Article credited to Texas Monthly: http://www.texasmonthly.com

MEANWHILE, IN TEXAS…

Real Talk

Former President George W. Bush delivered a harshly worded speech on Thursday. He condemned the divisive actions of President Donald Trump, though he stopped short of actually calling out the president by name. “We’ve seen our discourse degraded by casual cruelty,” Bush said during a sixteen-minute address at “The Spirit of Liberty” event in New York, sponsored by his presidential center. “Bullying and prejudice in our public life sets a national tone and provides permission for cruelty and bigotry. The only way to pass along civic values is to first live up to them.” Bush said our political system has been corrupted by “conspiracy theories and outright fabrication,” and cautioned against the U.S. turning inward under Trump. “We’ve seen nationalism distorted into nativism, forgotten the dynamism that immigration has always brought to America,” Bush said. “We see a fading confidence in the value of free markets and international trade, forgetting that conflict, instability and poverty follow in the wake of protectionism. We’ve seen the return of isolationist sentiments, forgetting that American security is directly threatened by the chaos and despair of distant places.” He took aim at white supremacy too. “Our identity as a nation—unlike many other nations—is not determined by geography or ethnicity, by soil or blood,” Bush said. “This means that people of every race, religion, and ethnicity can be fully and equally American. It means that bigotry or white supremacy in any form is blasphemy against the American creed.”

Article credited to Texas Monthly: http://www.texasmonthy.com

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Big Money

The U.S. House overwhelmingly passed a bill giving $36.5 billion in aid to areas affected by recent disasters like hurricanes and wildfires, after some concern earlier this week about whether Texas’s delegation would not vote to approve the measure because it didn’t earmark enough funding for the state’s Harvey recovery. According to the Texas Tribune, some Texas congressional members felt the Lone Star State was neglected in the bill in favor of hurricane-stricken Puerto Rico and California, which is dealing with deadly wildfires right now. The delegation sent a letter to congressional leadership last week requesting $18.7 billion in aid for Harvey alone. The exclusion of those specific funds caused some tension, and Governor Greg Abbott even called out the Texas delegation for not fighting hard enough to secure the money. But the bill did take two big steps for aid in Texas: It set aside $18.7 billion for FEMA’s main relief fund, and cancelled $16 billion in debt owed by the National Flood Insurance Program, from which thousands of Texans are expecting payouts after Harvey. Every Democrat in the House voted for the bill, which passed 353-69 and will head to the Senate next. Six Texas Republicans voted against it: U.S. Representatives Joe Barton of Ennis, Louie Gohmert of Tyler, Jeb Hensarling of Dallas, Kenny Marchant of Coppell, John Ratcliffe of Heath, and Roger Williams of Austin.

Article credited to Texas Monthly: http://www.texasmonthly.com

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Campus Shooting

More details have emerged after a campus police officer was fatally shot at Texas Tech on Monday night. According to the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, the officer has been identified as Floyd East Jr. Police said on Tuesdayafternoon that they were initially contacted because the suspect, nineteen-year-old freshman Hollis Alvin Daniels III, may have had a weapon. East took Daniels into custody for possession of a controlled substance following a student welfare check, and was shot in the head while he was completing the booking paperwork for the arrest. Daniels wasn’t handcuffed. “A .45-caliber RP shell casing was located near Officer East,” the report says. “[The secondary officer on scene] also advised Officer East’s police body camera was missing and Officer East’s pistol was in his holster.” Daniels apparently comes from a well-known family in his native Seguin. His father is a former city councilman and his mother is a travel writer, and they own the Palace Theatre in downtown Seguin, according to the San Antonio Express-News.

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Flesh-eating Bacteria

The Harris County Medical Office confirmed that a woman who fell ill after exposure to Harvey floodwater has died from flesh-eating bacteria, according to the Houston Chronicle. Nancy Reed, a 77-year-old Kingwood resident, died on September 15 of flood-related necrotizing fasciitis, which the Chronicle describes as “an infection that spreads quickly through muscle tissue and can cause organ failure.” “It’s tragic,” Dr. David Persse, director of the city’s emergency medical services, told the Chronicle. “This is one of the things we’d been worrying about once the flooding began, that something like this might occur. My heart goes out to the family.” Although Reed suffered the second confirmed case of the bacterial skin infection related to Harvey, she was the first fatality.

Hacks

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security notified Texas and 20 other states that they were targeted by hackers before the 2016 election, according to the San Antonio Express-News. As the paper points out, though, the hackers “who tried to mess with Texas didn’t get very far.” The Texas Secretary of State’s office told the Express-News on Monday that the hackers were attempting to break into the Secretary of State’s public site, which does not host any information on voters. Not that it matters—the hackers didn’t make it in. “If anyone was trying to get into the elections system, they were apparently targeting the wrong website,” agency spokesman Sam Taylor told the Express-News. This was the first time that Texas received official notification that it was a target of hacks in the lead up to the 2016 election.

