The Usual Suspects

While Lebanon burns, Texas Democrats vote with Trump.

As the tumbleweeds turn, the world is on fire, and the centrists in DC are doing the absolute dumbest things imaginable. Today, they aren’t even liberals, they’re reactionary centrists (and that’s being nice).

First and foremost, if you haven’t been paying attention to what’s been going on in Lebanon, when America attacked Iran in February, we enabled Israel to attack Lebanon. Israel has already done immense amounts of damage, killing over 3,000 people and displacing over a million.

*Lone Star Left is an anti-war publication.*

Yesterday, Rep. Rashida Tlaib introduced a measure to limit the Trump administration’s authority in Lebanon. 117 Democrats sided with Republicans to vote against this measure, and continue allowing Mr. Poopy Pants President, who may or may not have had a stroke this week, to destroy the world economy, murder people in the Middle East, and give Israel free rein to our military.

Out of the 13 Texas Congressional Democrats, FIVE of them sided with Trump, war, and military contractors.

Of course, the usual suspects:

• Henry Cuellar

• Vicente Gonzalez

• Lizzie Fletcher

• Julie Johnson

• Marc Veasey

Considering Johnson and Veasey are both on their way out, I expect their masks to come off completely from now until November. And don’t let the door hit you.

And about giving Israel free rein to our military, House Democrats didn’t do much better there either. On Thursday, the House Armed Services Committee voted down Rep. Ro Khanna’s amendment to strip Section 224 from the 2027 NDAA, a provision that would formally embed Israel into the US defense and intelligence apparatus under the name “United States–Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative.” Only Khanna and Rep. Sara Jacobs voted for the amendment.

Even voices on the right are alarmed. Joe Kent, writing in Responsible Statecraft, called Section 224 a national security nightmare that would give Israel “unprecedented access to US technology development and data fusion.”

It doesn’t stop there.

Because there’s more from our South Texas Conservative friend, Vicente Gonzalez.

This same week, Gonzalez joined three other Democrats to hand Republicans the votes they needed to cut the WIC program, which is food assistance for pregnant women, nursing mothers, and young children. The bill passed 213-210. Without those four Democrats, it fails. Full stop.

The cuts slash $141 million from fruit and vegetable benefits. For nursing mothers, that benefit drops from $52 to $13. For young children, from $26 to $10.

Vicente Gonzalez represents one of the poorest congressional districts in the United States. His constituents are majority Latino, majority working class, and disproportionately reliant on exactly the kind of nutrition assistance he just voted to gut. The Rio Grande Valley has some of the highest rates of food insecurity in Texas.

Gonzalez already voted against limiting Trump’s war powers in Lebanon this week. Now he’s voting to take food out of the mouths of pregnant women and toddlers in his own district.

Meanwhile, Texas Republicans are hyper-focused on Maine. 🤔

I spend most of my Texas time focused on my Texas business, but when Greg Abbott’s fancy-pants consultant, Dave Carney, is spending his time talking about the Democratic candidate from Maine, I stop and raise an eyebrow.

Now, don’t get me wrong, all this October surprise stuff is bad business, especially when it’s so far away from October. But I can’t vote in Maine, and I’m pretty sure I don’t have any readers in Maine, but I’m well aware of Dave Carney’s reach and influence in Texas.

Why would Greg Abbott’s top consultant want Texas Republicans talking about Graham Platner?

After all, Ken Paxton is guilty of all the same things.

And there it is. If they get Texas Republicans talking about Platner enough, they can frame him as the worst Senate candidate of the cycle, not Ken Paxton. It gives Paxton a leg up. It’s the Republicans’ favorite game of “whataboutism.”

But I’m just here minding my Texas business.

It’s getting heated in Frisco.

You know that white nationalist, who was beaten to a pulp in Minneapolis a few months back, and who has been traveling the country telling everyone he hates brown people? Jake Lang. Yeah, that fucker. He’s been frequenting city council meetings in North Texas this last year to complain about non-white people existing:

Trigger-warning:

This weekend, locals in Frisco held an “anti-Redneck rally” where they were accosted by about a dozen armed men, mostly in masks, who carried bacon and tore the Indian flag. And Jake Lang was arrested.

These morons are so dumb, they don’t even know the difference between Hindu and Muslim.

Here was the truck they brought with them:

It should be noted that “This Is Texas Freedom Force” was there. This group has been labeled an extremist militia by the FBI and was present in San Antonio in May 2020 at the Alamo when white nationalists pointed weapons at Black Lives Matter protesters, and faced zero consequences for it.

But here’s the thing.

The racists in Frisco think they’re winning. They showed up to city council meetings demanding fewer Indian neighbors. They tore the Indian flag. They brought bacon. They got their boy Trump to crack down on H-1B visas and make it damn near impossible for skilled workers to stay. They played themselves.

Because those Indian families they hate so much? They were 70% of new home buyers in the suburbs north of Dallas. That number has already cratered below 30%. There’s a developer sitting on 125 unsold properties right now. Home prices in Collin County are already down 9% year over year, more than twice the broader Dallas metro decline.

That’s the beginning.

And when that housing bubble pops, don’t think for a second the pain stays contained to a few unsold McMansions. The furniture stores go. The contractors go. The restaurants go. The tax base craters. The schools feel it. Every business that was built on the spending power of those families, the racists screamed out of city council meetings, is going to feel it in their bottom line.

Trump and his white nationalist friends in Washington killed the H-1B pipeline, froze visa petitions, and made legal immigrants too terrified to buy a house. The Frisco dipshits, with their bacon and torn flags, cheered them on. And now the entire economic engine that made North Dallas one of the fastest-growing regions in America is seizing up.

They ran off the people who were building this economy. On purpose. With help from the highest levels of government.

The racists won’t be happy when the economy turns to shit. But they’ll have nobody to blame but themselves, and the white supremacists they put in the White House to do it.

The world is on fire.

Lebanon is burning. Pregnant women in the Rio Grande Valley are going to have less food. North Dallas will have an economic hangover that lasts a decade. And white nationalists are showing up armed to city council meetings in the suburbs while the FBI-labeled militia that cheered them on faces zero consequences.

And what are the centrists in Washington doing?

Voting with Republicans to keep the war going. Voting to gut food assistance for babies. Voting to hand Netanyahu a permanent seat inside the American defense apparatus.

This is not a both-sides problem. One side is setting the world on fire. The other side keeps handing them the matches.

Texas progressives, we have work to do. The 2026 cycle is here. The candidates are on the ballot. The districts are winnable.

Remember their names. Remember their votes. This is why we have to get more progressives in office.

• Who Will Be On The 2026 State Ballot?

• Who Will Be On The 2026 Federal Ballot?

• Click here to find out what Legislative districts you’re in.

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