Rick Perry vs World

22 January 2006

"Strayhorn supports more school funding"

Strayhorn calls for more money to be spent on education:

Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn quickly agreed for more state spending on public education Friday amid rousing applause from some 800 community leaders attending a workshop to learn how the Texas tax system works.

...

"Let's be honest," said Strayhorn, an independent running for governor. "We need to say out loud that we need more dollars for education."

About 37,000 Texas teachers are leaving each year, she said, while 50,000 students drop out. It takes about $750 million a year simply to pay for the additional 75,000 to 80,000 students moving into the state every year.

She supports a $3,000-a-year raise for teachers.

"We're at a critical crossroad in this state," she said. "We're either going to have public education or we're not going to have public education."

Strayhorn also wants to transform the state's current elementary and secondary public education system into a 14-year program, with two years of community or technical college for all students.

So, oddsmakers, what are the chances that Strayhorn comes out for some type of gambling during the campaign? I've heard whispers, but Strayhorn was one of the big critics of Perry's VLT plan. Will she favor a different type of gambling, eg. poker?

Posted by Evan @ 01/22/06 12:58 PM | Comments (1)

Kinky Friedman on 60 Minutes and gay marriage

Kinky Friedman is appearing on 60 Minutes tonight at 6pm, Texas time -- not to exclude El Paso, which is an hour behind. I'll probably miss the piece, because the timing coincides with the beginning of the NFC conference finals between Seattle and Carolina. Football wins out over politics, though I'll try to hit the Friedman spot during commercials. I'm curious to see how the footage from the Willie Nelson golf fundraiser turns out.

Kinky also gave an interview to Dallas Voice, the "community newspaper for gay & lesbian Dallas" on gay marriage.

"I support gay marriage," said Friedman, who said he was raised in a Jewish family where there was no tolerance for racism or other types of discrimination.

"Not only do I support it, it's the right thing to do and the Christian thing to do," he said.

...

Part of that message is that he believes gay men and lesbians are weary of the Democratic Party's promises.

"Frankly, I think the gay and lesbian community is tired of slaving on the Democratic Party plantation," Friedman said. "They just never do a damn thing."

An interesting quote in the wake of Hillary Clinton's MLK Day plantation comments.

Posted by Evan @ 01/22/06 12:54 PM | Comments (1)

Paul Burka on Dewhurst and the 2/3 rule

Texas Monthly has a preview of Paul Burka's column on Dewhurst and the 2/3 rule. Dewhurst finds himself in a dilemma, caught between party activists who want the Senate rule amended to require only majority votes and the tradition probably favored by most of the press.

As Dewhurst positions himself to run for governor in 2010, it should be interesting to watch.

Posted by Evan @ 01/22/06 12:39 PM | Comments (0)

19 January 2006

Zogby online poll numbers

Greg Wythe posts numbers from Zogby:

Perry (R) - 38.3%
Strayhorn (I) - 20.5%
Bell (D) - 17.9%
Friedman (I) - 14.4%

Perry (R) - 38.6%
Strayhorn (I) - 21.3%
Gammage (D) - 15.3%
Friedman (I) - 15.7%

Senate:
Kay Bailey Hutchison - 56.9%
Radnofsky - 31.8%

Greg doesn't post a link to the data, and I couldn't find any of these numbers on the Zogby website. But I do know that Zogby Interactive recently polled for the gubernatorial race, so I definitely believe Greg.

General caveats apply: this is an online poll. Most people consider online polls much less reliable than telephone polls. We don't know anything about the poll yet, having not yet seen crosstabs, number of respondents, margin of error, etc. Sometimes, as in the flawed Houston Chronicle poll on CD 22, the devil is in the polling details.

These numbers are all similar to the Rasmussen numbers from a week ago, so my analysis then still applies.

Posted by Evan @ 01/19/06 10:23 PM | Comments (3)

Alvarado off the ballot?

Breaking news: Felix Alvarado is apparently off the ballot for the March Democratic primary.

His check bounced.

If Alvarado is out of the race, the chances of a run-off go way down, which means that Friedman and Strayhorn are likely to have an extra month to gather signatures for their petition.

UPDATE: There have been several comments attacking and defending Alvarado in a very personal manner. Since Alvarado isn't even a candidate anymore, I'm going to delete those comments and any future comments on the subject.

Posted by Evan @ 01/19/06 08:21 PM | Comments (4)

One Independent Strayhorn

AP, on Strayhorn dropping "Republican" from her ads:

Apparently trying to bolster her image as an independent in the race for governor, Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn has dropped the label "Republican" in her latest television commercial.

Strayhorn's first television ad explained that she was still a Republican but had "decided to put partisan politics aside to run for governor as an independent."

In a new version of the ad that began airing this week, she leaves out the word, "Republican." She calls herself an "independent Texan" who wants to put "principle above politics" and "cut property taxes and fix our schools."

Did polls show voters to be confused? Does this signal a shift in strategy? Does Strayhorn think she can become the de facto Democratic nominee?

Perhaps Clay Robison's report is a clue? I don't know.

