Pardon me while I brew myself a cup of tea and stare meaningfully out the window.
Beto O’Rourke
Texas’ Republican statewide primaries are heating up as challengers emerged in recent weeks for both Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton. But for all the Republican maneuvering, Democrats are remaining quiet about primary plans.
Texas Democrats are in a holding pattern as they plan for the 2022 cycle for two main reasons. First, the party establishment is waiting on former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke to announce whether he will run for governor.
Secondly, and crucially, incumbents and potential candidates across the state are awaiting the release this fall of new district maps to decide whether they’ll retire, run for reelection or consider a statewide bid. The new maps will come from the decennial redistricting process where lawmakers redraw the boundaries of the state’s congressional, legislative and State Board of Education districts.
“There’s a lot of planning and strategizing behind the scenes,” said Royce Brooks, the executive director of Annie’s List, the Texas Democratic women-in-politics group. “Whatever Beto decides to do is the domino that affects everybody.”
[…]
Beyond O’Rourke, there is some chatter that former U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro or U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro might make a run for governor. Otherwise, the field of potential candidates are a mix of current and former state legislators.
Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo remains a much pined-for candidate, particularly among female Democratic operatives, but so far she has not expressed interest in running statewide next year.
And there are some Democrats who have announced runs for statewide offices, but few are well-funded. Two candidates that have earned the most notice are Mike Collier, who ran for lieutenant governor two years ago and is making another run, and former Galveston Mayor Joe Jaworski, who is running for attorney general.
[…]
In a traditional election cycle, candidates tend to roll out their campaigns over the spring and summer of the off-year, but this year potential candidates are still watching and waiting for the new district maps.
The entire Texas election calendar could also be moved back, due to the delayed census amid the COVID-19 pandemic and the ripple effect on reapportionment and the Texas Legislature’s ability to draw maps.
Some statewide Democratic candidates could emerge after the maps are finished. If a Democratic incumbent finds themselves in a carved up district where he or she has no chance at reelection, the notion of running statewide — still an incredible challenge for Democrats — actually could be an easier lift than reelection.
See here for the previous update. I would say that one race has “heated up” on the Republican side, and that’s the race for Attorney General, where the opportunity to challenge a guy who’s been indicted by the state, is being investigated by the FBI and sued by several former top staffers who accuse him of being a crook, and also facing a State Bar complaint for filing a frivolous and batshit crazy lawsuit to overturn the Presidential election, would normally be seen as an obvious thing for anyone with ambition to do. The entry of a low-wattage one-term former State Senator into the gubernatorial primary is in my mind no different than Steve Stockman’s 2014 primary challenge to Sen. John Cornyn, but your mileage may vary.
I’m as big a fan of Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo as anyone, but I say there’s a zero percent chance she runs statewide in 2022. There’s no evidence to suggest that this is something she wants to do. My personal belief is that she wants to finish the job she started as County Judge, and only then will she consider something different (which may be retiring from politics). I could be wrong, and if Democrats do break through in 2022 and President Biden carries Texas in 2024 then it’s certainly possible Judge Hidalgo could be one of presumably many Dems to throw a hat in for 2026, but the very composition of this sentence should be acting to cool your jets. I will be extremely surprised if she does something other than run for re-election in 2022.
The prospect of someone who loses out in redistricting running for something statewide is one I hadn’t really considered before. It didn’t happen in 2012, mostly because there wasn’t anyone for the Republicans to screw out of a seat that year, given how they beat anyone who was beatable in 2010. Republicans will have more targets this time, though they are also operating on much tighter margins, but I could see a legislator who gets left without a winnable district deciding to run for something statewide. If nothing else, it’s a good way to build name ID and a donor base, and puts you in the conversation for next time. It’s all too vague and theoretical now to toss out any names, but this is something to keep an eye on.
Oh, and before I forget: Please don’t make us wait too long, Beto.
Beto should just get a regular job. He wet the bed with his Twitter a couple of months ago, said that Abbott had sent us all to certain death by ending the masks and shutdowns. Here we are, we’ve done fine. He’s proven that Abbott is a much better scientist, but still lots of problems with Abbott (power grid, and declaring authoritarian mandates in the first place).
