Governor, lately you've been pitching, twitching and puffing a lot of hot air about secession.
Texas is a real unique place all right and the Governor is a major contributor to its uniqueness.
Come on Governor, put your money where your mouth is. Just do it. Leave already. You can take all of your worshipers, i.e. secessionists, teabaggers, Birchers, birthers, racists and xenophobes with you.
Hit the road dude.
Leave, dude. Voters are the meanest old women you will have ever seen. You won't be packing any of our money with you when you leave, either.
But you can, Sir, help yourself to all of the creationism, witchcraft and voodoo science text books that you and your supporters put in our schools in yet another endless crusade of right wing conservative efforts to dumb down the children of Texas.
I'm sure you all will find a cozy place to establish a new Republic, Governor. Hell, Sir, you could name your new territory the New Republic of Teabagistan, Secessistan or Birchistan in honor of your strongest supporters. Below is a little reminder to help you sort out the guiding principles of your new Republic.
This would be a perfect time for you to leave Governor. After all, Bill White, Houston's former and very popular mayor raised $2.2 million last month. So far he has over $9 mil in his war chest.
It seems that we voters need to hold or obtain doctorate degrees in psychology or medical degrees in psychiatry to understand the twisted and dysfunctional behavior emanating from our fearless Republican leaders in Washington and Austin.
Both Senators Cornyn and Hutchison have trashed the stimulus bill (The American Reinvestment and Recovery Act,) railing against its waste and its abysmal failure to deliver cash infusions to our state while they extol the bill's virtues at the very same time. Maybe a little bird told the Senators that the recovery act they've been attacking for all kinds of reasons is actually a success.
To further complicate the Senators' stand on the stimulus package that both hate but love, John Cornyn has begged the EPA to deliver bucks for clean diesel projects in San Antonio and Houston.
Kay Bailey Hutchison praised the Port of Houston for its clean air strategy. Residents of the area may have a different definition of "clean air."
The Wall St. Journal obtained letters written by stimulus bashing Republicans who solicited federal recovery money for their states. When the funding is awarded the Republicans that hate the stimulus bill in Washington take credit for it in their home districts.
The Wall St. Journal included letters submitted by Senators Cornyn and Hutchison.
The Environmental Protection Agency received two letters from Sen. John Cornyn of Texas asking for consideration of grants for clean diesel projects in San Antonio and Houston. Mr. Cornyn is the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
One of the letters was signed jointly with Republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, also of Texas. The letter said that the Port of Houston Authority "has informed me of the positive impact this grant will have in the region by serving as a foundation for PHA's Clean Air Strategy Plan, creating jobs, and significantly reducing diesel emissions." Houston received millions of dollars in diesel funding.
Meanwhile, outside the Washington D.C. beltway bubble, our revered Texas Governor Rick Perry issued a fatwa against the EPA.
Gov. Rick Perry announced today Texas would legally challenge the Environmental Protection Agency's finding that carbon dioxide and other gases linked to global warming endanger the public's health and welfare.
The federal agency issued the finding in December in an attempt to regulate the heat-trapping gases under the Clean Air Act.
Texas is the nation's leading emitter of carbon dioxide, releasing enough each year that the state would rank seventh worldwide if it were a country.
The Senators and Rick Perry's behavior would be downright comical and would make great material for a new series of Homer Simpson cartoons or a Three Stooges redux except that the consequences of their hypocritical stupidity is downright dangerous to our financial security.
With this kind of leadership in power, I think we can safely assume
Texas we have a huge problem. If we don't fix it we are screwed.
Now is the time to throw at least one of the bums out. By 2014 we may have a modicum of responsible and sane leadership in both Austin and Washington.
It won't happen unless we Vote, Baby, Vote.
The polls opened yesterday.
Sadly, there is very bad news for a city that is located west of the Houston area. Sealy recently lost an Army contract that will result in 3,000 lost jobs. This is devastating for a small city in which the Army contractor, BAE Systems, is a major employer.
In late November and early December several progressive bloggers, including me revealed just how Texas fell victim to an impending and significant job loss thanks to do nothing, self-serving Texas lawmakers who are too busy palling around with fat cat sugar daddy donors to have given a rat's derriere about their lowly constituents.
Did the powers that be at BAE submit a renewal bid to retain the contract or did the company rely on its go to boys and girls in Washington to make it happen?
How come the Texas lawmakers in Austin and in Washington D.C. failed to notice that 3,000 jobs were about to be lost? What were they thinking? Were they thinking about Texas at all?
