http://amarillo.com/opinion/editorial/2012-11-08/editorial-ted-cruz-cant-cruise-washington

U.S. Sen.-elect Ted Cruz will hit the ground with both feet in full sprint when the next Congress convenes.

The soon-to-be-newly minted Texas Republican lawmaker is a darling the tea party, the GOP’s informal wing that had its head handed to it in the just-completed election. Tea party favorites Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock got trounced in Missouri and Indiana, respectively, as they sought to take their places in the U.S. Senate. U.S. Rep. Allen West of Florida got bounced out of office after one term by a Democratic challenger.

But while the tea party floundered elsewhere, it is alive and kicking its way across Texas. Ted Cruz’s easy win over Democratic former state Rep. Paul Sadler drives home the point about the tea party’s strength here.

I’m troubled by the signal it sends. There once was a day when Texas Democrats and Republicans worked together for the entire state. The state’s congressional delegation was known for its inter-party collegiality. That was when Rs and Ds met regularly to discuss ways to advance legislation favorable to Texas. That doesn’t happen these days.

Indeed, Democrats and Republicans spend little time talking to each other. They’ve gotten eaten up by their desire to disrespect the other side. Oh, for old days.

I love telling the story told to me years ago by former U.S. Rep. Larry Combest, who used to be my congressman when he represented Randall County in the House. Combest once worked on the staff of another fiery Republican senator, John Tower. Combest told me once how Tower would argue vehemently with Sen. Hubert Humphrey, D-Minn., an equally fiery liberal. The two men would argue on the Senate floor. They would gesture wildly, trying to one-up each other with rhetorical flourish. Then, when it was all over, they would walk to the middle of the Senate chamber, shake hands, laugh and then walk out arm in arm.

Those were the days when politics didn’t get in the way of politicians’ mutual respect.

I’m trying to imagine Sen. Ted Cruz doing the same thing with, say, Sen. Al Franken.

The Texas Board of Education is going to be loaded with seven new faces when it convenes next year.

One of them will represent District 15, which comprises a huge swath of West Texas, including the Panhandle. His name is Marty Rowley, who – although I don’t know him well – I consider to be a good man.

But there might be some alarms worth heeding as Rowley and other new SBOE members take their seats. It involves mixing religion with public education.

Rowley brings a unique perspective to the 15-member board. He is a lawyer who specializes in mediation. He also is a clergyman who served briefly as pastor of a huge evangelical church in Amarillo. Rowley is a man of deep religious faith, and it is his background in the pulpit that ought to concern those who frustrated with the head-butting that’s occurred on the board between the so-called “social conservative” wing of the SBOE with the more moderate wing.

Count me as one of those who is concerned about the ongoing ideological battle.

The man Rowley is replacing, fellow Republican Bob Craig of Lubbock, belonged to the moderate wing of the SBOE. Over the years, Craig expressed at times his own concern that religious-based ideology was dominating public education policy. Craig, a lawyer, decided to step down this year. My guess is that he’s had enough fun in public life.

The SBOE is charged with setting curriculum policy for public education in Texas. But as the two sides have dickered – and bickered – over curriculum, ideological differences too often have gotten in the way of what all board members insist is their first priority, which is to educate the state’s 5 million public education students.

My hope is that Rowley avoids the ideological fight and serves as a moderate voice. He is, after all, a mediator.

Conservatives are angry at losing the 2012 presidential election to Barack Obama, a man they thought was dead meat. The economy was his albatross and they knew – simply knew – he could be had. They nominated a successful businessman in Mitt Romney. The White House was theirs for the taking.

Then came this storm called Sandy. It pounded New Jersey and New York mercilessly a week before Election Day. The New Jersey governor, a fiery Republican named Chris Christie, stood under a cold, gray sky and heaped praise on a Democratic president for doing his job as the nation’s elected leader. President Obama went to the Jersey Shore, examined the damage, hugged grief-stricken residents, offered them comfort and consolation and said his administration would do all it could to make the region whole after Sandy brought its wrath.

Christie recognized that and said so publicly … time and again.

But now the right-wingers – his fellow Republicans – are angry at Christie for speaking so effusively in praise of the president they loathe. Some chatter is emerging from the Republican wreckage that Christie might be the tea party’s next target when he stands for re-election. They want that turncoat out of there. Why? Apparently for giving the president too much credit for the swift response he exhibited in the face of the killer storm. It reminds me a bit of the fate that fell on former Republican Florida Gov. Charlie Crist who had the audacity to hug the president. The embrace enraged tea party Rs so much he lost the 2010 GOP primary for the U.S. Senate to Marco Rubio. Crist left the party and ran for the Senate as an independent; he lost eventually to Rubio.

Crist eventually endorsed Obama for re-election.

I see a pattern developing here. Chris Christie might become a metaphor for what ails the Republican Party as it seeks to reclaim the White House. A party that won’t tolerate an elected official praising another elected official – irrespective of party – may be in more trouble than it is willing to recognize.

