Star-Telegram.com: Bud Kennedy

Kennedy: Just a normal week in Texas

Mon, 17 Nov 2008 09:12 CST

BUD KENNEDY

There seems to be some confusion over exactly how God has blessed Texas.

Did God bless Texas with Cynthia Dunbar, the State Board of Education zealot who preaches that the president-elect is a foreigner plotting with terrorists?

Or did God bless Texas with a Southern Baptist pastor who preaches about having sex every day for a week?

On the same weekend when the Diocese of Fort Worth is splitting the sheets with the Episcopal Church, Pastor Ed Young of Grapevine is preaching today from bed.

In a sermon titled "Leaving Lust Vegas," Young will climb off his mattress and begin a series called "Seven Days of Sex."

He’s challenging married couples in his Grapevine-based megachurch to ditch The Daily Show and get on with the funny business every night for a week.

"When we do sex God’s way," the Web site promises, "we can finally break the bondage of lust."

It is not clear from the Web site whether the lessons include an instruction manual.

But this might be the first church service full of single men in trench coats.

In the Austin American-Statesman, the news was headlined: "Pastor to ask flock to make whoopee." My columnist colleague John Kelso wrote, "All I’ve got to say is, praise Jesus."

Kelso also pointed out: "Doesn’t Rev. Young realize the Cowboys are playing the Redskins on the tube Sunday night?

"But what the heck. There’s always halftime."

Actually, Young’s challenge is a scaled-back version of a promotion by a Florida church last spring. The Relevant Church near Tampa issued a "30-Day Sex Challenge," with a worshipper going on the CBS Early Show to say, "We can do anything for 30 days."

Obviously, Young had to cut it back to avoid conflicts with high school football playoffs.

Meanwhile, State Board of Education member Cynthia Dunbar seems to need a vigorous editing.

In a commentary on the fundamentalist Christian Worldview Network Web site, the Houston-area attorney doubts whether President-elect Barack Obama is even an American. She accuses him of scheming with terrorists to "take down" the nation.

Dunbar, 44, did not explain the origin of her visions, although she has since said that her terrorist comment was "misconstrued."

She said she meant that terrorists might fear Obama less than Republican nominee John McCain.

But she still thinks Obama might not be a citizen.

(Republican state officials in Hawaii recently recertified his birth certificate.)

Obama could earn points with Texans and save money by canceling the border fence

Fri, 14 Nov 2008 07:53 CST

BUD KENNEDY

We don’t know yet what Barack Obama plans for Texas.

But if the new administration wants to save money, one place might be along the multibillion-dollar Texas-Mexico border fence.

Washington decided last week to postpone building 14 miles of the fence in Hidalgo and Starr counties west of McAllen. That $105 million segment, originally booked for completion by Dec. 31, must be redesigned to fix flood problems, federal officials said.

Border leaders met Thursday in Austin to ask Texas lawmakers to help delay, re-engineer or halt the "Texas Border Wall."

"There are so many reasons why this is a bad idea," said state Rep. Eddie Lucio III, a Brownsville Democrat, in a phone interview after the Mexican American Legislature Caucus’ hearing.

"The folks in the Valley have gathered a lot of good research about how this will affect our environment, our wildlife and the economy, not to mention the incursions on Texans’ property rights and water," he said.

Like many Valley leaders, he wants more Border Patrol officers and better equipment to secure the border, along with Rio Grande improvements to create an environmentally friendly but effective natural barrier.

Sierra Club and Audubon officials testified at the hearing, concerned that wildlife refuges that have become major Valley tourist attractions will be left in a federal no man’s land behind the fence.

Not many Texas leaders ever wanted a fence anyway.

Even Gov. Rick Perry has called the idea "idiocy," although he supports adding fencing through the busy Reynosa-McAllen and Matamoros-Brownsville metropolitan regions.

On the campaign trail, Obama said only that local leaders deserve more say-so over how the border fence crosses their communities. But South Texas hopes were lifted last week when Obama named one of those local leaders, University of Texas-Brownsville President Juliet V. Garcia, to his White House transition team.

Garcia and the university sued in federal court to stop the fence from slicing through the college campus and severing a golf course. Instead, UT-Brownsville raised its fence to 10 feet, with Garcia describing it as a vine-covered, "very friendly fence."