As Phillip Martin over at The Burnt Orange Report (cited above) reports:
Today, McCaul is blaming Washington and the Obama administration. However, there was no effective effort to save it by McCaul, Senator Hutchison, or Governor Rick Perry. It was not until after the contract was announced that any of the state's Republican elected officials began to work on saving the contract -- something they have now failed to do, and are now quickly trying to point fingers at President Obama to avoid accepting the responsibility of their failures.
John Cornyn's threat to block the confirmation of a top Army acquisition official is not only too little and too late, but the American people are fed up with the never ending Republican blocks and obstruction that are paralyzing our federal government. Go ahead Senator, block the acquisition guy and show us how much you support our troops and the two wars that you voted for.
BAE and Texas politicians should have known, given today's economy and the devastation in the Midwestern region of the country, considering the number of closed factories, the contract renewal in Sealy would have been almost a literal battle to the death. Either all involved did not have the fortitude for such a fight. Or perhaps all grew too arrogant and complacent after decades of a Republican majority in both Texas and in the U.S. Congress.
Well, folks it looks like our governor is playing more political tricks and pulling more dictatorial type stunts to save his derriere. The Houston Chronicle's Rick Casey discloses that Governor Perry's rationale for nixing Texas participation in the federal educational initiative, the Race to the Top program, must be a state secret.
Before being ordered by Gov. Rick Perry not to compete for a chunk of the $4.3 billion "Race to the Top" federal grants for public schools, staffers at the Texas Education Agency had put in more than 800 hours preparing an application.
Inquiring minds, including my colleague Ericka Mellon, wanted to look at what our employees had proposed and filed requests for copies of the draft under the Texas Public Information Act.
But TEA Commissioner Robert Scott, a Perry loyalist, ordered agency attorneys to appeal to the attorney general, asking that the work be declared a state secret.
Governor Perry shows complete disrespect for our state's journalists, teachers, students and the people of Texas. Why is his motivation a secret? Did some fundamentalist, anti-education sugar daddy or mommy bribe him? Or did he/she/it threaten to withdraw support if Perry approved our participation the Race to the Top Program? Why does Perry not want federal dollars invested in our public schools in order to strengthen standards and give our children a crack at a better education? As we know and as Republican lawmakers like to forget, Texas schools rank second to last nationwide.
It seems to me that under Governor Perry's watch Texas schools have been competing in a marathon called Race to the Bottom.
On Sunday Texas had the honor to be graced by the frequent flashing of pearly whites, volumes of hair, razzle, dazzle, sizzle and sazzle at a Perry campaign pep rally near Houston. Aside from memorized talking point attacks, a boatload of flash and glittering glamor, lots of hair all around and awesome wardrobes, Rick and Sarah had little of substance to offer their crowd.
All hats, all hair, no cattle.
Rick Perry and Sarah Palin fired up their base with the usual right wing rhetoric and campaign jingles. Approximately 1100 hard right conservatives comprised mostly of teabaggers, (including the group's neo-Nazis and white supremists)secessionists, racists, bigots and xenophobes cheered Mr. Good Hair and the Quitter on Twitter's pep rally.
Rick and Sarah spent much of their time attacking, attacking and well, more attacking. I guess neither have a plan to bring new jobs to Texas, nor are they interested in investing in alternative green sources of energy. The Quitter on Twitter remains locked in a 20th century energy framework, reciting her old drill baby drill campaign pledge. Perry offered no plan to bring down the drop out rate in Texas schools. Nor did he talk about the fatal flaws of the Texas criminal justice system. He failed to mention the transportation challenges that plague our state given the broken roads, the lack of viable public transportation and our state's crumbling infrastructure.
Out of touch do nothing government believers, like Rick and Sarah, who rely on fat cats to deliver the goods, don't get what happens when their sugar daddy fat cats fail to, thanks to greed, deliver the goods to the people.
Both Perry and Palin ignored state wide issues and both targeted their guns away from their own failures as governors while pointing at a convenient and predictable target.
Blame Washington DC for everything.
Meanwhile, back at the Perry farm in Texas and in the snow laden outpost called Wasilla, Alaska, federal funding has been greeted with both great sighs of relief and cheers.
But narcissists like Rick and Sarah don't care much about the people of Texas or Alaska, for it is all about them. For both, their main concern is:
What works best for me?
Kay Bailey Hutchison is no better. She said it is time to leave the Senate and yet she is still there. Her husband and children live in Texas and she is here every Thursday through Tuesday. Senator Hutchison is earning a tax payer funded six figure salary with health insurance benefits, while working two and a half days on behalf of Texas.
