Getting Ready to Vote: All Politics is Local

I’ll be voting tomorrow, early, ahead of the Election Day. Why tomorrow? Quite simply, because i’m undecided on several judicial elections, principally in the appellate courts and on a bond issue that isn’t as cut and dried as i originally thought.

I figure i have another few hours of research to do on the candidates and while i’ve listened to some in-depth analysis on the bond issue, I remain sitting between two stools.

Why am I not addressing the larger contest for U.S. President? Because I genuinely believe that local elections are at least, as important. Because we’ve seen what happens when demagogues get their way and make concerted efforts to determine local politics.

For example, i was on the fence about voting for a judge endorsed by both the Dallas and Houston papers. He doesn’t sound like, on the face of it, the type to rule based on a strict agenda and indeed, does have a reputation for adjudicating fairly. However, he also has the support of Texas State Attorney-Under-Indictment Ken Paxton and while his opponent seems genuine and sincere, is lacking in experience. But I have to question the integrity of anyone who’s garnered Paxton’s support. 

This is a huge issue in Texas politics that much of the electorate doesn’t seem to want to pay attention to. I have no respect for, let alone faith in the legislature in Austin. Governor Greg Abbott, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, and the aforementioned AGUI Ken Paxton are no one’s idea of principled leaders. 

It’s a given that i’ll be voting for Colin Allred in the senate race against Ted Cruz, but even if Allred wins, it doesn’t change the political landscape in this state if local elections are decided by appointees of a corrupt and frankly, power hungry, legislature that does not have the best interests of their constituents at heart.

I’ve been on this for awhile, that unless or until voters take their local politicians seriously, take their local judiciary seriously, their law enforcement policy-makers seriously, it only ensures that the status quo will remain in place. 

The brutal - and I do mean, brutal - irony is how complacent so many voters are in this state; they wonder why schools are a mess when they vote in and keep in, policy makers who seem bent on destroying public education. The electorate seems to be in favor of draconian measures to support political grandstanding on issues like immigration while effectively doing very little to work toward solutions. 

There is almost no issue of importance that the Texas state legislature seems to take seriously. From gun control to education to immigration to women’s reproductive health, all of these are subject to the whims of whatever Abbott, et al, all of these issues are used as fodder for maintaining their hold on the state and frankly, getting rich off of it. 

If there was genuine oversight or enforcement of ethics at the higher echelons, we might have a considerably different state. 

The state of the state looks rosy, for now. Tax incentives draw more businesses to Texas, but the counterargument is that these incentives are giveaways that don’t necessarily benefit the communities to which these companies relocated. They may not be taxed for X number of years, or at best, pay minimal taxes, and so on. 

There is also the inflation of numbers of people in a company that moves to the state. Governor Abbott touted the move of Chevron’s corporate headquarters to the Houston area. Setting aside the quality of Chevon’s standing as an ethical corporation, it seems to be that only 400 jobs were brought into the state. 

Additionally, there is a push for almost unlimited growth; in Houston, build-out continues apace and tends to outpace the number of people moving to the city. At the city and county levels, there are immense issues with infrastructure, the seemingly unending repairs to roads and streets. We won’t even go into the lack of investment in mass transit or the issues that beset the Houston Independent School District that may or may not be met with a 4.4 billion dollar bond. 

All of these are vital and important issues but there is relatively little long-range or long-term planning or looking toward a future that might actually address these issues. Larger issues like climate change and the effects of increasing intense weather events on the State as a whole or at the local level are summarily ignored by the legislature because, of course, this is tied to the petroleum energy and its lobbying and the increasingly ridiculous denial of extraction and drilling and its effect on the environment. 

Are all these issues going to be addressed, or even settled, at the local level if we all vote a certain way? Not likely, that’s not how it works, but the main point is that at the base minimum what is required are individuals who are experienced, knowledgeable, and serve - mark this word - serve their constituents. 

None of the issues that bedevil us are going to be met without a sense of unity or a shared sense of working together. Yes, we need this very much at the national level, but it should be just as much at the local level.

I sometimes think of it like this. We see issues that are used to divide people and sow confusion within communities, but what would happen if people decided at the local and regional levels to find solutions and provide answers that could be utilized?

We live in a republic of states that may not all be in the same page, but it doesn’t change the reality that that republic is the overarching structure of which those states are parts. ‘States rights” has been used as a cudgel to prop up more divisive policies, very often losing sight of the idea of a so-called “United States”.

Tomorrow, I head to the polls, do my favorite civic duty and try to maintain some degree of equanimity and hope. I hope to see you there, as well.