Gov. Rick Perry reached a milestone last night: Under his leadership, 200 people have been executed in Texas – more executions than have proceeded under any other governor in U.S. history, reports the Texas Moratorium Network. In all, the state has executed 438 people since 1982, including 152 under former Gov. George W. Bush. On June 2 the state put to death Terry Hankins, who was convicted and sentenced to die for the 2001 murders of his wife and two step children, 12 and 10. After his arrest, Hankins confessed to killing his father and 20-year-old sister a year before. Since 2001, 40 people nationwide, including two in Texas, have been exonerated from death row. Meanwhile, 40 men have now been exonerated from Texas prisons based on DNA evidence of actual innocence – including the most recent exoneree, Jerry Lee Evans, who is also the 20th exoneree from Dallas County. Like the vast majority of Texas' other exonerated men, Evans' wrongful conviction was due in large part to a faulty eyewitness identification.

Local women's health care advocates are planning a candlelight vigil Thursday night (June 4), in memory of Dr. George Tiller, the Kansas abortion provider who was gunned down at church on Sunday in Wichita. Here are the details, forwarded to us by the folks at NARAL Pro-Choice Texas:

CANDLELIGHT VIGIL TO HONOR DR. GEORGE TILLER Thursday, June 4th 8pm Butler Park 903 W Riverside Dr Near Palmer Events Center Please join us in honoring this great man who truly lived by his motto "Trust Women." Sponsored by: Austin Women’s Health Center, Jane’s Due Process, The Lilith Fund, NARAL Pro-Choice Texas, Planned Parenthood of the Texas Capitol Region, TAPPA, Texas Chapter of Law Students for Reproductive Justice, Whole Woman’s Health, Women’s Health and Family Planning Association of Texas.

Tiller was one of just a very small number of doctors in the U.S. who perform late-term abortions – those that take place in late in the second and into the third trimester. Those abortions are rare (usually related to the discovery of serious fetal abnormality and/or something that poses a risk to the life of the mother), and extremely controversial. As a result, Tiller, 67, and his Kansas clinic had been targets of abortion foes for years. His clinic had previously been bombed, and in 1993 he was shot in both arms by an anti-abortion protester.

A righteous throw down it was too. Testament to the ultimate success of Saturday’s Pachanga! Latino Music Festival at Fiesta Gardens occurred during nearly every performance of the second-year event. You couldn’t enjoy a full set for fear you were missing an equally gratifying vibe at one of the other two stages. Opposite ends of the venue’s lush grounds made for a two-minute trek that nevertheless justified multiple PopSoCools on a hot, still afternoon down by the riverside. Nine hours after my day began with El Tule’s ninepiece horn-, guitar-, and percussion-driven Woodstock, both headliners – Mexico City cumbia rockers Mexican Institute of Sound and Chihuahua-originated black-hat Tejano Michael Salgado – rocked Austin’s Eastside every watt as memorable as Of Montreal’s carnivalesque set in the unfathomably underutilized locale last fall. The crucial difference? Rather than a familiar variant of indie nation, cowtown’s rarely experienced melting pot kept its offspring shaded and hydrated in increasing numbers as the fiesta progressed. At the end of the marathon, Pachanga’s peak, co-organizer Rich Garza barely fathomed a weary, but genuinely validated estimate of 3,500 patrons. Whatever their number, each and every one of them will gush on exactly what went down at the famed Live Music Capital’s newest gathering of tribes.

There's a strange and beautiful symmetry to having a session that began with a display of chummy bipartisanship in the House, and a vicious rules debate in the Senate, end exactly the same way. The House left at 6pm, leaving the Senate to work out what to do with the Sunset rescue resolution they passed and the bond bill they didn't. Instead, the Senate hung on to a little after 9pm and, after a lengthy argument about whether discussing the date of sine die also means discussing the time, they punted the decision by doing nothing about either, and raising the specter of a special session. Lt. Gov David Dewhurst's logic was chillingly simple: The House hadn't passed the bond authorization, so it was pretty pointless passing the Sunset rescue because they'd probably be back (early betting says July) to fix both. It will be interesting to see how Speaker Joe Straus responds at his wrap-up meeting with the press on Tuesday morning.

Did anyone realize that the Texas House of Representatives and the Texas Senate were in different time zones? Because it was sine die two hours ago in the House, and the Senate keeps breaking off into caucus meetings to fix the unfixable. The problem comes in two halves. Firstly, the $2 billion in Prop. 12 bonds that the House never bothered to authorize before gaveling out. Secondly, the last major item of business: passing HCR 291. It was a basically a safety net resolution to save the safety net bill that saved the Sunset requirements for Texas Department of Transportation and the Texas Department of Insurance. The problem is that it sets a terrifically troubling precedent by allowing major statutes to be altered at the 11th hour by a resolution. The potential impact on future legislation is little short of monumental. Similarly, there are concerns that it could have severe consequences about the role of the Legislative Budget Board, and gives them too much power over the spending of federal stimulus dollars. The HCR was what got Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston, calling the issue about "the integrity of the House … When you violate the rules, the bite is always the same."

Shhhhhh, don’t look now but the Texas Rangers are actually in first place in the AL West! It sounds weird doesn’t it? Usually, anyone who follows the Rangers can count on three columns in any given year about the team’s chances. The first is about how the pitching staff still sucks and breaks down and that's why they are off to yet another “slow” start. The second usually comes around the all-star break, when the Rangers somehow manage to get their act together and threaten to make a race of the AL West, while the final column is the obituary for another season of futility. In a nutshell, it sucks cheering for a team that never spends money on pitching and who hasn’t won a pennant in almost 10 years. But even die-hard pessimists have to admit that this years the team looks like the real deal … at least so far. Slow starts and crappy pitching are as synonymous with the Texas Rangers as iPods are with music-playing devices. But this year not only did the Rangers come out of the gate fast, but thanks to the resurgence of Kevin Millwood and a frisky group of young pitchers, not only has the pitching improved, it’s kept the team in a lot games when their bats were cold. In the past the Rangers have been about offense – offense and more offense – but ironically enough with Josh Hamilton missing a good portion of the season and the offense sputtering, it’s been the pitching staff that has held the team together.

In this edition of Off the Record's 33 RPM, we’ll send off D-Madness in style, roam the Flatladers' Hills and Valleys, and check in with Hayes Carll for his third annual Stingaree Music Festival.[audio-1]

When it comes to the Texas Legislature, more than policy nuance, more than floor politics, more than gossip and the fate of bills, the one question asked most often is, "So is there really a band made of legislators?" Yes, there is. And it's called the Bad Precedents. As the 81st Legislature comes to an end, here's a little insight into the official State House band. [video-1]

In anticipation of Goran Bregovic & His Wedding and Funeral Orchestra's June 17 show at the Bass Concert Hall, Austin Public Library will be screening five films that have been scored by the Balkan composer, including 1994's Arizona Dream. We haven't seen it in years, but we remember rather loving Emir Kusturica's trippy little comedy, which stars Johnny Depp, Vincent Gallo, Lili Taylor, Faye Dunaway, and Jerry Lee Lewis. The clip below, which combines context-free scenes from the film with Bregovic's "This Is a Film," gives you a pretty good indicator of the film's many surreal charms. That's Iggy Pop, by the way, sounding off about a man and a fish. The film series kicks off tonight at 6pm at APL's Manchaca Road Branch with Time of the Gypsies. Go here for more on the series. Note: The films take place at different branches every week, but all screenings are free.