Here is more proof that life is stranger than fiction--or art. No matter how I tried; no matter what skeins of bullshit I threw out, and I can, I can; no matter what flights of fancy I committed, nothing in me is capable of approaching the utter jaw-dropping, self-referential, whining lunacy of this.

I find that I did not entirely express my glands of spleen about Our Empress in Waiting, and so thought I'd have another crack at it. Hearing her does that to me, especially when I'm not close to a remote control to shut that woman up.

I deplore her politics and those enough would disqualify her for guardianship of a burnt match, and one could spend some interesting time wondering if her politics are the result of her nasty disposition. I tend to think so, for with the exception of some cloth-headed liberals who cannot see how the idea of freedom has been subverted, more and more I see just modern liberalism as the political expression of meanness.

There are many instances of Hillary's bred-in-the-bone meanness, but let's concentrate on Travelgate. The White House travel office does what its name suggests; it also takes care of travel arrangements for journalists. The employees serve at the pleasure of the president, meaning that he can say, without reason, "Your services are no longer required," and there is no appeal. But Hillary wanted "to get our people in" and is reported to have said to various functionaries who were in point of fact not her subordinates for she was not in the table of organization but First Lady, "Fire the sons of bitches." And, fearing that there would be hell to pay if they did not, they did.

I had thought to compile some things about our Empress in Waiting, Hillary Rodham Clinton. There is much to say but only a few highlights are needed.

We had eight years of this woman while her husband was president of the United States: remember the daily miasma of deception and lies from the Clinton White House.

Recall them procuring FBI files on political opponents, the missing Rose Law Firm records, Whitewater, the White House Travel Office, down to a series of merely nasty little things, like her throwing things, her screaming, her disinclination to pay for either her hair-dressing or her clothes.

And there was the telling rudeness. The White House has, at dinners and receptions, accomplished military officers--doctors, of medicine and the academy; men and women of achievement who are there to provide the social oil for the occasion and to make people feel comfortable in the White House. Hillary had them pass canapes as a sign of her contempt.

Her obsession with utter control of everything--her health-care plan which was so comprehensive that it had no hope of success for it did not allow for humanity; it was designed by Ira Magaziner, whose name GE will not pronounce for he cost them $200 million in a similar plan to make rotary compressors for refrigerators. It didn't work. He then went on to screw up Volvo and Sweden. These failures were of course discounted for failure does not discredit liberalism--if it did, there would be no liberalism, or many other doctrines for that matter. Magaziner's plan had the cachet of exerting a control so utter that it was a crime to take full charge of your own health.

I will give her credit, though: although I disagree with all of her politics, she is intelligent and serious enough that I do not think that the nation would fall apart under her stewardship, as it would, I believe, under Barack Obama, who has been promoted above his preparation and abilities owing to his attractiveness.

All of this speaks only to her politics and personality quirks, and says nothing about how irritating she is--fingernails-on-the-blackboard irritating. I know that that ought not weigh heavily when deciding on a president, who should, in a perfect world, be chosen entirely for competence, but still: the very idea of four, or eight, years of her, with her voice, her smirk, and her laugh. And her rage. And her insistence on controlling everything that she can and things that she cannot--she is so bossy that she is intent on doing away with traditional American freedoms and rights, all, of course, in the name of the Common Good, and there is nothing that she feels she has no right to and no one she does not feel qualified to boss and control.

Can you imagine four or eight years of this?

An open thread for Proposition 1, i.e. "The adoption of the Fire Fighters' and Police Officers' Civil Service Law.

The story is wrong or the guy can negotiate an oil deal....or in this case, a non-oil deal:

Tom Ford isn't taking any chances when it comes to sanctity of his New Mexico ranch.

The fashion designer, 45, has purchased mineral rights beneath his property outside Santa Fe, in an attempt to block possible oil exploration in the area. Ford plunked down roughly $84,000 (pocket change!) to buy the rights to more than 1,400 acres from the New Mexico Land Office, the Associated Press reports.

"We are protecting our land by holding these rights," said Ford's lawyer, Janet McKay. Ford, who grew up in Santa Fe, went on his mineral purchasing spree in response to Tecton Energy's proposal to drill exploratory wells on 65,000 acres near his land.

Sixty dollars per mineral acre? Wow.

Any all bidness experts want to weigh in with what is going on here?

Bare percentages of conservatives in six states decided, for varying reasons, to "stay home (rather) than vote for half a loaf of bread." So believing, they would not even listen to President Reagan.

