Back In the Saddle Again
Twenty-five years ago, Texans hoped LBJ would lead them into the promised land. They have the same hopes for the new president, but George H. W. Bush is making no promises.
Reporting and commentary on the Legislature, campaigns, and elected officials
Twenty-five years ago, Texans hoped LBJ would lead them into the promised land. They have the same hopes for the new president, but George H. W. Bush is making no promises.
Bill Clements’ ambitious—and expensive—prison-expansion plan is only a tiny first step toward escaping the overcrowding problem.
Will Texas’ acquisition of the supercollider increase the state’s clout in Washington? We’d better hope so, because now that we’ve got it, we’ve got to get the money to deliver it
How Madalyn Murray O’Hair became the supreme being of the American atheist movement.
The case against conspiracy.
One day in 1962 Ross Perot read Thoreau’s insight that the “mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” The country hasn’t been the same since.
Houston Lighting and Power’s purchase of a Canadian cable TV company may come as a shock to HL&P ratepayers.
How the Pentagon really works, as told by a Texan who tried to make it work a little differently.
Eighteen years after their Senate race determined the course of Texas politics, their rivalry may determine the course of national politics.
The congressional investigation that is focusing on Speaker Jim Wright’s ethics is missing the real problem —his judgment.
A battle over a vacant state Senate seat reveals that the scars from years of Democratic party infighting haven’t healed yet.
On the eve of the Mexican elections, the country’s dwindling middle class prefers fatalism to Fabianism.
Houston’s city controller prided himself on being the most scrupulously honest politician in town. So why did he sign his name to someone else credit card?
Can a Texas publisher of technical books make a difference in the nuclear powers’ arms race? You bet.
The issues in El Paso’s colonias are watery and grave.
Profligate and polarized, Austin attempts to salvage its future by looking into the past for its next mayor.
For twenty years, the story behind President Johnson’s withdrawal has remained a mystery. Now, on the anniversary of his decision, his former secretary reveals the drama of LBJ’s biggest surprise.
Conover Hunt and the Sixth Floor Museum.
For all his integrity and noble intentions, George Bush has yet to prove he’s got the agenda of a true statesman.
An eleventh-hour filing by two candidates for the state Supreme Court has kicked off a season of judicial campaigning unprecedented in Texas history.
These are only aliases. Their real names are Mattox, Mauro, Richards, and Hightower. And they may be leading the Democratic party to its apocalypse.
Henry Cisneros has the vision and charisma of a born leader. Does it matter that he has the soul of an Aggie?
What do Odessa beer joints and the Iran-contra hearings have in common? Everything.
Highly partisan justices are at the center of the Supreme Court scandal.
Should a judge’s friendships survive his election to the Supreme Court of Texas?
The biggest legislative bloodbath in 31 years is shaping up between Clements and Hobby. At stake: not only the state’s education budget but the economic and political future of Texas as well.
Caught between the budget crisis and the power of Bob Bullock, politicos are hiring the comptroller’s savvy ex-employees in self-defense.
For the first time since Sam Rayburn’s day, the Speaker of the House will be a Texan. And if Jim Wright of Fort Worth is to be successful, he’ll have to remember what Rayburn taught him.
The governor has a good record, good ideas, and good intentions. So why is he in danger of losing his job to a man he already beat once?.
In boom times, John Connally and Ben Barnes used their political magic to build a sprawling real estate empire. Now they’re in a desperate struggle to keep themselves afloat.
Mix election time, South Texas, and barbecue, and you get the pachanga circuit, where politics and barbecue are served with equal reverence.
She unmasked the Klan and worried about the role of women, but she listened more to her husband than to the suffragettes.
Tapped by destiny, one man in Austin is forging an unlikely alliance between Texas oilmen and the friends of Israel.
Subtract Democratic voters, add new Republicans, and it equals realignment.
Pancho Barrio, an ex-accountant, a charismatic Catholic, and the mayor of Juarez, hopes to topple the ruling party in a July governor’s race.
Hank Milam was a businessman with $20,000 in equipment and a firm faith in the rules of the game.He took on the union that had ruled the Houston docks for fifty years and beat it on its own turf.
A look at Houston’s Meyerland, Dallas’ Munger Place, El Paso’s Sunset Heights, and Austin’s Hyde Park shows that few fights get the blood boiling like a good fight with a neighbor.
In 1969 a young man from Baytown decided, after a struggle, to fight in Vietnam.
Helmut Newton, world famous for his bizarre, sometimes shocking erotic photographs, turns his lens on another exotic subject—Texas tycoons.
In parts of Texas drought is a steady boarder who may stray but always comes home for supper.
Kathy Whitmire’s substantial achievements as mayor of Houston are overshadowed by her bad public image and political ineptitude—not a good situation for a candidate seeking a third term.
Just how good were the good ol' days, when Louie Welch was mayor of Houston?
We just rate them. You voted for them.
The six freshman Republican congressmen from Texas are young, angry, and energetic. The only question is, can they be effective too?
San Antonio city councilman Bernardo Eureste took a paltry arts budget and built it into a $3 million power base. Then he got mad and tore it all apart.
The computer industry in Texas has a new lobby organized by three lobbyists who were in the right place at the right time—and knew it.
Council tells mayor her budget stinks! Mayor tells council to like it or lump it! Both sides twist arms, trade insults! Read all about it!
The inside skinny on the elections.
He had it all: a wife and a mistress, a limousine and a motorcycle, the second-highest job at the Pentagon and some good-time Dallas buddies. Then the SEC took an interest in his life.
Where to find a life-size statue of businessmen shaking hands, the best right-wing burgers, and other landmarks of Republican life.