The Evening Brief: April 6, 2012

Culled:

• Santorum, Perry privately met in Texas (CNN): "Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum met with former opponent Rick Perry earlier this week, CNN confirmed Friday. 'We viewed it was a courtesy visit,' Perry's spokesman Ray Sullivan said, without discussing specifics of the conversation."

• Bernard Rapoport, 1917 - 2012: A Life Examined (The Texas Observer): "Bernard Rapoport’s politics were grounded in his conviction that the role of government was to improve the lives of its citizens. The growing accumulation of wealth in the highest tax brackets gnawed at him. He considered it not only unjust but a threat to capitalism. B told his marbles story so frequently and widely—as a child he would go in the tank just as he was about to win all his opponents’ marbles, so the game could continue—no one was surprised that the party favors at his 90th birthday party at Jay Rockefeller’s Washington mansion were bags of marbles and airline-cabin-service bottles of Canadian Club."

• The politics of making Texas winner-take-all: Obama would like it, the GOP establishment would not (The Dallas Morning News): "As for the Justice Department, getting approval shouldn't be hard — not politically. The Obama campaign is happy to see the long-running Republican primary run a little longer. And a big payday for Rick Santorum in Texas, where the former Pennsylvania Senator leads in the polls and is favored by many conservative evangelicals, would be just the thing to revive his foundering campaign — and damage likely eventual nominee Mitt Romney. So, politically, a Justice Department okay would be likely."

New in The Texas Tribune:

• Bernard Rapoport, 1917-2012: "Bernard Rapoport, an outspoken liberal and a stalwart of Texas Democratic politics, died late last night in Waco. He was 94."

• On the Records: Legal Spending on Redistricting: "Redistricting has cost Texas taxpayers nearly $1.5 million in legal expenses so far — a total that could rise as more invoices are filed. Use the interactive below to compare spending and the number of hours billed for legal work."

• More Changes May Be Ahead for TEXAS Grants: "Officials gathered at a Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board forum to begin a conversation about tweaking the state's primary need-based financial aid program for college students."