U.S. ELECTIONS | Guide to the 2008 Election
18 December 2007
Health Care and Iraq Preoccupy Texas Voters
Southwest Texas suffers high rates of uninsured, high military casualties
San Antonio -- The political season has kicked off in southwest Texas as those seeking election announce their candidacies, raise funds and take the pulse of the region.
Texans say health care and Iraq are their top domestic and foreign concerns, and candidates are responding.
“Health care continues to be the main issue, with the exception of those international issues such as Iraq,” says Representative Ciro Rodriguez, incumbent Democratic Party congressman of the Texas 23rd Congressional District. “Health care continues to be the Number 1 issue that we, as a country, need to come to grips with.”
Rodriguez reminded a recent breast cancer awareness forum in San Antonio that one-quarter of Texans have no health insurance. That percentage of uninsured in its population is higher than in any other state.
However, Rodriguez told USINFO the United States is probably not ready for a government-run, universal health care system.
“It depends on who the next president is, but it will be difficult to pull that off,” he said. “I’m really convinced that if you get everyone to participate, the private sector and everybody coming together, that’s the only way [to succeed]. Otherwise, it’s so easy to pit one against the other.”
Health care also dominated discussions at a San Antonio seminar organized by the AARP (formerly called the American Association of Retired Persons), the nation’s largest advocacy group for senior citizens. Several area politicians sent staff members to the event.
“We want our elected representatives to know that we don’t want to live in a country or a state where any one of us is just one catastrophic illness away from bankruptcy,” said Joe Sanchez, associate Texas state director of AARP.
Most of the speakers, who represented a cross section of political views and economic classes, advocated a greater government role in health care.
Amanda Garcia of the League of United Latin American Citizens summed up the views of many: “We have to push for universal care. We, the most powerful nation, are being outdone by England, by France and Spain. They have it. Why can’t we have it?”
TEXANS FILL THE MILITARY RANKS
The chief foreign policy issue on the minds of Texans is the war in Iraq.
Southwest Texas has a long tradition of military service, and the region hosts several Air Force and Army bases.
Bexar County Democratic Party Chairwoman Carla Vela told USINFO she hears from many constituents about the Iraq war and the toll it has taken.
“Texas has more soldiers wounded, disabled or killed than any other state,” she said. “And most of them are Hispanic from the [Rio Grande] valley. These are proud people and they believe in their country and they want to serve.”
Vela says the message she hears from voters is they want the war ended, and they want the needs of military veterans to be met.
The Iraq war has motivated a group called Big Bend Veterans for Peace to establish a West Texas memorial to troops killed in the conflict. Organizers say a tombstone is being mounted for each of the more than 350 Texans who have died so far.
The monument, outside the town of Alpine, is called Arlington Southwest, a reference to the Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, where the remains of service members are buried.
One of the organizers, Vietnam War veteran Paul Schafer, told the weekly San Antonio Current newspaper the objective is to support the troops, but not the war.
“In the past, it’s meant if you support our troops you also support U.S. foreign policy,” he said. “What we’re trying to make clear is that that’s not true. We do support the troops and we want them to have support when they come back. It’s just a strong reminder, a physical reminder, that these represent men and women, many of them very young, who don’t have a future. They are dead. They are gone.”
A few kilometers from Arlington Southwest is Sul Ross State University, where some different opinions have been heard.
Spike Miller is a reporter for the campus newspaper, the Skyline. In a column in defense of the war, he quoted an e-mail from a friend in the U.S. Marine Corps serving in Iraq who said: “We’re helping these people every day to have what we take for granted in the States.”
Miller continued: “Senators and presidential candidates would have us believe that the troops in the Middle East are dying for no reason.
“What they fail to realize is that soldiers … see the war firsthand, know the dangers and still would willingly die fighting to protect not just our safety, but democracy and everything it stands for.
“In closing. I’ll just say this: I get to sleep safely every night because of the troops willing to pay the ultimate price for our freedom.”
Miller and Schafer represent two poles of the debate that will continue across Texas, and the nation, throughout the election year.
For more information, see U.S. Elections.