Lucio said Valley leaders want Garcia’s help in Washington.

"She’s been a strong advocate against the border wall," he said. "She’s seen the problems of this plan firsthand."

Both Texas Republicans and Democrats must walk a careful line on border security.

Generally, Texans say we want a safe border. But hard-line border-hawk Republicans who scapegoat immigrants or bash Spanish have driven needed Latino votes away from the party in recent elections.

Juan Hernandez of Fort Worth, a former University of Texas at Dallas professor, was the director of Hispanic voter outreach for Republican presidential nominee John McCain.

"There were some lost opportunities for Republicans this election," he said Thursday. "McCain is very pro-family, pro-business, pro-trade — all important issues. But the stand some Republicans took was so far from what Hispanics want, it hurt McCain."

Obama lost Valley voters to Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary, then won them back in the general election without ever talking about the border.

He has billions of reasons to talk about it now.

Bud Kennedy: Read all about it. Or maybe not.

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 06:00 CST

BUD KENNEDY

For one magical day last week, everybody wanted a copy of the newspaper.

In an industry moving quickly from broadsheet pages to BlackBerry screens -- and hoping advertisers follow -- it was the sales day of our dreams, and the news day of many Americans’ dreams.

That is, everywhere but in a few small Texas and Oklahoma towns, where the election of Barack Obama somehow fell to the bottom of Page One or an inside page.

On Election Day, the afternoon Terrell Tribune had a banner headline of "McCain Makes Election Day Stops."

The next day, the Tribune led with a Kaufman County election.

Inside, readers found the headline "Market Reacts to Obama."

By the time the Tribune landed on doorsteps, readers knew Obama won. But some readers in comedian Jamie Foxx’s hometown wanted to see the headline.

"This was a defining moment in our history, and our newspaper didn’t see that," said Lera Duncan, 75, a retired beautician and one of the residents who protested and canceled subscriptions.

"My whole life, I don’t remember any other president winning and not making the front page."

President Bill Hartman of the parent company, Rosenberg-based Hartman Newspapers, defended his Terrell editors.

"We were trying to do the job we do, which is to cover the local community," Hartman said. "If people didn’t know who won by the next afternoon, we probably wouldn’t have been much help. The news cycle had passed."

Hartman’s Houston-area newspaper, the Fort Bend Herald and Texas Coaster, carried a local reaction story about an Obama celebration. The newspaper also reported on the foibles of local State Board of Education member Cynthia Dunbar, who published a religious tract calling Obama a noncitizen who wants to "take down America."

McCain won Fort Bend County by a slim 51 percent to 49 percent.

But in the Tribune’s home of Kaufman County, McCain won by 68 percent to 32 percent.

Notably, Obama got 1,000 fewer votes than other Democrats, indicating that some voters bypassed the top of the ticket.

The Sapulpa (Okla.) Daily Herald, owned by a Tulsa family, is also drawing complaints for downplaying the election.

Publishers in the Texas Press Association compared notes this week by e-mail.

On the blog Ragged Right (raggedright.blogspot.com), newspaper consultant Richard Stone of the Central Texas town of Cameron wrote that ignoring the election is like ignoring 9-11.

"Our newspapers . . . serve a dwindling elite," he wrote, adding that advertisers in small newspapers "don’t care that much about our minority communities."

Minority readers in small towns watched the election and their newspapers, he wrote, "and too many of our community newspapers discounted them. . . . Really, that’s a shame."

Bud Kennedy: Wise County straight-ticket voters may not like one of their picks

Sun, 09 Nov 2008 13:20 CST

BUD KENNEDY

The Wise County Republican Party’s newest elected official comes from the immigrant-chasing Texas Minutemen — and he isn’t sure Barack Obama belongs in America.

Decatur and Rhome voters have just given a badge and gun back to Republican Constable-elect Tom Bishop, 66, a pilot and journeyman police officer who once patrolled New Fairview in his own car and now publishes a Web site obsessing over "Barack Hussein Obama."

The last time Bishop made the news, he crashed a helicopter near the Texas-Mexico border on his way to the Minutemen’s paramilitary "border watch." Before that, he was investigated in connection with a controversial election in the Denton County town of Clark, since renamed DISH.

