Bastrop Co. Precinct Maps added

As part of our mission here at the Progress to provide something more useful than, say, a broken screwdriver, or Rick Perry, I've added a couple of MAPS of our fair county, linked in the right-hand sidebar under "Useful Maps and Info". Note that the voting precincts are subdivisions of the commish precincts; thus each voting precinct number begins with a 1, 2, 3 or 4 to denote the corresponding commish precinct. Basically, pct 1 is the Bastrop area, Pct 2 is Smithville and the rural eastern parts of the county, Pct 3 is Cedar Creek and the TX 71 corridor to Austin, and Pct 4 is the Elgin area.

Know your precinct!! New demographic and census data will be added as a soon as I get it and can hammer it into something understandable...

Happy weekend to all and enjoy the cool front...all our football teams are on the road tonight - Bastrop puts their 5-0 record on the line in Westlake (and since it's Westlake, you can hear it on the radio at 1300 AM. Woo woo woo...). The Wildcats of Sausagetown (1-4) try to get untracked down at Hays, and the Mighty Smithville Tigers (4-1)look to continue a potential storybook season downstream in Columbus...

Primarily Speaking

Bastrop County Democrats held an open seminar of sorts for prospective candidates back on September 10. District Judge Chris Duggan held forth on the demands of a campaign and some 'best practices' (e.g., work your ass off), and gave us a general overview of campaign finance law. Yours truly was asked to expound on 'what the party can do for candidates', and so I set out to gather information and assemble something vaguely coherent about the matter, including a cursory outline of statutes, party rules and other principles under which we would endeavor to operate with respect to candidates.

And wouldn't y'know it - a few people actually showed up for this dog-and-pony gig, including some current office-holders seeking re-election in 2010. Chris and I were both less-than polished, but I think we managed to communicate some helpful information and suggestions.
During my stand-up, it was necessary for me to differentiate between our role in the primary process vs. that in the November election. To wit: the Party itself does not endorse, or work on behalf of , any candidates in the primary, though individuals may; the Party does not 'decide' who can or will run for a particular office, and it is not our place to prevent or actively discourage people from running - even against Democratic incumbents. Once the primary is over and we have a Democratic ticket, our duty is to do what we can to support our whole slate of candidates in the general election. I also briefly outlined the concept of a Coordinated Campaign (thank you Shelly @ TDP!) for the general election and how it could benefit candidates who might choose to participate. More on that later...
County Chair Barbara Nichols also made it known that there were GOP incumbents in our county and districts who did not yet have Democratic challengers, and encouraged others to run for office if they believe they have what it takes. We directed them to online TDP resources and made it clear that our door is open and we are willing to assist any serious candidate in getting started with paperwork, info, and generally navigating the process. As we should, of course.

Pretty dry academic stuff, all in all, but of course SOMEONE had to get their Fruit of the Looms all wadded up over this. Right? Right...

Bastrop Dems foil wingnut hijacking

Suh-prize, suh-prize suh-prize. Sorry, goofballs - not in our backyard.

Many of you may have heard about Congressman Lloyd Doggett being ambushed by a mob at Randall's in South Austin this past Saturday, as he tried to hold his traditional "office hours" at the shopping centers where his constituents go.
The full force of the anti-health care reform "movement" was brought to bear on Lloyd as he tried to answer absurd questions and get a word in edgewise while a cabal of teabaggers shouted at him, waved outrageous signs (including a tombstone with "Doggett" written on it) and eventually forced him and his staff to leave (as they pounded on the cars of Lloyd and his staff). They prevented a congressman from communicating with constituents.

Which is what those tools wanted in the first place. The mobs disrupting town halls this week are part of a carefully orchestrated and financed nationwide PR campaign being waged by big insurance and other corporate lobbies, astroturf groups like Americans for Prosperity, and of course, the infamous Ralph Reed and his PR firm Century Strategies, along with Creative Response Concepts - who handled the media game for the Swift Boat Vets.

Yes, the same crowd. Now they are feeding and leveraging the ignorance of their useful idiots to wage holy war on behalf of their corporate clients against health care reform. These groups and firms are stoking and advising loose-meat online gangs of birthers, tin-foil 'libertarians' and other deluded paranoiacs and sending them out to ambush and harass Democratic Reps and Senators at their various constituent meetings over the August recess. They are instructed to disrupt, shout down and shut down any real dialogue on health care reform (or any other issue, for that matter). The idea, of course, is to keep those who favor reform from making their case to the people, and to create the appearance of mass opposition to health care reform ("Obamacare means euthanasia for old people"), when in fact no such mass opposition exists.