'God Save Texas': Contradictions Of The Lone Star State

This program originally broadcast April 24, 2018 with Meghna Chakrabarti

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Lawrence Wright turns a keen eye to his home state of Texas. The new book is "God Save Texas."

Lawrence Wright, author of "God Save Texas: A Journey into the Soul of the Lone Star State" and staff writer at The New Yorker. (@lawrence_wright)

Excerpt from "God Save Texas" by Lawrence Wright

The New Yorker, "America’s Future Is Texas" — "Texans, however, are hardly monolithic. The state is as politically divided as the rest of the nation. One can drive across it and be in two different states at the same time: FM Texas and AM Texas. FM Texas is the silky voice of city dwellers, the kingdom of NPR. It is progressive, blue, reasonable, secular, and smug—almost like California. AM Texas speaks to the suburbs and the rural areas: Trumpland. It’s endless bluster and endless ads. Paranoia and piety are the main items on the menu."

Texas. Big in every way. Size, population, politics and in the American imagination. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Lawrence Wright says of his home state that Texans see themselves as a distillation of the best qualities of America. Outsiders see big hats and belt buckles, the national id in snakeskin boots. But Texas is undergoing a tremendous transformation, an epic brawl, Wright says. The Lone Star State doesn’t stand alone. The direction Texas goes could influence the way the nation goes.

This hour, On Point: Lawrence Wright, on "God Save Texas."

-- Meghna Chakrabarti