Texas Progressives talk this and that

As I did last week, I have split this week's Texas Progressives roundup into two parts.

SocraticGadfly, with last Thursday being Aug. 6, did a roundup of old thoughts, with some new additions, on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Houston-area parents' bid to get an immediate hold placed on the Texas Senate's 10 Commandments bill failed, but a hearing on an injunction is set for Aug. 17.  

The Porvenir massacre site is under threat from a Big Bend-area portion of Trump's border wall. (I was last in Presidio County before the marker erection, but via Doug Swanson and others, am familiar already with the story.) 

The Observer says Mike Miles appears to be resorting to cheats to inflate campus accountability ratings in Houston ISD. 

Neil at the Houston Democracy Project visited the site of the ICE murder of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo.

Steve Vladeck strongly questions the notion that this SCOTUS is somehow "independent" from Donald Trump.

Mustafa Tameez observes that AI has developed intelligence faster than it has earned legitimacy.

The Houston Press urges the passage of a real immigration reform law to reduce the chances of more ICE killings.

Texas Public Opinion Research reports on what the people want with a variety of policy ideas.

Texas Progressives talk Paxton and Talarico and call out both halves of the duopoly

As with last week, I've split the weekly roundup into two parts.

Off the Kuff is following the polls in the Senate and other races. 

Related? Outgoing Ag Commish Sid Miller says Republicans will lose statewide races because of Strangeabbott's support for data centers and backlash to that. He thinks Abbott is trying to game the banana republic Texas Lege system to pass out favors within data centers, to boot.

Christofascist Tim Dunn is back in the arena to at least indirectly and in a small way support Ken Paxton financially per what Texas Monthly reports. Farris Wilks remains AWOL.

Kenny Boy failed again in his attempt to force gunz into the State Fair of Texas.

James Talarico, like Paxton, has a voting registration issue. (It makes me wonder if the top tier of non-duopoly candidates nationally has a similar problem anywhere. Dr. Jill Stein, have you always lived where you've claimed?) It makes me not wonder if Kuff will wrote about it, at least with a non-spinning take, because, unless snowballs freeze in hell, I know the answer is no. And, as of the afternoon of Aug. 9, the answer was indeed no. Shock me. The Trib story went up Aug. 5, plenty of time for him to write. 

Framing and spinning voting issues in Tarrant County

Lon Burnam was arrested over voting rights  issues at a special Tarrant County Commissioners Court meeting, part of a larger protest. Per the first link, Burnam is talking about suing Tarrant County Judge Tim O'Hare, who may also have violated the Americans with Disabilities Act with a previous speaker.

But, per the second link, and per both Republicans and Democrats on the court, the county elections official, a nonpartisan appointee, Clint Ludwig, suggested the cut in voting sites, which the court eventually decided to table.

We'll see what Kuff says about that one. As of Aug. 9, nothing, not even about the Burnam arrest, let alone that the protests were misguided; the Trib stories went up Aug. 6.

Lone Star Left reported on the situation in Tarrant County and tries to spin it as a D win with O'Hare "caving" when the full court, presumably 5-0, tabled action on the proposed cuts. It doesn't even mention county elections head Clint Ludwig. So, it did Kuff's dirty work for him; he submitted the link as part of his set for this week's Texas Progressives roundup, and I separated the whole schmeer, with my links above, out of the mix. I also restacked Lone Star Left's piece with a shorter version of the first sentence of this paragraph. And, Michelle Davis, with a "you're free to believe what you want" opener, responded. In her response, she ignored what I said then, and two paragraphs above. 

From the second Trib link:

[T]he commissioners — both Republicans and Democrats — said at the meeting that they didn’t suggest the plan.

There you are, Michelle. 

Actual Constitutionality vs McKinney's Islamophobic nutters

Texas Monthly goes in-depth about McKinney's Islamophobic nutters who lie about Islam and also either are ignorant of or else lie about the First Amendment. They hated the McKinney city council following standard zoning — and being cognizant of past Supreme Court rulings about religious structures and zoning reguluations, surely — to approve the expansion of an already existing mosque and religious center. It also notes the "don't sharia Tex-ass" stems directly from Strangeabbott.

Speaking of, here's somebody who does understand:

After four hours of public comment, city employees gave a brief but thorough presentation on the actual site plan—the purported reason for the agenda item. Then the council was asked if any of them would like to speak. Justin Beller of District 1 asked to say a few words. As far as concerns about traffic and parking went, the Islamic Association had shown a willingness to work with its neighbors. “I’ve struggled to find words to address the other opinions that are injected into this discussion. This is a site-plan approval, nothing else. But it’s disheartening to be asked to break my oath of office or to defy the constitution because of some algorithmic rage or misinformation. Watching partisan politicians, with power to gain, use fear and outrage is disappointing. I would encourage all citizens to resist this reckless political rhetoric, which in my opinion amounts to election-year fearmongering.” He was, of course, drowned out by loud booing.

There you go. Per the First Amendment and those Supreme Court rulings, every elected official in the United States is required to swear an oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution. 

On Shitter, in addition to responding to them last week, I also started reporting their posts under the "hate" checkoff. 

ICE and body cameras

ICE plans for all of its ICE cubes, ICE bergs, or whatever, to have body cameras in the not-too-distant future, but says it will only release video when in its "best interest." Ain't how it works, ICE. It's called the Freedom of Information Act.

Max Blumenthal, red-brown antivaxxer

World Socialist Web Site, per a link posted by a likely duopoly tribalist journalist at Reddit named Shinbreaker who elsewhere claims that ALL questions about WIV were conspiracy theorizing, notes that he's an antivaxxer who back in 2022 was promoting red-brown alliances, and in nutter ways.

WSWS nutgrafs:

Seeking to cultivate a “red-brown” alliance between workers and fascists, Blumenthal declared, “This is not a left versus right issue. This is about economic rights... human rights and our constitutional rights.” 

He went on to call for an alliance of the “99 percent” against the “biomedical security state.” Instead of calling for increased protections for workers and their families, Blumenthal demanded that schools be reopened and that workers who refused to get vaccinated be allowed to return to work and infect their co-workers.

It then notes this wasn't new from Max, that he'd had a nutter piece by alleged Marxist nutter Christian Parenti promoting more of the same published at Grayzone two weeks before this rally.  (Outside of some of his tankie non-skeptical leftist modern political ideas, Parenti also thinks Zachary Taylor was poisoned.)