edited by: Ted McLaughlin,
Texas Editor
Capital Metro's commuter rail line, set to begin operation in a few months, still doesn't have approval from the Federal Railroad Administration.
Wear: What's in rail name? Tougher rules
Looks like former rail director, Rich Krisak bailed for Atlanta just in time.
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Richard Wright, keyboardist and founding member of Pink Floyd, died today of cancer.
Pink Floyd’s Richard Wright Dies at 65 - Obituary (Obit) - NYTimes.com
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IdolHands takes a look at BarackObama.com and JohnMcCain.com to see how they stack up against each other in standards-compliance and design. The verdict? Republicans still have work to do.
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A pedestrian was struck by a Houston Metro Rail train earlier this week. One of nearly 40 rail accidents that go unreported or underreported. Another glimpse of things to come for Austin.
Capital Metro's commuter rail line is (not surprisingly) running behind schedule. The rail line running from Leander to downtown Austin is now not expected to open until March.
One more broken promise from CapMetro. First, Austin taxpayers get soaked with annual operating costs that are double [...]
Woman's weight poses challenge for courts in murder case:
The Hidalgo County Jail is not equipped to handle an inmate who weighs nearly 1,000 pounds, Sheriff Lupe Trevino said. And even if a cell and a bed for Rosales were available, deputies are not sure if the physician on staff [...]
Austin's Health and Human Services and Police departments paid UT $48,000 to survey Austin's omnipresent panhandlers. I'm sure they were shocked to learn that these people have problems:
Panhandlers in Austin want regular jobs but confront multiple barriers, including mental health problems and lack of identification materials, that [...]
Two stories today on illegal immigration. First, the Statesman has a report about state Sen. Dan Patrick and Rep. Frank Corte, Jr.'s request to the Attorney General to issue an opinion on the policies of "sanctuary cities" (like Austin) that restrict the ability of local police to enforce immigration [...]
I blogged about this a couple of weeks ago. AISD met last night to take public input on a proposed property tax increase to pay for teacher raises and benefits. No one opposed to the increase showed up for the meeting. The board will vote next [...]
Austin Bloggers News and Announcements: Zero Tolerance:
In the past week, I've removed six real estate blogs from the portal for violating the guidelines of this site. I intend to remove on sight any real estate blog (or, for that matter, any non-personal blog) that violates the guidelines.
I [...]
Our mayor and city council... the bigger the price tag, the more they seem to like any proposal that comes to the chamber.
The Travis Monitor: Up in Smoke - Austin's BioFuel Boondoggle
[...]Valleywag has more on T. Boone Pickens' energy scam:
Greenwashing: T. Boone Pickens proves where there's a drill, there's a way
Greenwashing — the practice of gussying up old-fashioned capitalism as newfangled Earth-saving — is an art form. I used to think local greenwashers Pacific Gas & Electric and [...]
This story seems to run counter to the commonly-accepted doom-and-gloom narrative for the Austin real-estate market:
The Austin-area real estate market continued to outperform the nation in the second quarter of 2008, a new report from the National Association of Realtors said Thursday.
Median home prices in the [...]
I've been using a couple of different rechargeable wireless mice for a while now. They're crap.
Yeah, I'm lookin' at you, Logitech.
Seriously. Any product that requires you to have a completely different duplicate product as a backup really needs to be re-thought. When the battery [...]
For such a "green" city, Austin is really behind on a lot of things. We will finally getting single stream recyling this fall.
Single-stream recycling allows you to place all of your recycables into one container rather than having to sort them out into multiple [...]
District 50 state rep. and uber-liberal Mark Strama extolled the virtues of the Democrats' "Drill nowhere. Drill never. Pay more" energy plan last at the Travis County Democratic Issues Policy Forum.
Sticking to the party talking points, Strama repeated the asinine "we can't drill our way out" [...]
Quid Nimis has been blogging about the Russian attack on Georgia since the outset. The Illustrate Conservative wonders, where's the outrage from the chronically-outraged?
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Hmm... Fodder for the chain-emailers and something for Obamatons to cry foul over no doubt, but Obama holds both US and Kenyan citizenship.
O-no by Quid Nimis
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Home broadband adoption continues to grow, with 55% of Americans now having broadband connections at home.
Just 10% of Americans are still using dial-up. Broadband growth was also strong with [...]
TAB wants tougher accountability system:
The Texas school accountability system is not doing a very good job holding schools accountable, Texas Association of Business president Bill Hammond said at a news conference Thursday.
“We can’t have a first-rate education system in Texas with a second-rate accountability system,” Hammond said.
He took issue [...]
Texas Libertarian Party Executive Director Wes Benedict wants Republicans to hand over participant list for the 2008 precinct conventions, but it seems nobody's home at the Travis County Republican Party headquarters.
