Burnt Orange Report
News, Politics, and Fun From Deep in the Heart of Texas
|
|
Burnt Orange ReportNews, Politics, and Fun From Deep in the Heart of Texas |
|
Support the TDP!  
|
 |
August 26, 2003The Ratliff Republicans: Endangered but AliveBy Byron LaMastersSome of my more conservative readers would argue that a "Ratliff Republican" is a RINO (Republican in Name Only). But they exist. These folks are moderates and conservatives who split their ticket. Rural east Texans who vote may have previously been Democrats, but now generally vote Republican. They vote for Sen. Bill Ratliff but also support their moderate to conservative congressmen in Max Sandlin, Jim Turner and Ralph Hall. They also support similarly moderate to conservative Democratic state representatives such as Barry Telford, Chuck Hopson, Mark Homer, Jim McReynolds, Dan Ellis, etc. So what's my point? Both Democrats and Republicans in East Texas generally win because they're moderates. Ratliff has sided with Democrats in this redistricting battle, not because he is shunning the Republican Party, but because he knows that mid-decade redistricting is not only unprecidented, but that it's bad for the rural water and timber interests of his state senate district. And both the Republicans and the Democrats in his district realize that. That's why, if Bill Ratliff runs for re-election, I doubt that he'll have much trouble. Why? He sided with Democrats in redistricting in 2001, because it was the best thing for his state senate district. It cost him the chance to run for a full term as Lt. Gov, but it didn't hurt him at all in his district. Republicans went all out to defeat Bill Ratliff in the 2002 Republican Primary. They ran former state representative Jerry Yost against him who was supported by the Young Conservatives of Texas and Free PAC (yeah, the guys who unsuccessfully attacked "RINOS" in the 2002 GOP primary with gay-baiting political pornography direct mail pieces). So what happened? Ratliff beat Yost by a margin of better than two to one:
Yeah, and Democrats like Ratliff, too. He votes for his district, not for his party (just like Democratic congressmen elected in GOP districts: Max Sandlin, Jim Turner, Ralph Hall, Chet Edwards and Charlie Stenholm), so he didn't have any trouble in the general election.
My point, however, is that Republicans can complain all they want about Ratliff. But the fact is -- he's popular in his district. Most rural east Texas Republicans care more about having their Democratic or Republican state rep/state senator/congressman fight for their water rights and their timber rights and having someone that represents their rural values than they care about being represented by a lockstep suburban Republican who won't take their interests to heart. Posted by Byron LaMasters at August 26, 2003 10:18 PM | TrackBack
Comments
Ratliff Republicans - An Army of One. Posted by: don at August 27, 2003 08:35 AMThis is a good point, one that not only explains why Democrats are elected to Congress, as I and others have pointed out in the comments, but also suggests the effectiveness of redistricting to elect more Republicans. This is one of the reasons that rural districts are being combined with suburban/urban areas, but still I wonder if these conservative Democrats might not continue to be elected. I grew up in East Texas with the likes of Hall and Jim Chapman as my representatives. I think you're dead on about the popularity of moderates. Folks might have the image of East Texans as die-hard Republicans (nee yellow dog Democrats). But the fact is that these rural areas and smaller East Texas towns aren't doing well . . . and haven't done that well since the early '80s. Their problems are different than urban areas. They care more about making a living than party politics. So much for respecting the idea of voting for the person rather than the party. Posted by: Tx Bubba at August 27, 2003 11:14 AMI am sure all the DEM senators just happened to come up with the same idea to run to N. Mexico...no peer pressure there, no voting party line, but true and virtuous principles. Bolderdash! Posted by: don at August 28, 2003 04:44 AM
Post a comment
|
|
About Us
About BOR
Advertising Policies Byron L. - Founder Karl-Thomas M. - Owner Andrea M. - Contact Andrew D. - Contact Damon M. - Contact Drew C. - Contact Jim D. - Contact John P. - Contact Katie N. - Contact Kirk M. - Contact Marcus C. - Contact Matt H. - Contact Phillip M. - Contact Vince L. - Contact Zach N. - Conact
Donate
Archives
November 2005
October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003
Recent Entries
Home Again
Greg Abbott gets a gold star Bush's Exit Strategy Courts Rule on School Finance Bill and Bell: More Than Just an "I" In Other Gubernatorial News... Where To See Your 2006 Democratic Hopefuls Just plain wrong. Person of the Year Sen. Eltife Speaks Out on School Reform Voting Rights Act Kabuki Dallas Democrats Preparing for 2006 Some Additions Phoney Baloney BORed: The Google Never Lies The Key Parrothead Demographic Rep. Coleman Issues Letter to John Sharp New Name in the Mix for TDP Chairman RPT Gets Deferred Prosecution Conversations with Bob Gammage
Categories
2004: Dem Convention (79)
2004: Elections (571) 2005: Elections (13) 2006: Texas Elections (154) 2006: US Elections (21) 2008: Presidential Election (9) About Burnt Orange (147) Around Campus (175) Austin City Limits (228) Axis of Idiots (34) Ballot Propositions (56) Blogs and Blogging (153) BOR Humor (69) BOR Sports (78) BORed (24) Budget (17) Burnt Orange Endorsements (15) Congress (47) Dallas City Limits (94) Elsewhere in Texas (40) Get into the Action! (11) GLBT (164) Houston City Limits (43) International (107) Intraparty (50) National Politics (585) On the Issues (13) Other Stuff (48) Politics for Dummies (11) Pop Culture (68) Redistricting (257) San Antonio City Limits (6) Social Security (31) Texas Lege (181) Texas Politics (770) The Economy, Stupid (18) The Media (8)
BOR Edu.
