FCC letter:

Dear Sirs,

I am writing to ask that you deny the petition to sell KTRU’s license to the University of Houston.

I have been a KTRU listener for over twenty-five years and know that its excellent and diverse programming is irreplaceable. KTRU’s tradition of communication and education will never be replaced in today’s concentrated media market, where commercial broadcasters race to the bottom seeking market share and return on investment.

A few years back, when the Houston Chronicle used to publish the local radio ratings, I saw that Clear Channel owned six or eight of the ten biggest radio stations in Houston. Stations that once played an all-jazz, all classical, even all oldies formats have gone away, as well as AM talk stations offering anything but right-wing bloviating. Houston needs KTRU to be an alternative to the usual commercial fare that is piped-in to studios nationwide.

Sincerely,

Charly Hoarse
Houston Texas

Tom Turkey

Well it’s been an extraordinary holiday, with the kids both back home for the first time, a lovely family feast complete with laughter and silliness; and still, I’m on cloud nine since the news Wednesday that a jury in Austin convicted Tom DeLay of money laundering and conspiracy for his scheme to illegally use corporate money to pack the Texas statehouse and gerrymander Texas congressional districts to give him a majority in Washington.

His conspiracy was successful. Six Democratic Congressmen lost their seats as their voters were moved out from under them. The Texas Congressional delegation, which long had acted in a bi-partisan manner for the good of the state, and for the amassing of power through the seniority system, was now as bitterly divided as the Congress itself in the wake of DeLay’s ‘pay-to-play’ K Street project and Reagan and the Bushes’ cynical use of Christian conservatives as a wedge-issue-motivated voting block.

The sentencing phase of DeLay’s trial begins on December 20th before Judge Pat Priest. DeLay faces up to 20 years on one count, and up to life on the other. Talk is that he might get off with probation. The planned appeal will be in the Texas’ Third Court of Appeals, the same court that once ruled that DeLay couldn’t be prosecuted for illegal fundraising because the money was in the form of checks. Should he lose there, a further appeal could go to the Roberts Supreme Court, which ruled in Citizens United v FCC to allow unlimited corporate election spending.

But for now, I’m enjoying this. DeLay is the reason that last month, I had the choice of a Phil Gramm clone and a Lyndon LaRouch nutcake in my congressional race, and it may be that way for years. From ‘the EPA are Nazis,’ to the Clinton impeachment, grandstanding on the brain-dead body of Terry Schiavo, his crooked dealings with the felon Jack Abramoff, pandering to crazy end timer Rev. John Hagee’s flock, or holding pro-war rallies with Rev. Ed Young’s sheeple, the body politic is a more venal and sordid place for his influence. Good riddance.

From thedailypalin.com

Tea Party threatens
'2nd Amendment remedies'
if Palin doesn't win
'Dancing with the Stars'

Rumblings within the rogue Tea Party voting bloc that has kept Bristol Palin alive on "Dancing with the Stars" suggest that anything short of a Palin victory could trigger "Second Amendment remedies."

Asked what that means, an anonymous Tea Party operative explained that "Second Amendment remedies" is a popular expression coined by Nevada Tea Party superstar Sharron Angle to advocate armed insurrection against governments or oppressive, left-leaning reality show regimes.

Amid rumors of death threats and bizarre conspiracies about voter fraud, Palin danced well last night, but remains an underdog in most polling. Fortunately for her and running mate Mark Ballas, the Tea Party is mounting an aggressive write-in campaign.

The plucky pro-abstinence heroine nailed a double pelvic thrust during a sexy freestyle dance routine, as cameras panned to proud mama Sarah cheering from the crowd.

Now America must wait until tonight to learn whether Sarah, I mean Bristol, can claim the coveted mirror ball.

Palin archrival Jennifer Grey has consistently received better scores from the judges, but sources say unnamed Tea Party operatives are prepared to "go negative" -- digging up dirt on the onetime "Dirty Dancing" star.

