The wingnuts come out for Radley Balko

Radley Balko, whose studies of militarized cops means he knows authoritarianism, tells librul Democrats to STOP believing the “woke” bullshit as being a political problem.

Sadly, half or more of the responses there by last Friday afternoon were either ex-ConservaDems now in anti-woke Never Trumper GOP land or else true wingnuts who tout election denialism and other things.

That said, these people in the first group, like previous rounds of former ConservaDems, were just looking for excuses to jump ship. In 2028, they'll pretend that Bagger Vance is a nice guy.

An hour after I had posted, the worst nutters, who I blocked, obviously were responding to me, but I wasn't seeing it as Substack was doing a back-and-forth flickering on comment numbers.

Texas Dems elect ConservaDem Kendall Scudder as state party chairman

So, Texas Democrats have gone from finally getting Gilberto Hinojosa to walk the plank from the water-treading SS Texas Democrats Minnow to this, Scudder getting elected in a highly contested race? (Interesting the TDP uses instant-runoff voting; now, along with stopping your effort to keep Greens off the ballot, maybe support it in state races?)

ConservaDem Kendall Scudder is, and I first met him seven or eight years ago. Riding Beto Bob's coattails then promoting Matthew McConaughey to run for gov is proof of that. More proof? In 2022, Kendall, in the DMN interviewing him for his state senate primary, said both parties had moved too far from the center.

As for his plans?

He wants the party to pay attention to areas he says it has previously written off, like rural communities, and put a priority on Spanish-language communications.

Wrote off rural Democrats? Did you forget about Beto, or Beat-0, in Muleshoe, which also involved his being a general PanderBear?

The reality is that rural Democrats, as in county-level political organizations, have long written themselves off. Those that aren't totally moribund welcomed Beto in Muleshoe for a bit of recognition in turn for a bit of his low-level grifting. That's in counties that even have a county level organization. Many don't, and the state party admits this.

And, Scudder, you served on the state party executive committee. You know this.

One other thing on Scudder, per my ConservaDem link? He bragged on his podcast about having a concealed carry permit, even with living in the Metromess. And yes, I saw it as bragging.

That, in turn, ties back to my post Friday: "With Texas Democrats, who needs Texas Republicans," as one part of that was about a majority of Senate Dems voting to get even tougher on the death penalty. In the DMN interview, Scudder wasn't asked about the death penalty. However, one of the other four candidates in that same state Senate race, Charles Gearing, twice volunteered his opposition to the death penalty, under the same question, about criminal justice reform. Maybe the fact that one of Scudder's three (step)-parents worked for either a county jail or TDCJ, as a correctional officer, per his website campaigning to replace Hinojosa, indicates he might tilt toward frying people, even if that was the dad his mom divorced. This would probably tie to his concealed carry permit, too. As would his being a "volunteer in patrol" with the Dallas PD. A more righty junior Jim Schutze? Gack.

I've done plenty of teh Google and can't find his stance. In addition to all of the above, IMO, if he actually opposed the death penalty he would have volunteered that info somewhere. 

I also don't know his position on Zionism and Palestine.

One-third trollingly, two-thirds seriously, I rhetorically asked about this on Shitter Monday night. Non-rhetorically, I asked Texas Progressive Caucus on Hucksterman, and Texas Democrats on Shitter. The purpose there is to see if THEY know, more than to get the answers themselves, since I already indicated I think I know what they are.

And, 24 hours later, neither has answered me.

So, contra Michelle Davis at Lone Star Left, in my world, Kendall Scudder is NOT a "pergressuve." Well, he surely is on LGBTQAI (If we're doing alphabet soup, I'm adding "Incel") issues, but not likely other than that. 

But, Jim Hightower supported him, because he has know-how and can raise bucks. Careful, Jim, or you'll find yourself in the neighborhood of yellow stripes and dead armadillos.

I mean, sexual orientation issues and abortion are important. So is combating US imperialism (Russia-Ukraine and NATO) and Israeli imperialism. So is real action, not fake action, on climate change. (Remember, in 2022, Beto-Bob discovered the religion of "drill, baby, drill.")

