Burnt Orange Report

Nice to see you guys cry bullshit on Bell for once. It is obvious by now that his campaign exists for the sole purpose of paying a handful of consultants. He ought to at least be upfront about it. And his placid acceptance of the hypocritical atack lines they feed him does not speak well of his leadership abilities.

Just how, exactly, does that constitute Repbulican-lite?

Karl-T, I think there's a big difference between opposition to violent video games, and opposition to the sale of violent video games to minors. If all he's saying is let's enforce the rating system, I don't see a problem.

It's such a cheesy pander and an issue that I hardly doubt people are going to cross over and be drawn by. And announcing that on a college campus is about as dumb of an idea as you can get, beyond the fact that the issue itself is just lame.

Bell is an opportunist who made an appeal to the GOP as he prepared to run for Houston Mayor but, after being outflanked by Sanchez, decided to run for Congress as a moderate. Now he's running for Governor as a liberal. In fact, he is is a perennial candidate on the fringes of the action... David Van Os, but without the consistency.

It's MOLLY Beth Malcolm Karl Thomas. She's a great Democrat and smart woman. Her endorsement means something. Dig a little deeper my friend.

No, not really. The only peopl who care about her endorsing would be Democratic party officials and activists. And a large majority of those don't really like her, or at best, are going to say, eh. Not much digging here.

And she may be a great Democrat, there are plenty of those. But there also a bunch more that didn't used to be Republicans.

You have got to be f***in kidding me. How juvenile are you Karl that you would pull out the fact that Molly Beth was a Republican to attack her. Whatever you feel about how good of a chair she was, she is a good Democrat and a good person.

Your comment is such an unnecessary and low blow that it shows how juvenile you are. If you don't like Bell, that is fine. If you don't like MBM that is fine, just give a reason. Don't go pulling ad hominem shit.

That would be like me saying no one should pay attention to a damn thing you say because your involvement in Texas politics consists solely of being the webmaster of the UDems and having a lot of free time to play on the internet.

But saying all of that would be an equally low blow, so I won't.

I don't think it is pandering to attempt to forge a new consensus, it actually stikes me as quite visionary--and why I signed up to work for the campaign. That and the insure every Texan child and the "education moonshot"--but, like, you know, whatever. Not to mention that Bell and his consultants are paying tons of attention to the blogosphere. Not seeing the issue here.

But you did, so...

What, you mean there can't be ridiculous attacks and charges against public officials in the comments? Then I guess I'll just have to ban half of the people that post here.

It's hard to take someone who posts anonymously seriously enough as it is, but you apparently also appear to have a lack of understanding of even what my name is, and what my involvement in Texas politics consists of, or the fact that I don't have a lot of "free time" as you so claim. Anyone who actually knows me can tell you otherwise.

Karl,

Perhaps the problem you have with Chris is that he's not running in Oklahoma, then?

That does seem like a lot of consulting for just an exploratory committee and raises some questions in itself in terms of the amounts paid.

Jason Stanford is certainly quiet. Maybe he didn't realize how easily campaign finance records are available on the internet. Or maybe he didn't think anyone would bother to look them up. Maybe some should look up the records from Bell's congressional races? Those are interesting too.

It does seem to contradict the comments by Molly Beth Malcolm. Who is indeed about as popular with mainstream Democrats as Bell is. Maybe that's why they call themselves the "new" mainstream? Hoping the real mainstream will just fall into line and hold their nose at the polls?

Quite a few of the mainstream Democrats plan to get Kinky Friedman on the ballot and vote for him. And this is yet another reason why.

Interesting that she used to be a Republican. There sure are a lot of Republicans and Republicans around and behind Bell. I suppose he thinks that makes him a "bipartisan" leader. It does make you wonder. Especially about his "positions" of late which seem to be geared to appeal to moderate Republicans. As far as I'm concerned, there's little difference between appealing to moderate Republicans and pandering to them.

"What, you mean there can't be ridiculous attacks and charges against public officials in the comments?"

