Rich Connelly isn't a fan of Chris Bell

A friend sent me a link to this blurb by Rich Connelly about the only declared Democrat for governor, Chris Bell:

The Texas political world is eagerly awaiting Chris Bell's official announcement August 14 that he will run for governor. Well, at least that part of the Texas political world that wants to see if Bell can pull off an impressive triple play -- losing elections at the local, federal and state level.

To be fair, he's won along the way -- two City Council races and a single congressional race. But still, after losing a mayoral run in 2001, after being beaten for his redistricted congressional seat in 2004, does Bell think the way to reverse the losing streak is by running for governor as a Democrat in Texas?

Yes, apparently.

"It's a difficult way to learn lessons," he says, "but you always learn more from the races you lose than the ones you win…You win and you think you did everything right, and you lose and you go back and figure out everything you did wrong."

Armed with such knowledge, Bell will be, it appears, Houston's lone representative in the gubernatorial race.

"This is a big step, and I'm swinging for the fence," he says. "But that's the way political careers are made. Sometimes the ball clears, and sometimes you…have to sit on the bench. I'm on the bench right now."

Bell -- who says he'll be a "fresh face" for the rest of the state -- will no doubt once again struggle to overcome an image of stolid earnestness.

Like when he announced August 3 that he'd be formally announcing August 14. "Not to get too terribly deep," he told an Austin crowd, "but something I've been telling folks for months is that I wasn't interested in running for governor because I lost my seat in Congress but because we've all lost our seat -- at the table."

Hey -- no worries about that "too terribly deep" thing, dude.

The Houston Press is normally very left-leaning. So, as my friend writes, "what in the world did he ever do to Rich Connelly?"

Good question.

Posted by Evan @ 08/10/05 10:14 PM

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