Chalmers Johnson 1931-2010

-A comment in Juanita’s non-blog today from Don A in Pennsyltucky:

“We must recognize that the terrorism of Sept. 11 was not directed against America but against American foreign policy. We should listen to the grievances of the Islamic peoples, stop propping up repressive regimes in the area, protect Israel’s security but denounce its apartheid practices in Palestinian areas and reform our “globalization” policies so that they no longer mean that the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer. If the United States’ only response to terrorism is more terrorism, it will have discredited itself and can expect to be treated as the rogue state it will have become. ”

-Don’s comment included a link to commondreams.org, which ran a bit from Chalmers Johnson, along with the news that Johnson passed away this week. Chalmers was a CIA consultant and Chairman of the Center for China Studies at The University of California at Berkley. Johnson was the author of the Blowback Trilogy, which I’m sure I’ll tell you about after I finally read it. Here’s a note from Wiki:

“Johnson sees that the enforcement of American hegemony over the world constitutes a new form of global empire. Whereas traditional empires maintained control over subject peoples via colonies, since World War II the US has developed a vast system of hundreds of military bases around the world where it has strategic interests. A long-time Cold Warrior, he applauded the collapse of the Soviet Union: "I was a cold warrior. There's no doubt about that. I believed the Soviet Union was a genuine menace. I still think so."[7] But at the same time he experienced a political awakening after the collapse of the Soviet Union, noting that instead of demobilizing its armed forces, the US accelerated its reliance on military solutions to problems both economic and political. The result of this militarism (as distinct from actual domestic defense) is more terrorism against the US and its allies, the loss of core democratic values at home, and an eventual disaster for the American economy.”

-This is the same theme I read in work by Andrew Bacevich, Jeff Huber, Tim Weiner and James Carroll, Three of the four are retired military, Weiner, the exception, won a Pulitzer for his book on the CIA. Heck, this is also the theme of Eisenhower’s farewell address. I don’t feel so out in the woods with sources like this, even living in the reddest of states,working at a university that does $10 million a year in Defense Dept. research and living smack in the middle of NASA and Ellington Field. All that Ike warned us about has come to pass. Now it’s a matter of whether we can turn this country around. Consider the alternative..

Chupacabra Report

After the mid-term elections I quoted H.L. Mencken, “the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” These days the news is all about that. Texas is often found lagging the rest of the country, and here we have another example of that as the Bush recession comes home to roost. The news is full of state and city governments awash in red ink. The Houston Fire Department is moving to cut the number of paramedic squads and close fire stations in response to a $10 million budget shortfall. Harris County Sheriffs Deputies have been shorthanded for so long that they have sued to stop mandatory overtime. Libraries have been under a hiring freeze, and so have been understaffed. Next they are going to be closed on Sundays. Our school district has put off new school construction, expecting NASA layoffs to dampen enrollment.

The Texas Legislature convenes next month facing a twenty-some billion dollar budget shortfall. With the biggest Republican majority since Reconstruction, deep cuts are expected in social programs such as Medicaid, Children’s Health Insurance, and higher education; all traditionally underfunded here even in good times. The only sacred cow here is probably the state prison system; with 649 prisoners per 100,000 population, second only to Louisiana. Again, the Texas safety net is topped with razor wire. There is a sort of self-fulfilling prophesy working here as hard times will probably reverse declining crime statistics.

State and local governments across the country are strapped for cash, and this Congress will not be passing another Recovery and Reinvestment Act to bail them out. The GOP seems poised to replay 1937, when FDR, thinking that the recovery from the Great Depression was self-sustaining, cut back on New Deal spending, which immediately plunged the country back into recession. Would the Republicans really risk a double-dip into recession just to gain electoral advantage? Just look what they’re doing with the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty; people who would push the Doomsday Clock forward just grandstanding won’t blink at a mere recession.

Hollah Loud!

I'm not anti-law enforcement, but my God they make it hard not to cringe sometimes.

The Lopez family in their search for answers to their loved one's murder has been up against powerful institutional resistance from the first moment of learning of their tragic loss.

