Yanez Supreme Court Filing Doesn’t Contain Enough Valid Signatures
December 31, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
Appeals court justice Linda Yanez–the one who was complaining about the law requiring statewide judicial candidates to obtain signatures to get on the ballot–may not have enough valid signatures to secure a place on the ballot for her race for Texas Supreme Court Place 8 according to a document obtained by Capitol Annex.
In a letter to State Democratic Chairman Boyd Ritchie, Neil G. Baron, counsel for State District Judge Susan Criss’ campaign, alleges that Yanez’s campaign has submitted an insufficient number of signatures from Appeals Court Districts 1 and 14.
SD 21: Bruni Switches Parties To Face Zaffirini In General Election
December 31, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
We told you about what would likely be the hapless candidacy of former Webb County Judge Louis H. Bruni against Senator Judith Zaffirini earlier this year. Now we learn that Bruni has actually switched parties to make his run:
TXU Fine Deal Struck Down By Court
December 28, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
This is indeed interesting news:
State regulators and energy giant TXU this summer agreed to a plan that would have protected TXU from any more fines like the one for $171 million it now faces after being accused of manipulating the power market.
It would do so by implementing controls intended to protect consumers when demand for electricity spikes.
But in drafting the plan, the three public-utility commissioners ignored the recommendation of their own staff that a group of hundreds of Texas cities and an advocate for Texas ratepayers be allowed to participate. Reliant Energy, one of the state’s biggest electricity retailers, also asked — and was denied — a seat at the table.
Moblogging
December 27, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
This is our first attempt at blogging from a mobile device.
Rick Perry. George Bush. Pot, Meet Kettle.
December 26, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
As we climb out from a mountain of wrapping paper, bows, and Christmas garland here at Capitol Annex, we’re picking up a few stories that made headlines while we were taking a bit of a much needed holiday break.
Our favorite concerns Texas’ own Dan Quayle–I mean, Rick Perry–who was out on the campaign trail for Mayor 9/11 just before the holiday. Check out Governor Perry’s latest quotable quote:
A recent indicator: Gov. Rick Perry, who ascended to Texas’ top spot when Bush left for the White House, declared on a campaign trip to Iowa for presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani, “George has never, ever been a fiscal conservative.”
This actually leaves us nearly speechless. But only nearly. Why?
It’s kind of like the proverbial pot calling the proverbial kettle black. Let’s face it: Rick Perry hasn’t exactly been much of a “Dollar Store Toilet Paper Budget” man himself. Fiscally conservative? Surely, the governor doesn’t really want to get in a “who is a bigger Fiscal Conservative” pissing match.
But, since it seems he does, we’ll refresh Lieutenant President QuaylePerry’s memory: Dude, you busted the constitutional spending cap. By $14 billion dollars. And called it tax relief!
Some Thoughts On Two Years In The Annex
December 26, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
Somehow, we at Capitol Annex got busy amid the hustle and bustle of the holiday season and forgot something very, very important: our birthday.
No, no. Not my personal birthday, but the birthday of Capitol Annex itself, which was December 9.
Yes, Capitol Annex turned two earlier this month. Of course, I’ve been blogging much longer than that (since 2003 at my own former site, Free State Standard, and then at Burnt Orange Report, Political State Report, and number of other sites–some of which I still blog at from time to time). Next summer will actually mark my fifth year as a political blogger, which seems like an eternity in cyberspace.
We at Capitol Annex are often privileged to receive emails from readers thanking us for the news and, more often, analysis which we publish. Every time we receive one of those emails, it warms our heart to know that, somewhere out there in cyberspace, what we’re doing makes a difference to (or helps) somebody understand the sometimes crazy, often fun, game that is Texas politics.
Since we failed to reflect on this important occasion a couple of weeks ago, we hope, as we dive head-first into our third year as a site, you will permit us some sappy nostalgic rambling.
When Capitol Annex was first established, it wasn’t something done on a whim. We’d run a political blog before and knew, to put it mildly, that doing so was often not exactly a bed of roses (it is actually hard work). We’d settled on the name, “Capitol Annex,” long before we actually decided to take the plunge and go “out on our own,” so to speak, because we’ve always been fond of the annex to the Texas Capitol. It seemed more than appropriate, too, since we don’t actually blog from the capital city as do many of the state’s political bloggers.
You may also be interested to know that we almost ditched the whole damned thing in a fit of folly about a month after we got it started back up. When we founded Capitol Annex, it was begun as a site running the Drupal content management system. If you are a computer geek, Drupal is wonderful. If you are a blogger who just wants to get content out to the masses with as little pain as possible Drupal isn’t (or at least, wasn’t at the time) the right choice. We’d used it before at Free State Standard, but changes to Drupal’s coding and behavior made it far too difficult for our second round of hanging out a shingle, so to speak. That, and it literally got covered over with spam in about 72 hours (which, it turns out, is not an unfamiliar happening with any blogging system.
