Free Republic

Announces Gang Initiative, Asks Legislature to Continue Border Security Funding AUSTIN – Gov. Rick Perry today accepted the Border Security Council’s report and asked the legislature to support continued border security funding to protect our state. Texas has taken unprecedented steps to secure its border with Mexico and is facing a growing threat: transnational gangs. They are infiltrating our communities and threatening the safety of our citizens. “One of the most significant threats to our state’s security is the rise of ruthless and powerful transnational gangs,” said Gov. Perry. “Working with local law enforcement, we will bring unprecedented pressure to...

The Texas Department of Transportation, which has alternated between fiscal gluttony and subsistence the past few years, may be about to belly up to a feast again. A feast paid for with money to be borrowed, mind you. Given the state of credit markets, one hesitates to reach for the salt right away. But absent the financial Armageddon that the president and others have been gabbing about, TxDOT might be sitting on an $8 billion stash this time next year. Even in the zero-laden world of government spending, $8 billion would be a significant infusion into TxDOT's budget. Without that...

All across southeast Texas, roofs need repair, debris must be discarded and towns hope to rebuild. Hurricane Ike's destruction is sparking one of the largest rebuilding efforts the state has seen in decades, but at the same time is highlighting a thorny facet of the region's labor force: A lot of the recovery work will be done by illegal immigrants. Homeowners have already turned to day laborers — many of whom are undocumented — to help clear brush, tent roofs and repair other storm damage. Contractors have hired them to rebuild or restore businesses and the city's infrastructure. And the...

One of the disadvantages of being a writer and former journalist is that I’m always sharing news and information. It’s also an advantage in times of crisis by providing instant therapy. Recipients of my Hurricane Ike email updates may have less flattering names for it. I attended a meeting on the Tuesday before Ike invaded our shores. One participant said we shouldn’t worry, because the Gulf is big and the chances of Ike hitting us were small. I predicted we’d see a lot of wind, rain, and flooding, something akin to Tropical Storm Allison back in 2001. Only without the...

The colorful testimony that has been a hallmark in the murder trial of Jose Luis Gonzalez continued Thursday and included statements from an investigator who hinted there might have been no trial at all had Gonzalez shot four intruders and not just one. Gonzalez, 63, was charged after shooting and killing 13-year-old Francisco Anguiano when he and three other juveniles broke into Gonzalez's mobile home last July to steal what they alleged were just snacks and sodas. Major Doyle Holdridge is a former Texas Ranger and ex-member of the National Rifle Association who currently heads the criminal division at the...

Gasoline supplies are tight in Dallas-Fort Worth08:39 AM CDT on Wednesday, September 24, 2008By ZACHARY WARMBRODT / The Dallas Morning News zwarmbrodt@dallasnews.com Hurricane Ike is hitting North Texas gasoline stations hard this week – causing delays in fuel shipments and spot shortages. Drivers should expect more frequent shortages in the next two weeks as the Texas Gulf Coast's refining capacity continues to come back online, fuel distributors said Tuesday. But after that, supplies should be back to normal, distributors said. And prices should remain stable, as the major brands of oil locked in their prices before Ike made landfall. Retail...

AUSTIN, Texas (Legal Newsline)-The Texas Supreme Court on Tuesday denied a petition to remove the Democratic and Republican presidential nominees from the statewide ballot. Libertarian presidential nominee Bob Barr and the Libertarian Party of Texas argued that Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama and Republican nominee John McCain should not be on the ballot because their respective parties failed to file with the state by Aug. 26. The high court denied the petition without offering explanation.

SOUTHLAKE — Tips keep pouring into Southlake police after releasing the now-infamous video of a gray-haired man using a key to vandalize a Hummer. The crime was captured on the vehicle's own surveillance system, which had been installed because it had previously been defaced in a similar way. There have been no arrests yet, but there is legitimate speculation that this could be a case of suburban eco-terrorism against a certain gas-guzzling SUV. Police say they don't yet know the identity of the man videotaped using his key to gouge "X" marks into the side of a Hummer. But the...

