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By Tony Platt
$22.95
By Brad Kessler
$16.32
$13
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On Tuesday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry made a bigger gaffe than his debate choke from a few weeks ago with the release of his new ad, “Strong,” in which he frames President Obama’s repeal of the ban on gays serving openly in the military as “wrong” for faith-based reasons.
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U.S. Air Force / Staff Sgt. Jonathan Snyder
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By William deBuys, TomDispatch —
Consider it a taste of the future: the fire, smoke, drought, dust, and heat that have made life unpleasant, if not dangerous, from Louisiana to Los Angeles.
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IFC Films
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Andrew O’Hehir of Salon recently picked up the phone for a conversation about life and death with German filmmaker Werner Herzog. The two discussed Herzog’s newest film, “Into the Abyss,” a nonjudgmental meditation on what it means to be human while awaiting the gallows in the shadow of horrific crimes.
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Can Texas Gov. Rick Perry come back from the brink of PR disaster after Wednesday night’s debate gaffe? It sure helped the embattled but tenacious Herman Cain, as the “Left, Right & Center” brain trust discusses on this week’s show.
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bbc.co.uk
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So he “stepped in it” during Wednesday night’s GOP presidential debate. Others might say he choked or even ate it. But despite Rick Perry’s Texas-sized blunder, he’s not giving up his White House dreams. (more)
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AP / Charlie Niebergall
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This might come as a shock to a handful of people: The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has released its analysis of GOP presidential contender Rick Perry’s proposed tax plan and has come away with the distinct impression that Perry’s approach favors Americans in the upper income-earning brackets, regardless of his ... (more)
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Gage Skidmore (CC-BY-SA)
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According to Google’s data, “4 of the top 10 cities with the most searches for [Herman Cain] are major cities right in Texas.” Those would be Austin, Houston, Dallas and San Antonio. (more)
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Pat Bagley, Cagle Cartoons, Salt Lake Tribune —
Posted on Sep 20, 2011
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Texas Department of Criminal Justice
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The U.S. Supreme Court stopped the execution of a Texas murderer Thursday who was sentenced to death by jurors who were told he was a bigger threat to public safety because he is black.
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On Aug. 18, 1989, Mark MacPhail, a young police officer, was shot to death in a parking lot in Savannah, Ga. Soon afterward Troy Davis (above) was convicted of the killing. Although a majority of testifying witnesses have recanted their statements, a U.S. district court has ordered Davis to be executed Sept. 21. (more)
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By Joe Conason — Hear the one about Rick Perry’s appointees who run Medicaid in Texas allowing hundreds of millions of dollars to be misspent on orthodontic braces for children who don’t need them—with huge profits for private dental clinics owned by Wall Street hedge funds? There’s more.
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AP / Erich Schlegel
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By Bill Boyarsky — While Rick Perry was denouncing the federal government at Wednesday’s debate, he was also accepting all the financial assistance President Obama could offer his burning state.
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Flickr / GalgenTX (CC-BY)
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Wildfires continue to rage in Texas, and by Tuesday the estimated 85 fires had destroyed more than 7,500 acres and more than 1,000 homes.
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Flickr / Josh Lopez (CC-BY)
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Bill McKibben, along with some 2,000 activists protesting the construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline, are our Truthdiggers of the Week.
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Paul Lowry (CC-BY)
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By Joe Conason — When environmental regulators do their job properly, that can mean serious trouble for Rick Perry’s largest political donors.
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Flickr / Loozrboy (CC-BY-SA)
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Hundreds of environmental activists have shown up outside the White House this week—prepared to risk arrest—to protest a proposed transnational oil pipeline project they say will do more harm than good. More than 200 people have already been arrested.
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The stock market continued its best imitation of a roller coaster this week, reports of Syrian protesters’ deaths came in after assurances that military operations against the opposition had ceased, and American liberals cringed at the thought of another former Texas governor in the White House. (more)
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AP / David J. Phillip
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By Bill Boyarsky — Gov. Rick Perry is a happy executioner, having presided over 230 executions in Texas. That’s more, reported The Texas Tribune, “than any other modern governor of any state.”
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This week on Truthdig Radio in collaboration with KPFK: Texan populist Jim Hightower and Robert Scheer discuss Rick Perry’s entry into the presidential race while Texas Observer Editor David Mann tells us about Perry’s “army of God.” Update: Full transcript.
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Flickr / Kristina B
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Molly Ivins was a popular humorist, liberal columnist and a Texan, and she knew Texas governor and now GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry well. (more)
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AP / David J. Phillip
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By Robert Scheer — It is unfathomable that yet another Texas blowhard governor has emerged as a front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination.
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Gage Skidmore (CC-BY-SA)
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The Texas governor will almost certainly launch a broadside against current GOP front-runner Mitt Romney this weekend when he takes the wraps off his campaign for president. (more)
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National Weather Service
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Texas is suffering through one of the worst droughts in the state’s history, and things have gotten so bad that news of a tropical storm—that thing just below a hurricane on the bad-weather scale—is being greeted with cautious optimism. Texas Gov. Rick Perry named three days in April “Days of Prayer for Rain in the State of Texas.” (more)
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Flickr / dherrera_96
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Texas Gov. Rick Perry points to his hyper pro-business policies to explain the fact that 37 percent of the nation’s new jobs created over the last two years were in his state. New York magazine has another suggestion though: the region’s multibillion-dollar drug trade. (more)
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U.S. Congress
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Texas Congressman Ron Paul is streamlining his professional plans. Yes, he’s still running for president, and it looks as though his supporters haven’t deserted him since the last election cycle, but he won’t be seeking to reclaim his House seat after 2012.
