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September 30, 2005

The hypocrisy of Republican outrage over the DeLay prosecution

In reading the various Republican statements (see here and here) alleging that Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle is engaging in an outlandish abuse of power in regard to his decision to indict House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a thought occurred to me.

For the past several years, the Justice Department under the Bush Administration has engaged in numerous and similar abuses of power. As a result, where is the Republican outrage over the sad cases of Daniel Bayly, William Fuhs, Arthur Andersen and Jamie Olis, to name just a few?

As I have noted many times, Sir Thomas More explains in the following passage from A Man for All Seasons why it is important to uphold the rule of law to constrain the abuse of overwhelming state power, even where doing so means that the Devil himself cannot be prosecuted unless he actually commits a crime:

"And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down -- and you're just the man to do it, Roper! -- do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?"

"Yes, I'd give the Devil the benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!"

The Bush Administration, Mr. DeLay and many of the Republicans who are criticizing Mr. Earle failed to uphold the rule of law in preventing prosecutions of business executives whose only "crime" was to be involved in arguably questionable business transactions that, at most, should have been the subject of civil litigation. Thus, the Republicans' irresponsible sacrifice of these executives' careers to the mantle of fickle public opinion has now contributed to the current environment where their own attempts to take advantage of loopholes in campaign finance laws is being criminalized.

Although abuse of state power against controversial politicians should not be condoned any more than abuse of state power against unpopular business executives, the Republicans' criticism of the DeLay prosecution rings hollow. They should have listened to Sir Thomas.

Posted by Tom at 7:11 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack (0)

Assessing the hurricane damage to Gulf production facilities

Following on this post from yesterday, the markets continued to react to more information that indicates that damage to Gulf of Mexico offshore production and drilling facilities from the recent hurricanes is going to reduce production and exploration from that key region for an extended period of time.

That information, combined with the slow process of restarting Gulf Coast refineries, is generating one of the more unusual political ironies that America has seen in some time. As a result of the restricted energy supplies from the Gulf region, the outspokenly pro-exploration and production Bush Administration is sounding eerily like the Carter Administration from the late 1970's, promising a national energy-conservation campaign to give Americans tips on saving energy during the winter heating season.

Actually, markets are still trying to adjust to the news of the restricted supplies. Gasoline and heating-oil futures settled lower on the New York Mercantile Exchange yesterday, but front-month crude oil contracts posted a 44 cent rise to $66.79 a barrel -- its highest level in over a week -- although forward month oil contracts were lower. After increasing almost 8% during Wednesday trading, October gasoline settled down about 4% to $2.2516 a gallon and October heating oil fell 1.64 cents to $2.1247 a gallon. November natural-gas futures continued their relentless increast as they rose 9.6 cents to $14.196 per million British thermal units.

The double whammy of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita has not only damaged the Gulf's production and drilling infrastructure, it has damaged the important service industry that provides key logistics support for the offshore exploration and production industry. Helicopters at this point are in such demand that they are nearly impossible to find and many Louisiana dock facilities that used to launch supply boats to the Gulf have been destroyed. Service companies are even having a difficult time finding enough employees to meet the demand for assessment and repair service. This lack fo workers, helicopters and equipment is hampering the damage assessment process with regard to offshore oil and natural-gas facilities, most of which remains shut down nearly a week after Hurricane Rita came ashore last Saturday morning. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for roughly one-quarter of U.S. oil and natural-gas production.

Even when existing production is restarted, the hurricanes have damaged so many drilling rigs that efforts to increase Gulf production of oil and natural gas will likely be severely hampered. Current assessments are that the two hurricanes either sank or seriously damaged 13 drilling rigs, which is 12% of the Gulf rig fleet. As a result, that will make drilling more expensive, adding yet another element to the upward pressure on energy prices.

Finally, although Houston area refineries are firing up operations, the seven refineries in the hard-hit Port Arthur and Lake Charles areas will probably take longer than initially thought because of problems in getting reliable power to those facilities. About 20% of U.S. refining capacity was shut down for at least some period of time by the hurricanes.

Posted by Tom at 6:00 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Langone unmasks the Lord of Regulation

You remember Kenneth Langone, don't you?

Mr. Langone is the co-founder of Home Depot who chaired the New York Stock Exchange compensation committee that approved Richard Grasso's $140 million pay package. As a result, he is a defendant along with Mr. Grasso in New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer's lawsuit to recover alleged overcompensation paid by the NYSE to Mr. Grasso. As this previous post from over a year ago indicates, Mr. Langone does not think much of Mr. Spitzer's lawsuit.

Well, in this delicious follow-up OpinionJournal op-ed, Mr. Langone updates us on Mr. Spitzer -- who he calls "the full-time New York state attorney general and part-time fund-raiser for his political ambitions" -- and his use of the high-profile lawsuit against Messrs. Grasso and Langone to promote his political career.

First, Mr. Langone notes Mr. Spitzer's inflammatory public statements regarding Mr. Langone at the outset of the litigation (a favorite Spitzer tactic):

A little more than a year ago I was obliged to defend myself publicly against a legal smear. Eliot Spitzer, the full-time New York state attorney general and part-time fund-raiser for his political ambitions, called me "unsavory," "deceptive" and "tainted." When many in the media were uncritically swayed by his posturing, Mr. Spitzer then pledged to "put a stake through" my heart.

This metaphorical threat to my cardiovascular system aside, the occasion for all this brash talk was the attorney general's assertion that I was a lawbreaker. I tricked some of Wall Street's keenest minds, so the accusation goes, into approving a portion of Dick Grasso's compensation when he headed the New York Stock Exchange.

Then, Mr. Langone proceeds to review what has been learned through the discovery process in the lawsuit so far:

[The other NYSE board members'] testimony is clear and consistent. Of the six directors deposed thus far who served on both the compensation committee and the full board, each has said they were not deceived in any way. They all confirm that, as head of the NYSE compensation committee, I provided them and the board with complete and accurate information about Mr. Grasso's proposed compensation--and that they approved it.

Pressed for examples, they cited one-on-one meetings with compensation experts, committee meetings, conference calls, comprehensive written documentation, full board meetings, as well as annual presentations I gave both to the committee and the board that included detailed handouts and unfettered opportunity for discussion and debate.

And, contrary to Mr. Spitzer's statements at the outset of the case, what has been Mr. Spitzer's reaction to discovery of this information? Mr. Langone lays the wood to the Lord of Regulation:

And confronted with these hard facts in full view, Mr. Spitzer's public response was flat, total silence.

Since the attorney general seems to be lying low of late--no more press releases every time he goes to the water cooler--allow me to summarize.

