heavy trucks, levying a "federal ticket tax" (like the tax you pay on an airline ticket) on all sorts of trips, instituting federal fees for freight shipping and taxing or capping greenhouse gas emissions. The commission also proposes allowing transportation entities to toll existing interstate highways and to institute congestion pricing on interstates in cities with a million or more people. It encourages public entities to enter into partnerships with the private sector to build highways.

Predicting technological advances (i.e., the development of alternative fuels) will render gas taxes inadequate by 2025, the commission recommends researching other ways to tax road users, such as making drivers pay taxes based on miles driven, rather than on gasoline burned. The commission also says that the existing 108 federal surface transportation programs should be combined and streamlined into 10 independent programs.

As for Texas, the commission proposes improvements to the existing Amtrak line connecting San Antonio to Dallas (and then to Oklahoma and beyond) and creating a new intercity passenger rail service between Dallas and Houston. The proposed railway would have trains speeding along on separate tracks at between 79 and 110 miles per hour.

"That's a great idea. I'm really glad to hear that because those are the things we've been advocating for years," says Dick Kallerman, Transportation Issues Chair for the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club. "Texas has been talking about that for a long time... talking about that. We borrow millions of dollars for highways; we do a lot of talking about rail."

Augmentation of public and private investment in freight rail is absolutely necessary for farming and ranching in Texas, says Steve Pringle, Legislative Director for the Texas Farm Bureau.

"We have got to have an adequate rail system," he says. "I've seen a decline in the quality of rail service in recent years. It's been hard for the railroads to raise money."

Highways and railroads are integral to agribusiness, he says, citing as an example the dairy industry in the Panhandle. Grain imported from other states goes in by rail to feed the cows, and the milk products leave in divers directions by truck.

The commission recommends the creation of an independent National Surface Transportation Commission to act as master architect — a reversion to centralized federal oversight of transportation policy and what the report describes as an "era of renewed Federal purpose." According to the report, this new independent commission would submit legislation to Congress for a straight "yea or nay" vote, with amendments prohibited in an effort to combat pork.

Perry's response highlights his displeasure with the proposed fuel tax increases, perhaps a reflection of Texas' status as a net exporter of federal tax dollars. "For every dollar sent to Washington, Texas receives back only 8 cents in federal transit program funds and only 70 cents in federal highway program funds," according to his op-ed.

That, coupled with a distaste for federal control over state projects, forms the meat of Perry's argument: "Tripling the federal gas tax while stifling states' ability to fund improvements by engaging the private sector could be a crippling blow to our economic future and disastrous for fast-growing states like Texas... Washington clearly can't meet today's transportation demands, so why should anyone believe they can handle tomorrow's?"

"The Governor's absolutely right," says Rep. Joe Pickett, D-El Paso. "He's absolutely right on that second point: We can do a better job than the feds."

Federal money comes with so many strings attached that it's usually not worth playing the puppet, says Pickett, who's also a member and former chair of El Paso's Municipal Planning Organization.

Perry's objections were echoed by Texans for Safe Reliable Transportation Chairman Joe Krier: "... calling for federal gasoline tax increases of up to 40 cents per gallon is politically unrealistic and unfair to Texas drivers as long as roughly 30 percent of gas tax revenue we send to Washington is diverted to other states. Until the federal government starts treating Texas fairly and stops siphoning off the gasoline taxes we pay to Washington, it make no sense to Texans to support federal tax increases."

However, Pickett says it's "hypocritical" to rail against raising gas taxes while mortgaging roads for quick cash.

"We're borrowing too much money. We try to hurry up and build stuff, and we forget the future," he says. "Well, someone's got to pay the piper. We can't keep borrowing our way out of trouble."

Furthermore, Pickett won't be convinced by TxDOT's Chicken Little act until he can see where the agency's money is going now.

In each of the past five years or so, the agency has taken in an extra $500 to 600 million above its estimated budget, Pickett says, daring, "Try to find it."

"TxDOT keeps it a secret," he says.

Pickett also wonders why private companies can turn profits on toll roads while the state agency claims it can't do the same thing at no cost.

"They say private investment speeds up the process -- that means they're not doing a good job," he says.

"We can't live without them, but we sure could use some cooperation and understanding of the bigger picture," Pickett says.

The national Sierra Club officially supports increasing gas taxes, Kallerman says. (It's a win-win situation for the environmentalists, as a high enough tax would both raise money and reduce fuel consumption.)

Pringle says the Farm Bureau favors increasing the gas tax, so long as revenues are "dedicated to rural roads within the state."

