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John C Moritz Austin Bureau USA TODAY NETWORK, Corpus Christi Caller Times Published 7:00 a.m. CT June 26, 2020

Of the confirmed two million coronavirus cases, more than 113,000 Americans have died since the virus emerged here a few months ago. USA TODAY

AUSTIN In the 12 months before the Texas Legislature opened its 2001 session, 1,841people were killed in motor vehicle crashes where alcohol was considered a contributing factor.

That session, lawmakers enacted a law banning the open containers of alcohol in cars and trucks. The message was clear in both committee testimony and floor debates: Texaswould no longer tolerate the sometimes deadly behavior of drinking and driving.

Gov. Greg Abbott at Dallas City Hall, June 2, 2020.(Photo: The Texas Governor's Office)

The vote was unanimous in the Senate and only two of the 150 House members voted no.

In the 88-day period that ended June 22, an estimated 2,200 people in the state had died from COVID-19, the illness caused by the fast-spreading coronavirus that is once again spiking to frightening levels in Texas.

But in his news conference called after 88 straight days of COVID-19 deaths, Gov. Greg Abbott said ordering all Texans to cover their faces while in public would be aone-size-fits-all approach that would be inappropriate for a state as large and diverse as Texas.

What may be true in Austin, Texas, is different in Austin County, the governor told reporters. And we need to have latitude for that differentiation.

More: Gov. Abbott: COVID-19 spike 'unacceptable,' but he says reclosing economy is 'last option'

During the pandemic that has has claimed more than 120,000 lives nationwide and has deflated a once-roaring economy, the mask has become something of a political bumper sticker for the face. Republican President Donald Trump, badly sagging in the polls heading in the final five months of his re-election campaign, has said people wear them not to halt the virus, but to signal their disapproval of him.

Why only some of Pres. Trump's COVID-19 advisors wear masks(Photo: ap)

Abbott, a second-term Republican, has becomea cheerleader for the voluntary wearing of masks even as hard-right conservatives in his own party accuse him of using a wink and a nudge to sell out the personal freedoms of Texans.

Personal freedom has long been cherished in Texas. When lawmakers finally passed the one-size-fits-all open-container law, it was hardly on a whim. For a decade, or perhaps longer, open-container bills would be filed and forgotten in the Legislature.

More: Hospitals sound the alarm as COVID-19 cases continue to spike up in Texas

The opponents had tradition on their side. What was the harm, they argued, of sipping on a cold one during their half-hour commute home? Some traditionalists even measuredlonger motor trips not in miles or hours, but in beer cans.

Austin was just a six-pack's drive from Fort Worth. A trip from Dallas to Amarillo would definitely require a pit stop somewhere nearWichita Falls, both to restock the cooler and to relieve a bulging bladder.

But such attitudes shifted as the century turned. Texas was increasingly suburban, and the suburbs became the epicenter for the Republican takeover of Austin. They weren't so much tea party Republicans back then, but soccer mom Republicans whose top concern as often as not was the safety of their families.

State Sen. Jane Nelson, a Republican and mother of five who came to the Legislature from the suburbs north of Dallas in 1993, took some blowback from conservative talk radio when she told a reporter back then that the days of "Bubba" riding around with an open beer in his pickup were coming to an end.

More: How do we know Texas' coronavirus spike was predictable? Gov. Abbott told us it was coming

But that blowback didn't stop her. When the open-container bill she had coauthored had cleared both chambers, Nelson took a victory lap.

State Sen. Jane Nelson(Photo: Texas Senate)

"We have the worst traffic safety record in the nation, and this bill will prevent tragedies on our roadways," said Nelson, now one of the upper chamber's most senior members and chairwoman of the Senate Finance Committee.

She was right. Alcohol-related fatalities began dropping in Texas the same year the law went on the books, according to the Texas Department of Transportation. Within five years, the annual number of deaths dropped by nearly 2,000.

And there was no blowback at the polls in 2002. In fact, Republicans that year finally completed their takeover of state government and ended the Democrats' dominance ofTexas' congressional delegation.

It remains to be seen what blowback might come fromTexas voters this November with the fallout of COVID-19 and the sufferingand death it has wrought still fresh in their minds. Will they be more concerned with their personal freedoms, or with the safety of their families?

John C. Moritz covers Texas government and politics for the USA Today Network in Austin. Contact him at jmoritz@gannett.comand follow him on Twitter@JohnnieMo.