I'm going to stop wondering why the SA Express News is such a whore, and just accept the fact that it is. She has her hot pants on and a handful of condoms this morning as she blows the entire SAPD and the NISD police by getting their story out there prominently to the public. Albeit laced with distortions and misinformation, this is what the public sees, and this is what the court of public opinion will digest; eventually poisoning a jury.

The Lopez family has nothing but questions; however, their questions are piercingly relevant: why didn't Alvarez call for back-up, and why did he have his gun drawn? Why didn't he follow established police proceedure? However, if they expect answers and not a public white-washing, I think they need to move quickly on a single front.

Hire counsel - good ones, and get the story of Derek's life out there. Refute publicly the city and the school district's facts. Demand investigations from outside the city, preferably the fed, and not the Texas Rangers. This is politics; be political. This is a causeworthy issue and people want to help.

Remember, whores do it for money; they don't care whose.

He Never Learned to Read Horatio Alger

The child that was shot and killed was named Derek Lopez. He was 14 years old. That's his mom.

It took three days to find this out. The family says the police and the Medical Examiner still won't tell them anything.

The cop's name is Alvarado. He is on paid leave pending an investigation.

The Express News has written on this everyday, a little bit, with somewhat of a derisive tone, in my opinion. The readers comments I've seen make me sick. It seems like this town is full of hate for this kid. Why?

The story yesterday described a child I am very familiar with. He was a loving son in a tight-nit family, and enjoyed all the things normal kids do. Except he always had problems in school with behavior, and I suspect academics as well. He was expelled from fouth grade. He was supended recently and placed in "alternative" school, which is the modern version of reform school for possessing a pill; a violation of zero tolerance policy.

He was expelled for tagging a building, and the night he was killed he was fighting with another boy at the school. The officer chased him, lost him, and finally found him in someone's back yard hiding in a storage shed. Derek made a dash of it, and Alvadrado shot him in the chest. The EN explains blythly that hitting the proud Alvarado in the face with the shed door was the reason he was shot, as if everyone would kill a person if they got the ol Three Stooges' door gag.

A UTSA professor in researching local schools found that 2/3 of children in alternative schools are in the 8th and 9th grades. After that, more than 70% drop out of school.

The problem, many agree, including me, is that the schools do not address learning problems in primary school, rarely intervene with learning assistance through special services; socially promote kids who can't read and do math, and then treat them as discipline problems when they act out. Kid's with mental and emotional problems find the same outcomes. The schools are basically criminal enterprises and anyone with a conscience who knows anything about Texas schools knows this too. This pattern of denying services under the Federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, and the Texas Education Code, and; therefore, the civil rights of mostly poor, at risk, minority children is pervasive state wide. But in the case of NISD, who has the money to spend on everything but the needs of poor kids within the district with behaviors that stem from mental, emotional, or learning problems treat them like criminals.

I asked a retired police detective about his view on Alvarado's actions with regard to law enforcement procedures in the Lopez case. "He's shitting bricks," was his response.

He added,"this is a case of 'P.O.P' - pissed off police."

Chupacabra Report

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen started talking last week about putting off the planned withdrawal of US troops in Afghanistan from next year to the year 2014.

Last week-end Afghan President Hamid Karzai called for an end to night raids and a reduction in the numbers of NATO troops saying that “the time has come to reduce military operations.”

The US commander in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus told Bob Woodward “I don’t think you win this war. I think you keep fighting. This is the kind of fight we’re in for the rest of our lives and probably our kids’ lives.”

-This is from retired U S Navy Commander Jeff Huber, on his blog Pen and Sword..
“America’s finest military minds (heh) have committed the best-trained, best-equipped armed force in history to an unending, ruinous war against an enemy that doesn’t have a single tank or airplane or ship and is led by a handful of cave dwellers who don’t even have a fort to fart in.

“We have to give Robert E. Lee credit for one thing: in charging uphill at Gettysburg, he was at least trying to gain a decisive victory because he knew his country didn’t have the strategic depth to fight a long war. Petraeus and his extended entourage in academia and defense think tank-dom not only want to charge straight up every hill they encounter, they want to make absolutely certain that their Long War lasts long enough to accomplish what Lee could not: the collapse of the Union.”