As for tolls, private-public partnerships and, specifically, the Trans-Texas Corridor, "We're just not excited about that right now," Pringle says.

About a quarter or more of annual agricultural production — both from Texas and the United States as a whole — is exported to foreign countries, he says, underscoring how vital it is to agribusiness to have decent, interconnected railways, highways and waterways. For Texas, all exports must make their way to the Ports of Beaumont, Houston or Corpus Christi.

"We would like to preserve the partnership between the federal and state governments," Pringle says. "We don't need one or the other to take over the transportation system."

Red carpet watchers might also be interested to note that one of the commission's "Blue Ribbon Panel of Transportation Experts" is Steven Simmons, deputy executive director at TxDOT.

—by Patrick Brendel

Officially: Former Rep. Terral Smith will be House Speaker Tom Craddick's new chief of staff.He'll start March 1. Here's the official statement:


Speaker Craddick announces new chief-of-staff (Austin) - Speaker Tom Craddick (R - Midland) today announced that he will appoint Terral Smith as his chief-of-staff. Smith will replace Nancy Fisher, who announced she was leaving earlier this week. "Terral is a former legislator, he was a senior aide to a governor and a president, and he is a proven leader who knows how to bring people together to achieve results," Speaker Craddick said. "I look forward to working with him; I think he will bring a lot to this office." Smith has worked in politics for more than 20 years. In 1980, he was elected to the Texas House of Representatives, where he served as chairman of the Criminal Jurisprudence Committee and the Natural Resources Committee. In 1992, President Bush nominated Smith to be a U.S. District Judge for the Western District of Texas. His nomination was pending when President Clinton was elected. In 1996, Smith became Governor Bush's Legislative Director. He served in that capacity until Governor Bush resigned to become President of the United States. Smith was a practicing attorney until he joined the Bush Administration, focusing primarily on business litigation. He then returned to the practice of law and government consulting. Smith graduated from Texas Tech University and then the University of Texas School of Law. He served in the United States Army from 1969-1971. "I am excited to join the Speaker's Office," Smith said. "I have deep roots in the Texas House of Representatives and many friends there. I look forward to working with them in this capacity." Smith will join the Speaker's staff on March 1.

A Harris County grand jury indicted Texas Supreme Court Justice David Medina and his wife, Francisca Medina on charges related to a fire at their home.According to Terry Yates, the attorney representing Justice Medina, Mrs. Medina was charged with arson and Justice Medina was charged with tampering with evidence. Officials have been investigating a June fire at the family's home in Spring, and fire investigators said early on that the origin of the fire had aroused their suspicions. A copy of the indictment wasn't available from the Harris County District Clerk's office. And District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal was quoted by KHOU saying he will ask a judge to dismiss the charges. Yates said the case was presented to the grand jury by the district attorney's office, which is now apparently trying to reverse the panel's decision. "I've been doing this for 18 years and I've never seen anything like it," Yates said. "We were just shocked." Medina's office referred calls to the court's public information office, which responded with a statement from Chief Justice Wallace Jefferson: "The Court is dismayed by news that Justice Medina may have been indicted. Obviously the Court cannot comment on pending litigation more than to express our confidence that the justice system will sort this out. As for Justice Medina and his wife, Francisca, and the entire Medina family, they remain in our prayers." If the indictment stands, the State Commission on Judicial Conduct would decide whether to temporarily suspend Medina from the state's highest civil court and whether to continue his pay during such a suspension. But officials there say they won't do anything until they have an actual copy of the indictment. And if Rosenthal is successful in asking a judge to drop the charges, the commission would stand down.

The Texas Lottery can display results of a bingo game electronically without engaging in electronic bingo, according to Attorney General Greg Abbott. The AG says showing the results isn't the same as having an automated or online — and illegal — bingo game. In those games, he wrote, "The player would have very little to do, aside from occasionally touching a computer screen or swiping his card at a terminal. Such games would be a kind of gambling far different from the social bingo contemplated by the Legislature and voters who approved the bingo amendment."

What he's talking about is a video lottery, which is prohibited. Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Lewisville, asked for the opinion to see whether displaying the results on an electronic board amounts to the same thing. In Abbott's view, as long as the results of the game are determined outside the machine — on paper, for example — it's not illegal.

The Lottery can't start a raffle-like game, according to Abbott. In an opinion requested by lottery officials, he says voters didn't specifically authorize raffles when they okayed lotteries, and that other pre-existing laws prohibit raffles in all but a few circumstances. Lottery officials had asked him about a game with limited numbers of tickets and no shared prizes. Not at this time, if they follow Abbott's advice.

