San Antonio, Texas
When I moved to Texas in 1984, every elected state-wide official was a Democrat. Several were notorious liberals.
When I left in 1998, every one was Republican. Until quite recently, many of these born again Republicans had been notorious liberals. Its still a solid Republican state.
I am tempted to blame myself for this predicament. After all, the rise of Texas Republicans coincides directly with my residence in the state. But more likely, this situation should be blamed on President George Bushs brilliant political advisor, Karl Rove.
I met Rove in 1988. He had just orchestrated an impressive fund-raising operation that had wrested control of the Texas Supreme Court from 150 years of Democratic control. That year George H. W. Bush had won the presidency, easily defeating a Massachusetts liberal named Michael Dukakis, despite Dukakis selection of popular Texas Democrat Lloyd Bentsen as his vice presidential running mate.
When I met him, Rove was sitting at his desk, holding back a smile as he burrowed through stacks of reports and statistics. Rove exuded confidence and focus rare among politicos. It was not exactly charisma far from it. It was more like the intensity one feels when sitting across a chessboard from an intimidating opponent.
I was then a young reporter for a major Texas newspaper with an intense curiosity about the changes Texas was experiencing. As I discussed the trends of Texas politics with Rove and other consultants and operatives, it became clear that Rove was soon to become the most powerful person in the Lone Star State. I had no idea he would become the most intimidating chess master in the United States.
Although he lost his only attempt to run a candidate nationwide (George W. Bush received 500,000 fewer votes than Al Gore, yet relied on his fathers friends to appoint him to office), Rove understands Texas better than just about anyone since Sam Houston himself.
Rove saw the ethno-racial shifts Texas is now experiencing nearly 20 years ago, when he was a low-level direct mail consultant and occasional campaign operative. Rove approached the changes with one goal: make Texas a solid majority Republican state as soon as possible by gathering as many white votes as possible and hold on to power as long as possible by chipping away at Democratic dominance within growing Latino voting blocs. Ultimately, he launched a drive to pull white people out of the Democratic Party and render it a party of blacks and Latinos.
So when Rove had the chance to drive George W. Bush a stammering three-time failure and family embarrassment who had never held a full-time job until he later assumed the presidency to the governors mansion in Austin, he did it by having the younger Bush appeal explicitly to Latino and white Democrats who were comfortable with Bushs message of practical, businesslike bipartisanship.
Bush defeated popular liberal Democrat Governor Ann Richards in 1990. As governor he worked form the centre on most issues, employing his personal charm to forge alliance with key Democrats who then controlled the legislature. As governor, Bush was the uniter he claimed to be when he ran for president in 2000. He was not very effective, but thats what Texans respect and expect from their part-time governors. As long as they do little harm, they are doing their jobs. Governor Bush won re-election easily in 1998, leading a Rove-orchestrated Republican sweep of state-wide elected offices.
Although it has produced two of the last three presidents and supported every Republican presidential candidate since 1980, Texas does not suffer from political monoculture. Conservatives occasionally split among those whose loyalties lie with the fortunes of big businesses, those for whom the Bible is the source of all values, and those whose blood runs strong with libertarian passion.
There is also a rich tradition of populist liberalism in Texas. And Texas was the site of many advances in the struggle for civil rights. The Democratic Party has strong support among Latino and Asian Texans, and almost unanimous support among African Texans. But you would not recognise such political diversity from looking at a list of its leaders or its recent political history.
Since assuming de facto control of the national Republican party, Karl Rove and Representative Tom DeLay have acted mercilessly, as if engaged in a battle for the very soul and future of their beloved Texas. They engineered a stunningly undemocratic redistricting effort in 2003. Brilliantly, DeLay instructed the Texas legislature to redraw the boundaries of the states Congressional districts, slicing up all the seats held by white Democrats. They left most African and Latino representatives in their districts, thus dodging a contentious civil rights review of the plan. They succeeded in making the Texas Congressional delegation shift from 17 Democrats to 15 Republicans. By January, Texas should have at least 20 Republicans and no more than 12 Democrats in Congress. So while Texas grows more Democratic and more diverse, its Congressional representation grows less representative.
Demographic trends only work so well. Texas Democrats have thus far been unable to fashion a message or solidify a mission. There is no Democratic Karl Rove. Texas is likely to remain in Republican control for more than another decade. After that, who knows?
Next week: The Alamo myth returns to America in a new big-budget Hollywood production. But the legends of Texas are getting increasingly far from the realities of an ethno-racially diverse state.