Nearly one in 10 Hispanics in the U.S. reported that in the last year police or other authorities have stopped them and asked them about their immigration status, the Pew Hispanic Center said in a report released Thursday. The finding comes amid the biggest crackdown in decades against illegal immigration – one especially evident in Texas, the No. 2 destination for such migrants. Municipal police in several suburbs of Dallas, including Irving and Carrollton, have stepped up cooperation with federal immigration authorities. Nationally, deportations or removals of Mexicans, Salvadorans and Guatemalans from the interior of the United States have doubled...

Debate rages on fate of undocumented workers in hurricane-hit areas HOUSTON - The men gather early on street corners here in storm-battered Houston, ready for the jobs they know will come their way, sweeping up broken glass and clearing downed trees and debris from city streets. They speak mostly Spanish, while looking warily at strangers. And these undocumented, also called illegal, immigrants worry that instead of a job and a day's wages, they might instead find themselves arrested and deported. -Snip- Question of benefits There are more than one million undocumented workers in Texas, with many living in Houston and...

I have dreaded a monster hurricane coming to our area for years. I even said that last year. My fears came true last week at this time when Hurricane Ike came crashing in. Granted it was just a Category 2 hurricane at landfall with large areas of Category 1 winds. You can hear the loud howling winds and rain. Also, you can hear the debris hitting the ground and transformers exploding and creating bright flashes that look like lightning. Going through a hurricane is torture, like having a bunch of large needles inserted into you one at a time. I...

GALVESTON, Texas — It's been nearly a week since Hurricane Ike bulled ashore, and the images of once-bustling coastal Texas communities reduced to only a faint shadow of their old selves are no less staggering. Survivors traipsing past debris piled higher than their heads. Loose livestock grazing beneath downed power lines. Before-and-after shots of whole neighborhoods washed away. Scores of people taking on the drudgery of making it all livable again for weary and anxious evacuees still waiting to come home.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- At least 49 offshore oil platforms, all with production of less than 1,000 barrels a day, were destroyed by Hurricane Ike as it raced across the Gulf of Mexico, and some may not be rebuilt, the Interior Department said Thursday. It said in the latest hurricane damage assessment that the platforms altogether accounted for 13,000 barrels of oil and 84 million cubic feet of natural gas a day. There are more than 3,800 production platforms in the Gulf producing 1.3 million barrels of oil and 7 billion cubic feet of gas each day. Most remain shut down.

The short - but eventful - life of IkeIn its brief lifespan of only 13 days, Hurricane Ike wreaked great deal of havoc. Affecting several countries including Cuba, Haiti, and the United States, Ike is blamed for approximately 114 deaths (74 in Haiti alone), and damages that are still being tallied, with estimates topping $10 billion. Many shoreline communities of Galveston, Texas were wiped from the map by the winds, storm surge and the walls of debris pushed along by Ike - though Galveston was spared the level of disaster it suffered in 1900. (28 photos total)   Some amazing...

KUWAIT CITY — Seven U.S. soldiers were killed early Thursday morning when their transport helicopter crashed in southern Iraq, officials said. Enemy fire was not involved in the incident, the military said. The CH-47 Chinook helicopter went down just after midnight around 60 miles west of Basra. All aboard were killed. In its initial news release, the military said five bodies had been recovered and that two soldiers were missing; hours later, that was updated to say the bodies of all seven aboard had been recovered. "It is a tough day for the coalition and we are deeply saddened by...

With no idea of numbers, authorities say final accounting may take years GALVESTON, Texas - The death toll from Hurricane Ike is remarkably low so far, considering that legions of people stayed behind as the storm obliterated row after row of homes along the Texas coast. But officials suspect there are more victims out there and say some might simply have been swept out to sea. Exactly how many is anybody's guess, because authorities had no sure way to track those who defied evacuation orders. And the number of people reported missing after the storm, whose death toll stands at...

