Friday, July 17, 2020

Stop Making Sense



This is what's going on:

Odd that Abbott is a party to the suit.  Can't figure out why he would be, except that the Texas GOP is.

Anyway, the argument is we tried to go virtual, but we're technical dweebs, so we have to expose hundreds of people in Houston so we can have our convention.  Except, how do they get everybody there now?  And does GRB have to allow them to stay beyond the contracted period?  'Cause I think that ends tomorrow, or maybe Sunday.  (My guess is the judge has no authority to require GRB to extend the contract period; only to comply with it.  I don't see how the judge can compel GRG to do whatever the GOP wants.) Allowing a day for travel, can the GRB say: sorry, we're closed now?  Your contract has expired? Especially considering many delegates probably can't get be ready to convene before Sunday. And what about hotel accommodations?  Or restaurants at 50% capacity?  Or Turner going back to enforcing public health orders, as he originally said he would do?

"Remain available" may not be the victory they were looking for.

Besides, I wonder if the judge can force the employees of the Convention Center to work the convention?

I know I'd be spitting in the food....

I'm gonna let this post stand, even though now we have a bit more information.  I'm assuming the judge decided the City of Houston "interfered" with the GOP's contract, though I find that reasoning dubious, at best.  I also find the judge's conclusions rather difficult to follow, but then I don't have the judge's reasoning to review and analyze:

Jared Woodfill, an attorney for Houston activist Steve Hotze, who helped file the lawsuit, said Judge Lynn Hughes ruled that the party can hold an in-person convention both this weekend and next weekend — and “that the City of Houston may not interfere with it.”

According to Woodfill, Hughes concluded that the state party, which joined the lawsuit Friday, “made a good-faith effort to have a virtual convention" and that Houston put the party "in an untenable position to do it [virtually] in a very short period of time.”

That sounds rather like the version Woodfill would like to have be true, so I'm still dubious. I see a gap between the reporter's version of what the judge ruled, and the attorney's version.  I don't see how the City put the GOP in a "dubious position" when it's the pandemic that did that.  I'd be interested to see if the City tries for an interlocutory appeal.  Especially that "the City of Houston treated us unfairly" stuff:

I'd like to know if this is a TRO or a TI.  World of difference in those two.  Still might be worth the interlocutory appeal, too.

And if I worked there, I'd still spit in the food.  Forcing the city to give the GOP another weekend seems especially unsound to me.  Then again, I'm not involved in the litigation, so maybe I've said enough already.

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