Tag Archives: Ted Cruz

local news, national news, State news

McCartt no longer stands alone as one who defies natural law

I long have held up a former Amarillo mayor as the model for defying certain natural laws. How? By being everywhere at once.

That’s what former Mayor Debra McCartt managed to do during her time as the city’s chief elected official. McCartt, the city’s first female mayor, seemingly was able to attend multiple events simultaneously while representing City Hall, advocating for the city, rooting for interests being promoted by municipal management and the City Council.

Debra McCartt might have to move over, making a place for another politician.

He is Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate. O’Rourke is challenging Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, who is running for re-election to his second term. Indeed, it seems as though Cruz has been in the Senate forever, even though he’s just a rookie lawmaker.

O’Rourke has been on TV shows left and right: Stephen Colbert; Ellen DeGeneres, Jimmy Fallon. He’s been interviewed by MSNBC, CNN and various broadcast network talking heads.

Has Beto cloned himself? Well, no. He hasn’t. It just seems as though he has.

I get that Cruz has been tied to his desk in Washington. For that matter, O’Rourke should be, too. Except that the House of Representatives, where O’Rourke serves, has taken some time off; the Senate, though, was kept on the job by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who canceled the Senate’s annual summer recess.

O’Rourke’s defying of these natural laws — visiting all 254 Texas counties  and appearing on every TV talk show under the sun — might explain partly why he is making this U.S. Senate contest so damn competitive.

I still hold former Mayor McCartt in high regard for the ability to be everywhere at once that she demonstrated while advocating for the city. However, she no longer stands alone as the public official who manages to be everywhere at the same time.

State news

Democrats looking for an actual victory in Texas

A “moral victory” in Texas won’t be good enough for Democrats who now are officially licking their chops at the prospect of knocking off a first-term Republican U.S. senator.

Beto O’Rourke is challenging Ted Cruz. The fact that Texas’s U.S. Senate seat is part of the national discussion on the eve of the midterm election is stunning enough all by itself.

However, O’Rourke and his supporters aren’t likely to settle for coming close to Cruz. They think now they have a chance to actually knock the Cruz Missile off his launch pad.

Poll after public opinion poll is saying essentially the same thing: O’Rourke has closed the gap to a dead heat, enabling the challenger to chip away at what was supposed to be an insurmountable lead in this most Republican of states.

Republicans believe the race is still Cruz’s to lose. I’m not sure about that. I cannot predict that O’Rourke will win. I am reading the same polls that others are reading. I am not involved in the campaign. I don’t know what the O’Rourke troops are doing in the field.

I’m just astonished that O’Rourke is continuing the strategy he has employed since the beginning of the fall campaign: He is traveling to rural counties, talking to voters one on one. He continues to visit counties where Cruz figures to do well. He is taking the fight straight to the incumbent.

As for Cruz, he has gone negative. O’Rourke hasn’t yet gone there. I don’t yet know what his plans are as Election Day draws near. Hey, I’m just a spectator out here, watching this race unfold right along with the rest of the state.

My gut tells me that a “moral victory” won’t be enough. If, after all this campaigning has ended, and Beto O’Rourke falls short of Ted Cruz’s vote total — even if it’s by just a handful of ballots — I fully expect there to be profound disappointment.

“Wait’ll next time” won’t be good enough to assuage the wounds.

O’Rourke wants it. Bigly.

State news

‘Likability’ to determine who wins this race?

Who would have thought that the winner of the next big contest for the U.S. Senate seat from Texas would hinge on the candidates’ “likability”?

Democrat Beto O’Rourke is challenging Republican incumbent Ted Cruz in 2018. Cruz was supposed to win re-election in a walk. He represents Texas in the U.S. Senate, one of the nation’s most reliably Republican states.

Something happened, though, on Cruz’s re-election waltz. He ran into a guy who seems to be throwing conventional wisdom out the window. O’Rourke is conducting an essentially positive campaign to date, speaking in vague terms about ridding Washington of the hyper-negativity that borders on hostility.

Meanwhile, Cruz is firing off barbs criticizing O’Rourke over his occasional potty mouth as a younger man.

