Please somebody, preferably a Texan, write a diary about the Democratic Senate candidate, Paul Sadler running against the tea party Jim DeMint Republican candidate, Ted Cruz.
I just watched the debate on CSPAN between these 2 men.
Paul Sadler was terrific.
Too bad that right now he is losing in the polls.
Even though I live in Texas, until I watched this debate I had no clue about the candidates vying to win the seat being vacated by Kay Bailey Hutchison.
Having listened to these 2 men, I believe it would be a horror for Ted Cruz's right wing gibberish to make its way to the Senate floor.
I feel that the Texas I have come to know over 42 years would elect Paul Sadler if he could get peoples' attention. He is comfortable with himself and his positions. He is cool under fire and is extremely skilled in delivering a political punch. He's from east Texas, debates in a relaxed, firebrand method full of piss and vinegar and according to what he says he stands for would do a helluva job, IMO, serving in the U.S. Senate. He stands for the right things, IMO, is not a fear monger, but a common sense fighter for common sense approaches to dealing with immigration, the budget deficit, health care, gun control. I didn't hear much about the economy in the questions (although I may have missed that when I stepped away).
The Texas I know could live with his positions - common sense, not ideological, not extreme. He has the heart of a fair minded practical man with a "judicial temperament" unlike his opponent IMO.
So please somebody write a diary on this. Sadler has very limited fund raising. Here's the vid from the pre-debate commentary:
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/...
The vid from the debate is not up on CSPAN yet.
6:41 PM PT: I happily oblige mffarrow's request to add this Act Blue web site:
https://secure.actblue.com/...
Update:
My brief impression of the debate was that the Democratic candidate, Paul Sadler is a wonderful politician in the best sense of the word. He gave me confidence that I could trust him to represent the best interests of the people of Texas and the principles of the Constitution of the United States. He was fair minded on all the issues that were discussed. He is comfortable with his own judgement in an Atticus Finch kind of way and won't be bullied. When his opponent and even the moderator tried it, he ignored the bullying and stood his ground and jabbed back.
One of the questions he received showed how unfair the attitude was toward common sense solutions when Sadler was asked whether he would allow all the Bush tax cuts to expire and the questioner refused to accept any answer that departed from either a full extension of the tax cuts or a full elimination of the Bush tax cuts - no option for the eliminatio of the Bush tax cuts for the top top earners in the country to help pay off the debt. I found that unfair and unreasonable.
The Republican candidate was a carbon copy of every tea party candidate we've been exposed to, parroting right wing mindless gibberish, brandishing the Second Amendment in the same mindless way as has become customary since the NRA took over the right wing of the Republican Party. It is shocking that this man graduated from Princeton University and Harvard Law School. What have our "elite" universities become to put people with this mindset out in the public arena with their credentials tatooed on their butts.
I just read this shocking story in the NYT raving about the man's intellectual prowess:
http://www.nytimes.com/...
The NYT is not a very good paper, IMO. No intellectual could spout the garbage this man spouts. Is it me or do Republican candidates of Cuban origin exhibit a certain mindless right wing bent that no self respecting Latino/Latina with a heart for the hardships of life would espouse?
Sorry, I don't consider myself xenophobic but the anticommunist Cuban Republican candidates seem to me to have gone overboard in their skewed view of the world. I understand that this is changing in the younger generations but Ted Cruz is stuck in the right wing scary column.
I will post the link to the video when it's available as soon as I see it.
7:20 PM PT: Here are links to the Texas Senate Paul Sadler Ted Cruz October 2, 2012 Belo debate:
http://www.wfaa.com/...
7:23 PM PT: It may be easier to access the 4 parts of the Sadler Cruz Belo debate here:
http://www.wfaa.com/...