While illegal aliens flee strict immigration enforcement policies in several states and settle in Texas, the state's budget is suffering and violent crime, soaring. News reports indicate a flood of illegal aliens is coming from states such as Arizona and Oklahoma – where immigration crackdowns have made life more difficult for them. In the meantime, Texas' violent crime rates have taken a turn for the worse. WND researched FBI crime statistics from years 2006 to 2007 for 29 of Texas' largest cities with populations of more than 100,000. The Preliminary Annual Uniform Crime Report reveals two of the state's well-known...

Aliens flee strict immigration policies for friendlier Lone Star State. While illegal aliens flee strict immigration enforcement policies in several states and settle in Texas, the state's budget is suffering and violent crime, soaring. News reports indicate a flood of illegal aliens is coming from states such as Arizona and Oklahoma – where immigration crackdowns have made life more difficult for them. In the meantime, Texas' violent crime rates have taken a turn for the worse.

Yesterday, Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr announced that he was filing a lawsuit against the Texas Secretary of State, proclaiming that since John McCain and Barack Obama had both missed the candidacy filing deadline under Texas law 192.031, both were ineligible and both should be knocked off of the ballot. Obviously, in a state with 34 electoral votes (and a state where John McCain leads by 21 points), this is big news. However, there are some inconsistencies in Barr’s case that should be hammered out.

CenterPoint Energy executives issued a timeline for power restoration, indicating it will be after Monday before most lights shine in a huge swath of the Houston area from Spring to Pearland to Baytown. CenterPoint reported Wednesday it had restored power to 42 percent of its 2.2 million customers. Entergy, which serves areas in the northern and eastern portions of the region struck by Ike, had restored 18 percent of its 395,000 customers. And Texas-New Mexico Power Co., which serves coast communities including Angleton and Texas City, reported 58 percent of its 113,000 customers had power.

HOUSTON (BP)--About 1,500 Southern Baptist disaster relief volunteers are setting up units in Texas and were expected to be operational by the end of the day Tuesday to serve victims of Hurricane Ike. The primary focus of the efforts currently is food preparation, with 39 kitchen units on site in the state. The American Red Cross has asked Southern Baptists to be ready to prepare up to 375,000 hot meals a day, while the Salvation Army has requested 125,000 meals a day, bringing the total to 500,000. In addition to the 39 feeding units, more than 40 other types of...

Police Arrest 81 Looting Suspects After Ike Houston Police Department FOX 26 News HOUSTON -- Many felt disgusted after witnessing looting in the city of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina left thousands of people dead and victimized. Who would steal at a time like this? According to Houston Police Department officials, more than 75 Houstonians and counting. At least 81 people have been arrested for looting. The crimes have hit several areas of our city as Ike was making landfall and after the monster storm moved out. "It's very disheartening because there's enough tragedy to infrastructure,...to the act of a...

The Huntsville Times reported on September 12 that, in response to the looming threat from Hurricane Ike, Alabama Governor Bob Riley declared a formal state of emergency. The governor's declaration of emergency activated the state's price-gouging law, which makes "unconscionable pricing" illegal during times of emergency. The Times quoted Riley as saying that he thinks "a threat to public health is a strong possibility due to the shortage of fuels." Hurricanes don't cause shortages, however. Price controls do. A "shortage" occurs when the amount of a good demanded exceeds the amount of a good supplied at the prevailing price. In...

Ralph Hayes walked up the pitch-black stairways of a north Houston apartment building Sunday, pulling a wheeled ice chest that thumped up the steps behind him. He emerged into a stifling hallway and knocked on the first door to his right. "Hello?" he shouted. "We've got water and sandwiches if you need it." Hayes and his wife, Charlotte Hayes, were on a mission of mercy at the Heights House, whose elderly and disabled tenants have been without power, water or telephone service since Hurricane Ike struck the Gulf Coast early Saturday. Over the weekend, thousands of Houstonians demonstrated similar devotion...

A small change in Hurricane Ike's course just before it crashed into the Texas coast Saturday may have spared the state and the nation from significantly worse economic damage. The center of the storm appeared to miss the vital concentration of oil and petrochemical refineries in the Houston area, and the surge of water rolling into the nation's second-largest port was also weaker than predicted.

