The Midday Brief: July 22, 2011

Your afternoon reading:

• "Will Kay Bailey Hutchison endorse fellow Texas Republican Rick Perry for the GOP nomination for president? Don't count on it. … 'I'm looking for the candidate who has real business experience. I'm looking for Gov. Perry's views on federal issues. I don't know what they are.'" — Kay Bailey Hutchison endorse Rick Perry? Not likely., Trail Blazers

• "Republican National Committee member Steve Scheffler says he'll be 'lobbying hard' to include Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin on the Iowa Republican straw poll ballot." — Expanded straw poll ballot is pushed, Des Moines Register

• "Tarrant County Democratic lawmakers Wendy Davis and Marc Veasey have teamed up with several minority voters in North Texas in seeking to intervene in the state's efforts to get pre-clearance for a legislative redistricting plan that the Democrats say is an affront to minorities." — Davis, Veasey intervene in federal redistricting fight, PoliTex

• "Republican fundraiser Fred Malek, a prominent figure in the American Action Network and the Republican Governors Association, pens a POLITICO op-ed voicing discomfort with Michele Bachmann and offering some kind words for the current RGA chairman." — Fred Malek gives thumbs down to Michele Bachmann, plugs Rick Perry, Politico

New in The Texas Tribune:

• "After battle appeared to be brewing between the state education board's left and right factions on contested language on evolution in one publisher's biology lessons, members found a compromise: let the education commissioner decide." — SBOE Gives OK to Science Supplements
  

• "Comptroller Susan Combs isn't a 2014 candidate yet, but she wants you to know that some of the Republican Party's money people are on board and that she's got a pile of cash in her campaign treasury." — Combs, Not Yet a Candidate, Flashes Cash

• "As the new chairman of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, Nizam Peerwani will oversee the controversial probe of the arson science that led to the conviction and 2004 execution of Cameron Todd Willingham." — A New Chairman of Forensic Science Panel Takes on Willingham Case