If Bell can make them in Congress, I think we should be able to make them here.

Yes, publicizing the endorsement of Molly Beth Malcolm is a bit curious, but let's also be realistic here. Molly Beth Malcolm led our party to loss after loss as much as the Texas Republican Party Chair from 1998-2003 led Texas Republicans to win after win. I'll admit, she wasn't a very successful state chair, but there are many, many better reasons we lost numerous races in that timeframe than Molly Beth Malcolm. Although for me the biggest thing that sticks out about Molly Beth Malcom is the fact that as head of the TDP, she couldn't recruit an actual candidate for KBH's 2000 campaign.

As far as the GTA blurb, all the guy is asking for is that we not sell the game to kids. It's not as if he's advocating a complete ban on morally questionable games. And really, isn't everything said in campaigns a blatant pander?

Finally, something that I don't think anybody has picked up on is the fact that she is now a consultant for the DNC. So maybe she's endorsing, but not giving Team Bell advice. I don't know. Which brings up another question. Why in the hell are Howard Dean and the DNC using Molly Beth Malcolm as a consultant?!?!

Karl Thomas - you posted earlier tonight that "Mary Beth Malcolm" endorsed Chris Bell when in reality "Molly Beth Malcolm" endorsed. It seems a bit silly that you can then claim to know her or to suggest how EVERY Democrat in the state thinks about her. You don't know what Texas Democrats think just like you didn't know the name of our immediate past State Party Chair. Oh how this blog has gone down hill. Bookmark be gone.

A friend swears that Howard Dean and Chris Bell are Republican wolves in Democratic clothing out to destroy the Democratic party. I'm beginning to be believe he may be right.

Oh Cass, you won't be able to not keep checking in so I'm not exactly worried. And I know who Molly Beth is, I was around her for a week at the Democratic National Convention in Boston last year. There is this thing called the typo. You may be familiar with it. Or should I point out your typing my name incorrectly as well?

"Oh Cass, you won't be able to not keep checking in so I'm not exactly worried."

You're probably right. I suspect we're all getting addicted to BOR. At least there's an occasional indication of intelligence here - a rarity on the internet.

And it's not about being presumptive, I know it came off that way, but over the past couple months, the BOR comments section has become like one of those car accidents, you don't want to see it but you can't look away. Plus, the last time we went through a summer in an off season election year was 2003 when the blog had just started up. If we hadn't had the lege in session, can you imagine the content we'd be forced to come up with? I'd have to rattle of tales of my day to day office job or something.

"Until mankind is peaceful enough not to have violence on the news, there's no point in taking it out of shows [and video games] that need it for entertainment value!"

--Clueless

Re: Video Games

You young whippersnappers may be entertained by violent video games, but some of them scare the hell out of average, everyday parents.

I'm an old reprobate, so censorship makes me nervous, too. Yet I have also listened to many LIBERAL parents who think violence on TV and the net hurts their kids.

You might take into account that violence on TV was a big issue in the 1970's, and it was the libs who led and won the fight to remove violence from Saturday a.m. shows. So maybe y'all should walk around in these parents' shoes a bit and reconsider your position.

I don't recall Chris calling for a complete ban. I thought he just wanted to stop sales to minors -- like we do beer and porn.

And, if all else fails, consider that BS is agreeing with you.

Only infrequently do I read the comment threads on blogs. One of the reasons I do not visit them often is that each time I do, I find a level of smug cynicism that is intellectually and emotionally stultifying. This thread was no different. Whehter you like Chris's methods or not, at least he's out there. I'm sure one or more brilliant armchair quarterbacks will call my following comment pandering, or offer some other smug putdown, but anyway here goes.

Gasoline will be over $4 a gallon by the time I get sworn in as Attorney General in January 2007. My first order of business will be the formation of a task force of Assistant Attorneys General to find every way possible to take action on behalf of the people over gasoline prices. When the major oil giants' profit ratios are increasing dramatically at the same time that consumers are getting hit harder and harder, something is rotten. Texas has strong antitrust laws and consumer protection laws on the books, and the Attorney General has strong enforcement power. It won't be just lip service with me, like it is with corporate-loving Republicans. I'll take the predators on. And the insurance price gougers will get the same treatment.

