Big Jolly Politics

politics in Harris County and Texas

Faux grassroots groups fear transparency, attack Texas Republicans

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Do you call it hypocrisy when a group pretends to be grassroots but is actually funded by one person? Is it hypocrisy when these same faux grassroots groups demand transparency from politicians but want their own finances to remain protected under the cover of darkness? If it isn’t hypocrisy, what is it? The reason for my questions is SB 346, a bill voted out of the Texas Senate and now under debate in the Texas House. It passed Second Reading yesterday on a vote of 99-46 as reported by Karen Brooks Harper in the Dallas Morning News’ Trailblazers blog, along with the blow-by-blow of the debate.

Let’s take a look at the HRO analysis to see what the bill actually does:

SB 346 would create political contribution reporting requirements for a person or group of persons that:

  • did not meet the definition of a political committee;
  • accepted political contributions; and
  • made one or more political expenditures, with certain exceptions,  that exceeded $25,000 during a calendar year.

The bill would not apply to labor organizations or their subordinate entities.

Under the bill, a person or group would be considered to have accepted political contributions if its members or donors made payments, including dues, that the members or donors had a reason to know at the time of payment could be used or commingled with other funds used to make political contributions or political expenditures.

A person or group of persons to whom the bill applied would be required to report as if they were a general purpose committee that did not file monthly reports. A person or group of persons to whom the bill applied would not be required to file a campaign treasurer appointment unless they were otherwise required to do so.

A person or group of persons would not be required to file a report under the bill if:

  • they were required to disclose the expenditures or contributions in another report required under Title 15 within the same time frame;

or

  • no reportable activity occurred during the reporting period.

Itemization of contributions required under the existing reporting provisions would be required only if the contribution exceeded $1,000 during the reporting period.

The first report required to be filed in a calendar year in which the $25,000 SB 346 House Research Organization threshold was exceeded would need to include all political contributions accepted and all political expenditures made in that year.

With the $25,000 aggregate threshold, and the $1,000 individual contribution threshold, I doubt it would affect more than a handful of Tea Party groups. Even if it does, so what? Their First Amendment rights are still fully in place and there is no limit whatsoever on speech. Why shouldn’t the public know who is funding political ads? Again from the HRO analysis:

The bill would not discourage honest political spending. In the case of Buckley v. Valeo, 421 U.S. 1 (1976), the Supreme Court explained that disclosure was an essential means of gathering data to detect violations in campaign finance regulations and deter corruption. Persons who are in compliance with the law should have no reason to stop contributing merely because they would be required to disclose their political donations.

Don’t we want to deter corruption in politics? I surely hope so. But be careful asking simple questions to those that are against it or this will happen to you as it did to me on Twitter:

mqs-twitter-conversation

All I did was ask a question and for that I get attacked. I absolutely support Speaker Straus and if that makes me a shill, so be it. But, if I’m anti-teaparty, why did I go on television yesterday and defend the Clear Lake Tea Party and the IRS attacks on tea party groups? As I have done countless times since I promoted and supported the first tea party rally in Houston in February 2009 and was the ONLY person supporting True the Vote when they were being viciously attacked by the left? But hey, truth doesn’t seem to matter to some people. And just who is trying to harass who into silence?

Many thanks to the Republicans that stood up to the pressure from countless faux-grassroots (and a few real grassroots groups) and voted for this bill. Now, do it again on Third Reading this Tuesday and send it to the Governor – where it will certainly be vetoed but at least you tried to be transparent.

And the next time you hear these groups yapping about this politician or that one not being transparent, just yawn and recognize it for the bovine-processed hay that it is.

UPDATE: For a different view on the “union” issue, see Jerad Najvar’s Fact-Checking Claims About the Inexplicable Union Exemption in SB 346 at his blog Lex Politico.

The Journey Ahead

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Ed Hubbard

When I sat down to write this post, I thought it would be one of the hardest posts I’d ever written, simply because I am so disappointed—basically numbed—by the outcome of the election yesterday, both locally as so many of my friends lost their races, but especially nationally.  My guess is that from reading what many of you fellow conservatives have written on social media or in emails, or have said to me over the phone, you are feeling some unhappiness today, too.

But, as I was writing, I realized that now is not the time to rehash data, or to argue what could have or should have been; nor is today the right time to start debating how to “fix” or “change” the GOP, locally or nationally.  There will be time for all of that soon enough.  One of the life- lessons I’ve learned over the years is that the worst time to make a major decision is in the immediate aftermath of either a great victory or a great loss, because one is bound to over-react at such times and make the wrong choices that lead down the wrong path.

So, instead of getting into all of that today, I want to share some quotes and poems that give me solace, and I hope that one or more of these writings will give you some peace of mind from which you can reflect about the state of our country and our party over the days and weeks ahead.

