People receiving extended unemployment benefits should be required to provide a public service while getting public assistance, so says Texas’ Workforce Commission chairman Tom Pauken. Predictably, critics, such as the Texas AFL-CIO, have blasted the idea.

This past weekend’s Dallas Morning News carried a predictable, editorial which sadly reflects the views of many in our society who believe themselves to be educated but aren’t.

As we all know, the next legislative session will be consumed by redistricting, along with the biennial budget, a voter ID bill, a sonogram bill, a possible immigration debate, and a potential challenge to Joe Straus for the Speaker’s gavel. However, redistricting is probably the most pertinent issue as Texas is expected to gain four congressional seats–four times as many as any other state!

Since I commented on Speaker Straus’ headlining of a fundraiser for State Representative Patrick Rose, I have gotten to know his opponent, Jason Isaac, and the people of HD 45. Many people had told me that Jason was “the real deal,” someone who stands by his principles and can beat Rose with an impressive grassroots effort.

Liberal Democrat Carol Morgan is that Leftwing Party’s nominee for the House District 84 seat. She will face conservative Republican John Frullo

Talk about a case of elitist conceit. Outgoing State Sen. Kip Averitt (R-Waco) managed to badly mangle his transition into political retirement, with a ham-handed withdrawal, forcing a series of very costly elections. Now, because a conservative has won the seat to fill his unexpired term, the Waco moderate is considering not withdrawing from the November ballot. And some politicos wonder why so many people have given up on what they see as a corrupt, good-old-boy system.

I was taught growing up that “bad company corrupts good character,” and that a man can be defined by his friends. Kind of makes you wonder, then, what David Sibley is doing hanging around with the likes of leftist Bernard Rappoport.

I am the future!

Well, not necessarily me personally, but people like me certainly are.

In a blistering letter to the chairman of the Texas State University System (TSUS), state Sen. Jeff Wentworth (R-San Antonio) trashed the character and qualifications of former state Rep. Brian McCall (R-Plano) to serve as the system’s chancellor. Sent on official stationary of “The Senate of The State of Texas,” this letter should send both an encouraging and troubling signal to conservatives and taxpayer advocates. In the letter, Sen. Wentworth makes the case that he should have been picked for the bureaucratic post on the basis of his history of delivering billions in pork over the years.

Attempting to capitalize on the recent rumblings in Texas sports about the realignment of the Big 12 Conference, Democratic gubernatorial nominee Bill White has revealed either a contempt for the state’s boards of regents, a complete misunderstanding of their job, or his desire to centralize even more power into the Office of the Governor. Apparently he believes the governor alone would decide all aspects of university life.