Texas: A Model For The Country (Really!)–Updated

I remember when I moved to Texas from New York (upstate, mind you, but still, The People’s Republic of New York) and just breathing an ideological sigh of relief. Even the Democrats campaigned on cutting taxes in Texas.

One news item demonstrated the different world that is Texas: A crazy woman in a car, driving erratically, and causing general mayhem on Houston’s clogged highways, prompted a police chase. Finally, they shut down a section of the road, cornered her, and she plowed her car, purposefully, into those yellow barrels filled with sand that stop you from dying if you hit that corner going off the exit ramp. She flung the door open, came rampaging out of her car wielding a butcher knife and charged toward the officers who had her surrounded. She was stopped by more than one bullet. Stopped dead. Well, that was shocking enough, but what followed reinforced that I was not in New York anymore. First, the news people who reported it treated it with the tone of “ah well, these things happen”. Second, the “investigation” took all of two days. Third, there was no public outcry over excessive force. Holy cow! In New York, the police officer would still be in jail for murder. Texas is different.

So, a lot of beltway insiders who I met and loved to a person (except for John Fund who is a turd, but that’s another story) came to Austin for the Americans For Prosperity/RightOnline conference. Here is the reaction of Robert Bluey, who I managed to not meet this weekend (ugh! too many fantastic people, too little time):

Leaving the Beltway can do wonders for you. Being in Texas the past couple of days for Americans for Prosperity’s Right Online conference was a refreshing experience. Some random thoughts about the trip:

• Texas conservatives are awesome. I came away from the conference feeling a lot better about the state of conservatism after watching these grassroots activists in action. The nearly 500 attendees were positive, upbeat and excited to get engaged online. I can’t say they are enthusiastic about the state of the Republican Party and GOP politicians, but they are certainly engaged on our core issues. Kudos to Erik Telford of AFP, who got his share of positive press from the Washington Post, New York Times and Wall Street Journal.

Emily Zanotti of the Sam Adams Alliance a conservative-libertarian think tank in Chicago came away with this impression of Texas:

Okay, I was told Texas was like a “whole ‘nother country” but to be honest, I never believed it until Thursday night, walking into a barbecue joint called Rudy’s, which appeared to have been converted out of the kind of abandoned gas station popularized by Hitchcock movies. On the wall in the outdoor seating area was a giant mural — a big oval — with the words “Real People Eat Meat” circling a lovely Texas scene: cattle marching headon toward slaughter proudly brandishing the Texas flag. Now, I’m not a full-time vegetarian and I’m only a half-assed PETA member, but let me tell you, suddenly, I felt very, very alone.

Buck up, Cowgirl! The alternative is much, much worse. I mean, imagine the world full of full-assed PETA members and dedicated vegetarians. The lack of protein makes ‘em weird. You said so yourself:

Also, while we managed to extract ourselves from the event unscathed and totally undetected [editor's note: a group of conservatives inadvertently crashed a Nutroots party at a 6th street bar], several lefties intent on disrupting Michelle Malkin’s speech were captured and released back into the wild before they ever reached the convention hall doors. Heh. And it didn’t appear the conference people were even checking nametags.

Texas is indeed a whole ‘nother country and a place the rest of America might want to visit, too, if for no other reason to get a stiff drink of what freedom tastes like again. We have relatives in New York and Michigan and Illinois and they don’t even know they’ve been boiled like fat frogs in the socialist soup that forms the basis for living in those states.

Up north and inside the beltway, they give so much money to the government that they don’t even realize how their freedom is inhibited. Without money, people are constrained. When the money is given to the government, not only are people deprived of economic choices, but more rules are imposed by the very ones taxpayers are giving their money, too. Nice, huh? Kinda like paying your mom and dad to restrict your curfew.

What works for Texas (low taxes, high individual freedoms which means that the government butts out) would be a great, simple model for America. In fact, I think that if John McCain campaigned on those two issues alone, he’d win. And if he really believed it, he’d put policies in place that would make America a better place. Too many “ifs”.

UPDATE:

Oh yeah! And if the rest of the country had politicians like Michael Williams, the Democrats would never have power again. What an incredible “rising star“. I could have listened to him talk all day, but to get an idea, go look at the video at the link.

Posted in America • Political Animals • Show Me The Money
Tags: America • Conservatives • Republicans • Texas