As a native-born, lifelong Texan, I think your analysis in your last few posts is pretty good. I will add a my opinion and perhaps counter point or two. Disclaimer: I am not a Corpus Christian, but I have visited many a time over my life, since it is the closest place to visit the ocean. If there are any of you Corpus folks here, none of this is intended to offend, and we'd love to hear directly from you.
First, and most importantly, there are more Texas flags in this state than American flags, no doubt. (They are Texas Flags, not "Texan" flags, please note
)
This is indicative of our proud history when for 10 short years in the 1800s, we wavered as a weak (but independent) country between Mexico and the US. Culture is funny - that brief timespan will inform our (seemingly independent) attitudes forever. That, while annoying sometimes, may ultimately be the key to allowing a ray of sunshine to come between Us Texans and Oil (pronounced "ohle" [one syllable] if you are serious about it).
But note that I say "ultimately". Oil and gas runs this state. Funds our arts. Funds our universities. Employs seemingly the entirety of West Texas. Pays C-suite salaries to the denizens of those skyscrapers in Houston. Brought in incredible profits relatively recently due to fracking. And yes, of course, funds our politicians. And yes, employs directly or indirectly, best I can tell, the vast majority of Corpus Christi.
Corpus Christi ("Corpus" to us folks) is the most culturally conservative, blue collar town I've spent any time in, just IMHO as judged by the houses, businesses, vehicles (yes, pickups 'By God and Texas'), roadside signs (only place I ever saw a restaurant advertised as a Christian Chinese Restaurant (???)), conversations overheard, trucks flying Trump flags, Trump billboards, anti-abortion billboards, etc. That itself is neither here nor there: I do very much admire folks who work harder than me (and most of 'em do it seems from the outside), and we all got our opinions. However, it seems to me these things are all tied together in a great mental/identity/spiritual tangle, and the oil+gas part will have to be carefully detangled from that mental framework to get any traction in moving away from it. To paraphrase Ted Lasso, as well as Elon, first, you have to "believe".
Building a successful refinery of the lithium variety there is indeed a solid strategy to
start gentrifying our beloved Mordor, but make no mistake, it is just a start. This is going to take a dang while. My guess is the average folks in Corpus can relate to a solid, familiar places of employment like that. If Tesla treats its workers well there (and gives 'em increasingly valuable options, even better) they may start to get a small caucus / constituency there. If it keeps growing, even better. Cybertruck may help with that if it checks all the boxes we hope it does.
But oil and gas built this place (Texas writ large, at least over the last century), and the ripping out of our own (fossil fuel) guts is not to be underestimated in terms of difficulty of change after generations of doing things one way. I know the climate cannot wait, as many of us do, but my hope, while very real, is tempered when I visit places like Corpus, or (fracking central) a lot of South Texas on the way _to_ Corpus. There is hope if we can tie "successful transition" to "independent Texan" in our minds, and well, every God-fearing Texan (American?) loves profit and success, so there is hope there as well.
Another hopeful sign: there are also more wind turbines near the coast every time I head down there, and that is also encouraging. Most of them onshore, co-located with very flat farms. I think the political zeitgeist will remain "all of the above" (fossil + new) energy strategy for the near future.