Included in a list of 13 questions posed by challenger Jonathan Sibley to Rep. Charles "Doc" Anderson, R-Waco, is this one: "Do you feel Gov. Perry should let another Republican run for governor in 2010?" That's an indicator of Perry's popularity in Waco, where Trans-Texas Corridor is still a dirty word. That geography turned up in the governor's race last year, too: While the Republicans around him did better in McLennan County than statewide, Perry's numbers there were lower than his statewide totals. Kay Bailey Hutchison, David Dewhurst, and Greg Abbott all got better results in Waco than average; Perry was the opposite. Sibley's onto it.

Jon Cole, a Republican challenging Rep. Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, in HD-67, picked up endorsements from three prosecutors. The three — former Dallas County District Attorney Bill Hill, Tarrant County DA Tim Curry and Williamson County DA John Bradley — opposed Madden's efforts to ease prison overcrowding by releasing some non-violent offenders. In a letter from the "Republican Prosecutors for Jon Cole," the three rail against Madden's "liberal agenda" and specifically, against his criminal justice work. One of Madden's bills has some other members on the ropes; the legislative effort to take pressure off prison inventories translates, during the political season into a soft-on-crime issue. One of the questions in that Sibley whack at Anderson, for instance, asks whether he voted to "support decriminalizing marijuana crimes last session."

• Rep. Juan Garcia, D-Corpus Christi, took a hit for fines levied by the Texas Ethics Commission because of errors in his campaign finance reports. TEC's write-up includes some technical violations, but also says Garcia's campaign failed to report $42,500 in contributions from a political action committee that was helping his campaign in 2006 and didn't report some direct expenditures made by that PAC on his behalf. Garcia paid $1,800 in penalties. Now that he's got an opponent for his reelection campaign, the Nueces County GOP is banging the drum to draw attention. Garcia says the mistakes were corrected as soon as he knew about them and the fines were paid. And he blames "small group of bitterly partisan Republicans" for stirring up the attention.

• Rep. Aaron Peña is the latest incumbent to attract an anti-vanity website. The Edinburg Democrat is in a rematch with Eddie Saenz, and Saenz started an Internet site to taunt his foe. He calls the incumbent "Aaron 'Burr' Peña." Rep. Betty Brown, R-Terrell, is the target of a similar website. That's a new trick this election cycle.

• Separately, Peña picked up an endorsement from former Texas Democratic Party Chairman Charles Soechting. Soechting did that while he was still chairman the first time Peña and Saenz clashed.

• It's too early to know what this is worth to a candidate, but a band of liberal Texas bloggers endorsed seven candidates and say they'll encourage their readers to contribute through the Act Blue website. The list from the Texas Progressive Alliance: Rick Noriega, running for U.S. Senate; Joe Jaworski in SD-11; and five House candidates including Garnet Coleman, Jessica Farrar, and Armando Walle of Houston, Paul Moreno of El Paso, and Brian Thompson of Austin. Coleman, Farrar and Moreno are the only incumbents in the bunch.

• Are voters distracting? The Texas Education Agency fiddled with its testing schedules to make sure none of The Little Darlings will be taking the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills on Primary Election Day. The powers that be don't want the disruption of voters (many schools are also polling places) while kids are taking the dreaded TAKS test. About 2.6 million kids around the state will be tested during that first full week of March.

Political People and their Moves

At the request of Harris County prosecutors, a Houston judge dropped the indictments against Texas Supreme Court Justice David Medina and his wife.The indictments were handed up yesterday by a Harris County grand jury. Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal told KHOU-TV he'd move to drop the charges because the evidence was too thin to take to court. That's what happened today. Now, the lawyer for Mrs. Medina, Terry Yates, is filing suit against two grand jury members who went public with their disgust over Rosenthal's decision. Yates wants them held in contempt for talking to reporters about a case that's still open. The jurors told the Houston Chronicle and the Quorum Report that they'll consider re-indicting the Medinas over the objections of the DA's office. The charges stem from a fire at the Medina's home in Spring last summer that investigators suspect was intentionally started. The grand jury accused Francisca Medina of arson and Justice Medina of tampering with evidence. Copies of the indictment and of Yates' contempt petition against the grand jurors are attached below.

The challenge to Democrat Wendy Davis' right to run for state office is headed back to North Texas, and a challenge to LaRhona Torry of Houston is on its way home, too.

The Texas Supreme Court rejected it without prejudice, saying the firefighters who want her off the ballot should take their case to the 2nd Court of Appeals in Fort Worth and not to the state's highest civil court.