Strayhorn also met last week with the Texas AFL-CIO's executive committee, which made no recommendations in any statewide races, said AFL-CIO spokesman Ed Sills. Endorsements, if any, will be made at the Committee on Political Education convention in May.

All statewide candidates were invited to meet with the committee, but the only gubernatorial candidates who did were Strayhorn and Democrats Chris Bell, Bob Gammage and Felix Alvarado, a school administrator from Fort Worth.

...

Some individual unions, including the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the Texas State Association of Firefighters and several police organizations, have endorsed Perry. Not all are affiliated with the Texas AFL-CIO. and those that are aren't bound by the state AFL-CIO's endorsements.

Sills said he didn't think the umbrella Texas AFL-CIO has ever endorsed a Republican for statewide office, but he couldn't predict what might happen this year.

"I don't have a good read on it. I think the 2006 election presents unique circumstances," he said.

For starters, two candidates — Strayhorn and humorist Kinky Friedman — are running for governor as independents. And Strayhorn, so far, is second in fundraising only to Perry.

Sanders said Strayhorn is seeking the "support of every hard-working Texan out there."

Spokesmen for Bell and Gammage, two former congressmen from Houston, said they weren't ready to write off labor's endorsement. And each predicted significant support from rank-and-file workers, regardless of which candidate, if any, the AFL-CIO endorses.

It's hard for me to believe that a few months ago, I thought this was going to be a dull race. Because it's a four way race (assuming it is), there's plenty of fluidity to the situation.

Posted by Evan @ 01/19/06 02:59 PM | Comments (0)

Tres on Kinky, uno on Bell

1. Friedman is having house parties today and Saturday. The BYOB parties will feature a open mic for musicians and a conference call with Friedman. (hat tip to the Tyler Morning Telegraph)

2. Technical difficulties are keeping the Friedman campaign from filing its overdue campaign finance report, according to the SAEN.

3. The 60 Minutes report on Kinky Friedman will be this Sunday at 6pm Texas time. Good for Friedman: 60 Minutes follows Pittsburgh v. Denver on CBS. Bad for Friedman: Carolina v. Seattle starts at 5:30 on Fox.

4. Chris Bell launched a new part to his website aimed at college students, Student Union.

Posted by Evan @ 01/19/06 02:39 PM | Comments (1)

18 January 2006

Paul Burka, Royal Masset, and Felix Alvarado

Texas Monthly's Paul Burka writes in and explains why Royal Masset might be right when he predicts Felix Alvarado as the Democrats' standard bearer in November:

Royal Masset may be right. Anyway, I'm jealous of him for saying it first. Here's the case for Alvarado. The Democratic party will have a small primary. There is no interest in their statewide ticket. Bell and Gammage won't draw voters to the polls. Locally, the party doesn't have a lot of strength at the courthouse level in major counties, Bexar excepted and, increasingly, Dallas. But the Ds are strong in South Texas, where the primary is the only race that matters, and the turnouts are huge. Alvarado will get most of those votes. The precedent, of course, is that school teacher Victor Morales won the Senate nomination, in 1996, beating two sitting congressmen, John Bryant and Jim Chapman. Then Morales made it into a runoff with Ron Kirk in 2002, beating out Ken Bentsen. If Alvarado makes it into a runoff, virtually all of the runoffs will be in South Texas (if history is any guide). Morales got a lot of free publicity with his pickup truck, and Alvarado may not get that. But his name may be enough.

That's a pretty convincing case. The battle in CD28 will certainly drive turnout up in South Texas.

Posted by Evan @ 01/18/06 05:45 PM | Comments (3)

Wes Clark coming to town for Gammage

Perry Dorrell notes that presidential candidate Wes Clark is coming to Houston on 1/26 to do a fundraising reception for Bob Gammage.

Posted by Evan @ 01/18/06 12:06 PM | Comments (0)

17 January 2006

SurveyUSA poll

A Survey USA poll done for WOIA in San Antonio and KEYE in Austin:

Candidate Favorable/Unfavorable/Neutral/Unfamiliar
Felix Alvarado: 8% / 7% / 14% / 70%

Chris Bell: 6% / 14% / 13% / 67%

Bob Gammage: 3% / 11% / 16% / 70%

Kinky Friedman: 21% / 22% / 20% / 37%

Carole Strayhorn: 40% / 19% / 22% / 19%

Rick Perry: 42% / 37% / 18% / 3%

I found this poll while browsing Felix Alvarado's blog in search of support for Royal Masset's claim (of which Kuffner and I are both skeptical) that Alvarado was likely to win the Democratic primary. The poll is of 499 registered voters, +/- 4.5%.

When SurveyUSA came on the scene, it was widely criticized by established pollsters. Those criticisms have largely died down, because SurveyUSA has a very solid track record in polling for elections.

A poll of registered voters for favorable/unfavorable/neutral doesn't tell us too much right now, but I thought I'd pass it on as a data point. I don't think SUSA polled party preference, but if they did I would have loved to see crosstabs on Strayhorn's numbers. I'm also a little surprised that Friedman has more unfavorables than favorables.

Posted by Evan @ 01/17/06 11:33 PM | Comments (3)

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