ompared to his contemporaries, Governor George W. Bush of Texas wields relatively little power over his giant state. He can't fire most agency heads. He doesn't regulate oil, one of the most important businesses. He can't even grant death penalty pardons.
Most of that work in Texas is left to the Legislature and other independent state bodies. But there's one area where Bush holds undisputed sway: his ability to appoint about 3,000 people to the state boards and commissions that do the daily work of government in Texas.
By most accounts, the vast majority of Bush's appointees have done their jobs admirably, running everything from the Texas university system to the state Committee of Examiners in the Fitting and Dispensing of Hearing Instruments.
But when controversy has surrounded one of his appointees - including some who have been accused of racist comments and charged with felonies - Bush has kept a distance, stepping in to demand a resignation only once in the past six years.
While fewer than half a dozen appointees have come under fire - not unusual for any Texas governor - critics say Bush's response shows a refusal to attack political controversies directly, sometimes letting them fester until they threaten the ability of the boards to function properly.
''These should not be very tough decisions to have to make,'' said Molly Beth Malcolm, head of the Texas Democratic Party. ''Is that what you want in a leader?''
Bush has made his appointees a special point of pride, referring to them in his autobiography as one of his most important responsibilities and a ''good case study'' of his decision-making process.
Bush aides say his hesitancy to ask for a resignation is partly because the GOP presidential nominee is a problem-solver who avoids unnecessary confrontation, and partly because Bush as governor actually has no direct power to fire his own appointees. Dismissal requires a special vote of the state Senate.
Bush invests much time and effort in each appointee, refusing to delegate the final decision of whom to put in a job, top staff said.
''It's very serious business, and it's a very important part of what the governor does,'' said Clay Johnson, Bush's former appointments director and current chief of staff.
Except for one case, when an appointee lied on his application about past legal troubles, Bush has made no effort - publicly or privately - to ask an appointee to step down, Johnson said.
Then there was the case of Florita Bell Griffin, a member of the governing board of the Texas agency that helps provide better housing for low-income families.
Bell Griffin was indicted in June on federal charges for her alleged involvement in a kickback scheme. Prosecutors alleged she traded votes to win tax credits for a company in which she was a silent partner.
At one point, the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development threatened to stop dispersing any more money to the board until Bell Griffin stepped down, and federal dollars amounted to 90 percent of the board's budget.
Although a deal eventually was worked out to allow the board to continue its work, Bush never stepped in to ask his appointee to resign. He did issue a statement expressing his concern about the charges.
Bell Griffin's term in office ends early next year.
Another appointee who has caused troubles for Bush is Charles W. Williams, chief of police in Marshall, a small city in East Texas. Williams, who serves on the board that sets training standards for police, earned notoriety this year when a court deposition surfaced in which he said that he did not consider a racial epithet a pejorative term when he used it to describe elderly black men as a child in Oklahoma in the late 1940s.
The deposition is part of a race discrimination suit filed against the department by a black officer.
After news articles about the deposition surfaced, Johnson said Williams called the governor's office for guidance. Bush responded by polling some of the leading law enforcement figures in the state, most of whom said Williams should step down from a leadership position, although they backed his credentials.
Bush did not dictate a course of action, Johnson said, other than saying he wanted to examine the circumstances of the comments. In the end, Williams resigned as chairman of the Commission on Law Enforcement Officer Standards-Education, although he continues to serve on the board.
Bush's record of controversial appointees seems no better or worse than those of past Texas governors. His predecessor, Democrat Ann Richards, was politically embarrassed when one of her first appointees, Railroad Commission chairwoman Lena Guerrero, turned out to have lied on her resume. Another of her appointees murdered his wife.
The Democratic National Committee plans to make use of Bush's record on appointments. One target audience will be Latinos, sources said.
Key to that plan is William ''Reyn'' Archer - son of Bill Archer, the powerful and conservative Texas congressman - whom Bush approved to run the state health commission.
Earlier this year, several Latino groups called for Reyn Archer's resignation after he said Latinos lacked the belief ''that getting pregnant is a bad thing.''
Bush neither rebuked Archer nor asked for his resignation.
A spokesman distanced Bush from the controversy, saying Archer's comments were ''not in keeping with the spirit'' of the governor's attitudes.