That means the case is still alive, but in front of a different set of judges. Davis resigned from the Fort Worth City Council to run against Republican Sen. Kim Brimer of Fort Worth. The firefighters, who share a political consultant with Brimer, say she's not eligible. For more, look at our report from last week.

The Supremes did the same thing with a case out of Houston, where the challenger to Democratic Rep. Garnet Coleman was knocked out for failing to designate a campaign treasurer before paying her filing fee. LaRhona Torry, also a Democrat, is appealing that. The Supremes sent her back to Houston with a similar ruling; Start in the local appellate courts instead of in Austin.

Nancy Fisher, chief of staff to House Speaker Tom Craddick, is leaving that job at the end of February. Fisher, a legislative aide turned lobbyist, became Craddick's legislative director when he became Speaker in 2003 and was named chief of staff (he initially went without someone in that position). There have been rumors of her departure — most of them wrong or at best premature — for more than a year. Craddick hasn't indicated who might replace her when she leaves next month. Early speculation centered on former Rep. Terral Smith, an Austin Republican who's been lobbying for several years. Craddick's office won't comment on that; Smith didn't immediately return our calls. Here's the official announcement from the Speaker's office:
Fisher announces she will be leaving Craddick's office (Austin) - Nancy Fisher, chief-of-staff to Speaker Tom Craddick (R - Midland), today announced that she will be leaving the Speaker's office. "It has been an honor to work with the Speaker in this capacity for the past five years," Fisher said. "I appreciate the trust he placed in me, and the opportunity to play a small role in bringing historic changes in public policy. While I will greatly miss working for the Speaker, the time has come for me to take some time off and pursue outside opportunities." Fisher joined Craddick's office in 2003 when he was elected Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives. She initially acted as the legislative director and was then promoted to chief-of-staff in 2005. "Nancy has done an excellent job as my top advisor," Speaker Craddick said. "Nadine and I wish her all the best in this next chapter of her life, and we are incredibly grateful for her service and commitment to us." Fisher will be leaving the Speaker's office at the end of February.

He announced he won't run, but San Antonio lawyer Rene Barrientos didn't say it in time to get off the ballot. He won't campaign against Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, but he'll be on the ballot and voters will have a choice. Elsewhere, Texas Democrats are in court to keep one candidate off the ballot and another one on it.

Barrientos, a Democrat, dropped out right after the filing deadline, saying he'd decided he wasn't willing to run the mean-and-nasty campaign his consultants outlined as the only way to beat the incumbent. But there's a state law that says candidates can't get off the ballot in the 62 days before an election. The primary's relatively early this year — March 4 — and that deadline coincided with the filing date. After that date, a filed candidate stays on, whether he's alive, convicted, eligible, or unwilling.

Something like this happened two years ago when Dr. Henry Boehm Jr. decided too late to take his name off the Democratic ballot in another Senate race. He didn't campaign, but beat the Democrat who wanted the job (by about 1.5 percentage points). After the primary, Boehm took his name off the ballot. The Democrats weren't allowed to replace him, and Glenn Hegar Jr., a Republican, went on to beat the Libertarian in the race and become a new state senator.

Barrientos wasn't available for comment. Zaffirini says she'll just do what she was going to do anyway: "As far as I'm concerned, his name is on the ballot, and my campaign will continue. Our advertising is produced, our team is in place, and we're conducting business as usual."

• Texas Democrats won one lawsuit keeping a candidate off the ballot and are involved in another legal action to keep a candidate on board. Presidential contender Dennis Kucinich went to court over an oath the state's Democrats require of their presidential candidates; they have to agree to support the party nominee even if they lose. Kucinich wouldn't sign that "loyalty oath," but a federal judge in Austin says it's legal. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declined to take the case, so the Ohio Democrat has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to have a look.

Meanwhile, the Texas Democratic Party is asking a Midland judge to affirm Midland Democrat Bill Dingus' right to run against House Speaker Tom Craddick, R-Midland. Republicans in West Texas have raised questions about whether Dingus resigned from the Midland City Council in a way that allows him to run. The Democrats say he did and want a court to put the Good Housekeeping Seal on their version.

A Fort Worth Appeals court will decide whether Wendy Davis is eligible to run for Texas Senate.

The Democrat and former city councilwoman is running against Sen. Kim Brimer, R-Fort Worth. But a group of firefighters whose association shares a political consultant with Brimer has challenged her eligibility, saying she was still officially a councilmember when she filed for the state office and is therefore ineligible.