Scudder DOES know about running for office. Huntsville city council, multiple times. State Senate. The new elected member slot on Dallas County Appraisal District. Now this, and I'm probably missing something. In short, he's a permacandidate. Will he use the party chairmanship to run for office again at some point?

State-level Democrats are environmental hypocrites, too

Yes, I know that Dems control the governor's office and both houses of the Lege in New Mexico, the Land of Disenchantment.

But? Look at the money they rake in from the oil and gas world, per Capital & Main. Yea, the independents and wildcatters still give more to Republicans, but the oil majors? They tilt Democrat because they're paying for "access."

Now, paying a ConservaDem like George Munoz, one of the barons of the New Mexico Senate? Understandable, as is his taking the money.

Paying Nathan Small in the state House? Yeah, understandable if he'll take the money.

But, on his side? As Capital & Main notes, he's also an organizer withe New Mexico Wild. Let's read his touts there:

Nathan first joined New Mexico Wild in in 2004, after graduating with dual degrees in Philosophy and English from the College of Wooster in Wooster, Ohio. Nathan is a third generation New Mexican who comes from a family of ranchers and educators. Nathan was a key team member working to secure and then safeguard National Monument protection for the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks and continues to work on additional landscape scale protections in Southern New Mexico.. Now there are 10 new wilderness areas in the OMDP.

Big environmentalist, right?

Back to Capital & Main.

First, his rake:

Not bad, eh?

Rep. Small received $16,100 from the industry in the 2022 election. For his 2024 election, that rose to $87,451 (of just over $385,000 in total donations), making him No. 3 in the state among Democratic recipients of such funds, after House Speaker Javier Martinez and Senate Finance Chairman George Muñoz. Between 2020 and 2024 he was promoted to chair the House Appropriations and Finance Committee, which also made him vice chair of the overarching Legislative Finance Committee, two of the most powerful positions in New Mexico’s Legislature. And he is one of the few top money recipients to have a contested race this year, which he won by 544 votes out of 14,244 cast in his race.

His babbling aside:

Does the combination of conservation work and oil and gas money make him uncomfortable? “No,” he said. “I want to have an open door and a large table for folks who see challenges and want to propose and bring solutions to those challenges.” Does he solicit campaign donations from oil and gas companies? “I engage with stakeholders, and certainly will, in appropriate ways, during campaigns, ask for support from a wide range of stakeholders for campaign efforts,” he said.

“At the state level, over the past five years, and particularly in the past three or four years, [we] have significantly increased enforcement of our common sense [oil and gas] rules,” Small said. “That’s resulted in significantly more fines for folks who are doing the wrong thing.”

He's a fricking hypocrite. He knows the oil and gas world causes climate change, has been in denial about that, and today is in the land of pretending to do something about that. That's even as Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham touts environmentally dirty blue hydrogen for hydrogen-powered cars because it's based on natural gas.

And, he's married to former ConservaDem Congresscritter Xochitl Torres Small. (Read some of the links at her Wiki page for her being a sellout to the awl bidness. Here's one to get started.) The piece didn't mention that, but it should have, that they're married.

Update, Feb. 19, 2025: Again from Capital and Main, more Small hypocrisy. And again, with another post March 12.

Top blogging for November

Older posts had the lead in most viewed stories for November, some signal-boosted by me, others not.

An old blog post, from the end of Shrub Bush's first term, my blogging about the Dallas Snooze's take on how Shrub could reinvigorate his Cabinet, has been trending for a full month or so and I have no idea why. It doesn't even have a potential Chinese bot launch-triggering comment. (BTW, if you want an example of how stupid the Snooze was then — and pretty much still is now — on its op-ed page, just click that link. It's a short read.)

No. 2 was signal-boosted and is an September post about coronavirus "vaccine losers," namely, we the people of the US not having a non-mRNA booster, among other things, and why people with bigger popguns than me on Twitter weren't talking about that. It got signal-boosted in part because of a quote-tweet back-and-forth with Dr. Peter Hotez, who talked about what his institute is doing globally with non-mRNA vaxxes, but who went radio-silent when I said globally isn't Merikkka.

