{"id":4859,"date":"2014-02-25T14:15:59","date_gmt":"2014-02-25T14:15:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/highplainsblogger.wordpress.com\/?p=4859"},"modified":"2014-02-25T14:15:59","modified_gmt":"2014-02-25T14:15:59","slug":"texas-ag-candidates-misrepresent-their-role","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=4859","title":{"rendered":"Texas AG candidates misrepresent their role"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Texas has a long history of tough-talking macho men running for state attorney general.<\/p>\n

They make all kinds of vows: to crack down on border security, to be tough on crime, to fight the federal government. <\/p>\n

That’s all fine, except that the office requires little of what they individuals are trying to sell.<\/p>\n

This year’s Republican primary for attorney general is no different. It’s getting tiresome, to be honest, listening to these individuals try out to out-tough each other.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com\/2014\/02\/republican-candidates-for-texas-ag-prepare-for-dash-to-finish-line.html\/<\/p>\n

The attorney general essentially is the state’s in-house lawyer. He or she represents the state primarily in civil matters. Crime-fighting? They leave that job to the district attorneys elected to serve the state’s 254 counties. <\/p>\n

The closest the AG comes to fighting crime is chasing down dead-beat parents who are delinquent on their child-support payments.<\/p>\n

Barry Smitherman touts his experience as a prosecutor; Ken Paxton boasts that he has tea party U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz’s support; Dan Branch declares his devotion to the sanctity of human life. They’re all spending a lot of money to promote themselves.<\/p>\n

None of it matters as much as how well they’ll perform as a civil litigator representing Texas.<\/p>\n

Sigh.<\/em><\/p>\n

My favorite attorney general candidate of all time, though, was the late Democrat Jim Mattox, who used to brag about how tough he was crime and how he loved a good political battle.<\/p>\n

The late great liberal newspaper columnist Molly Ivins once said of Mattox that if he spotted an ice cream stand and a crowd of folks fighting on opposites sides of a street, he’d go for the fight.<\/p>\n

Did that make him a good attorney general? No. It did make for a good punch line.<\/p>\n

Mattox’s political descendants — who represent the other party — nonetheless are following his lead in their quest for the office he once held.<\/p>\n\n

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Texas has a long history of tough-talking macho men running for state attorney general. They make all kinds of vows: to crack down on border security, to be tough on crime, to fight the federal government. That’s all fine, except that the office requires little of what they individuals are trying to sell. This year’s … Continue reading Texas AG candidates misrepresent their role<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[550,1252,2481,2652,3113,4537,4585],"class_list":["post-4859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-barry-smitherman","tag-dan-branch","tag-jim-mattox","tag-ken-paxton","tag-molly-ivins","tag-ted-cruz","tag-texas-attorney-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4859"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4859\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}