can we now start recall on this idiot Perry???nt

[OBrien]

[sonias]

1. Probably not worth the effort at this point

He's up for reelection next year anyway. The best thing to do is make sure he doesn't win another term in office. And for him that means he could be a loser by the March primary.

Sonia

[gilbertb11]

2. Perry Asks for $900 Million in Texans' Tax Dollars After Rejecting Fed Stimulus Funds

Perry Asks for $900 Million in Texans' Tax Dollars After Rejecting Fed Stimulus Funds

by: Katherine Haenschen
Fri May 15, 2009 at 11:41 AM CDT

After rejecting $556 million in federal stimulus dollars to expand unemployment benefits here in Texas, Governor Perry has decided to request another $900 million from our own Texas taxpayers' pockets to fund his office's business development initiatives. This comes after Perry's projects have already been sucking money out of our unemployment trust fund. Seems like Governor Perry's just in it for himself, and not for hard-working Texans who can't stay afloat in this tough economy.

News 8 reports today that Governor Perry has asked the State Senate for another $900 million to be added to the budget to fund his business development programs. The House is refusing, so Perry has taken his case to the State Senate, where the 19-12 Republican majority favors his agenda slightly better.

The $900 million would primarily go towards two discretionary funds overseen by the Governor's office: the Texas Enterprise Fund, and the Emerging Technology Fund. Neither are bad on the outset: the first fund helps business move to Texas or expand herein. The latter helps fund R&D. That's all well and good, except that the funds have faced criticism lately for a lack of legislative oversight. The Emerging Technologies fund recently drew fire over Perry's creation of a biomedical facility at Texas A&M, his alma mater, without sufficient oversight of the taxpayer-funded initiative.

Here's the catch: Perry's business-development projects are already paid for with our unemployment fund. From News 8:


The Associated Press Tuesday reported his Texas Enterprise Fund for businesses steadily pulls in tens of millions of dollars from the dwindling Texas unemployment tax pool.



Each October, if the amount of money in the is above a certain level, 75 percent of that holding account money goes to the Texas Enterprise Fund and 25 percent to a skills development fund to help retrain workers.

This comes, of course, after Perry rejected $556 million in Federal stimulus dollars for unemployed Texans, because he didn't want to broaden eligibility and help more folks keep their heads above water.

The House already rejected Perry's initial demands because both funds have healthy budgets already -- $200 million and $100 million, respectively. They'd prefer Perry focus on bringing more money to Texas, rather than just giving it away:

back in the House, lawmakers have attached a provision in their budget that would zero-out the Enterprise Fund if Perry continues to reject federal stimulus money to fund unemployment benefits.

So lemme get this straight. Heck, lemme make a list.

1) Perry rejects $556 million in federal stimulus dollars because it would require broadening benefits and helping more Texans (and thus, spending the money).

2) Perry asks for $900 million in Texan taxpayers' dollars to fund his own business development initiatives without sufficient oversight or transparency.

3) Perry gets 75% of what's left in the unemployment fund for his own projects if it isn't spent by October.

All in all, not a bad deal for Governor Perry. He gets to reject Federal money, which appeals to his tea-bagging base; prevent spending more money on those who need it most; hog taxpayer dollars to fund long-term projects that won't necessary help suffering Texans right away; and then take whatever unemployment money he's managed to keep from the people of Texas to repeat the cycle.

Hurting Texans while appealing to the base? All in a day's work for Governor Rick Perry.

[Why Syzygy]

3. Hi, gilbertb11

:hi: Welcome to DU. You've been registered awhile, but since you haven't posted much, may not have been welcomed.

Do you have enough posts to post an OP? This would be great in GD.

[Aragorn]

4. How many posts does it take?

I haven't seen a text version of what he said about secession (again) or I would gladly post a link.

[Why Syzygy]

6. DU rules don't say exactly.

It could be variable I guess.

This is the link for the post above:
http://www.burntorangereport.com/user/Katherine%20Haenschen

This is Huffpost's coverage on the Perry show:

AUSTIN, Texas -- Texas Gov. Rick Perry fired up an anti-tax "tea party" Wednesday with his stance against the federal government and for states' rights as some in his U.S. flag-waving audience shouted, "Secede!"

An animated Perry told the crowd at Austin City Hall -- one of three tea parties he was attending across the state -- that officials in Washington have abandoned the country's founding principles of limited government. He said the federal government is strangling Americans with taxation, spending and debt.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/15/gov-rick-perry-texas-coul_n_187490.html

[sonias]

7. Not many but they don't publish a number

Here is the rules page answer:

DU FAQ

How many posts do I need to start a new thread, etc?

New members are restricted from starting new discussion topics. We require you to first post responses to a few existing discussion threads before you are given the privilege to do so. We wish we did not have to enforce this rule, but we have found it very helpful to keep disruptors off of our message board. Please do not ask what the minimum number is; we won't tell you, and it's not very high. New members are similarly restricted from using the private messaging function or recommending topics for the Greatest Page.

I think you probably have enough to start a thread Aragon. Just go ahead and try and if the post option is available to you then you are good to go.

Have fun and good posting!

Sonia

[Name removed]

10. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[gilbertb11]

8. Thanks for the welcome

Yeah, I'm sort of a silent ready. No, apparently, I don't enough posts to start a new thread. I just thought it was an interested post read so I thought it appropriate to post under this topic.

[Aragorn]

5. Legislature fighting back

But, as you note, the lege is fighting back. Remember, a couple days after his first "secession" comments they stripped almost his entire office budget. Of course it was something like $24 million, which is a pretty ridiculous amount of tax money to run an office.

Now they are NOT giving in on this, even fighting back.

Perry got less than 50% of the vote in the last governor's race.

People here are more liberal and better-informed than some of the pols think.

[Gulftrout]

11. Thank God. But the Lege needs to keep its nose clean for the credibility!

Why does a prominent State Senator have a guy on his payroll who’s been arrested for voter fraud?

It’s interesting to note that State Senator John Whitmire (15-Houston) regularly pays a guy named Carl Whitmarsh, who has a history of arrest for voting fraud in Harris County dating all the way back to 1993! The story I heard was Whitmarsh stuffed some ballot boxes during the 1992 elections. The last checks from Whitmire’s campaign account to Whitmarsh were reported in the July 2008 report. We’ll see if he shows up again in this summer’s report. And it appears Whitmarsh is still up to his illegal shenanigans of voter fraud: Whitmarsh gets Whitmire’s paychecks sent to an address off Acorn in Pct. 270, yet Whitmarsh has his voter registration listed in Pct.73 in Garden Oaks. And to top it off, the Texas Democratic Party, various organizations, and county parties actually rely on this guy Whitmarsh to serve as their mouthpiece to get out word on events. The Democratic Party could do better than to rely on this man of questionable character. Who would want to jeopardize their reputations by associating with this guy?

I like anyone want to see Perry impeached. But lets keep ALL our legislators accountable for their actions (and payments) so they can continue to keep their eyes on the right prize!

[sonias]

9. Governor asshat (Keith Olbermann on Texas Secession)

Tips to Karl-Thomas Musselman on Burnt Orange Report.
It's a pretty funny rant. We can all laugh at Perry. Keith gives him the whole big long list. :rofl:

Keith Olbermann on Texas Secession video from Keith's new WTF momment segment.

Sonia