Crews fan out across Texas to assess Ike's wrathBy ALLEN G. BREED and PAULINE ARRILLAGA, Associated Press Writers. 2008-09-14 03:28:55 Rescue crews in high-wheel trucks, helicopters and boats ventured out to pluck people from their homes Saturday in an all-out search for thousands of Texans who stubbornly stayed behind overnight as Hurricane Ike blew out skyscraper windows, cut power to millions and swamped thousands of homes along the coast. State and local officials began searching for survivors by late morning, just hours after Ike roared ashore at Galveston with 110 mph winds, heavy rains and towering waves. Overnight, dispatchers received...

To Those Who Decided to Remain in Ike's Path: We're all painfully aware of the pounding that the Great State of Texas has taken in the wake of Hurricane Ike. One cannot help but pray that this storm and it's consequences don't represent a repeat of the Great Galveston Hurricane of 1900, a storm that stole the lives of between 6000 and 12000 people. It's a relief that the majority of coastal Texans heeded the weeklong warnings from various media sources. For those who for some reason chose to remain, I would like to share the following quote from one...

President Bush received updates on Hurricane Ike throughout the day. Deputy Press Secretary Tony Fratto: He's very comfortable that Texas emergency management authorities are doing everything they can. They have a very strong team down in Texas for dealing with the hurricanes. Obviously our thoughts and prayers are with the residents in the affected areas. The President encourages all the residents of Texas to listen to the guidance they're getting from their local emergency management authorities. And if they're getting direction to evacuate, to do it quickly; but just to pay very close mind to their personal safety and listen...

In an interview with the Taylor Daily Press, State Sen. Steve Ogden revealed a possible new course for the controversial Trans-Texas Corridor. Instead of building superhighways across the state, Ogden said, the state may opt to augment the Texas Trunk System, a web of rural highways that includes U.S. 79. The plan would expand those highways to four-lane divided highways, while expanding urban infrastructure with toll roads. “We need to limit that concept to existing highways,” Ogden said of the proposed network of superhighways and tiered rail systems. “I passed a bill last session that did that, but [Gov. Rick...

Click on the link for a slide show on the storm surge - Galveston is already a mess and the worst is yet to come.

Galveston Island, Texas Webcams (Various). At link.

Hurricane Ike is closing in on Texas, and stands poised to become one of the most damaging hurricanes of all time. Despite Ike's rated Category 2 strength, the hurricane is much larger and more powerful than Category 5 Katrina or Category 5 Rita. The storm surge from Ike could rival Katrina's, inundating a 200-mile stretch of coast from Galveston to Cameron, Louisiana with waters over 15 feet high. This massive storm surge is due to the exceptional size of Ike. According to the latest wind field estimate (Figure 1), the diameter of Ike's tropical storm and hurricane force winds are...

Texas Tech, local schools cancel Friday classes While Lubbock looked east the past few weeks to see if hurricanes would bring evacuees here, the city was drenched by storms coming from the west as six inches of rain caused numerous problems Thursday. More rain is possible through this weekend, which could cause cancellations or rescheduling for community and sporting events. No high school football games have been canceled yet, but athletic directors across the area said they will monitor the situation to make sure no one will be in danger. Thursday's impact was widespread: • Lubbock, Cooper and Frenship schools...

Large and dangerous Hurricane Ike approaching the Upper Texas coast. Mandatory evacuations began in earnest Thursday as an estimated one million coastal residents headed inland. There were widespread reports of gas stations running out of fuel. The National Weather Service posted dire storm surge predictions of 20-25 ft storm surge along the coast and bay heads. Hurricane warnings covered a 400 mile swath of the Gulf of Mexico. Wholesale gasoline prices spiked 30 percent Thursday, or nearly $1 a gallon, out of fear of what Ike might do. Public Advisory Updated every 3 hours Discussion Updated every 6 hours Buoy...

