Once again, we prove that we are the campaign of ideas. Don’t just take my word for it, check out this piece from the Dallas Morning News:
12:00 PM Wed, Jan 20, 2010
Rodger Jones/Editorial Writer
I almost fainted. The DMN editorial board had two Republicans in for interviews yesterday for the North Dallas-Lake Highlands-Garland House seat now held by Democrat Carol Kent. (This is HD 102, the former Goolsby seat.)
One of the two candidates, Geoff Bailey, actually came out for indexing the gas tax so it doesn’t lose buying power to inflation.
That’s a political risk for a Republican. Hard anti-taxers have criticized indexing as a creeping tax increase.
But here is Bailey arguing that Republicans have to have a “more mature stance” on paying for transportation. He said the state has a funding hole that has to be plugged, and so his party has to provide solutions. (Subtext: Repeating “no new taxes” doesn’t get roads built.)
Bailey cast it as an economic issue, among other things. Businesses don’t want to put up with traffic congestion, like the 75 and LBJ corridors in the heart of the district, he said.
Other parts of his transportation positions include stopping diversions of fuel taxes to non-highway uses and redirecting funds from rural areas to fight urban congestion.
Political footnote: Bailey said he talked with Sen. John Carona, transportation chairman for the Texas Senate, for a tutorial on funding transportation. His positions reflected that.
Carter, meanwhile, didn’t have a well-rounded position on transportation. She said she would stop diversions (as would most politicians in Austin) but would stop there for now, even while acknowledging that the move wouldn’t provide all the money that’s needed. She said reforming TxDOT would help, too.
Another political footnote: Carter said she was hoping to set up her own tutorial with Carona.
I’m guessing she doesn’t want it as badly as Republicans want this seat back. Carter’s campaign is funded mostly with homebuilder Bob Perry’s money.
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