The Midday Brief: May 3, 2011

Your afternoon reading:

• "A public fight over a bill that would allow the state to take more power over the Alamo erupted in the Texas Senate this afternoon, as two San Antonio senators verbally sparred over who should run the revered shrine." — Battle erupts over Alamo bill, Postcards

• "Now that bin Laden has been killed by U.S. forces on a mission first assigned by President George W. Bush, aided by evidence gained from the controversial “enhanced interrogation techniques” authorized by the former president, Bush’s frustrating 'mission impossible' has, in the dead of night, turned into 'mission accomplished.'" — Analysis: Bin Laden’s death could prompt re-evaluation of Bush anti-terrorism record, Texas on the Potomac

• "Pat Robertson’s American Center for Law and Justice recently provided legal defense for a public bus driver who was fired for refusing to take a woman to a Planned Parenthood clinic in Texas back in January 2010. According to the lawsuit, he was 'concerned that he might be transporting a client to undergo an abortion.'" — Pat Robertson’s law firm defends Texas bus driver who would not take woman to Planned Parenthood, The Texas Independent

• "Since he was the only state lawmaker I know of to hold a press conference on Osama bin Laden's death, the link between the news and his history with the Agency was hardly subtle. But it sure was interesting." — David Dewhurst: The Lite Guv Who Spooked Us, The Texas Observer

• "The remaining five GOP possibilities — Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, Governor Rick Perry of Texas, former Louisiana Governor Buddy Roemer, Michigan Congressman Thaddeus McCotter and ex-New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson — all have more primary voters who would definitely vote against them than for them. But a substantial number of voters don’t know enough about any of these candidates to know for sure whether they’d vote for them or not." — Christie Leads, Trump Loses When GOP Voters Asked Who They’d Definitely Vote For or Against, Rasmussen Reports

New in The Texas Tribune:

• "GOP lawmakers' battle against Planned Parenthood resumed today, as lawmakers on a Senate subcommittee passed out a bill that would renew the state's Women's Health Program, but prohibit the country's most prominent family planning organization from participating." — Planned Parenthood Again in Lawmakers' Crosshairs

• "An increasingly bitter disagreement over the future of the University of Texas at Austin between University of Texas System regents' chairman Gene Powell and state Sen. Judith Zaffirini is ratcheting up the ongoing debate surrounding higher education in Texas." — Zaffirini and Powell Escalate Higher Ed Debate

• "Less than a month before his scheduled execution, Cary Kerr had no attorney. And the ones he had had up to that point, he argues, didn’t do him much good. Now, he’s asking the U.S. Supreme Court to stop his execution — scheduled for tonight — and allow him another opportunity to argue for his life." — Execution Challenge Is First for New Texas Appeals Office