Whitmire: Christmas Mountains Sale 'Nuts'

When Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson suffered an embarrassing setback in his plan to sell off the remote Christmas Mountains, many observers expected him to back down. Ha!

Last Thursday, Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, sent Patterson a letter asking him to cancel the sale, put a two year moratorium in place, and let the legislature deal with it next session. Patterson issued a terse response that his proposals were "not acceptable to the Texas General Land Office."

This isn’t some rookie legislator Patterson brushed off so dismissively. Whitmire has served in the Texas House and Senate since 1973. He and Patterson were in Senate together in 1993. And while calling the sale "nuts" may seem undiplomatic, it should be noted that absolutely everybody who has spoken at any public meeting about the sale (except for one bidder who stood up to say he wasn’t a bad guy) has opposed it.

Patterson ignored the real meat of Whitmire’s suggestion, concentrating instead on a small subparagraph of the letter that refers to possible condemnation of adjoining land to create extra public access. He lumped Whitmire in with “those naysayers who are only concerned about whose name in on the title.” Patterson, however, isn’t bothered about that. He’s just bothered that they allow guns on the property. The Second Amendment absolutist went to the extremes, in a Nov. 5 meeting, of raising the specter of gun-toting drug runners in the area to make his point.

Which isn’t nuts at all.