There was a rumor in December that Democratic gubernatorial candidate had given a big contribution to one of his opponents  — Hank Gilbert — in interesting proximity to Gilbert’s decision to get out of the primary and into another race.

Farouk’s folks, and Gilbert’s, denied it. Loudly.

And they weren’t telling the truth.

…

Shami donated $100,000 to Gilbert three days later — on the following Monday — according to Gilbert’s report with the Texas Ethics Commission. And the Houston hair care potentate gave Gilbert another $50,000 on New Year’s Eve, the last day of the year, and of the reporting period. That accounts for two-thirds of the $225,000 Gilbert raised during the last six months of 2009.

Vince Leibowitz, now Shami’s campaign chief, held a similar post with Gilbert at the time. And he was busy trying to knock down two stories in the first two weeks of December.

One was about the money. “It’s just bullshit,” he told me at the time.

He now says he didn’t know about the contributions until later. And in any case, he says, there was no connection between the contributions and Gilbert’s decision to get out of the race for governor. “I was not aware that he had [given that money] when we talked in December.”

So the story is about Ross’ perception of a lie which wasn’t real and about Vince moving to Farouk Shami’s campaign as director (Ross, just FYI, John Oeffinger was and is Hank’s campaign manager. Vince was communications director).

Instead, it could have been about the fact that Hank now has more on hand, regardless of it’s provenance, than he raised in all of 2006. Knowing the kind of tight, efficient campaign Hank has always had, the story could have been about the depth of doodoo that Ag Commissioner Todd Staples is in. If you really wanted to dive into the speculative deep end, you could have also wondered about exactly how much more Shami, or for that matter Bill White, might give Hank and how much he’ll raise from Republican, Democratic and Independent contributors.

I can promise you, Todd Staples is far more worried about those contributors and the support Hank has from Republicans all over this state.

Of course, given that it was Senator Hutchison, it was inevitable that she would decide to kick the can down the road and let your children and grandchildren deal with debt and obligations we’ll be piling up. After all, she’s been doing it for years in DC.

Just for kicks, here are some of the high points…

• No ban on infrastructure privatization. As it turns out, Hutchison loves the very CDA’s the Lege shut out during 2009.

“Public-private partnerships are an important part of a modern transportation system, and can often build roads faster and cheaper than the government could do it working alone,” Hutchison said in a new policy paper presented by her campaign, and unveiled at a series of public speeches throughout Texas today.

All this is, of course, a wholesale lie since private companies have to obtain the same permits and follow the same procedures as a state agency. Plus, since they are private, they can’t obtain financing at anywhere near as advantageous a rate as the State which has the power to tax. The only reason these roads get built faster is that they have all their financing up front, as opposed to a state project which usually uses tax dollars as they are appropriated. She went on to talk about protections for taxpayers, but the fact remains that even with these so-called safeguards, TXDOT will still cut deals that aren’t at all good for taxpayers. Think of it this way… CDA’s = TTC.

• Not so much with a gas tax increase. Even though everyone knows we need it. She says she’ll appoint a commission to study waste at TXDOT, but as we all know there’s just not enough there to make up the gap. Good work there, Senator. You somehow managed to dodge the issue and look completely uninformed on it all at the same time. Even Senator Carona said this was, essentially, too little, too late.
• Eminent Domain Reform. Sen. Hutchison is going to talk about this, but she can’t escape the fact that she endorsed Prop 11 which did basically nothing to strengthen the legal rights of property owners, which is one of the reasons Hank didn’t support it. An interesting side note, Todd Staples who will be Hank’s opponent in the general election, was one of the architects of abusive ED laws that really hurt landowners. Like Kay, he was a supporter of Prop 11. One has to wonder if he’ll now step out and say he wants more.

So that’s it in a nutshell. Oh, She also wants some rail but it was more an afterthought than a proposal and no real funding ideas were presented. We at The Scoop give it a great big FAIL for, frankly, being as worthless as our senior Senator.

But don’t worry, Kay! We’ll give a do-over if you’d like to take another swing!

Earlier today, the world woke to the news that Sustainable Power’s proprietary reactor/catalyst-based Green Energy Technology claims had been verified after independent testing by Texas A&M (Hank’s alma mater which, for you Aggies out there, is Latin for the university one attended*).

A team of scientists from Texas A&M have completed their multidisciplinary analysis confirming the company’s earlier claims. The Texas A&M report states, “SSTP demonstrated that the oil yields with pyrolysis are much higher than simple mechanical squeezing process of soy seeds.” With Sustainable Power’s proprietary process involving heating biomass in a reactor vessel with the presence of the Company’s proprietary catalyst, Texas A&M reported a yield of 54.4% oil in addition to 25.3% flammable gas and 20.3% biochar. The biochar could be used as a solid fuel or, unburned, it represents a stable, sequestered form of carbon that would qualify for greenhouse gas credits.

