I am going to say something good about a friend of mine who happens to be serving his final term as a Texas state senator.
Kel Seliger, an Amarillo Republican, has just endorsed a Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, sticking his finger in the eye of the incumbent Republican who — as has been reported many times — has earned Seliger’s scorn.
This news gives me hope that there might be more Republicans ready to toss aside the Texas Senate’s presiding officer in favor of an individual who can do a better job of working across the aisle than Patrick has been able to do.
The Democratic candidate is Mike Collier, who ran against Patrick four years ago. This past weekend, Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley, who also is not seeking re-election this year, declared he is going to support Collier over Patrick.
Hey, I don’t begrudge either of these fellows for waiting until they became lame ducks before tossing Patrick under the proverbial bus.
Seliger detests Patrick. The feeling is mutual. Seliger also detests the founders of Empower Texans, the right-wing political action committee that backs Patrick. Seliger detests Seliger because the Amarillo lawmaker hasn’t been sufficiently loyal to Patrick’s archconservative legislative agenda.
Seliger also had the bad form of uttering a snarky comment about a key Patrick aide. Patrick got his revenge by stripping Seliger of his committee chairmanships and relegating his committee assignments to back-row panels about which few of us know.
I am going to hope that Sen. Seliger — a fellow I have known since the moment I set foot on the Caprock in early 1995 — can find the time to campaign for Collier and speak from the gut about the nastiness that Dan Patrick embodies.