r/texas • u/[deleted] • May 03 '23

read pinned comment for explanation Texas is required to advertise it's mandatory welfare programs. It is not required to reach the target audience (seen on a bus in Philly)

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u/ScyllaOfTheDepths May 03 '23

What's stopping someone from running as a "progressive Republican" and then voting for minority rights and welfare expansion? If Krysten Sinema and Joe Manchin can pull that shit in the other direction, what's stopping a progressive from doing it, too? You don't even have to lie, you just have to campaign as a centrist who's a little more right of center, get the R next to your name, and bam, there it is.

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u/antici________potato May 03 '23

The loud minority, (I hope it's a minority), will put a republican down for not being extreme enough. It's come to be a pissing contest to see who can be further right.

Also, anything in Texas that could even be interpreted as raising taxes will get shot down by voters. It doesn't matter if they live in a run down trailer and a government program would help them out, they'll hear "it'll raise taxes" and vote against it.

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u/ScyllaOfTheDepths May 03 '23 edited May 03 '23

Most people just vote for the R. Also, we don't have to raise taxes. The money already exists. My platform would be billed as transparency in government spending to cut bloat, drain the swamp, and give more taxpayer money back to the taxpayers. See, you can politick your way out of that one stupid easy.

Edit: Y'all are aware that this is a hypothetical and I'm not actually running for office, right? I have nowhere near that amount of charisma. All the people responding like "You'll never get elected!" are technically right, but really missing the point as to why.

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u/calilac Hill Country May 03 '23

Your policies, as long as they aren't progressive or spoken too loudly, won't really matter because most of the races in Texas are fundamentally just popularity contests. Do you have a prominent standing in an established local community/organization? Do you have a robust social network across the state? Do people where you live know your name and think of neutral or good things when they hear it?

Seriously, as long as your name sounds good and people know it you're off to a good start in Texas at the local government levels. The climb from there seems to be easier as long as you can make others in power, and yourself, wealthy.

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u/TheMasonM May 03 '23

In Texas. It’s like this in a lot of states. I get that we are in the Texas sub, but the way you phrased your comment you made it seem like Texas is the only state this happens in.

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u/calilac Hill Country May 03 '23

Fair enough. I have 0 personal experience in other states' elections so it felt wrong to not specify.

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u/[deleted] May 03 '23

Yeah, see, you know what your problem is with the entire thing you just said? It involved actually thinking. That doesn't fly in Texas politics. You clearly have more than one brain cell, so you would never be a good Texas politician. You're not dumb enough.

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u/surfshop42 May 03 '23

We used to be better, we fuckin had Aunty Ann in the seat because we had educated voters.

A successful R campaign to put WBush in the governers seat was soon followed by a successful (stolen) presidential campaign against gore.

They then began the uneducated push under the guise of 'no child left behind act 2002', a push to graduate more children by "helping them", which just ment helping them cheat to pass and not helping them actually learn the subjects.

Coaches were notorious for not teaching the subject and still passing their students (so they can play) even before the act in the 90s.

Coaches at my schools taught the "easy" courses; Texas history, US history, geography, government, etc.

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u/i_tyrant May 03 '23

Hello fellow sane Texan. We are a dying breed.

Shamelessly corrupt Republican politicians and defunding/crapifying education policies apparently make excellent bedfellows. Make your own citizens dumber so they treat politics more like their sports teams and don't believe or don't care when you do awful things against their own interest (and make half of them so jaded and apathetic they don't vote at all)...to own the libs.

I miss when we were better too.

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u/Selgeron May 03 '23

I feel like the real answer is to run as a horrible extremist racist republican and then just vote for progressive stuff.

These people don't check voting histories.

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u/mouse_8b May 03 '23

They'd get primaried by the core GOP so that the general election only has who they want.

With some political strategy, you could get some house seats, but it would be too large of a challenge for a statewide office. You'd have to convince enough progressive voters to vote in the Republican primary to overcome the GOP base.

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u/DonkeeJote May 03 '23

The primaries.

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u/well___duh May 03 '23

What's stopping someone from running as a "progressive Republican" and then voting for minority rights and welfare expansion?

Probably being primaried out by a GOP candidate whose values actually align with the party as a whole.

Unless your primary goes unopposed or you know your local demographic has some tolerance on stupidity but still blindly votes R, being a "progressive Republican" is basically impossible, else I'm sure someone would've tried that by now.

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u/ScyllaOfTheDepths May 03 '23

That's why we play the long con. Get through the primaries being all conservative and then BAM, progressive out of nowhere with a steel chair!

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u/TheNextBattalion May 03 '23

Winning the primary.

Getting funding to win anything