Shortly after the dawn of 2006, we’d sadly neglected this fledgling blog because (a) it was covered with spam and (b) updating was very complicated. In mid-January of 2006, however, we made the change over to Wordpress and haven’t looked back. Although we’ve taken a couple of week-long vacations from blogging, we’ve still managed to blog 3,626 posts just in the nearly two years since we’ve switched to Wordpress. We may not be the HuffPo, but volume (combined, hopefully, with quality), is never something we’ve been short on here in the Annex.
We’ve also had some nice recognition in the last couple of years. Along with some nice emails from state legislators and other politicos, we’ve had a number of mentions in the media, and Carl Whitmarsh, who runs one of the biggest Democratic email lists around, has sent out a few of our posts to his many readers, which is always flattering.
However, all of this could not happen in a vacuum. Sure, it is nice to know just how many folks in the Capitol read us based upon our SiteMeter stats, but there are three groups of people without whom Capitol Annex would not be what it is today: our readers, our tipsters, and our fellow bloggers.
I’ve said before and will say many times again that Texas’ progressive blogosphere is perhaps the most vibrant state-level blogosphere in America. The tremendous growth it has seen in the last two years has been wonderful and will, hopefully, continue for some time to come. The other day, I heard a joke, which bears retelling now simply to illustrate my point:
Q: How many bloggers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: One to change it, one to blog about changing it, one to link to the blogger who blogged about changing it, two to blog about how the first blogger changed the light bulb wrong, one to blog about how the blogger who changed the light bulb changed it right, one to blog about how the two who disagreed with the first blogger are wrong and one to post a picture of the light bulb being changed alongside a picture of a cat with a cute caption.
That may not be exactly how the blogosphere works, but you get the idea. Without our blogger colleagues paying attention to what we do (and us paying attention to them in return), offering additional analysis, and even the occasional disagreement, none of us–least of all Capitol Annex–would be where we are today. So, to our fellow bloggers: thanks for two wonderful years.
We must also give a massive word of thanks to our tipsters. If it weren’t for the many, many, many tipsters who have discovered Capitol Annex from all levels (and, indeed sides) of state government and the political spectrum, many of the stories we’ve been able to break would have gone unreported.
As for our readers, you deserve the biggest thanks of all. As much as we at Capitol Annex love to hear ourselves talk (and ask anyone, we love to hear whatever we have to say), we love to read what we’ve written even more (hence our frequent use of the royal “we” and sometimes flowery prose we are prone to from time to time). Nevertheless, we don’t love reading our own work that much, and we wouldn’t put in the time and effort if it weren’t for all of you wonderful people, out there in the dark [that's a Sunset Boulevard reference, if you are wondering] who log on every day and read what we’ve written. Thanks.
Merry Christmas!
December 25, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
We at Capitol Annex would like to take this opportunity to wish you a very Merry Christmas!
On Wednesday, we’ll be releasing (belatedly) our Reader’s Choice Awards for 2006 and begin our end-year round-ups.
Thanks for reading Capitol Annex over the past year.
TX SEN: Radnofsky Says Kelly Has A Right To Run
December 22, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · 1 Comment
Barbara Ann Radnofsky, the Democratic Party’s 2006 U.S. Senate Nominee, was the most recent candidate who had to face Gene Kelly, who is a perennial candidate for U.S. Senate. With much discussion today on Kelly across the Blogosphere, Barbara Ann notes that, regardless of anyone’s feelings, it’s a bad idea to challenge someone’s candidacy:
I think 81 year old Gene Kelly has every right to run. We don’t want to set a precedent of challenging candidacy because of motive. (He gives money to the Dem Party every time he does run). What is important is our reaction.
I don’t believe my primary (which I won) or runoff (which I won with 60 percent) against him was disastrous. Recall that in the primary, I reserved most of my money and we learned what you can do with hard work and volunteers against a well-known name with mistaken identity. Sure, reserving money was a gamble, but it allowed me to spend almost every penny on direct voter contact when voter interest was higher. It allowed me to contact all 3Ds in Texas three times in the runoff. We used him to gain attention, including national media coverage, and I received far more attention from united, loyal Democrats than if I’d had no contest leading in to the general. The risk-taking paid off in an electon which many predicted would be yet another mistaken name win for Gene Kelly. The activist democrats came together, and I am grateful to those Dems with the courage to endorse me pre-general.
Every penny saved was essential, as was the national attention which was a surrogate for money. It wasn’t enough to beat Hutchison, but is was a fight worth fighting. When these Republicnas go virtually unchallenged, they build massive war chests which make them even harder to beat. We are now starting to break the cycle.
Kelly’s many past victories, in primaries and in runoffs against legitimate candidates, are indeed reflective of mistaken identity for a beloved actor-singer-dancer. But my experience in 2006 was a positive lesson in the importance of good direct mail. A first time “Barbara Ann Radnofsky” running against a “Gene Kelly” can win decisively, in a state as big as Texas, at controllable runoff cost.