He is managing to make O’Rourke eminently more “likable.”

Cruz stormed into the Senate six years and made an immediate national name for himself. He became one of those rare freshman senators who could be seen on TV constantly, at times seemingly in several locations all at once. He seemed to defy the laws of physics by being everywhere at the same time. What drove Cruz? Personal ambition. Therein lies what I believe has been Ted Cruz’s primary reason for serving in the Senate.

He ran for president of the United States halfway through his first term in the Senate, which by itself isn’t all that unusual: Barack Obama did the same thing, too.

But Cruz comes off as harsh, self-centered and blinded by personal ambition. Indeed, Donald Trump may have spoken something approaching the truth when he said during the 2016 presidential campaign that “no one likes” Cruz in the Senate.

What was supposed to be a cakewalk to re-election for the GOP incumbent senator has turned into a journey fraught with peril.

It all might be decided on likability.

national news, State news

GOP seeks to bolster Sen. Cruz

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, a first-term Republican, was expected to — um — cruise to re-election in a heavily Republican state such as Texas.

Then something happened. Democratic voters nominated a young man named Beto O’Rourke, a congressman from El Paso. O’Rourke has visited all 254 Texas counties. He has appeared before small gatherings and large crowds. He tries to carry a positive message forward.

Then those polls started showing some movement toward O’Rourke. The race between them is now too close to call. O’Rourke has the momentum, or so many observers believe.

Republicans now reportedly are looking for ways to salvage Cruz’s re-election campaign. In Texas? Are you serious?

I guess so.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick went to Washington to ask Donald Trump to campaign for Cruz. The president agreed. He’s now planning a blow-out rally sometime next month in the “biggest stadium we can find.”

As Politico reports: Trump’s rally is just the most public display of a Republican cavalry rushing to the senator’s aid. Cruz remains a favorite to win another term, and some senior GOP figures insist the concern is overblown. Yet the party — which has had a fraught relationship with the anti-establishment Texas senator over the years — is suddenly leaving little to chance. Behind the scenes, the White House, party leaders and a collection of conservative outside groups have begun plotting out a full-fledged effort to bolster Cruz.

The battle has been joined. Democrats think they have the momentum on their side. O’Rourke has become a high-demand “get” for TV talk shows. He’s raising a more money than Cruz, although I remain dubious as to whether more cash translates to more votes. I hope it does, but one cannot always equate the the factors.

Yep. It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

national news, State news

How will Cruz explain his change of heart toward POTUS?

Whenever the two major candidates for the U.S. Senate seat now held by Republican Ted Cruz meet in a joint appearance, I am hoping whoever questions them will ask Cruz a critical question about his relationship with Donald John Trump Sr.

If it were me, I would ask him: Senator, you once called Donald Trump a pathological liar; you called him amoral; you called him gutless coward. How is it that you now welcome him to Texas to campaign for you? How do you justify this remarkable change in attitude toward a man you seemed to loathe when you both were campaigning for the GOP nomination in 2016?

If given a chance for a follow up, I might ask him to explain the president’s loathsome comments about Cruz: You took them personally, senator. Do you no longer feel the intense anger you expressed in the moment?

I also am thinking that Cruz’s opponent, Democrat Beto O’Rourke, is likely to ask the incumbent a lot of questions along those lines himself.

OK, I know what many of you are thinking. This isn’t new. Political foes for many years have buried the hatchet. Team of rivals, anyone?

To wit:

  • Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton campaigned against each other in 2008; they said some incredibly mean things about each other. Obama got nominated, then elected and selected Clinton to be secretary of state.
  • Obama also ran hard and aggressively against Sen. Joe Biden in 2008 and then named Biden as his vice presidential running mate.
  • Sens. John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson didn’t care for each other when they ran for the Democratic nomination in 1960. Then they teamed up and won the election.

That was then. The here and now presents another set of questions.

Trump disparaged Cruz’s father, suggesting he might have been complicit in JFK’s murder; he ridiculed the senator’s wife, Heidi. He called Cruz “Lyin’ Ted.”

Sen. Cruz’s response to all of that was intense and seemingly visceral anger — and justifiably so.

