I am not up to date on his chances, and hell, I don’t even know his platform or what he stands for, but he is not Greg Abbott and enthusiasm about him running might stave off some of the losses in 2022, so let’s go Beto.
Beto’s In
This post is in: Politics
SiubhanDuinne
I have no idea about his chances either, but I am affirmatively pro-Beto, not just for him because he’s not Abbott. He’s been a good candidate in the past and he absolutely walks his talk. Very happy he’s declared.
schrodingers_cat
Good on Beto, I hope he wins. It was not that long ago that California was a Republican stronghold. Once the Rs lose Texas. They are toast.
How competitive is Texas, do BJers from Texas want to weigh in?
O. Felix Culpa
Good news. And Steve Bannon (ptui!) has surrendered to federal authorities. Our systems are not dead yet. Obligatory.
Edmund Dantes
Wasn’t he praised for being fairly decent on GoTV in his senate run or am I remembering that wrong?
Betty
He has been working hard these last few years to help folks. He should do well with Hispanic voters which should matter in Texas, assuming the new laws don’t mess up the vote too much. Texas deserves so much better than all their current statewide elected officials. What a crew! I wonder if there is any chance the legislature can be improved.
Sean
As a Texan who voted for Beto for Senate and will happily support him in his bid, I believe his chances are quite poor.
Abbott will run his “absolutely we’re coming for your guns” statement from the senate bid on repeat, and in a state where rural turnout consistently sinks us, combined with the really horrible environment for democrats where those rural areas are incredibly engaged and determined to win/double down on every bad policy this horrible state can conjure up…I just don’t see Beto with any real chance even if he can win big in the cities.
It would be great to be wrong. Running a campaign on how the state left us all to freeze to death and also about legalizing marijuana- that’s about the most solid, popular and straight forward starting ground a Democrat has had to run on in a long time. He is a charismatic guy, and he has experience running statewide and lord, the money will come. But if Beto shows any life at all and climbs in the polls, this thing will get hyper nationalized, and become about CRT, masks, inflation, border screaming, etc. and I just can’t see any Democrat overcoming that any time soon
Also Matthew McConaughey is rumored to be considering an independent bid, and I gotta tell you, I have no freaking clue what weird ass voting patterns that might create here. I doubt it happens though.
Joe Falco
I’m still waiting on Stacey Abrams to make her announcement in Georgia for governor. We need as many Democrats as possible to run next year.
Geminid
. I don’t know what O’Rourke’s platform will be. But I think his campaign theme wil be “THROW THE RASCALS OUT!”
Republicans have controlled Texas for over 20 years now, and any and all Texas problems can be hung around their necks, especially the suffering caused when power went out during last year’s freeze.
Mike in NC
The headline in the local rag today was all about how Trump out-polls Biden in rural Iowa. No fucking kidding, right?
L85NJGT
@Edmund Dantes:
50.9%–48.3% Vs. Cruz.
As of today he’s headed into a pretty fierce political headwind. IIRC those national mood dynamics lock in around June, so we shall see.
Nelle
@Mike in NC: Only Iowa farmers have a right to government money.
Are you in touch with Mike Franken? I wish he had declared earlier.
rikyrah
Go Beto ????????
Nelle
@L85NJGT: But if no one takes the risk of running, we are left with awful choices.
Another Scott
@Sean: Marijuana is something that seems to be one of the issues that should energize younger, marginally connected, voters – if it’s done right. It’s a bit of a mystery why our smart political operatives haven’t made it more of an issue. (Schumer has, but he’s also been tilting at the windmill of cancelling all student debt, so I don’t know how his political skills on things like this play outside NY…)
Cheers,
Scott.
john b
Bannon’s in . . . custody:
mrmoshpotato
Hopefully someone blows that slapdick Matthew Dowd out of the water. (He’s supposedly running for Lt. Governor in Texas.)
guachi
It’s going to be exceptionally difficult for Democrats to do well next year. Gerrymandering means the Ds need to win the popular vote by about 3% to hold the House and that’s not likely to happen. Or even anything remotely close.
I wish him luck but I don’t see how he wins. I think he’ll have to make the campaign focused heavily on Texas as nothing negative in Texas can plausibly be laid at the feet of Democrats.
WaterGirl
@Edmund Dantes:
That would be a gigantic understatement.
WaterGirl
@Geminid:
Fixed that for you.
Geminid
@Sean: O’Rourke’s talk of confiscating weapons certainly won’t help him. I’ll be interested to see him announce his gun safety platform. He may walk back confiscation, and instead propose a ban on new sales of military style semiautomatic rifles.