John Moritz(Photo: File)

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One time, 2,000 deaths in one year forced Texas to curtail a time-honored personal freedom - San Angelo Standard Times

The Democratic Party is preparing for a generational changing of the guard. Joe Biden, the partys presumptive presidential nominee, is 77, while all of the top three leaders in the U.S. House are even older, including 80-year-old Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Nonetheless, a number of candidates who are younger, more progressive and often non-white have been successfully challenging incumbents in Democratic primaries this year. Following Tuesdays voting in New York, it appears that four new legislators backed by the leftist Working Families Party or the Democratic Socialists of America will be heading to Albany.

Voters are tired of the same old people going up there and representing them, says Eric Griego of the Working Families Party.

Final results from Tuesdays voting in Kentucky and New York wont be known for days, due to the large number of absentee ballots, but Congressman Eliot Engel of New York, a 31-year House veteran who chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee, lost his race against educator Jamaal Bowman. Carolyn Maloney, another congressional veteran and committee chair, is clinging to a narrow lead against Suraj Patel, a hotelier and business professor who called this a change election.

This is an early signal that there are tectonic shifts possible in November, says Daniel Squadron, a former New York legislator. This is a moment of change and frustration.

The desire for change has been expressed all over the country. This month alone, the top state Senate leaders in New Mexico and West Virginia were defeated in primaries. Powerful committee chairs who shaped state budgets have been shown the door. In Pennsylvania, a half-dozen incumbent legislators were ousted, including long-serving members from Philadelphia, home to one of the last old-school political machines.

In Pennsylvania, the progressives in the Democratic Party challenged incumbents, particularly in the state legislature, says Terry Madonna, a pollster and political scientist at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. Basically, its the progressives challenging what Ill call the Democratic status quo.

Generally, few incumbent legislators are ever challenged in primaries. Most are still winning this year. But there have been enough high-profile losses to make it clear that incumbents who may have felt insulated by the fact that in-person campaigning has been largely put on hold by the coronavirus pandemic cant rest easy this year.

Voters do want hope and a positive vision for the future, says Gaby Goldstein, political director for Sister District Project, which helps elect Democratic legislators but doesnt get involved in primaries. It is a rallying cry for Democrats and perhaps more broadly to have a future worth fighting for.

They were known as the Formidable Five. Five conservative Democrats in the New Mexico Senate occasionally voted with Republicans to kill progressive bills, to the frustration of their House colleagues and Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham. You get all these great House members sending bills over to the Senate, and the same five senators were working together to block the legislation, says Griego, New Mexico state director for the Working Families Party and a former Democratic state senator.

On June 2, four of the five were defeated in primaries, including Mary Kay Papen, the president pro tempore, and John Arthur Smith, who has served for 32 years and chairs the Finance Committee. Their challengers were able to paint them as out of touch with district concerns. That was despite the fact that Papen in particular received heavy financial support from New Mexico Strong, a group funded by petroleum corporations such as Chevron Oil.

Papen wasnt the only chamber leader to lose this month. Mitch Carmichael, president of the West Virginia Senate, was defeated on June 10 by Amy Nichole Grady, a teacher energized by state-level fights over teacher pay. Carmichael was one of two West Virginia senators defeated by teachers.

On Tuesday, Kentucky House Speaker David Osborne turned back a challenge from Tiffany Dunn, a teacher who had helped organize protests in the state surrounding public pension funds.

In West Virginia, Carmichael was also one of 10 sitting Republican legislators who lost in this years primaries, including a former state House majority leader.

Thats an incredible percentage. In most recent cycles, only one in five incumbent legislators has even faced a primary opponent (the percentage ticking up a bit to 21.9 percent in 2018). Between 1994 and 2014, more than 97 percent of incumbent legislators won their primaries, according to Steven Rogers, a political scientist at St. Louis University. He notes that for incumbent legislators, primaries are like a cold a nuisance, but seldom fatal.

This years numbers are striking, in part because of the usual circumstances that have upended campaigning. There are no parades to walk along, no service club meetings to visit, no hands to shake. Legislative candidates typically spend the bulk of their day knocking on doors, which is also verboten. All this seemed like it would play to the advantage of incumbents, who dont face the same challenges their opponents have in newly introducing themselves to voters.

