Texas is #1 in electricity rates

If it isn't obvious by now, electricity deregulation has been a complete failure for the citizens of Texas. According to an article by the Galveston Daily News, Texas has the highest increase in electricity rates, 57%. Click below for a larger pic.

BREAKING: Michael Berry's head to explode

UPDATE: Peter Brown will be endorsing Annise Parker for Mayor at 1:30 today.

Peter Brown has called a press conference to endorse someone in the race for Houston Mayor. The big question concerning this endorsement is: "When will Michael Berry's head explode?".

Berry, a white wing, 38 year old, young professional, who can shoot his mouth off about the wars, but won't shoot a gun to fight them, talk radio host has been going ballastic with his anti-Parker rants. He hasn't been too kind to Locke either, threatening to boycott the election. (boo-hoo) But come 1:30 cameras will be on Michael Berry's head.

Will his head explode because Brown endorsed Annise Parker? Or because he endorsed Locke? Will his head go left? Or left? Or will it just be sucked into his body? (all cavities are a possibility with Berry)

Whoever Brown endorses, we can expect Michael Berry to whine about it till Dec 12. Then he will whine about it for the next 6 years. Without a head.

WHO: Houston City Council Member and former Candidate for Mayor Peter Brown
WHAT: Peter Brown makes an official endorsement in the mayoral runoff
WHEN: Tuesday, November 10^th at 1:30 PM
WHERE: Steps of City Hall, 901 Bagby St., facing the reflection pool

CONTACT:

Lucinda Guinn, Campaign Manager

Telephone: 713-528-0049

www.peterbrownformayor.com

Palin to court the Tea Party nomination for President.

You read it here first. My prediction for the 2010 elections. Sarah Palin will seek the nomination for President of the United States from the newly formed Tea Party. Possible VP selections include Ross Perot, Joe the Plumber, Glenn Beck, and Governor Rick Perry.

Palin can't stay out of the spot light or in front of the cameras and the teabaggers need Palin for the Hollywood effect and comic relief. Their convention will be full of white angry teabaggers, having fun, and sharing lots of stupidity. But seriously, watch for Palin to seek this party's nomination. It will be a riot!

And if you don't think this is possible, the Tea Party has just been officially formed in Florida.

Locke-ing in the soccer mom vote

David Ortez writes about Gene Locke pandering to the soccer crowd at a Houston Dynamo game and posts a scan of his low cost campaign flyer his staff was handing out to the fans.

The literature falsely claimed "Annise Parker says she won’t “fund more museums and stadiums …*”" which is not what Annise said, or believes, but facts don't seem to matter to team Locke at this stage of the campaign. Parker has stated very clearly her position on additional spending while in the middle of dwindling income. Obviously Locke is clueless on this issue as well as soccer games.

Here is the complete flyer. More commentary below the pic:

What a waste of time, effort, paper, and money. Maybe Locke was trying to pander to the largely Hispanic crowd at the game. Unfortunately the crowd at Dynamo games is not predominantly Hispanic. It is a diverse crowd much to the credit of the sport becoming so popular with all ages and segments of the community. Score one for Houston.

Maybe next week Team Locke will have better luck with hand made flyers on the cars at the museum district calling for his life long dream of a Hispanic Museum.

At the end of the day, it will be Houston 2, Team Locke 0. GOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Where there is smoke, someone should get fired.

When will Leo Vasquez give Paul Bettencourt's "man on the inside" Ed Johnson the finger?

After settling with the Texas Democratic Party for voter suppression, costing the tax payers thousands of dollars in legal fees, requiring more tax dollars to come into compliance with the settlement, casting a dark shadow on the integrity of the Harris County Voters Registrar Office, and becoming a focal point for the United States Justice Dept, you would think Vasquez would take bold action to end this.

Vasquez has already reassigned Johnson, removing him from access to the voter records, but this is not enough. The investigation into his activity as a gop paid consultant and his access to the records is still ongoing. This shouldn't stop Vasquez from taking action and fire Bettencourt's inside man.

Seriously, what does it take for a republican to get fired in this town?

8 years later, insurance reform back on the table.