Libertarians' emails and phone calls requesting the lists have gone unanswered since April. [...]
Blue Dot Blues alerts us of a MoveOn.org stunt to deliver a "petition" to Congressman Michael McCaul's office today at noon opposing off-shore drilling. Liberals are watching what's happening with the Don't Go revolt and they're getting worried. Not only are conservatives beginning to embrace and make effective [...]
Getting a chance to hear Texas Public Policy Foundation education policy analyst Brooke Dollens Terry speak at last night's Austin Townhall Conservatives Meetup was fortuitous because I learn this morning that AISD bureaucrats are [...]
Undress4Success - Slap In Face Of Telecommuting:
Seems the Democrats have their nose out of joint because the Connecticut Republican leader Lawrence Cafero has proposed a telecommuting plan, and they didn’t think of it first. At least that’s what I gather from a piece Christopher Keating wrote today in [...]
Close races and Republican dissatisfaction are lending Libertarians new-found clout.
Libertarians meet with speaker's staff:
Libertarians continue to enjoy overtures from Republicans who, at least in some circles, worry that third-party candidates could be a factor in close races this fall.
Just days after ex-state Rep. Suzanna Hupp, R-Lampasas, urged Libertarians [...]
No doubt a glimpse of things to come for Austin drivers, North Texas officials will ask the legislature to approve a huge hike in vehicle registration fees to pay for expansion of light rail. And to rub a little salt in the wound, they're calling it a "user" tax:
While [...]
My wife, Daphne Holland, has a stunning new collection of encaustic work going up today at Bradz Salon on West 6th. The collection will be on display tonight and show through August. Stop by and check it out.
This collection follows Daphne's previous highly sought-after encaustic [...]
If you use the HTML/Javascript Twitter badge, you've probably noticed that it has issues under Internet Explorer. It will generally work the first time a user hits the page, but if the next time, the badge will not show a tweet list. Here is a work-around you can use if [...]
Suzanna Hupp, formerly state rep for District 54, made calls to three Libertarian candidates in close House races asking them to drop out. Texas Libertarian Party Executive Director Wes Benedict encouraged the candidates to stand their ground and make the Republicans "earn those votes". Good advice.
I don't want to [...]
After flip-flopping on ANWR...
... Noriega just can't seem to figure this whole energy policy thing out. From the Austin Chronicle:
You know those kids' puzzles where you have to find the four or five differences between two nearly identical cartoons? That's how Texas voters might feel [...]
[By way of Sal]
From thenewspaper.com - a transportation policy blog:
GAO Questions Wisdom of Public Private Partnerships
Government Accountability Office testimony warns of need to better assess the true cost of privately operated toll roads.
The Government Accountability Office last week questioned the wisdom of using public-private partnerships to build [...]
Along with their egos, Mayor Wynn and Council Member McCracken’s light rail vanity project is getting bigger and more expensive:
$600 million streetcar plan offered for Austin
City consultant's proposal still a work in progress, and many hurdles remain before concept could become a reality....
Central Austin should have a 15.3-mile [...]
Google's campaign for complete ownership of all things information marches on:
A few months ago we announced that we were testing a new product called Knol. Knols are authoritative articles about specific topics, written by people who know about those subjects. Today, we're making Knol available to everyone.
Well, I just got home from the second day of the Defending the American Dream Summit (see previous post).
Yesterday's session wrapped up with up with a speech from Barry Goldwater, Jr. and a keynote address from Robert "The Prince of Darkness" Novak. Novak was hilarious. He had [...]
I had a great time today at the Defending the American Dream Summit. This online activism and new media conference sponsored by Americans for Prosperity is a smaller, less noisy counter to the liberal Netroots Nation event being held downtown here in Austin.
It was great to spend time [...]
After Fox 7's Crystal Cotti calls out a Chronicle contributor for using the term "redneck fiefdom" in reference to Mustang Ridge in a discussion about the illegal immigrant detention center / "wetback" flap, the Chronicle's response is typical: ethnic pejoratives are A-OK as long as they're aimed [...]
I've finally gotten around to restoring a few videos from my old site. These three are from anti-war protests beginning just before the 2004 election and into 2005.
In this video, from 2004, anti-war demonstrators are surprised to be confronted by a small group of conservative counter-protesters (Young Conservatives of [...]
When EmpowerTexans PAC posted a YouTube parody of a recent political ad from the campaign of Martha Tyroch (who is in a run-off battle for the Republican nomination in the House District 55 race), the Tyroch campaign didn't like it and had YouTube pull the video claiming "copyright [...]
The Commodore 64 is celebrating it's 25th anniversary!
What memories. The C64 hit the shelves in August of 1982 and brought computing to millions that previously couldn't afford it.
I think I got my first C64 sometime in 1983. It wasn't technically my first computer - [...]
