ustxtxb_obs_1981_09_25_50_00014-00000_000.pdf

“You want to know about Texas?” Dwayne Holman asked UT-Austin students the other day. “Well, then read the Tulia Herald,” the executive director of the Texas Democratic Party said with a grin, “then read the Texas Observer and the Dallas Morning News. Believe twothirds of what you read in the Observer and a third of what you read in the Morning News. “Kennedy or Mondale in 84?” a student asked. “Hart.” Holman shot back. “I really think it’s highly unlikely either of those two will be at the top of the ticket.” Questioned about disciplining the Texas “Nine,” Holman suggested it would do more harm than good. “Give the people in their district a chance to run someone against them and give them a lot of help,” he advised. “Gramm is a bit different because he sat on the Republican side and helped them.” Rep. Morris Udall, D-Ariz., also doubts that Democrats will discipline Gramm and his compatriots this year, but he indicated that action is “more likely” next year when the new Congress decides on committee assignments. Udall said he didn’t want to make martyrs out of the conservative Democrats who backed Reagan’s economic programs. Texas Republican Chairman Chester R. Upham Jr. is itching to talk with Gramm and the other Texas “boll weevils.” “The tide is changing very, very rapidly,” Upham told Houston Chronicle reporter Cragg Hines, pointing out that conservatives who once would have had little chance being elected unless they were Democrats can now run as Republicans. Gramm has said he has no current intention of changing parties, but Upham, from Mineral Wells, has been working on his own Congressman, Charles Stenholm of Stamford. At a civic club luncheon in Mineral Wells during the August congressional recess, Upham publicly invited Stenholm whom Upham says is 14 SEPTEMBER 25, 1981 “as Republican as he can be” to switch parties. Upham said the crowd applauded the idea. Stenholm laughed off the invitation, saying Reagan had once been a Democrat and “maybe he’ll come back.” Rep. Jim Mattox, at present a redistricting orphan, told Mark Nelson of the Dallas Morning News he’s seriously considering a race against Gramm in next year’s Democratic primary. Although there has been some speculation that Mattox might run for a seat on the Texas Railroad Commission, those close to him say that possibility has been ruled out. Running against, Gramm, Mattox said, would be “the right thing, the fun thing,” to do. Despite Gramm’s popularity, Mattox believes the race could be won. “Kent Caperton beat Bill Moore, the Bull of the Brazos, handily in the primary in the district,” he pointed out. “The addition of Montgomery County to the 6th gives Gramm some Republicans, but it also includes a large black area around Conroe, and they are strongly Democratic.” Mattox said a “true” Democrat’s chances would be enhanced by a strong Republican primary in 1982 because many of the conservatives Gramm relies on might be tempted to vote in the GOP contest. And there’s always the chance that Gramm will switch parties and run for the Senate against Lloyd Bentsen, who defeated him in the 1976 primary. A0 Jim Collins and Walter “Mad Dog” Mengden have already said they’ll probably go after Bentsen’s seat, and either one will no doubt entice a sizeable chunk of media money out of the National Con: servative Political Action Committee. NCPAC chairman Terry Dolan has said the organization will spend as much as $1.5 million in Texas to try to unseat Bentsen and Jim Wright. Fort Worth Star -Telegram writer Bill Walker reports that NCPAC has spent about $47,000 this year \(according to Federal Election that Bentsen and Wright are liberals obstructing the Reagan agenda. The senator reports that he has raised about $2 million to fight back. He has called NCPAC officials “hired political guns with a long record of distorting the records of people in public office, and I see no exception in what they’re trying to do now.” In Fort Worth and Dallas, NCPAC has its sights trained on Jim Wright. Ten thousand form letters went out randomly from NCPAC’s headquarters in a Washington suburb to residents of Wrights 12th district. The letters chide Wright for opposing President Reagan’s economic recovery program, for supporting busing for integration purposes, and for backing a 29-percent pay raise for Congress, The organization took to the mail after failing to get air-time for its anti-Wright advertisements on Fort Worth and Dallas television stations KXAS, WFAA, and KDFW. It looks like Wright’s opponent will be Fort Worth mayor Woodie Woods, who will resign in November and run as a Republican when Wright seeks re-election next year. Woods said he is uncomfortable as mayor because he has to deal with liberal congressmen. He said he is resigning to campaign for conservative candidates. Governor Bill Clements announced last week he has “every intention” of running for re-election, but he won’t make it official until November. Clements said he is encouraged by his showing in a poll taken in July. The four issues most concerning those polled public schools, narcotics, crime, and better management in government coincide with his own legislative program, he said. Noting that inflation has driven up the cost of campaigning, Clements said he didn’t know yet how much he will spend in 1982. He spent $7 million in 1978. Meanwhile the Governor and a potential opponent got into it recently during a meeting of the Texas Energy and Natural Resources Advisory Council. At issue was whether the council would approve a resolution on the windfall profits tax, as requested by Attorney General Mark White. The AG believes that President Reagan has not acted quickly enough on his campaign promise to do away with the tax. “I think we’ve been fooled by President Reagan, who said he was going to abolish the windfall profits tax,” White said. “We forgot to ask him when.” Clements said the attorney general had little room to talk because White had been slow to fight the tax in the courts. Clements wanted to substitute a plan the council approved about 18 months ago. The council’s resolution urged White to sue the federal government over the tax POLITICAL IN TELLIGENCE Tulia Herald Touted