The Midday Brief: Dec. 9, 2010

Your afternoon reading:

• "In a move that could effectively run out the clock on the DREAM Act, the Senate voted on Thursday to table its version of the bill." — DREAM Act Delayed In Senate, The Huffington Post

• "The wind industry says it's mobilized to lobby Congress to extend a key subsidy that kept the business going during the recession. Despite having White House support, the program was left out of an agreement announced this week that would extend the Bush tax cuts, unemployment insurance, and a host of other incentives." — Wind industry says 3,000 Texas jobs could be lost if key subsidy isn't renewed, The Dallas Morning News

• "Election Day was more than a month ago, but the campaign fundraising around here has only accelerated in the weeks since. At least 89 of the 181 Democrats and Republicans who will serve in next year's legislative session have held fundraisers in Austin since the Nov. 2 election." — The election is over, but not the fundraising, Austin American-Statesman

• "U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio, today was appointed to be the chairman the House Judiciary Committee. He’ll take over when the Republican-led Congress convenes next year." — Lamar Smith to head House Judiciary Committee, Postcards

• "George Mason University continues to scrutinize charges of plagiarism against a 2006 congressional panel commissioned by U.S. Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), then-chair of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, that questioned scientific evidence of climate change." — Allegations of plagiarism, bias, misinformation surround Barton climate report, The Texas Independent

New in The Texas Tribune:

• It's Texas Medicaid's time in the limelight: Federal health care reform calls for expanding it, some Republicans are angling to bag it altogether and lawmakers are gearing up for a tense debate over broadening the reach of cost-cutting managed care plans. Often lost in these conversations are the people Medicaid served and the money Texas pays to cover them. Our interactive allows you to visualize the 3 million Texans covered and the roughly $6 billion that the state spends.