- Governor Abbott Urges Local Governments Against Increasing Property Taxes For Texans
- How Property Taxes Work (And Why Taxpayers Continue to Hurt)
- More deceptive talk on property taxes coming from local officials
- Texas, Localities Amass $86 Billion in Unfunded Pension Liabilities
- Tesla request reveals deep divide among agencies over battery power
- Texas had plans to replace its outdated unemployment system. The coronavirus pandemic hit first.
- Texas scaling back child care subsidies for essential workers, low-income parents
- AG Paxton Joins Amicus Defending Separation of Powers and Urging Court to Dismiss Case Against Lt. General Michael Flynn
- Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton challenges Keystone pipeline ruling
- Governor Abbott Appoints Rodney Burrow To State Board of Criminal Justice
- RNC chair: ‘We will not be holding a virtual convention’
- Phantom “progressive” super PAC says it returned donations to Texans
- Voter registration has flatlined in big urban counties
- Democrat State Rep: Every Texan deserves access to a vote-by-mail ballot during a pandemic – bull bleep.
- HD135: Want to Defeat Harris County’s Most Liberal State Rep? Here’s How.
- SD14: 6 Vying for Important Central Texas Senate Seat in Special Election
- Royce West says John Cornyn’s ‘Restful Royce’ taunt plays off racist stereotype of lazy African-Americans – come on! Typical race card playing.
- SD27: Can a progressive beat the most conservative Democrat in the Texas Senate?
- Federal judge says all Texas voters can apply to vote by mail during pandemic – not a Federal issue, should be overturned immediately by the 5th Circuit.
- Federal judge says all Texans can vote by mail during coronavirus – utter insanity! Get his quote: ““The Court finds such fear and anxiety is inextricably intertwined with voters’ physical health.”
- ——————————————–
- Coronavirus related
- Not admitting mistakes is subverting freedom
- Let’s Not Pretend This Is Constitutional
- Abbott says ‘All the trends are going good’ as Texas reopens
- Abbott Continues Coronavirus Restrictions, With a Few More Exceptions
- ‘Phase II’ Reopening: Here’s the Schedule for Reopening Texas Businesses, Sports
- Gov. Abbott spurs Texas business reopenings as coronavirus cases continue to rise
- Texas Strike Force Advisory Board member Marc McDougal confident in plan to reopen businesses VIDEO
- Texas schools can re-open for summer classes under ‘safe distancing practices’ – silly, just go to school and stop all this distancing stuff
- Map of Texas COVID-19 Test Collection Sites
- Flatten the bell curve? We don’t even know if the plotted curve was accurate.
- Texas COVID-19 situation report for 5/19/2020 (pdf) – 1347 deaths in Q1 plus half of Q2. Official Texas 2018/19 flu season P&I deaths were 9249 by end of July last year, over 10,000 for the year.
- Sweden has pioneered an alternative to lockdown — and it works
- Health officials wasted time on the speculative, didn’t harden the known
- Andrew Cuomo Dismisses Nursing Home Scandal: ‘We Did Everything We Could’
- Texas is testing everyone in nursing homes for coronavirus, but not state-run homes for people with disabilities
- Midland Fire Department will conduct testing at nursing homes
- 16 Midland Medical Lodge residents transferred back to facility
- New Mexico reports long list of care facility COVID-19 cases
- Did Social Justice Efforts Kill Thousands of New York Seniors?
- This is not a natural disaster, but a manmade one – beware the contextual numbers, those numbers will trigger those cowering under their beds.
- Do real men not wear masks? – no but educated men do not. See this.
- Neurosurgeon Says Face Masks Pose Serious Risk to Healthy People
- The uncertainties of mask use demand that no one be forced to wear them
- CNN Reporter Who Ripped off Her Mask Has a New Talking Point, Immediately Undermines It
- Texas Democratic Party director, Manny Garcia, says Texas should still be shut down! – the Dem line: In ‘re-opening’ Texas, it’s clear the donors are in charge
- More handwringing by those afraid to go out in Austin
- Tilman Fertitta asks Trump to set aside money in small business loan program for large restaurant chains like Landry’s
- The growing evidence on vitamin D and COVID
- Will a vaccine really be ready by September?
- Judge declares Oregon governor’s Wuhan flu edicts “null and void”; Overridden by state supreme court – fascism advances in Oregon. Oregon Salon Owner: State Sent Child Protective Services After Me Because I Opened My Business
- Illinois business owners now face misdemeanor charge if they reopen in spite of Pritzker’s stay-at-home order – tyranny
- Poll: 42% of voters back canceling licenses or jailing business owners violating coronavirus orders – collaborators
- Donald Trump Optimistic About ‘Staggeringly Good’ Moderna Coronavirus Vaccine
- Study: Obesity top factor in COVID complications
- Drying out: Abilene bar says they plan to defy governor’s orders to stay closed until Friday VIDEO
- People report being less worried and happier as Texas and other states reopen
- At-home COVID-19 test by Texas-based company approved by FDA
- Houston priest got pneumonia then died. Now five others have COVID-19 – the 5 are asymptomatic by the way and you can’t say for certain they got it from him.
- Dan Crenshaw: Lockdowns Went Long Because We’ve ‘Mentally Manipulated Ourselves’ into Fear
- Why San Antonio Was the Readiest – and the Most Reluctant – to Reopen – a lot of self-congratulatory B.S.
