Evan Smith had a sit-down with new Speaker Joe Straus, which was broadcast Thursday on KLRU in Austin. You can watch the video of it at that link; it's a little less than 30 minutes. Straus has made a good impression so far. Assuming there's no shenanigans on committee assignments and there's no Senate-like outbreak of voter ID madness, this may be a productive session.

For purposes of comparison, have a look at the interview Elise Hu conducted with former Speaker Tom Craddick. Like another formerly powerful Republican I can think of, apparently none of the bad things that happened on his watch were his fault. Funny how that goes.

Meanwhile, Burka has a look at the proposed new House rules, which should go a long way towards putting the Craddick era behind us, and Elise has a list of Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst's top priorities for the session, to which Eye on Williamson adds a few thoughts. Finally, this doesn't have anything to do with the Lege, but I wanted to note that Governor Perry and local religious conservative Steven Hotze have kissed and made up. Do yourself a favor and scroll through the comments for an awesome assortment of creatively-spelled reactions from the type of voter Perry is trying to woo in 2010 with this reconciliation. It's really...well, just go see for yourself.