When I use words in this space like "decadent" or "depraved" or "incompetent" to describe Texas' ruling red regime, I'm trying to be precise, not just looking for variety in the sackful of invective I have to haul up here every week. After 20-plus years of mostly talking only to themselves, our ruling partiers have become soft, clumsy, clueless, lost their bearings, aren't sending their best people. I wouldn't describe in those same terms earlier eras of Texas GOP governance, from Ann Richards' loss to George W. Bush in 1994 through Rick Perry's third victory in 2010, both wave elections for Team Red. Those were troubling, difficult, frustrating years for many Texans, in ways Bush and Perry mostly ignored as they hitched their wagons to the Texas Miracle mule train. But what we face now is worse; the state Republican Party has fracked up the buried strata of its voters' psyches to let the fossilized gases of racism and avarice flare out, giving the regime a burst of energy as it bounces off the bottom of the well and flails about when required to be useful.