Rick Perry vs World

05 September 2006

Ciro Rodriguez back in

Rodriguez announced Friday that he's back in the race for CD23 to unseat Henry Bonilla.

Fundraising wasn't going to be easy. Now it will be that much harder for Rodriguez. Maybe he'll make the runoff, but it's less likely now that he's been in and out.

UPDATE: From a Carlos Guerra column:

"Gasoline was $1.46 when this administration took over," Rodriguez continued. "I know it's going down now because an election is coming. But after November, if they win, how high will it get?"

Yup, I hear George W. Bush has actually been setting the price of gas from the Oval Office.

Nice demagoguery, Ciro.

Posted by Evan @ 09/05/06 05:33 PM | Comments (0)

01 September 2006

Lampson chickens out

Lampson has decided not to run in the CD22 special:

Nick Lampson, the Democratic candidate for the congressional seat vacated by former U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay, said he will not run in a special election to fill the seat temporarily.

Gov. Rick Perry this week ordered the Nov. 7 special election to temporarily replace DeLay, who resigned in June although his term doesn't expire until January.

Lampson said Thursday that he will focus his attention on the general election, which is also Nov. 7. He said his participation in the special election would mean at least four candidates vying for a two-month stint.

It's probably a smart move by Lampson: why risk losing? On the other hand, this hands Shelley the use of the honorific, so that she can run against him in 2008 as "Congresswoman Shelley Sekula-Gibbs."

But I don't really buy his excuse that he was staying out of the special to avoid a runoff. He was scared of losing.

Posted by Evan @ 09/01/06 01:32 PM | Comments (1)

DeLay gets a book deal

Suzanne Gamboa, AP:

Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, with his career in elective office finally behind him, said today he has a deal to publish a book.

"This is a book that's going to be the history of my career, how it furthered the conservative cause, with my spiritual walk and what I think the conservative cause ought to do next," DeLay, a born-again Christian, told The Associated Press.

DeLay said he'll explain how "everything I've done in my career furthered the conservative cause" and helped change the culture of Washington.

The book will be published by Penguin and should be ready by next spring, DeLay said.

Stephen Mansfield, author of The Faith of George W. Bush is working on the book with DeLay.

DeLay said the working title of his book is No Retreat, No Surrender: The American Passion of Tom DeLay but that could change by the time the book is published.

No Retreat, No Surrender sounds about right for a book on DeLay. Somehow, methinks they'll find a way to work a hammer into the title/subtitle.

I'm guessing he won't mention how he managed to find the one options that will temporarily leave his seat to a Democrat. Heh.

Posted by Evan @ 09/01/06 01:26 PM | Comments (0)

31 August 2006

Tape deck, rewind it back...maybe

Greg Jefferson at the SAEN blog is now reporting that Ciro Rodriguez hasn't really quit the race for CD23. Kinda. Sorta.

Despite confirming that he wasn't running this morning, Rodriguez had a spokeswoman call and tell Jefferson that he's giving himself until 5pm Friday to decide to make the race.

Indecision like this isn't going to help the fundraising if he stays in, that's for sure.

Posted by Evan @ 08/31/06 11:18 PM | Comments (0)

Stayhorn for governor

Stayhorn

This could be one of the funniest pictures I've seen in awhile. When I first looked, I saw that immediately behind the podium was a "Stayhorn." Oops. But it took me another couple seconds before I realized that every sign said Stayhorn. That's some quality "grassroots" action!

The Carol(e) St(r)a(y)horn campaign has had some problems in the past. Her filing to run as an independent listed her as Carole Strahorn, and then her lawyer called her Carol Strayhorn in a letter to the Secretary of State.

Good thing she's not running a write-in campaign.

Hat tip to the Perry blog.

Posted by Evan @ 08/31/06 05:40 PM | Comments (1)

Strayhorn on the air

Kronberg reports that Strayhorn will be on the air immediately after Labor Day through election day.

That's about 9-10 weeks of TV ads, suggesting that Strayhorn has budgeted about $10 million for her TV campaign.

Will her apparently sagging numbers move? Does Strayhorn have $10M cash on hand right now, or is she taking a leap of faith that she'll be able to keep raising money?