Will the Gentleman from News Corp, the Distinguished Senator from Saudi Arabia please yield to the Gentle Lady from Citigroup, the Senator from Russia? The Gentleman from Goldman Sachs, the Distinguished Senator from the great land of Dubai may have ten minutes.
By the way, Prince Al-Waleed, a grandson of the King of Saudi Arabia and the largest individual shareholder in Citigroup and second biggest shareholder in News Corp (Murdock's FOX "News") doesn't like Obama's tax on the banks. Nor does he think much of health care reform or the movie Avatar. Of course Saudi Arabia, a highly repressive country, is one comprised of the very rich and the very poor. For every Prince Al-Waleed there are thousands of impoverished Saudis. The King may wish to ask himself why terrorism has become a successful means of employment in his country.
Apparently Senator John Cornyn and Rick Perry have absolutely no problem with the recent SOTUS decision in which corporations can contribute unlimited amounts of money to political campaigns. In an interview with FOX "News" yesterday, Senator Cornyn said everyone is making too big a deal about this decision.
WALLACE: And finally - and we've only got about 30 seconds left - what's the practical effect of the Supreme Court ruling this week saying that corporations can now openly support and spend money, openly supporting or opposing candidates? Do you expect a rush of corporate cash into the campaign?
CORNYN: No, I don't. I think it's been overstated, the impact. Frankly, there's been an explosion of money into federal races for public office since - well, in the last 10 years, since campaign finance reform.
It hadn't done anything to stop the flow of money in. What it's done is make it less transparent and less accountable. President Obama spent more money in his campaign in 2008 than Senator Kerry and President Bush did in 2004 combined.
So what we need is transparency. We need contemporaneous reporting on the Internet. I think that's the kind of accountability that we need.
WALLACE: Senator Cornyn, thank you. Thanks for coming in today. And it's always a pleasure to see you, sir.
CORNYN: Thanks, Chris.
Overstated? I guess the Senator forgot that most of our corporations are multi-national now and thereby include hundreds if not thousands of foreign shareholders who have a lot of financial clout. Foreign investors like Prince Al-Waleed could very likely donate unimaginable amounts of cash through the back door, i.e. through the armies of lobbying firms that are already crawling all over Washington D.C. In fact, lobbying firms will very likely now become the biggest employer in the Washington, D.C. area, after the federal government.
Senator Cornyn also needs to be reminded that President Obama's ability to raise extraordinary amounts of cash is in no small part due to an immensely effective and powerful electronic grass roots fund raising tool. Through this mechanism the Obama campaign could easily raise vasts amounts from tiny donations ranging from $5.00 to $50.00. There were no small number of "money bombs" raised over at Daily Kos when progressive bloggers would feel the need to show then candidate Obama support especially through the media circuses of Reverend Wright and Bill Ayers. In fact, when progressive grass roots bloggers and activists would get fed up with media bias, John McCain or Sarah Palin we would implement electronic fund raising drives.
Well, I guess those days are over since the SCOTUS threw we little ol' grass roots activists and average Janes and Joes of America into a tank pervaded with with gigantic flesh eating sharks. Big John will tell us this is just fine and we should not worry.
I guess the Senator would love nothing better than to let Goldman-Sachs retaliate against President Obama's efforts to tax the banks, or for health insurance companies to crush the President in 2012 if he should sign the health care reform bill.
Imagine how many congressmen Goldman Sachs could make quake if it quietly let it be known it had decided to divert just 10 percent of the $16.2 billion in employee bonuses it has budgeted this year to retaliate against any of them who supported Obama's proposed reforms.
Who would have thought? In its true and hypocritical form The Party of No and Obstruction opposes President Obama's proposed fees on banks.
Dick Cheney must be hard at work at that printing press in his undisclosed basement.
Prominent Republicans are coming out in opposition to President Barack Obama's proposal for a $90-billion fee on large banks that took bailout money, a move that political observers say could force the GOP to choose between their traditional anti-tax position and populist anger over the bailout.
On Thursday, GOP Chairman Michael Steele declared that the bank fee -- which would be levied only on banks that took bailout money and have more than $50 billion in assets -- is "another tax on the American public."
The GOP is standing by fat cat the banker in yet another effort to oppose President Obama. Republicans demonstrate time and time again that they are willing to put politics ahead of working on solutions to solve the daunting challenges that we face on local, state and national levels.
Rick Perry has turned down the federal government's Race to the Top program in which Texas could have entered into a competition to bring up to $700 million home to improve our schools.
