RAG RADIO / Thorne Dreyer : Progress Texas' Glenn Smith Talks Wendy Davis, Rick Perry, and More

Democratic political consultant Glenn Smith in the studios of KOOP-FM in Austin, Texas, June 28, 2013. Photo by Roger Baker / The Rag Blog.

Rag Radio podcast:
Talking politics with Glenn Smith,
director of Progress Texas PAC

Glenn Smith, who organized Ann Richards' successful campaign for governor of Texas, talks about Rick Perry, Wendy Davis, and the Texas Legislature, and the prospects for Texas turning blue.

By Rag Radio / The Rag Blog / July 2, 2013

Progressive writer and political consultant Glenn Smith, director of the Progress Texas PAC, was Thorne Dreyer's guest on Rag Radio, Friday, June 28, 2013.

Rag Radio is a syndicated radio program produced at the studios of KOOP 91.7-FM, a cooperatively-run all-volunteer community radio station in Austin, Texas.

Listen to or download our interview with Glenn Smith here:


Glenn W. Smith managed Ann Richards' successful campaign for governor of Texas in 1990. A former reporter for the Houston Chronicle and Houston Post, Smith is the author of the highly regarded book, The Politics of Deceit: Saving Freedom and Democracy from Extinction. Smith, who served as a senior fellow at George Lakoff's Rockridge Institute in Berkeley, currently is director of Progress Texas PAC, “helping the Texas progressive movement develop and deliver disciplined, effective messages.”

On the show we talk politics -- with special focus on the phenomenal developments in the special session of the Texas Legislature, June 23-25, where Sen. Wendy Davis filibustered Rick Perry's draconian anti-abortion legislation. We also discuss the Supreme Court’s landmark decisions on voting rights and gay marriage, the status of immigration reform, and the prospects for Texas turning blue (or at least purple) in the reasonably near future.

We also discuss the efforts of Progress Texas, the progressive multi-issue organization with which Smith works -- and the under-the-radar work of Battleground Texas, the group that's busy applying the Obama campaign's grassroots organizing techniques to the state of Texas.

Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas called Glenn Smith a “legendary political consultant and all-around good guy.” Listen to Smith's earlier appearances on Rag Radio, at the Internet Archive.


Rag Radio is hosted and produced by Rag Blog editor and long-time alternative journalist Thorne Dreyer, a pioneer of the Sixties underground press movement.

The show has aired since September 2009 on KOOP 91.7-FM, an all-volunteer cooperatively-run community radio station in Austin, Texas. Rag Radio is broadcast live every Friday from 2-3 p.m. (CDT) on KOOP and is rebroadcast on Sundays at 10 a.m. (EDT) on WFTE, 90.3-FM in Mt. Cobb, PA, and 105.7-FM in Scranton, PA.

The show is streamed live on the web by both stations and, after broadcast, all Rag Radio shows are posted as podcasts at the Internet Archive.

Rag Radio is produced in association with The Rag Blog, a progressive Internet newsmagazine, and the New Journalism Project, a Texas 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation. Tracey Schulz is the show's engineer and co-producer.

Rag Radio can be contacted at ragradio@koop.org.

The Rag Blog