The Strange Priorities of Chairman Dan Branch (and Joe Straus)

Another fantastic piece from Agendawise:

House leadership is trying to impeach a champion of higher ed reform, but is protecting a State Board of Education member who appears obviously ineligible to serve.

The difference? Wallace Hall wants to bring transparency to a massive government bureaucracy and Thomas Ratliff is a connected member of a huge bureaucracy.

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This is a good representation of House priorities when establishment politicians like Joe Straus and his partner Dan Branch are in positions of power.

 Read all the details here.

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More Transportation Shenanigans from Texas House Republicans

A couple of must read pieces from Empower Texans on transportation shenanigans currently playing out in the Texas House; from Transportation U-Turn:

As the Wall Street Journal and the Texas Public Policy Foundation have independently verified, the legislature went on a wild spending spree in 2013 – spending approximately 25% more than in the 2011 session. And they just can’t stop.

The current special session features a call to provide better funding for transportation. Legislators are instead just creating new diversions for spending without any real protections. (Sensible policies, like ending the 25 percent gas-tax diversion to public education, or dedicating the vehicle sales tax to roads, are being ignored.)

Meanwhile, lawmakers want to start diverting half of the money flowing into the Economic Stabilization Fund (the so-called “rainy day” account) over to TxDOT. In the first special session, conservatives successfully inserted a constitutional “floor” ensuring the ESF couldn’t be drained and left for dead.

Yet for all practical purposes, the new compromise in the current special would do away with the idea of a protective floor. Rather than constitutionally protect the Economic Stabilization Fund by a establishing a defined floor, spendoholic legislators want to give the Legislative Budget Board – comprised of the House Speaker, the Lieutenant Governor and their appointees – the authority to set it.

Not a sound idea, unless the goal is to never have a meaningful floor.

 From 'Optional' ESF Protection:

You may recall the legislative members of the LBB are also charged with picking the “spending limit” for budgetary purposes. Of course, the LBB has always exceeded the “population-plus-inflation” figure, using a fictional “projected personal income growth” as their unlimited limit  – essentially allowing them to set a moving target depending on their spending appetites for the upcoming session.

 Whatever happens in the next few days, we're going to have to beat this crap at the polls in November....

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On Perry's Vetoes

Yesterday, Governor Rick Perry let loose some awesome vetoes:

• He vetoed the attempt to make University regents accountable to the permanent University bureaucracy instead of an elected Governor; this had been priority legislation for Cahnman's Musings.

• He vetoed a separate attempt to gut the authority of the elected State Board of Education.

• He followed through on his threat and used his line item power to eliminate funding for the so-called 'Public Integrity Unit' of the Travis County DA's office over the ongoing Rosemary Lehmberg embarrassment.

These vetoes helped restrain the worst excesses of the legislature for which the Governor deserves commendation.

Unfortunately, the Governor let the overwhelming majority of the budget stand.  He also signed the Common Core-style data collection bill.  And those are more important.

Last month, we wrote:

The general session of the 83rd Legislature revealed a Governor who is either unable or unwilling to control the Austin insider crowd in his own party.

 While yesterday's vetoes helped to contain said 'Austin insider crowd,' they don't control them.  The Governor helped stop some bad stuff, but he still let A LOT of crap through.  An appropriate end to a heartbreaking legislative session.

Onward....

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Update: Just spoke with a friend who knows more about Texas politics than anyone we've ever met.   This person believes the odds were "50/50 at best" that Perry would have gotten a better deal out of the budget a second time.  In either case, the solution is to throw out these clowns in 'leadership' of the legislature.

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Don't Tax My Credit Union

This will come as a 'shock,' but the same Obama administration that expanded TARP, re-appointed Bernanke, and gave us the Dodd-Frank big bank protection racket, now wants to tax independent credit unions out of existence:



Highlights:

• 96 million Americans use credit unions.

• 40% of Americans are credit union members.

• Only 6% of all financial assets in the United States are in credit unions.

Take action here.

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Moody's DOWNGRADES SH 130 by FOUR Notches!!!

Well, the good news is that if it fails completely, at least there's an asset a new owner can purchase:


Highlights: 

The company that operates the southern leg of the SH 130 toll road may not have enough money to make loan payments next year. That's the assessment from a major financial group which lowered the company's credit rating.
The 41 mile stretch between south Austin and Seguin opened last fall. Analysts with Moody's Investors Service say that traffic is only half of what was originally projected.
Officials with the sh130 concession company raised more than a billion dollars to build the toll way, with about $400 million coming from a federal loan. A spokesperson for the group says they are working to increase traffic, by lower toll rates for big rigs and working with local economic development groups to attract businesses to the corridor.

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Zero Hedge: Record Boom for People who Make Stuff Up

Priceless:

In what may be the most appropriate chart to summarize not only the entire US "recovery", the "all time high stock market" and the daily newsflow, we present the number of jobs for those in the motion picture and sound recording industries, i.e, those who "make stuff up." It just hit a record high. And with "circus" jobs at all time highs, we can only assume jobs for makers of bread, if the BLS actually broke it out, would be off the charts as well. We will just leave it at that.

Make sure you click the link to see the chart!

Fortunately, the Texas Legislature is chasing this dragon.

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