The decline and fall of John Whitmire

The Observer does a deep-dive takedown of Houston Mayor John Whitmire, and even more, the position in which he's in, both on the state and feds eroding more and more of Houston's strong-mayor powers, and with the city of Houston itself not what he — and maybe not just Sly Turner before him but Annise Parker before that — have claimed about it. 

Speaking of that? This pull quote:

Taken altogether, Whitmire is a nominally “strong” mayor with a relatively meager voter mandate, presiding over a once-mighty fiefdom in decline. And while Houston is no stranger to tragedy, he appears hardly able to confront the torrent of problems washing over his city. Municipal procedure here has for years been captured by the “task force” that goes nowhere, the “committee” that solves nothing. In those all-too-brief moments when the council chambers suddenly show signs of life, state Republicans are quick to intervene. How, then, did the strongest mayor in America become so weak? And even if Whitmire could get his way, what would that way look like?

Is a good summary. Read the whole thing. 

I knew Whitmire was a fair chunk of ConservaDem, but didn't know the details. 

ON the other hand? The idea that Houstonians are fleeing for the outer suburbs? Per Wiki, Houston's rate of population growth since 2020 has been faster than Phoenix, albeit slower than San Antonio. Here in Tex-ass, it's the same rate as Austin. Among major suburbs, it's faster than Plano and Houston's own Pearland and almost as fast as League City, both of which are outer suburbs if not exurbs. And, it's not losing population, unlike Sugar Land.

As with the Observer in the past, like the Monthly and the Trib, I've tagged the mag and the author on Shitter. As in the past, I expect no response, and even told Russek this.  I have created a new tag: Texas media inaccuracies.

Your latest callout of Democraps and Greens as well as Rethugs for backing Prop 4

This study from the Texas Water Journal says that on-site detailed inspection at sites in Texas shows:

[P]ermitting of surface discharges of produced water must be carefully regulated, and the downstream water quality containing signature produced water constituents must be continuously monitored.

Boom. I don't normally bold pull quotes, but this one needed it.

Continuously monitored? Yeah, sure, the Railroad Commission that can't even keep track of abandoned oil wells will do that, right? Or the Texas Water Development Board, in the middle of development? 

Here's the full abstract of the piece; the sentence bolded above is the last.

West of the 98th meridian, sufficiently treated produced water from oilfields can be legally discharged into surface water for beneficial reuse. However, its long-term impacts on the water quality of downstream waterways are poorly understood. 

In this study, we investigated the water quality evolution for segments of the receiving streams in the Nueces River watershed, namely the Lower Atascosa River and the Petronila Creek. The former site is associated with the permitted discharges from an active oil extraction operation, while the latter site represents a “legacy” site that is known to have been contaminated despite oil and gas operations being terminated in 1987. 

We analyzed datasets, including the historical water quality data from selected upstream and downstream locations relative to the discharge outfalls, to characterize the temporal and spatial trends of the key water quality parameters, including chloride and total dissolved solids. We also conducted correlation analyses between upstream and downstream water quality to describe the spatial relationship of the constituent concentrations and their association with hydrologic dilution effects. 

At both sites, the concentrations of key constituents were consistently and significantly higher than the upstream counterparts. Correlation analyses suggested the influence of additional downstream processes or inputs rather than simple longitudinal transport. Precipitation influences solute concentrations episodically, whereas the dominant drivers appear to reflect longer-term changes in solute inputs rather than hydrologic variability alone. 

While the causality of the worsening downstream water quality must be interpreted cautiously, the analyses showed a strong influence of external inputs impacting the water quality of these receiving streams. As such, permitting of surface discharges of produced water must be carefully regulated, and the downstream water quality containing signature produced water constituents must be continuously monitored.

There you are. 

This shit is why I called out the Texas Green Party's executive committee for backing Prop. 4. Texas Democrats are mainly urban and pretty clueless about agriculture in West Texas, even more, west of the 100th meridian than the 98th. I mean, even the Sierra Club, which ALSO SUPPORTED Prop. 4, admitted that the State Water Implementation Fund for Texas allows fracking wastewater, aka produced water, projects and that Prop 4 tax money would go to that. It's why I am officially no longer a Green at the state level as well as the federal.

For the unknowing, the 98th meridian is a bit west of Fort Worth and Austin, but east of San Antonio.  

Texas Progressives talk this and that

Off the Kuff interviewed four Democratic statewide candidates: Rep. Jon Rosenthal, Sen. Nathan Johnson, Clayton Tucker, and Sen. Sarah Eckhardt. (Your author wrote about Eckhardt yesterday and Tucker last week.)

SocraticGadfly, with author Jack Herrera providing his email on Twitter and asking for feedback, strongly critiqued and fact-checked Texas Monthly's piece on the Rio Grande water crisis, and got no response from Herrera — and, unsurprisingly, none from the Monthly, either. (Side note: Not for this reason, but others, no Monthly links this week; its updates since last week are meh.)

John Cornyn and a few other Republicans have condemned Bo French's latest racism. Too little, too late, especially since Strangeabbott was always in his corner and Dannie Goeb flip-flopped after he won the GOP primary for Railroad Commish.) Karl Rove said he's doing more than condemning, and voting for Democrat Joe Rosenthal.

Texas Supreme Court tosses out Galveston County's midsummer redistricting. 

US Senate Majority Leader John Thune's Super PAC is finally dropping some money for Kenny Boy Paxton.

What the Trib calls "public pressure" other people would surely call "corporate pressure" as the PUC approves yet more 765 kV power lines.  It does disclose its sponsors at the bottom, but doesn't disclose, as these lines are supposed to help the Awl Bidness, that it has pulled its punches there in the past.

