Category Archives: State news

State news

Lt. Gov. declares war on cities

Dan Patrick has gone to “war” with city governments.

Think of that for a moment. The Texas lieutenant governor blames city governments for all the problems afflicting the nation. The Republican official says, moreover, that Democratic municipal leaders are to blame for those urban problems.

Huh? Is this loudmouth suggesting that cities’ problems are exclusive to urban areas? Does he mean to suggest that rural America — and that includes Texas, of course — is immune from those maladies?

Good grief, dude!

Patrick made that declaration on Fox Business News. He all but admitted that he launched the attack for partisan purposes. He wants to lay the blame at Democrats’ feet and wants to protect Republican officeholders from criticism.

Nice try, big fella. It ain’t gonna work.

Patrick is getting some push back, of course, from city leaders. They are reminding the lieutenant governor that rural Americans suffer precisely the same problems as urban Americans: drug abuse, gun violence, sexual crimes, unwanted pregnancies, alcohol abuse … do I need to go on?

Patrick’s attack on urban Texas and the rest of the nation ignores the reality that most cities (in Texas anyway) elect their governing councils on non-partisan ballots. Mayors and city council members as a rule do not run as Democrats or Republicans. They are elected by voters on matters that next to nothing to do with party affiliation.

Lt. Gov. Patrick has decided to make it a partisan battle.

As if we don’t have enough of them already!

State news

‘Bathroom Bill’ on life support? Pull the plug!

Texas’s so-called “Bathroom Bill” is wallowing in the Texas House of Representatives.

Some lawmakers have said the bill is on “life support.” It’s not likely to get to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk for his signature.

To which I offer a hearty “hurrah!”

The Texas Legislature has eight days to go before adjourning its special session. The Senate has sent a bushel bucket of bills to the House. One of them is that damn Bathroom Bill, which requires individuals to use public restrooms commensurate with the gender listed on their birth certificate. The bill discriminates against transgender individuals. It is a patently ridiculous piece of legislation.

Legislative Republicans say it’s intent is to protect women and girls from male sexual predators who enter their restrooms disguised as women. Police chiefs around the state say that rationale is utter hogwash, that they have no reports of that kind of sexual assault.

Texas House Speaker Joe Straus opposes it. Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick supports it. The bill is one of many such bills that might end up in the trash can when the Legislature gavels the special session to a close.

If the governor intends to bring legislators back to Austin to finish their work, my sincere hope is that he reduces the legislative call by at least one measure: that would be the Bathroom Bill.

As the Texas Tribune reports: “House State Affairs Chairman Byron Cook, R-Corsicana, said Tuesday he will not give the ‘bathroom bill’ a hearing in his committee — and the measure’s author, state Rep. Ron Simmons, said it would be difficult to amend the bill as written to any other legislation moving through the chamber.”

Here is the Texas Tribune story.

It looks to me as though it’s time to pull the plug on the Bathroom Bill and concentrate on issues that really matter to all Texans.

local news, political news, State news

Welcome back, Beto!

I’m getting a little ahead of myself, but Beto O’Rourke is making himself quite at home in what might be considered “enemy territory.”

O’Rourke is the Democratic member of Congress who wants to succeed Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz at the end of next year.

He keeps coming back to the Texas Panhandle. He’ll be here Tuesday, conducting a town hall meeting beginning at 6:30 p.m. at Austin Middle School in Amarillo.

What’s the deal? O’Rourke represents an El Paso district in Congress. He’s got a Democratic Party primary yet to win. He has returned back home to Texas during the August recess to resume his full-time campaign for the Senate seat occupied by Cruz.

O’Rourke has developed quite a fan following among local Democrats — yes, there are actually living, breathing Democrats in the Panhandle. They can’t get enough of this young man.

I’m curious about a couple of things regarding Rep. O’Rourke.

First, how much time is he going to spend mining a limited number of Democratic primary votes when there exist so many more in larger urban regions in, say, Dallas and Tarrant counties, in Bexar County, in Travis County, Harris County and, oh yes, El Paso County? Hey, it’s a big state and he’s got to get from place to place in a big hurry.

Second, if the young congressman gets nominated by Democrats next spring, will he come back to the Panhandle when the general election campaign kicks into high gear?

You and I know the rule of thumb regarding partisan Texas politics: Democrats generally have given up on the Panhandle, while Republicans take this region for granted. Just as national politicians campaigning for president focus on “battleground states” and ignore the trusty Red and Blue states, the same can be said for the intrastate campaign in Texas.

