Okay I see what happened now, evidently plenty people thought checkers was being played instead of chess. I was a very young man when all of this took place, but I was also very politically astute and in tune with matters pertaining to the black community. What both of you are saying has merit, but let's be real about it. All congressman miss votes. That was one of a small number of phony issues used as a reason oppose him. He could come off as stand-offish at times though, so you'll get no argument from me on that one. Also, I will concede that Craig made some moves that made him politically vulnerable. Now for the real reason Craig lost, it was because he had lost the support of the white downtown Houston business establishment. I remember reading in the old Houston Post that Ken Lay, yeah that Ken Lay synonymous with the now infamously defunct Enron, promised to do everything within his power to get Craig out of office. He promised and he succeeded by playing the oldest game white business elites play. He went and got a black woman to bump a black man plain and simple. I don't know how you missed that, but somehow you did. At the time Sheila Jackson-Lee was a lesser known city council person in Houston and had nowhere near the name recognition of Craig nor the money to fund a campaign for congressional office. Keep in mind Craig was an incumbent and highly respected by his colleagues in congress for his political acumen, and he had a political war chest to fund his campaign(s) as a result. I have no doubt Tom "The Hammer" Delay wanted Craig out of office just as much as Ken Lay, but for different reasons. I also find it completely plausible that with the two of them having aligned interest, getting rid of Craig, that money for her campaign came from both camps. As you said in one of your other post is was ugly. I wish I could find that old Houston Post article, but as you probably know that paper went under. I did find something though.
Mr. Lay, temperamentally a Republican, directed three of every four dollars Enron contributed to Congress to the Republican Party. But he dabbled with Democrats, too. In Houston, after an incumbent congressman irritated downtown business leaders, Mr. Lay led the fund-raising efforts to help elect a little-known challenger, Sheila Jackson-Lee, now one of the most liberal Democrats in Congress.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/03/u...n-his-influence-lost-lay-prepares-answer.html