But … the men have let bygones be bygones. Yes?

I am left to wonder what it takes for a politician to tell us what they really think. I also have to wonder if Cruz’s outrage was feigned or was it for real.

As for the president, well, I don’t believe a single thing that flies out of his mouth.

local news

Blowing smoke, or is Beto the real deal?

Mick Mulvaney, budget director for the Donald Trump administration, has sounded a serious alarm bell.

He has told Republican faithful that U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas could lose his attempt at being re-elected. He said Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke poses a serious threat to the Cruz Missile (my description, not his … obviously).

How does one take this? Is it an attempt to gin up support among Republicans who until now had been sitting on their hands? Or is it a legitimate concern from a key Trump aide who think one of the GOP’s once-safest seats might be in serious jeopardy?

I cannot assess the motive behind Mulvaney’s assessment.

Mulvaney sounds the alarm

I’m not close to any political movements these days. I rely on what I see and hear in the media, or what I see on the street as I make my way through life.

I keep hearing about O’Rourke’s astonishing welcome in the Texas Panhandle, where I used to live. I hear about all the O’Rourke lawn signs showing up in tony old-money neighborhoods — such the Wolflin neighborhood in Amarillo — where residents have traditionally voted Republican.

Here, in Collin County, I’m not yet seeing evidence of this O’Rourke phenomenon. I drive through neighborhoods and I see a smattering of O’Rourke lawn signs, but nothing like the volume I hear about cropping up in Amarillo. I will add, though, that Cruz signs are quite rare, so perhaps there’s some anecdotal evidence of an O’Rourke “surge” in the final two months of the Senate campaign.

Yes, I have seen the polls. The race appears to be a dead heat. There remain, though, a large body of undecided voters, or at least those voters who aren’t yet ready to tell pollsters how they intend to vote. They remain the big prize awaiting to be lured either by Cruz or O’Rourke political machines.

Back in Washington, the budget director says Cruz could lose this contest.

I hope he’s right.

political news, State news

Flag burning becomes Senate issue … oh, boy!

I kind of expected this to happen. Flag burning has been introduced as an issue in the race for the U.S. Senate in Texas.  Except that it’s been distorted to something that bears no resemblance to what was actually said.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, the Republican incumbent, has accused Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke of favoring the burning of the Stars and Stripes as a form of political protest.

Oops! O’Rourke didn’t say such a thing, as the Texas Tribune has reported.

It seems that O’Rourke was asked at a town hall meeting to discuss political protest and, in particular, the landmark 1989 Texas v. Johnson U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declared flag burning to be a legitimate form of political protest.

O’Rourke gave a lengthy, long-winded answer to a question, but didn’t actually endorse flag burning. The Cruz campaign cherry-picked a portion of O’Rourke’s answer and linked it to flag burning, rather than to the broader issues that O’Rourke addressed in his town hall response.

Read the Tribune’s explanation here.

I fear this is the kind of thing we can expect in this campaign, which appears to be much closer than the Cruz Missile and the Texas Republican Party ever expected it to become. O’Rourke — a congressman from El Paso — has drawn essentially even with Cruz. He is campaigning in all 254 Texas counties, even in those rural counties where he figures to get clobbered by Republican voters.

As for whether he supports flag burning as a form of political protest, I think I can discern O’Rourke’s view, which well might mirror my own: I understand the act to be a legitimate form of political protest, but just don’t do it in front of me if you expect me to be swayed to whatever point you’re trying to make.

State news

Cruz gets blowback from criticizing O’Rourke’s potty mouth

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz’s re-election campaign is trying to paint challenger Beto O’Rourke as a potty-mouthed punk who drops f-bombs at random.

Social media response has been, well, a bit different from what the Cruz campaign expected. The revelation seems to be making the Democratic challenger seem more cool.

This mini-tempest makes me laugh and it reminds me of something that happened back in my hometown of Portland, Ore., during a race for the mayor’s office.

