Gary M. Polland

Gary Michael Polland (born September 10, 1950) is a Houston attorney who is the former elected chairman of the Harris County Republican Party (1996-2002) and the publisher of the "Texas Conservative Review", which he issues periodically on the Internet. From 2001-2006, the politically conservative Polland cohosted with the liberal commentator David A. Jones a weekly one-hour program "Texas Politics - The Real Deal" on Houston Media Source. In 2006, Jones and Polland created a new show at the Public Broadcasting Service outlet in Houston, "THE CONNECTION Red, White & Blue", a half-hour discussion and interview show on Friday evenings at 8 p.m.

Harris County Republican

Under Polland's tenure as the Harris County Republican chairman, the GOP continued to win relatively comfortable majorities in the county even if Republican candidates lost in the Houston corporate limits in contested races. Polland earned national recognition for his party's success from such publications as the national conservative weekly Human Events, which called him the most effective party chairman in the nation. Other publications in which Polland has been cited are the "American Spectator", the "Houston Chronicle", and "Inside Houston Magazine". Polland has been politically close to such Republicans as Karl Rove, the former chief advisor to U.S. President George W. Bush; U.S. Senators John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison, Governor Rick Perry, Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst, and Attorney General Greg Abbott. He is a leading fundraiser for Republicans, having secured more than $3.5 million for candidates and causes between 1996 and 2006.

In 2004, Polland led the Texas Legislative Mission to Israel. He serves on the national boards of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the Jewish Policy Center, and the board of the Susan B. Anthony List, a pro-life political action committee. He is also the vice chairman of the United Jewish Communities. Though he is himself Jewish, Polland has worked closely with the conservative Christian community within Harris County on political matters. Polland resigned in protest from the Anti-Defamation League after the group criticized conservative Christian activism.

Polland has been honored by the Republican National Hispanic Assembly and the National Federation of Pachyderm Clubs. He was designated "Reaganite of the Year" by the Reagan Alumni Association. He has written "A Time for Choosing 35 Years Later", an update of Reagan's classic speech from October 27, 1964. Mrs. Polland tells the story of her husband's infatuation with Reagan since Polland, at the age of 14, heard the speech that Reagan delivered on behalf of the Republican presidential nominee, Senator Barry M. Goldwater. She said that Polland often played Reagan tapes in the early 1970s, long before it was clear that Reagan might become president at some point in the future.

Polland is also active in the interest group Citizens Lowering Our Unfair Taxes (CLOUT), which seeks property tax relief in Texas. CLOUT finds that "appraisal creep" has hit Texas homeowners as hard as those in the Northeast, his native Illinois, and in Wisconsin.

Running for the state Senate, 2002

Polland ran unopposed to a second term as Harris County chairman in 2000, but he stepped down in 2002 to contest the District 17 seat in the Texas State Senate in the March party primary. He lost badly to Kyle Janek, M.D., who went on to win the seat in the November general election. Janek polled 8,495 votes (68 percent) to Polland's 3,967 ballots (32 percent). In a post-election letter to supporters, Polland wrote: "We ran a strong campaign based on our common conservative philosophy. We faced an incumbent [state representative] who was the darling of the Austin lobby. We were outspent at least two-to--one . . . " Janek was reelected in 2004 and 2006.

Polland won the support of many well-known Texas and national Republicans in his Senate bid including former presidential contender Steve Forbes, the publisher from New Jersey, former Texas Secretary of State George W. Strake, Jr., former U.S. Vice President Dan Quayle, Virginia Republican activist Morton Blackwell, and former presidential candidate and director of the Campaign for Working Families Gary Bauer.

In 2004, Polland contributed to African American Democrat Al Green in Green's successful primary challenge to 9th Congressional District U.S. Representative Chris Bell. Green, a lawyer and justice of the peace, won the nomination -- and thereafter the general election -- in the heavily black district, 13,920 (65 percent) to Bell's 7,125 ballots (33 percent). Another 2 percent of the vote went to a third candidate.) Bell, ironically would emerge two years later as the Texas Democratic gubernatorial nominee. Polland's donation to Green became an issue in that race, and many Democrats castigated Green for accepting Polland's support.

Polland's warning to the GOP, 2007

In January 2007, Polland warned the Texas Republican Party that it could face serious decline in the 2008 elections, if the conservative grassroots are not activated and brought into the mainstream of the party. He outlined four problems of the state's majority party:

(1) The decline in GOP straight-ticket voting

(2) The Democratic resurgence nationally in the 2006 midterm elections

(3) Weakened fundraising by the state and local GOP organizations

(4) A decline in general voter interest and in Republican activism within Texas.

He further outlined five proposals to reactivate party fortunes:

(1) The Republicans must increase their membership by finding "ideological issue allies" and recruiting them into the party.

(2) The GOP base must be "listened to . . . and [not] be put in the garage after [an election] , only to be brought out for the next election."

(3) The Republicans must have "zero tolerance for our candidates and officeholders when it comes to corruption and ethics."

(4) Texas should adopt a Virginia-style system where party grassroots nominate candidates who can then advance to a primary. Otherwise, he claimed that the "big special interest money picks the candidates as opposed to the conservative GOP base." Polland said "big money can buy nominations by television, radio, and mail and can overwhelm a conservative candidate and ignore the party during the primary."

(5) To remain in the majority, Texas Republicans must be "effective in office. We need to demonstrate that we as conservatives can run a limited efficient government, which controls spending and reduces the out-of-control tax burden (or government mandatory fees which are in essence the same thing)."

Can the Texas Republican majority continue?

Texas Republicans have held majorities of all statewide offices, including judgeships, since the 1996 elections, with the exception of one Democratic judge who resigned early in his last term and was then replaced by a Republican appointee of Governor George W. Bush.

However, in 2006, the Texas GOP polled only 39 percent of the popular vote for governor, but because the other 61 percent was divided among four other candidates, incumbent Rick Perry won a second full term. In addition to the decline in the raw vote for governor, the GOP lost two of its twenty-one seats in the United States House of Representatives from Texas: the seat vacated by the sudden resignation of former Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Sugar Land in Fort Bend and Harris counties, amid an indictment for campaign finance irregularities, and the defeat of the only Hispanic Republican member from Texas, former U.S. Representative Henry Bonilla of San Antonio. The state GOP also lost five seats in the 150-member Texas House of Representatives. The GOP entered 2003 with eighty-eight state House members, its first majority since Reconstruction. It began 2007 with eighty-one seats. That number then dropped to eighty with a defection from Republican to Democrat. In addition, the GOP lost the district attorney's position in Dallas County for the first time in twenty years. Polland claims that unless the national GOP addresses its decline from 2006, it is also facing a loss of the White House in 2008.

The Pollands reside in the Bellaire section of Houston.

References

*http://www.texasconservativereview.com/
*http://www.dataheaven.com/polland/
*http://www.houstonpbs.org/site/PageServer?pagename=con_rwb_david_gary_bio
*http://www.utexas.edu/student/txunion/alumni/tuac/?tuac=members
*http://www.sba-list.org/
*http://elections.sos.state.tx.us/elchist.exe
*http://www.houstontexaslaw.com/houston_texas_law.htm
*http://66.218.69.11/search/cache?p=gary+m.+polland&toggle=1&ei=UTF-8&fr=yfp-t-501&u=www.clouttexas.com/&w=gary+m+polland&d=MwfYGUVuOH5w&icp=1&.intl=us
*http://www.harrisvotes.com/HISTORY/000314/reprslt.htm
*http://www.political.com/gossip-arc/0624.htmlhttp://www.dataheaven.com/polland/saying.htm