The Race to the Top Program is part of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act. The purpose of this initiative is not only to improve our state's K-12 schools but it also promises to save thousands of jobs.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) provides approximately $100 billion for education, creating a historic opportunity to save hundreds of thousands of jobs, support states and school districts, and advance reforms and improvements that will create long-lasting results for our students and our nation including early learning, K-12, and post-secondary education.
Rick Perry, however, has decided Texas is better off by continuing its race to the bottom.
Gov. Rick Perry must be worried that the citizens of Texas are going to lose their minds and turn state government over to the Democrats.
This week on the campaign stump, he proposed two state constitutional amendments based on the notion that we can't afford democracy.
One is that any state tax increase would require a two-thirds vote of the Legislature.
Functionally this is already the case in the Senate, where everything but voter ID bills needs a two-thirds majority, but apparently Perry is concerned because Texas two years ago elected an uncomfortable number of Democrats and tossed autocratic Speaker Tom Craddick in favor of a speaker who will actually work with said Democrats.
Maybe Perry has become a great admirer of California, where a two-thirds requirement for passing a budget led to the state paying its bills with IOUs while the Legislature bickered and showboated.
Casey is spot on where California's woes are concerned. The state requires a two-thirds majority in order to pass tax increases. Of course since Republicans have an unholy aversion to taxes it is all but impossible to implement tax increases. Consequently schools go without funding and teachers lose their jobs. Class sizes increase and the quality of education thereby decreases. College professors in the University of California system had to take 8% cuts in salaries. Tuition and fees have increased to the point that it is very difficult for working and middle class students to afford a four year college education. There is no money to fix roads and bridges. The state's infrastructure will take a serious nose dive.
Democratic candidate for Texas Attorney General Barbara Radnofsky blasts Republican AG Abbott for challenging a law that does not exist. In her New Year's Eve press release Radnofsky wrote:
The Texas Attorney General is wrong on the law of his challenge of the senate version of the health care bill. He is wasting taxpayer resources on a loser challenge.
Attorney General Abbott challenges the constitutionality of a law that does not exist, promising to use the office of the Texas Attorney General to "explore all legal options" to dismantle federal legislation. Ironically, Texas would receive subsidies and benefits of greater magnitude than most of the nation, in the $7.5 to 10 billion range.
There they go again. Not only are Republicans willing to burn precious taxpayer resources on a frivolous lawsuit that has no legal basis, but they are also hell bent on thumbing their noses at extraordinary financial subsidies and benefits for Texans. Texas, as we well know, has the highest number of uninsured. Folks don't have health care insurance because they can't afford it or they have pre-existing conditions that no insurance company will cover. The federal health care reform bill would make health insurance more affordable and it would prevent insurance companies from denying coverage for pre-existing conditions. It would also put a stop to insurance companies that cut patients loose when their health care needs become too costly.
These benefits and consumer protections are what Abbott wants to kill. Abbott, like all Texas Republicans is more concerned about the interests of insurance companies than he is the people of Texas. It should also be noted that the Party that rails 24/7/365 against trial lawyers and frivilous lawsuits has no problem with either when Republican lawmakers are the ones doing the suing.
A couple of weeks ago I posted a piece about BAE Systems in Sealy and its recently lost federal contract. I had reported on an article that had been written in the Houston Chronicle about this issue.
The Pentagon's decision to shift the production of Army trucks from Texas to Wisconsin after 17 years caught Texas' elected officials by surprise, raising questions about overconfidence, a loss of political clout and the impact of economic incentives provided to the winning company by Wisconsin's Democratic governor.
Texas Republican Gov. Rick Perry and the 34-member Senate-House delegation are rallying to salvage a deal for BAE Systems that could be worth $2.6 billion and sustain 10,000 direct and indirect jobs around the sprawling truck manufacturing plant in Sealy.
Houston's Channel 13 News recently reported on the grim outcome for Sealy as well.
PDiddie over at Brains and Eggs had also written about the Sealy situation on November 27.
McCaul failed to enlist Democrats in Texas' congressional delegation such as Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Waco, to help protect the contract in a Democratic administration, says Matt Angle, a longtime Democratic operative who heads the political action committee known as the Lone Star Project.
On Tuesday, Phillip Martin over at The Burnt Orange Report wrote that Rep. Michael McCaul (TX-10) had fumbled away over 3,000 jobs in his district. The Lone Star Project revealed that indeed, McCaul had failed to advocate on behalf of BAE Systems and the folks in Sealy.
