Reliant Energy has a neat little “Home Energy Checkup,” where you enter facts about your home and Reliant offers customized tips on how to make your household more energy-efficient. (My tip: Don’t use Reliant Energy).

As part of this quiz, you select the appliances you have from a list. Something about that list caught my eye:

That’s right, folks: even if you have a clandestine marijuana farm in your closet, you can still benefit from Reliant’s power-saving tips.

A new state law restricts the public’s access to sales data used by appraisal districts. The Chron’s Rosanna Ruiz reported on this story. Predictably, the story is sprinkled with faulty assumptions, factual errors and editorial commentary:

Property owners considering whether to fight their tax bills may have a more difficult time thanks to a new Texas law.

That lede doesn’t make much sense. For the vast majority of property owners, it’s too late to be “considering whether to fight.” The protest deadline for most folks was more than two months ago. Nice timing, Chron!

The Texas Real Estate Association, which was the chief backer of the bill passed by lawmakers last legislative session, applauded the new restriction.

The organization is called the Texas Association of Realtors.

”The MLS data is copyrighted and private information.” said Tom Morgan, vice president of legal affairs for the Texas Real Estate Association.

(Sigh.)

Texas is among a handful of states that don’t require disclosure of real estate sales, so some appraisal districts must pay MLS agencies for such information.

That’ s incorrect. Sales prices aren’t disclosed. The sales themselves are.

But buyers and sellers of high-end properties typically seek to keep their transactions private and those properties often wind up undervalued.

Whoa now. That looks like an unsupported opinion. But whose? If it’s the opinion of someone in the story, it should have been attributed. That line appears between two quotes from State Rep. Mike Villareal, so I suspect Ruiz is parroting his opinion without attributing it.

If it’s the reporter’s opinion, it should have been left out of the story. Rosanna Ruiz is not qualified to tell me the market value of a piece of property.

”Voluntary sales price disclosure would benefit the average Texans and the realtors who sell homes to the average Texan,” Villarreal said.

“Realtor” should be capitalized, as it’s a brand name, like Dumpster or Sheetrock.

Property owners have 30 days after they receive their tax bills to protest the appraised values of their properties.

Wrong. Property owners have 30 days after notices of appraised value come out, generally in April/May. Tax bills aren’t issued until October.

I seriously hope people aren’t making financial decisions based on Houston’s Leading Information Source.

Some interesting research comes our way thanks to the fine folks at Professors R-Squared:

Well… they found that, when compared to normal conditions, rain significantly reduces voter participation — by a rate of roughly 1% per inch. They also found that an inch of snowfall decreases turnout by roughly 0.5%. Poor weather is shown to benefit the Republican Party’s vote share and may have contributed to two Electoral College outcomes, the 1960 and 2000 presidential elections.

The good professors’ conclusion is:

Pray for lots of rain and snow next November!

I would take a different tack. Aesop said, “the gods help those who help themselves.”

In that spirit, I think it’s time to fire up Old Reliable.

Must have been his intravenous drug habit.

UPDATED– Suddenly this picture makes a lot more sense.

UPDATED– It just keeps getting better.

Good ol’ boy, regular American guy Fred just can’t seem to figure out who he wants to run his non-campaign campaign. Maybe the third time’s a charm.

Fred Thompson on Wednesday tapped the man he credits with saving his 1994 Senate campaign to take over his likely presidential bid.

Bill Lacy, a former strategist for Ronald Reagan, Bob Dole and Republican National Committee, will run day-to-day operations of Thompson’s committee to “test the waters” for a presidential run.

“He turned around my campaign for Senate in 1994

Someone better turn this ship around. Lately it’s been more like one of those subs in the Hunt for Red October, sinking fast.

The all-but-declared candidate collected about $1.5 million less than the $5 million backers had hoped to bring in during June, his first fundraising month. In July, Thompson sidelined his campaign-manager-in-waiting, Tom Collamore, and watched a few other aides follow him out the door amid consternation inside the operation about the active role of Thompson’s wife, Jeri.

Perhaps Mr. Lacy will fare a bit better than he did in his last stint as a presidential campaign manager.

