"Ashamed of Texas" roundup

-- How to make winning Republican TV ads in Texas.  If you aren't ashamed of being from Texas after reading and watching this, then you're a TeaBagging GOP primary voter with poor spelling and grammatical skills.  But I repeat myself.

-- Dan Patrick denies that a hand-written letter, produced by the man whom he hired years ago and was undocumented at the time, is written in his hand.  This sordid display of renouncing one's previous compassion (WWJD?) is embarrassing enough for most Texans, but it still probably won't keep Patrick out of the runoff in his race.

Just to review: Dan Patrick is ashamed he once helped an immigrant, while Greg Abbott has no shame about standing with a pants-crapping, draft-dodging, virulently racist and sexist child predator.  And those two will probably be the governor and lt. governor candidates for the Republicans in November.

-- The Texas Observer has a worthy down-ballot aggregate.  It includes Debbie 'Terror Anchor Babies' Riddle, the 'my God can beat up your God' war between Baptists and Methodists in Tarrant County, and US Senate also-ran Chris Mapp, who despite calling the president a SOB and saying that "wetbacks" ought to be shot, can't get any traction in a primary race that includes Steve Stockman.  Oh, and Pete Sessions' Tea Party challenger, Katrina Pierson, is also toast.  It wasn't the Sarah Palin endorsement that finished her off, but the fact that she was once on unemployment.

-- Don Imus has endorsed Kinky Friedman for ag commissioner.  Does more need to be said?  Is that a brainer?

-- Last, the Texas Tribune, essentially the only news organization left covering the Lege and Texas politics, continues to be assaulted by people besides James Moore.  And yes, Evan Smith is a giant schmuck.  Everyone knows this.

The TexTrib is an embarrassment to media, and Evan Smith does blow goats... but they are all Texas has left for political insight, so I suppose I'll try to be a little nicer to them than some others.  Sorry, Evan: after that argument we had on the phone a few years ago about your polling -- you remember? you were banging pots and pans around in the background -- and my blog disappeared from your roll, you lost out on any donations from me.

You seem to be doing OK without them, though.  Good for you.

Hyperventilating over Kesha Rogers

There's a lot of that going on in the the blogosphere and social media this morning as a result of yesterday's poll results.  This is one of those times when the disconnect among the various caucuses in the Texas Democratic Party is painfully on display.

Black people vote for their own, y'all.  How many different ways does it need to be said?  How many times does it have to happen before y'all get it?

There's an extensive network of African American e-mail listservs (locally, D-MARS has one, Carroll Robinson has started another called Texas Politica, there are several others I'm not a member of) and they focus on their community's news.  They talk about the issues that aren't getting talked about anywhere else.  If you aren't on these lists or aren't reading the email you get from them, then you don't know these things.

Kesha Rogers is benefiting from the fact that there are no other African Americans at the top of the Texas ballot (and no, I'm not including Steve Brown at Railroad Commissioner because that's a down-ballot race).  She has by far the highest name recognition among the four US Senate hopefuls.  She has been on the ballot in Fort Bend County a couple of times, was the nominee for the Dems against Pete Olsen in 2010, she ran for chair of the Texas Democratic Party in 2006.  There's been lots of news online about her over the years.

I mean to say lots and lots of news stories about Kesha Rogers over the years, nearly none of it favorable.  What's that someone said about all publicity being good?  This same lack of understanding about what's really going on is also present in the Lloyd Oliver campaign for Harris County district attorney.  There are plenty of people who know why he won the nomination two years ago, and why he's campaigning the same way as he did two years ago.  It seems as if a whole bunch of insider Democratic Caucasians are the ones most confused about this.

Trust me when I say -- as a middle-aged white guy, mind you -- that black Democrats in Texas know exactly who Kesha Rogers is.  And if the TexTrib has properly sampled black Dems (not oversampled them) in their polling... then the results shouldn't be all that surprising to anyone.

You don't have to like it, but there it is.  In black and white.

Update:  Splitting the black caucus from the GLBTQ caucus is something some white folks know how to do.

Not the last word on Nuge

The national media finally caught up with the past week's story over the weekend (and to start the week).  Progress Texas has a good roundup.  But the last word, for now, goes to the DMN's Tod Robberson.

My guess is that Davis will not suffer long-term damage from relatively minor misstatements regarding her background. But Abbott did himself some serious damage by attaching himself to Nugent, a man who cannot seem to control his mouth and has a penchant for making racist and sexist remarks. There is also, of course, his background of affairs with underage girls and his days as a draft dodger during the Vietnam War. It’s beyond me why Abbott would see Ted Nugent as an admirable figure who would be an asset to his campaign.

But since Abbott hasn’t issued a statement of regret, I guess he’s still OK with the decision. Which means he not only demonstrates bad judgment unworthy of a leading gubernatorial candidate but also lacks the perspective of someone who knows when to stop fighting a losing battle. That’s the kind of hubris that just screams for a humiliating defeat.

Abbott's refusal to distance himself from Nugent is a tremendous, enormous mistake; maybe the biggest one he will make during the entire campaign.  Davis must tar and feather him with the child predator's slurs, and she must do so repeatedly, all the way to November.  How effective she is in pasting Ted Nugent to Greg Abbott will all but determine whether her contest is winnable in the fall.  If she lets it fade into the background...