Hank Gilbert running for Texas Governor has released a plan for insurance reform in Texas. For those who didn't pay attention in 2002, or haven't paid attention to your homeowners rates over the last 8 years, here is what Governor Perry said in 2002 campaign:

"In recent months, there have been troubling trends in the homeowner's insurance market in Texas," said Governor Perry. "In too many cases, homeowner's insurance is getting more expensive, coverage is becoming harder to get, and instead of more companies stepping up to meet the demand, some companies have stopped writing comprehensive policies altogether."

Nothing ever happened except homeowners insurance got more expensive (highest in the nation), coverage is getting harder to get, and companies have stopped writing policies altogether (USAA) Gilbert intends to revive this campaign issue and should be able to hammer Perry on it. His plan includes a 20% rollback in insurance premiums, and an Insurance Commissioner elected by the citizens of Texas.

Only the incredibly ignorant think insurance reform in 2003 has been successful. Hank is a no nonsense kind of guy. He is going to tell it like it is, and plan to fix it. Unlike Perry he isn't going to look you in the eye and pick your family's pocket.

Other key points in the plan include:

• Requiring insurance companies to provide detailed financial justification for rate increases including cost justification exclusive to Texas without Texas income diverted out of state. In addition, all financial justification must be transparent and lobbying expenses would not be allowed to be included in cost justifications to support rate increases.
• Banning the use of credit scoring, data mining, and pattern recognition by insurance companies.
• A blue-ribbon commission to reassess tort reform legislation.
• A mandatory 20 percent “good driver” on auto insurance.
• Capping deductibles for auto insurance at $500 and homeowner’s insurance at $2,500.
• Requiring homeowner’s insurance rate freezes for the disabled and persons 65 years of age and above.
• Requiring insurance companies to offer a minimum number of standard policies to allow consumers to make better informed decisions through being able to compare policies offering identical protections side by side.
• Mandating the end to use of any rating territories in Texas except individual counties, and setting a 15 percent limit on the amount insurers may vary premiums within a single county excluding counties to which greater variances would be justified because of weather-related risks.
• Making it illegal for an insurer to base adverse underwriting or rating decisions on consumer inquiries.
• Mandating the collection and public reporting of claim denial rates on all types of insurance policies.

Leo Vasquez punked by Paul Bettencourt

Did Harris County Tax Assessor, Leo Vasquez, know what kind of poo Paul Bettencourt left him in when he quit just days after his re-election? Obviously not.

Harris County Commissioners Court voted unanimously to accept a settlement of a lawsuit filed by the Texas Democratic Party against Paul Bettencourt's Voter Registration Office. Included in this settlement:

• The voter registrar must now comply with all Texas Election Code deadlines. In sworn discovery, Bettencourt's staff admitted that more than 11,350 timely submitted applications were not processed and on the voter rolls when voting started as required by law.

• The voter registrar's employees can no longer have employment or financial interests in outside companies that provide voter information to candidates or political parties, a practice Bettencourt allowed and Vasquez defended regarding moonlighting Republican political consultant Ed Johnson.

• The voter registrar must provide training to employees to stop illegal rejection of applications.

• The voter registrar may not reject applications for hypertechnical reasons, such as not checking a box even though all the information needed to register was provided.

Bettencourt must have known something was coming down and left Leo with his big butt up in the air before he abandoned the voters of Harris County. He was a rising star among the republican crowd. Some thought he would run for Congress, but instead just days after being re-elected he quit like a coward leaving Vasquez to deal with the allegations of corruption confirmed by sworn testimony from his own staff:

• In sworn discovery, Bettencourt's staff admitted his claim that only 3,518 applications were “rejected” does not include 64,036 applications where a notice of incomplete was mailed, thousands of which were mailed too late to allow registration in time to vote.

• Bettencourt creatively compares apples and oranges to claim Harris County didn't reject more voters than other Texas counties, even though figures from those counties include both rejections and notices of incomplete. Nearly 66,000 more Harris County applications did not result in immediate registration than in Dallas County.

Our legal team pinpointed reasons for this shocking level of disenfranchisement.

