TX-21

A week or so ago, the editors of Scientific American did something I never saw them do before-- they took a partisan political stand. They didn't mention any names, but it's clear they had two rotten characters in mind, Donald J. Trump and one of his top enablers in Texas, House Science Committee chairman Lamar Smith. Smith's district is not some backward hellhole like Louie's Gohmert's district.

Lamar Smith and Roger Williams-- this is not Austin, TexasIn 2003, Tom DeLay did Travis County in. It was part of a masterplan that brought Texas from a state with 17 Democrats and 15 Republicans in Congress to one with 21 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

For nearly a decade now, the Republican Party in the House thought it would be funny to appoint anti-Science neanderthals to the House Science Committee.

Indiana's somewhat senile retiring lobbyist-turned-senator, Dan Coates, called Ted Cruz "a wrecking ball" yesterday and added gratuitously that "he's the most self-centered, narcissistic, pathological liar I’ve ever seen." He went on to accuse Cruz of trying to hurt the Republican Party.

I readily admit that I don't know what transpired when then-Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy decided who to put on the House Science and Technology Committee.

President Obama started asking congressional Republicans for emergency Zika funding in March. BY May they hadn't done a damn thing. We wrote at the time that instead of cooperation, what the House Republican leaders had given Obama instead of cooperation was more deranged right-wing intransigence and more of their crazy, dangerous anomie.

With all this talk about an anti-Trump tsunami sweeping Ryan and his GOP House majority out of power, there are some hopeful signs, even if the DCCC doesn't have enough plausible candidates running to achieve that. One district the DCCC is studiously ignoring is TX-21-- the Austin/San Antonio corridor-- where derabged Trump enthusiast Lamar Smith managed to get a "free pass" from an increasingly out-of-touch Nancy Pelosi.

Barbara Lee says no wars without congressional approval; Fred Upton disagreesLast week the House passed the 2017 Defense Appropriations bill. As part of the debate, Barbara Lee (D-CA) offered an amendment that would prohibit the use of funds for the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force, a blanket excuse any president-- Clinton or Trump-- could use to attack anyone, anywhere without seeking constitutionally-mandated congressional approval.

Unless...Right-wing extremists and anti-immigrant fanatics Paul Gosar (R-AZ) and Steve King (R-IA) offered two amendments Thursday to prevent undocumented immigrants from serving in the U.S. military. Gosar's amendment was defeated 210-211, 30 Republicans crossing the aisle to vote with every single Democrat.

A couple of weeks ago, we looked at the narrow path to victory Texas Berniecrat Tom Wakely has if he's going to win the TX-21 House seat currently occupied by science-denying House Science Committee chair Lamar Smith, a Trump supporter.