The disaster that is Texas independent gubernatorial candidate “Grandma” Carole Strayhorn is the theme for Democratic nominee Chris Bell this week. His “Strayhorn Reality tour” hits Beaumont, Bryan-College Station and Waco today, after stops in El Paso and Houston earlier in the week. Bell’s latest public service crusade is to alert the public just how scary Strayhorn is. Here are the latest headlines from the stump:
One tough Grandma has been real tough for Texas’s healthcare system. In 2003, Grandma forced 213,070 children off CHIP so the state could save $231 million in the short term. No savings were ever realized, primarily due to the billion dollars that Texas forfeited in matching federal funds. Added burden also includes the financial and human cost of children seeking emergency room treatment in lieu of proper medical insurance.
Strayhorn orchestrated an $899 million out-of-state outsource that cost 2,900 full-time state employees their jobs and an additional 15,000 children their CHIP coverage.
Grandma also tried to cut $116.6 million and eliminate 5,465 jobs from the Department of Human Services.
Thanks to pro-voucher and million-dollar contributor extraordinaire James Leininger, Strayhorn has also pushed for school vouchers. As recently as February 2006 she said she “still supports vouchers.”
Grandma is also to blame for skyrocketing tuition rates. She’s the one that got the ball rolling on a 69% increase that has cost Texas students an extra $750 million.
Chris Bell believes that college should be affordable and that budgets are more than numbers on a line item. They are moral documents that reflect our shared moral priorities as a society.
Grandma doesn’t care about her kids, but Chris does.