The Midday Brief: Top Texas Headlines for Feb. 11, 2011

Your afternoon reading:

• "Texas Sen. John Cornyn, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, is running for the No. 2 position in the GOP Conference, an aide told POLITICO Friday." — John Cornyn jumps into heated GOP whip race, Politico

• "In a long-anticipated move, Sen. John Cornyn, R-San Antonio, is seeking the second-ranking post in the Senate Republican leadership to serve as heir apparent to veteran Senate leader Mitch McConnell, a 68-year-old Republican who faced tougher-than-expected re-election back home in Kentucky." — Sen. John Cornyn seeks to follow LBJ's path to Senate leadership, Texas on the Potomac

• "Texas Gov. Rick Perry, in Washington to address a major conservative gathering, unloaded Friday morning on Texas Democrats for blocking access to $830 million in education funds." — Perry takes Texas Democrats, federal government to task during D.C. trip, The Dallas Morning News

• "Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is scheduled to meet this morning with Fort Worth Rep. Kay Granger. Since Granger controls the purse strings for the State Department and foreign aid, as chair of the relevant Appropriations subcommittee, it's an important audience, for Clinton. Congress is poised to set a budget for the rest of the fiscal year — some unfinished business from 2010." — Rep. Kay Granger and Hillary Clinton set to talk foreign aid, Trail Blazers

New in The Texas Tribune:

• "If you’re going to make a bunch of people mad, you should make sure you’re getting something for it. The proposed budget cuts Gov. Rick Perry laid out in his State of the State speech — defunding the states arts and historical commissions, for example — are more symbolic than lucrative and trivialize the cuts that are being made elsewhere in state services and programs." — The Governor's Symbolic Cuts and His Real Ones

U.S. Rep. Ron Paul will speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference at 2:30 p.m. Gov. Rick Perry's on at 3:30 p.m. We'll live-stream them both on our home page.