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Texas Republicans have edge on kids and trans, drag issues. Now, watch them screw it up | Opinion

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, just last month, defined a new split in U.S. politics.

“The dividing line in America is no longer between right or left,” Sanders said in the Republican response to President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address. “The choice is between normal or crazy.”

Sanders meant to contrast the radical race and gender policies ushered in by Biden’s administration. But she may as well have been talking about a divide in the GOP — especially here in Texas.

On gender issues, books in schools and the super-important topic of drag shows, Republican lawmakers are looking at sensible positions that would be popular among a vast majority of Texans and asking: “Got anything nuttier?”

It stems from all the worst instincts prevailing in politics: The desire to be the furthest right or left on any issue to demonstrate “purity” to primary voters. A push to “own” the other side rather than achieve the best possible policy. And the astounding refusal of either major party to step up as the not-crazy option serving a sustainable majority of voters.

Take drag shows. Whatever you think of men dressing as women and dancing for a crowd, most reasonable people would say that highly sexualized versions of that or any other performance are no place for children and would approve government limitations on them.

Some, however, see something naughty that they just don’t like and overreach. Banning drag performances by and for adults is an unenforceable abuse of government power. Conservatives used to balk at that. Folks like freshman Rep. Nate Schatzline, a Fort Worth Republican, are all in.

A Schatzline bill would require venues for drag shows to submit to regulation as sexually oriented businesses, raising costs and risking liquor licenses. Apparently, protecting children just isn’t enough. Consenting adults need Schatzline’s guidance on entertainment choices, too.

At West Texas A&M University, the school’s president, Walter Wender, canceled a student drag show, calling them “derisive, divisive and demoralizing misogyny.” Setting aside that absurdity, they are also an expression of free speech that adults — yes, including college students — get to indulge.

TRANSGENDER MEDICAL CARE

Legislators in Austin are also working on bills to restrict medical treatments for transgender youth, including hormones and surgeries. There’s a simple logic that’s hard to defeat — don’t let people younger than 18, with brains that aren’t completely developed and judgment that defers to the short-term, make life-altering changes to their bodies. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has made the legislation a priority in the Senate.

But for some, it’s not enough. A committee is considering a more sweeping bill that would call into question gender treatment for adults, too. That simply goes too far — adults have the right to determine their own destiny, so long as no one else is harmed.

The dividing line is adulthood, and that shouldn’t be partisan or even hard to understand. We all know the 18th (or 21st) birthday isn’t a magic moment that conveys wisdom. But we have to set a point at which government and society let adults live their lives.

A robust agenda of protecting children is a winner, even in the realm of school library books. Activists have had school boards and liberal opponents on their heels over books with graphic depictions of sex in the name of gender or sexuality identification. Most people shake their heads at the idea that such a book would end up in a school in the first place.

LEAVE ‘LONESOME DOVE’ OUT OF IT

Rep. Jared Patterson, R-Frisco, was on firm ground in a recent legislative hearing when he said as much. But he let himself get baited into saying that Larry McMurtry’s “Lonesome Dove” might need to be removed from school libraries because of its frank depictions of prostitution.

Sigh. Is that appropriate for a 10-year-old? Of course not. But a 16-year-old could probably handle it and learn about McMurtry’s masterful storytelling and the importance of loyalty to lifelong friends.

The common sense version of these policy proposals are 70-30 majority builders. Of course, in Texas, GOP dominance needs no help. The only elections that matter in most places are primaries that draw so few voters. It’s safe for officeholders to overreach, as long as they do so to the right.

And yet, there will be a point where it’s too much. True conservatives understand that our best hope to maintain a peaceful pluralistic society is to live and let live. Adding popular protections for children as a corrective to what many conservatives see as a corrosive culture is not only right but also politically smart — until individual freedoms for adults are at stake.