Do candidates for statewide office spend as much time in regions where the outcome is preordained? If I would run a Texas-wide campaign, I would focus my attention on those “swing regions” and seek to gin up turnout among my own partisans, be they Democrats in Austin and the Hill Country or Republicans in Amarillo and throughout West Texas.

I hope I’m wrong about Beto O’Rourke. Just maybe the young man will possess the energy and pizzazz to spend more general-election time far from his base of support.

You know, too, that I am no fan of the Cruz Missile.

Enough said.

education news, State news

Texas loses a consequential public figure

Mark White has died at the age of 77.

This man’s name might not ring as many bells as it once did, but his passing from the scene allows us to bid adieu to someone I consider to be one of Texas’s most consequential and important public servants.

White served as Texas governor for a term between 1983 and 1987. But what a term it turned out to be!

On his watch, the state enacted something that has become a blessing and a curse to educators, students and parents throughout the state. No pass-no play became law during Gov. White’s term.

Its genesis is a story all by itself.

Flash back for a moment to 1983. A Dallas billionaire, H. Ross Perot, popped off about the quality of Texas’s public education. He said the state was more interested in producing blue-chip football players than it was in producing blue-chip scholars.

That message got quickly to White’s desk, and to the governor himself. I’m just guessing about this, but my hunch is that Perot’s remarks angered the governor.

He called Perot out. He said, in effect, “OK, buster, if you think you can do a better job of crafting public education policy, then why don’t you lead a blue-ribbon commission to craft one? You can present it to the people of Texas, and then to the Legislature, and we’ll see if it works.”

Perot accepted the challenge. The Perot Commission met for weeks and came up with no pass-no play. Perot then took off on a barnstorming tour of the state to sell it. I arrived in Beaumont in the spring of 1984 and Perot came to Beaumont to make his pitch. Suffice to say that Perot could command a room in a major way.

White then summoned the Legislature to Austin for a special session and it enacted the no pass-no play legislation, known as House Bill 72. It changed fundamentally the way Texas educates its public school students.

Here’s the Texas Tribune story on White’s death.

HB 72 has taken many forms in the 30-plus years since its enactment. The framework remains essentially the same: students have to pass certain mandated tests in order to advance to the next grade and then to graduate from high school.

HB 72’s success has been a matter of intense debate ever since.

White is the last former Democratic governor to pass from the scene in Texas. “Mark’s impact on Texas will not soon be forgotten, and his legacy will live on through all that he achieved as Governor,” the current governor, Republican Greg Abbott, said in a written statement.

I’ll go along with former Lt. Gov. Bill Hobby, who served with Gov. White, and who described White as “one of Texas’s greatest governors.”

The very notion of enacting such a huge overhaul of the state’s public education system puts Gov. White on a pedestal he need not share with anyone.

local news, State news

Patrick misfires on municipal government critique

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Oh, that Dan Patrick. He needs a lesson in Civics 101.

The Texas lieutenant governor has now laid blame for “all the problems” facing America at the feet of mayors, the vast majority of whom he says are Democrats. Oh, did I mention that Patrick is a Republican? There. I just did.

Patrick told Fox Business News that Democrats have made such a mess of municipal government that cities’ woes are spilling over into other walks of life. He said citizens are happy with governments at the state level. The cities? They’ve gone to hell, thanks to Democrats, according to the sometimes-bombastic lieutenant governor.

Shall we offer the lesson now? Sure, why not?

I’ll concede that there are pockets of municipal dysfunction around the country that have occurred under the watch of mayors elected as Democrats. Is that an exclusively Democratic problem? No. It is not. Republican-run cities have fiscal and crime issues with which they must deal, too. They have potholes that need to be filled and street signals that need to function properly.

What’s more, many thousands of mayors and city council members are elected on non-partisan ballots. Partisanship has no place in municipal governance. Cities with home-rule charters are governed by those who set aside partisan differences and who seek to set policies based on community interests, not based on whether they have positive or negative impacts on certain neighborhoods based on partisan affiliation or leaning.

I’m reminded at this moment of an Amarillo mayoral race some years ago in which a challenger to then-Mayor Kel Seliger called on all “good Republicans” to elect her instead of the incumbent. Mary Alice Brittain sent out pamphlets imploring GOP voters to turn out that spring to oust the mayor.

I was working at the time as editorial page editor of the Amarillo Globe-News and we reminded our readers to turn their backs on the ignorant rants of that challenger, given that Amarillo is one of most Texas cities governed by non-partisan mayors and city council members.

Seliger won re-election that year by a huge margin; Brittain disappeared and hasn’t been seen or heard from since.

Dan Patrick is entitled to espouse his partisan bias. I understand he’s a faithful Republican officeholder. He’s got a tough job running the Texas Senate, which is meeting at the moment with the House of Representatives in a special session of the Legislature.