But campaigns have adapted. Everyone is holding virtual town halls. Some are trying to make the experience of connecting online more fun, hosting trivia contests or having people phone bank in groups, making their calls and then chatting among themselves through their screens. Its actually easier to get a big-name politician to show up for a fundraiser these days, Goldstein says, because they can appear online for 20 minutes and then quickly move on to their next call.

In New Mexico, the Working Families Party rediscovered the phone. Griego estimated that his group made 50,000 calls, talking to about 10,000 individuals, mostly in the Papen and Smith districts. They called up and then reached back out to receptive listeners, not only comparing voting records but also walking them through the process of requesting and returning absentee ballots.

The hands-on approach paid off. By the end of the day, our canvassers had talked to these voters three or four times, Griego says. The incumbents lost their advantage. They were doing robocalls, featuring endorsements or saying dont listen to these left wing groups.

Incumbents also face the hurdle of running during a difficult time for the country. The pandemic is still raging and unemployment remains high. On top of that, there have been weeks of protests across the country, a clear expression of popular discontent.

The quick collapse of the economy, coupled with concerns about COVID-19, could motivate voters to vote and vote for change, against incumbents, says Jaclyn Kettler, a political scientist at Boise State University. In general, it seems as though many people are unhappy or anxious and looking for ways to exercise their political voice.

Kettler notes that in Idaho, several incumbent legislators were defeated in GOP primaries on June 2, largely by candidates who were more conservative and pushed back against Republican Gov. Brad Littles stay at home orders. In West Virginia, the main action in primaries was also on the Republican side. North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum spent nearly $2 million of his own money in an effort to challenge legislators hed clashed with, helping to knock out Jeff Delzer, a fellow Republican who chairs the state House Appropriations Committee.

In blue states, its Democrats who are going through a sorting process, with incumbents losing to younger, more ideological candidates. At the start of the last decade, Republicans were challenged in primaries by candidates aligned with the Tea Party or other factions. Now, its Democrats who have to watch their left flanks. That started to be evident in 2018, from the election of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez over a veteran member of Congress, to the defeat of numerous top Democrats in the Maryland Senate.

There was a long period of time when there wasnt that challenge from the left, Goldstein says. Having a more organized progressive movement electorally is a huge development.

Given delays in voting this spring, there are a lot of states yet to hold primaries this summer. In those contests and again in the fall incumbents may find themselves feeling more heat than usual, says Squadron, executive director of Future Now, which works with Democratic legislators on policy and politics but isnt involved in primaries.

People are really focused on whos representing them, maybe more carefully than they were before, Squadron says. Despite the fact that traditional campaigning isn't happening, folks are expecting outcomes from their representatives.

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Legislative Leaders Are Losing in This Year's Primaries - Governing

The fast bowling department of the Indian cricket team has been built around pacers Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Jasprit Bumrah. The deadly duo was instrumental in Indias rise to the top as they constantly contained the opposition batsmen at the end with their lethal yorkers. However, injury problems have led to both players missing considerable time of action in the past two years. First, it was Bhuvneshwar Kumar and then injury struck Bumrah last year. But gradually both players are making a comeback from injury.

But what does Bhuvneshwar consider as the turning point of his career?

The 30-year-old Indian pacer says playing for IPL side Sunrisers Hyderabad has been a turning point in his career as he learnt to handle the pressure of bowling at the death.

READ | An evening tea party, a random suggestion: The story behind IPL auction

Indias fierce pack attack is now one of the best in the world and Bhuvneshwar is a key figure in the set-up along with Bumrah, Mohammed Shami and Umesh Yadav.

Bhuvneshwar said he always had the ability to bowl yorkers but delivering in crunch moments is something that he learnt after joining the Sunrisers squad back in 2014.

I always had the ability to bowl yorkers but then I lost it. At Sunrisers Hyderabad, they wanted me to bowl at the start of the innings as well as at the end. The 14 matches I played in 2014, I learnt to handle pressure and that was a turning point, Bhuvneshwar told Deep Das Gupta on Cricketbaazi show.

I learnt new things, especially handling pressure at death bowling (during Sunrisers stint), he said.

Bhuvneshwar, who has taken 132 ODI and 63 Test wickets, said he has been most successful whenever he has managed to detach himself from the outcome of the games like former India skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni.Like MS Dhoni, I try to detach myself from the result and focus on small things, which I also refer to as process. And this helps in getting the desired outcome.

