Willie Nelson helped raise money for Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, center, with Bonnie Raitt at an Austin concert, one reason a state senator calls the renaming a political deal.
Posted on 04/07/2005 6:37:53 AM PDT by Arrowhead1952
GOP senators say keep Nelson's name off Texas 130 in their districts
By Ben Wear
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Thursday, April 07, 2005
Willie Nelson Turnpike? Not so fast.
Legislation to name the Texas 130 turnpike from Georgetown to Creedmoor after the man who put Austin music on the map cleared its first committee Wednesday. But it lost more than 18 miles in the process, and there were signs that some Republicans might not be so comfortable honoring the well-known Democrat.
Even with a toll road.
Texas 130, under construction now and scheduled to open in 2007, will be 49 miles long. And state Sen. Gonzalo Barrientos' bill as filed would have named the entire length for Nelson.
But when Barrientos, an Austin Democrat, unveiled Senate Bill 802 to the Transportation and Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday, he said that Republican Sens. Steve Ogden and Jeff Wentworth told him they didn't want the parts of the road in their districts to carry Nelson's name.
That trimmed about 17 miles off the north end in Williamson County, represented by Ogden who hails from Bryan-College Station, and the southerly mile-and-a-half in the small piece of Travis County in San Antonian Wentworth's bailiwick.
Thus foreshortened, the bill cleared the committee on a 7-0 vote, with Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano, present but not voting. Wentworth, who had to leave for another committee, tried to leave a "no" vote in writing, but that requires unanimous consent of the committee, and Barrientos torpedoed it.
Some senators indicated later that the bill might have trouble mustering the 21 votes — two-thirds of the Senate — needed to come up for passage.
The Senate has 19 Republicans and 12 Democrats.
Asked about their reservations about Nelson, Ogden said he doesn't favor naming roads after people who are still alive and declined further comment. Wentworth, meanwhile, made it clear he has several concerns.
"Let's be candid: This is a political deal," Wentworth said, Nelson "was out there having fund-raisers, raising money for (Democratic presidential hopeful) Dennis Kucinich against President Bush, and that was just last year."
Wentworth said he has a general leaning as well against naming roads for living people. He was in the Senate and Ogden in the House when the Legislature in 1995 and 1997 named roads for the first President Bush and former U.S. Sen. Lloyd Bentsen, both very much alive.
"To compare a former president of the United States with a country singer, surely that's self-explanatory," Wentworth said.
The Legislature, in that same 1995 bill honoring Bentsen, named a road in Brazoria County after Nolan Ryan, at that point only just retired from his baseball career.
Wentworth and Ogden both voted for that bill. Ryan, a Republican, has never served as president of the United States.
Of course, Nelson didn't strike out 5,714 major-league hitters. On the other hand, Ryan has no gold records or duets with Julio Iglesias.
But Ryan, unlike Nelson, also hasn't had any trouble with the Internal Revenue Service or brushes with the law over marijuana. To Wentworth, at least, Nelson's past matters.
"All of that figures into it, from my standpoint," Wentworth said. "He's not exactly a role model."
Nelson was in Ireland, according to Barrientos, and unable to comment on all of this.
But Barrientos said that he had talked with the singer about the possible renaming and that Nelson "was kind of shy, even a little bashful about it. He said it would be an honor.
Sen. Todd Staples, R-Palestine, chairman of the transportation committee, had a question about that conversation:
"Did you happen to mention to him that it was a toll road being named?"
Bill Clinton. Toby Keith.
I dunno.
Willie's a well-known kook Dem and convicted tax evader...just the person the people of Texas, who vote 65% Republican, need to honor with a freeway built with their tax dollars. NO THANKS.
We already have a freeway here in Dallas named after that Dem Disaster LBJ.
Name the TOLL BOOTH after the democrat! LOLOLOL
I love Willie. But, dump that ole outlaw.
Name that stretch of pay road for someone like Medal of Honor recipient MSgt. Roy Benevidez.
As a redneck-libertarian-conservative, I still like Willie.
Screw his politics. He's a great musician. The fact that he is a liberal Dem and a tax evader is gravy. It points out their hypocrisy.
Shut up and sing ping....
This is the kind of stuff that is easily spun to make the GOP look meanspirited.
Not to mention that Willie claims he smoked pot on the White House roof when he was a guest there.
Austin is the BerkleyofTexas!
What was it that Poncho said?
He is a rot already in Texas. Deport the elitist leftist toad.
Great? ...I like a few of his songs, but Willie is not a great musician.
I hadn't heard that before. (laughing)
I sincerely hope it's true.
LOL.
You've just named my 2 at the top of my own personal Top-10 most obnoxious, most self serving people.
Bill Clinton, OK, that's obvious. And I know, I know. Toby supports the troops. He writes songs about them.
Of course, before he figured out that he could make a ton of money singing about soldiers, his greatest hits included such masterpieces as "What do you think of me now", and "I wanna talk about me". Anybody see the connection between the songs? Sing it, shall we...mememememe. I think he's really cynical, but that's JMO.
I don't know about y'all, but I feel much better after that rant.
Willie got busted a few years ago passed out in his car outside Waco. Pot was on the dash. I don't think he's been completely sober for more than 1/2 hour since 1968.
What's got 48 arms, 48 legs, 24 heads, and 30 teeth? The front row at a Willie Nelson concert.
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