Among Texas A&M’s findings in the Confidential Report was that “Sustainable Power Corp…. invented a proprietary catalytic process which produces bio-fuels from what is essentially a heavy crude and light crude oil by a thermo-chemical pyrolysis… process as opposed to conventional pyrolysis… which typically occurs at… higher pressures.” The report added, “The tests conducted with blow torch indicated that oils produced with SSTP’s Licensed catalysts readily ignited while oils produced without the catalyst did not ignite easily.”

Previous independent analysis by AmSpec Services LLC of the oil produced by Sustainable Power’s process, called Vertroleum®, shows nearly identical yields to the Texas A&M report. In addition, AmSpec refined the oils into biogasoline, marine fuel and a replacement gasoline for E85 flex fuel. In witnessing the process AmSpec also determined that when using feed stocks of corn, soybeans, wheat, sunflower and other raw agricultural products, the fuels meet the US Energy Policy Act’s requirements for cellulosic biomass. A cellulosic biofuel producer that is registered with the Internal Revenue Service may be eligible for a tax incentive in the amount of up to $1.01 per gallon of cellulosic biofuel sold.

This is indeed impressive since the technology is not dependent on any one feedstock and produces a crude with the same theoretical energy content as crude petroleum.

This is exactly the kind of innovative solution we should be looking at to meet the fuel demands of the next 100 years.

• Commissioner Staples, fresh off another exciting week of doing as little as possible, is still working the press regarding the The Texas Bioenergy Policy Council. The Council was created by the 81st Legislature in an effort to force Staples into doing something to help the fledgling bioenergy industry in Texas. It’s ironic when you consider that in 2006 he campaigned on biofuels in an effort to match Hank’s detailed bioenergy policy and, once sworn into office, did nothing about biofuels until the Legislature mandated it.

*To my Aggie friends (including Hank), my apologies for having a little fun with y’all. Hook ‘Em, Horns!

Kay, not for nothing but we here at the Scoop would like to remind you that you will never, ever get the votes of the teabaggers. Your best option always was  and still is to paint them and the Governor who embraces them as delusional crazies who love to be angry just for the sake of rage. Instead, with that stupid new ad, you’ve managed to look like a weakling who needs to pull up the big girl panties.

We really didn’t think it was possible for you to grovel any more pathetically, so thanks for surprising us by exceeding our already low expectations.

Although Friedman has run an animal rescue operation and shares a ranch with a summer youth camp founded by his late parents, Capitol Inside said he still “must pass” an eligibility test to qualify – a contention Friedman’s campaign sought to counter.

“There may not be a lot of cattle, but he does raise and sell them,” attorney Abel Dominguez of San Antonio, the Friedman campaign’s lawyer, wrote Wednesday.

“Additionally, he grows feed for the cattle on the ranch” in Bandera County that Friedman and his sister and brother own, Dominguez said.

Campaign manager Rania Batrice, asked about the feed, said in an e-mail: “It’s called Klein grass, and it is a type of hay.”

Dominguez also wrote that the Friedman siblings’ ranch, which enjoys an agricultural exemption on property taxes, provides open space for wildlife management.

“Kinky has a sustained deer population on his ranch, which … can be said to be used for educational purposes for the summer camp kids to learn about Texas wildlife,” he said.

At a news conference at state Democratic headquarters, Friedman said he moved to the ranch in 1953, when he was 6.

“We’ve had cattle, actually, on and off, for many years,” he said.

He said former Agriculture Commissioner Jim Hightower, a populist Democrat who’s advising Friedman, “thinks everything is kosher.”

Friedman said he believes that his Democratic rival for agriculture commissioner, East Texas rancher Hank Gilbert, was behind the Capitol Inside article.

Gilbert spokesman Vince Leibowitz responded, “We had nothing to do with that.” He declined to comment further.

As humorous as it is to hear that Kinky’s eligibility questions have made him a little paranoid, it’s hardly a big deal for anyone over at Team Gilbert, least of all Hank. Staples, on the other hand, is a squirrely Republican and may have his own plans.

Just so we’re clear, Kinky, no one (including Hank) had anything to do with your eligibility questions. Those were probably brought up by the fact that you’re known more as an entertainer and self-promoter than as someone actively engaged in agribusiness.  Besides, we’re actually happy to have a primary opponent. This gives us all a chance to sharpen our teeth up for Staples after Hank kicks your ass in March.

We’ll try to keep it friendly, but if you keep accusing us of things we may be tempted to actually do something meaner than just pointing out that you really don’t know a damn thing about agriculture, other than how to consume it.

Good thing to know Hank at least knows what the office does and for bonus points, he even learned the functions of the Department! As for the Kinkster, it’s just flat out sad when the press is having to give you pointers on what the office you’re running for actually does and doesn’t have the power to accomplish. And we can add ‘pardoning death row inmates’ to the list of the latter.

