Imagine, just imagine, we were no longer saddled with a rogue’s gallery of plutocrazy, far-right Trumpists dominating our state government. Really, visualize this. All those mean, weird, corrupt, old white dudes (Abbott, Patrick, Paxton, Miller, et al.) voted out — poof! — gone for good. In their place we have a state government dominated by Democrats who look like the majority-minority Texas of today: women, Blacks, Latinos, Asians …
Immediately, we’d no longer be a bottom dweller in quality-of-life ratings. We would become more livable and infinitely more pleasant, and maybe even the damn temperatures would start to go down. Texas would no longer be a cruel outlier. We would join 40 other states that care enough about their citizens to expand Medicaid. Rural hospitals would not have to close. We would have a healthier society. Because more mothers would have health insurance, our high, Third-World pregnant maternal death rate would go down. Homelessness, crime, and hunger would also improve.
A state dominated by Democrats would be able to go after heavy polluters, instead of getting whiplash from looking the other way when their megadonors pollute our waterways and air. Imagine our North Texas air cleaner and not quite so hazy as downtown Fort Worth has looked this summer. Childhood asthma would go down. More people would live longer. The quality of life for all of us would improve. Cities would no longer be micromanaged by Austin. They’d be able to pass laws most of their citizens want, like banning plastic bags and regulating greedy payday lenders.
Imagine a Texas Attorney General who wouldn’t waste millions of our tax dollars filing frivolous lawsuits against the Democratic president for everything, including winning a free and fair election. Imagine our state not suing Dallas over the Texas State Fair for commonsensically banning weapons from Fair Park after a shooting last year that injured three people. Visualize a Texas legislature that would pass common sense gun laws that would decrease the number of weapons overall and ban AR-style guns. Not only would crime go down in our state but suicides as well.
If Democrats ran the state, we’d no longer have to worry about defunding public education with a poorly thought-out voucher scheme. In fact, Democrats would make sure that school funding would increase and that teachers would be paid better than they are today. In higher ed, they would kill the Republican’s anti-DEI-fixation. Our brain drain that causes us to lose scholars and students to other states would end.
Most importantly, Democrats wouldn’t blame teachers for everything. They wouldn’t creepily belittle them by calling them “groomers.” They would respect teachers and wouldn’t prevent them from adequately doing their jobs because a few people don’t want them to teach the truth about our history. Librarians would no longer have legal action hovering over their heads because of some ill-defined standard.
We’d no longer be spending millions of dollars on trafficking undocumented immigrants to other states. We’d let the federal government do its job at the border and not block trade from Mexico or set barbed wire traps to kill people in the Rio Grande. We’d be able to give our Texas National Guard a break from wasteful, politically motivated deployments, but, most importantly, we’d not be engaging in the cruel, hateful anti-immigrant policies of Texas Republicans. The Know-Nothing rhetoric describing hard-working immigrants coming to make a better life, the American story writ large, as an invasion would stop, along with the shootings that racist charge has inspired.
And a Texas led by Democrats would no longer offer women the heartbreaking choice of forced birth or fleeing our state. We’d go back to pre-Dobbs days, and women wouldn’t be dying in hospitals because doctors are too scared to provide the necessary medical care. We would no longer place women and their loved ones in legal jeopardy for seeking abortions and traveling beyond Texas’ borders.
A Democratic-led Texas would make life easier for workers by mandating water breaks in the summer and make all our lives easier by connecting our electric grid to other states before more Texans die. And, finally, if it’s good enough for animal shelters, it’s good enough for humans — it’s time to air-condition our prisons so a prison sentence is not a death sentence.
A Democratic Texas would stop the scapegoating of trans teens that’s driving families to leave the state. Imagine a state government more accepting of differences instead of hell-bent on attacking our most vulnerable groups. And without the modern antidemocratic GOP in power, we could get rid of gerrymandered districts, the most restrictive voting rules in the country, and Gestapo tactics specifically designed to intimidate minority voters.
One added benefit would be how much better off mentally we’d all be if we didn’t have to deal with Republican pols spending all their time throwing red meat to their base brainwashed by angertainment TV instead of governing. I can feel myself relaxing already.
Now, I’m about as far away from New Age as possible, but I do believe in the power of this visualizing thought experiment. If we can imagine a Democratic Texas and see how it would be infinitely saner, more compassionate, and way better for the vast majority of Texans, we can make it happen.
This November, state races aren’t on the ballot, so we have time to work toward a better future, but wouldn’t it be something if Harris won Texas or got close? Or that cankerous growth on our state’s soul, Ted Cruz, happily sailed into a Cancun sunset? It won’t be easy. It’ll take work. Lots of it, but as Michelle Obama repeated in her DNC speech, “Don’t just sit around and complain. Do something.”
This column reflects the opinions and fact-gathering of the author(s) and only the author(s) and not the Fort Worth Weekly. To submit a column, please email Editor Anthony Mariani at Anthony@FWWeekly.com. He will gently edit it for clarity and concision.
