Tag Archives: Texas politics

State news

Not so funny, eh?

Whoever photo-shopped this picture perhaps thought he or she was cracking wise.

In fact, it ain’t funny.

The Texas Legislature and the state’s governor, Greg Abbott, are turning the state into the butt of jokes that won’t make many of us laugh out loud.

The state has enacted three laws that took effect at the start of the month that give me the heebie-jeebies.

One of them is the so-called “constitutional carry law” that allows any Texas resident — with some exceptions — to pack heat openly without ever having to be tested to determine if they know how to handle a firearm. They can’t be convicted felons, or convicted of domestic abuse or be a dishonorably discharged military veteran. But … still.

Another of them sets strict voting restrictions aimed primarily at voters who live in heavily Democratic communities. It bans drive-in balloting, restricts vote by mail and gives partisan poll watchers more power to snoop at what voters are doing at polling places.

Then we have this law that effectively makes abortion illegal in Texas. It says women cannot terminate a pregnancy earlier than six weeks … when most women don’t even know they’re pregnant!

I suppose I should note that these laws are being driven by Texas Republican pols.

A couple we know well once moved out of Texas and settled in Virginia. Part of the reason they made the move — and this was years ago — was because of the wacky political climate that was developing in this state. The husband half of this couple, a retired journalist, told me bluntly that the state was going bonkers and he couldn’t stand to be anywhere near the state where he came of age as a young man. This couple was ahead of their time.

Accordingly, I get asked now and then, “Why do you live in that state?” Well, we live here because we came to Texas more than 37 years ago because I wanted to pursue my career as a print journalist. We are staying here because we love watching our granddaughter grow up.

As for the politics, I am going to compartmentalize all these political matters. I pledge to not let them get me down. It’ll be a tough task, but we do have a good life here … even if the politicians who write these laws are trying mightily to pi** me off.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

State news

Can it be, that Texas is state to watch on Election Night?

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

When someone as experienced — or “grizzled” as some might suggest — a politics watcher as Dan Balz speaks to matters political, I am inclined to heed his wisdom.

So … the venerable Washington Post political analyst has said that Texas might emerge as the nation’s most intriguing state during this Election Season.

How so? How can this once boring Republican bastion become such a hot spot for political pundits around the world? How can Texas possibly hold the key to whomever gets elected president of the United States next month?

Balz says we got a glimpse into a possible near future with Democrat Beto O’Rourke’s near-victory over GOP U.S. Sen. Ted “The Cruz Missile” Cruz in 2018. Balz figures O’Rourke’s close finish is harbinger of things to come. One of those “things” might be the reemergence of the Democratic Party in a state that has been locked in a GOP vise-grip for the past three decades.

The state’s changing demographics have nearly everything to do with it, Balz figures. Texas is becoming increasingly Latino. Indeed, the Latino population is on track to become the largest ethnic group in the state. Latino voters, therefore, might be inclined to vote more Democratic than, say, Texas Anglos.

I will this offer this no-brainer prediction: If Joe Biden manages to pick off Texas’s 38 electoral votes next month — which few pundits predict will occur — there is no way on God’s Earth that Donald Trump can win re-election.

Indeed, Biden is running neck and neck with Trump in this state, which in itself is a sign of big time change in Texas.

As Balz wrote in a column published in the Houston Chronicle: Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University, said Trump “catalyzed” the demographic changes that already were at work. “If we say what explains why Texas has become much more competitive in 2018 and 2020, it’s Donald Trump’s presence in the White House. He is a drag on the Republican Party.”

The intrigue with Texas, though, stretches down the ballot, where Democrats might pilfer more offices held traditionally by Republicans. So, as Dan Balz notes, stay tuned for these ballots to be counted. There well could be a surprise or two to be revealed.

political news, Sports news

Stop speaking for me, Lt. Gov. Patrick!

2 Comments

I should have written this note to Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick long ago. OK, I’m late with it, but I’ve got to get something off my chest.

Here goes:

Dan — I’ll call you Dan, OK? — I wish you wouldn’t purport to speak for me. Your TV ads keep saying “Democrats” want to do this and that. The implication is that Democrats all think as one. They’re all lemmings. Sheep. Mindless robots.

Let me stipulate something right off the top. I consider myself a liberal. I align with the Democratic Party. I am inclined to vote for more Democrats than Republicans when I vote on Tuesday. However, I do split my ticket and I’ve found a few Republicans on the ballot worthy of my electoral support.

However, not all Democrats support the things you say they do.

Open borders? Nope. Sanctuary cities? This one’s tougher, but “no” on that one, too. Granting undocumented immigrants the right to vote? C’mon, man … knock it off!