The only problem is, that’s no longer under the jurisdiction of the Texas Department of Agriculture, it’s really an effort better undertaken by the Texas Animal Health Commission.

Of course, when Jim Hightower was still running the TDA, the TAHC was still under the TDA.

Maybe it would be helpful if Kinky and his advisers actually learn what the office he’d like the voters to elect him to actually, you know, does before he announces his candidacy.

Naturally, Kay’s Magic 8 Ball was predicting this (and many other things) weeks ago.

Hutchison wants to have it both ways. This will cause a lot of issues in the overall Republican field–and could create a lot more contested primaries up and down the ballot.

We’ll have more as the story develops, so check back for updates.

Today in front of a Republican women’s group in Midland, Perry said President Obama was interested in punishing Texans, that tea parties needed to be twice as big, and that the Obama administration was “hell-bent” on making America a socialist country.

I don’t know about you, but that sounds more like the kind of rhetoric one would hear out of Dale Gribble as opposed to the sitting governor of Texas.

Here is a transcript of the most choice excerpts from Perry’s stump:

I think this administration is interested in punishing Texas.

[...]

It is time we make tea parties twice as big as what they were.

[...]

This is an administration hell bent on taking American toward a socialist country and we ought not to be afraid to say that.

Watch the video here:

Rick Perry’s solution to Texas’ problems is seriously bigger tea parties?

As if having one of the most corrupt members of one of the most dysfunctional presidential administrations in history actually endorse you isn’t bad enough, Cheney is coming back to Texas to headline a rally for Senator Hutchison.

From a Hutchison campaign e-blast sent out a few minutes ago:

Kay and her team are very excited to announce that Vice President Dick Cheney is coming to Texas to support Kay! The campaign will host a special endorsement rally in Houston on Tuesday, November 17, and we want you to be there! This is truly a once in a lifetime event that you won’t want to miss. Vice President Cheney is a proven conservative leader of our party, and Kay is honored to have his endorsement for her run for governor.

As she furthers her attempt to “out conservative” Rick Perry, we wonder who else Senator Hutchison might bring to town. Since former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is currently in the Rick Perry camp (along with Grover “drown government in the bathtub!” Norquist, maybe Hutchison will turn her eye to former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld or former AG Alberto Gonzales? Who knows. But, if Dick Cheney is the best Hutchison can do,  she is in real trouble come March.

A Dick Cheney rally (save everyone ducking every time there is a loud noise) would probably about as exciting and enthralling as watching hairspray dry.

Consider that in 2008 when Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama fought over Texas voters in the Democratic Primary, both candidates held essentially identical views to Hank:

Obama says that he personally believes that “marriage is between a man and a woman” but also says that “equality is a moral imperative” for gay and lesbian Americans. He advocates the complete repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) because “federal law should not discriminate in any way against gay and lesbian couples, which is precisely what DOMA does.” He supports granting civil unions for gay couples, and in 2006 he opposed a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. In March 2007, Obama initially avoided answering questions about a controversial statement by a U.S. general that “homosexual acts” are “immoral,” but Obama later told CNN’s Larry King, “I don’t think that homosexuals are immoral any more than I think heterosexuals are immoral.” [SOURCE]

And more:

CLINTON: “I am absolutely in favor of civil unions with full equality. Full equality of benefits, rights and privileges. And I have also been a very strong supporter of letting the states maintain their jurisdiction over marriage.” [SOURCE]

OBAMA: “I am a strong supporter, not of a weak version of civil unions, but of a strong version in which the rights that are conferred at the federal level to persons who are part of a same-sex union are compatible.” [SOURCE]

The simple fact is this: Hank’s position is mainstream. It isn’t left or fringe. Most Americans support the concept of civil unions for LGBT couples.  According to the 2009 Texas Lyceum Poll, 32 percent of Texans support civil unions and another 25 percent of Texans believe same-sex marriage should be permitted. Overall, 57 percent of Texans favor either civil unions or same-sex marriage in Texas. [SOURCE: 2009 Texas Lyceum Poll]. Among other issues, same-sex domestic partner benefits has become the mainstream at the federal level. In June, President Obama extended some of the same benefits that heterosexual couples have to LGBT couples in terms of federal employee benefits.

Hank’s position is just another example of his bold, common sense leadership.

CBS 11 has the details:

In August, Perry was given the “Defender of Jerusalem” award. So Perry and his wife flew first class to Israel at more than $5,000 per ticket. The governor’s security detail of four Department of Public Safety (DPS) officers was also along for the trip.

They all took the 7,000 mile journey to accept the award at a time when the governor was asking everyone else in state government to cut back on travel. During a speech in Houston, Perry directed state agencies to “curtail taxpayer funded travel.”

