A Modest Proposal: Ebay the Speaker’s Apartment

Today we receive the news that former Texas House Speaker Tom Craddick, and his spendthrift wife, Nadine, went on a $169,400 spending spree during the last week he was in office - after announcing he would not stand for re-election - liberating these funds from the State Preservation Fund to put the finishing touches on their $1.3 million remodeling project. A project to remodel the 1804 square foot Speaker’s apartment that lies beyond the Speaker’s private door to the House chamber.

By my reckoning, that comes to about $720 per square foot.

During the last week of his term, the Speaker placed orders for 2 paintings totaling $45,400, a crystal chandelier for $75,000, $26,500 for a piece of furniture, and another chandelier for $22,500.

Leaving a grand total of $18.50 in the remodeling fund.

To what end Craddick did this, I can only guess, but I imagine that since it was Tom Craddick who got his wealthy contributors and lobbyists to pony up the 1.3 million in the first place, the last thing he was going to do was let that horse racing promoter Straus use it.

Well I have a modest proposal.

Let’s send a message to these two people, who will forever be remembered as symbols of gratuitous excess and opulence. Let’s put all of this stuff on Ebay.

Then let’s use the proceeds to buy office supplies for the Texas Legislature for the next 10 years.

Did the Scales Just Tip?

Going by the numbers, with the “Gang of 11” Republican ABC bloc throwing their support for Joe Straus for Texas House Speaker, and with 64 Democrats having signed an “Anyone But Craddick” pledge, that gives you exactly 75 votes if the Democratic bloc throws in with the new anointed one.

That’s parity. That’s exactly half the Texas House. Not enough to elect anyone.

But wait, yesterday State Rep Aaron Peña took note of the new turn of events on his blog and had these words to say about Straus.

“I consider Rep Straus to be a close friend and half-jokingly call him a South Texas legislator, because part of his district lies on the boundary of cultural South Texas. By his selection this race for speaker has sufficiently narrowed to allow uncommitted members to make their selection. I would look for the other candidates to drop off and consolidate soon.”

Ever the cagey one, Rep. Peña falls short of declaring his support for his “close friend” but it seems clear that he is not entirely against the idea. That being the case, should this run its course, Peña is absolutely correct in his forecast that we should “have a better idea” of who will be the Speaker by the end of the weekend.

Peña, it should be remembered, is not one of the 64 signatories on the Democratic ABC declaration.

That makes his vote number 76.

And the scales just tipped.

Joe Straus is the New Messiah

Why not? In a time when we are on the rebound from “Joe the Plumber,” from “Joe the Anything,” why not “Joe the Messiah”?

That is what a bloc of eleven Anyone But Craddick (including Joe) Republican state house Members must be thinking. That and the hope that they can get the votes of 64 Anyone But Craddick Democrats.

The Dallas Morning News story summarizing it all also says this about the man chosen to save the Texas State House from the reign of the tyrant Tom Craddick:

“Straus is seen as even-handed and smart and someone who has worked with members on both sides of the aisle. He also is seen as a newcomer, which might cause some members to balk at elevating him.”

A newcomer he is, with only 3 years in the state body, although he has served in several Republican appointed positions during the Reagan and Bush-41 administration. He is also known for his family affiliation, the Straus family of San Antonio, which brought horse racing, and I assume pari mutuel betting, to San Antonio.

So Joe Straus seems to be a betting man.

A man who is betting that his very weakness, his lack of years in the state house compared to Craddick’s 4 decades of state house service, will be seen as his chief strength. He is known long enough to be seen as one who reaches across the aisle, but not long enough to have placed too many knives in the backs of his colleagues.

Something we cannot say about Tom Craddick.

Now I guess the only questions left to the 64 member ABC Democratic bloc in the House are these:

a) Is this guy named Tom Craddick?
b) If not, can they work with him?
c) If so, will Straus create a rift within his own caucus?

If the answers are, respectively, No, Yes, and Maybe then the way seems clear, doesn’t it?