• Despite an expected registration surge in 2008, Bettencourt did not alter policy that had reassigned experienced voter registration employees to other jobs.
• Some 39,159 notices of incomplete were sent in violation of law because voters provided a social security number instead of a driver's license number.
• Another 4,264 applications were delayed or rejected because Bettencourt and Johnson used outdated government databases to determine whether the address provided by a voter was residential or commercial, although the law requires the county to take the voter's word about residence.
• Thousands were delayed or rejected because voters did not check a box saying they were over 18, although they provided their date of birth.
• Thousands of applications were not processed within seven days as required by law, causing notices of incomplete to be mailed too late to meet the registration deadline. Bettencourt claims 29,386 eventually registered, but he and Vasquez refuse to release data showing how many registered too late to vote.
  

The last sentence sums up the problem. Instead of releasing the data that was requested in order to put an end to this lawsuit, Vasquez played hide the baloney and lawyer ed up. This from the party that doesn't believe in frivolous lawsuits and supports tort reform, but at the first sign of trouble, Vasquez hid behind an attorney.

In the end, the Texas Democratic Party did the right thing and the settlement proves it. It is a shame that it required a lawsuit to get out elected officials to do their damn jobs. As the Chairman of the TDP said:

It's time for Paul Bettencourt and his apologists to quit making excuses, take responsibility for his actions, and go away. In their place, Harris County taxpayers deserve new leadership and a voter registration office that doesn't need a court order to encourage participation by all citizens.

Dogpiling on the Hispanic voters who don't vote

As I said after the early voting totals were in, Hispanics are not voting. The Hispanic population could be the largest block of voters in Harris County unless they don't vote. And they proved that for the City races.

According to Marc Campos of Campos Communications Hispanics voted in the 9-11% range in the city elections and he has some pretty strong words for all Hispanics:

I’m going to recommend that the next Houston Area Latino Summit focus on Latino voter participation. For now, our “Si Se Puede” slogan has been temporarily revoked. We can’t Si Se Puede if we keep doing No Se Puede! All of us Latinos that are involved in H-Town politics ought be hanging our heads in shame right now. Latino power my arse!

Stace at Dos Centavos also has commentary on the issue. I have to agree with both. Why would any candidate pump money into winning the vote of those who do not vote? This has to change. At the very least the cheap pandering promises made by some candidates didn't sway anyone.

We can't expect to be heard if we do not speak up at the ballot box. If we do not vote, then we condone the actions of the few in attacking and blaming the Hispanic population for the city's problems. If we don't vote we condone racial profiling and those who pander on the steps of City Hall to the extreme right wing immigrant bashers.

We will talk about this at the next Latino Summit and then we will vote in November.

What a Boehner!

As predicted, Clear Lake goes for Morales

Did I predict this or what?

It just goes to show you how voters in the Clear Lake area think. It doesn't matter if your insurance rates triple, or your electricity rates double, or it costs twice as much to send your kid to college, if someone has an R by their name, they are voting for him! And they did in Clear Lake.

Roy Morales, the perennial city candidate with little if any experience in city politics got over 33% of the vote in Clear Lake. Parker received 30%, Brown 24% and Locke a very distant 11%. Maybe it was the biker vote. (although there is a very large biker presence in the Texas Democratic Party, one that includes a huge motorcycle rally at the TDP convention every two years.)

It will be interesting to see how Clear Lakers vote, or if they vote, in Dec for the runoff. Parker has received a grade of B from the Texas Conservative Review in Harris County, probably based upon her experience, fiscal policies and her no nonsense way of governing. Morales received an A. Peter got a C and Locke got an F.

Locke probably got an F for Fishing. Below are the details for voting in Clear Lake precincts:

precinct	Brown	Morales	Parker	Locke
92	142	210	218	64
306	118	161	183	57
391	72	81	108	39
393	31	36	31	18
416	113	85	99	55
417	56	80	99	55
473	148	263	180	54
474	1	0	0	0
475	44	35	22	32
545	2	0	3	0
568	165	244	200	99
699	105	167	136	59
718	246	272	233	87
721	155	240	191	53
724	39	57	44	24
728	45	65	63	13
732	111	171	132	51
744	112	153	123	44
745	139	208	180	60
746	23	17	28	7
748	24	17	27	4
750	8	2	8	17
782	3	1	0	0
845	1	0	0	0
	1903	2565	2308	892
	24.82%	33.45%	30.10%	11.63%

Why a Democrat should challenge Jerry Eversole

City Council Member Toni Lawrence has decided not to challenge ethically challenged Jerry Eversole. Why?

