Tuesday Roundup - A Senate slapfight and the Scorched Earth

Who thought that by this time in 2007 we'd be using the term "obstructionist Republicans?" Well, I did, and that's what happened last night when I turned on the news and saw that Senate Republicans had stopped debate on the anti-surge resolution. Majority Leader Harry Reid assured the GOP that the debate will happen anyways, and as the subject of money and budgets comes up, you can be sure Iraq will be a sticking point. The Chron has an in depth look at a couple of the implications.

Vince over at Capitol Annex has a veritable treatise on the new Too Close To Craddick PAC, the title of which is "Will We, Too, Eat Our Young?" I believe we have referred to this scorched earth approach in the past as cutting off noses to spite faces, and the argument remains the same - this is not a good idea.

Have you been seeing a lot of anti-coal ads lately? Guess who's producing most of them? Gas companies! The Texas Clean Sky Coalition is a website and a general marketing campaign with ads on websites and in newspapers, and I'm sure the smudged, sad faces of children will show up on billboards and TV sometime soon. The pro-coal commercials with the cute kids are also, of course, produced by coal companies.

Dewhurst has been showing his more reasonable side on tuition costs at state universities lately, cautioning colleges to not get out of hand with raising prices. Speaker Tom Craddick has come out in favor of whatever universities feel they need to do as far tuition goes. This is the sort of fight that everyone should have seen in the offing when tuition was deregulated. I imagine they'll hammer something out, but anyone who's been in college in the last four to six years knows how expensive things are getting, so to trot out the favorite old saw of government, someone oughta to do something. I'm not not optimistic, but at least the conversation is underway.

Legislators are fighting all over the place: state Senator Jane Nelson and some other legislators had a press conference yesterday, during the course of which they condemned Perry's move to require the HPV vaccine and recommended he rescind his executive order so the Lege can take the matter on. She also stated she would drag Attorney General Greg Abbot into the whole deal, asking him to rule on the legality of the order. The possibilities for the GOP to implode over this issue are endless and sort of morbidly entertaining, like watching the Kansas City Royals play baseball.

The Texas Republican who seems to having the most fun these days is Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, although now she has a creepy new pal: Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has come a courtin', and there's no stopping his charm offensive as he looks to the Senator for some needed support in the Lone Star State. Seeing as how KBH recently opened up to the possibility of being someone's VP nominee, they might become fast friends, although Romney is a long shot for the nomination.

I haven't mentioned it much, but if you're a total political junkie, The Politico has you covered on many fronts. Today they have a couple of interesting stories: one concerning how a couple of the big time Democratic candidates for President may skip some of the earlier, lesser debates; and an editorial from former Congressman Martin Frost asserting that greater interest (or even transparency) in government could be acheived by allowing more freedom for C-Span cameras to pan around the chamber and take in the real action in Congress, similar to how they film committee hearings. There's a ton to read at The Politico, and their staff is a pretty hot amalgam of political reporting experience.