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Flickr / Jeezny
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Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives are set to vote on a measure aimed at repealing part of a 2007 bill that calls for phasing out those inefficient, old-style light bulbs. If passed, it’s unlikely the proposal would clear the Senate. (more)
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The unseemly love affair of some American politicians with the death penalty is bad for justice and bad for our country’s standing in the world. It inflicts a wholly unnecessary moral stain on a nation that rightly preaches the rule of law to everyone else.
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We don’t have the full picture yet on the lineup of candidates revving up to race for the White House in 2012, even from the GOP camp, which has already kicked into high campaigning gear. A certain governor of a big state ... (continued)
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Well, will you look at that: Another Texas governor might up and throw his Stetson into the ring and run for president. No, this is not the year 2000. This time, we’re talking about Gov. Rick Perry, Republican, who has never lost an election. And he has great hair!
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Flickr / slobug (CC-BY-SA)
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He made a stir in 2008, and it looks like Texas wild-card Congressman Ron Paul is throwing his hat in the ring again for another try at the presidency in 2012. Paul will reportedly announce his intentions in Des Moines, Iowa, on Tuesday.
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Wikimedia Commons / Prolineserver
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According to New York Times econo-whiz Paul Krugman, all this emphasis on austerity will not be good for posterity. In his latest column, Krugman slams the GOP for claiming to be all about the kids while stacking the deck against them with “draconian” budget cuts.
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Martin Reffstrup Mikkelsen (CC-BY-SA)
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The city of Austin, Texas, long known for keeping it weird, decided to let the public rename the Solid Waste Services Department. The leading contender is “The Fred Durst Society of the Humanities and Arts.” Durst, the face of millennial rock band Limp Bizkit, probably won’t end up with the honor.
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By Eugene Robinson — Race still matters in America and justice is not completely blind. Anyone who believes otherwise should examine the case of Cornelius Dupree Jr., who was ruled innocent Tuesday after spending 30 years in prison.
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Flickr / dherrera_96 (CC-BY)
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Texas is one of those states that would appear to be among the least likely to do away with capital punishment anytime soon, but as The Huffington Post’s Laura Bassett reports, a district court in the Lone Star State will reconsider the death penalty this Monday.
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AP / Jack Plunkett
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The holiday special for former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay was a big helping of guilty-as-charged Wednesday, as the former Republican lawmaker found himself on the wrong side of the Texas legal system in a money laundering case ... (continued)
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Flickr / brian.ch (CC-BY)
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Much has been made about Mexico’s deadly drug war and the potential for violence to spill across the border, but it is less often reported that American guns make that war go. Over the weekend, police in Laredo, Texas, seized 147 AK-47 rifles and 10,000 rounds of ammunition en route to Mexico.
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Our friends at Brave New Films sent us this update on the Texas Board of Education’s partisan rewriting of American history. If you haven’t been angry enough today, hop past the jump and give it a gander.
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Eight-millimeter footage of the 35th president taken the night before his assassination was just discovered in Texas.
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By Chris Hedges — The difference between the tea party and the secessionist movement bubbling up in some two dozen states is that the tea party believes America can be fixed.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — Every April the Web and the commentary pages overflow with sweeping falsehoods that libel the work of committed federal employees, such as Vernon Hunter, the Vietnam veteran who was recently murdered by an anti-tax terrorist.
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The attorneys general of Alabama, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Louisiana, Michigan, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Washington and Virginia are suing over the health care reform bill, citing state sovereignty and alleging federal overreach under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution.
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youtube.com
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Texas’ Board of Education has approved a new social studies curriculum with a conservative seal of approval. After three days of debate the board voted to change the curriculum to explicitly present Republican philosophies and conservative leaders in a more positive light.
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governor.state.tx.us
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Rick Perry, already Texas’ longest-serving governor, has survived primary challenges from a popular senator and an insurgent tea party candidate. Debra Medina had hoped to spoil the Republican race, but the tea partyer (whom we recently called out) was able to grab only about 17 percent of the vote.
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U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency
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The head of the Gulf Cartel, the leading drug cartel in northern Mexico and southern Texas, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison after cooperating with the U.S. federal government and pleading guilty to five counts that included attempted murder and money laundering.
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AP / Pat Sullivan
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By Yasha Levine and Mark Ames —
Ron Paul proté gé Debra Medina is shaking up the Texas gubernatorial race, but scratch the surface of this rising tea party star and you’ll find a Bush-style big-government hypocrite.
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AP / Jack Plunkett
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Authorities continue to investigate why Joe Stack of Texas flew his small airplane into the Austin offices of the IRS, but based on early reports and a tirade the attacker posted on the Internet, it had something to do with taxes, big government, corporate crime and bailouts. (continued)
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