Media Articles

Dallas police Senior Cpl. Mark Nix took his life into his hands when he pursued a suspected murderer earlier this year, and died because of it.

Fellow officer Jeremy Borchardt, another senior corporal in Dallas, was wounded in a hostage situation last summer.

Republicans in Texas and across the nation are looking for a formula to pull their party out of the doldrums.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry says he has the proper strategy to win in 2008.

AUSTIN — As someone born and raised on a cotton farm, protecting private property rights is part of my political DNA.

Proceeds to go to Boy Scouts of America; Perry to start book tour in New York

A book by Texas Gov. Rick Perry, published this month, meshes memories of his boyhood in rural West Texas with a fierce portrayal of what he calls indefensible efforts by the American Civil Liberties Union and liberal elites to turn the nation away from traditional values and faith in God.

How Lone Star Republicans stopped abusive medical-malpractice lawsuits

That high lonesome sound you hear ululating over the wide-open Texas prairies isn’t coyotes — it’s hungry trial lawyers, forced to subsist on 40 percent of a litigation pie that has gotten a little bit smaller of late.

When Texas Republicans finally took control of the Texas legislature in 2003, tort reform was among their cardinal concerns. But legislation was only part of the fight. Several bare-knuckled political battles, the constitutional amendment known as Proposition 12, and five Rick Perry appointments to the state supreme court have entrenched a battery of reforms, including a cap on non-economic damages in medical-malpractice cases and several measures designed to keep frivolous lawsuits out of court in the first place. The guys in the ambulances are raising a joyful noise; the guys chasing behind are raising hell.

As Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton race around Ohio and Texas for tomorrow's primaries, they are telling a tale of economic woe. Yet the real story isn't how similar the two states are economically but how different. Texas has been prospering while Ohio lags, and the reasons are instructive about what works and what doesn't in economic policy.

There's no doubt times are tough in Ohio. The state has lost 200,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000, home foreclosures are soaring, and real family income is lower now than in 2000. Meanwhile, the Texas economy has boomed since 2004, with nearly twice the rate of new job creation as the rest of the nation. The nearby table compares the states over a decade or so.

When budgets begin to tighten, many state politicians start to talk tax hikes. So credit Texas Governor Rick Perry for cutting taxes this week as a way to keep his state as a national leader in job creation. Mr. Perry suspended the state unemployment insurance "replenishment" tax for the rest of the year on grounds that government doesn't need the money but employers do.

Gov. Rick Perry said Monday he was ordering tax cuts to about 370,000 Texas businesses because of the state's strong economy and low unemployment.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is determined not to let the Boy Scouts of America become the latest casualty of what he calls the ongoing cultural battle between traditional American values and the secular left.

In his new book, "On My Honor: Why the American Values of the Boy Scouts Are Worth Fighting For," Mr. Perry outlines the legal challenges over the Boy Scouts' refusal to abandon positions on gays and religion. He said the organization should not succumb to pressure to change.

Let’s talk about your new book, “On My Honor,” which draws on your experience as an Eagle Scout and champions the values of the Boy Scouts of America, to whom you are donating your royalties. Yes, to their legal-defense fund.

Which has been fighting the A.C.L.U., to keep gays out of the scouts. Why do you see that as a worthy cause? I am pretty clear about this one. Scouting ought to be about building character, not about sex. Period. Precious few parents enroll their boys in the Scouts to get a crash course in sexual orientation.