But, c’mon Dan! Knock off the broad-brush blame game against local government officials who are doing their best to cope with the problems facing every city in America regardless of party affiliation.

As the Texas Tribune reports: But “the fact that city elections are nonpartisan is one of the greatest things about city government,” said Bennett Sandlin, executive director of the Texas Municipal League. “We like to say that potholes aren’t Democratic or Republican… it costs the same amount regardless of ideology.” 

Patrick should know better. I fear he does not.

local news, State news

How does state enforce Bathroom Bill?

A friend and former colleagues poses a fascinating and pertinent observation about the Bathroom Bill that is pending in the Texas Legislature.

She writes: “So this bathroom bill thing. They say you will have to go to (the) restroom with the gender you were born. So, if a female changes into a male, he will have to go to women’s restroom. I can see women screaming ‘There’s a man in our bathroom.’ Go ahead and vote for your stupid bill so I can stand and watch all you horrified women when a man walks in.”

The Texas Senate has approved the bill and sent it to the House of Representatives. Indeed, the Legislature is meeting in special session, with the Bathroom Bill on its agenda of work to be completed. Gov. Greg Abbott included this monstrosity of a bill in a lengthy list of issues for the Legislature to ponder.

My friend wonders, as I do, about this bill’s enforceability.

If one is going to complete surgery that changes one’s sexual identity, how does the state enforce this law that requires folks to use restrooms in accordance with the gender noted on his or her birth certificate?

The Houston Chronicle reports that business executives are lining up against this bill: “Eleven additional top business executives, including leaders at iconic Texas firms like Neiman-Marcus and Baker Hughes, have joined the growing chorus of protests to kill the controversial bathroom bill.

“In a letter to Gov. Greg Abbott, who supports passage of the measure, the corporate officials warn ‘long-term economic harm’ they believe the passage of the ‘discriminatory’  legislation will bring and ask for Abbott’s  ‘leadership in keeping Texas open and welcoming to all.'”

Texas House Speaker Joe Straus has lined up against the bill. I’m unsure at this moment how the House is going to act, whether it will follow the speaker’s lead. I’m reminded of how a former Texas House speaker, Democrat Pete Laney of Hale Center, used to operate. He always sought to “let the will of the House” determine the fate of legislation.

Will that be Speaker Straus’s method of operation as the House takes up this issue?

Actually, I still believe this bill discriminates against transgender citizens.

I’ll leave it to a strong conservative U.S. senator, Orrin Hatch, to state what many of us believe. Sen. Hatch, in rejecting Donald Trump’s policy statement by tweet that bans transgender Americans from serving in the military, noted that transgender individuals don’t “choose” to change their sexual identity. “They are born that way,” he said.

The same argument ought to be leveled against this ridiculous legislation that awaits its fate in the Texas Legislature.

International news, national news, political news, State news

Rick Perry at Homeland Security? Interesting idea

Reports are surfacing that Energy Secretary Rick Perry is being considered for a major Cabinet shift within the Trump administration.

The Texas Tribune reports that Perry might move to the Homeland Security Department to become the new secretary there, replacing John Kelly, who’s taken the thankless job of White House chief of staff.

That the former Texas governor is under consideration for the Homeland Security job makes plenty of sense to me. I believe he could be a good fit in that post.

He served for 14 years as governor of Texas, which has the longest border with Mexico of all the states along our southern border. He understands the issue of border security as well as any leading politician.

As the Texas Tribune reports, though, a shift of this importance signals a dramatic — some would say unbelievable — evolution in the relationship between Gov. Perry and Donald J. Trump. Perry once campaigned for the presidency against Trump. Perry then called his fellow Republican a “cancer on conservatism.” Trump ridiculed Perry after the former governor started wearing eyeglasses, suggesting Perry did so only to make himself look smarter.

All that changed, though, after Trump’s election. The two men buried the hatchet — and not in each other’s backs. The Energy Department job was Perry’s reward from the man who beat him for the GOP presidential nomination.

Is the former governor the perfect pick for Homeland Security? No, but in one way — to my way of thinking — he actually could be better than the man he would succeed. Perry’s record as Texas governor suggests a more reasonable immigration outlook than the one John Kelly espoused while he ran DHS. Perry’s understanding of border issues, earned by his years as governor of a large and important state, tells me he well could be a stellar choice to lead the Department of Homeland Security.

Cue the music and let’s see whether this latest report puts Rick Perry into the DHS chair.

State news

Cubs forgive infamous ‘fan’

Winning is such a miraculous balm. It cures the deepest pain among the most ardent followers of sports teams.