An official letter from the Department of Defense obtained by the Lone Star Project states that no record exists of Michael McCaul contacting the Department of Defense during the contract review process to advocate for BAE systems or to request fair consideration that the contract be renewed. (Source: DOD Freedom of Information Act Request, 10/14/2009 ) Additional research shows that McCaul also failed to take other basic steps Members of Congress normally take when trying to win support from their colleagues to protect District jobs.
McCaul, of course, will take no responsibility for his failure to act on behalf of BAE Systems.
The Chronicle had also disclosed that Governor Rick Perry, U.S. House Rep. Michael McCaul and top aides for Senators Cornyn and Hutchison said they felt sucker punched and blind sided by Sealy's lost federal contract.
One congressional aide said Texas lawmakers should have been more alert to the possibility of losing a contract that Oshkosh had tried to win in 2001. "It just wasn't on anybody's radar," the aide said.
Sucker punched and blind sided?!
Wait a minute. These lawmakers who had completely forgotten about the serious and potential job loss in their state felt sucker punched and blind sided? Please.
If anyone has been sucker punched and blind sided it is the employees of BAE System and the folks in Sealy who will know a new world of hurt if the plant closes.
As an administrator for a scientific laboratory at an academic institution that is awarded a great number of federal grants, I can tell you that if BAE System's executives, Rick Perry, Michael McCaul, John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison forgot about the potential for a 10,000 job loss in Texas, all are grossly and hopelessly negligent.
The Republican Party threw the American people under a high speed train fast tracked straight to hell.
Again.
Predictably Republicans made a pact with yet another devil. This time the GOP sold its and our souls, too, to the hottest and most irresponsible devil in hell.
Let me introduce the banking devil for whom we emptied our U.S. Treasury in an extraordinary effort to save the American economy.
Tragically the Bush Administration and its rubber stamping Republicans in Congress failed to set up any rules, enforcement mechanisms, proposals for accountability, transparency or pay back benchmarks before it allowed the devil to empty our national piggy bank. Sure, guys, just back up your 18 wheeler big mother trucks to the U.S. Treasury and we will help y'all load the bags of taxpayer cash.
Clearly the GOP is totally on board with the banker devil run lawless casinos on Wall St. The devil is gambling with our money that includes our savings accounts, investment portfolios, retirement savings and bail out taxpayer dollars. The GOP also gave its blessing to a continuation of the banks extensive abusive consumer practices. Usury level interests rates and fees anyone? Worse, the GOP obviously does not have a problem with the obscene Wall St. bonuses, earned on the backs of our savings accounts, portfolio investments, not to mention again, the sucker U.S. taxpayer bucks, thank you.
I guess the sold-out Republicans are also supportive of the banks refusal to lend money to small businesses and consumers because it is more profitable for banks to gamble with our money instead.
Hell, at least we know for certain that the Republicans are completely on board with obstructing our nation's economic recovery. If small businesses cannot get jump started with an influx of cash, it cannot do business. It cannot meet its inventory needs nor can it make payroll. If mortgages cannot be re-negotiated, bankrupted homeowners cannot hold on to their homes. Consumers cannot purchase new homes or cars if we cannot borrow money, either. Nor can we improve or make substantial repairs to our homes if the banks won't lend home equity funding.
Republicans don't care. They simply do not care about the people.
Yesterday Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) informed the Huffington Post that the GOP signed a political pact with the banks to kill off regulatory reform measures.
The allegation of a quid pro quo was based on an email that Durbin received last spring after his amendment to allow judges to modify mortgages for homeowners who enter bankruptcy was defeated on the Senate floor. During a discussion to promote publicly-financed elections on Friday, the Illinois Democrat relayed that, shortly after the defeat of his "cram-down" amendment, a "banker friend" forwarded him the note from Tanya Wheeless, president & CEO of Arizona Bankers Association.
Unfortunately for Texas, the Pentagon decided to shift an Army truck building contract from here to Wisconsin. Since 1991, BAE Systems in Sealy has been manufacturing trucks for the U.S. Army.
According to the Houston Chronicle Republican lawmakers and BAE officials were completely unaware of the threat posed by our competitors in Wisconsin.
The Pentagon's decision to shift the production of Army trucks from Texas to Wisconsin after 17 years caught Texas' elected officials by surprise, raising questions about overconfidence, a loss of political clout and the impact of economic incentives provided to the winning company by Wisconsin's Democratic governor.