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Rainy Day

Governor Greg Abbott announced at a press conference on Tuesday that the state won’t tap into the Rainy Day Fund to help with Hurricane Harvey recovery efforts until the next legislative session—if it uses any of the $10 billion at all. Abbott’s announcement comes just after Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner wrote to the governor asking him to tap into the state’s fund so the city could avoid a year-long hike on property taxes, the Texas Tribune reports. At the press conference on Tuesday, Abbott said that Turner has “all the money he needs” in Tax Increment Reinvestment Zones, and that all he has to do is “tap into it.” Abbott also pointed out that the state has already given $100 million to Houston to help clean up debris and created a “accelerated reimbursement program,” for which Abbott would sign off on any invoices submitted to him in the next ten days. “In times like these, it’s important to have fiscal responsibility as opposed to financial panic,” Abbott said, according to the Tribune. Abbott added later that “the mayor seems to be using [Harvey recovery] as hostage to raise taxes.”

Sanctuary Complaints

One day after a panel of three federal appeals judges allowed parts of Texas’ sanctuary city ban to go into effect, Attorney General Ken Paxton announced that he would begin fielding complaints against local law enforcement agencies violating Senate Bill 4, according to the Houston Chronicle. Now, citizens who suspect that officials are in violation of the so-called sanctuary cities bill can file with Paxton’s office, which the AG can then use to “seek the removal of an elected official, create civil penalties for the jurisdiction or seek court orders compelling them to follow the law,” according to the Austin American-Statesman. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals said on Monday that local agencies must honor detention requests for people who are suspected to be in the U.S. illegally. “The 5th Circuit quickly confirmed what my office and I long maintained: Senate Bill 4 is a common sense measure that prevents governments in Texas from standing in the way of federal enforcement of immigration law,” Paxton said in a written statement. “By enforcing the key provisions of SB 4, we will prevent dangerous criminals from being released back into our Texas communities.”

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Political Play

The Cowboys beat the Arizona Cardinals Monday night, but the entire game seemed secondary to actions on the sidelines before anyone took the field. After President Trump spent the weekend tweeting his opinions about NFL protests, all eyes went to America’s team—which, going into Monday’s game, was one of only six left in the league that did not include any players who had publicly demonstrated on the field. Reports began to surface before the game about unnamed players who planned to take a knee during the anthem protest, which Cowboys owner Jerry Jones previously spoke out against. But Jones, along with his entire roster, took a knee before the anthem, then collectively rose and stood with interlocked arms as “The Star-Spangled Banner” played. Trump, who tweeted over the weekend that “standing with locked arms is good, kneeling is not acceptable,” seemed to both condemn and praise the Cowboys in two consecutive tweets Monday morning (see above). It’s still unclear if Robert Jeffress, First Baptist Dallas pastor and member of Trump’s evangelical advisory group, has in any way softened his stance after his home team took a knee. Jeffress went on Fox & Friends earlier on Monday to say that players should be “thanking God” that they don’t have to worry about being “shot in the head for taking the knee like they would be in North Korea.”

Harvey Help

As officials squabbled at a Houston City Council meeting on Monday over who should pay for the city’s Hurricane Harvey recovery, Mayor Sylvester Turner turned to the Texas Tribune to offer clarity on his take. Turner has been criticized for proposing a year-long property tax hike to help pay for recovery efforts, but he said that if Governor Greg Abbott had decided to tap Texas’s $10 billion Rainy Day Fund, he wouldn’t be in this situation. “If he told me he was going to tap it, I wouldn’t propose [the property tax hike],” Turner said in an interview with the Texas Tribune. For his part, Abbott has previously said that the state will likely utilize the resource, but has offered no clarification on when or how much aid the state would offer. In a public hearing on Monday, city and state officials butted heads over the proposal, with Senator Paul Bettencourt standing up for residents who he says are already facing significant financial woes. “I don’t think we should be kicking Houstonians while they’re down,” Bettencourt said at the hearing, drawing applause. Houston’s city council will vote on the temporary tax increase next month, which would bring in an additional $50 million and cost the average Houston homeowner $48.

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Arm in Arm

As NFL players around the league knelt during the national anthem on Sunday, the Houston Texans decided to stand and lock their arms during the pre-game national anthem at their road matchup against the New England Patriots, according to the Houston Chronicle. None of the Texans players took a knee, but the show of solidarity followed divisive comments from President Donald Trump late last week. At a speech in Alabama on Friday, Trump referred to any player who protests by kneeling for the anthem as a “son of a bitch,” and encouraged people to walk out of games if they see a player kneeling during the anthem. Before Sunday’s game, Texans owner Bob McNair released a statement criticizing the president for his comments. “The NFL specifically, and football in general, has always unified our communities and families,” McNair said in the statement, per the Chronicle. “The comments made by the President were divisive and counterproductive to what our country needs right now. I hope the reaction from our players results in positive action for our league, our communities and our country as a whole to make a positive difference in our society.” McNair is a Republican and had previously donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural committee. The Dallas Cowboys play Mondaynight, though it seems unlikely they’ll kneel, given the franchise’s general opposition to such protests.

