Tag Archives: txlege

Now That the Anti-Abortion Bills Passed in Texas, the Pro-Life Crowd is Terrified of Facing the Consequences

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Erick Erickson makes a living trying to rile up progressives and liberals for the entertainment of the more terrible elements of the right wing. It is difficult to know how much he believes the things he says, and how much he is playing to his audience. Put another way, is he really such a horrible person, or does he just play one on TV? The only thing I know for sure that he is very good at the job I just described. In the early hours of Saturday, July 13, 2013, he tweeted the following:

erick

The above image is from an article on Daily Kos. As of this writing, at 12:45 p.m. on Sunday, July 14, the tweet no longer appears in Erickson’s Twitter timeline, which leads me to suspect that he could not handle the heat he received. This should not be a surprise.

He did leave up some other gems, however: Continue reading →

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The Texas House Makes HB2 Seem More Popular Than It Is by Changing the Page Layout

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Via Stand With Texas Women/Facebook

Via Stand With Texas Women/Facebook

The Texas House of Representatives’ House Research Organization (HRO) releases a “Daily Floor Report” summarizing the bills and testimony presented before the House or its committees. The House has been in recess since the second special session started, although the State Affairs Committee held a hearing on the resurrected anti-abortion bill, HB2, last Tuesday, July 2. The Daily Floor Report for July 9, 2013 (PDF file) has a summary of that hearing, and it demonstrates a sneaky way of making it appear, at least superficially, that your bill has more support than it actually does (h/t Arthur).

Beginning on page 1 (the first page after the cover sheet), the report lists witnesses testifying “for” the bill, “against” the bill, and “on” the bill. It lists three pages of witnesses supporting the bill and one page of witnesses opposing it. The report also identifies one person who testified “on” the bill, Ellen Cooper of the Department of State Health Services.

Based on that, you might think that far more people testified in support of HB2 than in opposition to it, right? You might be excused, at first glance, for thinking that three times as many people testified for it as against it.

You would be wrong about that.

At the end of the three-page-long list of HB2 supporters, the report states that “about 1,090 others” signed up to testify in support of the bill. Most of them did not get to deliver their testimony to the committee in person, of course, since the hearing might still be going on a week later if they had. Still, three pages of names plus 1,090 more is quite a lot of people.

How many more signed up to testify in addition to the one page of names testifying against HB2? At the end of that much-shorter list, the report states that “about 2,060 others” signed up to testify against HB2.

According to the Texas Tribune, a roughly equal number of people testified for and against the bill. I suspect the HRO is not accustomed to writing such lengthy lists of witnesses, but that still does not explain the different page lengths. The scale of the testimony on Sunday, June 23 does not even come close to last Tuesday, and the Daily Floor Report (PDF file) for that day clearly indicates that more people signed up to testify against that bill than for it.

Wherever you stand on the issue of abortion, this sort of game-playing should not be acceptable.

Maybe Daily Floor Reports are subject to a page number limit. That is about the only honest reason I can think of at the moment for why the report is set up this way, but even that would not explain why the HRO cut off the list of opponents when it could have shortened the list of supporters.

The chair of the steering committee for the House Research Organization is Rep. Bill Callegari (R-Houston). I sent Rep. Callegari the following request for information through his Facebook page:

Dear Rep. Callegari,

I am a resident of Austin, Texas, and I have been researching and writing about the events surrounding HB2, SB9, and the related bills pending in the Legislature. I am not affiliated with any news or media organization. I have a question regarding the Daily Floor Report released today, July 9.

The report summarizes the State Affairs Committee hearing on HB2 that took place last week, and includes lists of people who registered to testify for and against the bill. According to news reports, only about 100 people were able to give live testimony to the committee, with about an equal number of people testifying in support of and in opposition to the bill. Today’s Daily Floor Report lists three pages’ worth of supporters’ names, then adds that about 1,090 more people signed up to testify in support of HB2. It then lists one page of opponents’ names, and adds that about 2,060 more people signed up to testify against the bill.

My question is as follows: why did the report list so many more names of supporters than opponents, when more people signed up to testify against the bill than for it, and roughly equal numbers of people actually testified to the committee on either side of the issue? Your attention to this matter is greatly appreciated.

I’ll update if I hear anything back.