Texas Republican Gov. Rick Perry and the 34-member Senate-House delegation are rallying to salvage a deal for BAE Systems that could be worth $2.6 billion and sustain 10,000 direct and indirect jobs around the sprawling truck manufacturing plant in Sealy.
Good luck boys. It's kind of too late to salvage anything, including your humongous egos. If our esteemed Republican lawmakers hadn't been too busy lying to and scaring their constituents at teabagging hate fests this summer and fall, perhaps they would have time to think about the plant in Sealy. And what were those top executives at BAE Systems thinking given the tough times in which we now find ourselves? Companies and academic institutions are engaged in a near dual to the death competition for federal funding.
Unfortunately for Texas, the Pentagon decided to shift an Army truck building contract from here to Wisconsin. Since 1991, BAE Systems in Sealy has been manufacturing trucks for the U.S. Army.
According to the Houston Chronicle Republican lawmakers and BAE officials were completely unaware of the threat posed by our competitors in Wisconsin.
The Pentagon's decision to shift the production of Army trucks from Texas to Wisconsin after 17 years caught Texas' elected officials by surprise, raising questions about overconfidence, a loss of political clout and the impact of economic incentives provided to the winning company by Wisconsin's Democratic governor.
Texas Republican Gov. Rick Perry and the 34-member Senate-House delegation are rallying to salvage a deal for BAE Systems that could be worth $2.6 billion and sustain 10,000 direct and indirect jobs around the sprawling truck manufacturing plant in Sealy.
Good luck boys. It's kind of too late to salvage anything, including your humongous egos. If our esteemed Republican lawmakers hadn't been too busy lying to and scaring their constituents at teabagging hate fests this summer and fall, perhaps they would have time to think about the plant in Sealy. And what were those top executives at BAE Systems thinking given the tough times in which we now find ourselves? Companies and academic institutions are engaged in a near dual to the death competition for federal funding.
Of course there is not a civil war brewing in the Republican Party. Someone just made it up. But a leading conservative has recently called the non-civil non-war an impending bloodbath.
After the havoc the Republican Party and its newly formed teabagger faction have wreaked on this country from Ronald Reagan to George H.W. Bush and culminating with the horror of George W. Bush and his neocon policies, a bloodbath sounds just fine by me. Indeed, one is long overdue.
According to yesterday's Houston Chronicle, the teabaggers in Texas are fed up and want to throw all of the bums out. In Texas, the bums happen to be Republicans.
Even Rick Perry is a target of this group because he apparently is not conservative enough.
While it's too early to determine if the Tea Party movement will prove to be a durable political force, its candidates could prove a costly and unwanted distraction for establishment Republicans who would rather be aiming their fire at Democrats. Case in point: the GOP race for governor, where Tea Party ally Debra Medina of Wharton has announced her candidacy for the Republican nomination against incumbent Gov. Rick Perry and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, whom she dismisses derisively as "get-along-style politicians."
Over at Politico, another sighting of Rick Blowhard , demagogue.
Perry: Obama 'hell-bent' on socialism Texas GOP Gov. Rick Perry accused President Barack Obama on Wednesday of "punishing" Texas and being "hell-bent" on turning the United States into a socialist country.
Speaking at a luncheon for a Midland County Republican Women's group, Perry said that "this is an administration hell-bent toward taking American towards a socialist country. And we all don't need to be afraid to say that because that's what it is."
Of course, Perry has offered no proof I could find for this continuing bogus battle cry. But wait , there is more!
Obama is punishing Texas by dumping illegal aliens in South Texas:
Despite the fact that Texas boasts the highest number of uninsured residents, all Texas Republicans in the U.S. Congress voted against health care reform that would guarantee coverage for the vast majority of Texans.
All Republicans continue to spin health care industry manufactured talking point garbage about HCR.
Showing their lack of honesty and the courage to cope with much needed change in this crucial area, Rick Perry and Newt Gingrich, mired in the same ol' out-of-touch GOP talking point silly nonsense and everything disingenuous, actually had the nerve to co-author an editorial in the Washington Post that extolled the virtues of states taking charge of health care.
They used Texas, all places, as a shining example of the finest state run health care industry with choices for all.
Surely Rick and Newt are kidding. Surely they know they are insulting the intelligence of every Texan who knows better.
But, Rick and Newt don't really know that they are insulting our intelligence because they are completely out of touch with any reality that resides outside of their air tight bubble.