And I do not want to “turn Texas into California.” I moved to Texas for a reason back in 1984. I came here to take a job as an opinion journalist in Beaumont. I like Texas just fine. I like the people. I like the diversity. I like the lay of the vast land. I like not having to pay a state income tax. That was 34 years ago, Dan.

I am not crazy about the political climate here, but then again, my life isn’t centered on politics. There’s more to living than worrying about politicians. I choose not to be consumed 24/7 by the whims of political leaders.

If I wanted to “turn Texas into California,” Dan, I would move to California. Just so you know, I happen to like California, too. I am sure you’ve been there. The state has a lot to offer. Tall trees and mountains, pretty beaches, sandy deserts, great skiing, glitz and glamor.

And San Francisco, Dan, is arguably the most beautiful city on Earth.

But for crying out loud, dude, stop trying to put words in my mouth! Stop purporting to speak for me. You and others of your political ilk don’t know what you’re talking about.

Well … Now, I feel a lot better.

I intend to vote Tuesday with a clear head and clearer conscience and I am hoping it all turns out the way I want it to turn out.

Have a great day, Dan.

2016 election, national news, political news

Senate races decided by differing factors

As I watch the Beto O’Rourke-Ted Cruz race for the U.S. Senate from Texas, I am struck by what is missing in the debate over who Texans should elect.

I am not hearing much chatter on which of these men will do more for Texas.

Will it be Beto O’Rourke, the Democratic congressman from El Paso, or Ted Cruz, the Republican incumbent from Houston? Which of them will work tirelessly on behalf of Texans’ specific needs, wants and desires?

Am I missing something here?

There once was a day when U.S. senatorial clout mattered to the home folks. I want to cite an example from my home state of Oregon.

For years, Oregon was represented by two moderate Republicans: Mark Hatfield and Bob Packwood. They were joined at the hip on many issues. They were linked to each other so closely that we in the media used to refer them as “Sen. Hatwood” or Sen. “Packfield.”

They both attained influential committee chairmanships beginning in 1981 when the GOP took control of the upper congressional chamber after Ronald Reagan’s landslide victory in the 1980 presidential election.

Hatfield and Packwood worked diligently to protect Oregon and Pacific Northwest interests.

Along the way, Sen. Packwood ran into ethical trouble relating to the way he treated women who worked on his staff; Packwood ended up resigning his seat. Sen. Hatfield remained the Boy Scout.

As we look at the current day, in Texas, I don’t hear the kind of chatter about Sen. Cruz or, how well he works with Sen. John Cornyn, the state’s senior U.S. senator. My sense is that the two Texans have a bit of a frosty relationship.

Cruz’s tenure in the Senate seems to have centered on his own future. He ran for president in 2016 and was among the final GOP primary candidates to hang in against the party’s nominee before bowing out.

Cruz’s theme so far appears aimed at ginning up GOP interest to counteract rage from the other side. According to the Texas Tribune: “The biggest challenge I have in this race … is complacency,” Cruz said. “People say all the time, ‘Oh, come on, it’s a Texas re-elect. How could you possibly lose?’ Well, in an ordinary cycle, that might be true. But this is not an ordinary cycle. The far left is filled with anger and rage and we underestimate that anger at our peril.”

O’Rourke has closed a once-gaping deficit to make it a race. I’ll stipulate once again that I am pulling for O’Rourke to defeat Cruz.

I’m just waiting to hear from the challenger — or from the incumbent, for that matter — what they’ll do to help Texans.

political news, State news

Texas on the way to turning purple?

If you live long enough you get to see lots of trends and transitions.

Politically, that’s the case for those of us who’ve spent a substantial amount of time in Texas, a state that once was “blue” before Democrats got tagged with that color label. Then it turned “red” — bigly, if you will.

I arrived in the Golden Triangle in the spring of 1984 to take up my post on the editorial page of the Beaumont Enterprise. The Triangle was among the last “Yellow Dog Democrat” bastions in Texas. That designation ID’d those who’d rather for a “yellow dog” than vote for a Republican. Its strong union movement voting bloc, along with its hefty African-American population, stayed true to their Democratic roots.

Then it began to change. Slowly, but inexorably, right along with the rest of the state.

Over time, Republicans captured long-held Democratic public offices.

These days, the state is about as Republican as any in the nation. The GOP occupies every statewide office. The last Democrat to win a statewide race was in 1998. That’s two decades, man!

Decades later, the state might on the verge of entering another transition stage.

