My Predecessor
My predecessor got a lot of mentions last night by President Joe Biden. It was a great speech. He came out swinging and never stopped. He scored major points. In baseball parlance, it was like hitting two grand slams and stealing home in a single game. Nice job, Mr. President.
The featured photo is Cong. Lizzie Fletcher with the President after the speech.
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I watched the City of H-Town Police Chief live on the flat screen yesterday addressing a couple of hundred thousand suspended criminal cases. He didn’t come across with a confident look. I don’t know about that.
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Jasper Scherer of the Chron has a piece on the aftermath of Tuesday’s GOP primary legislative races and here is how the article ends:
In another blow to House leadership, state Rep. Jacey Jetton, a Richmond Republican who supported vouchers but drew backlash over his vote for impeachment, was defeated in a surprise landslide by Matt Morgan, an insurance adjuster whom (AG Ken) Paxton endorsed.
Morgan left little doubt about his attitude toward the House’s status quo.
“Together, we have successfully taken out another lap dog for the Austin Establishment and Liberal Speaker Dade Phelan. But our work is far from over,” Morgan said in a statement Tuesday evening. “As your conservative leader in Austin, I will uphold my principles, fight for our values, and work tirelessly to fix the broken system in our state capital.
Luke Macias, a longtime GOP consultant for right-wing primary challengers, said Jetton’s defeat was especially notable because he is “a darling of the Austin establishment,” which spent heavily in an unsuccessful bid to fend off Morgan.
Phelan’s failure to clear 50% in his district, and his inability to protect allies like Jetton, signals the end of his speakership even if he returns to the House next year, argued Michael Quinn Sullivan, publisher of the far-right conservative publication Texas Scorecard and one of the speaker’s leading critics.
“Under all the gentlemen’s agreements that have existed for half of a century or longer, you can’t be the speaker of the Texas House if you’ve been forced into a runoff in your home district,” Sullivan said on a Scorecard livestream Tuesday evening. “You’re not safe. You can’t protect yourself, let alone any other member of the Texas House, and that’s the bargain incumbent lawmakers make.”
Here is the entire Jasper read: Texas House poised for rightward shift after record GOP primary upsets (houstonchronicle.com).
I guess we have a race for Speaker.
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Have a safe Oscars weekend and root for your favorite flicks.