"We have a lot of mutual friends, we really do, and it was really tough on a lot of those mutual friends," Lawrence said. "It was putting pressure on those people of who they were going to support and what they were going to do."

This is an indication that ethics is just another word for nothing left to steal. Lawrence had an opportunity to challenge one of the most unethical County Commissioner in the history of Harris County, and yet declined. Lawrence and the republican party of Harris County obviously thinks what Jerry Eversole has done with his donors money is within ethical guidelines of the party. I have to agree.

The republican party has lost it's soul. They are no longer strong on defense but are strong on defense spending for their corporate buddies. They tolerate their elected officials affairs with hookers and hot Argentina women. They turn a blind eye to teenage pregnancy when it happens to their party, all while thumping their bibles like a drum line at a half time show.

They can't balance a checkbook but can run a country or state into the fiscal toilet. They talk about immigration yet do nothing about it for 8 years. They screamed about ending abortion yet did nothing when they controlled Congress, the White House, and the Supreme Court.

And they tolerate Jerry Eversole. They are truly a party of immoral, bible thumping, unethical voters with the accounting skills of an Enron employee and illegal immigrants mowing their lawn because it is a good bargain.

And that's why a Democrat should challenge Eversole in the general election. This election will not be about the ethics of Jerry Eversole, it will be about the ethics and moral character of the republican party and their supporters. Let's put their holier than thou character on the ballot and let them vote on it.

I would bet on Eversole.

Where did Peter go wrong?

After spending over $3 Million, Peter Brown came in 3rd place to Gene Locke and Annise Parker in the race for Houston Mayor. I am sure many, including Rick Casey of the Houston Chronicle, will analyze what happened and why it happened. So here is my two sense.

Peter actually ran a pretty good TV and mail campaign focusing on a clear message: He has a blueprint for Houston. And with $3 Million at his disposal, he was able to repeat this message over and over and over.....and over, which is the perfect blueprint for getting peoples attention. Unfortunately it did not turn into enough votes.

Maybe it was the negative ads that was his downfall. Or his dispute with Locke over the black vote. Or maybe it was Peter Brown trying to cater to the moderate republicans. As Brains and Eggs said

"The old axiom about choosing between a real Republican and a pretend one is only partly true in this case -- more people still chose Brown, but barely."

Whatever was the cause for the 3rd place finish, Brown is out of the race and has $3 Million less in his retirement fund. Here's to Peter and his upcoming retirement.

If he waits till Dec 13, he just might have a fishing partner.

The shockers of the Houston elections

Roy Morales gets over 20% of the vote. That is a shocker. The man is clueless. Absolutely clueless and yet 20% of the voters want him as Mayor. Clue-frickin-less.

Peter Brown is in third place. After spending $3.2 Million of his wife's money, he is going to have a very long long Christmas season coming in 3rd place. How can you lose after spending $3.2 Million? Or come in 3rd. Kudus to the voters of Houston.

Gene Locke. Coming in 2nd place. That is a shocker to Peter Brown. So far he looks to be in a run off with Annise Parker. Everyone expected him to peak at 3rd. Maybe he will just peak at 2nd.

C.O. Bradford. I just don't get it. With all of his baggage with the crime lab, the voters of Houston put him back in office. Shocking. Just frickin shocking.

One thing about election parties.......

Everyone is a frickin expert. If you have a computer you are an expert. If you don't have a computer you look for someone who does then overwhelm everyone with statistical bullshit.

That is what is happening right now. I am being overwhelmed with statisticians.

Roy Morale's biker coalition on a roll!

Roy Morales now has 18% of the vote. And Annise Parker is leading with 29% of the vote. Locke is losing ground, and Brown is losing to the biker crowd.

Parker has just entered the room and the media is all over her. People are excited. The staff have smiles all over their faces.