-Had enough bad news yet? Today Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl said that the New START nuclear arms reduction treaty signed by President Obama and Russian President Medvedev will not be ratified by the lame duck Senate, kicking it down the road to the next Senate, which will have seven more Republicans to vote against it. This would be the fourth START treaty; the first three were negotiated by Republican administrations.

This treaty would make our world safer by reducing the number of nuclear weapons, of which the US and Russia have over 20,000; twenty times the number held by all other countries put together. It would give us better ties with the Kremlin, which could be helpful for us in dealing with Iran, as the Russians (unlike us) have some leverage there. And it would provide some leadership for the rest of the world by moving to eliminate, rather than proliferate, this existential threat.

DeLay trial week three..

Jurors in Tom DeLay’s money laundering trial heard today from the Republican National Committee’s Jay Banning, who as Chief Financial Officer was one of the officials who approved the swap of $190,000 with Tom DeLay’s Texans for a Republican Majority PAC in 2002.

"The bottom line is the money that came to these Texas candidates was not the same $190,000 that DeLay's PAC sent to the Republican National Committee," asked Dick DeGuerin, DeLay's lead attorney.

"That's correct," replied Banning

This reasoning reminds me of the infamous 2008 decision by the Texas Third Court of Appeals that DeLay couldn’t be guilty of receiving illegal funds because the funds were in the form of checks. Checks aren’t money?

Prosecutor Beverly Matthews asked “If a drug dealer gave the Republican National Committee $100,000 of drug money and asked the Republican National Committee to put it into a different account ... could the RNC put the money into a different account and turn around and send that money back to Texas candidates?"

Banning told prosecutors that the seven candidates receiving the swapped money got between $20,000 and $40,000 each, while other candidates received less than $500 from the RNC.

An accountant and others who worked for DeLay’s PAC testified today that the PAC was running low on money from individual donors. Figures. DeLay took money from corporations and businessmen across the country and as far away as Russia and China, but individuals, who could legally contribute to Texas campaigns, were already suffering from donor fatigue.

Eat Your Pudding!

Out north, way out north of the city lies a vast expanse of urban sprawl where people that are afriad of colored people lodge in row after row of McMansions, punctuated by super-mega-churches, and shopping malls. Trafic is hell most days. It used to be tolerable with periods in which there weren't that many Armadas, Expeditions, and Suburbans hurling down busy streets piloted by matrons with a cell phone fused to their ears and one or two children watching TV in the passenger area that are the sizeof a one bedroom apartment.

The schools are run by the Northside Independent School District (NISD), who brag that they are the second wealthiest school system in the county. And when the superindendent is not whining to the press about Robin Hood, you can find him perched in a lofty seat in the state of the art football stadium cheering on his teams.

NISD is the heaviest user of the relatively recent Texas School Penal Code, which allows the district to criminally prosecute things like truancy, vandalism, fighting, etc., and this district more than any other employs a large school police force. Unfortunately, these guys are mostly used to criminalize behaviors by mentally impaired students instead of providing educational interventions and accomodations, like behavior contracts. This saves the district a lot of money and makes folks like the superintendant very happy.

Saturday, one of the campus cops shot and killed a 14 year-old that, "made a move," towards him. Thank God! Another potential MS 13 stone-faced killer was put down by the school's brave law enforcement team.

When I heard this I wondered if it was the same guy who took my 53 pound, 12 year-old, psychotic, anorexic, former client - threw her on the ground during a pushing match with another student, wrenched her arms behind her back, put his knee on her neck, cuffed and arrested her? Or the one who tazed a 10 year-old autistic child?

I'm not sure who this stalwart is. The Express News yesterday I was using as a cat box liner describes the officer as, "devestated," and the community as shocked by all the police cars, emergency vehicles, and heliocopters invading their otherwise quiet neighborhoods.

Not one word about the boy they killed.

I was very upset about this, having had my own encounters with this crew of cowards. I thought about the terrible injustice of the whole thing, but having reflected upon the officer's feelings of devestation it occurred to me why he feels this way.

