Paul Burka has quite the evocative post up over at his Texas Monthly blog. The post takes the form of a friendly letter to Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) raising the merits of a Specter-esque party switch in her potential quest for the Governor's Mansion in 2010.

Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania has announced that he is switching parties and will run as a Democrat in the 2010 Democratic primary. Once Senator elect Al Franken (D-Minnesota) is seated, this will give the Senate Democrats a 60 seat majority.

Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas), chairman of the NRSC, last week:

A couple of weeks ago in the run-up to the Tea Parties, we discussed the difference between what Governor Rick Perry says about the Federal government versus what he asks of the Federal government. It turns out that in addition to asking for FEMA's help with wildfires, asking for American soldiers to be sent to the Mexican border and asking for an extension of Federal aid for Hurricane Ike-related cleanup, Governor Perry found another non-intrusive, non-oppressive and non-interfering way for the Federal government to help Texans today.

The Texas House of Representatives passed a bill earlier today that moves the ball forward for state support for elevating more Texas universities to Tier 1 status. The vote earlier today was 137 yeas to 0 nays.

Research 2000 for Daily Kos, April 20-April 22, 2009
Margin of Error +/- 4%

According to the Texas Freedom Network's live blogging of the confirmation hearing for Dr. Don McLeroy, chairman of the Texas State Board of Education, Dr. McElroy seems to think that the teaching of evolution is destroying America's soul in science. Dr. McLeroy, a dentist from Bryan, Texas, didn't elaborate on how our country's soul is being destroyed by teaching accepted, consensus science.

Last week we discussed a bill that is in committee in the Texas House that addresses the odd-sounding issue of "litigious grandparents".

Apparently Governor Perry's warm up act of cynically embracing the 10th Amendment was just the beginning of his contrived pandering. Yesterday at the Austin Tea Party, the Governor brought his A-game and took the nuttiness to a whole new level. From the Huffington Post:

In what I can only guess was a warm up act to his hitting the Tea Party social circuit later today, Governor Rick Perry tilted at the biggest windmill of his political career yesterday. Salon's War Room quotes Governor Perry:

The 10th Amendment was enacted by folks who remembered what it was like to have a very oppressive government, to be under the thumb of tyrants in an all-powerful government. Unfortunately, the protections it guarantees have melted away over the course of the years... I believe the federal government has become oppressive. I believe it's become oppressive in its size, its intrusion into the lives of its citizens, and its interference with the affairs of our state.

Last week, State Representative Phil King (R-Waco) filed an ominously-titled bill called the Texas Parental Rights Restoration Act (HB 2084) in the House Human Services Committee. The casual observer might infer that all manner of calamity is happening to Texas parents by the title of this bill. Are the liberals making parents schedule multicultural playdates? If so, I didn't get the memo.