What Conventional Wisdom Gets Wrong About Texas Politics

KUT 90.5 | By David Brown,

Richard Parker

Published November 5, 2014 at 3:31 PM CST

The Texas Delegation at the Republican National Convention in 2008

For much of this election year there was powerful conventional wisdom about the race for governor in Texas: Democrat Wendy Davis couldn’t win, Republicans couldn’t lose and Texas wouldn’t change.

Now that Election Day has come and gone, it’s clear that that conventional wisdom got a good bit right. But in the eyes of author and commentator Richard Parker, [it] got a good bit wrong as well.

Listen to Parker’s commentary for the Texas Standard above, and check out his book, “Lone Star Nation: How Texas Will Transform America,” here.

This post was compiled by Texas Standard intern Sarah Talaat An MP3 version of the story.

Politics

David Brown

David entered radio journalism thanks to a love of storytelling, an obsession with news, and a desire to keep his hair long and play in rock bands. An inveterate political junkie with a passion for pop culture and the romance of radio, David has reported from bases in Washington, London, Los Angeles, and Boston for Monitor Radio and for NPR, and has anchored in-depth public radio documentaries from India, Brazil, and points across the United States and Europe. He is, perhaps, known most widely for his work as host of public radio's Marketplace. Fulfilling a lifelong dream of moving to Texas full-time in 2005, Brown joined the staff of KUT, launching the award-winning cultural journalism unit "Texas Music Matters."

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Richard Parker