This is a significant pickup for the Cruz campaign, since David Dewhurst was previously endorsed by the NRA for Lt. Governor. Thus far Dewhurst has gotten a the lion’s share of business group endorsements, split social conservative groups with Cruz, and essentially garnered none of the economic conservative or Tea Party endorsements, which Cruz has been dominating. The Gun Owners of America is a big win for Cruz, since Texas has lots of gun owners. My guess (and it’s just a guess) is that the NRA will either issue no endorsement in the race, but it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that they could endorse Dewhurst. (How the NRA does endorsements is a somewhat murky area I don’t fully understand, especially when they candidates in question have no legislative record.)
Gun Owners of America is a smaller and newer organization than the NRA, and have been far-stauncher in support of issues like concealed carry that the NRA was initially more cautious on. It’s a good endorsement for Cruz, and one that will solidify his position as the candidate most likely to be in a runoff with Dewhurst.
It’s been a very quiet week in the Senate race. I suspect that some of the candidates had already scheduled vacation or break time following the original March primary date, so I expect things to pick up shortly. But Both Ted Cruz and David Dewhurst released ads mentioning their fathers:
Ted Cruz has released two radio ads, one called “Fighter” and the other “Delivered”:
Forbes columnist Louis Woodhill looks at Ted Cruz’s economic program. He generally likes them, but doesn’t go far enough in some areas, and goes to far in seeking entitlement reform. I agree with the former and disagree with the latter.
Robert T. Garrett in The Dallas Morning news says that the “guilt by association” wars between Cruz, Dewhurst, and Craig James is more than a little silly. Unless there’s more to the Tony Podesta story than the Cruz campaign has been able to bring forth, I tend to agree.
He also seems to be doing something of a straddle on the Texas Women’s Health Program issue:”I’m all for protecting life. I’m pro-life. I’m also for taking care of women and their health so there’s a balance somewhere in there, personal responsibility, and if they have a need for things, that they need to be able to take care of it themselves. If they can’t, then there needs to be a service to help them take care of their health issues.”
The Texas Tribune talks about Texas having a conservative core of voters, and how that’s affecting the presidential and Senate races (among others). It’s actually not too bad as these things go, but I do wonder if anyone has ever done a similar profile on “extremely liberal” voters?
Finally, I still haven’t been able to meet with David Dewhurst or Craig James for interviews. If the campaigns of either are reading this, and your candidate will be in either Austin or Houston sometime in the next month, please contact me so we can set up an interview.
Now that all the post-redistricting filings have been finalized, I thought I would take a look at Texas U.S. congressional races to see where either the Republican or the Democratic party has failed to field a candidate. While districts are usually drawn to protect incumbents and minimize the chances of the out-of-power party, it’s usually best to contest all possible races, for a variety of reasons:
You can’t beat something with nothing.
It helps tie down time, money and effort that could otherwise be shifted to other races.
It helps down-ballot races by drawing voters to the polls.
It offers a chance for Republicans to get their message of limited government, lower taxes and greater freedom out to people who might not otherwise hear it, and possibly make some converts in the process (the parable of the sower).
Stuff happens. Sudden, unexpected twists of fate can play out at any moment. Incumbents get caught stuffing bribe money into their freezer or consorting with prostitutes. Planes crash. And there’s always the possibility of someone being caught in bed with a dead woman or a live goat.
Unexpected opportunities arise, but you can’t take advantage of them if you don’t have a candidate in place.
With that in mind, let’s see how well Republicans and Democrats have done in finding candidates for all 36 Texas congressional races:
U.S. Congressional Races Where Democrats Failed to Field a Candidate
U.S. Representative District 2: Republican Incumbent Ted Poe
U.S. Representative District 3: Republican Incumbent Sam Johnson
U.S. Representative District 4: Republican Incumbent Ralph Hall
U.S. Representative District 13: Republican Incumbent Mac Thornberry
U.S. Representative District 17: Republican Incumbent Bill Flores (in a seat that was held by Democrat Chet Edwards until 2010!)
U.S. Representative District 19: Republican Incumbent Randy Neugebauer
U.S. Representative District 25: Open seat, formerly Lloyd Dogget’s until he moved to the newly created 35th District following redistricting. No less than 12 Republicans have filed for this seat (including former Senate candidates Michael Williams, Roger Williams, and Charles Holcomb). 56% of the newly reformulated 25th District’s residents voted for McCain in 2008; that’s solidly, but not overwhelmingly, Republican. But not one Democrat bothered to run…
So that’s seven U.S. Congressional races where Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee National Chair for Recruiting and Candidate Services Allyson Schwartz, and, well, whoever the hell it is at The Texas Democratic Party in charge of recruiting candidates, were unable to find a single person out of approximately 688,488 citizens in each of those districts to run for the United States House of Representatives. Say what you want about Alvin Greene running for Senator in South Carolina, but at least he showed up, which Texas Democrats couldn’t even manage to do in almost one-fifth of U.S. Congressional races this year.
By contrast, Republicans only fell down on the job in one congressional district:
U.S. Congressional Race Where Republicans Failed to Field a Candidate
U.S. Representative District 29: Democratic incumbent Gene Green gets a pass. In a district that went 62% for Obama, any Republican was going to have an uphill race. But given that there are five districts even more heavily Democratic (the 9th, 16th, 18th, 33rd, and 35th) where Republicans fielded a candidate, this seems like a lost opportunity, especially for a Republican Hispanic candidate in a Hispanic district headed by an old white guy. (Granted, this didn’t work for Roy Morales in 2010, but I would have preferred that Morales file again and run a token campaign over no one running at all.)