Here's a case alleging deception, in which nearly everyone involved says that the full details were provided repeatedly. The public official who brought the case has indulged garish profiles of himself to publications like Vanity Fair, People and New York magazines, while at the same time resisting scrutiny of key facts in the case. And while his office recently said it is low on funds to pursue Medicaid fraud, he is devoting multiple lawyers to this case -- which will benefit the state not one nickel. Medicaid spending by the way costs this state more than a quarter of its budget, in excess of $40 billion.

Mr. Langone concludes by boring in on the lack of judgment and troubling tactics that have been a consistent theme of prosecutions of unpopular business executives during this post-Enron era of criminalizing merely questionable business judgments:

The reliability of Mr. Spitzer's judgment, . . . should be an issue of prime concern when those votes are cast. But he also has a troubling method of making loud legal threats, strong-arming witnesses, and intimidating boards and companies into destructive concessions. . . Coercing settlements through fear, as anyone can see, is far different from delivering justice.

Read the entire piece. It is a wonderful unmasking of one of the most insidious demagogues on the current American political scene.

Update: Bill Dyer notes and comments on one of the more frightening NY Times articles of the year.

Posted by Tom at 5:47 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (2)

An interesting perspective

It is becoming clearer each day now that at least a substantial amount of the initial information coming out of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina was either exaggerated or misinformation. One such piece of misinformation was that large numbers of murders were occurring as a result of gunshots.

Commenting yesterday on the fact that only seven gunshot victims had been identified in the autopsies done on the first 650 or so bodies recovered from New Orleans, Coroner Frank Minyard made the following observation:

"Seven gunshots isn't even a good Saturday night in New Orleans."

Posted by Tom at 5:21 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

September 29, 2005

Market responds to Rita-related damage to Gulf production facilities

Following on this post from yesterday, Chevron Corp.'s announcement that its Typhoon tension leg platform was severed from its moorings by Hurricane Rita and is floating upside down in the Gulf of Mexico dovetailed with the news that natural-gas futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange skyrocketed 10% to almost $14 per million British thermal units, which is its highest closing on record.

Thus, if it's going to be a long, cold winter in the U.S. hinterlands this winter, then it's looking increasingly as if it's going to be a long, cold, expensive winter.

Natural-gas futures on the Nymex for delivery in October rose $1.251 to $13.907 per million BTUs. The expiration of the October contract at the same time that the delivery point for Nymex futures, Louisiana's Henry Hub, which has been closed down for the past week, added to the uncertainty and volatility in the market.

As a result, the Natural Gas Supply Association -- an association that represents producers and marketers -- issued this alert (pdf) that colder weather in the East combined with hurricane-related supply disruptions along the Gulf Coast will likely translate into substantially higher natural-gas prices across the U.S. this winter. The damage from the two major hurricanes in the Gulf over the past month have delayed or halted production of about 5% of the annual U.S. production of natural gas from the Gulf of Mexico, and that reduction in domestic natural gas production cannot be readily replaced with imports.

As for the Typhoon platform, it is floating upside down after the deep-water facility took a direct hit from Rita. Although Chevron has not announced whether the massive platform can be salvaged, my sense is that it's probably a total loss because its engines, pumps and living quarters are probably unsalvageable. The Typhoon is located in 2,000 feet of water in the Green Canyon area approximately 165 miles south-southwest of New Orleans.

Along those same lines, The Oil Drum provides this summary of the status of the known damage to drilling and production facilities in the Gulf of Mexico.

Posted by Tom at 9:50 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (1)

Paul Burka on the Houston evacuation plan

Following on previous posts here and here regarding Houston's hurricane evacuation plan, Texas Monthly editor and former Houstonian Paul Burka weighs in on the plan in this OpinionJournal op-ed. Mr. Burka does not offer anything new here in terms of a solution, but he does do a good job of framing the key issue:

There is no way that government can assure that the people on the roads are the ones who are in the most danger, those from Galveston and the low-lying areas near Galveston Bay. Common sense needs to be restored to the evacuation process, so that people with the greatest risk of danger will make the decision to leave, and those with the least risk will stay off the roads.

Tory Gattis over at Houston Strategies also has some good thoughts on how to improve the plan.

Posted by Tom at 7:27 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

A key tip for dealing with rattlesnakes

One of the best parts of the Houston Chronicle for many years has been the newspaper's Hunting and Outdoors section of its sports section. Inasmuch as my reaction to finding a rattlesnake would have been the same as the fellow's reaction as described in the following Chronicle article, I was glad to learn something from the Chronicle piece about dealing with dead rattlesnakes:

Even a dead rattlesnake can hurt you. Just ask Trey Hanover of College Station.

On Labor Day weekend, Hanover and his father, Tommy Hanover, were working on their deer lease when they killed a big rattler. They shot the snake's head off with a shotgun and loaded the carcass in the truck to show other hunters on their lease that they needed to be careful.

"We hung the snake on the fence at the camphouse," Tommy Hanover said. "When we got ready to leave, Trey picked up the snake and threw it out in the pasture for the buzzards to eat."

By the time he'd driven to College Station, Trey Hanover's eyes were very irritated. By the next morning, his eyes were swollen shut. The doctor who examined Hanover said it looked like he'd suffered a chemical burn.

It took them a while to figure out that the shotgun load that vaporized the rattlesnake's head splattered the snake's venom over its body.

When Hanover handled the snake, he got the venom on his hands and later rubbed it in his eyes, made itchy by dust and ragweed. Sixteen days later, the vision in his right eye was back to normal. His left eye was still a little cloudy, but the doctor thought it would return to normal as well.

"We learned a valuable lesson about handling rattlesnakes — even dead ones," said Tommy Hanover.

Posted by Tom at 7:03 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Stros close in on another playoff berth

After a 6-3 road trip that included a two-game sweep of the Cardinals, the Stros (87-71) come home for four games with the Cubs (77-81) needing any combination of wins or Phillies (85-74) losses equaling two to achieve the club's sixth playoff berth in the past nine seasons (the Phillies finish the season with three games in Washington against the 81-78 Nationals). Inasmuch as the Stros have gone a positively unbelievable 72-41 after a miserable 15-30 start to the season, one has to feel good about the Stros' chances of clinching the playoff berth at this point. However, given this club's chronic lack of hitting, it is reasonable to hold off celebrating until the final out of the clinching game is officially in the scorebook.