Posted by Evan @ 08/31/06 04:10 PM | Comments (1)

Strayhorn sued by director of camp for troubled teens

Comptroller Strayhorn has been sued by the director of a camp for troubled teens:

However, in August 2004 the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services closed [Woodside Trails Therapeutic Camp for troubled teens] by revoking its license. They did so after state Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn's "Forgotten Children" report was released. The report targeted abuse at foster care facilities and accused Woodside Trails of sexual abuse and neglect.

Gaines said the report was misleading, inaccurate and resulted in the camps' closure. The false facts could not be ignored, she said.

"I took this step with great reluctance and lots of thought. I feel it's necessary for the future of the children who are in the care of the state of Texas to make sure this never happens again," Gaines said.

The lawsuit states two judges found the Department of Family and Protective services had no evidence of sexual abuse and claims Strayhorn targeted the camp and used her political power to pressure state agencies to act.

According to the lawsuit, Strayhorn and other state officials "knowingly and intentionally distorted the facts about Woodside Trails and Plaintiff for Strayhorn's political advantage."

Austinist prints the story of a counselor who worked at a camp. Here's the counselor, describing the day the camp closed:

She said that she was a grandmother who cared about the children of Texas. Apparently she had decided that there was no therapeutic value in being outside. She was on a mission to shut down every wilderness camp in the state. It all seemed so ridiculous to us. For months she had been sending her people out to camp to "investigate." Really they were just carrying out her agenda. They took pictures of muddy tennis shoes after it rained, and claimed that we were abusing the children by making them live in horrible conditions. Everyone who works with "troubled" and abused children knows that from time to time false accusations are made. Woodside Trails, like most, if not all, residential treatment centers, had a list of false accusations that the kids had made throughout the years. Strayhorn had this list printed in some report, but neglected to provide the results of the investigations.

On that Friday, we got a call from Child Protective Services. They said that they were coming to get the boys who were in our care because they were not safe with us. Within an hour, a line of black, rented suburbans pulled onto the property. Officials got out of their cars with a list of the names of the children that they would be taking. It was the craziest scene I had ever witnessed. The boys were running around crying, begging us not to let them go. I was told by several that they did not feel complete with their treatment, that they wanted to stay with us because they were afraid they would get back into drugs or gangs again. We tried our best to calm the boys down. We told them to act maturely, to show these people that they were learning with us. The boys were encouraged to cooperate and not cause problems.

This definitely undermines a Strayhorn political strength. Much like attacks on John Kerry's strength caused him to wither, this seems to have the ability to do the same. We'll see how this plays out.

Posted by Evan @ 08/31/06 04:05 PM | Comments (0)

Book reviews

Couple book reviews of what I read today.

Barone has an interesting life story: super-elite educated (Harvard, Yale Law), he was once a Democratic political consultant and still publishes the bible of all political junkies, the Almanac of American Politics. He's become one of the nation's leading public intellectual, and has slowly drifted from liberal to conservative. He writes for USNews, where he has BaroneBlog. [FYI to Barone -- in this recent post, you should've referred to Ben Barnes as Lieutenant Governor, I think. A mistake uncharacteristic of you, sir.]

The thesis of Hard America, Soft America is that educated elites have been turned off by the hardness of becoming elite and successful, and thus became fans of softness which attempts to cool the ardor of a dynamic society. He posits that this led to the malaise of the 60s and 70s, only to be changed by the re-hardening of America in the 80s and 90s. While this in some ways autobiographically reflects his own political shift, it's a relatively unique critique of recent American political history.

Barone is probably the pundit I most respect in Washington, so it's no surprise that I largely agree with him, though I wonder how his book has been received by those who haven't shared his right-shifting politics. But it's a serious study, and should be read by liberals who want an educated, dispassionate view of how much of the right views politics today.

Conversely, The Good Fight is a book the right should read to inform themselves of how the left views national security and the use of American influence, particularly as ultimately expressed in military force.

