WAYNE SLATER / The Dallas Morning News
Fewer than half (45 percent) of voters say they approve of the job Texans are doing in state government. When asked whether they think Republican elected officials in the state have done well enough to deserve re-election, only 32 percent of voters said yes, while 54 percent were open to giving Democrats a chance in office.
Two quick points on this survey.
First, vague dissatisfaction will not turn the state blue, it takes leadership, good candidates, a statewide strategy and money, money, money. To win statewide races, we need to do much better in the rural voting boxes. There was a long discussion about this on another email listserv and I can honestly say nobody had an easy , quick fix for this deficit.
Second, who are our statewide ticket toppers? I deeply respect Chris Bell and David Van Os and all the rest of the great progressive candidates we fielded over the last 2 cycles, but I don't see them as the answer. Bill White? maybe, but with Kay Bailey entering the governor's race, I don't see Bill as our next governor, but I am open to persusasion. PLEASE presuade me. I am NOT the best analyst of statewide Democratic politics. I came late to the party, and have all I can do to keep up with Harris County.
I can't image Texas surviving another decade of Repub misrule. Why the extra worry now? The Business Enterprise Tax is going to fall a billion plus dollars short of its estimations. Since we know the Gov and his boyz only have one program - lower property taxes, what new gimmick will they use to pay for education?
And , there is also the matter of Texas mental institutions . Conditions there are so bad, that the Bush administration bureaucrats have censored them and called attention to the 57 deaths in these instituions over the last year.
Feds fault Texas' treatment of mentally disabled
At least 53 mentally disabled patients in Texas' large residential facilities died in the last year from preventable conditions "that are often the result of lapses in care," a federal investigation revealed Tuesday.
Those deaths, which accounted for nearly half of all patient deaths, were detailed in a Department of Justice letter sent to Gov. Rick Perry. The report concluded that the Texas facilities violate residents' rights and called the number of injuries to patients "disturbingly high."
The facilities, known as state schools, fail to provide adequate mental health services or treat patients in integrated community settings, according to the 62-page letter. It also detailed investigations into abuse and mistreatment, including an alleged rape of a 17-year-old female by a staff membe
If our Repub leaders can't be convinced to fund schools, how will they ever be convinced to reform the broken mental health system?
I have no illusions that even a Democratic capture of the legislature and the governorship would solve these problems, but at least we could honestly and directly talk about them and stop offering fantasy solutions that just mask or made the problems worse.
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