September 22, 2017 1:23 PM Smith: North to the Future, It All Comes Down to AlaskaQR’s Liberal Columnist Glenn W. Smith travels among the carnies otherwise known as leaders of today’s Republican Party In a better
world, Donald Trump and Kim Jong-Un are not actually leaders of
nuclear-armed nations but are instead just marginal pro wrestling personalities
posing as bitter foes in a World Wrestling Entertainment undercard. Does fake
wrestling have undercards? No matter. The above
is not the real world, of course. It’s just a harmless fantasy designed to
relieve a bit of the stress caused by the Odd-Haired
Couple’s nuclear game of the Dozens,
a name for a street game involving an escalating “pattern of interactive
name-calling” (thank you, Wikipedia).
By Glenn W. Smith The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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September 15, 2017 12:45 PM Smith: Is Politics Today A Content-free Shirts & Skins Sandlot Football Game?QR’s Liberal Columnist Glenn W. Smith wonders whether tribal loyalty has replaced individual responsibility and engagement in today’s politics I’ve
been critical of complaints about so-called “polarization” in American
politics. It can look like an easy out that allows pundits to pretend
“neutrality” using false equivalencies. Against
this, I’ve suggested we consider two people in a room. One of them goes crazy.
The other doesn’t. We don’t say the room is polarized, do we? Where’s Donald Trump’s opposite pole? See what
I mean? But
some recent studies and events in the political sphere have me second-guessing
my skepticism. By Glenn W. Smith The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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September 8, 2017 2:42 PM Smith: Catch a Falling Lone StarQR’s Liberal Columnist Glenn W. Smith sees rays of hope in the government response to Hurricane Harvey Paul Vance, the guy who wrote the
lyrics, “Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, save it for a rainy
day,” has been living in South Florida. As Hurricane Irma approaches, here’s
hoping Mr. Vance took the advice of Perry
Como’s 1957 hit song. “When your troubles start multiplying,” the
song says, your pocketful of starlight will help you overcome them. The
good news is the state of Texas has in its pocket a lot of starlight in its Rainy Day Fund, $10.3 billion to be exact.
And, in the wake of Hurricane Harvey, our troubles are multiplying. The
not-so-good news is that in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, some are
reluctant to use it for the recovery. By Glenn W. Smith The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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September 1, 2017 2:56 PM Smith: After the Flood QR’s Liberal Columnist Glenn W. Smith on pre-flood and post-flood Texas Before
engaging in a bit of dryland analysis of where Texas was before Hurricane
Harvey and where it might be post-flood (it’s not over), the major part
of our attention should remain on recovery efforts. Hundreds
of thousands of Texans face uncertain futures. We
would also benefit by spending more time contemplating the heroism we
witnessed, the automatic, empathy-fueled solidarity that had everyone who could
help others risking their own safety to help others. By Glenn W. Smith The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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August 24, 2017 4:19 PM Pauken: Abbott’s blame game avoids responsibility for property taxes and school finance Former RPT Chair says the GOP will likely never again have the large majorities in the House and the Senate they have now… too bad that they squandered the opportunity to address key issues Governor
Greg Abbott has lashed out at
Speaker Joe Straus for the failure
of the Republican majority to provide property tax relief and address school
finance reform in the recently completed special session of the Texas
legislature. Yet,
almost simultaneously, the Governor quickly announced that there would be no
second special session to finish the job. One would think the Governor would
have enough votes in both houses to at least get some kind of
limited property tax relief passed if he were truly committed to
it. At
the end of the first special session, the Senate and the House were not that far
apart in their respective positions on providing taxpayer protection to prevent
local governments from raising property taxes excessively without voter
approval. Surely, a sensible compromise could have been crafted at Governor
Abbott’s urging on that piece of legislation. Apparently,
the Governor likes to have it both ways. By Tom Pauken The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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August 11, 2017 12:46 PM Smith: Democracy and TreesQR’s Liberal Columnist Glenn W. Smith argues that for Texas’ GOP leaders, trees are like democratic rights. If they are in the way of their power, cut them down. Maybe
it’s time to remind Texas legislators of the fate of Easter Islanders. Some
say their world collapsed because they blindly destroyed all the trees. A new
theory has it that rats stowed away in immigrants’ canoes, multiplied rapidly
in a land without predators, and ate all the trees. Either
way points to a rather significant leadership deficit. These
islanders were smart enough to engineer and leave behind giant carved heads,
heads more swollen even than Texas’ current right-wing leadership. But they couldn’t see the trees for the
forest. Or
something. By Glenn W. Smith The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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August 9, 2017 2:44 PM Greenfield: The revenue picture in the dog days of summer Our resident number cruncher says there should be around $600 million in the ending certification balance for August 31, more than sufficient to address both health insurance for retired teachers and support for disabled children While
Comptroller Glenn Hegar
did announce the improvement in state revenue for July 2017, there was no
public comment on how this related to the revenue that is available to the Texas
Legislature. Lawmakers
in the special session have considered some issues, e.g., health insurance for
retired teachers, a pay raise for active teachers, and most importantly,
support for disabled children, that requires funding. While
Article
III, Section 49a doesn’t say “It shall be the duty of Stuart Greenfield to provide under oath
to provide the Legislature a report on the fiscal condition of the state,”
nowhere in the Constitution does it prohibit me from offering my view of the
state’s fiscal condition. By Dr. Stuart Greenfield The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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August 4, 2017 3:59 PM Smith: Whatever Happened to Deliberative Democracy?QR’s Liberal Columnist Glenn W. Smith argues that democracy withers while our ideologies dominate our identities Back
in the 1990s, it seemed like a noble cause. “Deliberative Democracy” it was
called, and it just might save us, argued its champions, folks like Robert Luskin at the University
of Texas and Stanford’s James Fishkin.
Over
time, of course, Americans have shown little inclination to actually
deliberate. Berate or eviscerate, maybe. But deliberate? That’s like something the Trump White House’s Stephen Miller would attack as
“cosmopolitan,” a word often used by 20th Century tyrants to scapegoat targeted
others. By Glenn W. Smith The rest of the story, subscribers only |
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Copyright September 22, 2017, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved 