By Chuck McDonald
Texas Insider Report: AUSTIN Texas The clich used to be
all politics is local. But in 2010 nothing could be further from the truth. All politics is national. It doesnt matter if youre running for U.S. Congress or the Texas Legislature or Governor. The voters are all getting their cues from the same place national cable news outlets.
Think about it. How many people talked to you about the Sharron Angle Harry Reid Nevada Senate race in the last month?
How many Texans told
you how much they either loved or hated Christine ODonnell who was running for the U.S. Senate in
Delaware which I calculate is approximately 1 million miles from Texas.
Ten years ago you wouldnt have been able to find a half dozen people in the entire state who could name a Senate candidate anywhere outside of Texas. Buts its a brave new world and the big winners were those who recognized it early on.
About a year ago Governor Rick Perry started really embracing this national GOP message talking exclusively about the evils of Washington. I thought that would change once he dispatched of U.S. Senator Kay Bailey
Hutchison (remember her?) and that the General Election rhetoric would focus more on state issues.
Not a chance. Perry and his team knew right where the sweet spot was and that was the national narrative.
On election night where I was trying to keep up with the statewide legislative returns while providing commentary for the local
Austin FOX-TV affiliate I was having a hard time grasping the scope of the statehouse wins the Republicans were racking up.
In hindsight it seems obvious that we shouldnt have been so blindsided by the fact that Republicans won Texas state legislative races in shocking fashion increasing the GOP numbers from 76 in 2009 to 99 (or possibly 100) out of 150 members in 2011.
The national political narrative as brought to us by cable news channels of all political persuasions was that it was time to send the Democrats in Washington a message. And since Texas has clearly replaced Utah as the most Republican state in the universe why wouldnt we lead the way if there really in this Republican revolt?
But even the most optimistic
Republican partisans in Austin were only hoping to pick up 10 or 11 seats. There wasnt a single public prediction that the GOP House numbers in Texas would be any higher than 90.
And I talked to smart guys who really do know Texas politics: Ross Ramsey editor of the
Texas Tribune Harvey Kronberg the merry chronicler of all things political in Texas Jay Root at the
Associated Press Austin
bureau and others.
Everyone knew the Republicans were going to pick up Texas House seats but winning a clear two-thirds super majority? No one saw it.
I think one reason was that many of us wrongly assumed that most voters realized that there is a huge difference between
Texas Legislative issues and what goes on in Washington.
Weve got plenty of Texas problems to worry about starting with figuring out how to provide a decent education to a public school student population of five million kids (compared to the entire population of the state of Delaware less than 900000) while the state is staring down a $20 billion budget deficit.
But thats not part of the national political commentary and it didnt resonate with Texas voters.
Nonetheless these folks we elected to send a message to Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi
are going to have to confont the Texas budget deficit those pesky schoolkids and the Texans who rely on the state for healthcare at
some point.
Should be interesting.
Chuck McDonald is president of McDonald Public Relations Inc. a hard-charging full service communications management firm located in Austin Texas.