In 2006, Bishop hosted a Minutemen rally at his ranch near Allison.

Bishop said Friday that he is "not ready" to talk about what he will do as constable, a job paying $26,300 a year.

He said he will communicate only by press releases.

"That’s how I’m going to conduct most of my business," he said.

Asked about his Web pages questioning Obama’s citizenship, he said, "I don’t have any comment for you."

So we can go only by what he writes on twbishop.com.

On pages that until Saturday were linked as "Need to know info," he published commentary from the political Web site WorldNetDaily criticizing Hawaii officials for refusing to release Obama’s birth certificate, and hinting that Obama might have been born elsewhere.

(Hawaii officials have said Obama’s birth certificate is authentic but not public.)

Bishop’s Web site also includes a copy of a lawsuit questioning Obama’s citizenship and a link to an anti-immigration video by a Virginia-based organization that wants severe limits on immigration.

The Web site also includes his campaign promise to crack down on "persons that illegally cross our borders and then continue to break our laws."

Bishop defeated 16-year Constable Dennis Hudson, a Decatur Democrat endorsed by law enforcement leaders in both parties.

Hudson said constables in Wise County enforce civil papers and court orders. Under Texas law, they have the same authority as sheriffs, but not necessarily patrol cars or equipment. That’s up to county commissioners.

Hudson said Bishop "just wants that job so he can go out and stop anybody. . . . A constable can do whatever he wants. But I don’t think I should go out in my pickup truck and start pulling people over on the highway."

That’s exactly what Bishop and two other officers were doing in 1998, when volunteer officers in New Fairview went out in a pickup and an Oldsmobile and started pulling over drivers between Decatur and Rhome, and sometimes south into Fort Worth.

Wise County Republican Chairman Allen Williamson of Runaway Bay said the party accepted Bishop because "he was the only person who filed." Williamson added that the Web site is not representative of the party.

Hudson said he thinks he lost because Wise County voters — including some Democrats — refused to support candidates on a ticket with Obama.

"I’ve had people from my church, from the schools, from every walk of life say they couldn’t vote for any Democrats this year," he said. "They’re my friends, but they voted straight Republican."

Kennedy: Was the difference in the Wendy Davis-Kim Brimer race only the length of a cigar stub?

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 13:50 CST

BUD KENNEDY

It’s Friday.

Do you know where your state senator is?

Kim Brimer wasn’t in his office Thursday. Far as I can tell, he hasn’t returned calls since Election Day, when the veteran Republican spent $1 million-plus and still lost to a Fort Worth Democrat who nicknamed him "Kim Shady."

All I can figure is, he must be off working for those 19 city mayors.

Brimer’s campaign boasted a solid block of mayors, but it wasn’t enough to overcome those Wendy Davis TV commercials of him in dark glasses with a stubby cigar.

His silver mane and hulking build left him looking like somebody out of a Robert Penn Warren novel up against a wispish, street-savvy former City Council member.

Both candidates said awful things about each other, some true and some embellished. Brimer and allies even sued to try to force Davis off the ballot.

In the end, Davis won because nearly 100,000 Democrats stormed the polls — most in early voting — and because a few John McCain voters apparently crossed over to support her.

Like McCain, Brimer and other local Republicans closed hard and won Election Day decisively, with Brimer winning Tuesday’s vote 50 percent to 46 percent. But Davis already had a 13,000-vote lead.

Arlington Libertarian Richard Cross helped. As a third-party candidate, Cross drew 7,584 votes, more than the 6,948-vote edge.

Unlike Brimer, Cross is taking phone calls.

"I don’t think I had anything to do with it," he said. "My Republican friends in Arlington were just fed up. They walked into the booth, hit the button to vote straight 'D,’ and walked out."

Cross said Brimer was "vilified" by Davis’ ads. Texas Democrats took aim at a little-known senator who had moved away from his original home base in Kennedale.

But Cross’ analysis was simple:

"If I could go back and tell Brimer anything, I’d say, 'Don’t let somebody take a picture of you that looks like it’s off an FBI surveillance tape.’ "

Photographer George Wada of Arlington took the Brimer photo along with snapshots of other candidates in the Crowley Celebration of Freedom parade in July.

