I have not had as much of a chance to focus on the Texas Senate primary as I would have liked. My inclination was to back Ted Cruz early on, but I just didn’t have the time to do the research. But I have been following the race, listening to Cruz’s interviews, and learning as much as I could over the past couple of months as time allowed.
Cruz has been working hard as an insurgent candidate, similar to what Richard Mourdock did in Indiana. David Dewhurst is not an incumbent, but he’s the establishment candidate and has far more money than Cruz.
But unlike Lugar, there’s no reason that I have seen to think Dewhurst would be a Lugar in the Senate. The race is not, in my view, an anti-Dewhurst narrative.
We need someone who will be a solid conservative leader in the Senate and the party, someone who will fight hard for principle, and who has the history to give us comfort. From everything I have seen, Cruz has the leadership qualities needed to distinguish between two conservative candidates.
Sound-bite: “It’s the leadership.”
The gap is closing, with Dewhurst’s lead down to single digits. As we saw in the Mourdock-Lugar race, when the electoral dam breaks, it breaks big. And the momentum appears to be with Cruz, at least enough to force a run-off election:
Texas’ Republican primary for U.S. Senate is close — and could be headed for a July 31 runoff — with Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst holding a single-digit lead over former Solicitor General Ted Cruz, according to the latest University of Texas/Texas Tribune poll.
Dewhurst had the support of 40 percent of likely voters, followed by Cruz at 31 percent. Former Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert had 17 percent and broadcaster and former football player Craig James was at 4 percent, with five other GOP candidates bringing up the rear.
Daron Shaw, a UT-Austin government professor and co-director of the poll, said Cruz has been able to position himself to the right of the lieutenant governor for a May 29 Republican primary where that’s a big advantage — and he’s done that in a year in which insurgent candidates have been scoring big wins against establishment Republicans.
At a minimum, let the two face off in a run-off election. If I could vote, I’d vote for Ted Cruz.
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
I WILL vote for Cruz.
Dewhurst is wrong, and I consider his campaign dirty.
Check is on its way.
I had the opportunity to work with Ted Cruz a couple of times before I retired. He is the real deal. He is incredibly smart, articulate, honest, and conservative. I have sent California money to his campaign a couple of times and will again if he gets into a run-off. Ted is a strong conservative force and would serve our country well in the senate.
Yeah! Thanks for supporting Ted, Professor. I’ve been hoping for this for a while, and cheer your decision.
On the positive side, Ted has done some great things and is very conservative. He sounds like a Texan version of Marco Rubio to me.
On the other side, I do not think Dewhurst is a true conservative (here is a sample of some criticism http://www.redstate.com/erick/2011/05/19/david-dewhurst-embraces-the-dewcrist-label-and-openly-declares-war-on-conservatives/ ) … although you can take EE with a grain of salt, he and others have made a number of specific points here and elsewhere. He falls into the “good ol’ boy” big spending Republicans that hurts Texas – a red state by all means – in its ability to elect true fiscal conservatives in particular. Much like Florida, the good-time growth of the economy can mask poor fiscal decisions and let fake fiscal conservatives get away with stuff.
Coming from the Northeast, it drives me nuts to see people fall for the tough-on-spending talk backed by all the wrong moves.
Which is why I think Ted would be a great addition to the Senate. I think he will be in the DeMint – Lee – Rubio conservative mold.
He got the Saracuda’s endorsement! I’ve told my brother in Houston to get his butt out for Cruz. Seems he already was!
Now, THERE was an unfortunate turn of phrase…
If you knew my brother….
The Right will need to persuade more Hispanic voters of conservatism’s merits. Not only is Cruz fully qualified to be a Senator, but he is Hispanic.
Many of us including our host, bless his upright soul, are too principled to point this out. I am not.
I’m in Texas and I like what I see about Cruz, but I’ve yet to hear anything too terrible about Dewhurst.
Dewhurst came to my battalion’s change of command and I shook his hand. He is in serious need of intervention in the use of hair gel, and I didn’t appreciate his mentioning his campaign at a military formation.
But just what is there about him beyond just yucky unlikeability that would make me campaign against him?
Perhaps you should call Dan Patrick’s office and ask about Dewhurst’s part in Joe Strauss’s actions to table both the Anti-TSA Groping Bill and the Sanctuary City Bill.