Neil at the Houston Democracy Project noted that Mayor Whitmire & HPD changed city policy on mandatory investigation of shootings involving federal law enforcement not long after Trump started his 2nd term. Maybe this action had a part in Whitmire saying off the bat that the city had no role in the ICE killing of Salgado.

Paradise in Hell did a yard sign survey. (Your author's note: Yard signs mean little; Beto-Bob outnumbered Havana/Cancun/Calgary Ted by about the same ratio in certain areas. Plus, per the infamous Literary Digest poll, this is nowhere near scientific. The link even admits that, then tries to deny it admitted that. I leave it in part for the possible mocking should Talafreako lose to Kenny Boy.)

Laura Rodriguez considers a lesson she learned from 9/11.

City of Yes reflected on the absence of the Twin Towers.

The TSTA Blog finds no moral imperative to send public funds to private schools.

Chris Tackett documents the polling place closures ordered by the Republicans on Tarrant County Commissioners Court.

Proof Sarah Eckhardt is a squish on BDS in the Texas Comptroller's race

I've already said this about the Comptroller's race, where the Austin-area state senator is the Democratic candidate vs interim Dreamy Don Huffines, that compared to Green Party candidate ???, Eckhardt is a squish on the issue of pledging the state to stop being anti-BDS on its investments.

ConservaDem Charles Kuffner recently interviewed her, and it may be in part that Kuff, himself being very much a squish on BDS or anything anti-Zionist, didn't ask her, but in the Word document transcript of the interview, neither "BDS" nor "boycott" is there. Kuff even says in one question that the comptroller's office has gotten in trouble at times in the past for "policymaking." Perfect place to ask about BDS, right?

Shehla Faizi has already adamantly pledged to trash that shit, as I noted back in March, as the Green candidate. I also noted back then Eckhardt being a squish. I don't know the position of Libertarian V. Alonzo Echavarria-Garza. For places like Community Impact and other media sites, he's refused to answer questionnaires. Maybe he's afraid the city of Hearne will fire him as city manager.

Climate and environmental news roundup

Two from the group of young Hawaiians who sued the state over climate change several years ago, with the case eventually settling out of court, talk to Yale Climate about where they're at today.

Otherwise? The year 2045 is too far out for the state's transportation department to target on "decarbonization," even without a likely scrambling for loopholes.

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Reminder: The feds' Colorado River Compact update plan is voluntary. Remember, part 2: Even more than his general not understanding shit about shit, Trump really doesn't understand this. 

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New England, as well as the western states, faces new firefighting challenge, some climate-driven, others related to Trump's cuts and reorganizations (which build on earlier, duopoly-bipartisan handling of the U.S. Forest Service). 

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Corpus Christi hates birds while still loving green lawns. 

Sure, rural voters will turn Texas blue

That's what Politico is claiming.

Sure. 

Looking at the two main statewide races?

Talafreako consistently has a small lead on Kenny Boy Paxton. That could change with Trump's big ad buy. Or it could not. In most cases, the lead is within the margin of polling error.

Gina Hinojosa and Strangeabbott keep flip-flopping, and neither one has posted a lead beyond the margin of error in any poll.

And, where have I heard this before?

Oh, yeah, already 20 years ago, jefe Gilberto Hinojosa was bleating about Hispanic demography turning Texas blue. 

I first wrote about that issue, not quite 20 years ago, but yes almost 15. My most in-depth follow-up was two years later.

It's like finding a pile of hay and thinking that means a pony is inside it. Kuff isn't alone among Texas Democrats believing this shit.

Could it happen? Yeah, but I'll believe it when I see it. It's like the Hood County voters butt-hurt about data centers but refusing to vote to incorporate themselves to give themselves at least a modicum of control.

A lot of speakers at meetings and such are anti-virtue signaling. Maybe that's the same in polls. 

Many of these folks are "Yellow dog Republicans," to riff on an old phrase. They're telling Abbott they'll vote him out. They're telling the polls that. They're even smartly not trusting him on his data center "audits." The high-voltage power line additions? Strangeabbott is out of step even with non-rural elected leaders in his own party. I know Lite Guv Dannie Goeb explicitly asked the PUC not to approve them and let next year's Lege take a further look.)

But actually vote for Hinojosa? Many will stay home, sure. A few savvy ones may vote Libertarian or write-in.

But, actually pulling the D lever? I doubt it. 

If I'm wrong, I'll admit it after Election Day. If Dems, or Politco, are wrong I invite them to do the same. I won't hold my breath. Otherwise, as I told Kuff, this is like actual AI, or nuclear fusion power. It's always going to be just around the corner.

Back to the story, first with Greg Torres from rural McCulloch County:

Torres in McCulloch County said Texans are going to have to make a choice about the state’s future. 

Do they want the romanticized version of Texas — with cowboys and wide open spaces — or a Texas that’s hyperfixated on business? 

“Are we just going to sell off our version of Texas for money?” Torres asked. 

Torres said he still plans to vote for Abbott. He said Abbott is responsive to public pressure, even though he doesn’t think Abbott is sincere in his attempts to regulate data centers or lessen the impacts of the 765-kV lines.

There you are. 

As for the rural voters? Especially if you live west of I-35, climate change is coming for your farms and ranches. The "hollowing out" will only continue. 

As for Suzanne Bellsnyder? She's a hypocrite on water use, and surely knew that Strangeabbott was a fake on rural understanding back in 2014. 

And, if Hinojosa DOES win? She'll be one-term. GOP talking heads will find somebody better than Strangeabbott. She'll be stuck with a Lege in opposition, to boot, and Goeb perhaps relishing the opportunity to play obstructionist and also to play gov kingmaker. (Hell no he doesn't want it himself. Get a clue.)

Finally, the story was two weeks old when Kuff posted it. (That's where I saw it.) Things change near the election finish line.