He was so far off campus when he did this he will lose his job, his career and probably his freedom in a place that will greet a child killer with open arms. The school district will pay many millions of dollars in a wrongful death suit. Even the Federal Department of Justice will investigate the patern of conduct of the district's sanctioned squad of rabid Barney Fifes violating kid's civil rights.

Hurray for zero tolerance Mr. Superintendant. Oh,and in a city where most kids drop out of school, keep those security lights on, folks.

Odor in the Court

The Tom DeLay money laundering trial continues in Austin amidst the common opinion that he will never be convicted.

This opinion stems in part from the fact that he is represented by Dick DeGuerin, one of Texas’s most outstanding criminal defense lawyers. DeGuerin, who once worked for legal legend Percy Foreman, has had a brilliant career representing such figures as David Koresh, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and Billy Joe Shaver.

And then there’s the thought that even if convicted, an ultimate appeal to the Roberts Supreme Court could end up with a decision like last year’s Citizens United v FCC, which opened up the floodgates to corporate spending in federal elections.

DeLay blames underlings for any wrongdoing, saying he was out of the loop on the $190,000 money swap with the RNC. I suppose there’s nothing to stop Jim Ellis and Warren RoBold from saying in their trial that they were out of the loop on it and that DeLay did it all.

DeLay and DeGuerin had asked Judge Pat Priest for a change of venue for this trial, (which they postponed for years leaving them more time to complain about not getting a speedy trial) saying that he could not get a fair trial in Travis county. The Judge wasn’t having any of it, and a jury from the city of Austin Texas, which DeLay gerrymandered into three districts trying to unseat Rep. Lloyd Doggett, will decide the verdict.

Yesterday the jury heard what might be the smoking gun in DeLay’s case; a tape of his testimony in 2005 that he knew about the money transfer before it happened and thought it was legal. He says now that he’s being “misinterpreted.”

The Chronicle’s been running the story in the ‘B’ section, No doubt it will be on the front page when the verdict comes in. For more colorful coverage you might look at Hal at Half Empty. As Juanita says, this could be more fun than recess in heaven.

Happy Veteran's Day

It seems like every year Americans pause to realize that soldiers who fought in WWII are dropping like flies, and will soon begone. This half-second of "that sucks," mixed with, "oh, well," has been going on for a while, and the true message is lost: the grown ups are gone. We have to fend for ourselves now.

Baby Boomers are not going quietly into the night, but not in any heroic way, like our fathers are. We need someone to be there who can assure us that this mortality thing is OK, and that we can manage like they had to. Faced with literal starvation and death, they managed seemingly by some super-human strength, that God forgot to give us, to get through a massive, catasrophic economic distaster and the unstoppable assault of world facism.

Lucy's father, who worked as a union man his whole life, never getting rich, but providing for his family well, fell off a six-foot ladder on to his head while painting his house. He broke his neck in two places, fractured his skull, and almost blead to death but for two crack heads passing by who called 911 before stealing his cellphone and wallet, (oh, kids these days!).

He refused pain meds (he hates 'dope') and following surgery, he walked out of the hospital in four days. These are the tough guys who we're losing.

You know what? Faced with similar challenges, I think we'll make it too - some of us - because we have to.

On the other hand, we collectively continue along as a nation with our heads up our ass. For some reason, as evidenced by the last election, half of suburb country assumes everthing's all right, and the other half doesn't give a crap. Believe me, WWII veterans in their day would have inserted an army boot up Rick Perry's smarmy ass, while tossing the whole lot, including our milque toasty democrats, into the gutter where they belong.

On this Veteran's Day, use the Google machine to estimate the tens, if not hundreds of thousands of homeless vets on our streets. I can tell you from experience that many military families, if not most, are forced to claim food stamps and Medicaid for their peeps because we don't take care of the people who sacrifice the most for us.

Talk to vets about the quality of medical care they receive for service connected injuries, especially PTSD, traumatic amputations, and head injuries.

