Asleep at the Wheel Confession on AG
Takes Top Wild Editorial Rankings Spot
Capitol Inside
September 24, 2023
With Texas House Republicans in an early stage of panic in the blackened shadow of an all-time perfect storm they created with Attorney General Ken Paxton's failed impeachment bid, former GOP representative Jason Villalba sought to counter it by getting cute.
Villalba argued in a Dallas Morning News opinion editorial that Paxton's acquittal should come as no surprise to anyone who's been involved in Texas politics during two decades of GOP rule. But Villalba confessed to be dumbfounded nonetheless - and he used a Peanuts comic strip analogy to show how clueless he'd been in the Texas Senate verdict's explosive aftermath until he taken the time to reflect.
Villalba suggested that he and many other Texans could relate to Charlie Brown when Lucy "snatched the football from his kicking pattern, leaving poor Charlie to kick wildly, and haplessly, at a football that was no longer there."
The former House Republican continued the amazing narrative though the legendary comic character's eyes. "Brushing himself off, after having tumbled embarrassingly to the ground, yet again, what could poor Charlie exclaim, other than “Good grief.”
Villalba suggested that most everyone in Texas failed to anticipate the ending that's obvious to him now. But Villalba made no attempt to pin the blame for the widespread misconceptions on the hometown newspaper or the state's other major dailies for giving readers a false impression of the case's progression when they also missed clues that were easy to read for journalists who weren't on either side. The editorial board's at the state's biggest newspapers have yet to own up to the remiss.
Villalba, who's a lawyer, followed GOP Speaker Dade Phelan's lead with the belated admission on why people would have seen where the trial was heading if they'd been more in touch with the way the case was heading from the start. But Villalba used the bulk of the opinion piece to explain how people could be so easily deceived - making no attempt to elaborate on the reasons why he sees the case so clearly now instead.
"Even as someone who has served in the Texas Legislature for six years as a commonsense “Reagan Republican,” I was dumbfounded," Villalba said. "The evidence presented was documented, clear, unambiguous and vetted by a “rock-ribbed” conservative Texas House."
Villalba was rated as one of the least conservative Republicans in the Legislature's lower chamber during a six-year stint that ended in 2019 when voters in Dallas ousted him in the primary election in a district that the Democrats went on to flip that fall. While Villalba's creative rescue ride may be too late - with the Phelan team on the brink of a historic self-destruction in hole that's deepened considerably in the past week and may be impossible to escape.
The DMN published Villalba's column just hours after the State Republican Executive Committee voted 58-2 to call for the speaker's immediate resignation. Phelan and 59 fellow House Republicans who voted to impeach the AG are the top targets for conservatives in 2024 in a Paxton day of reckoning crusade. Donald Trump will be down to campaign against the speaker and the lieutenants who convinced him they had a case that couldn't fail. The state's biggest-giving donors will bankroll a primary offensive that will be designed to destroy as many anti-Paxton House Republicans as possible.
With the exception of a wounded Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC, the House Republicans who opposed Paxton have every imaginable disadvantage at the start of a primary season that appears to be shaping up as a catastrophe for the speaker and his allies with no real opportunity for a miraculous revival.
House Republicans who circled wagons for a week are starting to make the leap from denial to the painful recognition of the consequences they can expect to pay for overconfidence that wasn't justified or realistic at a Capitol where a political outcome was inevitable regardless of the evidence.
It wasn't clear what Villalba hoped to achieve with the cartoonish opening for the editorial today. But he ran the risk of making it worse for the Republicans he's trying to protect when he capped off the Dallas New admission analysis with the recycling a Sam Houston quote that GOP State Rep. Andrew Murr repeated several times during the trial without any hint of success.
Villalba sought to explain what Houston meant when he ostensibly said "do right and risk the consequences." He could have been trying to put any hopes that Phelan has for surviving the self-inducted disaster with baseless claims about Senate Republicans ignoring the evidence and God's "wisdom and judgment." Villalba didn't see to comprehend that every senator for both party would say the same exact thing if anyone had the gall to question the sincerity and purity of their work as Senate jurors.
Villalba made it worse when he tried to rationalize the meltdown in objectivity by pointing out that "bright red conservative stalwarts such as former Gov. Rick Perry and firebrand U.S. Rep. Chip Roy were in vociferous agreement that Paxton had violated the public trust and deserved to be removed from office."
This alone shows how asleep at the wheel the pro-impeachment Republicans and their cheerleaders on big paper editorial boards had been throughout the case. The ex-legislator's mind-boggling attempt to speak for God and the Senate Republicans could have been a final coffin nail for a House GOP leaders who are struggling to come to grips with their epic inattention to a case that blowing up before their eyes for two full weeks.
The claims on God choosing sides - coupled with the Charlie Brown comparison, the lavishing of praise on Murr, a lecture on the Raven's imaginary relevance and the startling admission that he'd been clueless - have secured Villalba and the Dallas Morning News the crowning spot on the Wild Texas Impeachment Editorial Competition in the fallout of the Paxton case.
The rankings are based on a combination of editorial outrage, shock and entertainment value, persuasive potential, misinformation volume and an apparent comprehension of how the trial was unfolding and why Paxton was destined to win regardless of the evidence and testimony. The quality of the effort that the editorial composers make to back up their claims with real evidence. Inherent bias that surpasses the bounds of opinion is a factor as well. |