Texas, for example, has adopted approaches to controlling health-care costs while improving choice, advancing quality of care and expanding coverage. Consider the successful 2003 tort reform. Fewer frivolous lawsuits have attracted record numbers of doctors to the state as medical malpractice insurance premiums dropped by half. Christus Health, a large Catholic nonprofit system with a significant presence in Texas, spent about $100 million on liability defense payments in 2003. Last year, Christus spent $2.3 million on such payments. Much of that savings has gone into expanding health-care services in low-income neighborhoods.
Choice? Really? I didn't get a choice to choose anything other than that which is offered to me by my employer.
As we can see, it always comes down to those evil doing trial lawyers in Texas who might actually hold a robbing cheater accountable for stealing life from patients by denying the care that they need, deserve and pay for.
You might think Washington would be curious about plans to provide more low-income Texans with insurance, reduce expensive emergency-room visits for basic care and make it easier to buy into employer-sponsored insurance. Unfortunately, Washington has failed for 18 months to give Texas permission to use Medicaid dollars for these policies.
Silly boys, many small businesses cannot offer health care insurance b/c it is far too expensive.
Perry, of course, wants to steal money from the poor who are entitled to Medicaid and give it to his buddies in small business. Do you think for a minute small businesses would use the Medicaid bucks to insure their poorer employees in these dire times when banks will not lend them the money to increase inventories or meet payrolls? I kind of don't think so. At least not under the present conditions in which health care insurance coverage is off of the affordability charts.
Knowing what we know about Rick Perry, meet his Republican soul mates who voted against health care reform. And meet the few brave and principled Democrats who stepped up to answer the cries from their constituents. The picture below is not pretty.
Eugenia Willingham, mother of Cameron Todd Willingham, an innocent person executed by Texas, will lead the "10th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty" in Austin on October 24, 2009. The march and rally will include the delivery of a petition with thousands of signatures urging Governor Rick Perry and the State of Texas to acknowledge that the fire in the Cameron Todd Willingham case was not arson, therefore no crime was committed and on February 17, 2004 Texas executed an innocent man. The petition also urges Perry to suspend executions and appoint a balanced and independent commission to examine all aspects of the Texas death penalty system to determine what went wrong in the Willingham case and how to prevent the execution of innocent people. People can sign the petition at www.camerontoddwillingham.com.
The last request of Todd Willingham to his parents was "please don't ever stop fighting to vindicate me." U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in 2006 that in the modern judicial system there has not been "a single case-not one-in which it is clear that a person was executed for a crime he did not commit. If such an event had occurred in recent years, we would not have to hunt for it; the innocent's name would be shouted from the rooftops."
On Saturday Oct 24 in Austin, people from across Texas will gather and shout out that Todd Willingham was innocent to show the world and Rick Perry that there are people in Texas who are convinced that Todd was innocent and that executions in Texas should be stopped before another innocent person is executed.
The Houston Chronicle reported Sunday that former Texas Governor Mark White has said Texas needs to take a serious look at replacing the death penalty with life without parole. "There is a very strong case to be made for a review of our death penalty statutes and even look at the possibility of having life without parole so we don't look up one day and determined that we as the state of Texas have executed someone who is in fact innocent," said White.
Speakers and other confirmed attendees at the 10th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty will include two innocent, now-exonerated death row prisoners (Shujaa Graham and Curtis McCarty), Jeff Blackburn (Chief Counsel of the Innocence Project of Texas), Eugenia Willingham (mother of Todd Willingham), Jeanette Popp (a mother whose daughter was murdered but who asked the DA not to seek the death penalty), Elizabeth Gilbert (the penpal of Todd Willingham who first investigated and then advocated for his innocence), Walter Reaves (the last attorney for Todd Willingham, who fought for him through his execution and continues to fight to exonerate him), Terri Been whose brother Jeff Wood is on death row convicted under the Law of Parties even though he did not kill anyone, and Anna Terrell the mother of Reginald Blanton who is scheduled for execution in Texas on Oct 27 three days after the march, plus others to be announced.
Panel Discussion: Friday, October 23, the night before the march, there will be a panel discussion on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin at 7 PM with Elizabeth Gilbert (the penpal of Todd Willingham who first investigated and then advocated for his innocence), Shujaa Graham and Curtis McCarty, who will both speak about what it is like to be innocent and sentenced to death as they were. The panel is in the Sinclair Suite (room 3.128) of the Texas Student Union on Guadalupe Street.
Elizabeth Gilbert, Shujaa Graham and Curtis McCarty will be available for media interviews earlier in the day on Friday, Oct 23. Call Scott Cobb at 512-552-4743 to arrange an interview.
