End of an Era
Texas Monthly Pulls the Plug on Its Classic “10 Best & 10 Worst” Legislature Awards
Issue No. 7, 2025
Everyone has an opinion – except the the good people at Texas Monthly, who’ve quietly retired one of the Lone Star State’s most influential political rituals: the biennial list of the Ten Best and Ten Worst Texas Legislators
I can’t imagine my old friend Paul Burka, who stewarded the list for decades, is resting easy over this decision.
Paul – God rest his soul – passed away on August 15, 2022, at age 80. A Galveston native born May 21, 1942, he joined Texas Monthly in October 1974, emerging as the voice of political clarity in Austin – and nationally – until his retirement in 2015. That inaugural “Best and Worst” issue appeared in 1973, but by the 1975 list Burka was firmly in control – and never let go. Until this week, when Texas Monthly let go of his legacy of holding account those in power, regardless of the ruling political party.
I met Paul in 1992, shortly after I began consulting for the nascent Texas House Republican Caucus. Back then Democrats dominated the Capitol, and Republicans were only just gaining traction, behind George W. Bush and Rick Perry – a trajectory shaped by pivotal races in 1994 and 1998. By 2002 Republicans seized the Texas House for good.
From the 1970s onward, Texas Monthly did the heavy lifting: calling balls and strikes, praising substance and smacking down petulance. Through the 70s and 80s, with Democrats controlling both houses and all branches of government, Burka and his team would bring their collective conscience to bear on the citizen legislators.
Their conscience was manifest in the 10 Best and 10 Worst List.
For example, that 1975 Ten Best List featured a lone Republican, Ray Hutchison of Dallas, and 9 Democrats, a diverse group of Texas lawmakers with diverse views but known for their integrity, effectiveness, and leadership across party lines. Conservative, liberal, Republican, Democrat. Some may have batted an eye that Burka gave a nod of appreciation to his former boss A.R. “Babe” Scwhartz on the Best List, but I wasn’t there to hear the complaints if they arose.
The 10 Ten Worst from 1975, was just as bipartisan, three Republicans and seven Democrats were collectively cited for a toxic mix of ethical lapses, legislative incompetence, and misuse of power.
The point being, even with one party essentially controlling the Legislature, Texas Monthly did what journalists do: Spotlight those who abuse power and highlight those who serve the greater good.
But today, they’re punting.
And Paul Burka is tossing and turning beneath that sandy loam with disappointment that this tradition he nurtured for half a century has been laid to rest like an old issue in a landfill.
Is journalism dead? I can hear in his plaintiff voice.
It may not be dead, Paul, but it has certainly changed – and not necessarily for the better.
Paul and I stayed in close contact throughout the 90s and early 2000s as the Republicans moved from obscurity to leadership. He’d ring me often, saying he needed help getting to know a freshman Republican or understanding their new worldview or dissecting whether the first republican speaker since Reconstruction would be Kenny Marchant, Kim Brimer or Tom Craddick.
I hosted off-the-record dinners where Burka would press these members on their ambitions, their personal politics and their integrity. When members folded bills for personal advantage, I found in Paul a kindred critic. Yet he also admired lawmakers who fought with principle – even when he disagreed with them. That quality, he believed, was the cornerstone of representation.
Burka would insist to me in our conversations it wasn’t about ideology, but character: “lead, follow, or get out of the way.” Those who did neither were mere furniture. And, they should never abuse the public trust.
There were sheeple and leaders and furniture. Not Democrats or Republicans, in his view.
But now that we have an overwhelming Republican majority, Texas Monthly can’t bring itself to have a 10 Best List? To take the time to understand and support the do-gooders and hold accountable the ne’er do wells? Instead, we have story tellers.
I helped craft responses when members wound up on the “Worst” list, leaning into the magazine’s inherent tension: “What can you expect from the liberals out of Austin?” Yet even then, there was gravitas to the accolade. To be among the Worst was a mark of failure – and to Paul, a call-out with consequences. To be named one of the ten Best was an affirmation of genuine legislative accomplishment.
This, I think, is why the list mattered. Paul’s curated selections were not mere clickbait – they were a biennial check on power. Without that, Texas Monthly becomes like a beautifully upholstered coffee-table piece – great on barbecue opinions, but silent on accountability.
Texas journalism is poorer for this loss – and so is Paul Burka’s memory
Thomas Graham is a Texas storyteller, author of Branding Texas and serves as CEO of Crosswind Media & Public Relations, a national corporate affairs consultancy with offices in Austin, Texas and Washington, D.C
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