Look for Morales to continue to gain, but not much. More later.

varoom varoom.

Blogging from Annise Parkers Party

This has the makings of a great party. Lots of excitement. Just announced at the blogger table Annise 29.2 Locke 27.4 Brown 25.1 and Morales 17.25. Staff is very excited. Beer is not free. Crowd just got a glimpse of the results. Everyone is happy. So far.....

Morales. The biker vote must have come out because no one predicted 17% of the vote. This should be exciting. State Representative Jessica Farrar just walked into the room make the rounds.

More later.

Election winners for Houston CIty Council

OK. I am going out on a limb here. Winners for 2009:

Melissa Noriega. Her second term as an at-large is in the bag and she deserves it. Very good City Council Member. Congratulations. (unopposed)

Ed Gonzales. Recently won a special election and will return as City Council. Congrats. (unopposed)

James Rodriguez. A great Member of City Council. Returns for his 2nd term. Congrats!!!!

Anne Clutterbuck. Winner. Will return for a third term. Congrats. Her district will continue to be served well.

Jarvis Johnson. Winner. Second term for Jarvis. Good pick.

Wanda Adams. Winner. Second term for Wanda. Another good pick.

Mike Sullivan. I really have no idea what Mike has done or hasn't done for the district especially in Clear Lake, but I do know he isn't well liked and the more he jumps on the anti-Hispanic bandwagon, the more I dislike him. He loses on the personality contest for not having one, but, he returns for a second term barring a turnout miracle for Wayne Garrison.

Early votes are in. What do they mean?

For Mayor, 28%/28%/25% Locke/Parker/Brown. What does this mean? I don't have the foggiest. Really. I couldn't tell you if that was good/bad/worse, or good/gooder/goodest.

Everyone with a laptop and cell phone is calling and comparing notes, totaling precinct votes and looking real busy, except me and a couple of bloggers who look clueless on what these numbers mean. OK, it is only me looking clueless, but I have something else on my mind.

From what I am hearing from all of this commotion is that turn out is really low.Like and/or DUH! The quote of the day is "This could be really really good, or really really bad". So, that is where we stand. It all depends.

Clueless and looking for a beer. Stay tuned.

T-Minus 90 minutes at Annise Parker HQ

5:30 PM. For once today the Parker HQs is quiet. All the staff and volunteers are out knocking on doors looking for the last minute voters.

During the day there was a steady flow of volunteers and organizations coming in to block walk, door knock, and work the polls. There was at least one impromptu rally in the front yard. They were pretty fired up, which is saying something when you know you will be walking the streets for the next 2-3 hours. They all were excited and having fun. Lots of energy here.

The Parker campaign also had morning donuts and lots of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and drinks for lunch! Everyone is looking forward to the party tonight at the Hilton Americas. Lots of people are going to be there. (Hopefully there will be free beer for the bloggers.)

Would ya please pass the jelly?

Time to pass the jelly because someone in the Houston Mayoral race is toast and that first person is Roy Morales. With the polls ending in about 2 hours, it is pretty safe to say Roy will end the night in a solid 4th or 3rd place depending on the last minute turnout. Maybe that airplane banner flying over Houston this afternoon that said "Vote for Roy Morales" will drive out voters.

Regardless, this is the end of yet another run for a City office for Roy adding to his loss to Peter Brown, and twice to Melissa Noriega. The perpetual candidate should be buttered and jellied because he is now toast.

More toast predictions coming around 7:10PM. Oh...and speaking of passin da jelly:

$100 reward for the anonymous robodialer.

Someone is making anonymous robodial calls concerning the race for Houston City Controller. Whoever is making the calls is doing so anonymously and spreading false information. It is bad enough that the Mayor and the Harris County Democratic Party has issued a statement:

The Harris County Democratic Party and its leaders would not stoop to making anonymous telephone smears against any candidate – let alone one as competent, capable, and loyal to the Democratic Party as Ronald Green.

As Muse pointed out, the HCDP does not get involved in city elections so the call must be bad enough for them to break out from this long standing policy. This isn't the first anonymous call that has been made this season. Rododials are hard to trace, cheap, annoying as hell, adds very little value to a campaign, and very easy for a wingnut or a wingnut organization to do.