This is what some of us would call blind rage.

A startling set of numbers coming off the 2012 election results is jumping out at me.

It’s the total vote turnout for the two major presidential candidates.

With 99 percent of the vote counted, President Obama and Mitt Romney collected not quite 118 million votes between them this time around. Four years ago, then-Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain gathered slightly more than 128 million votes.

Turnout four years ago was 58.2 percent of registered voters, which was pretty good, but down from the more than 60 percent turnout in 2004, when President George W. Bush won re-election over Sen. John Kerry.

What is the turnout this time? That’s to be determined when every single ballot is counted. But a decline of 11 million ballots, give or take a few thousand, from the previous four years – along with the increase in individuals registered to vote in that same time span – suggests a serious decline in voter interest in what both sides kept claiming was “the most important election of our lifetime.”

I’ll be anxious to learn what kept so many Americans away from the polls.

Any ideas?

What a night. Everyone “in the know” seemed to think Americans were in for an all-nighter, waiting for the returns to determine who would win the presidency.

Turns out the experts had it wrong. President Obama’s re-election came in shortly after 10 p.m. Central time. Bingo. Done.

Mitt Romney gave his concession speech and offered to work to bridge the divide that splits Democrats and Republicans. Barack Obama reciprocated, offering to meet with Romney to seek common ground.

Will this be the result of the amazingly divided outcome? Let us hope so.

But at least two key points need to be made before we start looking too far into the future.

* Obama’s re-election doesn’t constitute a “mandate.” He is leading, with almost all the votes counted, with a little more than 50 percent of the popular vote. Romney’s 48 percent of the total isn’t chump change. The split still suggests an extremely divided country. George W. Bush declared after his re-election that he intended to spend his “political capital” earned. W’s re-election margin was about the same as Obama’s, meaning that he to find a magnanimous streak while governing. Obama needs to do more to reach out to Republicans who, for their part, need to set aside their anger at Obama. They failed in their mission to “make Barack Obama a one-term mission.” Get over it, GOP.

* The House is more Republican than before. The Senate’s Democratic majority is stronger than before. The Congress itself is divided. One commentator said this morning that now is the time for Obama to summon House Speaker John Boehner, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to the White House; he should set them down and lay out Priority No. 1, which is to start producing results for the country.

Those of us who are pleased with the outcome need not crow over beating the other guys. And the other guys need not spend a solitary minute looking for recriminations. The country has been through a contentious, occasionally bitter, presidential campaign.

It’s over. And as it has been said many times, the nation endures.

Time to get back to work.

A friend told me this morning his son is voting today for the first time in his life.

“He’s really pumped,” my friend said.

His son turned 18 a week ago. He is dialed in to public affairs, according to his parents. I don’t know the young man; only know his mother and father. Mom and Dad both work in the public sector in Amarillo, so it ought to stand to reason that their son would be aware of civics, government, and the many issues of deep public concern.

But it’s exciting to hear that a young, first-time voter is anxious to cast his first ballot for candidates seeking his vote. There will be millions more just like him around the country, young folks coming of voting age just as Election Day rolls around. They’ll be excited, anxious, maybe even a bit nervous. In Texas, we have these electronic ballots that can be a little intimidating when you put your hands on the machinery for the first time. My advice to the young man who’s about to cast his first vote: Take your time.

My hope for the young man is that he never loses his enthusiasm for voting. Over time, the candidates will disappoint him. I just hope the electoral process remains exciting. I want him to keep studying the issues as I’m told he’s been doing while getting ready for this big moment in his life.

Stay pumped, young man.

Well, it’s almost all said and done. Two men have taken their case to the country, although they’ve delivered it in person to a mere fraction of it.

Residents in about 10 states have seen more of President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney than many of them have cared to see. These are the residents of those so-called “battleground states.” Texas isn’t one of them. We haven’t been graced much by the presence of either man. Democrats don’t care for a state that votes so heavily Republican and, well, Republicans just take Texas for granted.

What will happen Tuesday? Will Obama win re-election or will Romney score an upset?

Every major pollster in the country seems now to be saying the same thing: It’ll be Obama by a whisker. I am believing what they’re saying.

I’ll venture this guess, though. The Electoral College victory won’t be all that close. I think the president will win with 303 electoral votes, down a good bit by the 365 electoral votes he won in 2008. Popular vote? I’m guessing it’ll be around a 1.5 percent Obama victory, making it a clean win, with no popular vote/electoral vote split, a la 2000 and Bush v. Gore.

Joe Scarborough made a curious observation this morning on his “Morning Joe” talk show on MSNBC. He thinks a Romney upset is quite possible. Scarborough – a former congressman – is a loyal Republican and I’ll concede his wishful thinking. I won’t concede what he said today about “no one seeing the Reagan revolution” coming in 1980. The folks who did see it coming worked within President Carter’s re-election campaign. Carter’s team knew by the weekend before the ‘80 election that the president was toast. The undecided voting bloc broke decisively for Ronald Reagan at the end, giving him a big victory. The Carter people broke the news to their guy three days before the votes were counted.