Raucous Rally

Fighting broke out and arrests were made at the Capitol after a rally against Confederate monuments turned a little rowdy on Saturday. Protesters initially planned to counter the Dixie Freedom rally, which was called to celebrate Confederate heritage. That event was canceled, so the counter-protest evolved into a cry against white supremacy, with protestors also demanding the removal of Confederate monuments at the Capitol, according to the San Antonio Express-News. The protest was peaceful until the end, when a bystander grabbed a bullhorn from one of the protesters and used it to thank the police, who had made a barrier with their bicycles to keep protestors out of the street. Protesters tried to take back the bullhorn and a scuffle broke out, resulting in two arrests. One of the arrests left a protester bloodied and in handcuffs, which prompted some more altercations between protesters and police. One officer discharged his stun gun, though no one was hit. After everything calmed down, protesters told the Express-News that they felt police escalated the situation, while police maintained that their presence at the protest was to protect the protesters’ First Amendment rights.

Long Horns

Cowboy Tuff Chex was sold at an auction Friday night at the Fort Worth Stockyards, netting his previous owners $165,000, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Tuff Chex is a longhorn bull, but not just any bull. He boasts the world’s longest horns for a bull, measuring about 101 inches from tip to tip. “We’re going to bubble-wrap him when we get to the ranch,” Jeanne Filip—who purchased Tuff Chex along with her husband, Richard—told the Telegram. “Our guys will know: You do not make Tuff do anything he doesn’t want to do. He’s the VIP of the ranch.” Heading into the auction, the longhorn’s previous owner, Bob Loomis, estimated that the six-year-old longhorn from Oklahoma could have been sold for as much as $500,000, so apparently $165,000 is a steal. The Filips, who have over 100 longhorns on their ranch in Fayetteville, told the Telegram they were prepared to drop $1 million on Tuff Chex.

MEANWHILE, IN TEXAS…

Diamond Rating

Ahead of next week’s scheduled ground-breaking, the Texas Rangers unveiled the latest renderings of the new Globe Life Park on Thursday, according to the Dallas Morning News. It looks pretty spectacular, a true mansion of Major League ballparks. The renderings depict a 41,000-seat behemoth complete with grand arched columns, clear views of the field from every part of the concourse, and—perhaps most importantly for a ballpark in Texas’s hot summer climate—a retractable roof. Notably, the roof actually slopes downward at certain points in a way that makes it appear somewhat understated to fans as they arrive at the ballpark. “Everybody still talks about Camden Yards, which was finished in 1992,” lead architect Bryan Trubey says, according to the Dallas Morning News (Camden Yards is the Baltimore Orioles’ ballpark). “With the exception of Globe Life Park, all the ballparks built since then have been more similar than they are different, and we think it’s time for another transformation.” All told, the stadium will take up 1.7 million-square feet and thirteen acres, at a cost of $1.1 billion. It’s set to open in time for the 2020 season.

Record Rain

The city of Liberty is laying claim to the unofficial rainfall record during Harvey, according to the Houston Chronicle. Although Houston received an astonishing 51 inches of rain during Hurricane Harvey, setting the previous Harvey record, the new hour-by-hour rainfall data collected by the National Weather Service shows a gauge in Liberty that recorded 55 inches of rain during the storm. According to the Chronicle, that measurement passes the previous record of 52 inches of rain from a tropical storm recorded in Hawaii in 1950. As the Chronicle notes, the record could be broken again as meteorologists continue to analyze rainfall data from Harvey. “The flooding Harvey caused from the rainfall was a historic event,” Scott Overpeck, an NWS meteorologist, tells the Chronicle. “For that reason alone, we need to make sure we get the rainfall amounts correct and understand how much rain actually fell.”

RIP Oreo

The first dog of Texas has died, according to the Dallas Morning News. Governor Greg Abbott announced the death of Oreo, his thirteen-year-old border collie, in a tweet on Thursday. “Sad news at the Governor’s Mansion today. Our border collie @OreoAbbott passed away after 13 wonderful years,” Abbott writes in the tweet. Despite Oreo’s absence, the governor’s mansion will still be roamed by Pancake, the Abbott’s golden retriever that they added to the family in 2015. Abbott would sometimes share updates on his two dogs on his Twitter account. According to the Morning News, Oreo and Pancake were pictured hugging on National Pet Day.