Dallas County Democrats Off To The Races: Molberg, Lackey & More
December 22, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
The other night, Capitol Annex was privileged to attend the Irving Democrats’ holiday party where we met a number of the outstanding candidates who are running for office in Dallas County in 2008.
We were especially glad to see longtime Democratic activist Ken Molberg running for the 95th Civil District Court in Dallas County. Ken is an outstanding, respected Democratic activist and attorney, and you’ll be hard pressed to find a more impressive list of endorsements for a countywide candidate anywhere in Texas. In fact, Ken just got the endorsements of State Sen. Royce West and former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk:
In their remarks to a crowd of several hundred prominent business and political leaders, many from the politically influential southern sector of Dallas, both Sen. West and former Mayor Kirk noted Molberg’s longstanding commitment to the legal profession and the Democratic Party. Molberg is a former Dallas County Democratic Party Chair and is currently the State Democratic Executive Committeeman for Sen. West’s 23rd Senatorial District.
Citing Molberg’s service as Dallas County Democratic Party Chair before Democrats began to win here, former Mayor Kirk noted, “It’s fun to be party chair now when you can wake up the morning after an election and say ‘we win, we win,’ but Ken was here in the tough times. We should all recognize his commitment to this party and our values. He has earned this. We should all get behind Ken Molberg and elect him in 2008.”
Sen. West told attendees, “Ken Molberg is a fine lawyer and critical member of our party who brought us to where we are today. I am proud to endorse Ken Molberg for Judge and I urge you to help elect him.”
If you are looking for a countywide race in Texas in which you can make a difference, drop a few bucks Ken’s way.
We were also privileged to meet Diana Lackey, who is the third in a triumvirate candidates in “must win” Tax Assessor/Collector races in major urban counties in Texas following Diane Trautman in Harris County and Glen Maxey in Travis County. Although the Dallas TAC office doesn’t handle voter registration, we still need to win it to get more Democrats in these vital posts across the state. Diana, who was endorsed for the post in 2004 over the Republican candidate, has top-notch qualifications and experience necessary for this office and is a star candidate for Dallas Democrats. She also has a pretty nice list of endorsements.
Capitol Annex also got to meet State Rep. Kirk England (D-Grand Prairie) who no longer holds the distinction of the newest Democrat in the House thanks to Dan Barrett’s victory in Tarrant County. Nonetheless, we had a great visit with Rep. England and are glad to have him on board. When you hear, from him, why he switched parties and became a Democrat, you know he’s the real deal.
GOP Contested Primary Filing Roundup
December 22, 2007 by Vince Leibowitz · Leave a Comment
Since I don’t expect many filings early next week with the holidays upon us, I thought now would be a great time to round up filings across the state (and some “intentions” we’ve heard about here, there and yon.
We’ll hit the GOP contested filings first, and the Democratic ones later today, followed by any uncontested primaries (at this point) in districts with incumbent lawmakers on opposite sides of the aisle.
U.S. Congress, District 3, GOP Primary
The dissatisfaction with State Rep. Johnson in Plano has evidently been significant enough to draw him not one but two opponents. The first, Wayne Avellanet, we told you about earlier. Now, another candidate has entered the race, Harry Pierce, a retired airline pilot. No information has emerged about Pierce yet, but we’ll keep you posted. So far, Avellanet is the biggest threat to Johnson.
U.S. Congress, District 4, GOP Primary
For the third election cycle in a row (if I recall correctly–2004, 2006, and now 2008), the people who are tired of waiting for Congressman Ralph Hall (R-Rockwall) to retire continues to grow. Kathy Seei, the former mayor of Frisco and most recent filing, is probably Hall’s biggest threat at this point. Kevin George (R-Celina) is campaigning as a “Constitutional Republican” and spouts tons of ultra-right-wing rhetoric on his website. Gene Christinsen (R-Celina) is the owner of a racing team (among other things) and has the dubious distinction of being endorsed by Chuck Norris (who has also endorsed the Total Gym). This will no doubt be an interesting primary. Can’t wait to see if Ralph Hall pulls out his decade-old endorsement from Charlton Heston in this race.
U.S. Congress, District 22, GOP Primary
To date, four Republicans have filed in the hopes of having an opportunity to spend half a million bucks in the primary and two million bucks plus in the general election for the right to come in a point or two behind Democrat Nick Lampson of Stafford next November. Perhaps the most interesting tidbit in this race is that State Rep. Robert Talton (R-Pasadena), the establishment front-runner, has yet to file. Of course, Shelley Sekula Gibbs, last year’s famous Temporary Congresswoman, has filed as has ad exec John Manlove. Pete Olson, a former staffer for U.S. Senator Phil Gramm is also in the race as is former state district judge Jim Squier.