Is a similar result possible Tuesday? I don’t think so. Polling is a lot better these days. There are many more polls. All of them taken together say the same thing: Obama in a squeaker.

Let’s hold on, though, for a long night.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-57544861/is-the-u.s-senate-broken/?tag=AverageMixRelated

The U.S. Senate is broken. Shattered into a million pieces. The one-time World’s Greatest Deliberative Body is now home to the world’s most annoying political logjam.

But that’s not the bad news, according to CBS News “60 Minutes.” Nearly all the 22 incumbents up for re-election this year are favored to win another term.’

The dysfunction will continue.

“60 Minutes” conducted an interview Sunday with U.S. Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Mitch McConnell, R-Ky, the body’s majority and minority leaders respectively. They call themselves “friends,” but they act like they despise each other.

Oh, for the days when Republicans and Democrats would reach across to each other, to work out deals in back rooms and then announce their compromises in public. Legislation got passed, the country moved forward.

Reid took note of the more than 200 filibusters he has battled from the Republican minority during his time as majority leader. He said the late Lyndon Johnson, the one-time Democratic leader in the Senate, had to deal with exactly one filibuster during his time as leader. He implied his “friend” McConnell is responsible for the obstruction.

The interview with these two men suggests that nothing will get done in this political climate, no matter who wins the White House on Tuesday. If voters re-elect President Obama, which is looking more likely as the hours tick down, Republicans will be madder than ever that they couldn’t defeat a president still struggling to correct the nation’s economic course. And if Mitt Romney wins the election, imagine the fury Democrats will exact on his administration as he tries to get legislation enacted.

Yep, the system is broken. I’m beginning to like Sen. Tom Coburn’s remedy, which he expresses in the “60 Minutes” broadcast. Throw every one of the senators up for re-election out of office and start over with new faces.

Of course, it’s easy for him to say. You see, Sen. Coburn – an Oklahoma Republican – isn’t up for re-election this time around.

http://amarillo.com/opinion/letters-editor/2012-11-01/letter-its-time-columist-gene-lyons-be-caged

The letter to the editor contained in this link reminds me of the battles I fought for years with newspaper readers who imply they don’t want to read opinions that disagree with their own.

I remember getting a letter from a gentleman in Perryton. He just couldn’t stomach reading “liberal” commentary on the page I edited. He only wanted to read conservative views, espousing – much as the gentleman in the link attached to this blog post has done – the view that this is a conservative region and thus, the newspaper should cater to the region’s prevailing political viewpoint.

What the Perryton resident didn’t quite get is that the world contains a wide-range of opinions, bias, philosophy and perspectives. The intent of a newspaper opinion page should be to present as wide a range of views as possible. Why not expose conservatives to liberal points of view or liberals to conservative points of view?

No one’s mind is going to change. Offering a varied smorgasbord of ideas, though, does provide validation – if nothing else – to whatever view the reader already holds.

I have lost count of the times I’ve heard from individuals complaining about having to read viewpoints that run counter to their own view.

The best news of all to those folks, though, is that no one forces them to read anything.

I rather prefer to read differing ideas. Doing so can cause me to hyperventilate and that’s good for the heart. It might be good for the soul, too.

I detest straight-party voting.

You know what it is, right? It’s that place on the ballot that enables people to vote for every candidate of a particular party. One punch of the ballot and voters can walk away from the polling booth … no muss, no fuss.

It’s a profoundly lazy way to vote. Texas allows voters to cast their ballots that way. My take on it is that the Legislature needs to change the law.

I want to stipulate that my loathing of straight-party voting in Texas has nothing – well, almost nothing – to do with the state’s heavy Republican leanings. I’d hate this style of voting even if the state leaned just as heavily toward the Democratic Party. But I didn’t arrive in Texas until the spring of 1984, by which time the state’s shift from Democratic to Republican dominance was well underway.

Here’s my version of a perfect electoral world in Texas: Make voters go down the ballot, which can be lengthy, and cast their vote one race at a time. If they choose to select all candidates of one party, they are free to do so. But the generous ticket-splitters will judge each contest on the quality of the candidates seeking that particular office.

It also must be noted that Texas election law has this curious provision that enables voters to punch the straight-party spot on the ballot while allowing them to vote for individual candidates from the other party. Why allow the straight-party provision in the first place if voters have the power to override their straight-ticket choice?

Many voters in Potter and Randall counties, sadly, still like to vote for the party rather than for the candidate. And in this Republican-red region of a Republican-red state, the GOP benefits the most from this form of ballot-casting. We’ll see a good bit of it once again when the polls open next Tuesday.

Will the 2013 Legislature do the right thing and end this practice of straight-party voting? Probably not. The Texas Legislature is dominated by Republican lawmakers who are quite unlikely to cut their own party’s political throat by requiring Texans to take a moment to think before casting their vote.