VIRUS LOAD MATTERS, NOT JUST MASK QUALITY
Mr. Hochman, here is the latest science:
Face masks effectively limit the probability of SARS-CoV-2 transmission,
SCIENCE Vol. 372, Issue 6549 (June 25, 2021), pp. 1439-1443
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/372/6549/1439
EXCERPT
The effectiveness of masks in preventing the transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 has been debated since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. One important question is whether masks are effective despite the forceful expulsion of respiratory matter during coughing and sneezing.
Cheng et al. convincingly show that most people live in conditions in which the airborne virus load is low. The probability of infection changes nonlinearly with the amount of respiratory matter to which a person is exposed.
If most people in the wider community wear even simple surgical masks, then the probability of an encounter with a virus particle is even further limited. In indoor settings, it is impossible to avoid breathing in air that someone else has exhaled, and in hospital situations where the virus concentration is the highest, even the best-performing masks used without other protective gear such as hazmat suits will not provide adequate protection.
I was hoping back in 2006 that we Dems would have had former congressmen post Delaymander running statewide than we did.
We’ll see what happens to Bucy/Talarico, Zwiener, Goodwin, and a couple of the reps in the Valley. I think the GOP will try to draw 86-88 GOP seats but they will dummymander Tarrant and Fort Bend this time. Not sure how aggressive they draw the Senate since they have to protect Paxton, Huffman, and Hancock to a lesser extent.
“If most people in the wider community wear even simple surgical masks, then the probability of an encounter with a virus particle is even further limited. In indoor settings, it is impossible to avoid breathing in air that someone else has exhaled, and… <<>>”
Peace out you 150+ (ex)Methodist employees who chose not to get vaxxed.
Interesting story in TX Monthly about a law firm employee who was canned for climbing over an El Paso zoo enclosure to feed monkeys Flaming Hot Cheetos. She was promptly hired by another Atty who argued she shouldn’t have been fired for breaching a zoo enclosure and feeding monkeys Flaming Hot Cheetos ’cause she wasn’t on the clock when she did it.
MISSING TEXT: “….in hospital situations where the virus concentration is the highest, even the best-performing masks used without other protective gear such as hazmat suits will not provide adequate protection….”
Peace out you 150+ (ex)Methodist employees who chose not to get vaxxed.
Interesting story in TX Monthly about a law firm employee who was canned for climbing over an El Paso zoo enclosure to feed monkeys Flaming Hot Cheetos. She was promptly hired by another Atty who argued she shouldn’t have been fired for breaching a zoo enclosure and feeding monkeys Flaming Hot Cheetos ’cause she wasn’t on the clock when she did it.
policywonqeria, the study once again has no control, and therefore is not really great science. It shows small benefit to wearing a mask where virus is already low, but then says that flimsy masks do nothing at all in a high concentration of virus environment. In that case, you need one of the suits with a filter for breathing air.
I have yet to see any study that suggest that wearing a mask protects other people. Of course, protecting yourself does indirectly protect others. If you don’t have it, you can’t spread it.
Many more papers that show no significance for wearing masks in real world situations. Other papers that show that mask mandates specifically don’t make a difference. (which is not the same as the potential benefit of wearing a mask). Beto went off on Abbott because Abbott ended the state mask mandate. It was the right thing to do, and Beto was wrong. If he had been governor, we would still be wearing masks and hiding until 2055. Of course Beto would be going out to lunch at the French Laundry while we cowered.
C.L. I wouldn’t eat Flaming Hot Cheetos, and wouldn’t feed them to any animals. Other than maybe a cheetah.
PROUDLY PROFESSING IGNORANCE
Re: “I have yet to see any study that suggest that wearing a mask protects other people.”
If you assume the position of the proverbial ostrich sticking its head into the sand, your vision will predictably be impaired. A lack of vision does not compel the conclusion that there is no world above the sand-rich subterraneous environment surrounding the buried head.
FALLACY: I don’t see it, therefore it can’t be there. All I need to do is close my eyes, and that makes the disliked matter go away.
