> budge wrote:
>
> >I'm usually allergic to 'Texas' coloquiallisms (one reason I
> >find Jim Hightower painful to listen to)
>
> How's that stuff play in Texas?
Well, not so hot in a state that every statewide office is held by a Republican. But he was once state Ag. Commissioner in a state where that office in some ways has more power than the Gov. (TX has a very weak Governorship.) But that was before my time, I moved here in '88 and he'd already been out of office for a few years when I got here.
But the cornpone shit, isn't just him, a lot of politicians here talk like that. Hell, there's a pretty well known trauma physician here that runs the level one nationally recognized trauma dept. and does spots on local teevee. His name is Dr. Red Duke (i'm not making this up), and he sounds a lot like Hightower.
> I've always suspected that Hightower's act was mainly
> designed to impress Yankees (Ivins too). Is it? Or does
> he have fans in Texas?
Hightower, I think, comes by it a little more honestly, but yes, I think he plays it up for Yankees. Ivins, OTOH, grew up here in Houston, in a very nice neighborhood, the daughter of a corporate lawyer. She went to Smith, and worked at the NYT. I'n very confident she didn't talk or write that way when she applied to either of those august institutions. Her's is definitely 100% put on.
-- no Onan