The Noise Machine (02/03/10)

Don't worry, we've burned our fact-checker at the stake....


An early candidate for moron of the year.


Rasmussen released a poll which has Perry's lead widening and Medina above 15%. (I got a Rasmussen call the other night. They compared the Republican candidates vs. Bill White, but no Farouk Shami.)


Medina gets the warm-fuzzy, useless news story treatment from ChronBlog while while Bill White gets his from the Austin American-Statesman. Next up, newspapers will wonder (again) why their subscription rates are dropping. (Maybe a new glossy section with pretty pictures will help?)


Read "water rate hike" as "tax increase" (which it is) and then let's talk about the wisdom of raising taxes during a recession. Something that was brought up, at the end of the story, by C.O. Bradford, who knows a little bit about faulty city organizations. (On another note, this rate hike has been predicted, for some time, by Houston blogger Ubu Roi.) I can't help but wonder if massive tax increases such as this could have been avoided had Houston simply made public works a priority over the last two mayoral administrations?


There's a war brewing over EPA smog limits, the setting of which seems to be more based on what some think things should be than how they really can be. (That is, if you want to keep some semblance of an economy as a going concern in Houston. If that's not your goal? Well, that's OK too.)


Not only is Perry leading in the polls, but he's kicking Hutchison's butt in fund-raising as well. ChronBlog future endorsee Bill White has a slight lead over everyone, but only has about 1/2 the COH. (That's "industry" slang for Cash On Hand. Just trying to spruce the place up a bit.)

Evan, of Rick Perry vs. World weighs in.


On a National level: Are rumors of the Republican resurgence built on a house of sand? I think so. There's still those icky problems of rhetoric and the fact that they've not much better a track record than the Dems. (If you replace the clueless with the incompetent, what have you gained?)


I'm linking to this story for no other reason than I like the term: precision cuts. When journos buy into political spin the result is a story like this. (funny? Well yeah.)


So, above, you have the job-eating smog reductions of the EPA. Here, you have Democrats eager to protect their jobs by focusing on energy. Unless they're pinning their hopes squarely on the Dippin' Dots economy that is, in which case carry on.


Today's ecomental moment: Please! Help us save our hefty government-funded research grants the planet.


Classic Stossel.


And finally.....


Slampo on the new Ligtnin' Hopkins Memorial Plaque. Good stuff.