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The Texas Blue
Advancing Progressive Ideas

Patrick M McLeod's blog

When Making The Grade Means Failing Texas

The Heritage Alliance, an organization dedicated to "equipping conservative Texans to impact politics and the Texas Legislature", released their scorecards for the 2007 Lege session earlier this week.

Our Ailing Infrastructure

An article in Friday's Washington Post shines a light on an often-overlooked problem that impacts all of us: The aging of our country's infrastructure. These paragraphs, in particular, caught my eye:

Nevertheless, the overall national infrastructure is stuck in a "death spiral," as states repeatedly fail to maintain the status quo condition of their transportation networks, Pisarski said. Maintenance standards slip further as the money is spread thin.

President Cheney Doesn't Shut Down YDA

Saturday was the final full day of the YDA National Convention in Dallas. Early attendance was a little on the anemic side as many folks celebrated progressive values into the wee hours of the morning. Democratic Presidential candidate Mike Gravel had to cancel his appearance, but the audience still got its money's worth with DNC Vice Chair Susie Turnbull and Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez.

Sine Die For Electoral Mobilization

The Dallas Morning News revisited one of the 80th Legislature’s failures to act in an article frontpaged on their website Thursday: Moving Texas’ primary date up to "Super Tuesday," February 5, 2008.

How They Voted: A Short Story of Technology and Transparency

To the surprise of no one who knows me, I'm a big fan of transparency in government. I'm also a big fan of using technology to make access to information easier for everyone.

How Many Rocks For A B.A.?

It's a week old, but I haven't seen anyone write on it around these parts (author's revision: Josh wrote about it in his Morning Roundup last Wednesday), so here it is: One of our state legislators publicly stated last week that increasing tuition rates is "like crack" for Texas universities.

Michigan State University's YAF To Be Labelled A Hate Group

According to the venerable civil rights organization the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Michigan State University chapter of the Young Americans for Freedom, a conservative student organinization, is a hate group.

Fuzzy Electoral Math Gets A Little Clearer

Earlier this week, I wrote a piece about the potential impact of California moving its primary up in the electoral calendar. In this piece, I mentioned that there were several other states currently considering moving their primaries up.

Scratch "considering" and make that "finalizing," at least for two big players.

Remember, Remember The 5th Of...February?

A brief version of the British childrens' rhyme that was popularized, if only for a month, here in America last year with the release of the movie version of V for Vendetta goes like this:

Remember, remember the Fifth of November
The Gunpowder, Treason and Plot
I know of no reason the Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot

Perry Hearts The Nuge

Hot off the digital presses from the Dallas Morning News' website:

AUSTIN - Hours after Gov. Rick Perry kicked off his second full term in office, rocker Ted Nugent helped him celebrate at a black-tie gala, but not all attendees were pleased by the performance.

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