So here, we have Mr. Hochman vs. an international and interdisciplinary group of researchers. To wit:
Yafang Cheng
Nan Ma
Christian Witt
Steffen Rapp
Philipp S. Wild
Meinrat O. Andreae
Ulrich Pöschl
Hang Su
Institutional Affiliations:
1 Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, 55128 Mainz, Germany.
2 Institute for Environmental and Climate Research, Jinan University, Guangzhou 511443, China.
3 Department of Outpatient Pneumology and Institute of Physiology, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Campus Charité Mitte, 10117 Berlin, Germany.
4 University Medical Center of the Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz, 55131 Mainz, Germany.
5 Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA.
6 Department of Geology and Geophysics, King Saud University, 11451 Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
7 State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Formation and Prevention of Urban Air Pollution Complex, Shanghai Academy of Environmental Sciences, Shanghai 200233, China.
Mr. Hochman dismisses their collective research results, published today in SCIENCE, a leading outlet for cutting-edge scientific research on the global level, and does not even bother to cite to any of the studies or reports that would weaken their conclusions or put their strength or validity in doubt. Not to mention addressing in any meaningful way the question of research design and control while basing his summary knee-jerk rejection of the study on that unexplored methodological objection.
Why should anyone listen to Jason Hochman and his ilk?
What needs un-masking here is ignorance and lousy argumentation in the form of unsupported conclusory assertions, apparently fueled by inchoate personal grudges.
Wolf,
You can start off by discounting any of the CCP linked folks. They’re the ones that unleashed this on the world…..maybe not trusting them is reasonable?
As to the Germans, the last decent things that came from Germany were the Michael Shenker Group, The Scorpions, and (arguably) Kraftwerk. Having said that, we gave Germany David Hasselhoff, so maybe they owe us some payback for that.
🙂
KRAUTROCK AND ROCKET SCIENCE
Ethnic Germans are actually pretty good in the Kraftwerk department, not to mention the already-legendary accomplishments of the Autobahn-oriented Bavarian Motor Werks and the not-just terrestrial rocket science of Team Braun; — the sort that post-war Amis found useful for sundry Russki-containment and moonshot purposes.
They also do windmills better than Sancho Panza, and got the tilting down to the precise adjustable angle. For the cutting 115-meter edge rotor science, check out –> Fraunhofer IWES
IN GOD WE TRUST, BUT NOT IN PUC
Instead of getting rid of bloody nonresident unaffiliated members, the Texas Parliament could’a — and perhaps shoud’a — put some krauts on the ERCOT board, preferably the kind that doesn’t already operate wind farms or pass gas in and around Texas.
Not to mention taking inspiration from their federal Kartellamt.
See here (in English translation sogar):
https://www.bundeskartellamt.de/EN/Economicsectors/Energy/energy_node.html
And how about the idea of a Market Transparency Unit?
What? … Transparency? Can’t have that in Texas.
—-
Transatlantic lingo note: KRAFTWERK = power station, generator, krautrock band
Daily dose of H-Town-Deutsch trivia: The mini-generator that is standard on German bicycles for riding in the dark is called “Dynamo” rather than kraftwerk. Since 2013, battery-fed bike lights are also allowed pursuant to tongue twister Straßenverkehrs-Zulassungs-Ordnung (StVZO) § 67.
You have cited the same study that you linked earlier. Again with the Misinformation. I am not “dismissing” their result, nor telling you what to believe.
Their paper acknowledges the limitations:
“Moreover, randomized clinical trials have shown inconsistent or inconclusive results, with some studies reporting only a marginal benefit or no effect of mask use (5, 6). Thus, surgical and similar masks are often considered to be ineffective. On the other hand, observational data show that regions or facilities with a higher percentage of the population wearing masks have better control of COVID-19 (7–9). So how are we to explain these contrasting results and apparent inconsistencies? ”
Randomized clinical trials are the gold standard. Without a control group you aren’t really doing Science. The paper starts off by stating that randomized trials have not shown any significant benefit from masks. They show that if there aren’t very many viruses, a mask is more effective. But of course if there aren’t many ambient virus particles, you have less chance of being infected with or without a mask.