No. 3? Fresh stuff. My Texas elections post-mortem (for both Democrats and Greens). Related? No. 9, my take that the Texas Green Party, like I said two years ago about the national party, is past its best-by date.

No. 4 was also election-related, but on a national level. That's my call-out of the New York Slimes for attempting to revive Russiagate just in time for midterms.

And, No. 5? Also election related, and also a post-mortem, this time for one Robert Francis "Beto" O'Rourke, whom I said, in a visual typographic pun, should be called "Beat-0" for his lack of election prowess the last three cycles.

No. 6 was related. After Greg Summerlin appeared to be trying to make Beat-0 into some wild-eyed radical, I summarized his comments, and expanded on my responses, in a separate post calling out his ConservaDem-ness. And, I may not be done yet.

No. 7 was a Texas Progressives non-election roundup, during election week. Not sure what triggered its popularity, whether it was the part about pro-lifer grifting, Xi Jinping supposedly getting ready to meat MBS or something else.

No. 8? Again, election related. This was my take on Axios undermining its credibility over conflating QAnon with all conspiracy theories, then conflating conspiracy theories with the possibility of an actual conspiracy (while using that word loosely) followed by other thought.

No. 10? My take on the XBB coronavirus subvariant. (Background: I think we're at least moving toward endemic, and that big popguns folks like Walker Bragman have one foot, at least, in tribalism on this issue.)

Texas Progressives talk ConservaDems, small towns, more

"Nice" that Houston area ConservaDem Lizzle Fletcher, fresh off mouth-breathing "drill baby drill" now thinks that price gouging isn't a real issue, even though gasoline prices are higher today than in 2008 when oil got over $140 a barrle. Of course, she's doing Houston Big Oil's bidding. Shock me.

Kenny Boy Paxton "versus" John Cornyn. First, it's "interesting" that Cornyn only now considers Paxton's lingering state indictments an "embarrassment." Is he afraid that, if Kenny Boy wins the AG runoff, they'll be that much of a boat anchor? Is he afraid a shoe is about to drop on the FBI investigation? Second, it's also "interesting" that Kenny Boy claims Big John represents "the Bush wing," when there's been no such thing in Texas for years.  Pee Bush himself is a Trump lapdog, and Big John's been Havana Ted Cruz's lapdog for years.

Samsung pollutes Austin water, gets TCEQ award. That about says it all about TCEQ.

SocraticGadfly offers a variety of thoughts on small town graduations, partly applicable to graduations in general, and a couple of aspects of small town manners. 

Off the Kuff sees some positive signs in the latest poll of the Governor's race. (Your blog editor sees this more as grasping at straws; Strangeabbott is underwater on approval ratings due to a mix of new anti-incumbent feelings and still not reconciling the GOP's wingnuts squared. I'll eat Kuff's hat if Beto finishes within 5 percentage points.)

DosCentavos friend, Cartoonist Lalo Alcaraz was awarded the Herblock Prize for editorial cartooning and even showed up in The New Yorker.

Tina Petway warns of the damage that helium balloons do to marine life.

The Kinder Institute presents a retrospective on the career of Rice University sociologist Stephen Klineberg, founder of the Houston Area Survey.

Melissa Kean remembers Houston icon Sandy Havens.  

CultureMap reports on the new digs of Houston's longtime public radio station KPFT.

The Current notes a bump in the bromance between Greg Abbott and Elon Musk.

Kendall Scudder takes the mask off as a ConservaDem

When I was living in Sulphur Springs and he stepped forward to run against Tinfoil Bob Hall for the state Senate, I said thought he was a nice guy, and decent.

BUT .... given that he, as pictured above, was ready, willing and able to ride the ConservaDem coattails of Robert Francis O'Rourke, I had my doubts about just how "progressive" he was.

And, per the header, the mask is off with him already openly touting ConservaDem (if that) Matthew McConaughey to run for gov against Strangeabbott in 2022. AND, as part of touting his true Texan bona fides, he BRAGS, Scudder does, of being a Dem with a concealed carry permit.