THE coastal city of Galveston, Texas, faces complete inundation from Hurricane Ike, and those who stay behind in one-or two-storey homes "will face certain death", the National Hurricane Centre said today. "All neighbourhoods and possibly entire coastal communities will be inundated during the period of peak storm tide," the centre said in a special bulletin released at 1.19am GMT (11.19am AEST) ahead of the powerful storm's forecast landfall later today. "Persons not heeding evacuation orders in single family one- or two-story homes will face certain death," it said. Slender Galveston island - about 5km off the Texas coast and whose...

GROVETON, TX (KTRE) - The Trinity-Neches Texas Sub-Regional Planning Committee, or TNT, is set to meet with the Environmental Protection Agency next week. TNT says TxDOT has not given enough thought to the environmental impact of the corridor, and they need the EPA to examine the findings they will get from TxDOT about the TTC. "We're not in opposition to improvement and expansion. We just want to make sure it's done right because once you cover up rural Texas with concrete you can't change it back," says Connie Fogle with TNT. The Trans-Texas Corridor is expected to use thousands of...

St. Hedwig has homes on large lots and a longtime tradition of rural living. And folks there want to keep it that way. “We want to be able to maintain as best we can the reason we moved out here in the first place,” said Kathy Palmer, the city’s planning and zoning commissioner. But a new master plan and recently updated zoning maps are no match for a proposed route of Trans-Texas Corridor 35 that would slice straight through the city of about 2,000 people and create headaches for several city departments, officials said. With neighboring Wilson County, St. Hedwig...

Texas began issuing mandatory and voluntary evacuations as Hurricane Ike continued to strengthen and slowly moved toward an uncertain landfall destination in the western Gulf of Mexico. Texas Governor Rick Perry issued a disaster declaration in advance of the storm. Louisiana Governor Jindal released several hundred buses to Texas for evacuation assistance. Reports from Cuba indicate widespread damage from Hurricane Ike, which raked the length of the island nation. The U.S. State Department again offered Cuba humanitarian assistance after a previous offer was declined by the Cuban government. The stock market Wednesday rose as investors bought oil stocks and and...

A man arrested during protests during the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota is now being investigated for arson at the Texas governor's mansion in June. The story was first reported Tuesday by CBS 11's sister station WCCO in Minneapolis. Bradley Neil Crowder, 23, of Austin, is charged with one count of possession of firearms not registered to him after his arrest Sept. 1 in St. Paul. Prosecutors believe Crowder and another man, David Guy McKay, made Molotov cocktails which could then be thrown into a St. Paul parking lot where law enforcement parked their vehicles. A high-level source...

Local Anarchist Group Has Affinity for Violence590 am KLBJ reports this afternoon that the Molotov cocktail plot involving two Austin men at last week’s Republican National Convention may be connected to the recent fire at the Texas Governor’s Mansion. Two members of an Austin based anarchist group called “The Austin Affinity Group” are locked up accused in a plot to use Molotov cocktails to disrupt the Republican Convention. Now investigators are trying to determine if the pair are connected to the fire that destroyed the Governors Mansion. News Radio 590-KLBJ’Security Analyst, Fred Burton from Stratfor.com says the “Austin Affinity” may...

PASADENA, Texas — Two teenage girls are accused of stabbing a 75-year-old man to death in a robbery that netted them just $15, and police say the mother of one of the teens helped put them up to it. Dannette R. Gillespie, 38, gave knives to her 15-year-old daughter and Vanessa Anne Ocampo, 19, then waited in the back seat of their car while the teens robbed and killed Eugene Palma, according to a probable cause warrant. ... Ocampo told investigators they went to the bar and followed Palma home when he left. Gillespie handed knives to her daughter and...

If it is true Wall Street favors Republicans, which is the traditional analysis, then here is a reason for share prices to be falling. John McCain might not carry Texas. How could that be? Evidently a Texas law requires a political party, in order be on the ballot, to file the names of its presidential and vice presidential candidates at least 70 days before the election. This year, that fell on Aug. 26, before either Senator McCain or Senator Barack Obama was formally nominated. Bob Barr, the Libertarian candidate, is demanding that the law be enforced, and that neither major...