During IPL when I had a couple of good seasons, I was in this zone. I was so focused on my process, that the result had become secondary. And results were positive.Talking about how is he keeping himself motivated while being away from the game due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Bhuvneshwar said it hasnt been easy.

READ |Connor breaches a cricket bastion, named MCCs first woman president

I was very motivated for the first 15 days of the lockdown. No one knew how long it would last and I didnt have any equipment to exercise at home either. We thought things would get better in a couple of months, he said.But after 15 days, I started finding it difficult to motivate myself. I then ordered equipment at home and things have improved since...I am working on coming out of this lockdown as a better version of myself.

On-field performance is different, but I can work on my fitness, or my athletic ability, or gaining more strength, he added.

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Always had the ability to bowl yorkers but then I lost it: Bhuvneshwar Kumar - Hindustan Times

Steve Waughs double hundred against West Indies in the 1995 Jamaica Test was probably one of the top innings played by an Australian. The four Test-match series was levelled at 1-1 when the Mark Taylor-led Australia travelled to Jamaica for the decider. In a recent interaction, Waugh recalled his famous innings from the Test and explained how words from the then coach Bob Simpson inspired him to challenge the West Indies pace attack.

Speaking to former England cricketer Michael Artherton in a Sky Sports Youtube video interview, Waugh praised Ambrose, with whom he had a few exchanges of words in the 3rd Test in the series in Trinidad.

Also Read | A Pak fan started abusing us: Shankar on absurd scene ahead of WC match

Curtly Ambrose was a great bowler. He was an incredible adversary and my most respected opponent. He never said anything to you, and that was worse than sledging. You didnt know what he was thinking, is he trying to get me out, or is he going to hurt me, Waugh said.

Thats worse than someone telling you what they are going to do. He was always there on the good length, and his short ball was always on the throat. He was an incredible competitor, he added.

Talking about his innings, Waugh went on: The West Indies innings made me as a player and probably goes back to Bob Simpson. He doesnt get a lot of credit. After the first couple of Tests, he sat our group of batsmen down and he said this is not good enough. Somewhere, one of you guys need to go and get a big hundred, and we said well, hang on look, why dont you go and try this, those are four quicks, and we are doing our best.

Also Read | How an evening tea party decided players will be auctioned in IPL

But I walked away from that meeting and I thought maybe there is something in what he is saying. Are we tough enough? Can we break through and get that big score.

That happened in the 200 I scored in Jamaica. Sometimes you need to be told the truth and he told us you are soft, and need to do better. And getting that 200 was the highlight of my career, against the best team in the world that had been unbeaten in 15 years, Waugh said.

With Waughs 200 and his brothers Mark Waughs 126, Australia posted 531 in the first innings in response to Windies 265, taking a lead of 266 runs. West Indies were bowled out for 213 in the 2nd innings as Australia won the match by an innings and 53 runs, and also won the series 2-1.

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Is he trying to get me out or is he trying to hurt me: Steve Waugh recalls battle with Curtly Ambro... - Hindustan Times

In the formal reception room of his Capitol office on March 22, Governor Greg Abbott sat at the desk where he signs bills into law, trying to project leadership at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the frame behind him, the states health and emergency management directors posed next to the U.S. and Texas flags. In just seventeen days, the state had gone from 0 COVID-19 cases to 263, with five deaths in the Houston and DallasFort Worth areas. City and county officials had closed bars, restaurants, and gyms.

But Abbott declined to adopt such measures across the state. Understand this, and that is I am governor of 254 counties in the state of Texas. More than 200 of those counties in the state of Texas still have 0 cases of people testing positive for COVID-19, Abbott said. At this time, it is not the appropriate approach to mandate that same strict standard across every area of the state.

So county judges in the largest metro areas continued to take the lead, operating with Abbotts blessing. Over the next nine days, the number of confirmed cases in the state jumped to 3,266 with 41 deaths, spreading from 46 counties to 122. The governor finally relented and issued a stay-at-home order on March 31.

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Over the next month, Abbott apparently changed his mind about local control over the pandemic response. As other Republican governors reopened their states, the right wing of the Texas Republican party and its financial supporters among business executives began applying pressure for him to do the same. Abbott could afford to take the risk. In April a poll by theDallas Morning News and theUniversity of Texas at Tylerreported that 86 percent of Republicans surveyed said he was doing a good job. Plus, the number of jobless Texans was nearing two million, and they were eager to go back to work.