The photo was first published July 17 on the local online blog WestandClear.com under the headline "A Sartorial Question." Blogger Pete Wann teased Brimer about his corporate-logo shirt.

One of the partners in WestandClear.com — the name refers to the two forks of the Trinity River — is Davis’ campaign spokesman, former City Council candidate Bernie Scheffler.

Wada said Thursday that he was surprised to see the photo.

"I would never, ever in my entire life have thought that this photograph would take off on its own," he said.

Kennedy: The yolk's on Aggie student group after 'Anti-Obama Carnival'

Sat, 01 Nov 2008 21:26 CDT

BUD KENNEDY

We knew that sooner or later in this American presidential campaign, somebody was going to do something really stupid.

We might have guessed where:

College Station.

First, a 20-year-old College Station woman was convicted in Pittsburgh of faking a story about volunteering for John McCain and getting attacked by a tall African-American Obama supporter.

She won’t be coming home to the heart of Aggieland anytime soon. A court ordered Ashley Todd into mental treatment.

Now, a Texas A&M student group known as the class clowns of conservatism has staged a stunt that even their own faculty adviser calls "really dumb."

The A&M chapter of the Waco-based Young Conservatives of Texas sponsored an egg toss Wednesday and again Friday.

But not just your typical Aggie barnyard egg toss. A&M students were offered a chance to hurl eggs at a giant photo of Barack Obama.

It was all part of a messy little campus publicity stunt called an "Anti-Obama Carnival" — with the Soviet hammer and sickle added inside the "O" in Obama.

A Young Conservative from Midland told a Bryan TV station that the events were meant as a free-speech political protest where students could — in the words of the official carnival T-shirt — "throw away your nest-egg with Obama’s economic policies."

But the yolk was on the Young Conservatives.

A surly student crowd saw them smearing Obama’s photo Wednesday with dozens of spattered eggs and surrounded the Rudder Plaza "carnival" to scramble it with more free speech.

According to photos and descriptions posted on the Web, a football player identified by other students as 6-foot-4 Aggies lineman Paul Freeney blocked the shelled photo of Obama.

The event also included a ring toss where Halloween masks of Obama and Hillary Clinton were posted on sticks as the target. It was called "Socialist on a Stick."

Dallas senior Tony Listi, executive director of the Young Conservatives, conceded that the metaphor about taxes, money and "nest eggs" cracked and fell apart.

For the Friday replay, the group added Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi photos and a list of "Policies." But this time, students took the eggs and threw them straight down into the ground.

By then, CNN and the national news networks were already reporting on the Texas Aggies Obama Egg-Toss Smear Incident.

Listi told The Eagle of Bryan-College Station something that didn’t help A&M.

"Frankly," Listi was quoted as saying, "I am not completely sure that every college student knows what the term 'nest egg’ means."

John Fike, an associate professor of technology in the College of Engineering, is the group’s reluctant faculty sponsor. The stunt-prone group was restored to campus in April after a suspension. "They have a history of doing really dumb things," Fike said. "It’s a small group of zealots."

Eats Beat: Gutierrez family casts net wider with new Los Cabos

Wed, 29 Oct 2008 20:50 CDT

BUD KENNEDY

Grapevine has always loved Los Amigos, the little made-from-scratch Tex-Mex restaurant on Northwest Highway.

Now, the Gutierrez family has added a new seafood restaurant: Los Cabos Seafood and Cantina, at 451 E. Northwest Highway.

The menu features grilled seafood: mahi-mahi in poblano sauce over cilantro rice, or sea bass.

Los Cabos is open daily for lunch and dinner. A bar is coming soon; 817-251-2227.

Los Amigos, 202 E. Northwest Highway, opens early for Tex-Mex breakfast Saturdays and Sundays; www.losamigosgrapevine.com.

A California chef will bring a casual grill to Magnolia Avenue.

Chef Molly McCook, a sous-chef with kitchen experience at Lucques on Los Angeles’ Melrose Avenue and other restaurants working with TV chefs Gary Denko and Suzanne Goin, will design the menu for the new Ellerbe Fine Foods.

