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.

Did Karl Rove help steal an election in 2002? Probably not

The original Turd Blossom, Karl Rove, actually talked some sense when discussing GOP responsibility for Jan. 6. OTOH, since his actions way back in 2002, or actions of those connected to him, may have led to an actual #StartTheSteal, he's a fucking hypocrite. 

But, did he actually help challenger Bob Riley steal the 2002 Alabama gubernatorial race from incumbent Don Siegelman?

First, contra the end of the piece at the second link, I've seen no evidence that Ohio 2004 was hacked, and have written about this and more here, and above all here, where I linked to Mark Hertsgaard CRUSHING "Chemtrails Bob" Fitrakis' BS claims on Ohio 2004. This includes arguing with Brains, and behind him, his co-conspirator Brad Friedman, or I should say, conspiracy theorist Brad Friedman, over this. And, contra the middle of the piece, per Wiki, there's controversy over whether a #StartTheSteal even happened in Alabama 2002. Per one claim, the explanation of how the original reported vote total in Baldwin County became the final number is convoluted at scale fully matching conspiratorial thought. Supposably, whoever was genyus enough to hack into Baldwin County's system was at the same time initially stupid enough to give votes to both Riley AND Siegelman, and then had to rehack to fix that!

The AP story, linked off Wiki, notes that, if it were a glitch, it was a big one, BUT, that Siegelman's original vote total was way overblown vs Alabama state average. Occam's Razor, per which had historic background, and is simpler, per the end of the paragraph above.

Beyond that, the author of the second link, Jennifer Cohn, seems somewhat given to conspiracy theorizing. Take Georgia's 2002 Senate race. Max Cleland got hardballed and smeared, but no hacking of anything happened.

The real issue that Cohn gets right is Rove and BushCo later prosecuting Siegelman for allegedly taking a bribe. The biggest subissue on that is that "look forward" Dear Leader Obama and his AG Eric Holder refused to look at the case again and Obama refused to give clemency, let alone a pardon.

Ambinder right on cons, wrong on libs

Mark Ambinder rues the increasing purity demands of hardcore conservatives, and the lack of party discipline, unity and message. But, he then totally spoils his column with some crazy counservative-liberal, Republican-Democratic equivalency claim on this issue.

Seriously. The never-before-elected Joe Miller, a fringe Palinite, is the same as three-term House veteran Joe Sestak? And, no, I'm not joking:

Democrats, too, have had their share of bickering. Arkansas Lt. Gov. Bill Halter — galvanized by the state’s labor unions — challenged Senator Blanche Lincoln; she barely won the June runoff. In Colorado, when Senator Michael Bennet was not responsive enough to party liberals, the state’s former House speaker Andrew Romanoff decided to challenge him. Mr. Romanoff sold his house to pay for his campaign and might have won the Aug. 10 vote were it not for strategic mistakes he made late in the campaign.

In May in Pennsylvania, Representative Joe Sestak would not let the Democratic establishment coronate Senator Arlen Specter — who had just been persuaded to switch parties by the White House after conservatives made it impossible for him to win the Republican primary. These anti-party forces are not likely to wane.

Indeed, conservatives and liberals alike will continue to insist on nominating unadulterated candidates and will become more successful in doing so. And those candidates are likely to distrust their own establishments as much as they ideologically oppose the people at the other end of the political spectrum.

Neither Romanoff nor Halter nor Sestak was an ideologue.

Even if Bernie Sanders, in Vermont, were to decide to become a Democrat and run against Pat Leahy, even HE wouldn't be Joe Miller and Ambinder's "equivalency" would still be untrue.

Also, contra claims Ambinder makes elsewhere in the column, there's no well of left-liberal funding anything like the Koch brothers and others.

Finally, so far at least, the tea party challenge has done fairly little to dissolve GOP party discipline. Of course, we'll have to wait not just until the end of the primary season, but until after midterm elections in November to test this, for various reasons. We'll need to see how many nutbars win, and how that affects the GOP with them inside the electoral tent. We'll also need to see how many nutbars lose, and how much that affects sniping at the GOP "establishment."

