In case you missed it, LST reader Kenyon Schmidt reminds us that everyone’s favorite war protester, Cindy Sheehan, held a Thanksgiving weekend book signing in a Crawford tent. Apparently the ditch was too small to hold the throngs brought out by the woman who declaimed “Get our troops out of occupied New Orleans!” Observe the crush:

Lest you think these were snapped by some Right-leaning maniac bent on damaging Miss Sheehan’s hard-earned reputation, these were newswire photos. I must admit to feeling sorry for the poor woman. On previous occasions the “protest mom” drew hordes of reporters, but these photos reveal only a few photographers and no book signers. Perhaps it was early in the day. In case you were wondering, the book is a 175-page paperback available at Amazon for about $10. Current sales rank is 4,880.

UPDATE:
Amazon now shows the book at #5,263.  Also, Editor and Publisher carries Cindy’s rebuttal of the "lonely book signing" photos. Apparently some people actually did show up.

But in a statement today, Sheehan accused “right-wing” sites of “spreading a false story that nobody bought my book at Camp Casey on Saturday. That is not true, I sold all 100 copies and got writer’s cramp signing them. Photos were taken of me before the people got in line to have me sign the book. We made $2000 for the peace house.”

Words fail me.

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Credit to Janet Elliot and the Houston Chronicle for highlighting the abuse by Texas school districts of nearly $6.3 million tax-payer dollars on 161 lobbying contracts this year.

Those numbers come from a report by Texans for Public Justice– not exactly a group of folks known for their strident right-wing headbanging.

The "Educrat-Bureaucracy-Blob", of course, disputes the figures:

The Houston Independent School District spent as much as $420,000 on nine lobby contracts, according to Texans for Public Justice, a group that tracks lobby spending. That was more than any other district, with Dallas ISD coming in second at $255,000 for up to eight contracts. HISD denied spending that much on lobbyists, saying the tally is about half that amount.

[snip] Terry Abbott, a spokesman for HISD, said the numbers in the Public Justice report are wrong. He said the district paid five lobbyists a total of $220,000 this year, an amount less than .014 percent of the district’s general fund budget of $41.4 billion.

A Houston Chronicle review in August of lobby reports filed at the Texas Ethics Commission found three additional lobbyists who listed receiving up to $150,000 from HISD. The district said at the time that it considers those lobbyists — David Thompson, Lynn Moak and Dan Casey — as consultants on school finance issues.

"Consultants." Oookay.

Always ready to extend a helping-hand in the crafting of public policy, LST recommends that Committee Chairman Kent Grusendorf and other state elected officials take a gander at how the citizens of Minnesota, with their long tradition of relatively honest and open-government, approach these issues.

Up-der inda Nort’ donchaknow, EVERY local governmental entity is required to report not just all expenditures of tax dollars on lobbying contracts, but almost all employee time and resources used to "influence legislation" as well. (Summary: 2 pages, pdf).

The result is a startling comprehensive document (185 pages, pdf) that lays out, line by line, how much taxpayer money is being spent by local government to grow government and spend more taxpayer money.

Similar requirements in Texas would be a political kick to the groin of folks like the Texas Municipal League, Texas Association of Counties, and the entire alphabet soup of groups that constitute the tax-and-spend lobby.

And if we applied these same standards to public school districts, HISD would never again have to "suffer" when a research group "inaccurately" characterizes the amount of money it has spent on lobbyists.

Is there a single current elected official in Austin prepared to advocate that Texas adopt these same (or even stricter) requirements?

And if not, can anyone think of someone we could send to Austin who thinks Texas taxpayers deserve at least as much protection as the pasty-white frost-bitten Lake Wobegon-lovin pinkos of Minnesota enjoy? (Quicktime, highly recommended link.)

On Purim, Jewish media outlets have a tradition of playfully writing satirical articles, ala "The Onion" or an April Fool’s Day prank.

But I don’t know how anyone will ever write a more mind-boggling headline then that on the front-page of today’s Jerusalem Post:

"Peres: Sharon only leader who can lead Israel to peace"

Strange days indeed.

Welcome to December– but beware, the New Year approaches!