Pelosi 'has a lot of nerve' promoting Obamacare on hospital campus

Friends in low places.

Nancy Pelosi walks into a bar. An Austin bar, it happens. Last night, with Austin Mayor Steve Adler and other liberal leaders.

That's not a joke as Austin has become quite the ATM for lefty politicians with its high concentration of "limousine liberals." [Update: She's here as part of a Georgetown University alumni event.]

But what is surprising is her choice of venue the following morning. According to the Travis County GOP, U.S. Rep. Pelosi (D-Calif.) is scheduled to speak at the Dell Seton Medical Center's Clinical Education Center on the Brackenridge hospital campus as we write this (10 a.m.). Travis GOP's press release says it all:

... "First do no harm" is the primary rule of medicine.  

This is why the Travis County Republican Party finds it odd that Congressional minority leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) would want to be anywhere near the Dell Medical School at the University of Texas considering all the harm that was done by Obamacare. 

$75 city rebate for a chicken coop? We suspect fowl play

Why the City of Austin is offering $75 per person in taxpayer money to help prospective urban farmers buy chicken coops seems strange when chickens are already in heavy demand. We at the Tracker can't resist a good mystery, and decided to scratch around for an answer.

There is no shortage of demand for backyard chickens in Austin. Chickens are hot. Everyone's peckish for farm-fresh eggs. There's even a popular documentary on Netflix featuring those who keep chickens as pets.

So incentivizing chicken ownership can't be the goal of this rebate. What else is there?

Natives getting restless about $1 billion in proposed local bond debt

Hat's off to our friends at Texas Insider for pointing out this development from the Comptroller:

The [Comptroller's] updated page includes information for about 70 local bond elections, ranging from a $1.8 million bond election for the Chico school district to a $737.5 million bond package for the Lewisville school district. Local elections will be held on May 6. [...] 

The Comptroller’s office also released the Debt-at-a-Glance tool with updated debt totals and trends for Texas cities, counties, school districts and community college districts.

With that, word has been spreading lately of some gargantuan local debt proposals brought forth by the Hays and the Round Rock ISDs. We thought we'd use the Comptroller's new debt-finding tool and the perennial listing of bond proposals and see what Austin-area taxpayers may be on the hook for should these items pass. See below -- it appears Central Texas voters will have nearly a billion-dollars' worth of proposals to sift through.

As always, if we missed anything or you have a differing opinion than what is being presented, please make use of our comments section.

Bobcats beware: Faculty brownshirts lurking about on social media

Mwrawr ...

It's not easy being a college student these days. At least when intolerant leftist radicals are in faculty positions -- in which case the job you have to work to pay for ever-increasing tuition and fees is in jeopardy if you dare step out of line in regard to liberal orthodoxy.

The following article from Leadership Institute's Campus Reform site relays a situation at Texas State University where a Texas Public Policy Foundation employee and Bobcat was tattled on at work by a college instructor for a simple Facebook argument. But it didn't end there: a student who merely "liked" said posts was targeted for "hate speech," as well.

[Texas State Instructor Elizabeth] Bishop contended in [a telephone] call that [Alexander] Morrissette had made a disparaging Facebook post about her, but refused to provide details on what the post said. The employee who answered the call said she would talk to Morrissette about his Facebook habits, and Bishop hung up the phone shortly thereafter. 

Seemingly unsatisfied with [Texas Public Policy] Foundation’s response, as Morrissette said they “laughed the ordeal off,” Bishop set her sights on an anonymous Texas State student who had “liked” several of Morrissette’s comments. 

Bishop allegedly called the university department where the student works and requested they investigate her and her “associates” for “hate speech,” and further demanded that the student be removed from her leadership positions on campus.

Read more: http://www.campusreform.org/?ID=9002

We've been told that Ms. Bishop is the same instructor who has called for boycotts of campus police for offering self-defense classes (a culture of violence, perhaps?), and frequently advocates for the divestiture of funds from companies that do business with Israel. Her Texas State faculty profile indicates a fascination with the same type of "anti-colonialism" that marked the Barack Obama Administration's regrettable foreign policy.

And, yes, your tax dollars are paying this.

Ever had a situation like this happen to you in class? Share it in the comments below.