Why Democrats in Texas & Washington are so Peeved at Tom DeLay-Redistricting in Texas

Before former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay began playing Texas statewide politics the same way Democrats had been playing the political game in the Lone Star state for years, the Democratic legislative delegations in Texas and the U.S. House of Representatives had a great ride, which lasted far longer than it should have. No wonder Democrats in Texas and Washington despise him so much.

With the exception of the post-Civil War period of Reconstruction, for more than a century, beginning in 1845 when Texas joined the Union, the Democratic Party thoroughly dominated Texas, the home of hundreds and hundreds of thousands of "yellow dog Democrats" who, as Bill Safire once explained, would "vote for a yellow dog on the Democratic ticket" before they would vote for a Republican.

Following Reconstruction, the first major Republican victory did not occur until John Tower won Vice President Lyndon Johnson's Senate seat in a special election in 1961. At the time, Democrats controlled 21 of the state's 22-member U.S. House delegation. Fourteen of them were elected in 1960 without opposition, and the other seven won an average of 73 percent of the vote. No wonder Texas Democrats in 1960 considered their domination of the congressional delegation to be a birthright.

Meanwhile, Texas was central to the national Democratic Party. Indeed, since Texas became a state, no Democrat won the presidency without winning Texas -- until Bill Clinton managed to do so in 1992 (and 1996).

The Houston Chronicle has been gunning for DeLay since at least the time he blocked federal funding of Houston's boondoggle of a light rail system that runs at street level down Main Street, reducing Main St. to one lane in each direction and no traffic permitted on Main for several blocks) from one stadium to another and cannot run if we get a moderate rain fall.

Unfortunately for the Chronicle, someone on the inside leaked their memo to their own website about their plan to bias their news to go after DeLay in the "news" sections as well as the OpEd page.

True, but Texas politics and political structure is VERY different from the other 49 States. This is an excellent educational piece, if anyone is interested. It also shows what was driving Teflon Tom, BushCo, and the Southern Baptist Convention/Conservative Agenda in Texas. FYI, there are many registered Dems in Texas, that actually vote Republican.

People may be interested to know that DeLay's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, (one of the top criminal defense lawyers in the country) is a self-described yellow-dog Democrat who regularly votes in Democratic primaries.

Since the beginning of the 1988 election cycle, DeGuerin has contributed $15,800 to Democratic candidates, including $1,000 in 1996 to former Rep. Nick Lampson (D-Texas), who plans to challenge DeLay for his seat next fall.

DeGuerin also contributed $1,000 in 2002 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which is pinning its hopes for the 2006 election on DeLay’s legal problems and their potential to taint all GOP House candidates.

In an interview, DeGuerin described himself as being “kind of raised in Austin and Democratic politics.” His father served as Lyndon Baines Johnson’s administrative assistant when the former president was a member of Congress. DeGuerin’s father later worked for the Johnson administration in the Commerce Department.

“I don’t know that I agree with [DeLay’s] politics, and I don’t have to,” DeGuerin said. “What’s happened to him is political, and I don’t agree with trying to affect the ballot box with the jury box, and that’s what Ronnie Earle is trying to do.” DeGuerin said he made his political persuasion “very clear” to DeLay and his supporters, and he said DeLay is comfortable with it.

Bottom line is Dick DeGuerin is a lawyer. He will sniff the rear of whoever pays him the most money. I'll bet Tom DeLay pays him quite nicely!

"Word" is DeLay needs to raise $1.5 million for his legal defense against these phony indictments, which will be no problem for the biggest money raiser in Washington, Teflon Tom. Kay Bailey Hutchinson blew approx $1.1 million on her defense with Dick DeGuerin, against Earle in 1994, and the charges were dropped the day of the trial.

I understand that TD has $1/4 million in his legal defense fund currently and raised approx $1/4 million in Houston last Thur & Fri nights at his fund raisers.

Re: TD's legal fundraisers in Houston last week - I've got to be honest here, I don't like it when these big time religion people (Ed Young, Pastor, 2nd Baptist Church-Houston, and past head of the Southern Baptist Convention) get in the middle of deals like this DeLay criminal indictment fund raising. Young was a keynote speaker in DeLay's behalf at both the Thursday and Friday fund raisers in Houston, I understand, per a detailed email. Second Baptist, with 30,000+ members, has almost twice lost their tax exempt status with the IRS, due to their political agenda. Stuff like this is just easy fodder for the Democrats and Earle's staff to call the IRS Regional Office in Dallas.

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