The Stros' successful road trip was the primarily the result of this team's strength -- strong pitching. The pitching staff's runs saved against average ("RSAA") is 92, second best among the 16 National League teams. Moreover, the hitting has also picked up of late as the club's four strongest hitters -- Morgan Ensberg (40 RCAA/.390 OBA/.567 SLG/.957 OPS), Lance Berkman (35/.413/.521/.934), Bidg (9/.325/.464/.790) and Jason Lane (5/.316/.501/.817) -- have all stepped up when it counted on the just-finished road trip. Even Mike Lamb -- who has had a generally horrible season (-13/.280/.413/.693) -- has had a robust 7 RCAA since September 5th and Brad Ausmus -- one of the worst hitting regular National League hitters over the past several seasons (-13/.353/.334/.688) -- has had a relatively Bondsian 4 RCAA since August 15th. As a result, the club's team runs created against average ("RCAA") has risen to -23, which is 12th in the National League. Nevertheless, reflecting just how remarkable this season has been, the Stros combined RCAA/RSAA of 69 still trails the Phillies combined RCAA/RSAA of 81, which means that the Phillies are really the better-balanced club. Just goes to show that great pitching can cover up a lot of warts.

It would be nice if the Stros could wrap up the playoff berth on Thursday or Friday so that they could rest the Rocket and Roy O in the weekend games, but don't bet on it. This club has had to fight and struggle for everything that it has achieved, so it would be fitting for this bunch to have to play a couple more heart-pounders before finally clinching the National League Wild Card Playoff berth.

Posted by Tom at 4:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

The Hammer's indictment

In one of the least surprising developments in Texas politics over the past couple of years, a Travis County (Austin area) grand jury on Wednesday charged Houston Congressman and House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and two political associates -- John Colyandro, former executive director of the Texas political action committee that Mr. DeLay helped form, and Jim Ellis, who heads Mr. DeLay's national political action committee -- with criminal conspiracy in an alleged campaign finance scheme that has been under investigation for almost two years. That investigation and Mr. DeLay have been frequent topics on this blog, as posts here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here reflect. Here is a copy of the indictment.

In a press release and news conference on Wednesday afternoon, Mr. DeLay insisted he was innocent and called Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle a partisan fanatic, which is not a compelling criticism of Mr. Earle. Nevertheless, Mr. Earle has made some imprudent public statements about Mr. DeLay during the investigation. By the way, Fred Graham of Court TV made one of the funniest comments that I've heard on television recently when, after hearing Mr. DeLay's press release and news conference, he observed "if a press release could froth at the mouth, this would be foaming."

Criminal conspiracy is a state felony punishable by six months to two years in a state jail and a fine of up to $10,000. The indictment forced Mr. DeLay to step down temporarily as House Majority Leader under House Republican rules.

Although a bit skimpy on the allegations relating to specific criminal acts, the indictment accuses Mr. DeLay of a conspiracy to "knowingly make a political contribution" in violation of Texas law outlawing corporate contributions. It alleged that DeLay's Texans for a Republican Majority political action committee accepted $155,000 from several companies, deposited the money in an account, wrote a $190,000 check to an arm of the Republican National Committee and then provided the committee with the names of Texas State House candidates and the amounts they were supposed to received in donations. Thus, Mr. Earle is apparently contending that the Texas PAC simply used the GOP National Committee organization as a conduit to funnel the illegal corporate contributions to the GOP candidates. The indictment against Mr. DeLay came on the final day of the grand jury's term and followed earlier indictments of a state political action committee founded by Mr. DeLay and three of his political associates.

The background of this mess harkens back to 1990 or so when the re-energized Republican Party in Texas decided that it could wrest the Texas House away from the Democratic Party. GOP party leaders aimed to take control in the 2000 so that the House, the Senate and the state's Republican governor could have control of redrawing the state's congressional district lines when the Legislature met after the 2000 census. After spending an extraordinary amount of money, the GOP fell short in 2000 and the Democratic House speaker refused to go along with the governor and Senate's effort to reconfigure the state's district lines so that a half-dozen more congressional seats could be won by Republicans.

That's when Mr. DeLay went to work. He created a political action committee in Texas that was modeled on his own very successful national PAC. Texans for a Republican Majority was equally successful, raising $1.5 million and electing 15 or so new Republican members to the state House. Thus, the GOP took control of the Texas House for the first time in about 125 years and then, with a GOP Texas House Speaker, Mr. DeLay oversaw the redrawing of the state's congressional districts that provided the GOP with I believe six new seats in Congress.

However, at the end of the day, this is a very weak indictment. From a strategic standpoint, Mr. Earle doesn't want to show too much of his hand at this point, but a prosecutor should be required to state with a fair degree of specificity the criminal acts that he contends occurred. Mr. Earle has not done that in regard to Mr. DeLay in the current indictment.

By the way, Mr. DeLay has purchased a first-rate defense team, which includes well-known Houston defense attorney, Dick DeGuerin. You may recall that Mr. DeGuerin recently obtained a rather extraordinary acquittal for a client who had far more difficult problems than Mr. DeLay does.

Finally, Dick DeGuerin -- like Mr. Earle, the prosecutor -- is a Democrat. So, one of the leading Republicans in the U.S. Congress is going to be prosecuted and defended by Democrats.

Only in Texas. ;^)

Local Houston blogger Charles Kuffner has followed the DeLay case closely, and is a very good informational resource on the background of the investigation.

Update: Professor Bainbridge adroitly sums up his feelings about the DeLay affair with a joke that is as good as Fred Graham's above comment on the DeLay news conference.

Posted by Tom at 4:04 AM | Comments (10) | TrackBack (4)

September 28, 2005

Guaranteeing expensive natural disasters

In his Wall Street Journal ($) Business World column today, Holman Jenkins picks up on a theme of several previous posts (here, here, here and here) that point out that governmental policies that distort risk analysis virtually guarantees that natural disasters in hurricane-prone areas will be increasingly costly:

Louisiana's Sen. Mary Landrieu offered a perfect expression on CNN on Sunday of where the new blank-check compassion is leading us: "Wolf, poor families were crushed. Middle-income families are staggering. And wealthy families have been just punched in the stomach. It is going to take a huge national effort for us to realize the importance of this Gulf Coast region."

To wit, everyone must be restored to their previous status and possessions, or better, at taxpayer expense.

Nobody criticized the handouts to New York after 9/11, which ratcheted up expectations of unlimited federal payouts when bad things happen on a large scale. Victim families got seven-figure checks because their loved ones died in a televised tragedy, though similar bounties aren't bestowed on families that lose loved ones in less visible tragedies.

This precedent has returned to haunt us on a giant scale in New Orleans and its hinterland. Why are such selective windfalls to the unfortunate necessary? The federal government already guarantees us retirement income and health care in old age; it provides insurance and health care for the poor. These commitments in excess of $70 trillion, if properly recognized, would have long ago brought the country up before a bankruptcy judge.