C. S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity, was a book he compiled from his radio broadcasts during the 1940’s about what it means to be a Christian. Here are two of my favorite passages from his book, which I feel are appropriate for conservatives to think about today:

We all want progress.  But progress means getting nearer to the place where you want to be.  And if you have taken a wrong turning, then to go forward does not get you any nearer.  If you are on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; and in that case the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive man….  There is nothing progressive about being pig headed and refusing to admit a mistake.  And I think if you look at the present state of the world, it is pretty plain that humanity has been making some big mistake.  We are on the wrong road.  And if that is so, we must go back.  Going back is the quickest way on.

And

God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing. That is the key to history. Terrific energy is expended–civilizations are built up–excellent institutions devised; but each time something goes wrong. Some fatal flaw always brings the selfish and cruel people to the top and it all slides back into misery and ruin. In fact, the machine conks. It seems to start up all right and runs a few yards, and then it breaks down. They are trying to run it on the wrong juice. That is what Satan has done to us humans. And what did God do? First of all He left us conscience, the sense of right and wrong: and all through history there have been people trying (some of them very hard) to obey it. None of them ever quite succeeded. Secondly, He sent the human race what I call good dreams: I mean those queer stories scattered all through the heathen religions about a god who dies and comes to life again and, by his death, has somehow given new life to men. Thirdly, He selected one particular people and spent several centuries hammering into their heads the sort of God He was–that there was only one of Him and that He cared about right conduct….Then comes the real shock. Among these Jews there suddenly turns up a man who goes about talking as if He was God. He claims to forgive sins. He says He has always existed. He says He is coming to judge the world at the end of time.

One of my favorite poets is Robert Frost.  Frost considered himself to be a philosophical dualist.  That is, Frost believed that there was no one, coherent theory or ideology of progress for mankind, regardless of whether the theory was based on science, religion, or a positivist philosophy (what he referred to as “monist” philosophies).  Instead, he believed that humanity progressed through history by making choices between alternatives, such as good and evil, and that all individual choices have consequences–for the individual and for society.  He believed that we progressed when we made choices that built upon the best of the foundations and traditions of the society we had inherited, rather than try to rest progress on new and clever theories that departed from such traditions.

Frost believed that Western man was the beneficiary of choices that had created a civilization that marched northwestward from the Middle East to North America over the course of more than two millennia.  What separated this civilization from the others that developed in different eras, or different regions, were the principles it learned, and to which it committed itself, through the choices that individuals had made.

Frost believed that each individual was comprised of, and driven by the spirit of the soul and the matter of the body.  He deeply believed that the spirit was the dominant of the two forces, and that the principles of Christian faith were fundamental to nourishing the soul.  In the end, he believed it was the correct nourishment of the soul that leads to making the right choices in the life of each individual, and that those right choices collectively lead to historical progress.

Over the years, three poems of his have touched me, because I believe they each speak to the choices we face, the decisions we make, the consequences we accept over the course of a lifetime.  Each of these poems conveys a similar imagery of the speaker contemplating the edge of a wood or forest.  They first were published over a 14-year period, each seven years apart, starting in 1909.  The first poem, one of his first published works, appeared in New England Magazine in 1909, under the title Into Mine Own.  The second poem, The Road Not Taken, first appeared in the Atlantic Monthly magazine in 1916.  The third poem, Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening, was first published in The New Republic magazine in 1923.

Into My Own (originally, Into Mine Own)

One of my wishes is that those dark trees,
So old and firm they scarcely show the breeze,
Were not, as ‘twere, the merest mask of gloom,
But stretched away unto the edge of doom.

I should not be withheld but that some day
Into their vastness I should steal away,
Fearless of ever finding open land,
Or highway where the slow wheel pours the sand.

I do not see why I should e’er turn back,
Or those should not set forth upon my track
To overtake me, who should miss me here
And long to know if still I held them dear.

They would not find me changed from him they knew—
Only more sure of all I thought was true.

 

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I–
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

 

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening, Robert Frost

 Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Soon, very soon, it will be time again to face some choices and make decisions about our party and our country that will have far-reaching consequences for our families, our schools, our churches, our places of work, our communities, our states, and our country.  Even after yesterday’s setbacks, I still firmly believe that one person, or one group of people, committed to positive ideas, can change the world for the better.  Such positive change rarely comes through revolution, which destroys more than it changes.  Instead, such positive change usually results from sustained effort to change one person, one family, and one community at a time, and to help them down a new path.  Soon enough people join the journey that the momentum of society shifts, and the new path becomes the agent of real and lasting change.

Each of us is capable of being one of those people who starts the new journey down the right path.  We have done that type of work all of our lives with our families, our friends, our work, and our community activities.  But to make the right decisions that lead to the right change in path, you have to see the woods in front of you clearly, and commit to follow the right path through them, even when others choose another wrong path.

Soon there will be no more time; our society is at the edge of the “woods.”  We will have to choose a path that will affect our society for generations—including our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.  When that time comes, we conservatives will have to choose the right path and work hard to lead our countrymen on that right journey.