There remains a huge well of free media still to earn (because Nugent keeps running his vile mouth publicly, and will go on doing so), and the continuing narrative helps Davis significantly with moderates and independents (precisely who she needs voting for her in order to win).  Most importantly, the episode cuts right to heart of Abbott's weakest link: his judgment and his character.

Nugent is a gift that is going to keep on giving, and you don't get too many of those in politics.

UT/TexTrib poll has Kesha Rogers leading the field in Dem US Senate primary

There aren't any other huge surprises in this (historically unreliable) data.

In the Democratic primary, the candidate who has been on the ballot the most times, Kesha Rogers, leads the best-financed candidate, David Alameel, 35 percent to 27 percent. Maxey Scherr had 15 percent, followed by Harry Kim at 14 percent and Michael Fjetland at 9 percent. Voters are largely unfamiliar with those candidates; 74 percent initially expressed no opinion before being asked how they would vote if they had to decide now.

“This is what it looks like when you have a bunch of candidates, no infrastructure and no money,” (polling co-director Jim) Henson said. “The first person to raise some money and run some ads could really move this.”

I think Henson has that accurate; Alameel's voluminous mailings and TV ads should get him into the lead by the time all the votes are counted.  But I warned a couple of my EVBB friends week before last that I feared an Alameel/Rogers runoff, and now it looks like I'm left to hope that the TexTrib's polling lives up to its comically bad reputation.  However there's greater confidence to be found in their other numbers...

-- Abbott 47, Davis 36, Don't know 17.  About right, I would say.  Update: And yes, it is worth noting that this poll concluded before the Ted Nugent crap exploded (pun intended), so the effect of the most significant development of the entire campaign is not reflected here.

-- Cornyn 62, Stockman 16, everybody else in single digits that total 15.  Also about right, and in defiance of what was released last week (somebody is awfully wrong, that's for sure).  The Conservative News distribution probably doesn't save Stockman, either.

-- Dewhurst 37, Patrick 31, Staples, 17, Patterson 15.  Nothing to quarrel over here, either.  Remains to be seen whether Patrick's Ill Eagle flap hurts him; that news also broke after the poll concluded.  But if something like these numbers hold, Dewhurst is toast in the runoff.  Let's note this also.

The Republican nominee will face state Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, D-San Antonio, who is unopposed in her primary. Van de Putte lagged behind each of the four Republicans in hypothetical general election matchups, trailing Dewhurst 44 percent to 32 percent, Patrick 41 percent to 32 percent, Staples 41 percent to 29 percent, and Patterson 41 percent to 30 percent. Undecided voters made up the difference in each race.

That seems like a sensible set of figures for late February, too.  The only other result that so much as raises my eyebrow is Tea Party queen Debra Medina laying waste to the well-funded men in the R comptroller race.

There's going to be some crying at Glenn Hegar's watch party on Election Night.  Hope he doesn't feel the urge to have to shoot anything.

Update: Socratic Gadfly with more on what this might mean for the Green Party Senate candidate, who also needs some free media but isn't well-positioned to take advantage of the publicity.  And Charles breaks things down as well.

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance thinks Ted Nugent is an appropriate spokesman for the modern Republican Party of Texas as it brings you this week's roundup.

Off the Kuff analyzes the turnout issue for Democrats in 2014.

WCNews at Eye on Williamson on the Round Rock members of the Lege reporting to the local business lobby, while leaving out the issues that matter most to the people in their districts, in Schwertner, Gonzales, & Dale Go To The Chamber.

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme is appalled at Texas Republicans holding a faux hearing on women's health care. Give it up. Republicans have waged a real war against women and their health care. You're not fooling anyone.

It's Ted Nugent's (Texas Republican) party, and we just have to live with it, noted the Texas Observer -- and excerpted by PDiddie at Brains and Eggs. But there were also problemas grandes para Dan Patrick last week.

Texpatriate endorses John Whitmire in the Democratic primary for State Senate District 15.

Neil at All People Have Value was prompted by a visit to Galveston to reflect that we can choose to view ourselves in life on the mainland, on an island or at sea. All People Have Value is part of NeilAquino.com.

========================

And here are some posts of interest from other Texas blogs.

Robert Rivard argues that cities and counties are left trying to solve the problems caused by a generation of indifference from Texas' state leadership.

Lone Star Q provides video of Wendy Davis discussing her support of same sex marriage to the San Antonio Express-News editorial board.

Concerned Citizens warns about the animus hiding behind religious exemptions.

Better Texas explains why a higher minimum wage is good for Texans.

Grits for Breakfast highlights the modern equivalent to the Dallas Buyers Club.

Nonsequiteuse gets to the heart of the Nugent/Abbott affair.

Greg Wythe continues his in-depth look at how the voter ID law was enforced in the 2013 election in Harris County.

Burkablog celebrates what would have been Barbara Jordan's 78th birthday.

Chris Quintero witnessed and videotaped two Austin Police Department officers detain and arrest a female jogger for jaywalking and not immediately identifying herself (see here for more).

And Swamplot makes us all feel old by taking a look at the house from Reality Bites, 20 years later.