The Gizzard of Darkness

"Flapping your arms can be flying..." - Robert K. Hall

By DUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ
The Paz Files

HARLINGEN, Texas - Around here, they like to say that all it takes to start a political fight is for someone to treat someone else like a Vietnamese. That "I'm-better-than-you" game lives in Harlingen as it never has lived anywhere else. Residents fight for the smallest, rottenest of morsels as if to not do it is to die. They take sides and then have trouble sleeping.

Such is the street dance these days in the contest for a largely powerless position on the Harlingen City Commission, namely the seat for District 1. That lady in the photo atop this story wants the job badly. She has two declared opponents, a former city police chief known for his rants against the Catholic church and its many local practitioners and a man who already has served on the commission, but who comes burdened with the fact that he once welshed on paying child support following a divorce.

You'd think they'd fight for better candidates, but life in a small pond is weird, and often beyond weird. That's Gail Moore in the photo above, a transplant from Kentucky who claims some service to her former community and an upfront fondness for her new home - this struggling town of some 70,000 denizens not on the border, but just about. Ms. Moore has served her new home in a variety of capacities, including membership in that thankless and mountainous effort of beautifying dusty Harlingen. She is said to be the favorite in the contest, although backers of all three candidates claim that assignation.

Former HPD Chief Danny Castillo, no relation to the Pope, arrives bearing some heavy baggage. His critics say he was less than spectacular as the chief of police and they pretty much down his political flight by associating him to the so-called local Old Guard, a group said to be comprised of aging Anglos who wish to do anything but cede power to the larger Hispanic community. To be fair, Castillo is only the latest Oreo to help the powers-that-be tame his ethnic community.

The third candidate, J.J. Gonzalez, is the only one who has experience of serving on the city commission. He, however, once balked at helping his ex-wife support his children, a sin said to be unforgivable in the Catholic culture. Gonzalez also has the shame of having called the city attorney while a city commissioner for help in bailing out of jail, a request deemed completely wimpish by local Macho men.

So far, it is early in the race, about a month and a half before the vote, but already charges of carpetbagging have been lodged against Ms. Moore, with her critics saying she is out of her element in Harlingen. Some have called her tiny Kentucky enclave a little more than a dressed-up neighborhood association. She wants to move larger - and much more diverse - Harlingen forward, although her experience with a Hispanic constituency is, really, non-existent. To Harlingenites, Kentucky may as well be Nigeria.

Former Chief Castillo has said little, other than announce his candidacy. And, who knows, he may yet issue declarations against everything from the horrible shape of city golf courses (his passion) to the architecture of the local Catholic churches he is said to despise. Castillo's reputation as a do-nothing administrator may also doom his bid, but, as in religion, politics also grants miracles. The ex-chief did not go out quietly when he resigned earlier this year, leading some to say his campaign may be nothing more than an attempt to get back at his former bosses - a well-known tactic within the Rio Grande Valley's vindictive labor force. Castillo is retired. Boredom, then, also may be playing into this flirtation.

Candidate J.J. Gonzalez seems to be the odd duck here. In a part of America where the culture speaks eloquently to the manliness of maintaining the family at all costs, he is among the thousands who have walked away from a marriage with a grudge. Someone should ask him who is supporting his kids these days. Public service efforts that come carrying such lousy killer baggage are not that uncommon in America, yet something tells me J.J. Gonzalez thinks he is above it all - parenting included.

The race will be decided by the district's voters, but it's pretty damned clear that this trio likely inspires only itself. Gail Moore reminds us of the 1960s actress Donna Reed, and we know her time has passed. In movies, Danny Castillo would be the soulful, introverted killer cast week after week after week on The Fugitive or Law & Order. J.J. Gonzalez? He's the quintessential annoying border Mexican.

Pity...

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