In 2011, Dewhurst was implemental in getting Strauss elected Speaker of the Texas House, along with the help of 69 Democrats, much to the chagrin of conservative Texans. Dewhurst loves to brag how he is responsible for Texas having a balanced budget, yet not once has he mentioned that a balanced budget in Texas is State constitutional law. He had no choice but to make sure the budget was balanced.
Unfortunately, Dewhurst is a Republican in the Texas mold of LBJ. Back slapping, palm greasing politics are his forte and he will give us nothing more than Kay Bailey Deux, i.e. the dirty campaign he is trying to run.
Dewhurst, and his buddy, Strauss, both need to be retired to private life.
Dewhurts (intentional) was also endorsed by Hucksterby…which was enough for me to oppose him.
Really wish and pray that Daniel Patrick would run for national office. What a treasure we have had in Daniel Patrick in the legislature. True conservative patriot American. Daniel Patrick needs to be on the national stage.
Yep, I support Cruz.
I already early-voted – for Ted Cruz.
I voted for Ted Cruz. I think you should know that in Texas turnout in the GOP primary is way down compared to 2008 and 2010. The primary was originally set for March, but several Federal judges held the election hostage until now.
I don’t know how the low turnout will affect Cruz’s chances, but if I had to guess the delay probably did not help. Dewhurst has a lot more money and name recognition than Cruz and conservatives are not as mad at Dewhurst like they were with Lugar.
For the Presidential race, it was a tough call. I decided to vote for Michele Bachmann, who is still on the ballot. The Texas media is just as intolerant and left-wing as the media you will find in New York or Los Angeles, and their hatred of Bachmann – a pro-life conservative Christian woman – has been so over-the-top and hysterical as to be unintentionally funny. Even though Bachmann dropped out long ago, my local “newspaper” has been wackily obsessed with her to the point a week does not go by without them printing a major article furiously denouncing her as some kind of Christianist theocrat (she gets almost as much press as Romney). In the eyes of the Texas media Bachmann seems to have replaced Sarah Palin as the GOP Hitler.
Cruz has many endorsements, Palin, Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, which means he’s a true conservative. What little I’ve heard from him, I liked.
Gov. Rick Perry endorses the establishment candidate Dewhurst.
As for the low turnout, I have heard that Romney is the most likely reason. Rick Santorum was the leading choice before he dropped out. Texas is a delegate rich state and it will be interesting to see who they choose.
It shoudl be noted that the poll was taken BEFORE the endorsement from Sarah Palin and she was doing robo-calls on Cruz’s behalf last week.
Attorney General Greg Abbott has chosen not to endorse his staffer, Ted Cruz.
Professor, how do you define leadership? Is it someone who talks a good game, argued cases in court as a hired gun at the direction of others, but who has never held public office? Someone who can’t or won’t explain why he represents a Chinese government-controlled tire company trying to evade a $26 million judgment for intellectual property theft against a Florida businessman? The kind of guy who calls the Council on Foreign Relations “a pit of vipers” after having his wife resign from a longstanding CFR membership just as he’s starting his Senate run?
Or is leadership standing tall and balancing the state budget, year after year, via spending cuts alone — without ever raising taxes? Repeatedly passing pro-life and pro-family legislation through a state senate where Democrats have effective veto power? Strengthening border security when the federal government failed to do so? This is Dewhurst’s record, and it’s a real one.
Cruz’s support relies heavily on out-of-staters (Jacobsen?) who think Cruz is ideologically pure and looks good on paper. Without Club for Growth, Jim DeMint, Freedomworks, RedState and Washington-based groups, Cruz would be totally dead in the water.
“Retire05” has commented previously that Dewhurst somehow elected an allegedly-moderate House Speaker in Texas. This is bizarre. In fact, Dewhurst had nothing to do with Joe Straus’ election and I’ve never heard that charge from anyone other than “Retire05.” The Cruz-Dewhurst campaign has indeed gotten dirty, but the low road was started in 2011 entirely by Cruz, who accused Dewhurst of favoring a state income tax — which everyone who knows Texas Republican politics realizes is a ridiculous proposition. As for Sen. Patrick, he stated publicly last week that he believed Dewhurst would win without a runoff, and hinted he would be endorsing in the race soon.