It would be insane, under the circumstances, to extend this safety net to subsidize entire regions that wish to build without making proper allowance for predictable geological and meteorological hazards. This is insurance not for life and health, but for "lifestyle," with the biggest benefits flowing to the least needy.

Sen. Landrieu and her Louisiana colleague, Republican Sen. David Vitter, have drawn up a bill for $40 billion in Corps of Engineers projects to encourage southern Louisiana to imagine itself immune to the weather. With near certainty, such a boondoggle would be the best way to guarantee an even more expensive disaster in the future.

Posted by Tom at 5:49 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Rita hammers offshore production facilities

This Financial Times article reports that preliminary assessments of the damage that Hurricane Rita caused to offshore oil and gas drilling and production facilities reflect that the damage is greater any other storm in history.

Rita's path -- which was west of the path of Hurricane Katrina last month -- tore through an area of the Gulf of Mexico that contained a large amount of exploratory rig activity. Given the apparent damage to the rigs, the biggest impact from the storm may be that it will exacerbate an already tight market for rigs in the region. As a sign of just how precious rigs are becoming to the market, The Woodlands=-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp., one of the biggest U.S. independent exploration and production companies, raised eyebrows in the energy industry earlier this week by committing to a rig six years in advance.

Oh, how times have changed in the exploration and production business.

Posted by Tom at 5:21 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

September 27, 2005

Comparing planning for impending Gulf Coast threats

Joel Kotkin is an Irvine Senior Fellow at the New America Foundation and is the author of The City: A Global History (Modern Library, 2005). In this Opinion Journal op-ed, he compares the disparate preparations of New Orleans and Houston to the two recent hurricanes, and makes several useful recommendations regarding planning for natural disasters and development of urban areas on the Gulf Coast, including the following:

[The Gulf Coast region], with the notable exception of New Orleans, is one of the fastest growing in the U.S. Its relatively low costs and balmy climate have turned it into the "opportunity coast." Yet clearly the Gulf's history has shown that ignoring nature has its perils. Few now remember Indianola, south of Houston. Until it was wiped out by hurricanes, first in 1875 and then again in 1886, it was Texas's second-largest port. Today, most of that city lies under water.

The other, better-known case, is Galveston. Before a 1900 hurricane--which took 6,000 lives--it was the premier port and commercial center on the Texas coast. After the hurricane, the flow of commerce shifted inexorably to inland Houston, which was, and remains, better protected from the Gulf's annual tantrums. Such lessons should guide development along the Gulf in the coming years. For one thing, it may make sense to use marketplace mechanisms -- in the form of insurance premiums -- to let developers accurately assess the risk of new development. After all, federal assistance may be limited in the future. Some places may need to be abandoned. Whole towns already have been demolished for safety reasons in parts of the Mississippi flood plain as have homes in some of the riskier parts of east Texas. Programs to buy houses from existing residents, move towns to higher ground and create new greenbelts, will benefit the environment--not to mention the taxpayers--by relieving them of the burden of subsidizing repeatedly flooded areas.

A less extreme but equally sensible course can be applied throughout the Gulf region by steering new development--through either environmental or insurance restrictions--further out into the interior.

More broadly, as a nation, we may want to consider ways to encourage greater development further inland. Americans have been crowding into the coasts for generations, even though one of our great assets is the broad interior hinterland. Our continued population growth -- from 310 million now to 400 million by 2050 -- may make repopulating the hinterlands more economically viable. Instead of offering "homesteads" or funds for repeated rebuildings on the crowded, and sometimes dangerous, coasts -- particularly in below-sea-level New Orleans -- it might make more sense to encourage settlement and investment deeper into our nation's interior.

This was the essence of much of 19th-century federal policy, which gave incentives for canals and railroads, as well as providing cheap or free land on the Plains. This could also bring new life to parts of country that have been losing jobs and people for a generation, but may now be ready for revival. With the Internet and small-jet travel, some of these areas, such as the Dakotas, are already showing signs of becoming more competitive in the national and global economy. It is a trend worth boosting, and may come to be the most attractive strategic lesson to emerge from Katrina and Rita.

Read the entire piece. Mr. Kotkin makes a valid point, which is that the federal policy promoting development of coastal areas -- accomplished through such mechanisms as federal subsidies of flood insurance and related federal bailouts of storm-ravaged areas -- distorts rational economic decision-making. Let's rebuild New Orleans, but on a rational basis and without the distorted decisions that often result from the incentive to grab well-intended but counterproductive federal handouts.

Posted by Tom at 7:33 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

More trouble for DeLay friend?

This NY Times article reports that the Justice Department's inspector general and the F.B.I. are looking into the November, 2002 demotion of Frederick A. Black, a veteran federal prosecutor whose reassignment shut down a criminal investigation that he had been pursuing of Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Mr. Abramoff is a well-known Washington lobbyist and a major Republican Party fund-raiser who is a close confidant of Houston congressman and House Majority Leader, Tom DeLay. Here are the previous posts relating to a broad corruption investigation of Mr. Abramoff focusing on accusations that he defrauded Indian tribes and their gambling operations out of millions of dollars in lobbying fees.

The focus of this newly-revealed investigation is different from the broader corruption probe involving Mr. Abramoff. In this case, the subject is Mr. Black's demotion only days after he had notified the department's public integrity division in Washington that he had opened a criminal investigation into Mr. Abramoff's lobbying activities for federal judges in Guam, who had sought Mr. Abramoff's help in blocking a bill in Congress to restructure the island court system. In addition, Mr. Black was subsequently blocked from participation in public corruption cases after his demotion. According to the Times article, no evidence has been uncovered to date that indicates that any Justice Department official took the action against Mr. Black in response to any communication from or on behalf of Mr. Abramoff, and evidence does exist that the Bush Administration had been preparing to install a permanent U.S. Attorney to replace Mr. Black at the time.

Nevertheless, the timing of Mr. Black's demotion sure stinks. Stay tuned.

Posted by Tom at 6:49 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Rita damage taxes power grid

On the heels of Entergy Corp.'s decision to place its New Orleans subsidiary in bankruptcy last week on the day that Hurricane Rita barreled into the Gulf Coast at the Texas-Louisiana border, the utility is now dealing with serious damage to its power infrastructure that is threatening to stall the recovery effort in East Texas from the storm.

On Monday, Entergy's Texas subsidiary commenced rolling blackouts in the area of far north Houston that it services, including The Woodlands. The move was made to reduce stress on the utility's damaged electrical system after Hurricane Rita and related tornadoes downed power lines and disabled most of the utility's power plants. A total of almost 1.25 million accounts were without power as of Monday in East Texas and Western Louisiana.