David Van Os
Future People's Lawyer of Texas

Hey David, I always appreciate it when you drop by in the comments. I've been a fan of your campaigns and rhetoric for the last two cycles and remember the incredible work you've done around the DFA and progressive community here in Texas. It's why I like your campaign and you as a person (as well as your equally passionate and politically active wife!). It's too bad I'll miss all the fun out in Lampasas tomorrow but I'm sure you'll give the Republicans some hell as only you can do.

I'm sure that most of the BOR commenters and nearly all of the writers aren't armchair quarterbacks by profession. It's our involvement in campaigns, fundraising, grassroots organizing, or technology that all allows us to bring something to the table. There are times when I wish there were Party/Organization insiders that had blogs and reported what the hell's going on, but barring that, we try to do the best we can do.

Great article in the Dallas Voice, btw!

You're right, David. It is pandering.

First off, I don't have an armchair. Secondly, I appreciate being called brilliant, especially since, normally, the only way to be right about politics is to absorb yourself in it to the point where you forget how to talk to people...

On behalf of everyone else, I apologize for not blindly agreeing to whatever an announced candidate says. I should know that the only appropriate place to be smug is from the losing side of an election.

Every day I meet and interact in the flesh with good people who are engaged in real actions in pursuit of their determination to take government away from the self-promoters and self-dealers who have stolen it and restore democracy. Every day I meet and interact in the flesh with good people who are full of hope and confidence that we can and will get rid of the madness. They are in East Texas, West Texas, North Texas, South Texas, and Central Texas; they are rural, urban, suburban, and exurban. They self-identify as liberal, conservative, moderate, progressive, centrist, and everything else. They all know they're getting ripped off by political and corporate hustlers, they are full of eagerness to do something about it, and they are committing themselves to doing something about it through concrete actions, each in their own ways. These interactions inspire me every day and fill me with the motivation every day to keep pushing myself as hard as I can. I feel sorry for anybody who thinks it is all just cynical pandering. I feel sorry for anybody who has been so misused or exploited by politicians that you are mistrustful of anyone who offers him/herself for public office. For a long time I felt much that way myself, so I decided to do it myself. You may not believe me and that is fine, but I assure you that it is possible to run for public office on the basis of conviction rather than positioning. It's too bad that for the last 25 years or so we have been led to believe that it has to all be about positioning and pandering, because it doesn't. Saying what you mean from the heart rather than checking with polls or consultants' scripts is certainly far easier, that is for sure. It saves a lot of time, it makes stumping fun, it ensures consistency, it keeps you feeling good about what you are doing, and it opens you up more to the pure joy of meeting and interacting with fellow citizens. It also scares the bejeepers out of entrenched power elites.

David Van Os

How the hell does anyone blame Malcolm for Dems losing statewide races, sorry i don't see how anyone could stem that tide.

And god forbide Bell or any other dem seek support beyond a liberal at UT. It'd be nice to break the 40% mark statewide.

"Gasoline will be over $4 a gallon by the time I get sworn in as Attorney General in January 2007."

Gasoline will be over $4 a gallon in January 2006. I don't even want to think about what it will be a year later.

"My first order of business will be the formation of a task force of Assistant Attorneys General to find every way possible to take action on behalf of the people over gasoline prices."

The prices at the pump are set by OPEC markets for the most part. The Texas Attorney General has little authority over OPEC the last time I checked. Our current governor along with our current mayor in Houston prefer to build "superhighways" that most of us most likely will not be using by the time they are finished because most of us will not be able to afford to use our cars as our primary means of transportation due to gas prices. Other cities and other states are far ahead of Houston and Texas in accepting reality. We are running out of oil. In New York and California, most take the rising gas prices as confirmation of the wisdom to buy more efficient cars, particularly hybrids, and pressure public officials to concentrate on mass transit. In Texas, we seem to be just plain spoiled.

