Crazy Texas

Up until about 1980, the Republican Party was solidly pro-business but surprisingly progressive on many social and environmental issues. Republicans in Congress provided the necessary votes, for instance, to pass the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, the Clean Water Act, and more.

During the Reagan years, however, the GOP lurched further to the right. To an outsider, they appeared to slowly lose their collective minds as they became focused more and more on social issues of interest to the evangelical far right who seemed determined to turn the United States into a Christian theocracy.

The New York Times published a thoughtful piece today in their print edition and online about how the ideologically crazed Texas Republican Party has become so obsessed with social issues that they're making the state anti-business (link here). After a long growth boom that kept the state out of the recent economic downturn, Texas is now seeing an anemic economy and flatlining job growth.

Instead of focusing on economic issues, the part-time Texas legislature is spending most of their time worrying about who urinates in what bathroom. In their little minds, the LGBT "menace" is far greater than economic lassitude.

Let's hope this GOP self-strangulation continues and spreads nationwide. The more business realizes the GOP zealots are bad for the bottom line, the less they will embrace the dark side.