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Dear Rep. Laubenberg

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Via Dallas County Democratic Party on Facebook

Via Dallas County Democratic Party on Facebook

The following is reposted with permission from a Facebook post by my friend Andreas, in relation to the HB2 hearings on Tuesday, July 2, 2013 in Austin, Texas:

Dear Rep. Laubenberg,

The truth shouldn’t ever have to fear inquiry. If this was a bill that would actually help increase women’s health and safety you would not have to avoid answering tough questions about its effect on women. You would not have to endure scathing rebuttals from actual health organizations and medical professionals. You would not have to ram this legislature through with a special session. If this was a bill that would help Texas women, you would have garnered broad support for it.

But as we have seen in the last couple of weeks, this is not about women’s health. This is about your personal religious view on women, sex and when life starts. This is about limiting access to abortions and making them so dangerous, expensive or logistically difficult, that you are basically outlawing them.

I might by cynical when it comes to the motivations and loyalties of politicians, and I might be disenchanted by the mockery of the democratic process – but I am not stupid. Don’t insult my intelligence by pretending that you have the health and safety of women on your mind.

You know what would convince me that you actually care about women’s health and safety and that you want to lower the number of abortions?

If you would fund the abortion providers so they can meet the medical requirements that you say are so important.
If you would champion age-appropriate and comprehensive sex education.
If you would fight to make contraceptives easily available and affordable.
If you would listen to what medical professionals have to say about this topic.

But as it stands all you do is using questionable tactics to get around a law that you don’t agree with. Since you can’t attack Roe vs. Wade directly you try to cancel it out by these shamefully disingenuous tactics. The truth shouldn’t ever have to fear inquiry, but there isn’t much truth here, is there?

With the same respect that you show towards women,
AF

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The Extent of Anger at Planned Parenthood

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A friend posted this on Facebook after the protests regarding HB2 and SB9 on Monday, July 1, 2013:

Out of all the blues I talked to tonight, MOST of them were just super focused on having their tax dollars NOT go to Planned Parenthood. I mean, I kept trying to ask them “how can we help women have planned (versus unplanned) pregnancies” and they would just go back to Planned Parenthood Planned Parenthood Planned Parenthood and how evil it was.

Even the really cool, chill, level-headed people were just so transfixed with the evils of Planned Parenthood.

I almost felt that they would be fine with private abortion clinics as long as they weren’t Planned fucking Parenthood.

Planned Parenthood has really really pissed them off. Their main argument was that women who go in there aren’t given unbiased info about their options – they are pushed towards abortions. And they argued that PP makes their money of abortions and wants abortions. That PP is pro-abortion and is in the “abortion business.”

Also they said that Planned Parenthood gets money for giving mammograms from the government but it’s a fraud because they don’t actually give them.

There was a WHOLE LIST. I didn’t really believe any of it, but I suggest anyone who isn’t super familiar with Planned Parenthood and all that it has to offer and all that it does (and does not do) and how it works to take some real time reading up on Planned Parenthood.

PP isn’t the bad guy – but I found myself without enough thorough knowledge about them (other than the basics) to defend them.

Learning what to research through the other side’s arguments….

I have two thoughts on this:

1. Their information on Planned Parenthood seems incomplete or inaccurate. Here is what they actually do:

© Planned Parenthood/Via washingtonpost.com

© Planned Parenthood/Via washingtonpost.com

2. Remember how, a week earlier, Planned Parenthood funding was considered “not germane” to the issues presented in SB5?

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My Video of the Stand With Texas Women Rally, July 1, 2013

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Here’s my video of the Stand With Texas Women Rally at the Texas Capitol this past Monday, July 1, 2013. It was a less-than-seasonably-hot day for Texas, meaning it stayed under 100° F the whole time. The iPhone apparently doesn’t handle heat all that well, so it kept shutting off on me. Here’s the video I was able to get. The initial graphic is by Lindsay Braun.

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You Live Here with Us

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Photo by Kathy O'Cain via Facebook

Photo by Kathy O’Cain via Facebook

None of you understand. I’m not locked up in here with you. You’re locked up in here with me.
-Rorschach, Watchmen by Alan Moore

An interesting feature of the past week’s events in Texas is the seemingly genuine surprise, not only among Republican leaders, but rank-and-file “pro-life” supporters as well, that so many people care so deeply about this issue and will stand and oppose bills like SB5 and its zombie equivalents, HB2 and SB9.

After ten years of dominating all statewide elected offices and both chambers of the Legislature, I suspect that Republicans, and conservatives in general, began to think of it as their state, and that we progressives were stuck here with them. If you’ll pardon the Watchmen reference above, maybe it’s time for them to realize that Texas is our state, too, and it is time for conservatives to realize that they have to live in it with us.