According to state documents, the taxpayers’ bill just to take Perry’s security officers on the 5-day trip was more than $70,000. The breakdown includes $17,000 for rooms at the swanky King David Hotel, nearly $13,000 for food and more than 350 hours of overtime.

The specific price tag for the governor and his wife are secret. So when CBS 11 asked to see the governor’s expense records for the trip, we received four pages and no specifics. Perry refused to do a formal interview with us and would only say, “Going to Israel or other countries is a wise investment for the state of Texas.”

[...]

Records obtained by CBS 11 show the governor’s airfare and trip costs for he and his wife were paid for by Irwin Katsof, a financier for energy companies around the world. And the man who presented Perry with the Defender of Jerusalem award, Guma Aguiar, owns a company that made billions of dollars in the Texas natural gas industry. Aguiar also created the award given to Perry.

Just two weeks before Aguiar and Perry posed for pictures in Israel, Aguiar posed for a mug shot in Florida. He was arrested for possession of drug paraphernalia and possession of marijuana. Aguiar pleaded no contest.

This, of course, isn’t Perry’s first travel junket. He’s been to Turkey, the Bahamas, and countless other places since he took office in 2000. The most infamous trip is probably his junket to the Bahamas to allegedly talk about school finance with Grover Norquist.

Why is this so ironic? Because Rick Perry has not been nearly as good for the manufacturing industry as his coiffure has been for the hairspray industry.

Texas lost 80,000 manufacturing jobs in just the period between July 2008 and July 2009. [SOURCE: Austin Business Journal] In fact, Texas ranked sixth in the nation in terms of manufacturing jobs lost in the 12-month period that was part of the study reported by the ABJ.

Why is TAM endorsing someone who has actually been bad for the manufacturing sector? Perry’s been bad for employment in all sectors, as a matter of fact.

Job Loss in Rick Perry’s administration has been the worst Texas has seen since the 1970s and 1986 and 1987.

(Texas LMCI TRACER Generated graphic, with modifications to highlight Perry’s years as governor)

For example, in Thursday night’s PoliTex post, the Star-Telegram gave the following summary of Hank’s transportation funding proposal:

Gilbert proposed funding new highway construction via an 8 cent gas tax hike followed by future hikes of up to 4 percent a year based on increases in highway construction costs.

To be very clear about this, saying the proposal is “based on increases in highway construction costs,” and the “future hikes of up to 4 percent a year” is not a full explanation of the policy.

Second, a few facts about Hank’s indexation proposal:

1.) Hank proposes a one time increase in the gas tax of 8 cents and implementing automatic increases in the gas tax annually from 2012 forward based on increases in the Highway Cost Index (HCI), with a four percent cap on any annual increase.

2.) Should the HCI increase by more than 4% in any year, the balance would carry forward to the next year and be added to any increase for that year.

3.)In years where there is a zero or negative increase in the HCI, revenue generated from carryovers would go toward reducing TxDOT’s existing debt.

Finally, it is very important to note that voters would actually get the final say in this. Such a change in transportation policy funding would require a constitutional amendment.

Does Kinky Friedman:

A. Sell books to run for governor, or,

B. Run for governor to sell books (and cigars and concert tickets)?

Of course, we’re more inclined to think it’s B. But that’s only because when there’s a book signing or a chance to sell dog rockets, he’s usually doing that rather than going to an actual campaign event. Well, except for recently when he made an appearance out in West Texas at the Ector County Democrat’s Local Heroes Banquet where he apparently didn’t win too many friends with his vow to ban  the death penalty. What the Kinkster doesn’t know is that folks out in West Texas are more accepting of civil unions for the LGBT community than they are of a ban on the death penalty.

One other thing caught our eye in the Herman piece…

Author Friedman noted that his “Heroes of a Texas Childhood” book includes Barbara Jordan and Sam Rayburn, ” who believed that politicians should be held to a higher standard than the rest of us.”

Politician Friedman had some trouble with one of those higher standards — accuracy — while answering an audience question about the State Board of Education.

“I think there’s 16 or 17 members. I think the governor has appointed 15 or 16 of that bunch in the 10 years he has been governor,” Friedman said.

“The problem here is, I’ve been told, that of the 15 or 16 Perry appointees, none of them have ever had a kid in public school,” he said.

It’s possible Friedman had “been told” that. But as a candidate it’s probable he should have checked this out prior to passing it on to voters.

The SBOE has 15 members, elected from districts. Governors make appointments to fill vacancies. Governors select the chair from among the elected members. Perry has appointed no members.

While it’s funny to read about some audience member putting The Kinkster on the spot (and, by the way, some of the radical right members of the SBOE do have children in public school which doesn’t do a thing to change their bizarre views on education), what caught us over here at The Scoop was that the late, great Barbara Jordan was a childhood hero of Kinky? After all, she was only 8 years older than Kinky and was first elected to office in 1966 when Kinky was 22. Which means his memory is either a little foggy or his childhood lasted far longer than that of most Texans. One also has to wonder how Congresswoman Jordan would have felt about Kinky’s great standup act, which would have been running about the same time she was leaving Congress.