The generation we are losing would have marched on Washington and forced some modern-day McArthur to let loose the fire hoses and police dogs and make us all watch and experience the burning shame.

Sometimes I forget that shame died of old age.

Press release:

The new Republican leadership in the House has notified the news agencies that it’s first initiative after gaining power will be a complete ban on the 21st century. One of its “young guns,” Eric Cantor, advanced the rationale.

“Up to this point our efforts to ignore the host of problems facing this country in the new century have focused on individual issues and consequently have put a drain on our best efforts to move us forward into the past, essentially spreading our efforts too thin. By simply banning the 21st century and any references to it we can systematically avoid dealing with any of the multitude of problems facing us as a nation and spare our constituency the headaches of contemplating the hard work that needs to be undertaken. I mean, really, the problems of this new century are simply overwhelming. We have looming peak oil, climate change, nations like China competing with us for resources, unstable political climates in most of the oil producing nations which we depend on, an overextended military in the Middle East trying to maintain hegemony and oil access, and a shaky unregulated finance industry teetering on collapse that could bankrupt the middle class and lead to a complete societal breakdown. Who wants to deal with that?

We’ve tried our best to prevaricate, dissimilate, play the outrage card, play the victim, point fingers, deny, ignore, shift blame, state utter bullshit as fact, and whatever dodgy methods we can come up with whenever legislation is proposed that might deal in a constructive way with such looming problems. The fact is there are simply too many problems and it’s far easier not to acknowledge their existence. That is why an outright ban on the 21st century makes sense. It frees our constituency to continue with the delusion that we can have a 1910 style government and still drive SUV’s to the mall, watch Maury and American Idol, and tell ourselves that we can live like gods forever if we just believe in the American Way.”

The news networks have reviewed this initiative very positively, calling it “brilliant”, “gutsy”, and “a bold new step into the past.”

-From ikalbertus on Crooks and Liars

Thanks from the Great State of Massabamma

When I see people worry about Republicans "taking over," it amuses me to reflect upon my 50 years of human experience that pukes can't even masturbate in a public restroom stall without fuking up, much less actually make rational public policy or manage government operations.

Face it, they are the, "Daddy spanked me so much I got Stockholm Syndrome, party," and the psychic trauma left behind compells them to make sure everyone else gets a trip to the woodshed.

"Movement Conservatism," and, "Freemarket Economies," plus, other political and economic genius propounded by the parties' intelligencia, whoever that is, makes no accomodations for stuff like reality, since the freemarket had to be pulled out of a ditch by a government tow truck, and the "movement" as we hear it from Glen Beck, et al, is utterly incomprehensible (see: 'spanking'). S.I. Hiwakawa and William Buckley, who talked prettily, never really ever said anything the current yahoos could understand, which leaves Ronald Reagan, (who was severely brain damaged) and Ayn Rand (now we're getting someplace) who posthumously dictates that, "I got mine and the rest of you can go fuck yourself and die," (snort!)

Which brings us back to Texas, in the post-election after-glow of a massive Republican daisy chain, with Rick Perry as Queen of the May. Millions of rolls of Scott Towells were required to wipe up the hubris left behind, that stained mom's furniture, (but she won't make a peep because dad might smack her).

The Leg is so excited at the prospect of litterally killing sick children, disabled people, and the elderly without anybody doing anything about it, that they are planning to "pull out," of the Medicaid and CHIPs system. They figure that if they don't have to pony up the 25 billion dollar deficit will just go away. All that boring, pointy-headed facts and figures about the catastrophic impact to the economy from 60 billion dollars in lost federal revenue, and from damage to the public health of 3 1/2 millions citizens, who are already the most under-educated populous in the country, is just more lies from "libruls," who want to take our guns, candy, and baby jeebus, (who is my favorite).

Hey, when your 50th in everything, what's less than last? No more, "thank God for Mississippi.

Chupacabra Report

An Echo Not a Choice

As predicted by polls, the GOP has swept the statewide races in Texas and taken a majority in the US House of Representatives. Results here in Harris County look much the same. An impressive mandate: over half of 39% of eligible Texans have spoken. The winners say this is all about Obama. Funny, I didn’t see his name anywhere on my ballot.