All in all this is good news for Republicans. If I were a Democrat, I’d be mad at how thoroughly the state and national party fell down on the job of recruiting candidates.
A suggestion: All six Republican incumbents who haven’t drawn an opponent should each hold a fundraiser for Republican Incumbent Francisco “Quico” Canseco, who figures to have the toughest race of any incumbent this time around.
A left-wing Irish documentary maker sets out to make a documentary about the plight of the Palestinians, but gets waylayed by those annoying facts, and instead decides to tell both sides of the story. Guess what? His friends aren’t interested. “The problem began when I resolved to come back with a film that showed both sides of the coin. Actually there are many more than two. Which is why my film is called Forty Shades of Grey. But only one side was wanted back in Dublin. My peers expected me to come back with an attack on Israel. No grey areas were acceptable.”
Israel and Hamas declare a ceasefire after four days of fighting. Honestly, maybe because I was traveling, or because I no longer feel the need to consult MSM news sources on a daily basis, I was actually unaware that there was slightly more violence than usual in the Middle East. The fact that Hamas cried uncle after a mere four days, despite the fact that Israel set it off by giving Hamas leader Zuhair al-Qaissi an express ticket to paradise, tells you that they must really have been getting their asses kicked by the IDF. Maybe Zuhair al-Qaissi really was important, or possibly Iran and Syria have had their hands too full to dole out the Qassam rockets with their customary generosity.
It turns out that Greece forcing haircuts on recalcitrant bond holders via the “Collective Action Clause” automatically triggers credit default swaps, the financial instruments that helped bestow such laughter and joy unto the world economy in 2008. There’s such a fine line between “bankrupt” and “solvent.”
But thanks to the rest of the EuroZone ponying up money to keep Greece solvent, Greece’s national debt will decline…from 120% of GDP, to a tiny, minuscule, almost-impossible to see 117% of GDP. In 2020. You know, the same year I’ll be enjoying a regular threesome with Olivia Wilde and Megan Fox.
But the bailout is accomplishing its primary goal: Keeping the whole thing from collapsing while Eurocratic insiders get to pretend everything is OK long enough to dump their losses onto taxpayers and continue to milk the rubes just a little bit longer.
And there’s already talk of another bailout being necessary before the ink on this latest batch of fiat Euros was even dry. A new record!
You may remember my mention of EarthQuest, the projected Montgomery County “environmental theme park” that was going to be partially financed with public money.
Well, now comes word from Dwight that it is officially kaput. “No construction is planned; investors are nowhere to be found. Funding to EarthQuest consultants has stopped.”
Who could have possibly predicted that? Well, beside the blogger who wrote “the entire project has “money-losing rathole” written all over it,” that is…
In the game of District 35 Chicken, Ciro Rodriguez decided that no, he didn’t want to face off against Lloyd Doggett’s 18-wheeler full of money and swerved aside. Instead he’s going to run against Republican incumbent Francisco “Quico” Canseco for the 23rd Congressional District seat Rodriguez lost to him in 2010. But before that, he has to get past State Rep. Pete Gallego, who has been running for the 23rd for months and tried (unsuccessfully) to warn Rodriguez off what is now likely to be a very bruising Democratic primary fight. (John Bustamante, son of yet another former Democratic congressmen, is also running, but with only $3,000 in his campaign coffers, I see no sign that he has gotten any traction, whereas both Rodriguez and Gallego have broken the $100,000 mark.)
That’s a terrific pickup for them. Epstein is on a very short list of the very most important conservative legal scholars in the country. His book Takings (which, I must confess, I still haven’t read) is widely regarded as the most comprehensive legal exegesis of why the New Deal is unconstitutional. I think Epstein (like Mario Loyola and Ted Cruz) will find the Center for Tenth Amendment Studies an ideal place to further his research.
Congratulations to TPPF for a very solid addition to their already impressive array of scholars.
Ohio Republican incumbent Rep. Jean Schmidt has been ousted by political newcomer Brad Wenstrup in the Republican Primary. Mark her down (along with Charlie Crist and Mike Castle) as another Establishment Republican taken down by the Tea Party. John Fund comes to the same conclusion on NRO, noting “votes to raise the debt ceiling and for the Wall Street bailout, support for the pro-union Davis-Bacon Act, and a record of supporting tax increases when she was in the state legislature.” Among the issues the Super-PAC Campaign for Primary Accountability (who spent $241,000 in advertising against her) cited in opposing Schmidt were her taking money from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee PAC in her first race for congress, her love of earmarks, and various campaign-related abuses of taxpayer money.
This is a safe Republican seat, so the replacement of a Washington establiushment Republican with a fresh conservative is a good thing. And, as Micky Kaus has noted, defeating wayward Republicans in primaries does wonders for keeping the others from wavering…
I’ve made my feelings about district-shopping and carpetbagger bids clear before. Roger Williams’ home of Weatherford is smack dab in District 12, currently represented by Republican incumbent Kay Granger. I can certainly understand not wanting to take on an entrenched Republican incumbent, but that still doesn’t justify district shopping.
That said, I think either Williams would make a solid Republican Representative.