For now, rest and reflect.

David Dewhurst, Ted Cruz: different paths to the same goal

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Well, the last televised debate of the long campaign to replace retiring US Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison has come and gone. The end is near. The decision is up to you – will you choose Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, with his long record of business and conservative legislation success? Or will you choose Ted Cruz, a candidate with no record of business or legislative success but one that many think has a huge upside because of his rhetorical ability that would benefit conservatives twenty or thirty years from now?

There was a moment near the end of the debate last night that defined the contest between Lt. Gov. Dewhurst and Mr. Cruz. A question was asked about the Castle Doctrine, a common term for the law that allows citizens to defend themselves without having to retreat. Mr. Cruz answered first, stating that he had once debated a lawyer from DC about the need for the law in the capital city. Mr. Dewhurst said simply, I passed it in Texas.

And that, in a nutshell, defines the two campaigns and the debate last night.

First off, congratulations are in order for the King Street Patriots, and specifically founder Catherine Engelbrecht and executive director Mark Antill, for garnering the trust of both candidates to hold the debate and then for pulling it off without a hitch. Roughly 400 people packed into the King Street headquarters in Northwest Houston and for the most part, followed the rules! I was worried about Robin Lennon from the Kingwood Tea Party, thought she might jump out of her seat and rush the stage, but her husband Jim told me he had a good grip on her arm. 😉

I had the opportunity to meet Marine Corps Capt. Dan Moran (ret.).  Capt. Moran is an ardent Dewhurst supporter that has had to put up with terrible attacks from a  prominent Cruz supporter because he was burned in an IED explosion in Iraq. He greeted me with an enthusiastic hug and his zeal for life is inspiring. I was humbled that he even recognized me. This man is a true.

As for the debate itself, I thought that Lt. Gov. Dewhurst started strong and won the first half of the debate but that Mr. Cruz finished strong and took the second half. That has nothing to do with substance, it is just a reflection on how they seemed to come across in the room. If it is substance you want, then Lt. Gov. Dewhurst is clearly your candidate. If it is style and the ability to quickly answer a question with a series of bullet points, then Mr. Cruz is your guy.

Perhaps it is a debating technique of Mr. Cruz but he seemed to lose his composure a couple of times. I say that it might be a debating technique because it did seem that the Lt. Gov. wasn’t as strong after the two incidents. The first incident is widely reported and has to do with a flyer that Mr. Cruz claims questions his patriotism. He moved away from his podium and clearly got into the Lt. Gov.’s space. And, he wouldn’t let up even after the moderator reminded him that there were no rebuttals allowed.

The second incident has not been widely reported, so you should watch the debate and see for yourself. The question was about who influenced the candidates and how would they instill conservative values in their daughters. Lt. Gov. Dewhurst talked about his mother and the values that she instilled in him and that he was doing his best to pass them on to his daughter.

Mr. Cruz decided to use this simple question to attack the Lt. Gov., basically saying that he was raising his daughter better because he wasn’t saying negative things about the Lt. Gov.  Bizarro to me, especially since I’ve followed this campaign very closely for over eighteen months and the Cruz camp has been far more negative on the whole and has attacked much more personally, again, on the whole. How many times has Mr. Cruz himself called Lt. Gov. Dewhurst spineless, weak, timid, tired, or old? Mr. Cruz himself set the tone that causes his supporters to be so vicious in their attacks. Pot meet kettle and I think that to use a man’s child as a political target is way over the top.

Like I said, I don’t know if Mr. Cruz actually loses his composure that easily or if it is some sort of debate technique but either way, it doesn’t look good for him when he does it.

Most people in the room had already made up their minds for one candidate or the other and nothing said was going to change that. Just like most of you reading this have made up your minds and nothing I say will change that. But as I learned at the Greater Houston Pachyderm meeting last week, some people are still deciding and need to know why people support one a particular candidate.

I support Lt. Gov. Dewhurst because I don’t think that we have twenty or thirty years to wait to see if Mr. Cruz’s potential is realized. That doesn’t mean that I hate Mr. Cruz – as the title says, I think that for the most part he wants the same things that Lt. Gov. Dewhurst does, he is simply on a longer path. I think that our country needs someone right now that has the ability to negotiate without compromising core principles and I think that Lt. Gov. Dewhurst has proven time and time again that he has that ability. He started the debate last night by saying that he was a “doer”, not a talker, and he hammered that point home all night long. I think that we need “doers” and we need them now. Sure, rhetoric is fun and it sells books and gets people to rallies, but the plain truth is that that is all rhetoric does. It doesn’t “move the debate” as people claim. In fact, the debate moves right past those that are shouting the loudest and the longest.

I’m a conservative. I demand more from politicians than loud, angry rhetoric. That is why I’m voting for a man that has a record of significant accomplishments in his personal life, his professional life, and his political life. That man is Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and I’m proud to support him.