Max Powers

El Paso Times Does Not Heart Claudia Ordaz Perez

I have said it before, and I will say it again, the El Paso Times will not be endorsing Claudia Ordaz Perez. 

Need proof?

See this novel of an article published in the paper today - CLICK HERE.

Before I go any further, this blog is a respecter of Eliza Tomatillo. 

Once she wins, I will be making her pour overs every morning.

Anyways. 

Back to Claudia. 

If I were Claudia, I would not even bother showing up to the El Paso Times editorial board meeting.

Hell, do not even bother taking the Times' calls. 

But back to the article, it does sound like Claudia was trying to be clever.  

She is dismissing the complaint as being political-motivated. 

Well, no shit.

But so was sending the mailers to residents outside of her district. 

So whatever.

The bigger issue is see here is whether or not she is well-liked. 

There are people on City Council and outside of it that have no love for Claudia.  

Vince might getaway this election, but those who do not care for Claudia are gonna make sure she does not. 

 

Karla Nieman - In Over Her Head?

Say what you will about last City attorney, it at least appeared she kept things more or less under control.

This one that Mayor Dee Margo wanted - against better judgement - seems like she is way in over her head.

There are some people that I know that think attorneys are their bosses.  I will not mention names. 

An attorney is someone skilled in the legal world, and tells you how to navigate in it.  

Just as I want a pilot to fly a plane, I want an attorney to counsel me on legal matters, but just as you are not asking your pilot to handle your finances, you do not outsource your policy-making and common sense to an attorney. 

Not that all attorneys do not have common sense, but a lot of them look at everything through a straw.

Case in point...Karla Nieman. 

"The Law", whatever that means, as interpreted by Karla, said the Council had to fire City Representative Cassandra Hernandez-Not Brown's ass.  

But "The Law" as interpreted by Karla, also said Hernandez-Not Brown could run for her seat back despite being canned. 

If Karla were a good lawyer, she would have said, "This is what the law says, we may need to seek outside legal counsel, however, common sense says that if she can legally run for a seat again, there is no point in firing her and incur a cost of a special election.  That and Mr. Mayor you will have a pissed off two-ton frau back on council."

But Karla is not a good lawyer.

Yes, "legally" maybe everything was done by the book with Hernandez-Not Brown, but then it all looks a bit off when compared to the situation with City Representative Sam Morgan. 

"But muh law!"

Then there is the whole EPE sale bullshit going on. 

Again, if Karla had any sense she would have shut that thing down and let the sale go through. 

Now anybody wanting to invest in El Paso is gonna get cold feet.  

You think any large firm wants to kiss the ass of any of the felons - plural -  you have on City Council?

Nope.

Things are a mess at City Council.

Some of that is on the voters on who they send to City Hall.

But a lot of it is also on Dee and hires he has made, and especially on his choice of City Attorney.

 

Iliana's Problem

So apparently Commissioner Vince Perez has to fend off not only Iliana Holguin, but ten other people as well?

But let us not kid ourselves this is a race between Vince and Iliana. 

Again, Vince could have avoided this had he ran for County Judge or not crossed his political godmother on the Commissioners Court, Veronica Escobar.

But here we are. 

You gotta give credit to Iliana for starting early and putting the work in, but will it be enough?

Vince is a lot of things, but a shitty commissioner? 

That is a hard case to make. 

I do not know if there are any votes made by Vince where Iliana would have voted differently. 

And it is a question voters should ask of Illiana, "Do you disagree with any of the votes Vince has taken on Commissioners Court?"

My hunch? She will struggle to answer that question.

Maybe a Commissioner Iliana would play nicer with her colleagues than Vince has or will.

But then her colleagues include a Commissioner who does not show up most of the time, a County Judge whose first priority was to give himself a pay raise, and another Commissioner who probably spends more time in Austin than in El Paso. 

Do you really want a Commissioner who gets along with the rest of them? 

The only thing Iliana probably has Vince beat is on personality. 

And that is not saying much. 

Vince can come off a little pedantic about of all things....county government.  

Oh, and there is his association with his former staffer, and current political consultant, Jaime Abeytia.

While Abeytia might be fun to have around  and watch "Game of Thrones" with, not sure you want him out there getting out your vote. 

So what's Iliana to do? 

At this point, she just has to keep at it. 

While she does have an uphill climb, it is not exactly gonna be easy for Vince either.

Again, we are talking County government, if someone asks Vince, "Well, what have you done?"

Remember, he is pedantic. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beto and the Texas House Speaker's Race

I have said before that Joe Moody does not have a shot at being Speaker should the Texas House turn blue. 

But I might need to adjust that statement. 

He is still a long shot, but his odds have improved.

Why?

Beto O'Rourke.

Look, Beto does not want to be a stay-at-home dad. 

He is looking for reasons to get away from his wife and kids.

I do not blame him.

And what better way to get away from the family than by targeting select Texas House Districts represented by Republicans, but that voted for you when you ran for U.S. Senate?

So how does this work?

If y'all remember, Beto hired Moody when Beto ran for Senate.

