Texas Progressives talk Cancun Ted, Beto-Bob the politician, Shelley Luther

Off the Kuff presented the primary campaign interviews it has conducted so far.

SocraticGadfly offers some thoughts on Karl Rove, election thuggery and election theft in the wake of Rove's Jan. 6 column.

Shelley Luther is continuing to look for political relevance after getting squashed by Drew Springer a year ago. (With the money and notoriety she has, surprised she didn't take a gander at a state House seat, or even primarying Michael Burgess for the U.S. House with redistricting.) Her latest? Calling for a ban on Chinese university students. That said, yeah, some of them may indeed have CCP connections, and two-party duopolists may not look at the issue with more depth.

Van Taylor is getting bigly primaried for supporting an independent commission to investigate Jan. 6, even though he later opposed the House commission. (Remember, this was one of those ersatz "filibusters" by Senate Rethugs.)

What does "progressive" actually mean in Texas politics, at least in Congressional candidates? The Express-News takes a look.

Gus Bova takes the latest state news sites look at R.F. O'Rourke. He indicated that Beto is at risk of becoming Just.Another.Politician.™ Got news for you, Gus. Beto was long there. Like in 2018. Bova does note that after his "take your guns" screed, he then was part of the Texas Democratic Mafia that cock-blocked Bernie Sanders. So, say that he hit a more thorough version of JAP (a prince, or princess version, I see what I did) in 2020. Meanwhile, at the Dallas Observer, Simone Carter goes full bromance on R.F.

For the unknowing, after actually saying something halfway close to the truth about the Jan. 6 insurrection, Ted Cruz then went on Cucker Tarlson, I mean Socialist Swanson Tucker Carlson, and proceeded to cut his balls off and put them on a plate for Tucker. Per that link, Cancun Ted has actually said things 25 percent of the way to the truth about Jan. 6 for months, even while refusing to admit that his vote not to certify electoral votes contributed to the problem. He should have known Swanson Tucker was going to do just what he did, which means Carlson is wrong about one thing — Havana Ted ain't so smart.

Nature vandalism is getting worse at Big Bend, as at other NPS and general nature sites.

Michael Li explains why the discourse about how Democrats have "won" redistricting misses a lot of the picture.

Glasstire eulogizes Ann Harithas, artist and curator and co-founder of the Art Car Museum.

Rick Casey predicts the future following the ongoing 2020 election fraudit.

National

Just when you think Texas election law is hard for third party ballot access, Georgia says hold my beer.

Michael Lind writes about the strange career of Paul Krugman. (And does so without irony, though possibly with some hypocrisy, given Michael Lind's own peregrinations within a tight box generally focused on left-neoliberalism, as in, yes, left, but still within neoliberalism.) Interestingly, per the next piece, Lind notes that Krugman went on to call Stephen Jay Gould an academic fraud.

Sociobiology, like its successor, ev psych, IS sexist, but it's hard to argue that it's racist. So, I would agree with this guy that calling the late E.O. Wilson racist, AND doing so after his death, AND doing so in a Sokol fashion, was a hit job. Who did that? Per Peter Burns, none other than Scientific American. (OTOH, Burns is wrong in thinking Wilson is Mr. Innocent. Sociobiology, and even more its successor, ev psych, was and is sexist. And, both were/are more pseudoscientific than scientific.) Per the graf above, Gould was one of the first to call out sociobiology.

The Nation has a fatuous mini op-ed on climate change, talking about how expensive it will be but NO actual discussion of the details, Tweeted with an even more fatuous hot take about how this is all Republicans' fault when Status Quo Joe has allowed new gummint drilling leases and Dear Leader publicly pushed his "all of the above." And, that's why, after years of 10 cents on the dollar starter subscription offers for the mag, I've continued to refuse.