A great story from the American Spectator that is Must Reading for anyone who thinks sitting out an election sends a message.

Conservatives, we are particularly susceptable to this thinking for some reason. The best Republican/conservative candidate does not agree with you on issue x, y or z. His opponent does not agree with you either, but you vote for the opponent (or sit the election out) to teach the conservative candidate or his party, a lesson: if they had agreed with you on x, y or z, as any good Republican/conservative should, they'd have gotten your vote. This is extremely short-sighted thinking.

There are unending unintended consequences from that punishment vote, a good case of which is described in the article.

Before casting your vote or deciding to stay home, recognize that in the self-evidently critical issues of liberty, taxation, growth of government, life, the Supreme Court and national defense, any Republican will be more conservative than a Democrat opponent. You want to maintain freedoms, reduce taxation, support life and keep a strong national defense with the possibility of smaller government? You must vote for the conservative/Republican candidate, even if he or she does not agree with you on your pet issue. The stakes on these critical issues are too great to trust the Democrats. With the current slate of Presidential candidates, any of the Democrat candidates will be better for the country than Mrs. Clinton, and any of the Republican candidates will be better for the country than any of the Democrats.

If you think that politics is merely a sport and you just want the team to win that your family has supported for 3 generations, do us all a favor and stay home. But don't stay home because your candidate agrees with you on most things, but not your pet issue. Pet issue politics just doesn't work just like politics as a football game doesn't. The stakes are too great.

The story in the MRT regarding the draft recommendations to the MDC by their "Consultants with no ideas" is kind of disturbing.

First things first, I just have to fix the lead quote:

Consultants Alan Cox and John Roberts of TIPS Strategies Inc. repeatedly have emphasized the importance of both the obvious need for workforce recruitment and the company line of developing Midland's downtown.

I'm still struggling with why we are paying these people any money at all.

Here's "new idea" number one:

....hiring a company to draft a proposal for an "agile port" in the La Entrada Business Park, near the airport and visit with private companies that may be interested in developing it. The facility would serve as a point where goods arriving from Mexico could be processed and transported by air, rail or road to destinations throughout the United States.

Ummmm...hasn't MOTRAN and the La Entrada Rail district been working on that for almost a decade. Also, wasn't the trade zone designation acquired around the airport when we were building the new terminal for this exact purpose. So we hired a company to remind us what we were already supposed to be doing and they tell us to hire another company to do something we have two quasi-governmental agencies already working on?

Here's "new idea" number 2:

Additionally, the consultants suggested the MDC partner with Midland College to develop an applied technology center at the ClayDesta Business Park. This center would help existing businesses improve their products and services by introducing them to current technologies that could be used in other ways.

Ummm...doesn't MC already have a center off campus near Furr's that is supposed to provide many of those functions now? And why build at ClayDesta? Isn't the college's main campus like right across the airport? And don't they have lots of newly available land due to the closure of the third runway a while ago? What about Downtown? Can't they at least be consistent? You drill invest in downtown as #1 and then you propose ClayDesta for a "Business Technology Center"? Huh?

And the best part, they encourage the MDC to take some more risk, since we are more conservative than a bank. Does that mean we do things like eliminate the clawback provisions and just invest in companies like a drunken investment capitalist?

An open thread for the City of Midland Mayoral race between Stephanie Sparkman and Wes Perry.

Useful Links:

Sparkman for Mayor

WesPerry.org

An open thread for the Midland City Council At-Large race between Scott Dufford, Jonathon Dumire, and Berry Simpson.

An open thread for the Midland City Council District 4 race between Jerry Knudsen and Michael Trost.

An open thread for the Midland City Council District 3 race between James Roberts and John James.

All candidates for office at an open forum on the south side advocate better streets for the south side!

Actually, there have been two shockers in the last couple of days. The first being that the Craig Anderson show possesses a listener.

Commenters should keep in mind that while your identity is unknown to us your IP address is not and we can tell very easily that several comments have been left by the same person (or at least the same computer) under different names. This has resulted in the removal of about 35 comments and the outright banning of two IP addresses.

Further, disagreements are fine. Elections are all about disagreements. Keep it civil, though.

You are not standing in front of anyone on a stage here....you are sitting at keyboards. Which means that you have some time to actually think out questions, answers, and retorts before delivering them to us all. Make good use of it.

