The Texas Observer

Kudos to Col. Thomas Davis, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, that he didn’t insult our intelligence with the old I’m-retiring-to-be-with-my-family line. Instead the statement that went out this afternoon simply said:

“After 43 years and 9 months with the Texas Department of Public Safety, I am retiring on Aug. 31, 2008.”

Davis became director of the DPS in 2000. The resignation won’t become official until the DPS Commission meets on Thursday. Nor will we likely have an inkling until then who might replace him.

Those in the media will probably blame fallout from the fire at the governor’s mansion and the browbeating Davis received from legislators at a June 24 public hearing of the Sunset Advisory Commission as reasons why he stepped down.

I have my doubts.

If the mansion fire was a DPS error, the fault likely did not reside with Davis. Yes the DPS did not have sufficient staff at the mansion. But one has to wonder if troopers were pulled off the mansion detail to accompany the governor as he gallivanted around Europe on the taxpayer’s dime. We will never know since DPS does not comment on the governor’s security. Another, perhaps more likely, reason why there was only one trooper at the mansion has to do with Operation Border Star, Perry’s get-tough on the border initiative. It is now apparently standard practice to send troopers down in squads to patrol the border area, stretching an already undermanned agency.

The Sunset Review found all manner of problems at the DPS, including the aforementioned shortage of officers. This is less Davis’ fault than the demographics of an aging population and a very young one without much in between. It also doesn’t help that there is fierce competition for officers from the border patrol and the military. The feds pay more. The review also found fault with DPS’ handling of driver’s licenses. The logical solution to this would be to spin off this non-law enforcement responsibility as a stand alone or move it to another agency, say TXDOT. DPS Commission Chairman Alan Polunsky made it clear that he would never agree to such a move.

Polunsky is not waiting for the Sunset review process to play itself out over the next legislative session. In this way, the reforms underway will not be widely disseminated and publicly debated before implementation. Instead there appears to be a still-largely secret plan for DPS. This plan may have played a role in Davis’ departure.

To begin to understand what is underway, read Perry’s 2005 homeland security plan authored by Steve McCraw. The plan calls for a statewide intelligence service. This state intelligence service is to focus on intelligence gathering and counter-terrorism investigations. TDEX, the governor’s database, was a piece of this plan.

Polunsky referred to this obliquely at the Sunset hearing, when he said that the commission will “be directing the department to extend into other areas as we go forward.”

I called the chairman the following day and invited him to expand on his remarks. While insisting that “nothing has been decided,” he admitted that “there is probably going to be some movement in that [intelligence] direction.”

A consultant will look at the agency from top to bottom before changes are instituted.

Then there is the cauldron of personalities that can be DPS.

There has long been a rumor of tension between the graduates of the so-called class of ‘77. That class included Kent Mawyer, chief of DPS’ criminal law enforcement division, current DPS Assistant Director David McEathron, and Perry’s Homeland Security Director McCraw. While Mawyer and McEathron scaled the hierarchy at DPS, McCraw, an El Paso native, left the agency in 1983 to join the FBI as a special agent. We’ve heard McCraw and his former DPS colleagues don’t always get along.

Does McCraw hope to head this new intelligence service/state police? Are his former classmates troubled by the changes under discussion? Did Davis’ efforts to mediate the potential conflict fall flat? We don’t know. Was the rush to make changes to DPS before the Legislature convenes in January a factor? Hard to say.

We will try to get some answers to these questions in the days ahead. In the meantime, Davis had a very tough job that he did quite well. It’s a shame for Texas that he is stepping down.

I strongly urge anyone who is in Austin and cares about human rights or Latin America or documentary photography to get thee to the Harry Ransom Center at UT. There you will find an exhibit titled “Inside El Salvador.” It features more than 100 photographs concerning that nation’s 12-year civil war and its aftermath. The exhibit is based in part on a collection of photographs called Learn to See, El Salvador: The Work of 30 Photographers.

The exhibit brings back a tumultuous time when a country the size of Massachusetts became a focal point in the Cold War and a proving ground for US-imported counterinsurgency. Here are images from all the low-points: the massacre at El Mozote, the killing of the three U.S. nuns and a lay worker, the murder of six Jesuit priests and their housekeepers, and the body dump for the disappeared at El Playon. The latter was taken by photographer John Hoagland, one of six photographers in the exhibition who lost their lives while working in El Salvador.The surviving photographers, rather than accept money for the exhibition, had the Ransom Center pay to install a similar exhibit in El Salvador at El Museo de la Palabra y la Imagen.

The exhibit at UT kicked off today with a two-day conference titled Image, Memory, and the Paradox of Peace. The speakers tonight included former ambassador to El Salvador Robert White, journalism professor Mark Danner, and two extraordinary photographers who helped create the collection, Susan Meiselas and Harry Mattison. Day two of the conference will feature numerous panels on war and peace and the effects of violence. The day will end with a session on martyred Archbishop Oscar Romero.