On April 27 Abbott ordered a partial reopening of the Texas economyfreeing the public to attend movies, dine in restaurants, and play in parkssuperseding local governments and limiting their ability to enforce either his orders or their own. He overturned Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgos order for her constituents to wear a mask and said no jurisdiction could fine people for not doing so.

When Dallas hairdresser Shelley Luther was jailed for refusing to close her businessa punishment allowed under Abbotts original closure orderand then became a cause clbre for conservatives, the governor reversed himself and declared that no one could be jailed for failing to follow a COVID-19 emergency order. Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins, a Democrat, called Abbotts reversal on enforcement clearly political.

For most of his tenure, Abbott has pushed for and signed into law legislation that has curtailed local power, especially the Democratic influence in blue cities. He had overturned Dentons ban on gas drilling in the city limits and Austins restrictions on tree cutting, and he had opened up San Antonio to lawsuits for banishing Chick-fil-A from the city airport. But now he was taking such measures to new extremes.

In mid-May Texas attorney general Ken Paxton wrote a warning to officials in Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio threatening suit over specifics of their local public health orders, where they differed from Abbotts. Austin mayor Steve Adler, in response, lamented that he had made a point of not engaging in naked politicization of the virus and did not plan to get sucked into a fight.

In June, a harsh reality began to set in. From the start of the pandemic in March until April 30, the day before the state began reopening, Texas reported a total of 28,087 positive tests for the virus and 782 deaths. By mid-June, the number of infected Texans had tripled and deaths had topped 2,000. New cases and hospitalizations ticked up by the day. The Texas Medical Center, in Houston,warned it was just weeks away from exceeding its ICU capacity.

On June 16 nine Texas mayors released a public letter asking for the authority to require the wearing of face masks in their cities. Abbott said he believed in individual responsibility and that persuasion was better than mandates.

Then the governor blinked. The very next day, Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff issued a new order instituting fines of up to $1,000 against businesses that did not require patrons and workers to wear masks. The governor suddenly gave Wolff his blessing, saying that had been his intent all along. The county judge in Bexar County finally figured that out, Abbott said on a Waco television station.

Not to let a news cycle go by without looking like the man in charge of a return to normalcy, Abbott had his education commissioner announce on June 18 that students would be returning to classrooms in the fall.

This weekend, audio leaked of two employees of the right-wing group Empower Texans criticizing Abbotts latest mask order while making fun of him for being in a wheelchair. A Tarrant County tea party group castigated the governor for allowing local officials to mandate businesses mandate masks, calling him Governor Abdicate.

From the left, the hashtag #AbbottBetrayedTexas trended on Twitter, with complaints that the governor had put business ahead of lives in reopening without the virus being under control. There were also calls for Abbott and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick to resign.

On Monday, Abbott said if Texans follow his voluntary guidelines, the state can limit the spread of the virus. He urged Texans to wear masks and cajoled them to stay home. Texans have already shown that we dont have to choose between jobs and health. We can have both, Abbott said. Together, we can keep Texans safe. Together, we will keep Texas wide open for business.

The very next day, Abbott authorized local governments to reduce the size of outside gatherings from five hundred to one hundred going into the Fourth of July holiday, using standards set by one of his executive orders. By Thursday, Abbott ordered hospitals in four counties to halt all elective surgeries. Abbott also paused any further reopening of the economy beyond what he already had allowed, and what has been blamed, in part, for the current spike: bars and businesses open at 50 percent capacity, restaurants at 75 percent capacity. The last thing we want to do is go backwards and close down businesses, Abbott said.

All through May and early June, Abbott ignored warnings from local officials. Now hes backpedaling, but it might be too late for thousands of Texans.

In the fourth week of June, the number of COVID-19 cases grew by more than 9,000 to hit 40,920 active infections, with 3,409 people in the hospitals. Within days, active infections surpassed 50,000, with more than 4,000 Texans in hospitals.

As the numbers of infected and hospitalized grew, Baylor College of Medicine virologist Dr. Peter Hotez said if the trajectories persisted, Houston could become the most coronavirus-affected city in the United States. We can hope and pray for the best. But if this spike comes, Abbott wont have the local officials to blame.

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Will Politics Prevent Us From Dealing With the Next Wave? - Texas Monthly