I heard Midland mayoral candidate Stephanie Sparkman on the infamous Craig Anderson show this morning, and I just have to say -- way to hang in there, girl. Sparkman was forced to endure being yelled at, insulted, and repeatedly berated with the same questions over and over by some of the callers -- all while Craig Anderson sat quietly by, occasionally throwing in a comment about how he's not feeling well.

The most tense, wheels-off moments came when a caller who had used the Interwebz to research Sparkman's bankruptcy history, used the information to attack her first professionally, then personally. Stephanie was clearly rattled and fired back loudly with her responses, but Anderson allowed the knucklehead caller to continue unabated, long after he was out of ammo. So naturally, the call subsequently devolved into a whipping post situation by which Sparkman was simply answering the same accusations again and again as Anderson's flu medication did its evil work. Sparkman was dropping ginormous hints to Craig, by telling the person, "I thank you for calling, thank you for your call," etc. It did little good, however. Anderson (on the record as supporting Wes Perry in the election, by the way) refused to hit the Dump Button.

Well, I'm on the record as supporting Wes, too, but I'll be the first to come to Stephanie's defense on the whole bankruptcy issue, as well as in calling Anderson out for refusing to take control of his own show. That guy needs a producer, a call screener/board-op, and a co-host. When you insist on doing everything yourself, guests (and certainly listeners) suffer when you're having a bad day. This morning's on-air train wreck was case in point.

This is already going viral on the internet, but what the heck, I am going to post on it anyway.

Long story short:

Smug, arrogant journo in Iraq writes a blog post about how he had trouble getting into the Green Zone because 1) He didn't have proper identification, and 2) Worse still, the dumb "stuk in Irak" hick soldier was not familiar with the Knight-Ridder newspaper conglomerate.

Journo unintentionally unites the entire internet in the belief that the journo is an asshat and gets dealt a severe beatdown in his own comments section.

Journo edits orginal post to make it more palatable. It doesn't help. (Don't worry, there is a happy ending).

Journo's blog site is now down.

Fear Not! Docweasel has the original post in its entirety aong with the 197 comments that had amassed before the site went down.

Grab some coffee and brighten your day by reading the comments.

Oh, and the posts and comments on this story at Ace of Spades and Blackfive are hilarious also.

UPDATE: The reporter, Bobby Caina Calvan is back online:

Consider this my apology.

Overwhelmed by the e-mails, many of them vitriolic, I initially edited the post, then blocked further comments. Finally, I took down the site. Unfortunately, my actions were yet another faux pas, I was told; I should have left up the post and created a new one to share my reactions and issue an apology.

Yes, I am getting well-deserved criticism. But surprisingly, not all of the subsequent e-mails I got were vitriolic. Some were thoughtful. A few gave good advice.

There are many fine men and women serving in Iraq. There is no doubt about that. I've spoken to quite a few of them in my brief time in Baghdad. They have done their best to help many of us do our jobs. It is an environment that is extremely stressful and challenging.

The soldier at the checkpoint to whom I referred to in my earlier blog was doing his job. That much I do know. I was trying to do mine. In the end, he let me and my security guy in - after rightly taking the necessary steps to verify our identities.

For that I should have been thankful. My blog should not have upbraided the soldier. My personal reflections - ramblings, if you will - about the incident should have been kept private.

Perhaps any future incarnation of this blog should be private, too.

Sounds like a good enough apology, but then there is this:

By the way, this blog was never sanctioned by my employers, The Sacramento Bee and the McClatchy Co. It was meant to be a private blog that chronicled my experiences in Iraq and a way for me to express my personal thoughts. Again, it was meant for friends and family - to save me the trouble of responding to every e-mail I would get. I should have made this blog private - and judging from the response I've gotten, I should consider such a move [Emphasis mine].

Sounds like he is really only sorry that he got caught and had to face feedback.

The news business was so much better when it was a one-way street.

Air America gets the boot.

In Austin.

Is it possible to fail worse than that?

A random sample set, but a small one, but since every local media outlet is using unscientific polls for entertainment instead of coughing up some money for the real thing which could actually be reported as news, I will do the same.

Three unsolicited conversations with three unrelated and unconnected voters:

All voted for whatever new face (read non-incumbent) they could find on the ballot.

In other words: Throw the bums out.

Particular ire was reserved for the councilman who was circumventing his term limits by running for an At-Large council seat. But then, perhaps he has "fought too hard and too long" for that council seat to give it back now.

Does anyone know where to find the archived videos of the last two mayoral debates?