One of the biggest problems facing Entergy is the damage to the company's huge Roy S. Nelson power plant near Lake Charles, which suffered substantial damage during the hurricane. That plant generates power for a large part of Entergy's service area in East Texas and Western Louisiana, and the high voltage power lines that carry the power throughout the region were so badly damaged in the storm that Entergy is having problems getting electricity to some parts of its Texas service area. Entergy announced that it was about 30% short of the power it needs to meet the local needs of a four county area that it serves in the far north and east areas of Houston because only three of the 13 power plants that the utility normally relies upon were in a position to furnish power yesterday. As a result, the company initiated the rolling blackouts on a day in which temperatures in the area were around 100 degrees, and those blackouts will continue indefinitely.

Outages in the areas serviced by Entergy are more severe than in Houston. Inasmuch as Entergy draws its power from the giant electric network known as Eastern Interconnection, its power base had been hit hard by both Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. In contrast, Houston draws its power from companies within the Electric Reliability Council of Texas ("Ercot"), which escaped from Rita relatively unscathed. Texas has maintained its transmission system and power plants as a separate grid in order to keep that system under state control, whereas the system from which Entergy draws power is an interstate system that is regulated by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

As of Monday, Entergy reported over 650,000 metered accounts in Louisiana and Texas that were without power as a result of damage from the two recent storms.

Posted by Tom at 6:18 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

September 26, 2005

What's really going on over at Texansville?

Kevin Whited over at blogHouston.net has this interesting post chronicling the trial balloons that are being floated out of the Houston Texans' camp these days as various coaches and management figures attempt to deflect criticism for the team's absolutely horrendous start to the 2005 season.

Although the Texans have a myriad of problems, it appears reasonably clear that the biggest one is that they do not have enough good players. That problem falls squarely in the lap of General Manager Charlie Casserly, whose golden touch with the media has been much better than his coordination of choosing the team's players. The good news is that the Texans are almost $10 million under the NFL salary cap. Moreover, even with the almost certain decision at this point to exercise an $8 million option on under-performing QB David Carr's contract for next season, the Texans should still have plenty of room under next season's salary cap to attract some good offensive and defensive linemen during this upcoming off-season. The key question that Texans owner Bob McNair has to address is this:

Given the below-average nature of the player selections made to date, should Casserly be in charge of making the next round of player selections for the team?

Posted by Tom at 8:27 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Throwing money at All the King's Men

John Fund explores in this OpinionJournal piece the risk that long-standing Louisiana elements of corruption are likely to hijack a good part of the extraordinary amount of federal aid that will be flowing into the state in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. That reality is likely not going to stop or slow the flow of such aid because, as William Easterly points out in this Foreign Policy (pdf) piece, such aid has the following beneficial effect:

The poor have neither the income nor political power to hold anyone accountable for meeting their needs--they are political and economic orphans. The rich-country public knows little about what is happening to the poor on the ground in struggling countries. The wealthy population mainly just wants to know that "something is being done" about such a tragic problem as world poverty. The utopian plans satisfy the "something-is-being-done" needs of the rich-country public, even if they don't serve the needs of the poor.

Confronted with this confounding state of affairs, Stephen E. Landsburg proposes this innovative choice for spreading the federal aid to the victims of Katrina:

Before we spend $200 billion on New Orleans disaster relief, can we just pause for about three seconds, please? That should be long enough to divide one number by another. The numbers I have in mind are, on the one hand, $200 billion, and, on the other hand, 1 million people—the prestorm population of the New Orleans area, broadly defined.

Two-hundred billion divided by 1 million is 200,000. For the cost of reconstructing New Orleans, the government could simply give $200,000 to every resident of the region—that's $800,000 for a family of four. Given a choice, which do you think the people down there would prefer?

Based on my anecdotal experience in talking with New Orleans evacuees during Houston's relief effort, I can say unequivocally that every evacuee would prefer to receive direct aid over throwing federal relief funds into the black hole that is Louisiana state government.

Hat tip to Arnold Kling for the lines to the Easterly and Landsburg pieces.

Posted by Tom at 7:27 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

Mississippi's AG increases the cost of rebuilding

This previous post explored the role of federally-subsidized flood insurance in attracting capital investment in New Orleans that probably would not have occurred had the owners of the capital been faced with paying the cost of private flood insurance. Until Hurricane Rita developments took us a bit off track, I had been meaning to pass along this NY Times article about a batch of lawsuits by plaintiff's lawyers and Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood that seek to eviscerate flood exclusion provisions in homeowner's liability insurance constracts and make the insurers responsible for damages caused by flooding from Hurricane Katrina For those of us who prefer to pay less rather than more for such insurance, these lawsuits are a real bad idea, as the following and this OpinionJournal piece explain.

Insurers have long had flood exclusions in their insurance contracts, which is one of the primary reasons why the federal government got into the business of subsidizing flood insurance in the first place. The reason for this is that floods are not a typical insurable risk, which insurers normally spread among a large pool of insureds who are subject to the risk through collecting premiums from that pool. Insurers then use the premium funds from that pool to compensate the relatively few who actually suffer accidents from the risk. Floods are also not a typical insurable risk because the only people who buy flood insurance are those who are likely to be flooded, which makes it impossible to spread risk over a large enough pool of insureds. Finally, floods tend to be widespread and recurring, so they cause huge losses that require equally huge pools to cover the losses. That's why private flood insurance is very expensive.

However, Attorney General Hood is now attempting to set aside these flood exclusions in private insurance contracts in the wake of Katrina as being "unconscionable." Similarly, well-known Mississippi plaintiff's lawyer Dickie Scruggs is following up with other lawsuits in which he contends that the insurers engaged in deceptive trade practices by excluding flood coverage arising from storm surge from their contracts. Messrs. Hood and Scruggs are taking these positions despite the fact that federally-subsidized flood insurance has been promoted in the region for about 40 years and relatively few Mississippi coastal residents have bothered to buy it, presumably because either they did not want to pay extra for it or they assumed that the feds would bail them out in the event of a Katrina-like catastrophe, anyway.

So, Messrs. Hood and Scrugges are demanding that private insurers pay for Katrina flood damages even though the insurers never collected any flood premiums over the years and thus, have no such reserves dedicated for that risk. Inasmuch as insurers are already liable for an estimated $50-70 billion in insured losses, adding another $15-20 billion in uninsured flood losses would ensure that at least a few insurers would end up in chapter 11.

