Thread: State GOP convention opens Friday (Texas)

This is pretty much what I have been picking up from the TX Republican camp. They are taking a hard line on illegal immigration. I hope they come out and tell it all after the convention.

http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/14719383.htm

Posted on Thu, Jun. 01, 2006

State GOP convention opens Friday
By JOHN MORITZ
STAR-TELEGRAM AUSTIN BUREAU

AUSTIN — Texas Republicans open their two-day convention in San Antonio on Friday confident that they will continue their decade-long dominance over the state’s political landscape, but many observers and even some party activists say that beneath the veneer of tranquility lies some turbulence.

"My fear is that we have forgotten some of the very lessons we learned when we were still trying to break though," said Royal Masset, a veteran Republican strategist who was the state party’s political director during much of the 1990s. "It used to be that our candidates for office ran to serve the people of Texas. Now it seems that they run to serve the Republican Party."

Masset and others agree that the fall campaign looks tailor-made for another GOP romp. The party has not lost a statewide election since 1994 or a major statewide race to a Democratic challenger since 1990. Republicans hold every statewide judgeship, and the party has solid majorities in both houses of the Legislature and in the Texas congressional delegation.

The ticket is anchored by proven vote-getters such as U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and Gov. Rick Perry, and every candidate for statewide office has an overwhelming advantage over the Democratic field in campaign cash. Democrats will hold their state convention next week in Fort Worth.

Will Lutz, editor of the conservative newsletter Lone Star Report , said it remains a good time to be a Republican candidate in Texas. But some in the party’s base — which will be well-represented by the more than 10,000 delegates expected at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center — are beginning to demand more from their politicians.

"At the federal level, what these delegates want to hear is that Congress is ready to get serious about controlling spending," Lutz said. "At the state level, they want to hear that the property tax cuts just passed by the Legislature are real and that the rates will stay down."

Robert Black, a campaign spokesman for Perry, said the governor expects to be greeted by a united party when he addresses the delegates. Perry, seeking his second full term and the opportunity to occupy the Governor’s Mansion for 10 consecutive years, will likely tout his efforts that resulted in the Legislature’s passage last month of a school-finance overhaul package. It includes a one-third reduction in property tax rates over two years and a new taxing system for businesses.

Even though Perry has spent much of his time since becoming governor in December 2000 nurturing the party’s conservative base, political analyst Harvey Kronberg said there might be some restlessness on the right over the new business tax.

During the recent special session, conservative activists, many from the Houston area, waged a spirited campaign to derail the plan that will tax the gross receipts of almost all businesses in Texas.

"We could see a real wild card agitating the conservative base in San Antonio," said Kronberg, editor and publisher of the Quorum Report , an online political newsletter. "The question is, Has that antipathy spread beyond Houston? I don’t know."

Lutz said he doesn’t think so. But one issue that sizzles in the ranks of the party faithful is illegal immigration, he said.

"The Republican primary voters have made it very clear that they expect action on this issue, and they expect it now," Lutz said. "They want the border controlled, and they don’t want amnesty for illegal aliens. You’re going to hear a lot of that at the convention."

Masset, who is married to a Mexican citizen who is a legal resident of the United States, said he has heard a lot from Republicans on that issue. And he doesn’t like much of it.

"I am for very strong controls along the border, and I am not for amnesty," Masset said. "But I am definitely not for all of this hateful rhetoric we are hearing on this issue — that we are going to felonize them, that we should deport them. It’s talk like this that is going to lose us the Hispanic vote just like we lost the black vote in the last generation.

"We are the majority party now. We should be working now to increase that majority."

Also online: www.texasgop.org


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Moritz, 512-476-4294
jmoritz@star-telegram.com

Masset, who is married to a Mexican citizen who is a legal resident of the United States, said he has heard a lot from Republicans on that issue. And he doesn’t like much of it.

"I am for very strong controls along the border, and I am not for amnesty," Masset said. "But I am definitely not for all of this hateful rhetoric we are hearing on this issue — that we are going to felonize them, that we should deport them. It’s talk like this that is going to lose us the Hispanic vote just like we lost the black vote in the last generation.

"We are the majority party now. We should be working now to increase that majority."

This says it all!.......Go BACK TO MEXICO MASSET........wife's a Mex Citizen? YUP, LOVE THAT USofA, right?

All they want is the VOTE.......nothing about this country matters to these scum.