But, Dems, without even Bernie Sanders types, let alone, say, Alexander Cockburn types, challenging on their left, continue to be more fractious than Republicans. Blame Rahm Emanuel for the Blue Dog Congressional candidates he recruited. Blame President Kumbaya for not cracking a whip on party discipline, which his predecessor did. In other words, Obama needs Rahmbo to be Rove, and he's not pushing Rahmbo to do that, in that way.

Schadenfreude for Karlo Rove? NOT

Even though he's getting divorced from his second wife, I expect he'll continue moral blathering, not just foreign and economic policy, as part of his punditry.

Neanderthals had three subgroups

DNA sequencing (which is probably a bit iffy, given age and scarcity of remains) has identified three subgroups of Neanderthals.

Contrary to rumor, they are not the Rovian, Cheneyinsky, and Bushite subgroups. Actually, they were in different areas of Europe; a fourth has been tentatively identified in Asia.

Rove and Miers to testify on DOJ firings

That said, Congress did a half-cave with closed depositions. And the lawsuit in the case is being stayed, so no test case over executive branch power; that’s a specific part of the agreement.

Rather canned to satisfy Rove!

You gotta love the discovery process in lawsuits. And, Dan Rather’s wrongful firing lawsuit against CBS is turning up exactly that — the Eye canned Dan the Man to pander to the GOP.

Andrew Heyward, the former president of CBS News, was asked in a sworn deposition about the composition of a special panel CBS named in 2004 to look into the veracity of letters claiming Bush dodged the draft. And, Heyward acknowledged that he had wanted at least one member to sit well with conservatives:

“CBS News, fairly or unfairly, had a reputation for liberal bias, the harshest scrutiny was obviously going to come from the right.”

And, while Rather has yet to find the fingerprints of Rove in particular, they’re there.

By the time we get to the actual open court, Heyward, Les Moonves and Sumner Redstone could all be on the stand.

That is, if Rather’s got enough money to burn beyond the $2 mil he’s already spent.

Palin – it’s the GOP hierarchy’s fault

That’s the latest person/entity she’s throwing under the bus, this time courtesy of something the WSJ charitably calls an “interview.” “Gospel,” or something like that, comes more to mind.

I’d guess by hierarchy, she means Steve Schmidt, at least, though she may be pointing directly at Rove.

Get on the wahhmbulance; line forms (as it always does for the GOP) at the Right.

‘I’m Karl Rove and I approve this message’

After Turd Blossom admitted earlier today that John McCain ads had gone “beyond the 100 percent truth test ,” if Obama doesn’t hit this HARD, and with more than a campaign statement, then he is weak.

Instead:

Run a whole damn series of ads about McCain’s lying, with the kicker at the end of each one.

Find a Rove look-alike, and have him say: “I’m Karl Rove, and I ran what had been the sleaziest campaigns ever, to get George W. Bush elected. And I approve this message.”

Time after time. About McCain’s lies about what he has done, that he hasn’t. About McCain’s lies about Palin. About McCain’s lies about Obama.

Run it.

Again and again.

But not necessarily nationally all the time. This is a HUGE ad campaign for swing-state target markets.

This can’t be run enough to be run into the ground.

Rove contempt vote means nothing

So the House Judiciary Committee has finally voted to hold Karl Rove in contempt.

Big deal.

We know that Attorney General Mike Mukasey won’t enforce it.

And, we have no evidence so far that House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, let alone Speaker Nancy Pelosi, aka Passive Pelosi™, has any desire, guts or cojones for a showdown from using Congress’ inherent contempt powers.

So, it’s meaningless.

More proof? Last December’s Senate Judiciary contempt votes for Rover and Josh Bolton.

The panel’s ranking Republican, Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who has been extremely critical of the Justice Department, voted in favor of the contempt citations “knowing that it’s highly likely to be a meaningless act,” as he put it then.

You are correct, sir!

But ‘impeachment is off the table!’ — July 15 version

So it’s now official. Pat Tillman’s death by friendly fire, not unfriendly, and Jessica Lynch’s non-heroics, were all official parts of the Bush-Rove Iraq War spin machine.