But there would be even a more draconian result if Messrs. Hood and Scruggs are successful in their lawsuits. Insurance companies would have to assume that flood risk is a part of the insured risk, regardless of the exclusions in the insurance contracts. Consequently, the insurers would either charge you and me higher premiums -- certainly at least hundreds of dollars annually -- to cover this risk, or they could simply stop writing policies at all in the Gulf Coast region. That would reduce the competition among insurers to provide policies to all of us, which would also ratchet up the cost of such insurance.

Finally, one has to ponder how Mr. Hood -- a governmental official who has at least an indirect responsibility to encourage reconstruction of the battered regions of his state -- rationalizes taking actions that will increase the cost of liability insurance and thus, make it more expensive for Mississippi citizens to rebuild. Hopefully, a common sense opponent to Mr. Hood will appear in the campaign for the next election who will point that out to Mississippi voters.

Update: Professor Ribstein notes the even wider impact of the Mississippi insurance lawsuits on respect for the rule of law:

[N]obody’s safe if courts don’t enforce contracts. How could the insurance industry ever be sure it was excluding a risk if can't enforce this clearest exclusion of all? How could any company ever be sure it was limiting the scope of any promise?

Doug Simpson over at Unexpected Consequences also reviews the effects of the Mississippi insurance lawsuits.

Posted by Tom at 6:10 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

September 25, 2005

Rita's expected economic waves turn into ripples

It's been a helluva past month in Houston.

First, the Houston community responded to the worst natural disaster in America in decades by taking in tens of thousands of evacuees (posts here, here and here) from New Orleans and the central Gulf Coast who had almost everything but their lives. Then, as that relief effort was winding down, Houston confronted Hurricane Rita, a category 5 storm bearing down for a direct hit on the city. Implementation of the city's evacuation plan led to an estimated 2.7 million Houston area residents hitting the road, resulting in unprecedented traffic gridlock and gasoline shortages throughout the region. After Rita veered off to the east to make landfall on the Texas-Louisiana border, Houston is now dealing with the not insubstantial problem of how to have 2.7 million people return to their homes in the region without experiencing the same type of gridlock and shortages that occurred when they left.

Whew!

Despite all that, the initial signs are that the feared economic repurcussions of damage from Hurricane Rita will not be all that bad. Damage to the vital concentration of oil refineries along the Texas coast appears to be relatively light, and U.S. Coast Guard aerial reconnaissance of the Ports of Houston, Galveston and Port Arthur and their related shipping lanes showed few problems as a result of the hurricane. The biggest problem at the Port of Houston is that the winds out of the north as the storm pushed onshore pushed water out of the Houston Ship Channel and Galveston Bay so that those relatively shallow waterways do not have enough water to accomodate deep sea vessels at this point. However, the water levels should should return to normal levels by Monday or Tuesday, so no substantial disruption in Port operations are expected.

Inasmuch as prices for gasoline and diesel fuel would rise if Houston-area refineries and ports are slow to resume operations, the light damage reports were good news for markets that are still recoiling from the economic impact from the damage to the New Orleans area from Hurricane Katrina.

However, even without extensive damage to refineries and Gulf oil and gas production facilities, the energy industry's pre-Rita shutdown will at least stretch gasoline supplies for the next several weeks. Sixteen refineries were shut down in anticipation of Rita, and that accounts for almost 25% of U.S. refining capacity. That's nearly twice as much of the U.S. capacity that was shutdown prior to Hurricane Katrina, and only about half of that capacity affected by Katrina has come back on line. It normally takes between a week and two weeks for a shutdown refinery to resume normal operations.

Nevertheless, good news emanated on Saturday from the Houston area refineries. Exxon Mobil Corp.'s Baytown plant, which is located between Port Arthur and Houston and is the nation's largest, announced that it planned to restart a number of units beginning today. Terminals and pipelines have already reopened, and the 557,000 barrel-a-day refinery is already delivering gasoline out of storage. Similarly, Royal Dutch Shell PLC announced Saturday that its 340,000 barrel-a-day Deer Park refinery near Houston was not damaged and that both its North Houston and Pasadena distribution terminals are fully operational. BP PLC's huge Texas City refinery is thought to be in the process of restarting, while the smaller Marathon Oil Co. and Valero Energy Corp. refineries in Texas City were also moving towards restarts after reporting no serious damage.

The initial damage reports are worse from the refining area near the Texas-Louisiana border where Rita made landfall. The Port Arthur-Beaumont area has four refineries and Lake Charles, La. just across the border has three plants. Although damage assessments are still ongoing at those plants, the restarting of those plants will take longer both because of probable greater damage than to the Houston area plants and the lack of power, which will probably not be remedied until later in this week.

As a result of the foreoing, crude oil futures fell sharply in unusual Sunday trading as it appeared that oil rig and refinery damage from Hurricane Rita was less than originally feared. Oil prices had climbed steadily last week as Rita churned through the Gulf of Mexico as a category 5 and then 4 hurricane, but fell Friday as the storm weakened before its early Saturday morning landfall just south of Sabine Pass, La. A barrel of light sweet crude for November delivery was down $1.40 at $62.80 on the New York Mercantile Exchange, and unleaded gasoline fell 10.46 cents to $1.98 per gallon. Sunday trading via the Nymex electronic Access system and on London's International Petroleum Exchange was arranged late last week in an effort to mitigate energy market volatility resulting from Hurricane Rita. However, the lack of damage to the facilities appears to have deflated interest in early trading. On London's IPE, Brent crude futures fell $2.59 to $62.01 in light trading.

Posted by Tom at 12:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

Does Joe Pendry use the Run 'N Shoot?

Looks as if Chronicle NFL sportswriter John McClain better avoid political analysis and stick to football.

In the introduction to a column noting that new Texans offensive coordinator Joe Pendry is much more conservative in his offensive philosophy than the just-fired Chris Palmer, McClain makes the following analogy:

"Texans offensive coordinator Joe Pendry has a reputation for being so conservative he makes George W. Bush look like Bill Clinton."

Posted by Tom at 7:05 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

September 24, 2005

Thinking about Houston's evacuation plan

A couple of days ago it was gridlock as an estimated 2.7 million Houstonians evacuated out of fear of Hurricane Rita. Today, it appears that at least a portion of that gridlock is developing coming in the opposite direction as many residents attempt to return to their homes despite a quickly-developed government plan to stagger the return of the evacuees.

During all of this, I have been giving some thought about Houston's evacuation plan, as reflected by this earlier post. In 1983, Hurricane Alicia -- a minimal category 3 storm -- made a direct on Houston and Galveston. There was no evacuation to speak of and, thus, no gasoline shortages. The storm killed 22 people and caused damage costing about $4 billion in 2005 dollars. On the other hand, Hurricane Rita -- a stronger category 3 storm than Alicia that did not make a direct hit on Houston and Galveston -- has already caused more deaths (24 in the Dallas bus crash alone) than Alicia and resulted in a regional gasoline shortage, while the direct costs of the storm will likely be much smaller than Alicia's.