Cheney,who famously (accidentally) shot Austin attorney Harry Whittington in the face on a hunting trip and kept goodness knows what in his man-sized safe, is not exactly a model for much of anything–much less a good government conservative. Take, for example:

“Cheney’s White House energy task force produced an all-drilling-and-no-conservation plan that failed not just on policy grounds but as a political matter as well, saddling the administration with a year-long public relations headache after Cheney insisted on running his outfit with a near-Nixonian level of secrecy.” [Washington Monthly]

And, let’s not forget the CIA leak scandal and a host of other scandals Cheney was involved in. And, while we’re at it, remember: this is the same Dick Cheney who was George W. Bush’s partner in bad policy–sometimes leading the way–on virtually every single bad public policy initiative spearheaded by the Bush administration.

For Hutchison to decided that accepting this endorsement was a good idea shows that she is far less politically savvy than people give her credit for.

Hutchison has accepted the endorsement hoping it will drive a wedge through Governor Perry’s conservative base. The problem, however, is that many mainstream conservatives are as displeased with Cheney as Democrats are.

This isn’t something that helps Hutchison–it only hurts her.

Perry’s office is refusing to disclose the report–which is a summary of the status of the case and was given to Perry at 11:30 a.m. the day Willingham was to be executed.

From the Chronicle:

Perry’s office has refused to release the report, claiming it is a privileged document. The clemency document was used by Perry in the process of deciding whether to give Willingham a 30-day stay of execution.

[...]

Willingham was put to death shortly after 6 p.m. on Feb. 17, 2004, just 88 minutes after the Governor’s Office received an expert’s report that the fire that killed Willingham’s children could not be positively attributed to arson. It is unknown whether the report by Perry’s general counsel included any mention of the arson controversy in the Willingham case.

In a statement e-mailed to the Chronicle, Perry spokeswoman Allison Castle said, “Todd Willingham was convicted and sentenced to death by a jury of his peers for murdering his three daughters, and that conviction was upheld by Texas courts and nine times by federal courts including four times by the U.S. Supreme Court. The governor reviewed all the facts in this case and agreed with jury and the courts that Willingham was guilty of murdering his three daughters. Our office has fully complied with the public information act.”

[...]

The lawsuit contends that Chronicle reporter Lise Olsen on Aug. 31, 2009, requested documents on the Willingham case from Perry’s office. With her permission, the Governor’s Office redacted personal e-mail addresses and then produced 883 pages of documents.

The lawsuit says the governor’s attorneys never informed Olsen that they wanted to withhold the clemency report. Nor did Perry’s lawyers tell Olsen the document was not among those delivered to her.

Perry’s office responded to Olsen’s e-mail by saying the documents were similar to reports the Texas attorney general previously had ruled could be held from public view as privileged attorney product.

The obvious question here is this: if the governor has nothing to hide, why is he refusing to release the documents?

In a Postcards blog post about The Scoop today, Statesman reporter Corrie MacLaggan claimed that the campaign’s rapid response operation–basically the only rapid response operation among Democratic gubernatorial campaigns–was not always so speedy:

It remains to be seen how rapid that will be; the Gilbert campaign’s response time hasn’t always been so speedy. For example, on Thursday, Sept. 17, Gov. Rick Perry made his much-criticized recession remark (“We’re in one?”) at a luncheon. On Friday the 18th, several reporters blogged about the speech, and the Hutchison campaign sent an e-mail blast criticizing Perry for being out of touch.

It is unsurprising that a newspaper so obsessed with “process stories” as the Statesman would make this mistake.

MacLaggan is actually dinging the campaign for a so-called delayed response although there was no official campaign on September 17. Hank didn’t launch his campaign until Monday, September 21, 2009 with a stop in Dallas.

Additionally, the Statesman fails to note that, in spite of Gilbert having no official campaign launched, the campaign was highlighting unemployment issues in press releases on the 16th and 18th.

Finally, The Statesman failed to note that although Hank, who hadn’t oficially launched his campaign, did respond to the statement, Democrat Tom Schieffer, who launched his campaign months prior didn’t respond to the issue and in fact issued no press releases between September 16 and September 23–although he did post a few newspaper articles on his website. Schieffer never issued a release about Perry’s remarks.

Among other things, an Associated Press review of her personal holdings shows a huge stake in big oil:

A big stake in Exxon-Mobil, valued at between $250,000 and $500,000, along with other stock holdings and equity investments, have also helped provide the family yearly dividend income of about $60,000 a year since 2001, records show.

They’re easily millionaires, reporting assets of between $2.8 million and $6.7 million in 2008, not including homes used for residential purposes, Senate records show. The Senate records give ranges of asset value, making an exact calculation impossible.