You think Passive Pelosi™ is going to actually start calling for impeachment, though?

Dream on.

Passive Pelosi™ FIGHTING inherent contempt

That’s the word from After Downing Street about this oh-so-tough Speaker of the House.

Specifically, she’s fighting Judiciary Chairman John Conyers on the use of inherent contempt against Karl Rove.

The link has numbers for all the Dems on House Judiciary; Pelosi’s phone is listed in comments.

Or, e-mail her.

WHAT KIND of contempt will Rove get from Conyers?

Let’s face it. Karl Rove is NOT going to show up at the House Judiciary Committee’s July 10 hearing on the possible political motivations of the trial of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.

Let Conyers subpoena away, like he did with Harriet Miers and John Bolton in the U.S. Attorney firings. Attorney General Mike Mukasey refused to enforce the contempt citations, so the House filed a legal motion.

But, in that case, the court could simply tell Conyers that he hasn’t exhausted all his possibilities yet, namely that of inherent contempt.

The flip side to that, though, is that inherent contempt only applies to the Congress sitting at the time. So, Conyers et al would have to compel testimony from Miers and Bolton (or Rove) with the clock ticking toward the clichéd Labor Day start of the campaign season.

And, even with inherent contempt, what if they still refuse to testify? Is Passive Pelosi™ going to swear out the Capitol police to go to their houses with warrants?

Bush — Rove firing shows evil genius and not clueless idiot

His mangling of the English language aside, at the time of the 2000 presidential election and even before, there was a lot of liberal debate, including inside myself, as to whether Bush was a clueless idiot, or he was consciously nefarious.

But, the way Bush fired Turd Blossom — in church — clearly points to the “evil genius” side.

That, according to a new book — “Machiavelli’s Shadow” — by former Time magazine reporter Paul Alexander, is where President George W. Bush informed trusted advisor Karl Rove in 2007 that his services would no longer be needed at the White House.

“On a Sunday in midsummer, George W. Bush accompanied Karl Rove to the Episcopalian Church Rove sometimes attended,” writes Alexander. “They made their way to the front of the congregation. Then, during their time in the church, Bush gave Rove some stunning news. ‘Karl,’ Bush said, ‘there’s too much heat on you. It’s time for you to go.’”

Maybe Bush knew what he was doing in breaking such bad news in such serene atmosphere: As Alexander documents, Rove has quite the temper.

Follow the link for some anecdotal comments about that temper, and about the short-term gain, long-term loss of Rove’s political style, all from Republicans.

Matthew Dowd falls out of love with W; why was he ever in love in the first place?

The question is, besides his talking about being in denial about Bush’s out-of-touchness, what he originally saw in Bush’s “Texas style of governing” to trust him in the first place?

After all, as a consultant to Lt. Gov Bob Bullock, he’d surely been enough of an Austin insider to hear about Bush’s Karla Faye Tucker imitation cackle, Bush’s funeral home crisis troubles and more.

In other words, Matthew Dowd was in denial in 1999, long before his claim to have recognized his denial in 2004. Dancing with the devil called Karl Rove is proof enough.

N.M. Senate prez indicted; but will he be convicted, because of BushCo meddling?

Politically-fired U.S. District Attorney David Iglesias DID have a corruption case under investigation. New Mexico State Senate President Pro Tem Manny Aragon (a known sleaze since I worked at a N.M. paper a decade ago, and before that, has been indicted in a $4.2 million public funds skimming scheme.

The problem, as similarly-fired U.S. District Attorney Bud Cummins puts it? The political nature of Iglesias’ firing is a GREAT defense team weapon for Aragon’s lawyers.

Way to go, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Karl Rove, et al.

Exactly why we are still in Iraq

For political reasons, to play to "the base," if you're Karl Rove.

For psychological reasons, because Dick Cheney simply cannot admit he's wrong. CLASSIC Type A American male.

For religious reasons. George Bush's Freudian slip of "crusade" reflects what his mindset actually is.

THAT's why we keep pounding sand down a rathole.