My name is Brent Keis.
In American history there has been a certain amount of playing loose with the truth that has characterized political campaigns. That is a regrettable but well-documented fact.
Candidates’ zeal to win can stimulate excesses in charges they make, and wounded feelings of unfairness can make their opponents respond in kind. To you campaign veterans and volunteers this is well known.
What is perhaps new is the rancor, bitterness, and very low regard for the truth, that has been experienced in American public life in the recent past. It is increasingly hard to recruit qualified candidates of good character for public office in this climate of malice and slander. It is certainly a recent development in Republican contests in Tarrant County, where clever paid campaign consultants now manipulate (what they must regard as a naïve base of Republican Primary voters) through fake voter guides, supported by questionable funding, to engage in wholesale character assassination.
This is behavior Republicans cannot afford. If it continues, unrebuked, it will destroy our party and our chance to hold office. More importantly, if uncontested for a long enough period, it will destroy the fundamental fabric of American representative government, because good people will no longer be willing to suffer the abuse involved in standing for office.
Ronald Reagan once championed what he called the Eleventh Commandment: Speak Ill of No Other Republican. It might do well to abide by this maxim today, and even expand it to: Speak Only What Is Fair and True.
I have had the honor to have served you for over twenty-one years on the bench of County Court at Law #1. I am grateful to have done so and proud of my performance.
I did not make any irresponsible charges in my campaign. You did not hear trashy, irresponsible allegations or insinuations that my opponent was of bad character. I did not speak ill of him. I spoke only for myself and I spoke only that which was fair and true.
BrentKeis@JudgeBrentKeis.com