Senator Hutchison’s husband’s work for Vinson & Elkins is also coming under increased scrutiny:

Perry aides, meanwhile, have raised questions about Ray Hutchison’s compensation from Vinson & Elkins, where he has served as a bond lawyer for projects that have benefited from his wife’s advocacy as a powerful force in the Washington appropriation process.

“While typical for Washington politicians, the people of Texas deserve to hear directly from the senator how this cyclical relationship is ethical considering her husband continues to draw a half-million dollar annual salary from his firm 12 years after he supposedly retired,” said Perry campaign manager Rob Johnson.

It appears from the AP story that Senator Hutchison did not actually turn over her tax returns to the Associated Press. We know the AP has requested tax returns from other campaigns–including Hank’s tax returns, which he released to the AP this month. If the AP asked for Senator Hutchison’s returns, it appears they didn’t get them since they used the Senate’s disclosure filing system to report on her wealth.

On the day Gov. Rick Perry removed three forensic science commissioners, citing their expired terms, at least 100 appointees whose time was also up remained in their jobs.

[...]

The list of gubernatorial appointees who were serving after their terms were expired on September 30 also contains nine chairmen of state boards and commissions, according to data obtained by The Texas Tribune under the state’s open-records law.

[...]

The appointees with expired terms represent just a fraction of the roughly 2,400 people serving now. The 103 people serving after their terms were up had overstayed their terms, on average, more than 100 days when the other commissioners were ousted. Several had overstayed their terms more than a year, the records show.

The Forensic Science Commission had scheduled a meeting to examine a report in the case of Cameron Todd Willingham, a Corsicana man convicted of capital murder in the 1991 fire deaths of his three daughters. The state executed him in 2004, after numerous appeals, but some experts now question the investigative conclusions made by arson investigators at the time of the trial.

As the day of the commission’s meeting approached, however, Perry announced the removal of chairman Sam Bassett, an Austin attorney, and two other panel members, including a Tarrant County prosecutor whose work has sent killers to Death Row.

The Tribune’s review illustrates fully that Perry removed the commissioners for one reason: to create a cover up in an attempt at avoiding bad publicity.

Watch the video below, followed by our analysis and fact-check of Governor Perry:

Let’s take Governor Perry’s statements one at a time:

MS. CARLSON:  Should the nation use Texas as the blueprint?

GOV. PERRY:  There are certainly some things that they can learn from Texas from the stand-point of don’t spend all the money, keep taxes relatively low and a regulatory climate that’s fair and predictable.  We passed the most sweeping tort reform so we don’t have over-suing. And we’re big believers in the 10th Amendment that states should compete against each other.  I think it was Judge Brandeis back through the years that said that’s how it should be. If you have a really bad policy that doesn’t work, rather than visit that on the entire country, let states be the laboratory of innovation.  So yeah, I think we’re doing it right.

It is interesting that Perry continues to pose as a taxpayer hero. He led the Legislature’s efforts to raise taxes on businesses in 2006 as part of a property tax swap. The Legislature, at his behest, expanded the franchise tax to include all businesses with gross receipts in excess of $600,000. Thus, many small businesses saw their tax burden increase substantially.

There is more:

MS. CARLSON:  Let me ask you about the states’ rights, because today we’re talking about the government-run health care part of the reform plan that may, in fact, go now to states — whether they can opt in or opt out. Would you believe, then, in that type of a program?

GOV. PERRY:  I’d certainly want to look at it first, but that is substantially better than what they were talked about.  The bill, as introduced, costs Texas anywhere between $30 and $60 billion over the next 10 years, so $36 billion a year — that would obviously bankrupt this state — the state of Texas — and we’ve got $9 billion in our rainy day fund.  So it is not an option that was pleasing to us at all.  As a matter of fact, we would have probably looked at a lot of different ways to pushback hard.

Again, Governor Perry has his facts wrong, and it isn’t the first time. The $30 to $60 billion figure Perry cites wasn’t current the first time Perry used it back in September:

Perry, one of a few Republican governors who opposed the extra unemployment benefits Congress included in its economic stimulus plan, said the federal health reform bills will hit some business with a new tax and amount to a ‘federal takeover of some current state insurance functions.’

For his $60 billion estimate, the governor, who is seeking a third term, cited an analysis by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission.

Stephanie Goodman, a spokeswoman for the commission, said the $60 billion estimate was based on earlier healthcare bills. The commission slashed its forecast to $20 billion after analyzing the latest proposal from U.S. Democratic Senator Max Baucus, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee.

A spokeswoman for Perry said the $60 billion estimate was still current because it did not refer specifically to the Baucus plan.

Gretchen Carlson and FOX also aided and abetted Perry in pushing forward his fantasy that the Texas economy is doing just fine:

MS. CARLSON:  How have you kept the unemployment rate at 8.2 percent — at least that’s what it was in Texas in September — when a lot of states are looking at over 10 percent?