On the Perils of Addition

I follow a canon in life that has served me well over the years. On its face, it seems a little obvious, and that’s part of its elegance. It’s a simply stated obvious fact, but I think people forget about its truth sometimes. Here it is:

Some of it plus the rest of it equals all of it.

Now where am I going with this? It has to do with the public pronouncement of 64 Democratic Texas House Members who have publicly proclaimed that they will vote for Anybody But Craddick on January 13^th.

Now 64 votes don’t make a majority but that’s the point. These 64 ABC votes represent the “some of it” in my equation. The announcement comes on the heels of the notice that a 12^th House Member has thrown his hat in the ring to become Speaker. These 12, a mish-mash whose views run across the political spectrum, represent “the rest of it.” The intent here is to demonstrate that there are 76 ABC votes out there and Tom Craddick’s hope for a 4^th term as Speaker is doomed.

That is, if indeed we have 12 actual “rest of it” votes, and I’m not so sure we do. And therein lies the rub: when we do this addition, we need to be certain we have the right numbers.

First we have the enigma that is Sylvester Turner. Now Turner announced that he was running for Speaker just before the end of the 80^th Legislature. Right at about the time that he was supporting Craddick’s refusal to recognize a motion to remove him from the Speaker’s office. Sylvester Turner, I think, is not part of “the rest of it” and from the lack of his signature on the ABC 64 document, he’s not part of “some of it” either.

And you really have to wonder about the sincerity of Dan Gattis. Is this guy still playing the role of stalking horse for Craddick? Granted I am influenced by his filing of a constitutional proposition that seemed on its face to be anti-Craddick. Now you have to wonder, as Matt Glazier does on BOR, whether this is just another ploy.

All of this has such a familiar ring to it, you know. This is how things were playing out the last time we went through this. We have conflicting lists of supporters now as we did then. Indeed, the only names on that list of 12 that I think are “for real” is Senfronia Thompson, Scott Hochberg and Pete Gallego.

We see mostly the same Democrats not signing on to an ABC document. Flores, Dukes, Giddings, Peña, Dutton, Guillen, King, McClendon, and Turner. However, two former Craddick supporters, Rose and Lucio, are now aligned against him.

So the shell game is afoot again and it would normally be such fun to watch, except that there is more at stake this time than last.

Let’s All Run for House Speaker

In the wake of a near-nuclear melt-down in the waning days of the Texas House 80^th Legislature, when House Speaker Tom Craddick refused to recognize a motion from the House floor to remove him as Speaker, you would think that there would be a deliberate line-up of ducks to avoid a repeat performance.

You would think.

But the only line-up we are seeing in the days leading up to the January 13^th vote to elect a Speaker is the line-up of twelve, count ‘em, twelve declared candidates for the spot.

Among the Republicans we have Craddick, of course, along with Delwin Jones, Jim Keffer, Tommy Merritt, Burt Solomons, Edmund Kuempel, and now, just announced today, Dan Gattis.

Among Democrats we have Senfronia Thompson, Pete Gallego, Scott Hochberg, and Sylvester Turner.

That field, however, should thin by mid January when the vote comes up. It always does. Case in point. Tom Craddick was the only House Member nominated in the 2007 Speaker’s race. Even with all of the jockeying for pledges that took place in the run-up to the January 9^th election of Speaker Craddick to a third term, in the end, the vote went to Craddick when he demonstrated his supporter base and maneuvered through the maze of setting rules for voting for Speaker.

This last announcement by Gattis has all of the earmarks of many of the other Craddick challengers. A former shill for Craddick, Gattis has publicly turned on his former patrón. In fact, the common denominator among these Republican candidates (and Turner) is that they are former Craddick allies – in public anyway. In fact, Gattis came out against Craddick in a big way two weeks ago when he filed a constitutional proposition that would allow for the removal of the House Speaker by a 2/3s vote.

And we are now seeing Craddick-esque behavior by Keffer who laid out a smokescreen before the general election saying that his election as Speaker is a done deal and he has the votes.

