Rats!

I just read in the paper this morning that James Hallmark, recently selected by the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents to be West Texas A&M’s interim president is a member of the search committee looking for a permanent WT president.

The search team will seek to replace J. Patrick O’Brien who announced his retirement effective at the end of the current academic year, which is when Hallmark takes over the helm on an interim basis.

Thus, the story said, Hallmark won’t be a candidate for the permanent post.

That would seem to shoot down a theory I posted yesterday that regents had found their WT head man when they selected Hallmark as the interim. It means Hallmark will return to WT — where he served previously as provost/vice president for academic affairs before becoming vice chancellor for the A&M System.

See earlier post here.

But let’s hold on a moment.

I’ll take you back now about 16 years to the time when a certain Texas governor was about to sew up the Republican nomination for president of the United States.

George W. Bush called on his good friend — Dallas businessman Dick Cheney, the former defense secretary in Bush 41’s administration — to look for a vice presidential running mate.

Cheney and his search team looked high and low — supposedly — for the right candidate to run with W in the fall campaign against Vice President Albert Gore Jr.

Then, by golly something weird happened.

Gov. Bush chose Cheney! They went on to win the election and, as they say, the rest is, uhh, history.

So, you see, recent precedent has been set right here in Texas.

Is Hallmark, a man perfectly suited to lead the WT campus, really and truly out of the picture as the permanent president of the Canyon school?

I’m not taking that bait … just yet.