The most accurate sentence in your blog post, Professor, is the first one: “I have not had as much of a chance to focus on the Texas Senate primary as I would have liked.” With all respect, Professor, you still have research to do.
“Someone who can’t or won’t explain why he represents a Chinese government-controlled tire company trying to evade a $26 million judgment for intellectual property theft against a Florida businessman?”
Your wrote a whole lot of stupid in that post, but this was something I won’t let you get away with.
Cruz is an appellate lawyer. He represents people with RIGHTS in Texas courts. That is not an evasion.
That is DUE FLUCKING PROCESS.
You might support that, as you could one day need to have a Cruz representing you.
Ragspierre: Unfortunately for Cruz, he has based his entire “public service record” on his zealous court advocacy, much of it for conservative causes. This is how he wants us to judge his “record.”
And now, along comes the Linglong tire case, which nobody forced him to take. He pursued the Chinese representation and took the case because there were big bucks in it, for him and for his law firm. There is no arguing about the Chinese intellectual property thieves being entitled to legal representation. But when the rubber hit the road, and a huge legal fee was at stake, Cruz was more than eager to forget about his pro-American principles and argue on behalf of Chinese thieves eating our economic lunch.
And Cruz “represents people with RIGHTS in Texas courts”? But this was no Texas case. It was a 4th Circuit case, based in Richmond, Va. Why was Cruz chosen by the Chinese thieves for this case? Was it because Cruz had clerked for an influential 4th Circuit judge, and was considered an insider, “wired” into the Circuit? You make the call.
Another aspect of this is interesting. Cruz was the lead appellate lawyer for Linglong until late last year, as the U.S. Senate race heated up. He was listed as “counsel of record” and was expected to argue the appeal personally. Perhaps feeling the political heat, perhaps too busy politicking, Cruz talked somebody else into making the 4th Circuit argument in December….hardly the stuff that will land him in a future edition of “Profiles in Courage.” Now he blithely claims he barely had anything to do with the case, wasn’t the trial lawyer, etc. Who, me? I’m just sitting in my office, editing briefs!
Correct me if you can on any of this, Rags, but until you do, I will politely note that I’m not the one commenting stupid on Prof. Jacobsen’s blog.
“Cruz was more than eager to forget about his pro-American principles and argue on behalf of Chinese thieves eating our economic lunch.”
Ah, I see you’ve weighed the legal issues (which is all you have at the appellate level) and decided the case.
The Chinese are “thieves”, huh? Well, that remains to be seen, doesn’t it?
You seem afraid of the Chinese. I’m not. And I’m not excited about prejudicing their rights in U.S. courts.
And, as to the Cruz role, MOST of appellate practice is completed on paper. Increasingly, courts will not even entertain oral argument.
BWAAAAHambulance for ConservTexan.
ConservTexan – I’m going to assume that you don’t have a Law Degree or any background in Intellectual Property, and thus explain WHY the Chinese Tire claim is a bunch of hooey. If you DO have either of those things, then you’re a Dewhurst PLANT and should be ridiculed.
Either way, I’m not going to let this BS about the tire company go unchallenged any longer. It’s horse-hocky.
First, the owner of the company that claims his intellectual property was stolen MOVED HIS COMPANY TO THE CHANNEL ISLANDS IN EUROPE. Mr. Fishman decided to use CHINESE LABOR 20 years ago because it was cheaper than manufacturing his tires in the US. So the whole “Cruz is destroying American Jobs” lie is laid bare. That LIE alone would stop me from voting for Dewhurst. But let’s continue:
WHILE IN CHINA Fishman’s company (Tire Engineering and Distribution LLC) PARTNERED with a Chinese company (Guizhou Tire Company aka GTC) to manufacture his tires. THIS IS A CASE BETWEEN TWO CHINESE COMPANIES. Mr. Fishman would be the beneficiary of the suit IF AND ONLY IF his Intellectual Property was impinged (I’m about to show it wasn’t).
If you’ll notice, in EVERY ONE of Dewhurst’s attack ads and advertisements about the case, they only give PARTIAL documents. Dewhurst doesn’t want anyone to actually READ the other documents which would show that Mr. Fishman was actually manufacturing in CHINA and not running a US company.
