Don Huffines cracks me up.
I stumbled onto his website this New Year’s morn and found something hackneyed and time-worn: a declaration that a politician is not a “career politician” and who is a “true conservative.”
Huffines is running against state Sen. John Carona of Dallas.
Carona’s been in the Legislature for a while. I don’t know much about him, except that he, too, declares himself to be a conservative. My bet is that he’s not conservative enough for Huffines, although I only can presume that to mean that Carona doesn’t declare his conservatism with the requisite zeal and fervor that many on the far right seem to insist in their politicians.
He vows to serve only 12 years in the Senate. Then he’ll back out … he says. Border security is a federal responsibility and if the feds don’t do the job, Huffines vows to hold ’em “accountable.” Of course, he opposes the Affordable Care Act. He wants good highways, good public education that enables parents to have more “choices,” and wants the government to let private enterprise create jobs.
Does any of this sound familiar? It should. I think I’ve heard it a bazillion times during my lengthy career covering politics and government in Texas — and in Oregon, where I grew up and where my career got its start.
Don Huffines, though, is not a career politician and, by golly, he’s going to make it all happen just because of that declaration.
I’ve heard that one, too. A lot.