So, we are looking for a new DNC Chief.  The names that have floated to the top of my bucket are Keith Ellison, Martin O’Malley and Howard Dean.

I like all three.

Keith Ellison would be best because he’s Keith Ellison.  He came to my county to do a fundraiser for one of our candidates and and brought an upbeat, energy charged liberal message.  The downside is that he’s already got a job and you can recall the problems we had with Debbie Wasserman Schultz trying to be both a congressman and a DNC Chief.  His former Chief of Staff is one of my good friends and tells me that Keith is the real deal. However, the conflict of interest in fundraising concerns me.

Martin O’Malley might be the key to bringing white men back into the fold.  He’s funny, smart, warm, authentic, and progressive. Most importantly, he can do a full time job of the position and has no conflict of interest with fundraising. His Chief of Staff is also a good friend of mine and he has amazing political instincts and great outreach to the Asian community.

I also have no complaints about Howard Dean.

So far, I’m conflicted.  If you live in Texas, a list of the DNC members (who will elect the new Chairman) is here under the Senate Districts.  Their contact information is also included. Please contact them with your thoughts.

If you have a link to your committee members, please put it in the comments.

¡Buenos días!

I am happy to join Juanita Jean and her other Pals to Participate in Professional Political Punditry to Perpetrate Perpetual Prickly Publishing.  Having just joined, I thought I would use a few lines to introduce myself to you.  After a long career of pulling wrenches, brewing beer, baking bread, and cleaning windows, I started my punditry avocation about 10 years ago by ranting and raving on the internets about the sorry state of politics in the good ol’ US of A, and especially in Texas.  I started my ranting after the 2004 elections, raved through the 2008 cycle, which was bruising, and then continued, though not as publicly, to talk about holding politicians accountable to their obligations to the people as elected officials.  I have been dismayed at the failure of party politics, that apparently only exist (with a few notable exceptions) to benefit those in office.

Today, I live just up the road from the World’s Most Dangerous Beauty Salon and visit often, ranting and raving at Juanita Jean (especially since last Tuesday). After patiently listening to my hair-on-fire raging, recently Juanita finally said, “Don’t just tell it to me, tell it to everybody else.”  I thought, OK; so here we are.  In the coming days/weeks/whenever Juanita kicks me out, I’ll be sharing my thoughts as an independent thinker/screamer.  I’ll be talking about social justice, the fossilization of political parties, gerrymandering, the media, healthcare policy, education, energy policy, head in the sand environmental and climate change policy, the cancer of money in politics, and any other damn thing that pops into my head.  Thank you, Juanita Jean, for letting me talk to (yell at) your loyal customers.

To get us going, I’ve posted below a little about me personally.  See you shortly when I pull out the flamethrower.

EL JEFE El Jefe met Juanita Jean some years ago when he opened El Jefe’s Beer, Bread, and Pickle Emporium just up the road from the World’s Most Dangerous Beauty Salon. He savors anything made with his home grown yeast, but especially those things that go well with his South Texas Pucker Up & Slap Yo’ Knee Bread n’ Butter pickles, made especial for the Holidays and coming soon to an HEB near you.

A native Texan, El Jefe is proud to be the great-great grandson of Napoleon Bonaparte Fisher who joined the Texas Rangers in 1860. He was born in North Texas to a jen-u-wine Bible-thumping praise and glory preacher and to the daughter of a jen-u-wine Bible-thumping praise and glory preacher, receiving more Bible & ear lobe thumping before he was 6 than most are privileged to get in a lifetime. Because of his pure and crystal-clear upraising, he now practices his own spiritual tradition of worshiping every Sunday at Our Lady of the Perpetual Bloody Mary & New York Times. He was elected Deacon of the parish many years ago.

El Jefe rants regularly on social media, and is an equal opportunity insulter of all proclivities. He’s sure he’ll insult you, too, and likes to proclaim that he’s old enough to not care about what you think of him or his hand crafted pointy toed roach killer boots made way-the-hell-out-there in Fredericksburg just for him.

So there.

Free fancy entertainment.

The bitter infighting that plagued Donald Trump’s campaign during the Republican presidential primary is starting to spill over into his team’s efforts to establish an administration and political operation, according to more than half a dozen sources familiar with the planning efforts.

The tensions played a role in a Friday shakeup in which the president-elect replaced his transition team chief Chris Christie with his running mate Mike Pence. Sources familiar with the move say it was precipitated partly by clashes between Christie’s allies and rival factions on the transition team, as well as Trump’s influential son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Bitter infighting is a Trump trademark.  Now if he could just find a way to make it build a wall.

If collars could kill.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg appeared in court today wearing her dissent collar although no cases were heard.

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg appeared to be wearing her infamous “dissent jabot” on the bench Wednesday morning.

The move is being widely interpreted as a repudiation of Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential election a night earlier.

I have a friend who lost her husband this year to a slow and painful death.  She sent me this text message this morning.

I just stopped by a Veteran’s Day celebration in my neighborhood – Pecan Grove. There were a bunch of veterans there with their military hats on. I’m not sure if you’re aware of this but my husband John was a decorated Vietnam war veteran and he was a very staunch Democrat.

Part of the reason he died may – just may – have been because of his exposure to Agent Orange in Vietnam as well as Benzene products in the construction industry.

Although I think it is bad for people to do violent things in the protests that are occurring nationwide I think it is good in that a lot of people have the courage to say we will not stand for this man’s hateful rhetoric.

OK at the Veterans Day celebration our sheriff Troy Nehls, who goes to my church by the way, led the “service”. I have always liked him and thought he was a pretty good guy but I voted straight Dem ticket this year and I’m pretty vocal in my neighborhood so I’m sure that a lot of people at my church know that I’m a rabid Dem.

In this service Susan he thanked God for our new administration and he stated that he hopes God will forgive the demonstrators.

I had just put my hand over my heart and said the Pledge of Allegiance and listened to the national anthem alongside my neighbors with tears in my eyes thinking about my husband who was a veteran. When he said that God “needs to forgive the demonstrstors” I turned on my heels and walked away. Not particularly politically correct right?

I just feel this portends things to come. The religious right is going to be so judgmental of the Democrats. It was OK for them to call President Obama a Nazi, the N-word, a Socialist, accuse him of not being born in the United States, show unmitigated disrespect for him and our First Lady. Now that the Democrats are upset about the results of the election it’s not OK. It is the unbelievable hypocrisy of the alt right people.

I need to calm down I really need to calm down.  I keep getting angry and sad off and on. I heard Elizabeth Warren last night on the Rachel Maddow Show and she said what we need to do is get active which is what I want to do so let me know how I can help Susan. OK I just had to get that off my chest to someone who would understand. I love you and Don and thank you from the bottom of my heart for all of your hard work!

Onward through the fog! (Name omitted)

My friend could not honor her veteran husband today.  This is worth fighting for.  

As an interesting historical note, the Democratic Presidential candidates have won the popular vote in 6 out of the last 7 Presidential elections, yet only won 4 of them.  In 2012, in addition to winning the Presidential election, Democrats outpolled Republican Congressional candidates by 1.4 million votes nationwide, and yet Republicans won 49 more seats.

Rigged?  Hell yeah.

Always remember: whenever that guy accuses someone of something, look for that skeleton in his closet.

Every. Damn. Time.