My purpose in pointing this out is not to criticize the governmental officials' execution of the Houston evacuation plan, which has been thoughtful and generally good. My thoughts are more with regard to the plan itself, which during implementation encouraged all Houston residents -- even those in non-mandatory evacuation areas -- to evacuate. The result was that, despite the fact that Houston has the most highway lane-miles per capita of America's large metro areas, dangerous gridlock and accidental deaths occurred, and the area experienced severe gasoline shortages as a result of the huge spike in demand. Moreover, the gridlock precluded suppliers from being able to deliver new supplies of gasoline and other goods, and despite the good faith efforts of the governmental officials, similar gridlock is occurring as residents return.

This is not to suggest that a hurricane evacuation plan is unnecessary for the Houston area. Clearly, the people in the areas of the metropolitan area that would be flooded by a strong storm surge need to get out. Similarly, arrangements need to be made for the poor and infirm, and for those folks who do not live in sufficiently solid structures to withstand a strong hurricane. However, if Alicia and Hurricane Carla in 1961 taught us anything, then it's that most Houstonians survived the storms just fine by battening down the hatches and remaining in their homes. Moreover, the recovery from such a storm is facilitated in many ways by having property owners tending to their property immediately after the storm rather than attempting to find the back way home from afar.

Just some thoughts to ponder as Houston attempts to return to normal after experiencing one of the largest evacuations in American history. And in the meantime, enjoy Ken Hoffman's alternately hilarious and insightful column about Houston's Rita experience.

Update: The Chronicle's Dan Feldstein and Matt Stiles weigh in on many of the same issues discussed above in this post-Rita article. And the Chronicle's Eric Berger -- who has provided both exhaustive and exhausting (he had to evacuate his family from Clear Lake) coverage of both major hurricanes over the past month -- notes the following in his Monday post on Rita:

Why were people so far away from the coast leaving town? In College Station, my wife ran into a man who had evacuated from Conroe.

Posted by Tom at 3:29 PM | Comments (11) | TrackBack (5)

Houstonian wins USGA Senior Amateur Championship

In the category of better things to do than waiting around Houston for a hurricane to arrive, Houstonian Mike Rice -- who I believe plays out of Champions Golf Club -- won the the 2005 USGA Senior Amateur Championship on Thursday at the Farm Golf Club in Rocky Face, Ga. Mr. Rice, who is 65, is the oldest winner of the event in 18 years. Here is the transcript of the post-victory interview with Mr. Rice. Hat tip to Bogey McDuff over at Golf Texas for the links to Mr. Rice's victory.

Posted by Tom at 2:02 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Pay-to-stay evacuation plan?

The always insightful Tyler Cowen over at Marginal Revolution is already thinking about how to improve Houston's evacuation plan:

"Pay people who stay behind. By the day, of course. And only if they own cars."

Tyler's plan makes a lot of sense, particularly for folks who live in sturdy structures in non-flood prone areas. The evacuation of Houston ended up being arduous because an unanticipated large number of people evacuated who did not live in the mandatory evacuation areas. Most of those folks would have been better off battening down the hatches and staying put, but it's hard to criticize folks -- particularly those who do not have a safe haven to ride out such a storm or who are worried about infants -- for wanting to get the hell out. The number of non-mandatory evacuees clearly surprised governmental officials and that resulted in a the delay in getting all main freeway lanes going in the same direction to accomodate the evacuees.

Posted by Tom at 10:22 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack (1)

Entergy's New Orleans unit files chapter 11

Following up on this post from earlier this week, Entergy Corporation's New Orleans subsidiary filed a chapter 11 case on Friday in New Orleans (that filing location will certainly cut down on the number of lawyers attending the first round of hearings). Neither the Entergy parent company nor any of its other subsidiaries were included in the bankruptcy filing, which is important because about 250,000 of Entergy's Gulf Coast unit's 1.3 million Texas customers are currently without power as a result of Hurricane Rita. The difference between those two units is that those 250,000 customers without power are still Entergy customers. In stark contrast, Entergy's New Orleans unit has lost a staggering 130,000 customers as a result of Hurricane Katrina, and its unclear how many of those customers will even return to the New Orleans region.

The filing occurred after Entergy concluded that the estimated $750 million to $1.3 billion cost of rebuilding the unit's electric system from Hurricane Katrina-related damage far exceeds what the utility's customers can afford to pay. Immediately upon filing, Entergy's parent corporation requested bankruptcy court authority to advance the New Orleans unit $150 million to head off an emergency liquidity crisis and to provide funds to continue the rebuilding effort. Even that emergency financing was dependent on the parent company obtaining emergency concessions from its lenders to avoid a cross-default on its $2 billion emergency line of credit. Although the New Orleans unit's reorganization plan is in the infancy stages, Entergy is attempting to arrange a plan that is based on insurance proceeds, federal support and a limited rate increase to cover rebuilding costs.

Posted by Tom at 9:29 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Hurricane Rita update from The Woodlands

As predicted during the morning yesterday, the Houston metropolitan area was spared a direct hit from Hurricane Rita, which came onshore at about 2:30 a.m. this morning at Sabine Pass near the Texas-Louisiana border.

In The Woodlands, which is on the north side of the Houston metro area (pdf region map), the strongest winds -- which were probably 40 - 50 mph steadily with gusts of 75 mph -- occurred between 3:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m., and have decreased steadily since then. Rain has not been particularly heavy, and my home has had power throughout the storm, although there are wide areas of Houston and the north end that have lost power. Interstate 45 to the east of The Woodlands appears to be a rough demarcation line on the north end where the wind and rain have been worse on the east side of that line. The area between Huntsville and Livingston to the north has been getting hammered hard over the past couple of hours, and the East Texas area around Jasper (just north of Beaumont) is really bearing the brunt of the storm at this point.

Conditions will gradually improve over the next several hours and, by noon or so, we will be able to venture out safely and assess the damage. My sense is that the primary damage in this area will be relatively light wind damage caused by fallen tree limbs, roof damage, broken windows and the like. Frankly, I'm looking forward to venturing out into the weather today because one of the few fringe benefits of these storms is that they cool down the atmosphere greatly, which is much appreciated in these parts because we have been experiencing an excrutiatingly hot late summer -- the high temperature was 95 degrees yesterday.

