The Texas Observer is releasing a fascinating story this week about a new intelligence database called the “Texas Data Exchange” (aka, “TDEx”). The stated purpose of this database is to catch criminals, hunt down terrorists and allow law enforcement agencies throughout Texas to share valuable information. Close to $4 million has been spent so far on this behemoth, and it’s already chock full of records. Now, the existence of this database is hardly news; such databases are often necessary for effective law enforcement these days, assuming they're used ethically for their intended purpose. The real story here is that TDEx isn’t being run by the state's top law enforcement agency, the Texas Department of Public Safety, as required by current law. It’s being run by Gov. Rick Perry’s office.

Intrigued? The story is here.

Photo of Gov. Perry courtesy of Wikipedia.

For the students (and their parents) at the University of Texas, tuition increases at a faster rate than at most other comparable public universities. In fact, the tuition for an in-state Liberal Arts major has increased 391.5% between 1970 and 2002. For an in-state graduate Law student, the increase has skyrocketed 1,059.9%. Even with flat-rate tuition prices for students, lack of caps on tuition increases allows for the price of a UT education to rise pretty much every year, often by hundreds of dollars. In fact, if you were a liberal arts major at UT who graduated in 2004, after a typical four-year education you saw your tuition rise $1,449. This includes a $157 increase between your freshman and sophomore year and a $800 raise between your junior and senior year.

Yesterday, three state senators proposed four bills that attempt to control the problem of rising tuition rates at our public universities, especially the University of Texas system. Senator Florence Shapiro (R-Plano), Senator Juan Hinojosa (D-Mission) and Senator Rodney Ellis (D-Houston) presented Senate Bills 85, 96, 100 and 578 to the Senate Subcommittee on Higher Education. A run-down of the bills are after the jump. We'll let you know what happens to them in the future.

Everyone's favorite transient, transgendered Marine who tried to Keep Austin... Austin, but managed only 6.7% of the votes in the 2006 mayoral election, has left our town in a fresh attempt to Keep Dallas... Dallas.

We're used to seeing Gale on street corners asking us for signatures (or money for the bus), but if you listen to the video above, you'll recognize her agenda is just a tad bit recycled from her 2006 Austin campaign. And, we admit, we may not know much about Dallas politics, but what great irony if they also have a problem with protected ecosystems and relocating tech forms: "I want to maintain our aquifer by making sure our microchip companies don't locate over the aquifer so we're not polluting it."

Not only did she recycle her campaign slogan and many of her main campaign positions, but she still advertises her website jennifergale.com for campaign info, but has yet to clarify that she has moved out of Austin. Whether she campaigns here or there, it's still the best bad website we've ever seen.

While we're all pretty tired of Jennifer Gale, the populace of Dallas is just now getting into it. Yawn. Wake us up for the live television debate.

And he's telling us all about it.

Mr. Bush is just not the man Dowd thought he was when Dowd first signed on with him, he indicated today in a New York Times interview.

Dowd, an Austinite and longtime key Texas Democratic strategist, switched parties and joined the Bush campaign team in 1999 because he believed then-Governor Bush would make a sincere attempt to bridge the partisan divide. His disillusionment during the Clinton administration left him hungry for a more hopeful era, and Bush's straightforward manner and unique agenda quickly sparked Dowd's interest.

Dowd rose in the political ranks and was soon part of Bush's inner circle of advisers. He was impressed by Bush's education platform and his refreshing stance on immigration - both of which seemed to indicate that Bush was a different type of Republican. Dowd described his hopeful, enthusiastic feeling in those days as akin to "falling in love."

And like any good political adviser caught up in the game of getting his guy elected, his personal admiration of Bush allowed him to ignore the creeping doubts Dowd had about him. For a while.

Photo from KLRU