Consider what occurred in Chicago, which welcomed a World Series championship this past year when the Cubs defeated the Cleveland Indians.

Do you remember a guy named Steve Bartman? He was the fan who was sitting along the left-field wall in October 2003; he reached out over the field and disrupted the Cubs’ Moises Alou, who was running to catch a popped-up baseball. Had Alou made the catch, the Cubs — who were leading at that moment — would have been just four outs from winning the National League Championship Series playoff game against the Florida Marlins. He didn’t, thanks to Bartman’s interference. The Marlins won the game — and the pennant. The Cubs would be denied their first NL pennant since 1945.

Bartman has been scorned ever since. He has kept the lowest of profiles.

Well, the Cubs gave Bartman a World Series ring earned from the title they won in 2016. It’s the Cubs’ way of saying, “We forgive you, Steve.”

Bartman was touched by the gesture. “I humbly receive the ring not only as a symbol of one of the most historic achievements in sports, but as an important reminder for how we should treat each other in today’s society,” Bartman told WGN in a statement. “My hope is that we all can learn from my experience to view sports as entertainment and prevent harsh scapegoating, and to challenge the media and opportunistic profiteers to conduct business ethically by respecting personal privacy rights and not exploit any individual to advance their own self-interest or economic gain.”

As the late Vince Lombardi once said, “Winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing.” In this case, it turns out to have been the only way for the Cubs to demonstrate they had no hard feelings toward one of their more ardent fans.

I happen to think the Cubs did something very cool.

local news, State news

Bathroom Bill is a huge error

I am going to stand foursquare, solidly behind my former colleague Jon Mark Beilue, who has written a profoundly reasonable rebuke of Senate Bill 3, which the Texas Senate approved on a partisan vote.

SB 3 is the so-called Bathroom Bill. As Beilue notes, it is rooted in unfounded fear. Read Beilue’s column in the Amarillo Globe-News here.

I’m not an “embarrassed conservative” who voted twice for Ronald Reagan, as Beilue describes himself. I am an unapologetic progressive who is horrified that state government would waste its time — and my money — on this discriminatory legislation.

The bill would require transgender individuals to use public restrooms that comport with the gender assigned on their birth certificate. That’s right. A burly dude who once was a woman has to use the women’s room; a hot babe who came into this world as a boy has to use the men’s room.

How in the name of all that is reasonable does one enforce such a law? Who is going to check to see if a woman has all her appropriate body parts? Who’ll do the same thing to a man?

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who runs the Senate, keeps yapping about protecting women from sexual assault in the restroom. The police report zero incidents of such crimes occurring; senior police officials oppose SB 3.

So does House Speaker Joe Straus, whose chamber gets this bill next. What is the House going to do with this monstrosity? That remains the Question of the Day.

All 31 Texas senators voted on SB 3. Twenty-one of them approved it. I don’t yet know this with absolute certainty, but I’m sure that means state Sen. Kel Seliger of Amarillo joined his GOP brethren in approving this hideous legislation.

And that, dear reader, provides me with one of my greatest disappointments, that Sen. Seliger would sign on to this travesty.

I do share Beilue’s concern, though, about the fate of “sane, reasonable” conservatism. It has been trampled to death by far-right fear mongers.

legal news, State news

Hoping that texting ban produces tangible result

My wife has many innate talents. One of them is her ability to detect someone who is texting while driving a motor vehicle.

Tooling along the northern edge of Des Moines, Iowa, she spotted a car in front of us; she was quite certain the driver wasn’t paying sufficient attention to the task of driving a motor vehicle. The driver was erratic; the car was weaving back and forth in the lane. Then the driver moved to the exit lane and sure enough, as we passed, we noticed a young woman looking at her texting device while hurtling along at about 60 mph.

I wanted to scream!

My wife then wondered about those electronic signs that the Texas Department of Transportation posts along our state’s highways that give us a running total of the traffic deaths during the calendar year. “I wonder if the state could put the number of fatalities caused by texting while driving,” she said.

I don’t know the answer to that. Then I mentioned that the state does keep some sort of record on the cause of traffic fatalities.

Oh, yes. The Texas Legislature this year finally approved a bill that bans texting while driving throughout the state. It’s now against state law to operate device while driving a motor vehicle. I thank Gov. Greg Abbott for signing the bill into law.

My hope now is that the new law, which takes effect in September, will have a tangible impact on the number of traffic deaths caused by that idiotic behavior, that the ban over time will reduce that number dramatically.

As for the moron we witnessed along the Des Moines freeway, I will say a prayer that she doesn’t hurt someone else — or herself — while acting so damn stupidly.