"Sorry," Scudder, but any Dem in an urban place like the Metromess who BRAGS about that doesn't have a "progressive" podcast.

AND, to bust your chops? When you spoke before a candidate forum in your state senate run ... teachers union regional group, a Dem-friendly group was that sponsored it ... you NEVER talked about gunz, let along bragged about a concealed carry permit.

In short, you were pandering for Dem votes and thus already three years ago were Just.Another.Politician if you didn't talk about gunz, let alone tout the idea of doing concealed carry, especially when many librulz, let alone leftists, were worried then about concealed carry and abhorred its expansion. (Said expansion included the 2015 Lege expanding concealed carry licenses to include open carry. Other nuttery has followed, such as gunz in college dorms.)

I assume his Armadilla Strategies, as a Tex-ass political consulting firm, works most with ConservaDems. As for his partner there, Lillian Salerno? The "about" at Armadilla puffs her 2018 run to be a Congresscritter. Ballotpedia has the reality. She barely beat out Republican Brett Shipp (sic) to go to the CD 32 runoff against Colin Allred, where she got her hat handed to her, after he took nearly 40 percent of the vote in a seven-person first round. I'm pretty sure it wasn't that she couldn't find a political organization with enough transparency, rather that no campaign consulting group with real skillz, and the money needed for them, was getting into that runoff. 

I also have little doubt that their Pod Bless Texas podcast promotes a ConservaDem version of Texas exceptionalism.

We as a nation and the Democratic Party have gone BACKWARDS on gun control

The AR-15, 25 years ago, was specifically listed as among weapons banned under the Bill Clinton era Federal Assault Weapons Ban.

Last night, at the third Democratic debate, Robert O'Rourke called for AR-15s, and other guns, to be banned again. And Democrat senator Chris Coon went apeshit.

Coons said he is working with Republicans to pass more modest gun control measures.

Judging by the rest of The Hill's story at the second link, his measures are modest indeed, and like Winston Churchill's one famous putdown in the House of Commons, Coons surely has much to be modest about.

A "notification" when someone banned from buying guns tries to buy one? We should have that already in place federally and in all 50 states.

Here's Coons on O'Rourke:

“I don’t think having our presidential candidates, like Congressman O’Rourke did, say that we’re going to try to take people’s guns against their will is a wise policy or political move,” Coons said.

Whether or not it's a wise political move (and it may be more that than you think, Coons), it's a good policy move — with some editing.

Let's start with the ban part of O'Rourke's call being THE POLICY 25 years ago. A buyback is the logical next step forward off that. That said, given the current Supreme Court, a mandatory buyback would almost certainly be found unconstitutional. But legislation on a Cass Sunstein "nudge" angle could sweeten the pot for buybacks. As part of a new assault weapon ban, declare that the use of a weapon on an assault weapons ban list for any crime automatically federalizes the crime, or even federalizes it and enhances it one felony degree. Or something similar.

That said, and sorry, fellow ardent gun control advocates, I think a mandatory buyback would be unconstitutional, but not on Second Amendment grounds. I think it would be deemed ex post facto legislation. I would consider it that. I do also think a mandatory buyback might lead to other, violent, problems.

But, back to Coons.

Besides, you're almost certainly being played by Pat Toomey and other Rethuglicans anyway, Coons.

To a man, or woman, GOP Congresscritters are either scared shitless of the legendary power of the NRA (which ain't necessarily reality any more) or else, like, say, Dan Crenshaw here in Tex-ass, or Briscoe Cain at the state level, really are gun nuts.

These are the same people who just say "enforce the current laws better" then work to carve out loopholes in those laws that people like eBay use.

Stop following the Overton Window, Chris. 

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That said, Beto having quote-printed T-shirts for sale shortly after the debate, and having his website updated to show Trump as white nationalist, shows this was all a canned, packaged plan.

THAT that said, how much actual lifting did Bob on a Knob do on gun control when he was in the House? He was kind of a ConservaDem on many issues himself. And, Puff Hoes reminds me that he refused to campaign for Gina Ortiz Jones, or more, refused to campaign against travel buddy Will Hurd, last year. That could be seen as somewhat of a gotcha.

