We got ourselves quite a thing happening down in Texas. While I am sure it will end in pony tears once again for my beloved Texas Democratic Party, it was rather nice to see Blowhard Dewhurst sent back down to the minor leagues of politics. One of the major themes missed in his lost to Commandante Cruz is how this was a Texas GOP referendum on Perry and His Boys.
No, not Perry's boys from Charlie's in Austin, but rather his warmed-over still-shockingly-around Bush Neo-Con Machine still languishing in Texas. You know the cards have been stacked when Rove's FreedomWorks backed Cruz, now the Supreme Leader of the Texas Tea Party, or the fact Rove and friends threw Dewhurst under the bus, then drove over him a bit, after all those years of carrying their water and drinking their kool-aide in the Texas house.
Either of those jokers couldn't fit a toe in the shoes being left by Kaye Bailey Hutchison, but now we get to watch Cruz try, and I wish fail.
But the Texas Democratic Party is what it is.
Having long run out of three-legged dogs, we have now appeared to just give up the ghost and let anybody run. Case in point is that now finally Gene Kelly had retired, we had yet another dude with a famous name muddling up the Democratic Primary.
I actually miss Gene Kelly, he, at least, was amusing. Our latest faux Democrat was banking on a famous last name, the Yarbroughs. Only he isn't from that family, or even related. Sadly, Grady Yarbrough, who also runs as a Republican, was still able to pull 33% of the vote.
(Interesting side note, speaking of famous Texas families. Candace Duval, of THE Duvals, is running against Lamer Smith-SOPA in the ancestral land of her family. This could shape up to be the biggest upset of the election cycle in Texas.)
Name ID, Paul Sadler just doesn't have it. Heck, even I had to go back to the archives to figure out if this was the same dude who made a small peep a decade or so ago by helping the teacher's union. He was. But that's about all I got.
Of course, he is from Rusk county, one of the last guards of Texas liberal populism. The land of Sam Rayburn! East Texas wahoos! Great people around those parts.
The only problem is the Texas Democratic Party has long embraced the banner of bicoastal progressivism which sells worse than hot coco in Laredo. This is the land of Jim Hogg and the Farmer's Alliance. Heck, even Cruz used the right-wing of populism as a main plank of his campaign.
And to be fair, Sadler is promoting himself as a left-wing populist, which I like.
The problem is no one will ever hear his message.
That dude only pulled in $15,000 in the run-up to the run off. This won't even buy you a week's worth of ads in the North Zulch newspaper. I am not even sure you can for dog catcher in one of our major cities with that kind of scratch.
These fundraising results show why you need a machine in Texas if you are going to run for state-wide office. Or at least Mikal Watts' phone number. Sadler has neither.
Now what is good for Sadler is that Cruz had to go so far right in his rhetoric to out tea party Dewhurst that the moderates have been hammered, along with the rest of Texas, by political ads showing just what kind of piece of work he is.
This should, in theory, help Sadler peel off a rather large moderate vote in Texas. But being broke as a joke, I doubt he will he will be able to capitalize on this before the voters forget by November.
I'll try to remind them, so join my next time for Commandante Cruz's Greatest Hits.