Further, the whole case is probably bunk: a “trusted employee” of Fishman named Sam Vance (head of the firm’s international sales unit) made an agreement with Shandong LingLong and provided them the specifications necessary to produce the tires when it appeared that Guizhou Tire Company was going to be unable to do so. Mr. Vance was going to have Al Dobowi (a third party company) distribute the tires from Shandong LingLong to the Tire Engineering and Distribution LLC customer. The BENEFIT of the payment appears to have been to accrue to Tire Engineering(thus, no damages would have been due AT ALL had the business deal been concluded as envisioned).
Notice also that Dewhurst never makes mention that this case has ALREADY been overturned once for lack of jurisdiction. It was originally filed in FLORIDA, was tried and then was overturned by the 2nd District Court of Appeals when it was found that Sam Vance wasn’t a resident of Florida, but a resident of Virginia and had done ALL HIS BUSINESS IN CHINA. It’s likely that the Virginia Court ALSO lacks jurisdiction over the Chinese Companies because the companies lack minimum sufficient contacts with the United States to be subject to Jurisdiction to suit here (they don’t do business here and they don’t sell products here). Without jurisdiction, the court has no authority to pull in a Chinese company, nor to force them to pay ANYTHING.
So, to sum up, Dewhurst’s attempt to smear Cruz by claiming he’s representing a Chinese Tire Counterfeiter against an upstanding American business is a blatant LIE.
Conserv – how long have you been on Dewhurst’s payroll? You are repeatedly misrepresenting the facts. You know it, and so do we. As my fellow Texans have indicated above, your boy will not be getting my vote either. If you want to bring up things, why don’t you address the reason Dewhurst divorced his first wife. Did you forget that he kicked her to the curb after getting a DWI and embarassing her hubby. Not conducive to his rise to power. Any truth to the rumor that Perry is “endorsing” Dewhurst because he wants him out of the State?
I don’t know who’s on whose payroll, but it’s really strange that every time I do a post about Cruz (which isn’t often), new people who’ve never posted here before show up with really lengthy diatribes against him, and they keep at it until they get the last word and others give up. I see a pattern here.
Yup.
I’ve already voted for Cruz and I only wish I was a dead man in Chicago so I could vote for him 100 times!
Paging voodoo witch doctors!!!!!
I have been following Cruz.
He seems very gracious & learned & rather handsome.
It would be nice to have a Ted in the Senate that was not a murderer.
The power of Palin. If she bags another GOPe/RINO then the good old boys have just been served notice. Once, a fluke. Twice, bad luck. Three times? Get a clue establishment.
In 2010 the Tea Party’s wrath was mostly against the dems.
In 2012 the Tea Party’s wrath is still on the dems, but a lot of RINOS are on the menu.
With no money or time to donate I did all that I could for Cruz, I cast my vote for him in the early ballot last week.
Cruz is up to his eyeballs in a developing scandal involving China and industrial espionage for starters. He is exactly what is not needed in Washington. Cruz is a slippery litigation attorney.
Dewhurst is the establishment candidate but is reflective of the Perry syndrome of non-accomplishment.
My choice, (though not enthuiatically), is Tom Lepert who has three things going for him… a) Not a lawyer, b) Is a businessman like Romney and c) Not a career politician and as a bonus has the best ad by far.
Apparently you ignored my earlier very lengthy explanation of exactly WHY Dewhurst’s “Chinese Tire” Claim is a LIE.
I think that ConservTexan just did you the proper justice.
I’m stickin’ with Tom Lepert…
Ah, no. ConservTexan did not do it proper justice. Please see below.
By the way, you’ve misspelled Leppert’s name twice in separate posts. It has TWO p’s.
As for Leppert, I just don’t think he’s got enough traction or name recognition outside of the DFW area. If I wasn’t as plugged into the political scene as I am, I would have never heard of him.
I haven’t heard or seen a single advertisement for him in Western Texas. Cruz has been advertising pretty heavily in the El Paso area and is expected to do well there in the Republican primary.