The paper also acknowledges that other measures may play a part: “Notably, the increasing effectiveness of mask use at low virus abundance implies synergistic effects of combining masks with other preventive measures that reduce the airborne-virus concentration, such as ventilation and social distancing”
They also claim that masks do have a source control effect, but don’t make a strong case for it. Mostly, in my interpretation of their study, the mask protects the wearer, not other people.
There are many papers you can find that show little or no efficacy of masks in real world settings. Just take your head out of the Fauci sand, and please remove your Proudly Professing Ignorance title. Thanks.
I love Kraftwerk, especially Trans Europe Express and Radioactive. They are also avid bicyclists, accused of ignoring their music in order to tour around the countryside. The German bicycle maker Canyon made a beautiful and very expensive limited edition Kraftwerk bicycle. As for Michael Schenker, not so much a fan of MSG and Scorpions, but UFO is pretty amazing, especially Phenomenon LP from the early 70s.
Germany also gave us the air cooled VWs and Porsche and the older BMWs, both cars and motorcycles.
PS. By the way the topic of the post and my initial comment were in the context of Beto vs. Abbott. When Abbott announced that he was ending the mask requirements and occupancy limits, Beto hysterically Twittered that Abbott had sentenced us all to certain death.
Now, it has been 3 months since Abbott took this action, and here we are without a massive death toll, and the state has been doing fine. One point to Abbott.
Secondly, Beto was twittering about Abbott ending the mask mandate. Whether or not masks work is a separate question from whether or not mask mandates work. And another question is do we want the government ordering us to do every health and safety intervention? Do we trust the people to gather their own information and make informed choices about if/when to wear masks and what type of mask to use? We want to make sure everyone can vote but we don’t trust them to make this decision? Should the police with their reduced funding be wasting their time to give citations to people not wearing a mask instead of addressing, for example, the murder epidemic?
UFO was great, but underrated. I didn’t mention them because they’re English, not German. Lights Out was my favorite album to sustain hearing damage with.
Jason the prolific liar is consistent with his lies.
Abbott did “Murder” thousands of Texans by lifting the mask mandate early.
https://www.statesman.com/story/news/politics/politifact/2021/05/26/texas-recorded-thousands-covid-deaths-since-removing-mask-mandate/7436158002/
HOW TEXAS NEWSPAPERS COULD BECOME MORE RELEVANT
Thank you for the link, Mr. Manny. Unfortunately, that Austin, TX newspaper is behind a paywall. It would be great if Texas newspapers were to implement a permeable paywall system that applies locally (to avoid losing paying customers in their prime/home territory), but allows free access from IP addresses from elsewhere in Texas, from other states, and internationally.
Most average folks are not going to pay to subscribe to more than one newspaper, and the obvious choice would be the local one (or nearest metro paper such as Houston Chronicle, Dallas Morning News, or San Antonio Express-News). Therefore, granting free access from elsewhere — i.e., outside the home territory — should not have much of an impact on revenue (The same would obviously not apply to quality papers with nationwide subscribership and readership such as NYT, WSJ, or WP).
Alternatively, it would be helpful if Texas newspapers were to at least show the top two paragraphs of locally-generated articles. That would facilitate meaningful citation, and would increase site traffic and at least generate some marginal additional revenue through the ads served on the page. And visitors would linger longer if they get to read at least the top portion of the article, rather than just the headline.
A look at the state’s COVID-19 dashboard shows that, although daily fatality numbers are decreasing, more than 3,000 Texans have died of the coronavirus since the mask mandate was lifted. That’s about 6% of the 50,000 deaths Texas has recorded since the beginning of the pandemic.
…
A look at the state’s COVID-19 dashboard shows that, although daily fatality numbers are decreasing, more than 3,000 Texans have died of the coronavirus since the mask mandate was lifted. That’s about 6% of the 50,000 deaths Texas has recorded since the beginning of the pandemic.
This total also does not include fatalities from May 23 to date, which have not yet been recorded by the state. And totals from May 10 onward are still trickling in because, according to a Texas Department of State Health Services spokesperson, it takes around 10 days, on average, for funeral homes and medical officials to submit death certificates.