Incumbent Mayor Frank Ivancie’s 1984 re-election campaign dug up a 1978 picture of a challenger, Bud Clark — owner of the legendary downtown Park Blocks watering hole the Goose Hollow Inn — “exposing himself” before a statue. The picture showed Clark with his back to the camera pulling open a trench coat with the caption “Expose Yourself to Art.”

Ivancie, a man with no discernible sense of humor, thought the picture would doom Clark’s insurgent candidacy. It did precisely the opposite. It called attention to the challenger and — no pun intended — exposed Ivancie to be a stuffed-shirt prude.

Clark won the election, defeating Ivancie.

So, with that I want to hail the attempt by Sen. Cruz’s team to make Beto O’Rourke out to be a young man with a foul mouth. It well might produce the same result that occurred in Portland so many years ago.

local news, political news, State news

Memo to Beto: Money doesn’t win elections

All these news stories I read about the Beto O’Rourke-Ted Cruz fight for Cruz’s U.S. Senate seat keep harping on the same theme: O’Rourke is raising more money than Cruz.

To borrow a phrase: Big … fu***** … deal.

O’Rourke is the Democrat challenging the Republican incumbent, Cruz. Texas hasn’t elected a Democrat to statewide office since 1994. Texas Democrats are feeling it this year, man. Maybe it’s for real. Then again, we are talking about Texas, where Republicans generally have both legs up merely by being Republican.

Make no mistake: I want O’Rourke to shoot down the Cruz Missile. The Washington Post story accompanying this post tells of O’Rourke’s meet-the-people strategy and how well he is performing in places one might not expect a progressive Democrat to do so well.

Such as the Texas Panhandle, where we used to live.

See the Post story here.

But money alone won’t win this election. Andrew Gillum got outspent by a factor of about 20 in Florida, but he still managed to win that state’s Democratic primary for governor this past week. The same can be said of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who won a New York congressional Democratic primary a few weeks ago against a powerful incumbent despite being outspent by 40 or 50 times.

It is with that I offer Beto O’Rourke and his avid followers a word of caution.

I want him to win. I will use this blog to advance his candidacy for the U.S. Senate. His opponent, Cruz, isn’t concerned with the state nearly as much as he with his own image, reputation and political ambition.

Do not try to tell me that O’Rourke is some flaming “socialist” or extremist who is going to vote to disarm our armed forces, open our borders to criminals and confiscate everyone’s firearms.

He is a reasonable young man who deserves a chance to represent Texas in the U.S. Senate.

Sure, he’s raising a lot of money. However, the pile of campaign cash doesn’t always equate to more votes than the other guy.

Keep working and hustling, Beto.

Many of us in Texas will have your back.

State news

How will POTUS fill the ‘biggest stadium we can find’?

Donald John Trump is blowing it out of his backside when he proclaims his effort to stage a campaign rally in “the biggest stadium we can find.”

He intends to come to Texas to campaign for Sen. Ted Cruz’s re-election. The president said in a Twitter post that he is going to look for the largest venue in the state to stage the rally.

One quick query: How does the president expect to fill such a venue?

He has staged rallies for a couple of years since announcing his presidential campaign in June 2015. He hasn’t drawn crowds that would even begin to fill such a monumental venue.

AT&T Stadium in Arlington? Kyle Field in College Station? Memorial Stadium in Austin? Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth?

They’re all big venues. As in really big, man.

Does the president really believe his presence at a rally will attract 100,000 or more spectators?

C’mon!

Cruz is running against Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke, an El Paso member of the House. O’Rourke has closed Cruz’s lead to virtually zero. The men are tied. It’s a dead heat. Yes, we have several more weeks to go before midterm Election Day.

I plan to support O’Rourke, who by my lights puts Texas’s interests ahead of his own ambition — unlike the Cruz Missile.

Cruz and Trump have exchanged some mighty angry rhetoric in the past. That’s all behind them — or so they hope.

The rally that Trump will stage? He ought to set his sights a whole lot lower than the “biggest stadium” notion. Of course, we all know that won’t happen.

If Trump has this rally in the huge venue and attracts enough supporters to fill half the seats, or fewer, he’ll still proclaim it to be the “biggest rally crowd” in the history of the world.

The Trumpkins will believe their hero, which is all that matters to the president.