The Texas Department of Transportation is asking Nueces County residents to attend a public meeting in Driscoll to comment and provide input on proposed upgrades of US 77 to a controlled access facility that meets interstate standards. The purpose of the meetings is to review proposed options for upgrading US 77 and to present recommendations, TxDOT officials said. The first round public meetings were held in early March. This second round of public meetings is being held as part of TxDOT's continued effort to gain public input on issues related to proposed improvements and to provide an opportunity for public...

What does Washington have against Texas women? Every election year, Washingtonian magazine surveys about 1,700 Capitol Hill staffers regarding members of Congress, asking them to pick gold, silver and bronze medalists in competitions ranging from "Least Likely to Star in a Scandal" and "Member I'd Like to See as President in 2012," to "Most Clueless" and "Most Likely to Star in a Scandal." The theory is based on the ancient notion that nobody knows a man like his butler, and that butlers talk to each other. Finally first: Jackson Lee This year our own Republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison is...

As the Republican faithful waited in anticipation to hear vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin speak Wednesday night, a local Austin man was watching his cousin take her next step as a politician, and he hopes, vice president. "If the media is not careful, they may just awaken the sleeping giant known as Republican women," said U.S. Senator John Cornyn... Palin has four cousins who live in Austin and another in San Antonio.

T. Boone Pickens, Scam Artist, Given Eminent Domain Authority in Texas!By Cary Wesberry • August 2, 2008 All-around jerk T. Boone Pickens has managed to swindle Texas into giving him eminent domain powers.  The State Legislature changed State Law allowing two residents in Roberts County to vote and create a municipal water district, thereby giving them the power to confiscate private property.  The two voters were Pickens’ wife and manager of his ranch.   Regardless of T. Boone Pickens, those responsible for this abomination in my State Legislature need to be held responsible for their probable criminal activity in working behind the backs of the People...

BLUE MOUND, Texas (AP) - When two gunmen smashed through the glass front door of her suburban Fort Worth home, Kellie Hoehn didn't think twice. The 34-year-old mother of two grabbed a shotgun that had been pointed at her face early Wednesday, starting a struggle that ended with one intruder killed with his own weapon and another in the hospital. "I wasn't going to let them get to my babies," she said, recalling the moment when she pushed up the muzzle of the shotgun, pointing it away from her children's rooms. Although the intruders told her to keep quiet, she...

A car driven by a drunk driving suspect with four previous DWI arrests raced away from a sheriff's deputy, ran a red light then went airborne after a wreck and landed on top of an SUV, killing a newlywed couple inside, authorities said. Second-grade teacher Erika Clouet, 24, and her husband of a little over a month, construction worker and aspiring musician German Clouet, 23, of Irving, were killed in the accident early Monday. The driver, Uriel Perez Palacios, 22, of Dallas, remained in the hospital Tuesday. His passenger had to be cut from the vehicle and was also hospitalized....

We reported on Bob Barr being the only candidate to submit his paperwork on time to be on the Texas ballot last Wednesday. Then we reported on the Texas Secretary of State "finding" the Democratic and Republican paperwork "upon further checking." We also covered the Barr camps response to this "upon-further-checking-discovery." Now we can mention a few legal precedents that might get the Democrats and Republicans on the ballot, in spite of the technical legal requirements. According to Ballot Access News: "Although that it seems undisputed that both the Republican and Democratic Parties missed the August 26 Texas deadline for...

NEAR MISSION - Police say a suspected illegal immigrant working for a Democratic state representative brutally beat another man to death with a bat Monday morning. Froylen Casares, 24, was working at a ranch owned by state Rep. Kino Flores near the intersection of North Tropser and Yukon Roads when he killed a young Hispanic male whose name authorities have not released, said Hidalgo County Sheriff Lupe Treviño. "It was a very bloody, very bloody, very gruesome crime scene," Treviño said. Authorities continue to search for Casares, of Honduras, who fled the scene before they arrived at about 5:30 a.m....