Thoughts from the Campaign Trail

Why are politicians weird? Because politics is insane.

I have block-walked beneath the gibbous waxing moon. I have broken bread with men who would rather spit on me. And I have kissed babies who were, let’s face it, ugly.

A close friend of mine walks about 10 miles a day at his job in a micro-chip factory, running between computers and manufacturing systems. I asked him if it ever got annoying, and he simply said, “It’s my job.”

I now understand what he means. Elections are all about getting in front of voters, and you can do that one of two ways. Either buy all the signs, postcards, and matchbooks you can, or hit the pavement all day, every day. And the larger the election, the more people you have to meet. I’ve got roughly 350,000 folks in my district we call Precinct 3. Since I don’t have the collected corporate interests of the county in my back pocket, I walk a lot, every day. It’s my job.

This is the world of politics – the challenges of running for office. It’s hard at 4:30 in the morning when you’ve had one hand’s worth of sleep and can’t believe you promised to drive thirty miles for breakfast. But it’s all worth it when someone says, “My hard-core Republican friend said you were the nicest Democrat she’d ever met and that I just HAD to vote for you!”

Every day brings new challenges, from learning that yes, you actually have to ask for money from people, to an opponent who won’t debate you because he knows you have better answers than he does. Whether you’re campaigning for a month or two years, there is a never-ending stream of people who are waiting to tell you that what you did yesterday was wrong. Fortunately there are several people who don’t mind helping figure out what you can do tomorrow to make it better. But in the end of any election, the toughest part is realizing that 70,000 people who hardly know you will pull a lever to decide how nice of a person you are, and how much they trust you.

I Walked The Line

Fourteen miles on a train is pretty much enough time to make a few phone calls and drink your tea. Fourteen miles on foot is quite a bit longer.

I left the crowd at the Parker DART station at 6:40am on Saturday morning with five supporters who felt as strongly about the need for rail expansion as I did. Even at that early hour, the Plano Parker station was full of people who were travelling to Dallas for a day’s work or arriving in Plano for their job. With 750,000 citizens in Collin County, never a day goes by without industry making its mark.

We walked along the path of the proposed rail line, talking to voters and concerned citizens about the desire to see mass transit grow beyond the city of Plano. Our path took us along the side of the old Southern Pacific Rail - a line of train tracks that extends all the way north into Sherman. DART purchased the entire line in April of 1988, with an eye towards the future. They understood back then that as Dallas, Denton, and McKinney grew, they would need more than simple bus transportation to get them past the year 2000.

We talked about the growth patterns in the North Dallas and Collin County area. Plano was all horse ranches and cornfields when my family moved to Texas in ’76, but now it’s corporate headquarters for several global companies like JC Penny, Frito Lay, EDS, and Cisco. Collin County continues to grow north, with McKinney, Frisco, and Allen passing around the title of "Fastest Growing City In The Nation" over the last five years. The next wave of super-growth is already started in Melissa, Anna, Prosper, Princeton and Celina.

In the end we agreed that cities could not sustain the growth without rail and bus transportation. Will the DART Rail system ever rival the transportation systems of Atlanta or Washington, D.C.? There’s no need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to mass transit - the key is simply to compare what we’re doing to the rest of the world and find what works best for us.

It was just past noon when we arrived at St Mark’s Church in McKinney to a welcoming crowd. People are excited about the chance to make a difference in their world - the idea that we can create change in our own society has once again caught fire in America. A few swigs of Gatorade and a pat on the back, and I felt right as rain.

I stood on Sharlene’s pickup and reminded the crowd, "A few years from now when this rail line is finished, you’ll be able to ride in ten minutes what took us all morning to walk. And you can tell your friends that you were here. You helped bring the DART Rail to Collin County for our future!"

Thanks to my fellow walkers: Julie and David Cuniglio, Carman Marshall, Larry and Lou Ann Jackson, Ang and Christian, and Edward and Winter Manuel (my kids). Thanks to everyone who came out in support of what we’re trying to accomplish for our future. Thanks also to my wife Suzi, my manager Sharlene, and my friend John for your support - I couldn’t do it without you!