Election

Election Skattershooting

I love election time (especially when I'm not running). Observations about last Tuesday:

Last summer, State District Judge Ed King of Dallas reduced the bail bond amount of alleged murderer Patrick Richardson to $30,000. But this was no run of the mill murder allegation. Richardson was accused of killing his Junior League member wife in their high tone Park Cities home. Since this story involved the three key factors to garner press coverage: (1) it involved murder, (2) those involved were rich, and (3) those involved were white, the story was jumped on by every local TV and newspaper outlet in a New York minute. The result: Don't even remotely give the impression you are soft on crime - the judge is voted out of office by a 69% to 31% margin.
Speaking of the power of television, long time Arlington Police Department spokesperson Dee Anderson received over 50% of the vote to beat Tarrant County Sheriff David Williams and five other opponents. No other law enforcement officer has graced our TV screens as often as Anderson has in the past eight years. The result: Anderson can be the sheriff of Tarrant County for as long as he wants.
Long time Dallas District Judge John Marshall got booted from office. Interestingly, in this hard line, pro-business, conservative climate, it was a rich Plaintiff's lawyer that helped master mind the judge's demise. You may remember Marshall has having halted a Carrollton gun club's "pigeon shoot" as well as temporarily stopping the tree-uprooting-renovation of Tennison golf course.
Two Democratic leaning defense lawyers ran for the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals as Republicans: (1) J. Gary Trichter, who is probably the most famous DWI defense lawyer in the State, and (2) Pat Barber, who once posted a billboard on I-20 near Abilene that read "Just say NO to Searches". Both of the men lost the election but I'm not prepared to say it had anything to do with their philosophy. The vast majority of people have no idea who to vote for in state wide judicial elections, and to ask them to research the candidates on their own is simply unrealistic.
As to the Texas Supreme Court, two candidates filed as Republicans but the state GOP, believing they were nothing more than Democrats in sheep's clothing, branded them unworthy. Both individuals, Valorie Davenport and Rod Gorman, lost. Once again, judicial philosophy probably had less to do with their defeat than the fact they had names like "Valorie" and "Rod".
Locally, County Commissioner Jerry Flusche lost his job in Tuesday's vote. I like Jerry, but no one can hold the job of commissioner more than six months without becoming a county whipping boy. It wouldn't matter if the county budget was run as smoothly as Microsoft, if someone hits a 1" pot hole on their country road, they'll be writing a letter to the editor calling for the head of their precinct's commissioner.
The Republican proposition asking whether student led prayers should be allowed in public school passed with an overwhelming 97% of the vote. I've always said, would you Baptists and Methodists be so willing to support the proposal if the Decatur ISD became 51% Hindu tomorrow? The issue is not about Christianity, it's about allowing the government to sanction a particular religious interest. And once that student graps a microphone purchased with tax dollars, it becomes a government issue. (As a side note, the Texas Atheist Newsletter has reported that of the 18 references in the Bible of Jesus praying, only one of them, the infamous "My God, my God. Why hast thou forsaken me?", occurred in public).

Barry Green is the District Attorney for the 271st Judicial District.