Speaker's Race: Phone home
Ok, maybe they're talking to somebody. It's just not us. Or at least, not yet.
There's still time for a handful of House members to return their phone calls (hometown paper, anyone?) before Tuesday's speaker vote. So I can't say that their inexplicable and, in some members' cases, UNPRECEDENTED disappearances are unequivocally linked to any indecision or fear on their part to reveal where their loyalties lie in the race.
Just feels a little coincedental.
See, for reporters, who pontificate and theorize and predict with the best of the wonks, the primary indicator of who's getting soft on their previously declared support is simple:
The House members who call us back tend to give it to us straight, either way.
Then there are the House members who have apparently lost their voice mail passwords, gotten caught in the El Paso blizzard (since the Colorado alibi doesn't really fly anymore), or found themselves in reaches international with a sudden inability to figure out their cell phones in a foreign country.
Or, they're hunkering down with their thoughts to try and figure out whether they're going to continue supporting Waxahachie Rep. Jim Pitts or House Speaker Tom Craddick. Maybe they haven't decided, or they're playing both sides, or they just think it's none of our business.
Right now it appears that the answer will come on Tuesday, no matter who we can find.
But the answer will come out. The best thing about covering the Legislature is that at some point, no matter how many voice mails go unreturned, we eventually see everyone - and I mean everyone - face to face.
Tick-tock...
Comments
You must not have gotten the email from Betty Brown, State Rep Dist 4. She sent out an email on Friday, it was her Austin update. With the vote coming up next week and the TTC and school vouchers there are alot of issues she needed to update us on......Oh, her email was her response to a humor column that appeared in an Austin paper a month ago. She needed to defend herself because she submitted to the new Leg a bill proclaiming Athens, Tx the official birthplace of the hamburger. No word from her on who she supports for Speaker (but bet your paycheck its Craddick), or her stance on the TTC, or school vouchers (shes taken money from James Leininger, so thats an easy one to figure out).
Posted by: JAKinTT | January 7, 2007 7:46 PM