- Australian study: COVID-19 spreads in schools ‘considerably less’ than influenza
- Antibody tests continue to suggest COVID-19 far more widespread, less deadly than initially thought
- China just locked down over 100 million in new COVID-19 outbreak
- Ending the Lockdowns and the Question of Political Sustainability
- Public Choice and the Pandemic: For better or worse, the people will ultimately decide how to strike the balance of public safety and convenience.
- Avik Roy compares flu and COVID-19 deaths in eye-opening thread on risk by age group
- UT researcher says hospitals should prepare for surge in the coming weeks – so if he is wrong what will he lose? It won’t even be reported like all the others.
- ———————————
- Federal/DC related to Texas
- Committee Approves Texas Congressman John Ratcliffe for DNI, Sends to Full Senate, more
- Treasury to send some remaining stimulus payments on debit cards
- President Trump remarks on assistance for farmers, food supply chain
- USDA to provide relief to farmers, ranchers, producers
- ‘COVID forced our hand’: Texas entities join lobbying rush over federal government’s coronavirus response
- Government Intervention Would Hurt Energy Producers
- NASA head of manned space abruptly resigns
- ———————————————
- Presidential race / national politics
- Biden Dings Trump with Nickname Over Social Media Use
- Biden’s Most Ridiculous Veep Prospect
- What You Need to Know about Tara Reade’s Credibility
- Is it time to bring back Steve Bannon?
- Team Trump is well aware of the Catholic problem that Biden poses
- The Weird Andrew Cuomo Boomlet
- Republican Mike Garcia wins Dem-held Los Angeles-area Congressional seat
- ————————————
- Border / immigration
- 127 Pounds of Methamphetamine Seized at Texas Border Crossing
- Judge OKs border-wall surveying on land adjacent to Santa Ana Wildlife Refuge
- Report: Fugitive Sinaloa Cartel Commander Executed in Home State
- Frontline DACA recipients anxiously await Supreme Court decision
- ——————————————–
- Business
- Tesla request reveals deep divide among agencies over battery power
- James Avery to Lay Off Fredericksburg Employees, Close Plant Due to Coronavirus Shutdown
- Pier 1 to permanently close stores after COVID-19 upends sale
- San Antonio chef Jason Dady sues insurer over restaurants’ lost business
- Americans are paying the price for the rotten meat business
- Google Backs off on AI for Oil and Gas Extraction
- SpaceX delays Starlink launch to put manned mission first
- At-home COVID-19 test by Texas-based company approved by FDA
- GM, Ford, Fiat Chrysler resume production in US
- Covid-19: A Bankruptcy Pandemic
- List of Austin businesses close permanently during COVID-19 pandemic
- Lubbock’s Joyland Amusement Park Asks for the Public’s Help to Re-Open; On the Verge of Going Out of Business
- Suit: ADT Employee Spied on Customers’ Home Security Systems
- ——————————————–
- Crime & general news of Texas
- Motorcyclist killed in wreck while fleeing Harris County deputies, sheriff says
- Stabbing suspect killed by Houston police left psychiatric hospital 2 weeks earlier
- ‘He’s got a sword.’ A ‘delusional’ Texas man’s long wait for help VIDEO
- Historical human remains found near downtown San Antonio road improvement project
- DEA testing pills after 2 die in Travis County, officials say
- Austin entrepreneur and educator Khotso Khabele has died at age 46
- Police ID pedestrian killed while crossing I-35 in North Austin
- DPS: 2 pedestrians die in Odessa
- Odessa apartment fire being investigated as arson
- Ector County Sheriff’s deputy okay following crash in West Odessa
- West Lubbock hotel evacuated after reports of carbon monoxide exposure
- Off-duty Lubbock police officer saves elderly woman her burning house
- Good Samaritan pulls child from deadly wreck, father charged with murder
- Crew wanted for robbery inside east Houston brewery
- One dead, one injured in north Houston shooting
- ———————————————
- Local government
- Texas, Localities Amass $86 Billion in Unfunded Pension Liabilities
- Lubbock to spend almost $10 million on “pilot microtransit” program – I don’t have the numbers but I’d bet you could use Lyft and Uber, paying the commercial fare, and likely deliver the entire transit systems folks for less than its operating budget (excluding its on-campus contract service at TTU.)
- Edinburg CISD serves a million meals during coronavirus pandemic – schools should be for education but have been turned into social welfare agencies.
- Former Bowie Mayor Gaylynn Burris becomes mayor again to fill unexpired term
- Wichita Falls taxpayer subsidized hotel project put on hold, officials say VIDEO
- WFISD School Board votes on plans to move forward with potential property improvements
- WFISD purchasing over 180 acres for potential new high school; budget deadlock
- Bexar County leaders OK more money to help small business, discuss partnering with city on works program for coronavirus recovery
- Cleaning up South Dallas: An environmental grant is a step forward – you won’t fix anything until those who live their clean it up themselves and keep it that way.
- Renewable Energy Debate Comes to Bell County
- ———————————————
- Colleges & universities
- UT reports outbreak among custodial staff
- UT athletics issues 48-page guide with rules on returning to work amid coronavirus pandemic
- HSU Police Department Ensures Campus Safety – another ridiculous expense for a cash-strapped very small university.
- Worship Degree Now Available at WBU
- TTU: Today Marks The 20th Anniversary Of The First West Texas Mesonet Installation
- TTU Researcher Uses Design To Improve Life For People With Neurodiversities
Pratt’s post for 5/19/2020
May 19, 2020 by Leave a Comment
Speak Your Mind