Finally, I want to pass along my heartfelt thanks for the dozens of phone calls, emails, blog comments, blog posts and the like over the past several days expressing concern and conveying goodwill and prayers for my family and me. The outpouring of concern has been greatly appreciated by my family and me, and we are humbled by the gracious expressions of support. Thank you all very, very much.

Posted by Tom at 8:08 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

September 23, 2005

Emergency shelters in The Woodlands need bedding

Three emergency shelters have been established in The Woodlands to care for evacuees who got caught up in the bottleneck on I-45 leading out of Houston. The shelters are at The Woodlands High School at 6101 Research Forest Drive in The Woodlands 77381-4902, The Woodlands College Park High School at 3701 College Park Dr. in The Woodlands 77384, and The Woodlands McCullough Junior High School at 3800 South Panther Creek in The Woodlands 77381-2799. The Reverend Howard Huhn, the Minister of Outreach at The Woodlands United Methodist Church has sent out this email requesting the following:

Dear Friends,

Because of the traffic associated with Hurricane Rita, our local high schools (McCullough, TWHS, College Park) have opened as shelters. They are in need of bedding. If you have bedding available, please drop it off directly at the schools.

Thank you for being Christ to others.

Howard Huhn
Minister of Outreach
The Woodlands United Methodist Church

Posted by Tom at 1:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

A hopeful sign for Houston and Galveston

Jeff Master's latest update of just a few minutes ago indicates that experts are increasingly forming a consensus that Houston and Galveston will avoid a direct hit from Hurricane Rita:

The latest computer models are tightly clustered around a landfall point just west of the Texas/Louisiana border. Confidence is high in this forecast. Houston and Galveston should escape major wind and storm surge damage, and only experience maximum sustained winds of 60 mph with gusts to 85 mph. It is still too early to tell what will happen after landfall, as the models all take Rita different ways. A major rainwater flooding problem will ensue after Rita's landfall, with 10 - 30 inches of rain falling over a large area of Texas and Louisiana.

For the first time since Hurricane Rita entered the Gulf earlier in the week, the cone of uncertainty that shows the range where the hurricane force winds will hit does not include a substantial portion of the Houston area, essentially that part west of I-45.

Posted by Tom at 10:01 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)

Here comes Rita

Houston awakens this morning to the news that the two most likely locations for landfall are Port Arthur and Galveston. The cone of uncertainty extends from southwestern Louisiana on the east to the entire Houston metro area on the west. The National Hurricane Center is currently predicting landfall to occur in Jefferson County near Port Arthur, while local experts are predicting landfall slightly west in Chambers County nearer Galveston Bay (county map here). As Rita continues to move slowly with its eye about 260 miles southeast of Galveston, a consensus has developed that the storm will move into northeast Texas after landfall and then stall on Sunday and Monday, potentially causing huge amounts of rainfall of the type that flooded the Houston area during Tropical Storm Allison in 2001. Landfall is expected at this point sometime in the early morning hours of Saturday, probably between 5 a.m. to 8 a.m., although heavy rainfall and strong winds throughout the Houston area will be experienced well before then.

Houston, get ready to rumble.

Posted by Tom at 7:30 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

"Houston to Coach Briles, are you with us?"

For the sake of the University of Houston football program, I am hoping that head football coach Art Briles had his tongue placed squarely in his cheek during his weekly radio show Wednesday described by Chronicle sportswriter Richard Justice:

"OK, there's no requirement that your local college football coach has to read the New York Times Book Review.

But shouldn't he know something.

UH's Art Briles went on the radio Wednesday and just about made a fool out of himself.

When he was asked if this week's game with Southern Miss would be cancelled, he said he hadn't heard anything about it. He also said he hadn't heard anything about a hurricane.

If I'm the president or athletics director at UH, I'm wondering if this guy might have a little too much tunnel vision."

Posted by Tom at 6:12 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

September 22, 2005

Adam Everett and Eric Bruntlett

As the Stros continue their improbable push to a second straight Wild Card playoff berth, two of the team members who are most popular among the Stros' players -- shortstop Adam Everett and utility player Eric Bruntlett -- are the subjects of the seventh segment in our series on the Stros' key players. Previous posts are here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Everett came over to Houston from the Red Sox organization in the 1999 Carl Everett trade, but he lost out to Stros farmhand Julio Lugo in the minor league competition to replace the eminently forgettable Tim Bogar as the Stros' shortstop after the disappointing 2000 season. However, Lugo had a highly-publicized spat with his wife in 2003 and was promptly exiled to Tampa Bay, so Everett was handed the job as a 26 year old rookie.

He showed promise during the 2003 season by exhibiting superior fielding skills while generating about a position average hitting line (-13 RCAA/.320 OBA/.380 SLG/.700 OPS). Then, while showing improvement at the plate during the first part of the 2004 season, Everett's left wrist was broken in a beaning and he was not able to come back in time to play any meaningful role in that club's historic run to the playoffs. Thus, the 2005 season is quite important for Everett, who is no longer a young player at 28 and still has not established himself as a top level National League shortstop.

Frankly, Everett's season has been disappointing. He still is excellent defensively, but his hitting has regressed to the point that a genuine question exists whether he can be anything more than a complementary defensive player on a good hitting team, which the Stros are not. Everett's hitting problem is twofold -- (i) he does not take enough walks (only 24 in about 550 plate appearances), so his on-base average is deficient, and (ii) he has a bad habit of attempting to pull every pitch, which results in a high number of weak ground balls on outside pitches that he ought to be taking to center and right field.

Thus, Everett is not yet a part of the Berkman-Oswalt-Ensberg-Lidge nucleus that will likely keep the Stros in playoff contention over the next several seasons. Inasmuch as he is an above-average defensive player and is at least close to league position average as a hitter, Everett could still become a productive player for the Stros if he can continue to bump his power numbers (11 HR's so far this season) and learn to generate more walks. However, he will be 29 next season, so he needs to improve those skills quickly or he will fall into the category of players who cannot be taught new tricks.

Bruntlett, on the other hand, has had a remarkable season, although perhaps because the expectations for him were much lower than Everett. For the first part of the season, Bruntlett was the player named most likely to be sent to the minors whenever a player was ready to come off of the disabled list. However, the 27 year old career infield utilityman expanded his defensive skills to play center and left field, and has done it very well. In the meantime, he has hit better than expected, has had two game winning hits, and hits above-average for his usual position, which is shortstop. It is doubtful that Bruntlett has the ability to sustain that level of hitting if he were used as a regular player, but he has proven this season that he is a valuable (and, perhaps most importantly, inexpensive) utility player. Bruntlett is one of the real nice stories for the Stros during this surprising 2005 season.

Everett and Bruntlett's statistics are here.

Posted by Tom at 5:32 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)