  Recent developments in the theory of amorphous plasticity point to the
central role played by the concept of an effective disorder temperature
$T_{eff}$. An athermal dynamics for $T_{eff}$ are proposed in the framework of
a deformation theory and discussed in light of the recent steady state
simulations by Haxton and Liu [Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 99}, 195701 (2007)]. The
structure of the resulting theory, its parameters and transient dynamics are
discussed and compared to available data.
