For Valley Democrats, A Time For Inward Reflection...Decades Of Nothing...Years of Corruption...

By EDUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ
Editor-In-Chief

RIO GRANDE VALLEY, Texas - Most eras in any region's history come with a few ups and downs. That's to be expected with Human Beings. Good times are balanced with bad times. Progress is measured with defeat. Leaders are painted with red paint or with black. The jury is the people.

And here, in the most southern geography of the country, the political era of note has long, long belonged to the Democratic Party. The Valley's culture is said to be unique. It is at once a slice of America and one of neighboring Mexico. The cultures meld in a noisy, happy, colorful daily lifestyle that speaks to the struggle of the poor and the ever-whipped. There are some wealthy, but most residents could be said live the desperate grind of not knowing where the next meal is coming from, where the next job will surface, when the paycheck will stop stretching, when it will all come tumbling down, accompanied by a sea of sincere tears and sky-high regrets. It is a Life accepted and Life handed-over, to the hopes of religion and the schemes of the criminals.

Lately, some of the more-creative criminals have come from the leadership of the region's Democratic Party, a political umbrella with a  long, crooked handle and, again lately, a ragged sun guard. Democrats here are on the ropes in more ways than one. They have seen their flag-bearers take the wrong road, walk the path of humiliation to the courthouse and accept punishment of the sort reserved for abusers, thieves, burglars and drunks.

Perhaps it is time someone grabbed the party's reins and turned the wagon around. Or maybe it's too late. The danged thing is over the cliff. You'd think so after reading a year's worth of the local newspapers. County leaders off to prison. A macho sheriff outbound in shackles and forwarded to a prison in the South. A miserable state judge humbled like a peon caught stealing. A pathetic former state representative upbraided in front of his wife. More are said to be thisclose to taking that same perp walk. It's a Goddamned shame, but there it is in color on local television.

Nevermind the river of alcohol and the wanton adultery and the hidden fraud and the petty obfuscations that forever surface in local governance. Nevermind the lovely, golden promises made and forgotten, broken and abandoned. Nevermind the brutal pain. Leadership here is not about leading; it is about leading oneself to the kitty, to the bounty, to the treasury, to the purse. The price paid by the citizenry is progress. There is none. This Democratic Party is rotten to the core. Here, it plays as the Big Dream sold as something to be expected, desired and awaited. It is a wet dream for everyone except the leadership, the politicians. Someone is being undressed at this very moment. Someone is being taken advantage of, being raped and turned out into the cold, darkened night after a muted physical plundering. As song, it carries the lyrics of Hell. As tune, it is the worst of violins, notes stirring only in that well-known cavity of life, notes exploding but never heard, felt, but never heard, never understood.

The party's roll is well-known:  State Senator Eddie Lucio, Jr., State Rep. Rene Oliveira, former Cameron County Judge Gilberto Hinojosa, District Attorney Armando Villalobos, Sheriff Omar Lucio. All alleged leaders and none answerable to the community. You can add Republican Cameron County Judge Carlos Cascos to the pile of do-nothings. He was a Democrat long before he turned Republican, and everybody knows that he is savvy on the culture of the Texas-Mexico border. Cascos has done nothing, himself, other than get elected - much like the others who seek office in the area's time-honored tradition of doing for themselves and to Hell with the populace.

Not that the poverty-stricken Valley should look to the cruel Republican Party, however. That would be taking the bitterest of medicines. The Libertarian Party is a viable option. But that particular party frowns on most government, its philosophy being that less government is better government. That goes wholehog against the Valley's "government entitlement" addiction, so...

Perhaps its time for a local convention of sorts, some mass gathering to take the Democratic Party to task, to scare the Hell out of it by way of serious threats, like outright abandondonment. It is a sick party and it will take some serious surgery to bring it back to honest life.

There are few other options. It's rage and revolution or more of the same - the same being being led down the road of perdition and that familiar video on local TV news showing your latest local official taking his priest to an arraignment and then being led to jail...

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