This review of Robert Redford's "Lions for Lambs" in Variety is pretty lukewarm. It almost seems like it would have been an outright pan except that the reviewer wants to throw Redford a bone or something.

It is the comments that are the most entertaining though.

Will it bomb? No question. Just like "Rendition" is bombing.

Me? I look forward to more "message" movies (that Speak Truth To Power!) from people who haven't heard the word "no" in thirty years.

The invaluable Dr. Theodore Dalrymple reports in The Spectator that a Belgian journalist told him that his nephew of 15 years was stabbed in the throat by two young Ukrainian asylum-seekers and that for some days it was unknown whether or not he would live.

To my mind there was little to do but hope that the young man recovers and to throw the book at the thugs who stabbed him; there was, evidently, no question about their actions or their guilt. And indeed, the press reported the horror of the crime in perfectly reasonable ways.

But that being politically correct (read intellectually fascist) Belgium, the seat of that monstrous unelected European Union, the wet dream of all statists everywhere since the fall of the Soviet Union, it did not take long for the usual suspects to tell us that our perceptions were wrong and that the criminals are not properly understood.

According to Dr. Dalrymple, which is the nom de plume for Anthony Daniels, whose books are worth the price, after the press had reported this assault, two professors of the law faculty of the Free University of Brussels decided that this reportage was hysteria--it had the effect of "creating a fundamental dichotomy between them and us."

And that is a bad thing? Please tell me how that is not a good thing, that is, if you are not evil or complaisant to it, which is the same damned thing. Here are two murderous thugs who stab a teenager and nearly take his life, and reporting what they did is wrong because it might make us think that they are not like us. I do not like the implied insult that I am really no different from knife-wielding footpads

Since the "Money in the Bank" post has degraded into a "Who owns most of Downtown" vs. "Who has more failed businesses" I figure the commenter's at Jessica's Well need an open thread to clear their minds of all those rumors of political skeletons.

The mud pit is now open...'rasslin' is allowed.

This may be an odd venue to review a movie called The Raspberry Reich by the gay Canadian pornographer Bruce LaBruce, but it tickled me so much that I'll have a go at it. [Update. A Canadian friend tells me that in Canada he is not considered a pornographer but just a movie maker; she went to the same film school and says he's sweet and a very nice man. Not to the left, as you'll find although that may not have been uppermost in his mind.]

First of all, the movie is not for the squeamish. There is hard-core sex in it, mostly gay, and at first I thought that it wouldn't actually be sex, in the Clintonian sense, but even though there is sex, in even Slick Willie's idea of it, it is not a sexy movie. Because it's gut-wrenchingly funny.

It is really a send-up of the 80s German radicals--mostly the Baader-Meinhof Gang. A gay pornographer makes the very valid point of the absurdity of viewing people as constructs, which is the essential leftist position on humanity.

It opens with a man putting the muzzle of a gun in his mouth--not, unfortunately, to end his life, but as part of the sexualization of violence; one of the characters' running gags is that he has pleasure with weapons. He, wearing very little, strokes automatic weapons as seductively as it is possible--I suppose, never having done or it considered it--on a bed under a huge Warhol-like posterized poster of Che. Che's murderous mug gets quite a workout in the movie, making it, at least for me, worth the price of admission to at last see someone link this murderous thug with, well, murderous thuggery instead of sanitizing this, er, murderous thug as the darling of the spoiled, sensation-seeking, irresponsible left.

City election politics may be heating up, but it seems the community may be tuning out....to a point. For the watchers (junkies), not much new is coming out of these debates and forums, just a little refining of their message and a bit of political calculus.

The MDC and the Menchaca/Urby episode are still getting some play, but the latest thing from the LWV Forum seems to be the City's reserve funds.

I guess the MDC's $10 ~ $14 million in the bank is a little too sacred right now, so everybody is hunting for something else to place on the tax-cutting campfire.

According to the City's 2007-2008 budget (.pdf):

The General Fund Unappropriated Fund Balance, which is essential for bond ratings, self-insurance considerations, disaster recovery and major economic or regulatory changes, is projected to be $28,097,112 at the beginning of Fiscal Year 2007 - 2008.

The debate comes in the fact it is City Policy to have an Unappropriated Fund Balance equal to 25% of the annual GENERAL BUDGET (about $70 Million), and this year the percentage is around 40% (which is down from 44% last year).