Ellerbe replaces an old gas station on the booming Magnolia row across from Nonna Tata and Lili’s. Owner Richard King and McCook named it Ellerbe after a favorite street in their hometown of Shreveport, La.

Ellerbe promises seasonal grilled dishes and local vegetables. Watch for it next year at 1501 W. Magnolia Ave.; 817-926-3663, ellerbefinefoods.com.

Grace, the new downtown Fort Worth restaurant with an all-star lineup, has added another familiar name.

Pouring wine will be Jenny Kornblum, long the manager at the Sapristi! bistro.

Grace features chef Blaine Staniford’s dishes and prime steakhouse manager Adam Jones’ familiar welcome. It’ll open in mid-November.

KENNEDY: Tarrant County plays a key role in Tom Craddick clash

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 23:29 CDT

BUD KENNEDY

At 65, Tom Craddick of Midland has held Texas House Republicans in his iron grip for nearly 20 years.

Next week, Tarrant County voters decide whether his rule will end.

If Democrats win two Republican districts in south Tarrant County — and all of Austin is watching to see whether they can — then Craddick’s fate might hang by a single vote.

Right now, he can count on no more than 75 Republican votes out of 150 House members. The House has 77 Republicans, but two are already campaigning against Craddick for speaker.

Now you know why your mailbox is full.

Craddick started the election season with $3 million banked. That’s Craddick’s money buying mail for Fort Worth Republican challenger Mark Shelton or Arlington Republican incumbent state Rep. Bill Zedler.

Shelton is facing Fort Worth Democrat state Rep. Dan Barrett, swimming against a red tide trying to hold a Democratic seat in a Republican district.

Zedler’s opponent, Burleson Democrat Chris Turner, faces the same tide.

That’s in addition to the name-calling, eye-gouging steel-cage match over in the Texas Senate.

Fort Worth Democrat Wendy Davis is testing Fort Worth Republican state Sen. Kim Brimer not only for his Senate seat, but also to limit Republicans to at most a 19-12 majority. (It takes 21 votes to debate a bill.)

Maybe all this helps explain why Texas corporate lobbyists, preachers, teachers and trial lawyers — not to mention Dallas reporters and even Texas Monthly magazine — have developed a sudden interest in Tarrant County.

"The state is watching to see if the Democrats can make any gains in a strong Republican community like Tarrant County," former Texas Secretary of State Roger Williams said this week.

Williams, a Weatherford car dealer and chairman of the Texas Victory 2008 campaign, had just met with Parker County Republicans at a barbecue smokehouse in Willow Park.

Puzzlingly, county party chairwoman Zan Statham told campaigners to fight for "all the Republicans from the top of the ticket to the bottom" . . . "from [U.S. Sen.] John Cornyn all the way to the courthouse."

Maybe she figured out a way to detach presidential candidate John McCain and running mate Sarah Palin from the ballot.

That’s one way to focus attention on the races that really count.

Shelton, 51, a doctor, and Barrett, 53, a lawyer, have been at this for more than a year.

Barrett beat Shelton last fall when they were alone on a special-election ballot.

Shelton knew a partisan election might be different. But he didn’t know how different.

"There is so much emphasis on the presidential race this time, you have to explain that there are down-ballot races," he said after a Republican rally before a few dozen students at conservative Texas Christian University.

Bud Kennedy: Don't expect Republican candidates at Grapevine High election event tonight

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 23:55 CDT

BUD KENNEDY

GRAPEVINE — In the absence of John McCain and Barack Obama, the last forum of the Grapevine campaign season will match student debaters from Team McCain against Team Obama tonight before an audience that might actually include some Democrats.

That’s an unusual sight in Northeast Tarrant County, the reddest corner of the reddest county in America’s reddest state.

Yet every Republican candidate from McCain down to local constables rejected the invitation to participate in the Decision 2008 Presidential Debate and Candidate Forum.

That left only two Grapevine High School student debaters to defend the party against debaters on Team Obama. Five real-life Democratic candidates will speak afterward, all to support the school debate team and the Grapevine Heritage Foundation.

High school senior Eric Wey, 17, of Colleyville and sophomore Tom Rayermann, 16, of Grapevine are the Republicans debating on behalf of a candidate who is 72.

