TX Progressives wrangle the Lege's nuttery and more

Stupidity abounds on the political landscape in the Pointy Abandoned Object State™ this week, from the Texas Legislature through the city of Dallas and on to that city's daily ink-waster, the Dallas Morning Snooze.

Dive in as the Texas Progressives tackle that and more.

Buckle your seat belt, because this version of the roundup has lost of high-octane snark.

The Lege

It's "hell week" in Austin, when bill authors scramble to avoid poison pill amendments, calendar back-burner placement and other problems and try to cross the finish line, then hope Gov. Strangeabbott puts his scrawl on their pet legislation.

Yesterday was the last day for Senate bills to get first consideration in the House. Today is the last day for that if they're on the consent calendar — which always can be torpedoed, and was in the previous Lege by Former Fetus and Forever Fuckwad Jonathan Stickland. Friday is the last day for the House to accept negotiations or changes on its bills as suggested by the Senate; Saturday is the last day to vote on such bills.

As of Monday, here's a big picture look on various bills from the Trib. Following is a pullout on some specific bills.

Off the Kuff analyzes the relentless Republican attack on local control this session.

Stephen Young reported on the Lege’s progress in a “born alive” bill and the pandering behind it. 

Sophie Novack at the Texas Observer reports on SB 22, the “anti-Planned Parenthood” bill. 

Also at the Texas Observer, Megan Kimble details how Kelly Hancock is leading the charge to let apartment owners jack up the late fees they can charge. 

Another wingers’ pet project, a campus free speech bill, has passed both houses. It ignores the reality that, in high-profile cases elsewhere, off-campus agitators, often themselves conservatives, caused the problems, and that speeches organized by campus-based political groups have high security costs said groups dump back on the university. It also ignores that wingers' support for free speech is just as selective as that of many of the librulz they condemn.

The Texas bullet train dodged a legal bullet about its ability to use eminent domain but it still retains a stupid route, as I have said before. Whether Brains is right that it’s too late for that to be addresses or not, along with other issues, remains to be seen. Kuff, like Brains, likes the bullet train. Whether it actually gets built and then, whether as a privately financed line, it asks for state help because of its stupid route and stupid stops, also remains to be seen. (After all, stupid routing ideas are part of what derailed California's bullet train, at least for now.) And, before the end of this year, I'll surely have more on this issue. Nuff ced for now. No ... not enough ... there's several people that agree with me on ever-growing comments on Kuff's link that Texas Central was, has been and is selling a pig in a poke. A lot of libertarian-type wingers at groups who know how to crunch numbers, like Reason, are also saying that ride counts are not just inflated but WILDLY inflated. (That said, contra the wingers, airports are subsidized in various ways, too.)

The "save Chick-fil-A" bill has risen from the dead.

For the second straight Lege, a "disobedient presidential electors" bill has failed.

SB 9, Hughes' vote suppression bill, is dead.

Rachel Pearson flaunts her sorcery in the face of Forever Fuckup's antivaxxerism.

HB 2504, which would make it much easier for third parties to have statewide ballot access, was very alive and well and has now passed all three Senate readings and heads to Abbott's desk. Progress Texas showed it is part of the duopoly by not even listing it under good bills in its late-session bill watch blog (NOT linking) which got a smackdown on Twitter from me:

@WesleyStory0 If HB 2504 to ease third party ballot access ain't on your list of "good bills" in the #txlege you and .@progresstx are watching (and I saw it ain't), then you're not really so progressive, are you? I "understand"; you're part of the #duopoly. But I don't "accept."

— reallyDonaldTrump  🚩🌻 (@AFCC_Esq) May 20, 2019

And that's that for what's happening in Austin.

All things Dallas area

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, the “Tropical Trump,” showed up in Dallas and got protested. 

Stephen Young also calls out the abysmal editorial page of the dying Dallas Snooze for its blank-check support of Trump’s nutteries. 

Jim Schutze notes how all the people that allegedly “matter” in Dallas, the “endorserati,” are lining up behind Eric Johnson in the mayoral runoff, just like they did for the Trinity toll road. He also talks about the runoff debate between Johnson and Scott Griggs. 

Schutze also kicks former Observer peer Robert Wilonsky, now at the Snooze, in the nads, for buying the official city of Dallas party line for the umpteenth time. (Lawrence Wright, in his latest book, "God Save Texas," seems to actually like Wilonsky.)

Yours truly notes that activist investors in Belo / The Snooze rightfully are huffy when it overestimates the value of its own property by $5 million and takes a bath in its sale.

RIP to I.M. Pei, designer of the interesting-looking Dallas City Hall and the beautiful Morton Meyerson Symphony Center. Pei has five buildings overall in Dallas. Read about the Meyerson's history here. As a one-time DSO season ticket holder, the place is beautiful and still has fantastic acoustics.

Fort Worth is following Dallas' footsteps in a homeless crackdown.


Texana

Lisa Gray says people should avoid bad tacos. I'd expand that to avoiding bad Tex-Mex, which, as a person who grew up in New Mexico, includes most of it.

Speaking of overrated Texas food, Whataburger is looking for a minority investor to help facilitate an expansion. (Contra Texas Monthly, In-N-Out is better than What? A Burger?, as I spelled it on Twitter.) What would be a GREAT train wreck and probably applauded by many wingnut Texans? Chick-fil-A doing a takeover behind the scenes as that minority investor.

Beyond Bones wants to tell you about Megalosaurus.

National and more

Scoffing at, yes, SCOFFING AT Donut Twitter and #TheResistance, Socratic Gadfly, with help from political scientist and author Corey Robin, explains that Trump is not a fascist but rather a schematically predictable variety of president.

David Bruce Collins writes about sociopathy in various ranks of politics.

Juanita has thoughts about Gene Simmons and his kind-of presser for DoD.

Slate argues that Alabama and Missouri have gutted the plans of The Umpire and his Roberts Supreme Court to quietly kill Roe at the edges.

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