I am happy to continue debating Ted Cruz’s unconscionable representation of Chinese intellectual property thieves. You will find I don’t resort to bold face, ad hominem attacks, accusations of lying and distortion of legal matters as Cruz apologists do. The facts are plenty sufficient and plenty damning.
First, Rags, we already have a pretty good idea whether the Chinese are thieves. They were found liable on every count by a unanimous Virginia civil jury in 2010….Cruz took up their defense later, successfully (thus far) delaying enforcement of the judgment. If the verdict is overturned, it won’t be on the merits or the facts — those have been determined by a jury of American citizens — but on technicalities and procedural issues being pursued by clever lawyer Cruz.
And yes, Chuck Skinner, the case has been delayed on jurisdictional grounds previously. The plaintiff, Jordan Fishman, is 74, and the Chinese are clearly trying to footdrag the case until he dies or runs out of money. The Virginia trial judge explicitly denied the Chinese jurisdictional claims in his court. More damningly, a co-conspirator in the Virginia trial testified the Chinese were emboldened to try every conceivable appellate trick because they thought the now-bankrupt Fishman couldn’t afford the appeal, or would die while lawyers for the Chinese pursued their delaying tactics.
And this episode brings up another relevent insight into Cruz’s credibility. When a reporter asked Cruz about the co-conspirator’s testimony, he refused to answer, brushed the journalist off with a statement that “Dewhurst is lying” and turned away. But the reporter pressed the matter with Cruz’s campaign. Cruz’s top consultant eventually claimed Cruz was “unaware” of that testimony. Is there anyone out there who believes that Cruz — lead appellate lawyer for the Chinese tire company — had somehow missed reading that section of the trial court transcript? Bueller? Anyone?
Finally, Skinner tries to claim, sleight-of-hand style, that this is a dispute between two Chinese tire companies. The Cruz campaign similarly tries to define the issue as no American “manufacturing” jobs lost. Please move on — nothing to see here. But Fishman had up to 25 U.S. employees at one time, plus a host of distributors, prior to the intellectual property theft. In bankruptcy, he’s now down to two employees, himself and a part-timer.
Yes, it’s unfortunate that so much American manufacturing is going offshore, where taxes, regulations, labor and other factors are less onerous. But Americans are ingenious, and we’ll do fine if intellectual property rights are respected, and a fare share of profits from American IP comes home to the U.S. One reason our economy is in trouble is that the Chinese are playing dirty, manipulating currency and stealing intellectual property. Hired gun hotshot lawyers like Ted Cruz are helping them do it, and get away with it.
You’re ignoring the point: The MERITS of the case should never have been argued at all. The VENUE was improper because the COURT DOES NOT HAVE JURISDICTION OVER THE PARTIES.
I know this is a difficult concept for non-lawyers. But the proper VENUE to bring this suit would have been CHINA because it is a suit between TWO CHINESE COMPANIES (GTC and Shandong LingLong). You can try to downplay that FACT all you want, but it is a FACT that is not subject to debate; it’s right there in black-and-white in the court filings. Fishman would be a necessary aggrieved 3rd party, but that alone does not make venue proper in the United States.
Continuing: Fishman didn’t follow the RULES. China is a signatory to the Paris Convention for Protection of Industrial Property (part of the World Intellectual Property Organization). Fishman didn’t file a PATENT. If he had gotten a PATENT, this would be a very different case. When you don’t have a PATENT, you don’t get certain protections. In the earlier cases, the trademark claims were entirely thrown out, and the Copyright claim against the TIRES are VERY shaky ground. (You can copyright the ART on the tires, but not the DESIGN of the tires). My guess is that it wouldn’t survive appeal even if venue in the case was proper. The copyright on the blueprints is slightly different, but then you get into lawful control of the information. See next paragraph.
Finally, you didn’t address the argument that I made: that Sam Vance was lawfully in control of the information at the time he provided it to Shandong LingLong for business purposes (Per Article 39 of the TRIPS convention). If he was (as head of international sales) then there’s NO CASE to be made. Without an iron-clad “non-competition” agreement in place prior to providing the information, once that trade secret is out of the bag, it’s GONE FOR GOOD.