"The more I’ve seen of McCain, the more I’m convinced that he is the best candidate to lead our foreign policy," said Wey, a McCain campaign volunteer who originally backed Mitt Romney.

McCain "always had the best economic policy," Wey said. "He’s been solid in the debates, but Obama is such a smooth speaker that people don’t hear McCain."

In this part of money-minded suburban Texas, young people stick with their parents’ party.

A poll in a Southlake middle school this week went 65-35 for McCain.

"Welcome to Texas," Wey joked.

Like a certain vice presidential candidate, he went on a shopping spree for the big debate. But that meant Men’s Wearhouse.

Team Obama pairs Tully Moorehead, 16, of Grapevine with renegade former Ron Paul backer Monte Halprin, 17, of Colleyville.

Moorehead said she is supporting Obama because of pocketbook issues and energy policy, in part because her engineer father is interested in wind-turbine energy.

Halprin, the son of a former Montana Libertarian candidate for the U.S. Senate, joked that the team will support Obama like "hyperintensive pit bulls."

But he truly supports Obama for the same reason he supported Paul: "I’m for whichever candidate will get us out of Iraq fastest."

Afterward, the crowd will hear Democratic congressional challenger Tom Love plus Democrats running for Texas House and Commissioners Court.

Only two Republican incumbents, U.S. Sen. John Cornyn and Tarrant County Commissioner Gary Fickes, called and apologized for declining.

"We wanted everybody," debate coach Jane Boyd said sadly. "Our students know a lot about McCain and Obama. We want them to learn more about the local, state and U.S. House races and how they affect their lives."

Maybe Republicans taught the students a different lesson.

Decision 2008 Presidential Debate and Candidate Forum 7 tonight

Kennedy: Folks in two Oklahoma towns are now clear on one thing — the KKK doesn't endorse Barack Obama

Sat, 25 Oct 2008 23:54 CDT

BUD KENNEDY

Some newspaper readers in Oklahoma found a surprise inside their local papers this month.

Rolled with the Ada Evening News and Holdenville Tribune was a political endorsement.

But it wasn’t the newspapers’ endorsement.

This was a special delivery for Oklahoma newspaper readers, apparently from white supremacists promoting an Arkansas faction of the Ku Klux Klan.

Just in case there was any doubt about exactly where the Harrison, Ark.-based Knights of the Ku Klux Klan stand in the presidential race, somebody grabbed hundreds of copies of Oklahoma newspapers and rewrapped them to include a handout from the Knights’ national director, nondenominational church pastor Thom Robb.

The ad reads: "Ku Klux Klan DOES NOT Endorse Barack Obama for President."

Apparently, even the Klan is launching a publicity offensive to correct rumors.

Under "How the Rumor Got Started," the ad says, "The fact is, the Klan is NOT endorsing Barack Obama for President."

The handout didn’t say whether the Knights endorse John McCain.

Oddly, it singled out only one other candidate, saying that although the Klan "is also NOT endorsing Hillary Clinton for President, it has nothing to do with her being a woman."

News Publisher Loné Beasley took 300 complaints from readers in the central Oklahoma city of about 16,000 residents, barely two hours’ drive north of Fort Worth.

The handouts were delivered about Oct. 1 and again with Sunday papers Oct. 12, mostly wrapped around old papers that might have been taken from a recycling bin.

Many readers thought the News had sold the Klan an ad.

"They felt hurt — violated — just really insulted," Beasley said Friday. "I consider it stealing. They’re pirating our public image."

The Knights’ ad also says: "Protect Our Jobs! Put Troops on the Border," and gives a Web address for "Your White Pride News Source."

The ad supports a "God-fearing white man or woman" for president who will "end the social experiment called forced integration."

Robb, 62, ordained as a Baptist minister, answered his church phone.

He said that he didn’t know who distributed the handouts and that they must have been printed off the Web.

The News quoted Robb defending the publicity stunt, saying newspapers don’t own used copies, "the same as the publisher of a Stephen King book doesn’t own the novel once it’s sold at Wal-Mart."

Ada Assistant Police Chief Carl Allen said officers don’t see anything to investigate.