The City has a policy of maintaining a General Fund Unappropriated Fund Balance equal to at least twenty five percent (25%) of each fiscal year's operating expenditures. This level is an important factor in maintaining the City's general purpose bond ratings because of the cyclical nature of the energy industry, which is a major factor in the City's economy. It also provides a source of additional investment income to help maintain a level property tax rate.

So, it seems that by City Policy we have about $10.5 million more in the bank than required. According to the graph in the budget, we've been above 25% for the last 10 years and over 40% for the last 3.

This reserve doesn't include the funds we have in capital reserve funds, interest and sinking reserve funds etc. This "extra $10.5 Million" is just left over money from previous general budgets that we just kept in the cookie jar, while going to the bank and borrowing money, or soaking water customers with tiered rates and the "concept" of drainage improvement and treatment fees. Hmmmm, the budget said this fund is used for regulatory changes...isn't our storm water drainage problem mostly due to regulatory changes due to our population??? So why do we need a fee?

More interesting though, according to the September 30, 2006 financial audit of the City of Midland, city government was sitting on $67 Million in cash and $40 Million in investments. What the heck are we doing sitting on $107 Million (it has got to be larger now) in *Cash and Investments* and yet we borrow money.

Now, I'm sure some will say, well there are the liabilities and you have to have some reserves and what not, but according to the audit, the City of Midland has a net worth of $293 Million (it has got to be higher now).

When corporations start seeing high net worths, with lots of cash available, they discharge debt, buy back stock, give dividends to investors, etc. Don't our city Fathers pride themselves in saying they run the City like a Business, and the Mayor is the CEO?

I suppose that the world has achieved some sort of harmonic balance when the Nobel Committee, in order to embarass America, begins selecting as winners of the Peace prize the exact same people that Americans would have them select if our aim was to see the Nobel Committee totally discredited.

One of the supposed great features of most (if not all) of the 'incentive' agreements that we as taxpayers enter into with these companies is the "Clawback" provision. The clawback provision theoretically provides us protection in that if a given company does not perform on its pledge to create a certain number of jobs, then in that event they must pay back the money that was provided them by the development corporation.

In our cases locally, TMP Trailer, Countrywide Mortgage, and W Power and Light have all paid back their incentive money because they did not make their "job creation" targets.

But if these companies are in a position to pay this money back after their venture has not performed to expectations how is it they need the money from the Midland Development Corporation on the front end?

And if these companies are indeed on the hook for the money by way of a clawback provision then how can this money ever be (correctly) labeled an incentive? It seems that to be an true incentive that the money handed over to these privately owned companies would have to somehow alleviate some risk for them. But if there is a clawback provision, how is risk for the company reduced, exactly?

The announcement of the production of Trace Engine's first aircraft power plant was treated as a big deal by the news (which it should have been) and by the local chamber (again, which it should have been) and by the local economic development establishment which, along with the state, essentially took credit for Trace Engines coming to Midland.

Never mind that Trace is owned by thirty area investors and was never going to go anywhere else but Midland.

And also never mind that, if this deal also has a clawback provision like the others, it does not reduce or alleviate the risk of the venture to the investors.

So what is this money for? Does taking this money from the taxpayers and turning it over to well-connected private citizens facilitate true economic development in this (or any) case?

Look at the overall size of the Trace Engine venture. Then make an estimate of the likely aggregate net worth of the thirty local investors. And then look at the $400,000 that the MDC will give Trace Engines and make your own decision as to whether thirty of the areas most sophisticated investors made a go/no-go decision based upon the MDC's participation....a participation level that was not even known until well after Trace's arrival.

The economic development establishment would like you to picture this great public-private partnership involving visionary city leaders joining with rugged industrialists in order that things get done when they otherwise would not, thereby securing Midland's economic future.

I picture a hamster slapping down a lever because it has learned that when it does, food drops out of the chute.

In an AP Story carried by the MRT, and the rest of the Hearst Clan of papers, the much vaunted Texas Enterprise Fund is taking some heat for grantees who have laid off employees. It seems it took something the size of Countrywide to spur a little investigative reporting, yet we never got the full number of lay-offs from Countrywide, because they weren't talking.

[Countrywide] isn't the first company to lay off workers after securing millions of dollars in grants from the Texas Enterprise Fund, according to an Associated Press review of the program.

At least five other major companies - Vought Aircraft Industries, Texas Instruments, Washington Mutual, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin - laid off Texas workers after entering agreements with the job creation fund, records show.