So, if anyone knows who did this I've got a hundred bucks for you.

Teabaggers in ten minutes

This is about 10 minutes long, but it is amusing and an easy watch. This video was taken at the Glen Beck rally on 9/12 in Washington where over 87 Bazzillion teabaggers attended. Geez. Why isn't this in color?

HOA given go ahead to file suit against Hurricane Ike victims.

The homeowners of the Pineloch Community Association has spoken, sort of.

Saturday a farce of an election was held to give guidance to the board members of the association on whether to file suit against 40 homeowners who re-roofed their homes with the wrong colored shingles. The community was asked by the board to vote on changing the deed restrictions which required 1700+ yes votes out of the 2040 homes. It wasn't going to happen and it didn't.

This now gives the board members the right to spend thousands of dollars on filing suit against the victims of Ike for selecting the wrong colored shingle. Not that anyone has complained or anything. Not that it is noticeable. It is just because the board probably doesn't have anything better to do with their time except play HOA nazis.

The deed restrictions were written almost 30 years ago. Some homeowners, like those in Bay Oaks Community, use light colored shingles for the energy savings aspects. Some use whatever is less expensive or what is suggested by the contractor. And others don't think twice about it because their neighbors rarely look at the roofs of the homes when driving in the neighborhood.

Unless you are on the board. Good luck to those in the firing line.

Cheney shoots Hutchinson in the face

Cheney has publicly endorsed Hutchinson for Governor. This is about as disastrous as Lee Brown endorsing Gene Locke, Tony Sanchez endorsing Peter Brown, or my favorite Sarah Palin endorsing Rick Perry. (Although Perry actually wanted Palin, in a political way) Hutchinson responded:

“I am so *&^%$# pleased,” Hutchison said Wednesday. “I fear the former vice president so much. I just hope he doesn't shoot me in my *&^damn frickin face!”

OK. So I took a tiny bit of liberty with her response. What could be worse for Hutchinson than an endorsement from Darth Vader who won't keep his damn mouth shut like every other former vice president does? Instead Cheney has become a camera whore looking for every opportunity to tell Obama how he is screwing up his war in Afghanistan and Iraq. (As if Cheney has any experience on winning a frickin war)

Cheney is like the old uncle that invites himself to your kids 8 year old birthday party dressed like a cowboy and smelling like one to. Hutchinson would be lucky if her uncle doesn't bring a firearm.

PULL!

What does it take for a Harris County republican to resign?

Harris County Commissioner, Jerry Eversole, has decided to seek re-election.

This is the same Jerry Eversole that was fined by the Texas Ethics Commission $75,000, the largest fine in its history. The same Jerry Eversole under investigation by the FBI. The same Jerry Eversole under investigation by the Harris County District Attorney. The same Jerry Eversole who took over $180,000 from his donors and spent it on fancy western art, cowboy outfits, western books, coffee, cattle, personal trainers, coffee, and more.

What does a republican have to do to get fired? Have sex with a hooker? Have sex with one of their staff members? That didn't seem to work since republican United States Senator Vitter and Ensign are still Senators. How about sending emails asking to kiss their secretary behind the right ear? That seem to work for republican Chuck Rosenthal.

And where is the holier than thou chairman of the Harris County republican party? Why hasn't he called for Jerry Eversole's resignation? Even County Judge Emmet, who claimed to have clamped down on ethics violations, is taking up for the ethically challenged Eversole:

“I've known Jerry for more than 30 years, before he was a commissioner,” Emmett said. “I consider him a friend, and I think he's done a good job as county commissioner. People are going to look at the parks and the job he's done out there, and, hopefully, that's what the campaign will be all about.”

Eversole has stolen over $180,000 from his campaign account. Emmett and Eversole should know that anything over $1500 is a felony. Emmett should be calling for his resignation not supporting his re-election.

Eversole is probably going to run for re-election, win, then quit like Paul Bettencourt did, giving Emmett and his Commission another opportunity to appoint another republican to office. It is just another day for the republican party in Harris County.

