The Midday Brief: Top Texas Headlines for April 7, 2011

Your afternoon reading:

• "Texas baseball legend Nolan Ryan is pitching Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples as the next lieutenant governor. The Staples campaign announced today that Ryan will spearhead Staples' 2014 lt. governor exploratory committee." — Todd Staples looks at Lt. Governor bid, Trail Blazers

• "The House's chief champion of giving poor, elderly and disabled Texans discounts on their utility bills is so frustrated, he wants to kill a surcharge funding the program and use all unspent money as a one-time fix for gaping holes in the state's social services budget." — Turner says repeal fee on electric bills, use unspent funds on social programs, Trail Blazers

• "Hours before Senate budget-writers publicly discuss their search for non-tax revenue, the House Appropriations Committee is laying out bills to do the same." — Finding non-tax revenue, House-style, Texas Politics

New in The Texas Tribune:

• "A Texas lawmaker said the magic words Thursday morning to a panel of exhausted and nearly hopeless state budget writers: He has found a 'new revenue source without raising taxes.'" — Unexpectedly, a Lawmaker Finds Extra Money For Schools

• "The public version of drawing new congressional maps for Texas started this morning with committee hearings and the unveiling of a proposal from a coalition that insists at least two of the four new districts should have Latino majorities." — Two New Texas Latino Seats in Congress?

• "Brandon Darby has transformed himself from liberal social justice organizer to much-maligned FBI informant to now right-of-center conservative hero of sorts. Living on a farm outside of Austin, Darby still sees himself as a community organizer, but his disillusionment with the left-wing groups who shunned him propelled him into the arms of the right." — Radical, FBI Informant, Conservative Hero: The Lives of Brandon Darby