The Second Court of Appeals in Fort Worth agreed to hear the case next Wednesday. Davis wasn't immediately available for comment.

A copy of the court order is available here.

Mark Brown, the director of the legal division at the Texas Legislative Council, is retiring at the end of February. TLC's the Legislature's in-house law firm, and he's one of the most respected folks over there, leading a staff of 46 attorneys. He also served as the agency's interim director before the current director, Milton Rister, was hired. Brown's replacement hasn't been named.

Former Rep. Wilhelmina Delco, D-Austin, is House Speaker Tom Craddick's newest appointee to the Texas Ethics Commission. She served 20 years in the House — more than half of them as head of the Higher Education Committee — and was Speaker Pro Tempore for two years.

Former Rep. Joe Nixon signed on as a senior fellow in the Center for Economic Freedom at the Austin-based Texas Public Policy Foundation. That's an addition to — not a replacement of — his Houston law practice.

TPPF also started a new Center for Natural Resources. It'll be directed by Kathleen Hartnett White, late of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, who'll join the foundation's staff.

Kinnan Golemon is opening his own environmental law and regulation practice after 34 years at Austin-based Brown McCarroll. But he'll keep his offices there and continue to work for some of the same clients he's been working for.

Terri Burke, the former editor of the Abilene Reporter-News and a reporter and/or editor at a number of other papers, is the new executive director of the ACLU of Texas. she's succeeding Will Harrell, who left last year to become the ombudsman at the Texas Youth Commission.

The Texas Council of Community MHMR Centers named Danette Castle of Lubbock their executive director. She was CEO of the Lubbock Regional MHMR Center.

Mike Grable is ERCOT's new vice president, general counsel, and corporate secretary. He's been the assistant general counsel there and worked at the state's Public Utility Commission before that.

Deaths: Betty Bivins Lovell, mother of former Sen. Teel Bivins, R-Amarillo. She was 88.

Dennis Kucinich won't be on the Democratic primary ballot in Texas. The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear his case against the state party's "loyalty oath."Kucinich refused to swear he'd vote for the Party's nominee in November, a condition the Texas Democratic Party puts on its presidential candidates. It's a symbolic thing, since nobody — including candidates for president — has to share their actual ballot to prove how they voted. But Kucinich refused on principle. The party then turned him away and a federal judge in Austin ruled that the Democrats were within their rights. The Ohio congressman appealed all the way up to the Supremes, but they refused, without comment, to hear his complaint.

Quotes of the Week

Yeakel, Reed, Flores, White, Haggerty, Pachon, Bushell, and Smith

Federal Judge Lee Yeakel of Austin, quoted by the Austin American-Statesman after he ruled against Dennis Kucinich's challenge to a loyalty oath required of Democratic Party presidential candidates in Texas: "It seems to me courts should intervene in the affairs of political parties sparingly. I don’t think courts should go out of their ways to inject themselves."

Bexar County DA Susan Reed, quoted in a Houston Chronicle story on Harris County DA Chuck Rosenthal: "All of us will make a mistake once in a while and do something stupid. But this was consistent."

Rep. Ismael "Kino" Flores, D-Palmview, in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, on whether he'd vote again for House Speaker Tom Craddick, R-Midland: "If we can elect a Democrat for speaker, I'll vote for him. I'm not sure we'll get there. But if we do, I'll be voting for the Democrat."

Houston Mayor Bill White, quoted in the Houston Chronicle on funding for a new professional soccer stadium: "It's not going to be done the way it was done with other stadiums, where the taxpayers picked up the tab. We're not going to do some special deal of giving a lot of money that could go to police or fire to a sports owner."

Rep. Pat Haggerty, R-El Paso, on his reelection race, in the El Paso Times: "I think it's going to be very ugly and very nasty. I've already warned my mother."

Harry Pachon, head of the Tomas Rivera Policy Institute at the University of Southern California, talking to the Los Angeles Times: "That's been a traditional way to approach the Latino vote in the Southwest. The candidate would come into town, say a couple of words in mangled Spanish, eat a taco, wear a sombrero. Times have changed."

Victor Bushell, a partner at Bushell, Sovak, Ozer & Gulmi LLP, in an article on worry in The Wall Street Journal: "I spend all day thinking of ways to gain an advantage over my adversaries, and I assume they're doing the same thing. If that was your job description, wouldn't you be worried?"

Smith County Sheriff J.B. Smith, telling the Tyler Morning Telegraph how he responded when People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals asked him to put a jailed man accused of cannibalism on a vegetarian diet: "I kind've said 'pfft' in a very nice way."