Given the way the TEF usurped the MDC on two occasions by doing a press release the day before the MDC could craft their own, and announce their share of the bounty, I though this quote by Greg LeRoy, executive director of the Washington-based nonprofit Good Jobs First, was spot on:

"I call it a photo opportunity fund," he said, suggesting there's a temptation to give money to high-profile deals "so they can issue the press release and cut the ribbon."

I read the entire article attempting to digest it and take it to heart. But it turns out that I really just want to see a picture of the "lovely Spanish girl" who worked in the guy's office. Does that make me an alpha male, a beta male, or just a pig?

Some years ago a man, distressed from a difficult divorce, got a gun and sat in the stairwell of the building housing a high-priced San Francisco attorneys' firm, and started shooting lawyers. I realize that this may give a frisson of pleasure to some people, but let's, in the interest of fairness, recognize that not every law school graduate is Johnnie Cochran or F. Lee Bailey and some good people were no doubt killed.

Which may have been the view of one woman whose husband was murdered by this shooting mad man and who was primed to go before Congress in yet another attempt to get the Holy Grail, or at least a piece of it, of the coercive left--gun control--and there she stood, giving her testimony on why the Second Amendment was after all a bad idea and ought to be done away with as soon as possible.

(Coercive left. I'm being redundant. Sorry.)

I shall not go into the benefits of the Second Amendment except to state my view that it is essential so you can shoot the government when it comes for you when you find intolerable its designs on your life and purse and freedom; that's for another day; what bothers me is the way that this poor bereaved woman was used.

She appeared before Congress primed well. The quiver played between her lips and her voice, and her eyes were hurt and accusatory; her stance hurt and yet defiant. She was obviously in pain, and she was obviously made a pawn, in her grief, by the usual suspects, the totalitarians who dare not speak their name.

...what is Jessica's Well worth?

From 24/7 Wall Street:

Take Huffington. According to research firm Compete, it has an audience almost as large as the online version of the Philadelphia Inquirer. As a part of a larger newspaper organization like The New York Times (NYT) or Washington Post (WPO), that audience could probably be much bigger. NYT and WPO need a Huffington or two. Their internet revenues are under 10% of their total and not growing fast enough to keep up with falling print sales. Huffington has raised $10 million in VC money. What is it worth? $100 million. Maybe more.

There is a catch though:

The problem for the potential buyers is keeping the talent at the blog sites.

I know I'd quit blogging if I cashed out at a sum much smaller than $100 Million.

In another report from CBS-7 on the economic development sales tax, Midland Development Corporation Executive Director and Chamber Vassal President of Economic Development Mike Hatley is quoted as saying:

"The sales tax for economic development is a bargain, and a bargain in the sense that by some estimates about 43% of our MDC funds come from folks in Midland..."

"That means that the other 57% of the tax comes from visitors to the community."

Uh, excuse me....but now that you guys have "leveled the playing field" doesn't that mean that it is only a bargain if we never travel outside of Midland?

I guess that it did not occur to Ms. Hubbard to ask who it is that funds the economic development slush funds of other communties.

* It should be noted that CBS-7 owner John Bushman has an interest in a company [Trace Engines] that is currently taking economic development money from the MDC. I point this out not because I think that this needs to be disclosed in every CBS-7 story on the ED Sales tax but because I think that this flurry of puff pieces trying to bolster the ED tax's flagging public perception is no accident.

I am also sorry to see that the once mighty Mr. Bushman has fallen on such hard times that he is having to take public assistance.

It sure is nice to see the story in the MRT that TRACE has shipped their first engine, and is on their way to producing a significant number of these engines per year.

Of the MDC's projects, this is the ONLY project to date which fits the mold of what was sold to the Citizenry. It is an enterprise which is not Oil and Gas related, it involves manufacturing, it supplements and expands a very good aircraft maintenance program at Midland College, and it helps retain the high performance engine industry brought to the Permian Basin by Jim Hall and VDS.

We can debate all we want about how the large amount of local investors may have moved this business here without the help of ED funds, but in the end this is what the majority of voters in the City of Midland (right or wrong) pledged a portion of their tax monies toward.

Update: In the CBS7 report on the TRACE roll-out, I noted that they added the disclaimer that their parent company owns a small share of TRACE.

This one was in both my email boxes this morning from two different people. I guess it's making the rounds. Astounding stuff:

And note that the hallowed halls of state government always seem to be half empty, which makes this nonsense possible.