Many of these photos are familiar to those who have followed El Salvador. Yet to see them together, along with the mountains of commentary and context put together by the Ransom Center, is very moving. Meiselas ended her remarks by saying that they had hoped to “enrich two worlds with their photographs.” And indeed they did. The humanity these photographers captured and the struggles of those times speak truths that continue to be relevant today.

I thought I’d leave this one to everyone else. How ABC chose to handle this debate was so appalling that I felt sure that most blogs, if not the mainstream media, would call them on it. Our country faces serious challenges, but rather than focus on them, Charlie Gibson and former Clinton staffer George Stephanopoulous decided to dwell on the trivialities of gotcha politics for the first 50 minutes. After that, it wasn’t much better. This was embarrassing for everyone who watched it, let alone the participants. Viewers went away feeling soiled.

Not surprisingly, the outrage in the mainstream media was muted, with some exceptions. To critique the handling of last night’s debate would involve accepting an implicit rebuke of all the horse race blather and minutiae that passes for most campaign coverage. Yet still unsatisfied after my morning reading, I decided to take a look at ABC’s own site. I wondered what comments the network collected from viewers. The first six I found restored a measure of hope for our democracy after a dismal evening. Below are some excerpts.

This is from the first comment:

ABC you are disgusting. That was the most biased debate I have ever seen. Half way through I wanted to turn off my TV and gouge my eyes out.

The second:

I can’t imagine why anyone feels betrayed by ABC news for their terrible debate questions. They are just doing what they exist to do: Trivialize important matters, sensationalize petty garbage, and generally distract their viewers with utter nonsense. They help keep the public as sheep.

The third:

I’m done with ABC, done with Disney. I want a list of the advertisers for that sham last night, so I can write them, let them know they didn’t get lot for their money.

The fourth:

It appears I will have to switch to Katie Couric for news, though I have avoided it for so long, Charlie. Tim Russert will also be the benefactor, though I always enjoyed George Will’s point of view on Sundays, I can’t support this junk journalism.

The fifth:

As a service member who has been deployed to Iraq and having a family member who is going through brankruptcy i found the hosts of the debate utterly direlect in their duties. Why it took 45 minutes to get to a single relevant issue is beyond me. I think ABC news should be ashamed of themselves for such a tabloidial (don’t know if thats even a word) opening half of the debate.

The sixth:

ABC SHOULD BE ASHAMED of how they handled this debate.

The Obama campaign declared victory in the senatorial conventions held yesterday. This just in, the Clinton campaign has declared… something else. See below.

And of course, the counties are still counting.

Statement by Texas Campaign Chairman Garry Mauro

Austin, TX – Following the Democratic Party’s county conventions in Texas this weekend, Clinton Campaign Texas Chairman Garry Mauro issued the following statement.

“Our delegates came out to their county conventions in full force over the weekend, and as a result, we gained at least two delegates to the national convention, with the possibility of picking up two more. Barack Obama did not make threshold in at least 20 counties, and we out-performed in many areas throughout rural Texas, where Hillary Clinton’s support is strong.

“We continue to be grateful to the enthusiastic support Hillary continues to receive throughout the Lone Star state, and look forward to a strong showing at the Texas State Convention in June.”

This in from the Obama Campaign. It might be a bit premature. When we get something from the Clinton Campaign, we’ll post that as well.

Meanwhile, once again the national media is shaking its head at the bedlam produced by Texas Democrats…

Caucuses Guarantee Obama Win In Texas

AUSTIN - With more than 56% of the results tallied from today’s 284 Democratic district conventions across Texas, Senator Barack Obama currently is projected to earn a 38-29 pledged delegate win in the Texas caucuses, exactly as projected on the day after the March 4th precinct caucuses. The nine delegate margin in the caucuses means Obama will gain a net margin of five pledged delegates from Texas because Senator Clinton narrowly won the Texas primary by only four delegates, 65-61.

“Despite the Clinton campaign’s widespread attempts to prevent many Texans from participating in their district convention, the voters of Texas confirmed Senator Obama’s important delegate win in the Lone Star State,” said Obama spokesman Josh Earnest. “Today’s record-shattering turnout sends a clear message that the American people are ready for change in Washington and new leadership in the White House that will stand up for working families.”

The Obama campaign will release a more detailed tally of the results tomorrow.

Democracy Inaction at Senate District Six by Emily DePrang

Full results can be found at Burnt Orange Report

Over a thousand delegates and an unknown number of alternates converged today on the George R. Brown Convention Center in downtown Houston to wait for literally eight hours to begin voting. While an unexpectedly large number of delegates turned out, precinct chairs from several small precincts did not show up at all, and a quorum wasn’t declared until 1:15 p.m. That’s when officials in the Credentials committee started tabulating the registration paperwork to come up with a temporary delegate roll, which was needed before any voting could happen. Despite explicit instructions not to, several precincts decided on their delegates amongst themselves, turned in their ballots to their precinct captains, and went home.