Roy Morales video at a biker bar

Roy Morales. Always good for a laugh.

Brown running out of money

Could it be? Has Peter Brown's personal kitty gone dry? According to a press release titled "Lots of money pays off" by Brown's staff, Brown is asking for money to continue his personal and baseless attacks against his opponents:

On Tuesday, Peter told you about a new poll showing us in the lead. Lots of free money pays off! For weeks, we've been launching angry vicious personal attacks. Now they’re taking our misleading negative attacks to the next level by debunking them. Please contribute so we can continue our attacks and because I have been cut off from my wife's unlimited bank account.

Ok. That's not what the press release really said, but it is odd that Brown is asking for money. He has an unlimited amount of his wife's personal wealth to spend on this race for Mayor. To date he has spent $3.2 Million recently slinging mud at his opponents. Why does he need to ask for money now?

Brown's millions has allowed him to put out at the very least 5 TV ads and a number of mailers. I doubt seriously if he needs any more money. His kitty didn't dry up.

Maybe his support has?

Who is Pam Holm?

I was told that Pam Holm running for City Controller had a funny TV commercial with her dog making a few ruff comments. (get it? Ruff?) Anyway, I was curious and decided to watch. You can too. Wait till the end for the dog:




Well, when I first saw the commercial, I wondered if I had made a mistake. The Pam Holm I have seen on her mailers and on her website looks like the picture on the left. There is quite a difference, enough so that I really thought I had made a mistake in identity.

What is on the left seems a bit like a picture from 20 years ago or so. I am sure lot's of people use a younger more attractive picture in their campaign literature. Not that there is anything wrong with it. Even Gene Locke does it.

:)

Peter Brown fails to launch at lunch

I didn't think this was a good idea in the first place.

Peter Brown was featured at a meeting of the Space Advocates today. The "Space Advocates" started out a few years ago as "Space Advocates for Lampson". As a candidate and Congressman, Lampson would always speak to a packed house of those interested in the Space Program. As a member of the Science Committee, Lampson, had exclusive insight into the workings of Congress and kept those in attendance aware of the situation. It was always a great bipartisan event. Once elected, Space Advocates for Lampson was renamed to just Space Advocates.

After the NASA area elected a rookie to Congress, Space Advocates went on a long hiatus until today. Yesterday NASA's new vehicle had a successful launch, but today's lunch didn't go as well.

A small crowd, half who didn't live in the Houston city limits, and two members of the LaRouche Nazi youth group were on hand to greet Peter Brown, running for Mayor and chief antagonist of Mike Sullivan. From what others have told me, the best part of the lunch was when former Congressman Nick Lampson said he was considering a run for state wide office.

To further the poke in Mike Sullivan's eye, his challenger, Wayne Garrison, took the time and made the effort to visit with those in attendance. Mike probably had more important things to do.....

Oops he did it again

Oops! I Did it again to your heart. Got lost In this game; oh, baby.
Oops! You Think that I'm sent from above... I'm not that innocent.

--Britney Spears. Oops I did it again.

Candidate for Mayor Peter Brown did it again. As I said yesterday, With unlimited wealth you can expect Brown to continue his air attack and mailers attacking his opponents. And sure enough he did it again. According to Muse:

Brown sent out a mail piece that attacked both Annise Parker and Gene Locke. I heard it was sent to women Republican voters. You can see it right here. The Chron has Mayor White's response...

This prompted the Mayor who has stayed neutral on the issue to issue a statement debunking Brown's criticism. Gene Locke also has released a radio ad simply titled "Trust" and he just might have a point. From his radio ad:

NARRATOR: Peter Brown is a punk ass, liar.

Ok. That's not exactly what he said but it's what the ad is alluding to. Locke caught Brown in listing supporters on his website who really were not supporting him including members of Locke's staff. In response he took down his supporter list from his site.

Parker, during the debates, called for Brown to stop taking credit for some of the accomplishment of others on City Council. In response he took down his list of accomplishments from his site.

And now with his wife's vast fortunes, he continues his attacks on his opponents while claiming to be taking the high road. As President Bush said "He can't take the high horse and then claim the low road".

In short, he's not that innocent.