OK, his gun ratings? Both the NRA and the even more nutbar (yes, true) Gun Owners of America ranked Bob very lowly, but neither one ever gave him a zero. And, if he really thought gun rights were this ardent of an issue 12 months ago, he would have done more for Jones and against Hurd than just sharing a donor contacts list.

RIP Ralph Hall, the original modern ConservaDem

Ralph Hall, who along with John Dingell, was one of the last two WWII veterans to serve in Congress, died Thursday.

For those who don't know more, Hall was the second successor to "Mr. Sam," Sam Rayburn, in Texas' 4th Congressional District.

Rayburn held the seat for a little over 48 years. Ray Roberts won a special election at Mr. Sam's death and held the spot for almost 20 years. Hall then held it 34 years before being primaried out of office by John Ratcliffe.

The first newspaper I was at was the now-defunct Bonham Daily Favorite. This was several years before Hall jumped parties but the speculation was out there in already in the middle and late 1990s. And, I asked him directly in his 1996 re-election cycle and he brushed it off.

After Newt and the Gang took over the House in 1995, that's when the speculation all heated up. I hit him in the first election year after that. But, Rethugs at that time wouldn't honor his overall seniority and committee seniority at 100 percent at that time, which is part of why he said no.

Eventually, Shrub Bush mixed carrots and sticks, and got Danny P.(edophile) Hastert to make it all good on seniority issues, and Hall jumped ship in 2004. Long before then, he was the most conservative Democrat in the House.

Political pundits and sociologists who decry the polarization of America get it wrong, especially if they point to Hall's past as an example of what was better.

Although Hall was not, as far as I know, an unregenerate segregationist, nonetheless, he points to a past when such men held swing power in the Senate as Southern Democrats. Polarization problems have little to do with American political parties continuing to engage in "sorting" that makes them more like parliamentary parties in Europe. Rather, this is something we should applaud.

Rather, polarization has primarily to do with large degrees of racism, anti-government conspiracy mongering and anti-science stances in today's GOP, combined with, to a definitely smaller but not nonexistent degree, SJW-type elements among Democratic backers today.

Unfortunately, Democratic leadership, especially in the House, worried about numbers or whatever, is still ready to accept too many "galvanized Blue Dogs" into membership.

TX Progressives attack Trump, ICE,ConservaDems on immigration

The Texas Progressive Alliance has never needed a taint team, but it does call for firm opposition to warmongering, as it brings you this week's roundup.

Off the Kuff casts a skeptical eye at a lawsuit filed against Dallas County claiming that white voters are being discriminated against.

SocraticGadfly wonders if Kawhi Leonard has already played his last game for the Spurs.

Neil at All People Have Value wrote an open letter to Democratic Party leaders about the  need for an assertive response to any effort by Trump to curtail the Robert Mueller investigation.  

Stace at Dos Centavos is (without names, so far) criticizing Democrats who even passively support Trump (and supported Obama) on immigration crackdowns, and may name names soon.

Ed Darrell at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub punctures the myth of violently criminal immigrants.

Does ICE need to be abolished? If, per Texas Monthly, it’s now no longer releasing pregnant women from detention facilities, yes.

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And here are some posts of interest from other Texas blogs.

Down with Tyranny says Republicans are worried about Blake Farenthold’s Congressional district.

Dwight Silverman shares how you can check to see if Cambridge Analytica has your Facebook data.

Mark Bennett explains why you shouldn't argue while angry.

Better Texas Blog criticizes the latest farm bill.

Grits for Breakfast has a modest proposal for counties that complain about the cost of indigent defense.

Paradise in Hell remains our state's foremost interpreter of Donald Trump.

Juanita has a close encounter with Tom DeLay.

Downwinders at Risk wraps up disbursing the $2.3 million it got in a settlement with cement plants.

At the Dallas Observer, Stephen Young asks if Erin Brockovich is a “parachute enviromentalist” peddling poor information.

Also at the Dallas Observer, Jim Schuetze discusses early noises in the 2019 Dallas mayoral election.