GOV. PERRY:  We’re still a percentage-point-and-a-half below the national average.  One of the ways has been creating an environment in Texas where people know they can come and risk their capital.  We have a lot of businesses — 1,000 people a day are moving to the state of Texas.  Caterpillar, Metronics, Toyota all within the last nine months have announced major moves to the state of Texas.

Evidently Gretchen Carlson didn’t bother to do her homework–or FOX deliberately wanted to help make Perry look good.

An unemployment of 8.2 percent may be low compared to other states, but it was a record high for Texas, via AP:

The state unemployment rate jumped to 8.2 percent in September and an additional 44,700 jobs were lost, the Texas Workforce Commission said Friday.

In August, the jobless rate hit 8 percent for the first time in 22 years. The state has lost jobs every month but one over the past year, and the number of employed people has dropped to early 2007 levels, according to commission figures.

But wait, there is more. Catch this from Perry:

And again, it goes back to that business environment that’s been created there with the tax structure, regulatory climate, legal system that doesn’t allow for the abuse of any of those.  Plus, we have a skilled work force.  Caterpillar, Metronics — a great medical technology company making artificial pancreas — they moved out of the Bay area to San Antonio.  They knew there was going to be a skilled work force there. So those four things are how you govern.  And then you get out of the way and let private sector do what the private sector does.

“Get out of the way and let the private sector do what the private sector does?” Governor Perry can’t be serious. But wait, he is! That is why he touts a regulatory climate and legal system that fails to allow Texas companies to be held accountable to the wrongs they commit against consumers and the environment.

Check these facts:

PAY TO PLAY ENVIRONMENTAL POLITICS. One of Rick Perry’s more generous campaign contributors, Exxon Mobile, was recently (September 23) before the Perry-appointed Texas Commission on Environmental Quality for an enforcement action. In spite of the fact that Exxon-Mobile is a multi-billion dollar corporation and released “volatile atmospheric compounds,” hydrogen sulfide, and sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere on two occasions last November at its Beaumont Refinery in Jefferson County, they were fined only a pittance. (LINK) Exxon-Mobile and its associated political action committees have been generous contributors to Governor Perry’s campaign:

$2,500.00 6/26/2000
$15,000.00 11/1/2006
$5,000.00 9/11/2002
$5,000.00 12/5/2005
$15,000.00 11/1/2008

A full transcript of governor Perry’s remarks can be found here in .pdf format. A fact sheet on why Rick Perry’s Texas is no blueprint for the rest of the country is here.

While we will not be able to stop Mother Nature entirely, we may be able alter her course, changing the weather in small, yet significant ways.

She’s not talking about reducing carbon emissions or anything like that, either. She’s talking about plain, old, weather modification. Which doesn’t work very often.

Question: “Would Proposition 11 prevent future Trans-Texas corridors from seizing private land.”

Perry: “This is where a government entity can take a piece of property and hand it over to a private developer for development, to enhance tax revenues. When we’re building highways in the state of Texas, that still stays the sovereign land of the state of Texas. So when the next road that’s built in the state of Texas and there’s eminent domain authority that goes into place…”

You can also watch the video here:

Via the Dallas Morning News:

Then Hutchison posed for some pictures, and stepped over to a scrum of a dozen or so reporters to take more questions. One asked about net neutrality, a rather complex issue of special interest to Texas-based AT&T. Hutchison turned to me for the next topic. She really did seem open to taking more questions.

I offered a toss-away to the effect that she has already said she’ll leave the Senate soon, any hints yet about timing. No she said. Then, apparently, I crossed a line. Basically, I asked why she feels a need to stay in the Senate while running for governor.

GILLMAN: “Do you have some qualms that a replacement for you will not have essentially the same positions on important issues, to Texas, like cap and trade, like net neutrality, for instance?”

HUTCHISON: “Ok, thank you.”

And then, dear readers, she turned abruptly and walked away, leaving a gaggle of journalists dumbstruck.

Like Hank says, you could get better answers from a Magic 8 Ball than from Senator Hutchison.

Kinky Friedman's last campaign for TXGov -- an opportunity to sell book(s). From the Publisher's Weekly review: "The Kinkster, "Kinky's term of endearment for himself," has been busy churning out the pages (three books last year; two so far this year), even as he prepares to run for governor of Texas in 2006. ...Although in the end, it's clear Friedman doesn't have much to say about anything,...

After spending the formative weeks of the 2010 election cycle in France and Belgium, Kinky Friedman is back in Texas and peddling his wares, not campaigning:

Friedman visited the Freeport Community House on Friday afternoon to discuss life, the future of Texas and his new book, “Heroes of a Texas Childhood.”