Your position mirrors the position of Chris Bell with regard to total disconnect from reality with regard to gas prices and the abominable lack of any substantive mass transit plans in Texas.

You'll both probably be using gas prices and gas taxes as a political platform when gas hits $10 a gallon which it will in the not-too-distant future. As for the massive profits of big oil, big oil is putting a lot of those profits into research into viable alternative fuels.

Get a grip, get a life and get a hybrid.

Molly Beth Malcom's claim to fame is her ability to cry to get what she wants. literally.

maybe she can bring this talent to the campaign trail.

Molly Beth is also a consultant, so why was she bashing consultants in her endorsement of Chris? She tried to sell her endorsement to Wesley Clark in last year's presidential election... even he didn't want it. She is as shrill as Strayhorn and as clueless as Chris.

I suspect they're both a little more calculating than clueless. And dependent upon people not remembering their last temper tantrum.

If she's a consultant, then you have to wonder if she's been paid as well for her endorsement.

Wonder if we could get Wesley Clark to run for governor? He at least knows which consultants to avoid.

Dear Baby Snooks,

A Texas Attorney General can do plenty about what happens on Texas soil. As you sit there in your self-satisfaction of knowing all the answers, wage-earning Texans at the low end of the income scale are getting squeezed harder and harder into the vicious catch-22 of not being able to afford not to go to work and not being able to afford to go to work. Get a grip yourself and climb down from your ivory tower. Working people aren't spoiled - they work hard for a living and they need to be able to afford gasoline for their pickup trucks and used cars NOW. Clearly mass transit systems need to be constructed on a vast scale. But in the meantime people don't have the luxury of waiting 10 to 20 years for the systems to be constructed (assuming public servants have the will and foresight to construct them). They still need relief as soon as they can get somebody to fight for them. To tell me that I have to sit back and assume I can do nothing as Attorney General to fight for the people of Texas against economic terrorism is like a waving a red flag in front of a bull. It just makes me more determined. While you are on the sidelines saying nothing can be done, I will be finding a way to do it.

David Van Os
Future People's Lawyer of Texas

I'm sure other people have said this, but if saying that a game that glorifies killing cops, having sex with and then killing prostitutes, doing and dealing illegal drugs and committing various other acts of criminal violence is bad makes you a Republican who would ever want to be a Democrat?

Kudos to Chris for standing up for those of us who realize that being pro-peace means more than opposing a war: it means opposing a culture that objectifies people and glorifies violence.

"Clearly mass transit systems need to be constructed on a vast scale. But in the meantime people don't have the luxury of waiting 10 to 20 years for the systems to be constructed (assuming public servants have the will and foresight to construct them)."

And how long has Houston been working on a plan?At least 20 years. And Houston will still be working on a plan 20 years from now when gasoline will be a memory for all of us. The only cars and trucks you will see will be hybrids running on alternative fuels. Everyone else will be using old buses or walking to work. All Houston has so far is one rail line that serves the developers and stadium owners and another one being planned to serve the Galleria while the poor, who have no cars, still have no adequate mass transit apart from very unreliable bus service. Now it will have a "superhighway" that is guaranteed to create more headaches along the Katy Freeway than it will solve. Houston is home of the "unfinished" highways. How long have they been "completing" the Gulf Freeway? The only reason transportation funds were finally released was that something is better than nothing. But in the end, we will still have nothing but empty highways in this state. And no mass transit.

I have immense empathy for those who spend half their income on rent and their other half on gasoline and utilities. I've been there. I have no empathy for the "status seekers" who buy the gas guzzlers so everyone will know they are doing well. You and Bell just seem to want to make things easier for them. Not the poor who, again, don't even have cars. How does cutting the price of gasoline and cutting the gasoline tax help them since you are so concerned about them?