By 5:00, the hall started to feel like the Breakfast Club, like the full spectrum of Democrats got sentenced to Saturday detention and hung out together for long enough that they learned they’re more alike than different.

The feeling lasted until someone actually took the podium and read the delegate count. “Of 1152 delegates, 513 went to Obama…” the speaker said to a deathly quiet room, because everyone knows that’s not enough. “And 637 to Clinton.” The Clinton camp exploded. The Obama camp was pissed. It’s 45 percent to 55 percent, with two delegates undecided.

Update, (see below)

Democratic delegates for Senate Districts 14 and 25 started arriving at the Travis County Exposition Center by 7:30 a.m.

By 9:00, a traffic jam extended miles away from the expo center. Those who didn’t want to wait in their cars, parked on the side of the road and walked the rest of the way.

When delegates arrived, long lines to get their credentials greeted them. The official schedule had optimistically set the Call to Order to begin at 10. A volunteer told the crowd trudging in: “The check-in has been extended indefinitely.” It was still going on by noon.

Nonetheless, the Travis County Democratic convention could end up being one of the smoother major urban area conventions in Texas. Much of the credit should go to the credentials committees. The committees began meeting Tuesday night and worked steadily through the rest of the week. They were divided almost evenly and yet exhibited little partisan rancor.

SD 14 had 8 Obama members and 7 Clinton members. They decided all of the dozen or so challenges they heard unanimously. “There was no sign of anyone putting their thumbs on the scale,” said committee member Deece Eckstein.

A few major problems became apparent almost immediately. The largest concerned the caucus sign-in sheets from March 4. The tri-part forms included a space for whether the caucus-goer was elected a delegate or an alternate. The idea was that after everybody signed in, the caucus goers would vote to determine the delegates and alternates. After that, the precinct chair would write a D or an A next to the appropriate names.

But those who signed in thought the space was a place to indicate a preference–that they wanted to be a delegate. Many people put Ds beside their names. Precinct chairs then failed to cross them out if they were not in fact delegates. The sheet along with supplemental sheets from the actual delegate selection elections were then sent to the county party to be inputed into the master list. Those entering the data didn’t want to disenfranchise anyone so they just identified everybody who had a D by their name as a delegate. That list was then put on the Internet. The result was that many more delegates than a precinct had a right to showed up at the convention.

These overages have created chaos across the state. Additionally, it appears that many folks had trouble with the complicated mathematical formula the Party provided to determine the ratios of delegates. Finally, poor data entry created confusion when names were mangled. Deece Eckstein, for example, wore a delegate badge that identified him as Delbert Einstein.

In Travis County, the committees patiently worked through the problems. In precincts with too many delegates, members were told that they had decide who would get to stay, if they didn’t the committee would pick the names out of a hat.

“People get all heated and they want their candidate but if you kind of force them to be fair — they’re fair,” said Reggie James, who is on the credentials committee for SD 25.

Kudos particularly to Travis County District Attorney David Escamilla, SD 14 committee co-chair, who approached each case with a preternatural calm, offering Solomon-like solutions.

While the sign-in and credential challenge process worked itself out, a number of politicians, candidates, and guests served up red-meat speeches to the crowd. Congressman Lloyd Doggett went first since his district covers three counties and he had other conventions to attend.

He applauded delegates for working toward a future after the “unmitigated disaster that has been the presidency of George W. Bush.” And working to bring to an end “the dictatorship of Tom Craddick “and “the public embarrassment of Rick Perry.”

Doggett, who has endorsed Barack Obama, talked about receiving angry e-mails from supporters of both Democratic presidential candidates, with each camp claiming that they’d rather vote Republican than support their primary opponent. “That kind of short-sighted perspective is a formula for failure,” he said. “We will get to the White House together or we will not get there at all.”

It was a refrain that most speakers echoed. Former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk, also an Obama supporter, reminded the crowd of an African proverb he likes to recite. “Two people in a burning house don’t have time to argue.

“We are all in the same house,” said Kirk. “And the president doesn’t even know the smoke detector has gone off.”

By around 3:00 the actual delegate selection began, two-and-a-half hours later than expected. By and large the crowd stayed in good humor and took the problems in stride.

When first confronted with the line to sign-in, state Rep. Mark Strama remarked, “We learned in Florida, better to be accurate than quick.”

It wasn’t quick but in Travis County at least, it might well be accurate.

Update:

Burnt Orange Report has the final tally for Travis County: 313 for Obama, 144 for Clinton