Endorsing Straus doesn’t make Straus a conservative. It makes you a liberal.

The man you endorsed:

1. Was brought to power by the Democrats
   
2. Only has unanimous pledges for Speaker from one party in the House of Representatives: The Democrats. Straus is the Democrats choice.
   
3. Presided over a session wherein roll-rates indicated clear Democratic control

Galveston Judge Susan Criss is blocking General Abbott’s order for the release of TWIA settlement details.

The Straus team, which includes the Austin media jack-in-the-boxes, is making hay about the pledge count. Straus has 120 and Paxton has 12. It’s a good sound bite for them.

It’s also as hollow as a paper mache speaker gavel.

Joe Straus’s sacrificing of his relationship with Larry Taylor at the altar of establishment control exposes his “let’s all be sweet to each other” scam. Taylor is being scapegoated amid an ethics storm gathering around the Straus team.

So much for that congenial loyalty we’ve heard about. Texas House Speaker Joe Straus this weekend tossed House Republican Caucus chairman Larry Taylor under the proverbial bus. So much for friendship.

In an interview with the Houston Chronicle, Straus said he wants the Texas House to address ethics reform.

Joe Straus lieutenant Jim Pitts provided a snapshot for the importance of the Texas House Speaker race when he told a questioner that to save any money opting out of federal Medicaid Texas would have to throw people out on the street .

We’re in the frontier with this speaker’s race. Nobody knows what we’ll find. Nobody’s been here before.

With the removal of the law that forbade citizen engagement in the race, all of us have front row seats to the new system.

Political peace and quiet would be the worst possible sign for Texas voters right now, so we should be very encouraged by the Speaker’s race fight. The old guard will do everything it can to convince us the conservatives we sent to Austin are causing problems, but it’s exactly the opposite. They’re causing solutions.

Politicians are judged primarily on their philosophical commitments and voting record. Other things that determine the effectiveness of a politician, like agenda-setting and toughness, need more attention.

How does a party, with as powerful a mandate as the Texas GOP just acquired, motivate for election day 2012? After all, nobody is afraid of the liberals right now. In one day, American liberals went from tigers to orange tabbies.