A White House political director in the Reagan administration, Lacy was Dole’s political strategist for 10 years, including during the Kansas senator’s failed 1996 presidential run. Lacy resigned shortly after Dole lost the New Hampshire and Delaware primaries.

I’ll say this for Mr. Lacy, he sure nailed the reason for ol’ Fred’s turnaround in his Senate race.

“Fred isn’t Superman. His style has some similarities to President Reagan, but he hasn’t been around as long and proven himself as much,” Lacy wrote. “But he has been tested: In the darkest hours of his political career, when the wheels were about to come off his first campaign, he figured out how to scoop them up, put them on a red truck and drive off into the sunset.”

You could write a book from that statement. Certainly, his style is similar to Reagan’s, give him that much. But even though his Senate career wasn’t exactly stellar, you have to give him credit where credit is due. He did manage to get McCain/Feingold passed, even got a loving note from Russ for his efforts.

But I like that last one best, about scooping up the wheels, renting a little red truck and driving into the sunset. What little red truck?

Although some of his campaign staff protested the move as cheesy, they leased Thompson a red Chevy pickup and he hit the road. Cooper attempted to paint Thompson as phony, calling him a “Gucci-wearing, Lincoln-driving, Perrier-drinking, Grey Poupon–spreading millionaire Washington special-interest lobbyist.” But voters loved the truck. They didn’t seem to mind that the candidate often switched from a sedan to the truck just miles from his appearances. “We couldn’t believe anyone was buying it,” says Kopp.

There are a lot of good, hard working conservatives running for the Republican nomination in 2008. Hunter, Romney, Tommy Thompson, Giuliani and others. Why settle for style over substance?

Just a reminder, courtesy the New York Times.

Attacks on American-led forces using a lethal type of roadside bomb said to be supplied by Iran reached a new high in July, according to the American military.

The devices, known as explosively formed penetrators, were used to carry out 99 attacks last month and accounted for a third of the combat deaths suffered by the American-led forces, according to American military officials.

“July was an all-time high,” Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the No. 2 commander in Iraq, said in an interview, referring to strikes with such devices.

Such bombs, which fire a semi-molten copper slug that can penetrate the armor on a Humvee and are among the deadliest weapons used against American forces, are used almost exclusively by Shiite militants. American intelligence officials have presented evidence that the weapons come from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, although Tehran has repeatedly denied providing lethal assistance to Iraqi groups.

As of today, taxpayer-funded government pension funds in Texas still have billions of dollars invested in French and German and Russian companies doing business with Iran.

The money these foreign firms put into developing and operating Iran’s energy sector produce enormous profits for the radical mullahs, who turn around and use those profits to build the bombs and fund the insurgents in Iraq that are murdering our troops. (Not to mention paying to fund Hizb’allah and Hamas.)

Texas needs to make it perfectly clear to these foreign firms–you can do business with the Devil if you want, but not with our money. If you insist on generating profits for the Iranian regime, don’t come looking to Texas for the capital to do so.

Governor Perry promised to act on the issue last month; Senator Dan Patrick introduced a bill to this same effect last March.

Will everyone else up in Austin get in gear and get this done?

Or will Texas taxpayer’s dollars still be invested in Iran when the casualty totals come rolling in for August, and September, and October, and…

Last Sunday, the Houston Chronicle ran an op-ed from its reader representative, James Campbell, explaining why the paper quotes local “community activist” Quanell X so frequently (Campbell estimates an average of once per week, which is quite high).

Campbell argues that Quanell X is quoted because he always appears at the scene of some perceived racial injustice, and always has a newspaper-friendly sound byte prepared. Of course, that explanation boils down to “we’re lazy,” and although Campbell sheepishly admits that the Chronicle will probably continue to quote Mr. X, he lets slip that the paper’s credibility would be better served by finding better sources (like, say, actual witnesses).

However, what’s really aggravating is how Campbell dodged the central issue surrounding Quanell X, namely his radicalism. If a media-savvy KKK member started showing up at every event involving blacks, Jews, Catholics, etc., the media still wouldn’t give him the time of day because such a person would lack credibility.