Moody put in his fair share of work, and now Moody is calling in the favor...flip these House seats - Nine of them.

Once flipped, O'Rourke calls in his favor, and asks those nine Democrats to support a Speaker Moody. 

Those nine, plus Moody himself, and the rest of the El Paso Delegation, you got a block of 14 Democrats for Moody.

NOW Moody could be in the driver's seat. 

But again it only works if both the House flips, AND those nine targeted by Beto are part of the flip. 

Not outside of the realm of possibility. 

But you gotta assume Beto is still popular, people will vote that far down the ballot without the straight ticket option, and Republicans still crossover and vote blue.

At the very least, it buys Moody time with his boss, Rick Francis.  

 

 

Claudia Ordaz Perez -Thin-Skinned (UPDATE - Maybe?)

UPDATE - DAVID K SAYS CLAUDIA DID NOT CALL HIM BECAUSE PEOPLE THINK SHE RIPPED OFF FINE MEXICAN CUISINE ESTABLISHMENT LOGO.

Back in late October, I joked that Claudia Ordaz Perez's campaign logo looks a lot like the Taco Bell logo.

Again, late October.

And the only reason I even cracked a joke about it was because Claudia's political consultant, Jaime Abeytia, ragged on Eliza Tomatillo's logo for looking like a shit emoji. It is a stretch, but whatever. 

But yesterday, yesterday being December, I saw David K post THIS:

Yes Ordaz's logo looks like the Taco Bell logo.  I get it, ha ha, so funny!  The problem is that the universal sign for a traditional Spanish mission is the bell framed into the stucco there in front of the building.  Ordaz was looking to honor the area's history (which is real and documented unlike other parts of town that just suddenly become "historic" at the whim of He Who Shall Not Be Named).  Taco Bell kind of screwed anyone wanting a mission themed anything.  

Hmmm.

Again, I make the Taco Bell joke more than month ago. 

Either I am not the only who thinks of Taco Bell when looking at her logo, or I really got you all dreaming of Double Deckers and Cinnamon Twists when looking at the logo.

Regardless, it appears it was just too much for Claudia too handle by herself. 

From the looks of it, she probably called David K to clarify that her logo is about selling her candidacy and the district's history, and not Enchiritos.

"District's history."

Sure, that is one way of looking at it.

What you call history, the "LatinX" crowd may call symbols of the White Man's genocide of the brown man.  

But that is neither here nor there. 

How does this relate to Claudia's race?

Look, Eliza Tomatillo might be a half-wit, but she is probably not thin-skinned like Claudia. 

If Claudia is getting worked up into a lather this early in the race over her logo, can you imagine her in February? 

She is gonna lose her shit when she does not get the El Paso Times endorsement.

And this thin-skinned person is who you want to send to Austin?

 

Filing Deadline and Other stuff

Claudia Ordaz Perez - We are seven days shy of filing deadline and it looks like Cesar Blanco is going to waltz his way to the State Senate.  Which would be bad news for Claudia Ordaz Perez.  Because Blanco would then be free to help his candidate, Elisa Tomatillo.  Now much is made of Ordaz's "base".  But Blanco's base is bigger than Ordaz's.

Eliza Tomatillo - Hey, girl. Rather than looking through my blog posts for Claudia's text messages that went public a while back, just gimme a call.  I got you.

Illiana Holguin - Here's the problem.  Vince Perez is not a fatally flawed candidate.  The truth is, at Veronica Escobar's urging, County government was glorified, when in fact there is not much to it.  It is mainly a hospital, jail, and courts.  You are not gonna find much there there to crucify Vince on.  ON THE OTHER HAND, there is not much for Vince to brag about.  He has taken some symbolical votes.  Like, if I am not mistaken, he voted against the most recent pay raise.  But it ain't like he's returning the money.   So why is Vince having to run for his life instead of helping his wife? Well, besides having NOT run for County Judge last cycle?  Well, because he pissed off Veronica Escobar and Richard Wiles.  They may know that Vince can pull it off and win, but they want him to know he needs to think twice before calling some impromptu press conference on a Sunday.

Dee Margo - For a while I thought Dee was toast.  But maybe, just maybe he can pull it off.  Yes, there are three people running against him.  But that is the problem right there for those running against him.  At this point, all Dee needs to do is make sure he gets into the run-off.  And then? Who exactly votes in December?  

El Paso Electric - I saw Veronica vomitted up some letter, likely written by environmental activists to halt the sale of El Paso Electric.  How do you know it was written by environmentalists? The push for rooftop solar.  So what's the problem? The residential payback.  Some folks will not see a return until 10 years or more has passed.  So what do? Get the utility to subsidize it so that makes more sense for residential solar.  How much is that gonna be passed on to you? That's the kicker.  Solar for commercial rooftops is whole other beast, but there that payback can be quicker due to how it is reflected on the company books.  But if Escobar were really serious about reducing the carbon footprint of El Paso, she would be pushing for a Palo Verde power plant.  "But nuclear energy is dangerous."  So is eating Whataburger french fries.