Free Republic

Wendy Davis, who lost the Nov. 4 gubernatorial election to Republican Greg Abbott, has won Texas Monthly magazine's coveted "Bum Steer of the Year" award for her "train wreck" of a campaign. The annual awards take a snarky jab at Texas politicians, odd news stories and personalities. Fromer winners include Anna Nicole Smith, Gov. Rick Perry, Lance Armstrong and Tom Delay. This year's cover depicts Davis stepping in a cow patty while wearing the bright pink Mizuno "Wave Rider" sneakers she donned during her 2013 filibuster against Texas' new abortion restrictions that brought her into the national spotlight. The magazine...

The Texas Department of Public Safety is withholding trooper dashboard camera video taken during the arrest of Texas representative Mike Krusee. Using the Texas Public Information Act, KXAN requested the video after the state lawmaker from Williamson County was arrested for DWI earlier this month. A state trooper pulled him over after he noticed him driving erratically in northwest Austin. The license plate on his vehicle also had expired last December. Elected state officials all have personalized license plates. Therefore, the trooper would have known he was pulling over a state official before asking for identification. A spokeswoman for the...

GEORGETOWN, Texas (AP/KXAN) -- A state lawmaker who helped pave the way for major toll road projects and stiffer drunken driving penalties now faces a DWI charge. Rep. Mike Krusee of Williamson County is the Republican chairman of the House Transportation Committee. He was charged with first-offense driving while intoxicated after a state trooper noticed his car moving erratically in northwest Austin Wednesday night. The license plate on the vehicle also had expired last December. Elected state officials all have personalized license plates. Therefore, the trooper would have known he was pulling over a state official before asking for identification....

At the front of a quiet, dimly-lit auditorium inside Weatherford High School Thursday, Gov. Rick Perry and other friends eulogized the late Ric Williamson. Perry borrowed a quote from author Jonathan Swift to describe Williamson, who, as chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission, was often at the center of controversy. “When a genius comes into the word, you will know him by this sign: that the dunces are all in confederacy against him,” Perry recited. “Jonathan Swift didn’t know Ric Williamson, but he pegged him.” Williamson, 55, was pronounced dead on Sunday after suffering an apparent heart attack while at...

     In a talk with the editor of the liberal Texas Monthly magazine who hosts a monthly interview show on Texas PBS stations, former CBS anchor Walter Cronkite uncorked some more liberal opinions. In praising the CBS-boosting, Joseph McCarthy-trashing movie Good Night and Good Luck, Cronkite liked how it reminded Americans that "one nut could endanger the democracy," was "locking up our democracy in a very dangerous way," and persecuting people who were "simply good Americans." When pressed to compare Vietnam and Iraq, Cronkite declared that the comparison was "almost exact."      On Thursday, the Poynter Institute's Romenesko Web site...

Please freep this poll. Texas Monthly is asking the question "Is Karl Rove Bush's Brain?" and running a poll on the answer. The lefties are ahead right not, but not by much.