So the shell game is now being played in earnest. The winner will be the one who plays it best. In the past that has been Tom Craddick. But with a net gain of 3 House seats by the Democrats, my bet is not on Craddick this time. Democrats missed getting parity by a narrow margin, but hopefully they will play a cannier match this time around and not squander their pledges on meaningless advances and advantages.

Take Back the Texas Legislature

The Fort Bend Democrats have a new fundraiser, and its theme is “Take Back the Texas Legislature”. This is something we in Texas are currently poised to do in November 2008, and what better way to kick it off than to hold a fundraiser/dinner honoring State Representative Senfronia Thompson.

Rep. Thompson stands as the only Democrat currently running for the 81st Texas Legislature’s position of Speaker of the House. The only Democrat, that is, who did not support what became the very autocratic rule Speaker Tom Craddick at any time during the 80th Texas Legislature.

Her Democratic opponent in the race for Speaker, State Rep. Sylvester Turner, cannot make that claim.

As the only “Real” Democrat running for the Speaker position, this makes State Rep Thompson a shoe-in as the next Speaker of the House of the Texas House of Representatives when Democrats retake the majority in the House, the first woman to have that distinction, as well as the first minority.

This makes it doubly important that you and everyone you know who supports Turning Texas Blue go here now and find out about making reservations online or by phone (I’d post it on this notice also, but I’m lazy and slightly under the weather).

But here are the pertinent dates and times for you so you can mark your calendar.

Who: State Rep. Senfronia Thompson

What: The Fort Bend Democrats Annual Winter Fundraiser

When: Friday, February 22nd, 2008 from 6:30 until 10:00 (dinner served at 7:30)

Where: Quail Valley Country Club, Missouri City, Texas [map]

Why: To hear the words of the future Texas Speaker of the House and to help the Fort Bend Democrats raise money to support our Fall 2008 candidates.

How: It’s easy. Click HERE.

A Democratic Speaker in the Texas State Legislature?

Let’s take a break from the presidential hustings that have now shifted to New Hampshire. God knows we need it. I want to look back to state politics for a second and make some observations.

In 2008 there will be 26 Democratic challengers to Republican incumbents in the State House. Twenty-six. If this seems like a big number, then you are not wrong. Some of these challenges are in arguably safe Republican districts, but I am certain that if you asked the Republicans who live in Dan Barrett’s HD 97, they would have said the same thing. Granted, some districts are still too red to flip, but consider the odds. All we need are one in five odds in order to turn 5 house districts, and that, means a 75-75 split in the Texas House. One more and the Democrats have a majority. If we win one in four house races, we have a majority.

And then do you know what happens next?

We have a new Texas Speaker of the House.

A Speaker elected by the new majority. A Democratic Speaker.

There are just a whole bunch of Republicans who want to unseat Tom Craddick, the Republican state rep who has exercised what amounts to autocratic rule over the House. Some still side with Craddick, but with a Democratic majority, I think we don’t have to worry any more about which moderate conservative we want to elect.

Now that we have Democrats running for the Speaker’s spot.

These Democrats include State Rep Senfronia Thompson and State Rep. Sylvester Turner. Both have filed in the race for Speaker, the election to be held in the early days of January 2009. Of the two, I am guessing that Sylvester Turner will be garnering whatever votes the Republicans don’t cast for their own party’s nominees. Turner, you see, turned his back on his Democratic colleagues in the waning days of the 80th Legislature, as he stooped to support Tom Craddick in his lust for absolute power. When Tom Craddick wasn’t at the speaker’s desk turning away Democratic calls for removal of the speaker, State Rep and Speaker Pro Tem Sylvester Turner was there, doing likewise.

This leaves only one obvious Democratic candidate for Speaker of the House, and that is State Rep. Senfronia Thompson.

So when we retake Texas, by retaking the State House majority, we will have a new day in Texas, and a new Speaker of the House: Senfronia Thompson.