The 2010 elections will be remembered for Republican victories and Democratic defeats, but as Ben Philpott of KUT News and the Tribune reports, it was a notable year for two other political parties on the ballot.
Libertarians and Greens Win, Sort Of
Posted in
State Government
What 99 Means
When a party wins everything, as the GOP has in Texas this year, it gets almost everything its way. It also has everything to lose.
Posted in
Demographics
MALC’s Makeover
The addition of five Hispanic Republicans to the Texas House means the Mexican American Legislative Caucus will now include at least a few dissenting voices on issues like immigration. “It does Latinos a huge disservice to say we all think alike,” says state Rep.-elect Larry Gonzales, R-Round Rock.
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T-Squared
T-Squared: Newsweek’s Mark Miller Joins Trib Staff as Editor
Mark Miller — most recently the editorial director of Newsweek and the editor of Newsweek Digital, and previously an assistant managing editor for Sunday and enterprise reporting at the Dallas Morning News — has agreed to join the Trib’s staff in mid-December in the newly created position of editor.
Posted inState Government
Didn’t See THAT Coming
In retrospect, everything on our Hot List should have been Red. In the Texas House, all seven Republicans on that list survived, and easily, along with two of the Democrats. The two congressmen got booted, along with the 19 other Democrats on that roster. Three Democrats who weren’t on our list went down on Tuesday, including David McQuade Leibowitz of San Antonio, and every officeholder named Solomon Ortiz (that’s a father and son, in the U.S. and Texas Houses, respectively, if you just came in).
Posted in
Energy
Bullish on Batteries
The impoverished border town of Presidio is home to the largest battery system in the country: a $25 million contraption that’s the size of a big house. That’s not as weird as it seems. Partly because of an affinity for wind energy, the state has a number of experiments going in “energy storage” — often referred to as the “holy grail” of energy technology, because it can modernize the grid by more efficiently matching people’s demand for power with the generation of electricity.
Posted in
Health care
No More Medicaid?
Some Republican lawmakers are proposing an unprecedented solution to the state’s massive budget shortfall: opting out of the federal Medicaid program. But experts say the rhetoric may be more of a middle finger to Washington than sound public policy.
Posted in
Politics
TribWeek: In Case You Missed It
Our wall-to-wall Election Day coverage — complete results up and down the ballot and county by county, the all-hands-on-deck Trib team on the Republican tsunami, my conversation with George W. Bush’s media adviser and Rick Perry’s pollster about what happened on Tuesday, Stiles and Ramsey on what 194 candidates spent per vote this election cycle, Hu on how the GOP rout will affect the substance of the next legislative session, Hamilton on the Texas Democratic Trust’s unhappy end, Ramshaw and Stiles profile the new arrivals at the Capitol in January, M. Smith on what’s next for Chet Edwards and Ramsey and me on six matters of politics and policy we’re thinking about going forward — plus Thevenot and Butrymowicz on a possible solution to the high school dropout problem: The best of our best from Nov. 1 to 5, 2010.
Posted in
State Government
TribBlog: Straus on the Offensive
House Speaker Joe Straus is moving quickly to squelch any talk of a speaker’s race. His office released two letters this afternoon — one from conservative leaders expressing support for him, and another that emphasizes his strengths as House leader.
Posted inState Government
The Midday Brief: Nov. 5, 2010
Your afternoon reading: John Cornyn seeks help for Joe Miller in Alaska, and the Texas press looks back on Election Day