But Beinart's target audience is ultimately his fellow liberals. His thesis is that liberals have a cohesive national security position, and he attempts to explicate by weaving a story throughout the last half of the century (much like Barone, except that he focuses on foreign affairs and not domestic). He starts by telling how there was once a serious split in the left on fighting communism, but that ultimately Americans for Democratic Action (who knew the ADA was once a serious political organization, and not just people who want to Bork any Republican judicial nominee?) won the battle and fought communism. After his interpretation of 50 years of foreign policy, he brings us into his view of Iraq, but also how American hegemony ought be constrained today in multilateral organizations.

It's a valuable book, and appears largely to have been dismissed by the left's grassroots (at least as expressed in the blogosphere), which astounds me. I disagreed frequently, and thought he rather blithely dismissed some inconvenient history, but it's a well-expressed view that's provoking to those who disagree. It's also part of what a smart Democratic presidential candidate would adopt as a national security platform.

A classic in encouraging creativity, and deservedly so.

Posted by Evan @ 08/31/06 12:38 AM | Comments (0)

30 August 2006

CD23: Ciro Rodriguez withdraws?

Tonight's AFL-CIO meeting was supposed to be a crucial test for Ciro Rodriguez. If he got their endorsement, it'd be a good sign. If he didn't get the endorsement, then raising money would be an awfully tough row to hoe.

Instead, Rodriguez apparently decided to withdraw. No word as to whether he wasn't going to get the endorsement and thus decided to give up the race.

Pure speculation: my feeling is that Democrats in Washington weren't wild about his candidacy, and weren't willing to put money behind him. Rodriguez didn't think he'd be able to raise enough on his own to battle Gilliland's self-funding capabilities.

What happens now?
The campaign analysis shifts quite a bit now. The question is whether the race becomes a three man race, or simply a face off between Bonilla and Gilliland. Can Albert Uresti be a formidable challenger?

Voters tend to vote for candidates that they think is "someone like them." In modern American campaigns, race/ethnicity plays a big part in that. In a 60% Hispanic district, one has to wonder whether Anglo Democrat Lukin Gilliland will be able to unite a significantly Latino Democratic base against Henry Bonilla. Not only is Gilliland an Anglo, but apparently he lives in outside the district in Alamo Heights. That's probably not the greatest symbol to the South Side: Alamo Heights is the poshest neighborhood of San Antonio.

With Rodriguez out, Uresti may be a serious candidate. His brother Carlos is state Senator-elect (more or less) from an overlapping district, and Albert is a former district chief of the San Antonio Fire Department. He may carry some name ID from his brother's race. The main question with Uresti is raising money: can he impress the right people to raise enough money for his campaign? With Rodriguez in, the answer seemed likely to be no. With Rodriguez out, Uresti may be able to raise some money.

Still, one has to think that Bonilla's chances of avoiding a runoff go up a good deal.

Addendum:
Jaime Castillo, in a pre-Rodriguez withdrawal column, has a couple interesting tidbits:

"Tony Sanchez spent $60 million in 2002 and only got 49 percent of the vote in that district. It's not a hopeful sign," [Hernandez] said, referring to the one-time Democratic nominee for governor.

...

Former Mayor Ed Garza, who was courted at the last minute to enter the race, told Political Writer Greg Jefferson that the timing wasn't right to mount a credible campaign with only weeks to go before Nov. 7.

What Garza didn't say is that a private poll helped him make up his mind. The whispers say Garza's numbers weren't bad, but they didn't differentiate him enough from the current field.

Right now, I bet Garza is kicking himself for not getting in.

Posted by Evan @ 08/30/06 11:53 PM | Comments (0)

29 August 2006

Perry meets with bloggers...in North Carolina

I mentioned before that Perry was going to do a fundraiser for North Carolina state senator Fred Smith (not the founder of FedEx). At the fundraiser, he and Smith did blogger-only press conference.

Anyway, the bloggers all wrote it up, so I'll link to 'em: Lorie Byrd, Dean Stephens, Nathon Tabor, and Jason Moir.

It's not all that newsworthy, but I doubt anyone else'll write about it, so I thought I would.

Posted by Evan @ 08/29/06 10:10 PM | Comments (2)

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