Four Texas Greens File for 2018

The basic information is up on txgreens.org. It may be moved to a different page on that site before long. It may also be updated in the next few months. The page contains a link to an as-yet-incomplete profile of Janis Richards, who has filed to run for governor of Texas.

Jan Richards is all too aware of her name's similarity to Ann Richards. With so many Texans holding fond memories of Governor Ann, she is willing to milk that similarity for all it's worth. Jan is a bit of a wonk, as I've mentioned in this space—more the type to run a campaign than to speak from the stump—but from my observations she is as sincere a disillusioned Sandernista/converted Green as you're likely to meet.

Some Greenies may be disappointed that only four Greens applied to run. There are more self-identified Greens filing to run independently than within the Party label, understandable given the odds against regaining ballot access. I hope to have more information on that bunch in the next few days.

I can picture PDiddie not knowing whether to laugh or cry. I can hear the f-bombs raining from katija gruene's lips. As for myself, I'll figure out later how I feel about this.

A bigger disappointment is that no Greens stepped up to run for one of the six available positions on the State Supreme Court or Court of Criminal Appeals: The Democrats have once again left a vacancy, this time for CCA Place 8. If the Green Party manages to regain ballot access, having a candidate in a race with no Democrat virtually guarantees retaining that access for the next even-numbered year.

​The silver lining is that the Texas Greens are moving away from the Occupy the Ballot model of recent years, toward focusing on a small number of races for which the party can allocate its limited resources. That's how I intend to spin it, even though it's certainly not the main reasons the roster is so small.

Here are a few details worth knowing about the other candidates:

Jamar Osborne for Attorney General
Osborne was also the Green nominee for Attorney General in 2014. His 0.63% of the vote was below average for Greens that year, but he didn't run as robust a campaign as Martina Salinas (Railroad Commissioner) or Kenneth Kendrick (Agriculture Commissioner). Also, he faced a Democrat named Sam Houston, whose mission was to defeat Ken Paxton, so how ya gonna do in a situation like that?

Sadly, I barely know Osborne at all. We may have met at the 2014 state convention in Austin, but we didn't get to converse much. (That was the same convention at which Brandon Parmer, who filed for governor in 2014, did not show up but sent some friends to represent him.) There are some hints as to his legal mind available online, such as this and this.

George Reiter for Railroad Commissioner
Our historical RRC candidates are not available. Martina Salinas, the record-setting Texas Green candidate for percentage of the vote obtained in a four-way contest, is sitting this year out. Dammit. (Since I am also abstaining from running this year, I can sympathize.) Art Browning has moved out of state. The late, beloved Charlie Mauch is permanently unavailable. George Reiter, PhD, is taking a turn.

Reiter, a professor of physics at the University of Houston, has been active with the Harris County Green Party since before it officially existed. He is currently serving as a co-chair in Harris County, as he has done for more years than I can accurately recall. He ran for Congress to represent District 25 in 2002, back when that district was still in Metro Houston. He was going to run for something in 2016, but he backed out because he was still serving on the Programmers Board at KPFT, where he has hosted the public affairs program Thresholds.

Apart from subscribing to the Green canon on policy matters, Reiter's pet issues include some rather esoteric ones, such as ending violence against children (including spanking, yelling, and other forms of "discipline" that leave us scarred as adults). He also advocates a global effort to deploy solar power arrays on the moon and microwaving the electricity generated back to Earth, which could power global civilization far more efficiently than the same amount of collectors on Earth could.

James Partsch-Galvan for Congress, District 29
Gene Green is retiring after 26 years as the first and only representative from the 29th. A whole pack of LatinX Democrats, including three* named García, is lining up to take over the seat in this heavily LatinX district. Partsch-Galvan was on the ballot in 2016, taking garnering 1,453 votes (1.10%) in a low turnout race.

* (Oops, UPDATE: There are in fact only two Garcías running in the Democratic primary for TX-29, Roel and State Senator Sylvia.)

I have met Partsch-Galvan only a few times, as he is not a regular at Green meetings and events. He is far from orthodox in his Greendom, and more than a little extreme in his anti-Zionist rhetoric. In 1998, before HCGP was formed, he ran as a Libertarian in District 18, supported Ron Paul in 2012, and still leans Libertarian. Here is a souvenir from his 1998 candidate appearance on KPRC-TV.