So why does Mr. X supposedly have credibility? James Campbell answers this question in an extremely snarky, disgusting fashion:

A profile of Quanell X published in 2001 reveals much about the man. I suspect some of the animus toward him is part racial, and part general annoyance with seeing him frequently decrying an injustice, usually against someone black.

There you have it. I could be wrong, but it looks as if Campbell is saying “part of the animus towards Quanell X is general racism, and part of it is a specific racism against pointing out racial injustices.” This reveals something important — Campbell thinks that the color of Mr. X’s skin gives him credibility, because anybody who opposes him is probably a racist.

But this is absurd given Mr. X’s background. As I relayed in the comments to Campbell’s post:

[Quanell X] has identified with the Nation of Islam, which holds that whites were genetically engineered 6,000 years ago by a black scientist, and are innately evil and inferior to blacks. Still, he somehow managed to get kicked out of the Nation of Islam when he encouraged blacks to mug whites in River Oaks during the Gary Graham execution. Now he is a member of the New Black Panther Party, which is considered by the Southern Poverty Law Center to be a hate group for preaching racial genocide.

I could go on, but I think you already know all of this. Quanell X is more than a simple racist; he’s a fanatical racist. His ideology compares favorably — with no exaggeration — to Nazism.

So, is Campbell an apologist for people who preach racial genocide, or is that kind of thing just plain acceptable provided you’re a member of a racial minority? I’d really like Mr. Campbell to answer this, because enquiring minds want to know.

Accordingly, I’d encourage everyone to e-mail Campbell at james.campbell@chron.com. Ask him why he thinks that it’s ok to quote a member of a racist hate group an average of once per week. Be sure to tell him that laziness isn’t an excuse.

As we noted here, the fastest, lowest cost and most effective way to immediately impact illegal immigration is to eliminate the opportunities for employment that tempt people to risk their lives crossing our country’s border.

The Bush administration is finally going to allow the Dept. of Homeland Security to crackdown on employers that flaunt our laws to make an extra buck.

After first proposing the rules last year, Department of Homeland Security officials said they held off finishing them to await the outcome of the debate in Congress over a sweeping immigration bill. That measure, which was supported by President Bush, died in the Senate in June.

Now administration officials are signaling that they intend to clamp down on employers of illegal immigrants even without a new immigration law to offer legal status to millions of illegal immigrants already in the workforce.

As we all knew, we didn’t need new, “comprehensive”, laws to stop the influx, we just needed to enforce the laws already on the books. Now those firms that think they can make an extra buck by hiring illegals and letting the taxpayers bear the brunt of the social costs are running scared.

“A lot of employers are saying, ‘We just can’t handle this,’ ” said Laura Reiff, co-chairwoman of the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition, which represents employers in low-skilled industries. She said the rules might lead to new pressure from business on Congress to reconsider measures granting legal status to illegal immigrants.

Pure bunk. Employers can handle it. They choose not to. Employers like Mark Chamblee of Chamblee’s Rose Nursery in Tyler, Texas. Check this out from the Lufkin Daily News.

For Mark Chamblee, the stricter rule could mean losing some of his 28 workers at his nursery in Tyler, Texas.

Chamblee suspects a few of his workers could have trouble with their Social Security numbers and said he will fire them if the problems aren’t resolved.

“Of course, it would add to the workload for the other workers,” he said. “It would reduce our production and our output. Not all of our demand would be met on our products. Operating costs would go up.”

In other words, Mr. Chamblee suspects that he has a problem but refuses to do anything about it because “Operating costs would go up.” Incredible. Our schools are overflowing, our health systems are awash in red ink and Mr. Chamblee doesn’t want HIS operating costs to go up.

Perhaps the DHS reads the Lufkin Daily News and will give Mr. Chamblee a call to help him with his suspicions.

The Houston Chronicle is hot-and-bothered again about the “distorted,” “misleading,” “ignorant,” “misinformed,” “disgraceful,” “posturing,” and “opportunistic” advocacy by some members of Congress regarding the Ramos & Compean affair.

I’m going to shock many of you (and probably many of them) by conceding they have a point. Moreover, I am going to accept that their characterization of the border agents’ conduct is completely and totally accurate.

