Judging by this, Lone Star state Republicans may have much to fear in the future.
I’ve made plenty of fun of Texas and that breed of Texan that keeps electing crooks and nitwits like Tom DeLay and Junior-clone Rick Perry against their own best interests, but it seems things have gotten bad enough down there that even Houston, the nexus of Bush Oil Country, has elected a lesbian Democrat, former City Controller Annise Parker, as Mayor rather than face a corrupt and/or dumb Republican. (Albeit that Houston has been trending Dem for some years and the last mayor was a Democrat.) Although Parker has some past ties to the energy industry, her most recent non-political gig was running a bookstore and she is regarded as fairly liberal, at least by Texas standards.
It’s no secret the GOP has raped the state from one end to the other, giving massive tax breaks to the wealthy and corporations while cutting social safety-net programs to the bone, eviscerating the educational system, and putting workers at the mercy of employers it was the neocon corporatist blueprint for what King Junior tried to do in Washington, but didn’t quite succeed at entirely. Now that the economy has gone all to hell, fed-up Texans are worse off than most of the nation, and they have no one to blame but the laissez-faire policies of the Republican Party.
Sure, the voting machines have been rigged and districts redrawn to keep the GOP in perpetual power, but even that may not be enough to underwrite the Republican Party’s future in Texas.
The Tattler’s prediction: Within ten years all the major state offices will be held by Democrats, as well as the two US Senate seats. Texas was, at one time, a populist state; I think it will be returning to those roots who knows, maybe the great Jim Hightower will end up in office again, if he can stomach campaigning again.
Houston biggest US city to elect openly gay mayor
Monica Rhor, AP Writer
December 13, 2009HOUSTON Houston became the largest U.S. city to elect an openly gay mayor, with voters handing a solid victory to City Controller Annise Parker after a hotly contested runoff. […]
Parker, 53, has never made a secret or an issue of her sexual orientation. But it became the focus of the race after anti-gay activists and conservative religious groups endorsed Locke and sent out mailers condemning Parker’s “homosexual behavior.”
Read the rest here.
“Anti-gay activists and conservative religious groups” couldn’t defeat an openly gay woman in TEXAS?! Oh, yes, the doom come soon for the GOP.
2009 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org
I have never understood Texas and Texas attitude. I have friends who love Hank Hill and say, “I love King of the Hill because that’s just what people are like in Texas.” I tell them, “If that’s what they’re like I want nothing to do with them.” I have never found arrogance, ignorance and pride in having both, attractive in any sense. Reminds me of one too many relatives, only worse.
Visited Dallas in the 80s. If I ever decided to worship at the altar of $$$$ then I might reconsider my own attitudes. I’ve heard Austin is nice and progressive, but this from Texas and proud of it blather reminds me of those in NYC who feel it’s “THE City;” and everywhere else is Hicks-ville. They are the most ignorant people I’ve ever met, and I have lived in the South for over 30 years. That’s really bad.
There are nice people and a-holes everywhere.