University of Texas
University Democrats
BOR News
The Daily Texan
The Statesman The Chronicle
BOR Politics
DNC
DNC Blog: Kicking Ass DSCC DSCC Blog: From the Roots DCCC DCCC Blog: The Stakeholder Texas Dems Travis County Dems Dallas Young Democrats U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett State Sen. Gonzalo Barrientos State Rep. Dawnna Dukes State Rep. Elliott Naishtat State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez State Rep. Mark Strama
Traffic Ratings
Alexa Rating
Marketleap Truth Laid Bear Ecosystem Technoranti Link Cosmos Blogstreet Blogback
Polling
American Research Group
Annenberg Election Survey Gallup Polling Report Rasmussen Reports Survey USA Zogby
Texas Stuff
A Little Pollyana
Austin Bloggers D Magazine DFW Bogs DMN Blog In the Pink Texas Inside the Texas Capitol The Lasso Pol State TX Archives Quorum Report Daily Buzz George Strong Political Analysis Texas Law Blog Texas Monthly Texas Observer
TX Dem Blogs
100 Monkeys Typing
Alandwilliams.com Alt 7 Annatopia Appalachia Alumni Association Barefoot and Naked BAN News Betamax Guillotine Blue Texas Border Ass News The Daily DeLay The Daily Texican DemLog Dos Centavos Drive Democracy Easter Lemming Esoterically Get Donkey Greg's Opinion Half the Sins of Mankind Jim Hightower Houtopia Hugo Zoom Latinos for Texas Off the Kuff Ones and Zeros Panhandle Truth Squad Aaron Peña's Blog People's Republic of Seabrook Pink Dome The Red State Rhetoric & Rhythm Rio Grande Valley Politics Save Texas Reps Skeptical Notion Something's Got to Break Southpaw Stout Dem Blog The Scarlet Left Tex Prodigy ToT View From the Left Yellow Doggeral Democrat
TX GOP Blogs
Beldar Blog
Blogs of War Boots and Sabers Dallas Arena Jessica's Well Lone Star Times Publius TX Safety for Dummies The Sake of Arguement Slightly Rough
Daily Reads
&c.
ABC's The Note Atrios BOP News Daily Kos Media Matters MyDD NBC's First Read Political State Report Political Animal Political Wire Talking Points Memo Wonkette Matthew Yglesias
College Blogs
CDA Blog
Get More Ass (Brown) Dem Apples (Harvard) KU Dems U-Delaware Dems UNO Dems Stanford Dems
GLBT Blogs
American Blog
BlogActive Boi From Troy Margaret Cho Downtown Lad Gay Patriot Raw Story Stonewall Dems Andrew Sullivan
More Reads
Living Indefinitely
Blogroll Burnt Orange!
BOR Webrings
< ? Texas Blogs # >
<< ? austinbloggers # >> « ? MT blog # » « ? MT # » « ? Verbosity # »
Election Returns
CNN 1998 Returns
CNN 2000 Returns CNN 2002 Returns CNN 2004 Returns state elections 1992-2005 bexar county elections collin county elections dallas county elections denton county elections el paso county elections fort bend county elections galveston county elections harris county elections jefferson county elections tarrant county elections travis county elections
Texas Media
abilene
abilene reporter news alpine alpine avalanche amarillo amarillo globe news austin austin american statesman austin chronicle daily texan online keye news (cbs) kut (npr) kvue news (abc) kxan news (nbc) news 8 austin beaumont beaumont enterprise brownsville brownsville herald college station the battalion (texas a&m) corpus christi corpus christi caller times kris news (fox) kztv news (cbs) crawford crawford lone star iconoclast dallas-fort worth dallas morning news dallas observer dallas voice fort worth star-telegram kdfw news (fox) kera (npr) ktvt news (cbs) nbc5 news wfaa news (abc) del rio del rio news herald el paso el paso times kdbc news (cbs) kfox news (fox) ktsm (nbc) kvia news (abc) fredericksburg standard-radio post galveston galveston county daily news harlingen valley morning star houston houston chronicle houston press khou news (cbs) kprc news (nbc) ktrk news (abc) kerrville kerrville daily times laredo laredo morning times lockhart lockhart post-register lubbock lubbock avalanche journal lufkin lufkin daily news marshall marshall news messenger mcallen the monitor midland - odessa midland reporter telegram odessa american san antonio san antonio express-news seguin seguin gazette-enterprise texarkana texarkana gazette tyler tyler morning telegraph victoria victoria advocate waco kxxv news (abc) kwtx news (cbs) waco tribune-herald weslaco krgv news (nbc) statewide texas cable news texas triangle
World News
ABC News All Africa News Arab News Atlanta Constitution-Journal News.com Australia BBC News Bloomberg Boston Globe CBS News Chicago Tribune Christian Science Monitor CNN Denver Post FOX News Google News The Guardian Inside China Today International Herald Tribune Japan Times LA Times Mexico Daily Miami Herald MSNBC New Orleans Times-Picayune New York Times El Pais (Spanish) Salon San Francisco Chronicle Seattle Post-Intelligencer Slate Times of India Toronto Star Wall Street Journal Washington Post
Powered by
Movable Type 3.2b1 |
|