The agents, Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean, are in prison because they failed to report the shooting, lied to investigators, tried to conceal evidence and filed a false report with their supervisors.

Fine, fine, fine.

For what it’s worth, I’ve never been in the camp that thought the two were innocent “heroes” who were rail-roaded by a rogue US Attorney acting as a puppet for bureaucrats for the nascent North American Union operating from a secret headquarters buried 17 stories below the Alamo. It always seemed pretty obvious and logical to me that:

• The agents knew with 99% certainty they were dealing with a drug-smuggler, not a typical border crosser;
• One agent, pumped full of adrenaline and out in the middle of nowhere decided he was going to get all Charles Bronson on the dude and smack him in the face with the butt of his gun;
• Instead, the donut-eater fell flat on his face and the drug-smuggler took off, infuriating said donut-eater and prompting him to start shooting in order to “get that bastard”;
• Everything that occurred afterwards was designed to keep a lid on an embarrassing episode, one with the potential to generate lots of paperwork, cause lots of grief, and to the benefit of no one accept a drug-smuggling scumbag.

See, Houston Chronicle? I’m willing to concede a lot. I’m going to take grief from many quarters for conceding so much.

In that same spirit of risk of angering one’s “base” in pursuit of honest debate, I’d ask the Chronicle’s editorial writers to please address two issues:

1. While it is true that the agents were convicted in a jury trial, it has now emerged that the prosecutors [or, to help you liberals "get" it, "cronies of John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzalez and George Bush installed in the Justice Department"] knowingly lied to the jury, claiming that the drug-smuggler was a one-off affair, desperate to pay for his sick mother’s healthcare, but otherwise an innocent angel. In fact, Aldrete-Davila, at the time of the trial had already been implicated by DEA agents in additional smuggling activity, conducted with a US government-issued border-crossing card. The jury wasn’t allowed to know this. Shouldn’t this fact play some, even partial role in determining what “justice” demands as appropriate punishment? Would the Chronicle’s editorial writers honestly answer that question the same way if the situation were reversed, and Ramos & Compean had gotten off at trial, in part because the jury hadn’t been allowed to hear that they had a history of unjustified shootings of border crossers? So that’s issue number one.
2. Secondly, any fair-minded observer has to admit that the weapons charge (which is responsible for so much of the mandatory sentence) wasn’t written or intended to be applied to situations such as this, and didn’t have to be pursued by prosecutors. So at the same time Sutton’s office was demonstrating extreme leniency towards their still-drug-smuggling star witness, they were acting with extreme prejudice towards the border agents. Does the Chronicle endorse all applications of mandatory minimum sentences, no matter how tortured the reading of the law upon which the prosecutions were based? Does might suddenly make right? Common sense is inconsequential as long as the government tells you so? So that’s issue number two.

Instead of endless debates over whether or not Ramos & Compean are good guys or bad (and Kennedy assassination-esque mental reenactments of what “actually” occurred out there that night), I’d like to see the Chronicle’s editorial board directly address those two simple matters.

For all their uncharitable characterizations of their opponents on this issue, it is the least they should do.

The Houston Chronicle (picked up by the AP of course) has a hit piece this morning outlining Texas Governor Rick Perry’s security detail costs for his foreign excursions.

Foreign trips by Gov. Rick Perry and his wife have cost Texas more than $250,000 in security provided through his protective detail, according to figures obtained by the Houston Chronicle.

Look, the governor has plenty he can be criticized for. His security detail isn’t one of them. For once, his spokesman gets something right.

“As the leader of the 10th largest economy in the world, the governor has made job creation and economic development a cornerstone of his administration, and that means … bringing jobs to this state, whether from inside our own country or from around the world,” Black said.

That’s a fact, Mr. Black. Texas’ economy is booming thanks to international trade. And like him or not, the governor of Texas cannot hop on a plane and visit a foreign country without protection.

There is one little trip that just might raise a few eyebrows. That little trip the governor made to speak at the globalist Bilderberg meeting in Istanbul, Turkey cost Texas taxpayers $24,734.57 for security and is certain to revive the conspiracy theories flowing from wacky Ron Paul and his acolytes.

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