Schedule for the 10th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty, Saturday Oct 24 in Austin
1 PM - 2 PM Members of the press are invited to attend a press availability in a room inside the Capitol building. The room number will be announced. The purpose is to allow the media to ask questions and conduct interviews with the speakers listed below. (For the room number in the Capitol, call Scott Cobb at 512 552 4743 or check in the Speaker's Committee Room 2W.6)
2 PM Marchers start to gather at the Texas Capitol on the sidewalk by the South gate of the Capitol entrance on Congress Avenue at 11th Street
2:30 or 2:45 Start to march down Congress Ave to 6th Street and back to Capitol
3:00 or 3:15 Rally on the South Steps of the Texas Capitol with speakers mentioned above
The march is sponsored by many organizations, including Texas Moratorium Network, the Austin chapter of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement, Texas Students Against the Death Penalty, Texas Death Penalty Education and Resource Center, Kids Against the Death Penalty, Sister Helen Prejean, Journey of Hope ... From Violence to Healing, the Texas Civil Rights Project, Reprieve, Iranians for Peace and Justice, UT Campus Progress, Democrats for Life of Texas, S.H.A.P.E Community Center in Houston, the Dallas Peace Center, ALIVE Against the Death Penalty (Germany), Ensemble Contre la Peine de Mort (France) and many others.
For more information and the complete list of sponsors, visit www.MarchforAbolition.org or call Scott Cobb at 512-552-4743.
Governor Rick Perry must be blinded by arrogance to believe that he could actually shut down and cover up an investigation and no one would notice. A politician would also have to be completely overcome by an over sized ego to do so during a tough primary contest.
Last night on MSNBC's Hardball, Chris Matthews interviewed Samuel Bassett, former Texas Forensic Science Commission Officer about the Todd Willingham case.
OK so Perry did not like where this investigation was going and so, as only a dictator would do, he shut it down. And now we also know where the fake, self-serving "moderate" Kay Bailey Hutchison stands on barbaric medieval practices. We already know where she stands on ginned up wars and a deregulated Wall St. KBH voted with W. over 90% of the time. Princess Sparkle Pony may have made a brilliant tactical political move, at least according to Slater, but she also revealed her true colors as anything but moderate.
Earth to Perry: as hard as you spin, rail and cry, the execution of an innocent man on your watch ain't going away. And Kay, hell will freeze over before this liberal would ever in her dreams vote for the likes of you. You squarely belong in the deather box right there along with Dictator Perry and your beloved W. who is responsible for the deaths of over 100,000 Iraqis. For? Please do remind us.
Scott Cobb over at The Burnt Orange Report has been providing exhaustive and outstanding coverage of this issue. Please click on the link to see how you can get involved with ongoing efforts to abolish the death penalty. Now that we know Texas has executed an innocent man, never has the case been stronger to eliminate this barbaric medieval practice.
This morning in the Houston Chronicle, Lisa Falkenberg wrote a sobering commentary about Rick Perry and the Todd Willingham execution.
According to today's Houston Chronicle Perry received an arson report from an expert in 2004 but he won't reveal if he read it before Todd Willingham was executed.
In a letter sent Feb. 14, three days before Willingham was scheduled to die, Perry had been asked to postpone the execution. The condemned man's attorney argued that the newly obtained expert evidence showed Willingham had not set the house fire that killed his daughters, 2-year-old Amber and 1-year-old twins Karmon and Kameron, two days before Christmas in 1991.
On Feb. 17, the day of the execution, Perry's office got the five-page faxed report at 4:52 p.m., according to documents the Houston Chronicle obtained in response to a public records request.
But it's unclear from the records whether he read it that day. Perry's office has declined to release any of his or his staff's comments or analysis of the reprieve request.
A statement from Perry spokesman Chris Cutrone, sent to the Chronicle late Friday, said that "given the brevity of (the) report and the general counsel's familiarity with all the other facts in the case, there was ample time for the general counsel to read and analyze the report and to brief the governor on its content."
A few minutes after 5 p.m., defense lawyer Walter M. Reaves Jr. said he received word that the governor would not intervene. At 6:20 p.m. Willingham was executed after declaring: "I am an innocent man, convicted of a crime I did not commit."
In the past, as recently as during George W. Bush's term, gubernatorial reviews were made public. Rick Perry, however, does not believe any of his or his staff reviews should be.
A Forensic Science Commission was about to disclose a report that seriously questions the arson evidence in the Willingham case. But Perry had immediately fired three of the Commision's members, including the Chairman. The meeting at which the report would have been revealed was canceled.
