Wanted to post a quick note about a subject that I think warrants a lot of attention, but about which I have yet to see a post.
Former Assistant United States Attorney and Assistant Dallas County District Attorney Rafael De La Garza announces today that he has switched parties and filed for the Democratic nomination for Criminal District Attorney of Collin County. Earlier this morning, Mr. De La Garza submitted to the Collin County Republican Party a certificate of withdrawal of his previously submitted candidate filing for the Republican nomination for Collin County District Attorney.
(From the press release, via the Quorum Report)
Yes, it's a story about a party switcher. But this time, it's a local official switching from the GOP to the Dems. What's most significant, of course, is that this is happening in Collin County.
Despite repeated campaign promises to always be in the District on weekends, Pete Sessions is working overtime today to kill health care reform.
His latest outburst on the House floor drew "a burst of chatter" in the room, kind of like it does in bi-partisan settings here at home when Sessions gets stuck for an answer and says the first thing that comes to mind, usually a tangent about "socialism" or "Nancy Pelosi."
In his latest gaffe, Pete Sessions defended the insurance industry's practice of charging higher rates to women, comparing the practice to charging higher rates for smokers. Transcript over the jump...
(Really? Huh. - promoted by Karl-Thomas Musselman)
Pete Sessions was one of the first members of Congress to co-sponsor John Boehner's bill, H.R. 3571, to cut off Federal funding to "Any organization that has filed a fraudulent form with any Federal or State regulatory agency."
The bill was intended as a "de-fund ACORN" measure, but Democrats figured out right away that the broad wording of the bill could also cut funds to a long list of military contractors, effectively defunding the "military industrial complex."
Last night the President said he wanted to work together and bring out the best in both parties.
I applaud the President's noble efforts but, with all due respect, I cannot see how this is possible given that we do not know if there is a best side of the Republican Party. What is meant by "best" I wonder?
Progressives who don't know Pete Sessions have taken his his statement about disruptive town hall meetings out of context, as if he were challenging the screamers to "bring it on." But those of us in the District know that Pete Sessions is a coward. Re-read the Politico article and you'll meet a man who pines for a fantasy town hall meeting that never existed, where only "15 or 20 of your friends show up." But in today's town hall environment he's in his element. The screamers are his base. In this video, he answers a woman's health care concern by throwing them some red meat:
"The legitimate object of government is to do for a community of people whatever they need to have done, but cannot do at all, or cannot so well do, for themselves, in their separate and individual capacities. In all that people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere. ...
Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio either had a moment of clairvoyance this afternoon or just enjoys opening up a North/South civil war in his suggestion of who is to blame for the current failure of the Republican Party. Via The Hill's Briefing Room...
"We got too many Jim DeMints and Tom Coburns," Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) told the Columbus Dispatch. "It's the southerners."
Voinovich, a native Clevelander who retires after the 2010 election, continued after the southern elements of the GOP.
"They get on TV and go 'errrr, errrrr,'" he said. "People hear them and say, 'These people, they're southerners. The party's being taken over by southerners. What they hell they got to do with Ohio?'"
As we know Senator Arlen Specter changed his Party affiliation yesterday from Republican to Democrat. In his remarks the Senator had said the Republican Party had been recently "purified" by the right. Needless to say Specter's switch delivered a devastating blow to an already wounded GOP.
When I (James) went on MSNBC two weeks ago to talk about immigration reform, I didn't think that I had anything that outlandish to say. Contessa Brewer, the daytime host, asked Republican strategist Ben Porrit and me if we thought we were going to get immigration reform passed and I said frankly that we won't, because there is a segment of the Republican party that is racist and will stand in the way of real reform. Simple enough, right?