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How Have Texas Republicans Been Abusing Their Power Lately?

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When liberal fascists form a mob, they do so in an orderly, color-coordinated fashion. (© @OFA_UT/Twitter)

When liberal fascists form a mob, they do so in an orderly, color-coordinated fashion. (© @OFA_UT/Twitter)

We’ve all heard about how an “unruly mob” disrupted the Texas Senate last week, and how all the beleaguered rich white dudes were scared. We’ve also heard how someone allegedly doctored the voting records to make it look like the vote on SB5 took place before midnight on June 25, when in fact it occurred after midnight on June 26 (and therefore after the expiration of the Legislature’s special session.)

One of these is a group of citizens making noise for about ten minutes inside a public building to express discontent with some pretty shady legislative practices. The other is felony falsification of public documents. Which one do you think state Republican leaders are choosing to make an issue? Continue reading →

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SIGNAL BOOST: The Context of the “Unruly Mob”

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History is often written by whoever gets their story out the earliest, repeats it most often, and says it the loudest. Republicans will try to make the night of June 25, 2013 a story of an “unruly mob” who disrupted the democratic process. Anyone watching Tuesday night knows that this is a lie, but Republicans know that repeating a lie enough times makes it the truth (cf. Swift Boat, Benghazi, IRS, etc.)

We have to be the authors of history on this one, and truth is on our side. They’re going to try to pass this bill again. They have the numbers to do it. We have the power to make it clear that they had to break the rules—and the law—to get SB5 passed.

Texas Rep. Donna Howard posted this on her Facebook page with the following note (h/t Jennifer): “I want to emphasize the comments from someone who posted on my page because it gives you a perspective that is not necessarily being conveyed by the media and certainly not by the Republicans.” The comment is from Kathy Kennemer Genet (paragraph breaks added for ease of reading):

For the last day, I have glad to have been known as a member of the Unruly Mob at the capitol. But I want to straighten out a misconception about what happened in the Senate Chamber on Tuesday, and on Monday, and in the House Chamber on Sunday.

I was fortunate to be a witness in the galleries those days. Each day I was there, the leaders in those rooms, and the leaders of the groups organizing us made it crystal clear that we had to respect the rules of decorum there. We were shushed if we clapped, or spoke out in any way. We were prohibited from any expressions, including silent “jazz hands” during the proceedings.

The threat was that after being warned from the floor, if even one of us spoke out, the whole gallery would be cleared. Our job each time was to be a silent witness and a silent support for our legislators doing their work. Occasionally, a new spectator was allowed into the gallery, and if they yelled out, dozens of us quickly got them quiet and told them not to do it again.

I saw many of the same faces day after day in the chambers. We listened to things that made us sad, and happy, and angry and proud. We watched our legislators doing their work and hoped they got some support from our witness and our presence. We silently watched Sen. Davis’s tireless filibuster and the good work of the Senators supporting her for over 12 hours.

In the last half hour, as procedural rules were ignored and broken so that the vote could happen against the law, Senator Letcia Van de Putte, said these words: “At what point does a female Senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized over the male colleagues in the room?” At that moment hours and days of decorum did break, but they broke as a civic duty to halt what should have been halted legally, through the rules of the Texas State Senate. We were the last wall, and all the anger, and frustration and emotion poured out.

We responded to the rule of law being broken right in front of us. And this time our legislators from the Senate, and from the Texas House of Representatives who had come into the Senate chambers, looked up at us and smiled and held up two fingers which meant a NO vote. And we held up two fingers and yelled until our ears rang. The troopers were leading people out, and as the gallery emptied to 2/3, the sound got louder.

I have never been more proud to raise my voice and I would have happily been arrested for that right. We were not an unruly mob in the gallery despite what Lt. Gov. Dewhurst says. In this way, as in countless others that night, he is wrong.

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If You’re Planning on Joining the Next Round of SB5 Protests, Take Heed (UPDATED)

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UPDATE (06/30/2013): Karen has been kind enough to update her research, which I have put in a new post. Please direct your attention there instead of her for more up-to-date information. Continue reading →

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The MDs of the Texas Senate

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I’m awarding my first-ever Tweet of the Day Award to Andrea Grimes, for her brilliant assessment of certain Texas doctors who legislate.

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