Texas Progressives — final pre-election thoughts Texas and national

Following up on my blogging last week about a long-form Texas Monthly piece, Bud Kennedy, arguably now the dean of Texas political columnists, notes that women and youth voters won't save Democrats and in fact didn't save them during early voting.

Bud has more good stuff, including wondering why Beto-Bob and Collier, even more, since he WAS running for Lite Gov, attacked only Strangeabbott and not Danny Goeb.

And, yet more after that. In my blogging last week, I noted Texas Dems have long, and wrongly, relied on "demographics as destiny" on future Hispanic growth. Bud says another version of "demographics as destiny" also isn't true, namely that the Californication of Texas holds no hope and in fact, the average California new move is more conservative than the average Texan already here.

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Of course, Beto-Bob is also fighting upstream against Warmonger Joe's inflation. (Notice that gas prices went back up again late last week, negating Warmonger Joe's latest SPR release?) "Democrats burn it all down" says Arin Gupta at Counterpunch. Even with the paywall, you get the gist in the portion you can read. But, that's not all from my quarter.

Remember that even the Congressional Progressive Caucus has signed off on the burn-down. Remember that Biden doesn't want diplomacy. Remember that the NYT tried to revive Russiagate to boost Dem chances (something even a Thom Hartmann was dumb enough to accept at face value) 

Oh, and the warmongers, Nat-Sec Nutsacks (and clueless Thom Hartmanns) of the world claiming that Putin doesn't want to negotiate? No, it's Zelenskyy, and Bezos Post spills the beans. US officials, though not really wanting to negotiate themselves, worry that Zelenskyy looks so intransigent that more and more Global South countries will tune him out. Of course, when Zelenskyy and the US feed off each other, it's easy to blame only him.

But, both Texas Dems, re the first half, and national Dems re the second half, will remain clueless because, per Mencken, their pay, along with fame and standing, depend on it.

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Speaking of the last graph above? Readers have one more chance to hit those polls at right.

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Texas SoS John Scott continues to muddle his message about Texas elections being secure. Going beyond the Trib, it's possible this is deliberate footsie on his part.

That impression is increased by the story about the one-eyed spavined but unconvicted mule, Ken Paxton, following in Scott's footsteps by sending a boatload of people to Harris County. They've responded by asking for federal monitors, though Merrick Garland had yet to respond at the time of the story.

Dan Crenshaw has gone further than Soctt and called out election deniers as knowing they're lying, saying they've said that behind closed doors.

Election deniers don't care what either Crenshaw or Scott say. Beyond anything else, per this longer read, there's money involved if you're doing a denialism tour, plus fame within the wingnut, or wingnut-squared, section of the GOP, and possible future campaign plans. (One person in the story was Crenshaw's primary challenger this year.)  But, foremost? Follow the money. A cool $25 a pop for a ticket to one of these events? You sell 200 tix for two a week? That's $5K a week. Even if half of that goes to overhead? Nay, 60 percent? You're still netting $2K a week. Nice side hustle. On the non-money side? Kenny Boy has spoken to (at least) one of these events. And, per the first link, Weston Martinez claimed he had a meeting with Scott; Scott said, yes, but it was with public and media there, and not any "close contact."

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Texas churches continue to defy the IRS on electioneering. Bud Kennedy wrote specifically about Mercy Culture, to which I retweeted this:

Hey, Bud, per 2 Chron. 18:21, how does .@MercyCulture not know it might have a lying spirit in its midst? Since it keeps violating Romans 13 & refuses to submit to the governing authorities, I'd say that's PROOF .@landonschott is exactly that. Don't you hate ppl like me Landon?

— TheRealSocraticGadfly (@real_gadfly) November 5, 2022

Which applies to all churches doing it.