Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

With the tax cuts extended, the top 1 percent of households
will receive more than $1 trillion in tax benefits over the next decade.

We must protect people like Mary from the hundreds of dog attacks that take place in Texas every year. This week, we filed SB 411. Under the bill, if a person allows their dog to make an unprovoked attack that causes serious injury or death, it is a third degree felony. Also, the person is liable for up to $10,000 for the dog attack.

Rio Grande Guardian: El Paso leaders believe that if 21,000 extra soldiers, 25,000 extra family members, and 9,000 school-age children were moving into Fort Hood it would be statewide news. As it is, that is exactly what is happening at Fort Bliss over the next five years and it was the job of about 40 El Pasoans to deliver that message to legislative leaders on Wednesday, El Paso Day at the state Capitol.

As a Texan, as a member of the state's congressional delegation and - most importantly - as a grandfather, I am concerned by media reports that the Legislature will consider the construction of up to 18 conventional technology coal-burning power plants. I agree with Gov. Rick Perry and others that, as Texas grows, we must ensure adequate power production. However, I think we need to take a hard, deliberate look at how the external costs of conventional coal pollution will affect the health of our citizens and our state - and consider better options being tested right here in Texas.

Without a public debate or formal policy decision, contractors have become a virtual fourth branch of government. On the rise for decades, spending on federal contracts has soared during the Bush administration, to about $400 billion last year from $207 billion in 2000, fueled by the war in Iraq, domestic security and Hurricane Katrina, but also by a philosophy that encourages outsourcing almost everything government does.

One of the best of the many recent books about the Iraq debacle is Rajiv Chandrasekaran’s “Imperial Life in the Emerald City.” The book tells a tale of hopes squandered in the name of politicization and privatization: key jobs in Baghdad’s Green Zone were assigned on the basis of loyalty rather than know-how, while key functions were outsourced to private contractors.

As many as one-third of the students who should graduate from Texas high schools don't. Instead, they drop out.

In the beginning, Bob and Jane Cull thought if they just wrote homebuilder Bob Perry a letter about all the defects in their new Mansfield house, everything could be resolved.

A tortuous legal battle has carried the retirement-age couple through the courts, to arbitration and now through the courts again — all the way to the Texas Supreme Court. The Culls have won every round, but their home has not been fixed, legal costs have soared and the couple has postponed retirement plans.

A spokesman for the Mexican Consulate in Dallas says police in North and East Texas profiled illegal immigrants and exceeded their authority in checking the immigrants' residency status.

In a proposal that could keep Houston smokers from dodging the city's tougher public smoking ordinance by patronizing bars and restaurants outside the city limits, state Sen. Rodney Ellis is proposing a statewide ban.

After a year in which voters across the state expressed a lack of confidence in election returns, several lawmakers are pushing measures including a backup system for electronic voting machines, last-minute registration and required proof of citizenship.

Every school day, Texas teachers willingly embrace the responsibility of shepherding our children toward bright futures. In return, it is our duty as parents, employers and taxpayers to empower these teachers with the best tools so our students are prepared to succeed.

UNLESS self-correcting, a social problem cannot be relieved unless it is acknowledged. Most Texans and all of their elected representatives should be aware of this state's horrendous dropout problem, but the Intercultural Development Research Research Center in San Antonio has provided a useful and timely reminder.

This week, Gov. Rick Perry rightly proposed a package of incentives to keep Texas competitive in the movie industry. Texas is a natural when it comes to filmmaking. With its mild climate and diverse topography — from plains and deserts to rolling hills and beaches — the Lone Star state had been a leader in attracting the filmmaking industry and the dollars that go with it. Now, Texas is trailing behind Louisiana and New Mexico.

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst has it right: Higher education in Texas needs more state money to thrive. He also is correct when he says that more state money should put the big tuition hikes of recent years on hold. That way, more Texas families should be able to afford to send their children to college.

Sprint Nextel should stop charging wireless phone customers a 1 percent fee to pay the state's new business tax, Comptroller Susan Combs said Monday.

Operation Wrangler, a program launched Jan. 22 by Gov. Rick Perry to combat drug trafficking and human smuggling, is responsible for the questionable and possibly illegal deportation of illegal immigrants in Denton County, Fort Worth, Weatherford and Marshall, officials with the Mexican Consulate of Dallas said Monday.

For many of us, trips to the doctor or hospital have turned into bills, calls, collectors, wrangling and even litigation. While the insurance company is quick to say what it will pay, it leaves it to you to pay the rest. This practice is called balance billing and Texans want it to stop.

On Wednesday, January 31, we released a report called "Texas on the Brink: How Texas Ranks Among the 50 States." Leadership means dealing with the facts today to inspire all of us to make a difference tomorrow. "Texas on the Brink" shows the hard facts about where Texas is today.

Molly Ivins, the acerbic Texas writer who shed her family's conservative roots to become one of the nation's best-known, treasured (sometimes vilified) liberal commentators, died Wednesday after battling cancer. She was 62.