Don’t misconstrue my reasons for welcoming the change. My major reason for rooting for a resurgent Democratic Party is my desire to keep the other major party, the GOP, more accountable for the decisions its officeholders make.

Believe this or not — and you are entitled to disbelieve it if you wish — but I was leery of total Democratic control upon my arrival in Texas. I felt that Democratic pols took voters for granted, much like Republicans do today. And I said so at the time using my forum at the Enterprise.

Are we going to see a sweep of all statewide offices on the ballot in 2018? Hardly. My strong sense is that Republicans will maintain their vise grip on most of the state offices being contested. You know already that I want one of those GOP seats to flip: the U.S. Senate seat now occupied by the Cruz Missile, Ted Cruz, who is running against El Paso Democratic Congressman Beto O’Rourke; I’ll likely have much more on that contest later.

There might be a more competitive climate up and down the ballot as well. Democrats might be able to declare some sort of moral victory if they make Republican foes squirm.

That is not a bad thing for the general well-being of a state’s general political health.

My hope, thus, for a more “purple” hue does spring eternal.

political news

No need to vote today … woo hoo!

Texans are voting today. Big deal, yes? Well, yeah, it is!

I won’t be among them.

Today is Election Runoff Day in Texas. Democrats are going to nominate someone to run against Republican Gov. Greg Abbott this fall: It’ll be either Andrew White (son of the late former Gov. Mark White) or Lupe Valdez (the former Dallas County sheriff).

Here’s the deal: I didn’t vote in the Democratic primary in March. Given that I am registered to vote — for now — in Randall County, I chose to vote in the Republican primary. Randall County is the unofficial capital of Texas Republicanism.

It was important for me to cast my vote for a key Texas legislative race, the contest for Senate Texas Senate District 31. I am happy with the result, which is that state Sen. Kel Seliger of Amarillo won the GOP nomination without a runoff against two primary opponents.

The runoff is important. I know that it’s critical for candidates who must run a second time for their party’s nomination to get the vote out. Texans don’t vote in huge numbers anyway in these primary races; the numbers plummet even more for runoffs.

That’s to our state’s voters’ shame.

We vote often in Texas. Our state constitution gives us plenty of chances to exercise our rights as U.S. citizens, as Texans. We need to do better at performing that duty.

Having said all that for the umpteenth time, I am glad to be sitting this one out.

My plea to the rest of you? Get out and vote! It’s important, man! Really! It is!

local news, political news, State news

Sen. Seliger gets needed challenge

I used to drive former state Rep. David Swinford borderline batty with my occasional columns about the need for incumbents to get challenged at every election cycle.

My argument always has been that political incumbents at every level need to defend their record against legitimate challengers to their incumbency. The Dumas (Texas) Republican legislator understood that argument … but he still would express some mild (and good-natured) displeasure at my stating it.

One of Swinford’s colleagues — Republican state Sen. Kel Seliger of Amarillo — is getting a serious challenge again this coming year. Regular readers of this blog know that I want Seliger to win his party’s nomination, which is tantamount to election in the GOP-friendly Texas Panhandle.

But he’s going to have to work for it. Which I consider to be good (a) for the incumbent and (b) for the cause of good government.

Former Midland Mayor Mike Canon is stepping up once more to challenge Seliger. The two of them faced off in 2014. The race was close, but Seliger emerged victorious. This year, Amarillo business owner Victor Leal has joined the Republican primary lineup.

The quality of Leal’s candidacy remains to be seen. Canon’s approach four years ago was to talk in TEA Party clichés, talking points and platitudes. He still garnered a lot of votes.

That’s all OK, though.

Seliger has served the sprawling Texas Senate District 31 he has represented since 2004 quite well, in my estimation. That doesn’t mean he should get a free pass.

Representative democracy demands a stout challenge when the opportunity presents itself. It’s doing so in this legislative contest.

Whoever emerges victorious in this primary fight — and I do hope it’s Seliger — figures to be tempered by the difficult campaign he will have endured. That’s good for state government.

local news, political news, State news

O’Rourke trying to make a fight of it for U.S. Senate

I am going to give credit to a young member of Congress who wants to upgrade his status as a public official.

Beto O’Rourke is a Democratic congressman from El Paso. He’s running for the U.S. Senate seat occupied by Republican Ted Cruz.

What deserves a word of praise is that O’Rourke is coming here, to Amarillo, the unofficial “capital city” of the most Republican region of one of the nation’s most Republican states.

He’s scheduling a meet-and-greet this coming Saturday at Abuelo’s Restaurant. He’s going to shake a few hands, get his picture taken with individuals, perhaps answer some questions from those coming to meet the young man.

