It's Hard Out There For A Christianist
A longish feature in the Texas Observer is billed as an expose of Warren Chisum, the fundamentalist Republican who runs the State House Appropriations Committee. Atheists, to your bunkers! Use your freedoms while you still can! Chisum is going to… well, he's going to…
[W]hat horrors from the far-right wish list would Chisum use his seat of power to extract? In the end, it seems, not many. He has not used the chairmanship to ramrod through his own bills, although they appear to have made it further along in the process than in past sessions. Chisum authored the abortion-trigger ban (which died in committee with a whopping fiscal note), some bills that encourage strong marriages (which were watered down by amendments on the House floor), and a bill that would require high schools to offer elective Bible classes (to which the Public Education Committee added teacher training, a textbook other than the Bible, the course will be elective for schools rather than required, and an established curriculum so as to ensure the book would be taught as literature rather than religion).
I'm sympathetic to the reporter here, Megan Headly. I've sat down with politicians who had long records of crazy statements (*cough* Tom Coburn *cough*) and gold-plated memberships in fundamentalist churches and come up dry. The story isn't "how will this dastardly Christian surprise us all with his… secret plan?" It's more like "Boy, fundamentalist power is on the wane."