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Weekly Newspaper and Tourism Guide for Ward County Trans Pecos, Big Bend of West Texas

Opinion

Aug. 20, 1998

Monahan's Well


By Jerry Curry
The first time I talked with Garry Mauro was more than 15
years ago when I was a hired gun for the San Antonio
Express-News where, in that era, we took the obligation of a
newspaper seriously: "Spell the names right and raise
hell!"

I had done a series of stories on the Houston downtown
office building eruption in which several politicians,
Republican and Democrat, had a stake. Many made money
without investing their own before the Houston bubble burst
and red ink flowed like lava. Garry was not one of them
although he was caught in the maelstrom of debts that
followed.

That was about the time my appendix busted and they ran me
into a San Antonio hospital to see if they could mop up the
mess. An old Army doctor did the work and I awakened the
next morning to the telephone in my hospital room ringing.
It was Garry Mauro, Land Commissioner of the State of Texas,
and he wanted to know how I was doing. At least one
co-worker at the time said Mauro was praying I'd be dead but
I prefer not to believe that. Garry Mauro, I believe to
this day, really was concerned about my health and I thanked
him then for the call and I thank him now. I survived and
was on the soccer pitch that Saturday, a move to which the
old Army doctor objected and which at least one soccer
associate considered somewhere between stupid and insane.

In the following years I talked with Garry Mauro several
times. I thought, and I said several times, Garry Mauro
ought to run for governor. But he never did. It was my
opinion at the time Garry Mauro was going to retire as
Texas Land Commissioner.

He and I made at least one mistake together. Both of us
supported Bill Clinton in his initial and successful run
for the White House. I have acknowledged that mistake. Garry
Mauro has not and I do not plan to hold Mauro's misplaced
loyalty to Clinton against him.

After all those years, Garry Mauro is finally running for
governor. His opponent is incumbent Republican George W.
Bush, who is as far ahead in the polls as the Green Bay
Packers were ahead of the Denver Broncos before the last
Super Bowl. Things do not look good for Garry Mauro in
this race but he has focused and is running hard.

Garry Mauro and I talked on the telephone back in July and
I asked him about his feelings on the decision by Bush's
criminal justice decision staff to deny federal funding to
the now defunct Permian Basin Drug Task Force and
effectively kill the regional attack on dope smugglers in
the Trans-Pecos and Permian Basin. Garry said he'd research
it. Politicians talk like that. I remember telling Garry
Mauro there weren't as many votes in West Texas as there
were in a couple of vacant lots in San Antonio or Houston
but I also said most of the voters in the Texas Outback
do vote and they might make a difference in a close election.

Garry stopped by Odessa this past weekend in his run for
governor. Garry has now researched the issue. The decision
not to fund the Permian Basin Drug Task Force was made by
Nancy Hugon, who was director of the governor's criminal
justice division when the decision was made not to fund on
June 1. Hugon has since resigned.

Garry Mauro now has an issue that will work in West Texas.

He wonders why his GOP opponent has not apologized to every
citizen in the Trans Pecos and the Permian Basin for ending
the regional war on dope.

Mauro says Bush fired Hugon but won't apologize.

Garry Mauro wonders whose side the governor is on - the dope
smugglers' or the people's.

Garry Mauro is gaining on Bush.

And it's a long time until November.

You gotta obey the rules


Furor raged and still rages in Grandfalls over violations
of the state's Open Meetings Act in the town's city
government. A mayor has been removed.

All elected governmental bodies in Texas, including the
state's general assembly, must follow this law and its
twin, the Open Records Act, which applies to records kept by
all government entities, elected, appointed or hired. Both
laws are designed to allow voters who hire members of the
various elected bodies the opportunity to keep an eye on
their employees.

Following the Open Meetings and Open Records laws is not
difficult if elected representatives of the people hold the
interests of their constituents first which is what the
majority of them said when they sought office. There are
nuances, obviously, in both laws. Still, most is common
sense.

If elected officials will remember only a part of both laws,
they will avoid both scandal and censure by the people that
elected them and who, in the case of civil service workers,
pay them.

Public business is public. Public records are public.

Any attempt to circumvent this is definitely immoral and
probably unlawful.

Most elected bodies (Ward County Commissioners Court,
Monahans City Council, etc., etc., etc.) usually have no
trouble with this. But it seems some do not understand.

Clinton lies inappropriate


Bill Clinton stepped to the cameras the other night and said
he really did have an inappropriate relationship with a
White House intern. Then he said it was time for the nation
to put this whole affair aside and look at an economy he
says is booming and acknowledge he really is a wonderful
president. Bill Clinton said his inappropriate relationship
with the White House intern was now a matter for himself,
his wife and his daughter to resolve. It was and is no one
else's business. Having acknowledged the inappropriate
relationship, Bill Clinton also agreed he had been telling
semi-lies for at least seven months about the inappropriate
relationship, lies that included denials in a civil court
deposition in reference to the inappropriate relationship,
which is perjury, which is a felony in Texas but is not even
a misdemeanor in Washington D.C., where perjury appears to
be required if one aspires to high office.

It is time for Bill Clinton to confesses his inappropriate
relationship with the Chinese government, his inappropriate
relationship with billion dollar a year contributors to his
campaigns, his inappropriate relationship with thieves, his
inappropriate relationship with the American people, to whom
he lies repeatedly.



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Copyright 1998 by Ward Newspapers, Inc.
Joe Warren, Publisher
107 W. Second St., Monahans TX 79756
Phone 915-943-4313, FAX 915-943-4314
e-mail monnews@ultravision.net

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Copyright 1998 by Ward Newspapers Inc.