If you want to argue the “American Employees” angle, DO IT HONESTLY. Fishman HAD employees BEFORE HE MOVED HIS OPERATIONS TO CHINA. That was 20 YEARS prior to the intellectual property theft (aka 1985). I have not been able to find a reference to a larger group of employees beyond that time (If you have, please provide a reference). I think that the public would have much less sympathy for distributors of Chinese produced products who largely do business in Asia and Australia as opposed to Dewhurst’s dubious claim that it cost American Manufacturing jobs.
Dewhurst IS lying. Blatantly. Someone who is going to so blatantly and bald-facedly lie to the voters to try to destroy his opponent is going to similarly abandon his principles once it no longer suits him. That is the psychological nature of someone willing to follow that path.
And while we’re at it, let’s discuss who talks big, and who walks the walk.
Most major Senate candidates here released at least two years of tax returns earlier this year. It developed that Dewhurst donated approximately $1 to $2 million annually to charity, at least once giving away more than his net income for the year. He gave generously even when it produced no tax deduction. His beneficiaries ranged widely, from pro-life groups and spreading the gospel in the Third World to Battleship Texas preservation, funds for underprivileged kids to attend the Houston Symphony, huge donations for Israeli defense, and significant funds to refurbish the French museum honoring U.S. war heroes at D-Day (including his own father). Dewhurst, by the way, served in the U.S. Air Force and abroad with the CIA.
Cruz, who made $1.7 million as a lawyer last year, and his Goldman Sachs wife, by contrast donated almost nothing to charity. His charitable deductions were Biden-like in their near-nonexistence. At first, Cruz tried to hide the specifics, releasing only that his miniscule listed contributions went to “various charities.” He was later finally shamed into more details, and they included “in-kind” contributions to Habitat for Humanity. So — he gave nothing to very little, attempted to write off his pro bono legal work, hid the details, and finally tried to take political credit. Needless to say, he never served in the military.
If fancy talk is important to you, I’m sure Cruz looks great in Rhode Island. But are you starting to see why Cruz is having trouble making the sale among Texans?
Most posters here are not Texan.
People are just scanning the likely Republican Senate field to see if there is hope.
Seems to me the Senate must start being accountable to The american people. I have been amazed at how much they have got away with. For instance obama Biden Clinton byrd Kennedy MCCain did nothing but campaign or be semi dead (hard to know which ) for 2 years.
In this race who is likely to have more impact in DC – Dewhurst or Cruz. I like it that Cruz has experience at SCOTUS & was successful. Perhaps he will be better than rubio who makes nice speeches & that is about it. (& is pretty ).
There are lawyers & there are Lawyers. Cruz looks to be interesting & I will be following his future. He has star potential.
Heh… I’m originally from RI and slippery politicians are the order of the day. I can assure you that most of ’em have never heard of Cruz and if he were to become a known factor, he might fit in nicely.
My point is that we need less in the way of lawyers in Congress and more in the way of doers. Lepert seems to fit this requirement, (of mine), better.
Ted Cruz will be US President 2020.
You read it here .
Bill, for the record, I have posted here before though it has been a while. I am a native Texan and was a resident for over 50 years in that great state.
While I was an early booster of Ted Cruz and published a couple of profiles in 2010 of Cruz for the currently shuttered Lone Star times blog, Ted has not been all that I would like him to be. That being said, he is still, by far, a superior candidate to David Dewhurst.
The following was added to a Paul Mirengoff column today at Powerline blog by the esteemed Steven Hayward describing his encounter with Lt. Governor Dewhurst:
“STEVE adds: I really should have said something about this race before now. I’ve known Ted Cruz slightly since the late 1990s, since shortly after he clerked at the Supreme Court for Chief Justice Rehnquist. A very solid guy. I’ve also had a very unpleasant run-in with Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. Last year my writing partner Ken Green and I wrote a study for the Texas Public Policy Foundation about the energy sector in Texas, in which, among other things, we argued that the state government should not use its heavy hand to tilt the playing field against coal and toward natural gas, even though Ken and I are both great fans of natural gas. We think the market should decide. (And it is–the winner is: natural gas.) The study made no mention of Dewhurst, but he took offense anyway, and summoned me to his office in the capitol building in Austin and worked me over for about an hour. It became clear that he is an old fashioned petty corrupt pol who believes in using the power of government to help his friends and favored interests (he made his own personal fortune in the natural gas business). I’ve met a lot of politicians over the years, but he was perhaps the single most unappealing and offensive one I’ve ever met, in either party.”