A growing number of the "middle class" no longer have cars either. Most have found that repairs that used to cost $100 now cost $500. I think the average repair is now between $500 and $1,000. Not in a lot of people's budgets. You want a campaign for consumers? Why not go after the sleazy mechanics who buy a part for $50 at AutoZone and then charge the customer $250? Or charge for four hours of "labor" when in fact there was only one. That hurts more people than paying another dollar per gallon for gasoline.

Reality of gas prices is that our domestic supply is mainly offshore and owned by multinational oil companies. So we "import" it as well. And we import it at prices set by OPEC. And OPEC could care less about what anyone in Texas thinks. They don't even care what anyone in Washington thinks.

Maybe Congress could do something. Maybe the governor could do something. Maybe the governor could ban the export of Texas oil and gas. He better find a big field somewhere first. But I doubt the Attorney General can do anything at all. But it sounds good. Particularly if you're running for Attorney General.

What is that people don't understand about the words "we are running out of oil?" Or about the words "supply and demand" which are driving those OPEC prices up every day it seems. We are fast approaching the day when demand will exceed supply. We are already at the point where demand will soon exceed production capability.

Talk is cheap. So are most campaign promises.

"it means opposing a culture that objectifies people and glorifies violence."

I couldn't agree more. Why not focus on the parents who allow their children to play those video games? If mine did, they would quickly find out what real violence is all about. They would get hit upside the head with the Three C's.

No CASH to buy the videos or to play them at the video arcades, no CAR to drive to their friends' houses or to the video arcades to play them with their friends, and no COMMUNICATION with their friends who introduced them to the videos to begin with. And their friends' parents would get a phone call from me telling them what I thought about them and why I forbade my children from associating with theirs.

Good parenting begins at home. Not in the legislature.

If you want to legislate the behavior of children,however, why not push for a law that punishes bullying? Both the children who bully others and the parents who promote it. The violence in our society is not produced by video games. It is produced by bad parenting.

"Jason Stanford is certainly quiet."

Maybe he moved on to other blogs where no one looks up campaign finance records?

Re: Jason Stanford

I'm glad he's not engaging in this senseless "conversation". Its just not useful. I don't think I have to remind anyone that he's running a campaign for THE ONLY PERSON IN OUR PARTY WITH ENOUGH BALLS TO RUN. That is a huge f*&king job. And I also don't think I need to remind anyone that one of the main reasons that Democrats don't win in this godforsaken state is because of this stupid petty sh*t and the fact that we can't agree on a goddam thing.

And since everyone seems to be hot on knowing everyone else's background, Jason Stanford knows more about campaign finance reports (and the backgrounds of other candidates) than any of you ever will. Yes, the Bell team is probably paying their consultants way too much at this stage in the game but one thing they're not lacking is an intimate knowledge of opposition research. Beware Bell opponents.

"Beware Bell opponents."

Beware? Beware of what? More innuendo and dirty tricks and vendettas? Is he going to file ethics complaints against any challengers the way he did against Al Green? That was so effective he garnered 30% of the vote. Oh, wait, I forgot. He lost the primary because of Tom DeLay. Oh, wait. No, he lost the primary because he was the wrong color. His own words. He's the wrong everything.

Fortunately the "mainstream" is focusing on regaining the legislature instead of putting this loser in the governor's mansion.

No offense but it looks to me like he's been "ringing the bell" all over the state and no one, as they say, is home. Not for him anyway.

We need someone who is not obligated to any deep pockets to stand up and say "enough" is enough. Kinky Friedman is making the highest seat in government a joke. Democrats are trying to make right a "wrong" done to Chris Bell, and I pray no one wants Perry back, and Strayhorn just needs to get real. She does not have any more real solutions than any other candidate. The TDP does not even know how many candidates are running on the democratic ticket.
It is just pathetic how politics and political discourse has gotten in Texas. The issues facing Texas are affecting all lowersocioeconomic populations, especially minorities. Every politician is trying to woo the Hispanic voter, hoping their vote will get them the office they seek, but how real are their concerns for the needs of these people? Do they even know the needs of these people?
I say, they need to stop trying to gain their confidence by giving them a bumper sticker and instead give them hope for their future and the future of their children.