OK, I get that the election is more than a year away. O’Rourke might not even win his party’s primary next spring; another young up-and-comer, U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro of San Antonio is thinking about challenging Cruz.

That’s a decision to be made by others.

But I’m struck by the idea that a Democrat would come here. I understand this isn’t the first time O’Rourke has ventured this far north since announcing his candidacy. I’ve long lamented the idea that Democratic candidates have given up on the Panhandle while Republican candidates take this region for granted.

This ain’t necessarily a battleground region within Texas, if you get my drift.

Am I going to assert that some back-slapping at a popular eatery in Amarillo is going to turn this region into a critical front in the fight for political supremacy? Oh, no.

I do have to give Rep. O’Rourke some props, though, for spending some time among Panhandle partisans. Just maybe we can restore some competitiveness to these statewide races.

There once was a time, as the late U.S. Sen. Lloyd Bentsen used to say, that “politics in Texas is a contact sport.” It hasn’t been that way for more than two decades, since the last time a Democrat was elected to a statewide office here.

I am left to wonder — indeed, hope — that Beto O’Rourke is ready to return some of the rough-and-tumble to Texas politics.

political news, State news

Partisan labels ought to go

1 Comment

democrat_republican

I arrived in Texas in the spring of 1984 with my eyes open about the state’s vigorous political climate.

Perhaps I should have opened my eyes just a little bit wider so that I could see something that got past me as I studied up on the way things would be done in my new home state.

I knew that Texans like to elect people to public office. We have more elected offices than I’d ever seen, for instance, at the county level.

What I didn’t quite grasp, though, were the partisan labels that we attach to all the candidates. Perhaps most fascinating is how we elect judges in this state — as Republicans or Democrats.

My new Texas home would be — for my first 11 years in this state — in Beaumont, where Democrats ruled. Indeed, the entire state was still controlled by Democrats, who held most of the elective office statewide.

What I couldn’t quite grasp, though, is why we elect choose Democrats and Republicans among candidates seeking public office.

I’m left now, 32 years later, to keep asking: Can someone identify for me the difference between a Democratic and a Republican tax assessor-collector, or county clerk, or district clerk, or treasurer? For that matter, does a sheriff or district attorney arrest and prosecute criminal suspects differently if they’re Democrat or Republican?

I posed these questions once in a column I wrote for the Amarillo Globe-News. I got an interesting response from a county elected official — a loyal Republican, naturally — who agreed with me. She couldn’t fathom the difference, either, between how individuals of one party would do the job she took an oath to do any differently from individuals of another party.

Judgeships have proved to be the most troublesome.

In the early to mid-1980s, solid Republican were getting booted out of office or were losing elections simply because they were of the wrong party. It was wrong then, just as it is wrong now to see more qualified Democratic candidates losing to Republicans for precisely the same reason.

I don’t intend — yet — to make this a major issue for this blog. I just feel inclined to suggest that a change to a more reasonable and logical election system would serve the state better than the system we have now.

State legislators, governors and other statewide officeholders — except judges — surely can make the case that partisan differences exist. I’m fine with that.

Judges? That’s another matter.

I’ve all but given up arguing for a retention system in which judges are appointed and then stand for retention at the ballot box. At this point, I’d settle for a change in the way we elect judges, simply by having them run on their judicial philosophy rather than on whether they belong to a certain political party.

How would we change all that? Through a constitutional amendment, which requires a vote of all Texans — and which is equally cumbersome, antiquated and nonsensical.

That, though, is a subject for another day.

 

State news

End of a Texas era is about to end

One of my favorite Texas political observers, pundits, commentators and thinkers is about to call it a career.

Paul Burka is retiring in March from Texas Monthly after a 40-year career commenting on Texas politics, government and public policy.

I haven’t met Burka, but I hope to shake his hand one day before one of us checks out. I’ve read his work extensively over the 30-plus years I’ve lived and worked in Texas. He brings considerable heft to any political discussion.

http://www.texasmonthly.com/burka-blog/last-forty-years-and-future

He includes a lengthy email sent to Texas Monthly staffers from editor Brian Sweany.

Sweany notes in his email the many contributions Burka made to the magazine, including one of my favorite essays, the 1986 cover story about how the Chevrolet Suburban had been named the “National Car of Texas.” His best-worst list of Texas legislators has become a political staple every other year.

I enjoy including Burka’s thoughts in my own blog and I usually rely on his expertise about political matters relating to our great state.

The man knows the ropes. He has, as the saying goes in Texas, earned his spurs.

Good luck and Godspeed, Mr. Burka.