Eyes of Texas Were Quick to Spot Jeb/George Gaffe

December 26, 1994, may forever be remembered as a day of infamy where I work. Well, infamy is too strong a word. Embarrassment is more like it.

Call it “Day of the Iguana.”

What happened was this: A feature story was assigned about the return of unwanted Christmas gifts. The front page Valley Newswatch column even mentioned unwanted animal gifts and teased readers with a photo of a jaunty little reptile posed on a sales receipt.

Neat photo. The caption, alas, identified the iguana by name--the name of the female owner of an Encino pet store.

How did this happen? It’s a long story, but one of the problems was that an editor disobeyed what might be called the Twinge Rule: “Twinge of doubt? Check it out.”

The editor, you see, was at home gardening and suddenly realized that a bit of miscommunication might lead to such an error. He knew he had to call the office to make sure they ran a photo of the shop owner, but at that moment he was spackled with mud. Later, he forgot.

I know the feeling too well. And by now you may have figured out that I’m leading up to a confession. I’m sure many readers noticed my latest error and laughed at me, not with me. I was mortified. And if only I had followed the Twinge Rule, it all could have been avoided.

For me it happened last Saturday night at the movies. A friend who lives in Riverside met me halfway to catch “The Apostle,” Robert Duvall’s film about a Texas evangelist in trouble. God is said to move in mysterious ways. Suddenly I felt a twinge about the column I had filed the night before about how the Texas cattle industry’s pathetic lawsuit against Oprah Winfrey was another sign of the Lone Star State’s sad decline. I thought I should call the copy desk. Instead I turned to my friend. “The governor of Texas,” I whispered. “One of Bush’s sons. What’s his first name?”

My friend, a knowledgeable guy, thought about it. “Jeb,” he whispered.

That’s what I thought too.

Let the record show that the governor of Texas is in fact George Walker Bush, while brother Jeb is the Bush boy who is searching for political destiny in Florida. Lissa Sawyer, Jim Hemphill, Marcia C. Peterson and a few other readers called my attention to my ignorance.

“You could have beefed up your article . . . with a few prime facts,” wrote Sawyer, a self-described “daughter of Texas” who recently moved to Glendale from Dallas.

“George Bush, a naturalized Texan who earned his keep as a ‘doodlebugger’ [a surveyor] in the West Texas oil fields alongside my dad, would be surprised to learn that his son Jeb has moved from Florida to Texas. Not to mention George W.’s alarm that he is no longer governor of the Lone Star State. (Of course, we’re expecting him, George W., to soon move to the White House anyway.)

“You’re right, Jeb is a Texas kinda name. Just like, oh, say ‘Gov. George W.’ ”

Now at this point, Sawyer darkly joked that maybe Karla Faye Tucker might have asked the wrong Bush for a reprieve. Tucker is the pick-ax murderer-turned-born-again Christian who on Tuesday became the first woman to be executed in Texas in more than a century. Texas, of course, is big on capital punishment. Whether Tucker’s execution reflects on Texas’ general decline or the advancement of the women’s movement is a question that hurts my brain.

Back to the Bushes. I knew that the Texas Bush is an early favorite for the GOP nomination in 2000. Some readers, incidentally, identified the Texas governor as George Jr. but sadly that’s not true. His daddy was George H.W. Bush, and he’s just George W.

I say “sadly” because otherwise everybody might just call him Junior, which would help him politically. There’s no common nickname for George, and Americans like nicknames. Bill, not William, Clinton. Bob, not Robert, Dole. Jimmy, not James, Carter. . . .

Governor Junior has a nice friendly ring. So does President Junior. Some people joke about President Bubba, meaning Clinton, and look how popular he is. It must have been a sad day in Texas when a man from Arkansas, that little itty bitty state next door, beat Bush. Then again, they all knew that the original George was at heart a Kennebunkport kind of guy.

Now, don’t think I don’t regret the error. Factual errors undermine one’s credibility.

But it has occurred to me that this factual error, strangely enough, actually supports my general theory about the once-great Lone Star State. Was there ever any confusion when John Connally or Ann Richards was governor? Yes, this George/Jeb business is embarrassing, just like Time magazine referring to Los Angeles Mayor Robert Riordan. But it fits a pattern. Texans must be embarrassed about the pitiful state of the Dallas Cowboys and the fact that a nation that used to wonder who shot J.R. now laughs at the cartoon Texans of “King of the Hill.” As for “Walker, Texas Ranger”--please, a kung fu Texan?

Sadder still, while many readers caught my error, nobody exactly rose to Texas’ defense. One reader was just generally ticked off that I didn’t really explain mad cow disease. She wrongly claimed I had insulted Richards, whom in fact I had described as a “USDA Choice Texan.” And that reader missed the Bush mistake.

I really hoped Lissa Sawyer might put up her verbal dukes. I e-mailed her but her response was kind of laid back and mellow, which is what Angelenos used to be.

“Los Angeles is okay, but you sure need to work on your barbecue here.” Not exactly fightin’ words. And she even added this: “Correction: Mr. Bush and my dad technically worked in the same area of the West Texas oil patch at the same time--but not necessarily rubbing elbows on a daily basis.”

Well, Texans are supposed to exaggerate. But to admit it? Sad.

And by the way, Ms. Sawyer, many people say the best ‘cue in town can be found in Van Nuys at Dr. Hogly Wogly’s Tyler Texas BBQ. It might taste a little bit like home.

[Editor’s note: Scott Harris double-checked the spelling of Hogly Wogly and verified that Lissa Sawyer spells her name with two Ss. Also, this editor admits to being responsible for the iguana.]