More than 200 people filled the community house to hear the self-proclaimed “Jewish Cowboy” read from the book and answer questions. With his trademark black cowboy hat, shirt and jacket, Friedman kept the crowd enraptured with every turn of the page.

The event, which was sponsored by the Friends of the Freeport Municipal Library, went off without a hitch, library officials said.

This makes one wonder whether Friedman, who raised most of the money for his independent campaign in 2006 from merchandise sales, is in the governor’s race to sell books and cigars or actually govern. Given that Friedman seems to be running more of a high profile book and merchandising tour than a campaign, one must wonder what his real intentions are in this race.

“I’ll also be checking the box for Proposition 11 which sustains our state’s forward momentum in protecting private property rights and builds a firewall between the misguided principles of the Supreme Court’s Kelo ruling and our state’s private property owners.”

Congratulations, Governor Perry, you’ve earned a FACT CHECK from The Scoop.

Governor Perry Claims: Proposition 11 “builds a firewall” between the Kelo ruling and the state’s property owners.

FACT: Proposition 11 is not real eminent domain reform. Much of Proposition 11 is already codified in state statute. Leading anti-eminent domain advocates call Proposition 11 “counterfeit” eminent domain reform.

Governor Perry Claims: The state has “forward momentum” in protecting private property rights.

FACT: Governor Perry vetoed “forward momentum” in 2007 with his veto of House Bill 2006. House Bill 2006 was real eminent domain reform. From the Legislative Reference Library’s analysis of the bill:

HB 2006 would have modified the processes governing eminent domain proceedings, standards of evidence that may be considered by a court in the course of making decisions regarding compensation, obligations placed upon condemning entities, and the rights of previous owners to repurchase taken property.

As a basis for assessing actual damages to a property owner from a condemnation, HB 2006 would have allowed special commissioners to take into account evidence relating to the change in value of the property, including any injury or benefit to the property owner. If property was condemned for purposes related to the state highway system or a county toll project eligible for designation as part of the state highway system, special commissioners would have been required to consider diminished access to highways for any remaining property to the extent that it affected the present value of the property, including factors considered when determining market value for property tax purposes.

The bill would have defined “public use” as a use of property that allowed the state, a political subdivision, or the general public to possess, occupy, and enjoy the property.

Governmental and private entities would not have been able to take property except for a public use and would have had to provide relocation services for displaced persons.

The bill would have allowed a previous owner to repurchase condemned property on which a public use was cancelled within 10 years of the acquisition at the price paid to the owner by the governmental entity at the time the property originally was acquired, rather than the fair market value of the property at the time the public use was canceled.

HB 2006 would have added the “Truth in Condemnation Procedures Act” to require a governmental entity, for each property or group of jointly owned contiguous properties to be condemned, to formally authorize by motion the initiation of condemnation proceedings at a public hearing by a record vote. The bill would have required entities that intended to acquire property for a public use to make a bona fide offer to acquire the property by voluntary purpose or lease.

In response to a request by the property owner under the Public Information Act, condemning entities would have had to furnish only documents relating to the condemnation of the specific property. Any condemning authority not subject to public information requirements would have had to serve property owners with notice prior to initiating proceedings.

Even Republican legislators criticized Governor Perry’s actions. A very conservative Republican slammed Perry for his veto:

Rep. Beverly Woolley, the bill’s author, said:

“Gov. Rick Perry’s veto of HB 2006, eminent domain legislation, is a grave injustice to every private property owner in Texas. The governor’s statement that the bill would slow down and shut down needed construction projects at the expense of taxpayers is simply disingenuous.”

Granted, Herman’s column is supposed to be funny, but it shows, instead, how far the mainstream media is from being in tune with Democratic primary voters who will decide from as many as seven candidates to pick their nominee next March:

While Gov. Rick Perry and U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison are shredding each other in the GOP gubernatorial primary, the two “leading” Democrats (translation: the only two there is an outside shot you’ve ever heard of) are working on establishing their Democratic credentials.

His candidacy — and that of Austin deli maven Marc Katz, to date the only Democrat announced for lieutenant governor — raises a potentially troubling problem for Texas Democrats when they think they have a better chance of winning a statewide race than they have in years.

What if they somehow wind up with Friedman as their gubernatorial candidate and Katz as their lite guv candidate? It doesn’t just seem like a ticket made up of a guy trying to sell books and a guy trying to sell pastrami carries the kind of credibility Democrats need this year. But we’ll see.

First, Herman leads voters to believe that he believes Friedman is actually a serious and legitimate candidate. Second, He doesn’t even bother to examine the entire Democratic Primary field and zeroes in on two candidates—neither of whom have the grassroots support or statewide name recognition Hank has.

Herman also, by and large, seems to assume that Democrats won’t actually make up their minds based on the substance of campaigns, but rather the flash (or, in the case of Kinky Friedman, the action figure). Texas Democrats are smarter than that, but Herman doesn’t seem to think so.