Obama’s two-year record of legislative success, achieved despite slim majorities and with hardly one Republican vote, has scarcely been noticed by the electorate. Expeditious measures to arrest the freefall of the US economy, progressive reforms in banking, credit, and healthcare, a payroll tax cut, and withdrawal of forces from Iraq are all ignored by the corporate shills on TV “news,” and unnoticed by the vidiots that stare at them.

Soon-to-be GOP House leaders have already announced that they will proceed with investigations of wrongdoing in the Obama administration, whatever that means. Don’t hold your breath waiting for John Boehner to say that “impeachment is off the table,” as Nancy Pelosi did when she took over under the Bush administration. I expect them to prosecute him under provisions of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. I wonder if folks knew that they were voting for witch-hunts?

Hapless Obama says he will reach out to work with the new Republican Congress. I guess he has to say that, but he must know that they have no intention of working for anything except his defeat in 2012, country be damned.

The voters of Kentucky have replaced retiring Paleo-Conservative Senator Jim “Bean-ball” Bunning with Paleo-Libertarian randroid Rand Paul. Paul is a wing-nut deficit hawk who would, among other things put the dollar back on the gold standard. As a Senator, Paul has the power to filibuster the upcoming move to raise the $14 trillion dollar statutory debt ceiling, shutting down the federal government, something Newt Gingrich needed a House majority to do in 1995.

Back in Texas, the GOP will go to work in January with robust majorities to enact their mandate for lower taxes and smaller government. This in a state facing a $20 billion structural deficit from the last round of tax cuts. Expect deep cuts in education and social services in this state that is already bring up the rear in both categories.

And so the people have spoken, regurgitating the message that has been drummed into them by the corporate media ever since they elected Obama, the secret Muslim who wants to cut off our heads. As that great misanthrope H.L. Mencken said; “The common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”

Chupacabra Report

Joe Holley of The Chronicle reports that after an initial surge of Republican early voters, the numbers are a wash so far, and Democratic candidate’s hopes are pinned to a good turnout on Election Day tomorrow. These hopes are dimmed by the weather forecast, which calls for thunderstorms tomorrow in Houston and Dallas, two population centers that have been trending Democratic in recent years.

I’ve seen today that some of the folks I’ve been jawboning haven’t voted yet and probably won’t make the effort to show up at the polls tomorrow either.

Driving through the 3rd Ward today I saw a sign urging folks to vote ‘out of self-respect and in self defense.’ Good point. Wish I had a sign like that to beat people with. Beatings don’t cure ignorance, but they may have some effect on apathy. After all our bloody history, to sit out the vote because raindrops might mess up your hair-do is deplorable. People around the world stand in line to vote in places where they may be bombed or shot. What’s our problem?

Heard somebody suggest today that only property owners should be allowed to vote. How eighteenth-century. This person no doubt feels that poor people on the dole are voting themselves favors. There is just so much wrong with this idea. I believe this, like the venom directed at President Obama, stems from racism, and plays into the hands of those who would divide us for nefarious purposes. The biggest welfare queens in our society stroll the halls of power in expensive suits, spending pennies-on-the-dollar in campaign contributions to belly up to the public trough. We have socialism for millionaires here.

I spoke to two young people last week-end who weren’t planning to vote, and I’m not sure I made an impression on them. These kids are draft age! They receive state and federal student aid! I hope that they remember our conversation when they’re squealing next year because the new kleptocrats are raising their tuition and fees as their benefits are cut; as they find themselves on their own in the healthcare market, as the next wars begin. It’s your self-interest; it’s self-defense.

Besides not voting, there’s the matter of voting stupid. I favor requiring new voters to pass a short civics test, showing that they have the sort of knowledge of our system of government that we ask of eighth-graders. I think of this every time I see one of those polls where people are given the Bill of Rights or something and they don’t agree with or approve of half of it. Or when I read that a candidate for office turns out to have never voted before. Gets my goat.