I am a longtime reader of LI, and an enthusiastic one. Professor Jacobsen is doubtless referring to me suspiciously as someone who appears only periodically in these comments, and then does so at length. To that, I plead guilty — with an explanation.
I read a number of blogs, and comment only when I believe I have unique information. I typically do not throw in my cheap political opinions unless I have special knowledge or facts to back my point of view. For example, I have turned to LI three-four times a day recently to keep abreast of Fauxahontas E. Warren, but I have never been close to posting about her. She taught at University of Texas law school for a while, but I can’t find anyone here who has anything new or pertinent to add about her. I know nothing special — I wouldn’t know her if she hit me with a tomahawk — so I keep my counsel. That’s the way I roll.
I’ve lived in Texas for a long time. I know the politics here and most of the players well. This is a huge, diverse, complicated state. It pains me when national commentators come in and make two-dimensional statements about situations that have a rich, nuanced and somewhat disparate history. I really got active in those few weeks when Rick Perry was the flavor of the month in the presidential primary, because I had first-hand information about him, and a point of view, that was often not being represented in national blogs or mainstream media. Now the spotlight turns for a day or two to Texas’s U.S. Senate race, and here I am again.
Professor, I don’t believe you should dismiss occasional posters like myself simply because I don’t have the comment totals that others among your fans do. Judge me instead on the quality of my contributions, especially their factual content, not on their number. (I will admit my posts, when they come, are long, perhaps excessively so, and I’m grateful they are not censored.) There should be room among your blog followers for selective commenters as well as prolific ones.
By the way, looking at TexPat’s comment above, the Hayward anecdote has a couple of “minor” problems. Dewhurst made his fortune in co-generation, not in natural gas. It must have been galling for Hayward, a casual drop-in to the energy business, to be lectured by a public official who has spent much of his business career in it. More importantly, Texas government (including Dewhurst and Perry) are at war with the EPA, which is doing everything possible to run coal plants — in Texas and elsewhere — out of business. So the ad hominem anecdote is entertaining, but it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
I live in Dallas and refer to LI often, though not as often since the ‘inevitable one’ became the default nominee.
I proudly voted for Ted Cruz for many reasons, not the least being his victory at SCOTUS on the Jose Medellin debacle.
As for Dewhurst, we already have far too many gop-e clones in Congress.
Also, having been a resident of Dallas for the past twenty one years, I wouldn’t have voted for Tom Leppert to be re-elected for Mayor, much less the Senate. He wants to take credit for reducing crime in Dallas, when that credit goes to Police Chief David Kunkle. Leppert’s actions on behalf of his Sugar Daddy T. Boone Pickens in pushing the CNG(compressed natural gas) vehicles on all the commercial vehicles in the Dallas area was egregious. There was no concern for the cost or effects of this effort, only what HE wanted.
Jay Nordlinger has written favorably about Ted Cruz many times, and I concur with his opinion of our next Senator. I can hardly wait until we can rid our state of Cornyn in a few years.
ConservTexan
RE: Your assertion that Falcon Seaboard had nothing to do with natural gas
Exactly how do you think Dewhurst’s company’s three plants generated all that power ? With firewood ? Falcon Seaboard had extensive natural gas holdings both onshore and offshore.
Good grief. Do you know anything about the cogen business ?
RE: Your assertion Steven Hayward is a “drop-in” to the natural gas arena.
Hayward has been writing and researching energy, oil & natural gas, environmentalism and government policy since the 1990s for organizations like the American Enterprise Institute. The Texas Public Policy Foundation did not choose Hayward to write their report because he doesn’t know the industry.
Also, Hayward never questioned Dewhurst’s knowledge or experience regarding natural gas. What he did do was question Dewhurst’s personal integrity for unflinchingly exerting his political authority to game the system by creating governmental obstacles for his favored fuel source. Distorting free market incentives is the tool of hack politicians with no faith in capitalism and open market enterprise results. It’s more principally called economic liberty, but Dewhurst obviously doesn’t care.
Again, you appear to not know what you are talking about reinforcing the perception you are just a shill for David Dewhurst.