(Political Ramblings from a Little Left of Center)
Beto O’Rourke announced today that he’s running for President. Look. I live in Texas. I like the guy. I contributed multiple times to his Senate campaign against Ted Cruz. I certainly voted for him. He came closer to winning than anyone initially expected. He generated a ton of excitement in Texas and nationally. He functioned…
This should be interesting. My personal positions here are likely to piss off just about everyone on both the left AND the right. So be it. I’m choosing this as my first 2020 Platform post mostly since there’s been some recent Congressional activity in this arena. I’ll start with a statement that might be just…
It really hadn’t occurred to me to go back and evaluate my 2018 race analyses. But when a reader asked, I thought it was an interesting question. I’m currently online at a bar, so a little self-indulgence seems quite appropriate. With respect to the Senate, I mostly just called a Democratic takeover improbable at best. …
Across the nation, early voting has been pretty popular – beating 2016 thus far. Texas is having record-breaking early voting turnout for a mid-term election. That’s great. It just doesn’t mean a whole lot yet. People who were going to vote anyway this cycle could just be voting early. I did. Stuff happens and I…
My gerrymandered TX-31 Congressional district includes Ft. Hood – the largest active-duty armored military installation in the country. Hence, the military vote here is pretty important. As I’ve noted in previous posts, the Democratic candidate for TX-31 is MJ Hegar. She’s an Air Force veteran who served three tours in Afghanistan as a rescue helicopter…
My work-in-progress modus operandi for this blog is to first simply collect random notes, articles, and references that I find interesting. These artifacts occasionally combine to form the raw idea of a blog topic and a few of the collections eventually morph into an actual post. This week, however, I’ve found myself largely unable to…
The syndicated columnist Molly Ivins once opined that Texas politics was “Better than the zoo.” Yeah, I don’t know. Wild animals at the zoo do tend to shit on everything, but they can’t cause nearly as much permanent damage as Texas politicians can. From my perch in Austin, perhaps I’m on the wrong side of…
“Fun with Flags” is a recurring bit on “The Big Bang Theory” sitcom where Sheldon records a video podcast on the exciting topic of vexillology – the study of flags. I wondered how the gang might weigh in on the various flag stories currently in the news… Scene: The apartment. Sheldon and Amy are on…
While I don’t have the personal wealth to make a huge dent in any political campaign, I do feel the personal need to contribute … something … to assist the Democrats in taking control of … something. Or, more accurately from my own perspective, to help wrest control of any section of the federal government…