O’Rourke has a better gun safety issue now in the new permitless concealed carry law. When that bill was proposed this spring, the Texas Tribune reported a poll showing a clear majority of Texans opposed this terrible idea. Ideally, the headline on stories about O’Rourke’s gun safety event would be:
“O’Rourke Vows to End Unrestricted Concealed Carry; says he won’t confiscate weapons.”
Sean
@Another Scott: I agree and its certainly worth a shot at trying to change the dynamic here, especially RE: job creation, wealth creation, tourism, etc., but also consider, this might equally fire up rural bible belt people who believe Marijuana is a tool of satan. I grew up in East Texas and, it’s a different world. This state is huge and the rural population is a force that has been impossible to overcome for a long, long time. If he can thread the needle to make marijuana a salient issue beyond marginal youth voters (and it is popular in some GOP corners here for the wealth potential) then it could create a weird shake up. I think running on that + our failing infrastructure gives him at least a non-zero chance here. But it’s about as much optimism as I can generate.
Sean
@Geminid:
He’ll probably take a more nuanced approach, for sure. If he doubles down he’ll destroy his campaign before it begins. But it will be hard to escape his previous positions in this distorted media environment we’re all trapped in.
Mike in NC
@Nelle: My shipmate from active duty Navy days in the 1980s. I’ll be supporting his run against the dinosaur Grassley.
Searcher
@guachi: Only 3%?
Shit, that makes me positively optimistic.
Betty
@Another Scott: PA’s Senate candidate, John Fetterman has been pushing this since becoming Lieutenant Governor. He visited all 67 counties to hold town halls and hits Republicans over it constantly as neighboring states legalize it.
L85NJGT
Put him on the board as a 53/47 underdog – he’ll cover, and an outright win is a long shot bet with a heck of a payout.
Geminid
@Sean: Confiscation is definitely a risky position. When Virginia Democrats proposed a number of gun safety bills in January, 2020, State Senator Saslaw introduced an assault weapons bill along the lines of Connecticut’s, whereby these weapons would have to be turned in. He withdrew it that same week. A law that would have just banned new sales remained, but it was later punted to the State Crime Commision for study, and was not revived for this years session. Six good gun safety measures were passed in 2020, and they all showed 70%+ support in polling. The ban on sales of “assault” weapons polled closer to 50-50.
guachi
@Searcher: Might be worse after the latest round or redistricting.
Ds won in 2012 House elections by 1.1% and Rs had a majority 33 seats. Rs won 2016 by 1.1% and had a majority of 47 seats. Ds won 2018 by 8.6% and had a majority of 36 seats.
PJ
@Another Scott: Legalizing MJ in NJ didn’t seem to make any difference for Phil Murphy in this month’s election.
Another Scott
@guachi: Redistricting is a big wildcard, and I have to assume that everyone in DC knows that it must be reasonably fair or we’re cutting our throat as a republic. That’s why I continue to assume that a strong bill will pass and address these GQP abominations before the elections.
Cheers,
Scott.
Geminid
@Sean: I can see some value for cannabis legalization as a secondary issue. I think O’Rourke can find better primary issues to run on, and with which to motivate younger voters.
Another Scott
@PJ: He won. That’s what matters. I have no idea if it made a difference, but one needs every vote…
Cheers,
Scott.
Fair Economist
The Republicans could be weak on a lot of issues – killing more Americans than Bin Laden every week, in Abbott’s casing freezing the entire state to allow corruption and pollution in the energy issues, etc. – and while it’s hard to break through the determination of the media to protect Republicans from the consequences of their misdeeds, I think Beto is a good guy for it.
Sean
@Geminid: He certainly has things to work with, not least that Abbott is unpopular. I mention MJ because it has support among some GOP corners here and it’s an issue on which some divide might be bridged (though I still doubt it). Ultimately, Texas is a heavy lift statewide for any Democrat. But no candidate will have the name recognition, money or experience that Beto will have. It’s expensive as hell to go on the air here and blanket the state. Beto will actually have money to work with to get his message out. But he had it against Cruz too, who was even more unpopular and still couldn’t pull it off in a MUCH better environment for Democrats. So…yikes.
ian
@mrmoshpotato:
Mike Collier, the 2018 Democratic nominee, is facing him in the primary. Texas Dems have a choice: Dowd, or the guy who got blown out of the water in 2018. I would vote Collier personally, but I am not a Texas Dem, so my say doesn’t mean much
debbie
@Geminid:
With all of the GOPers vying for the Looniest Award, moderates might be able to tolerate the idea of Beto better this time around.
Suzanne
I am on Team Beto. He’ll probably lose. Whatever.
I don’t know if any Democrat can win Texass. But Beto has the best shot, I think.
balconesfault
Beto was brilliant in the early stages of the 2018 run against Cruz.
Cruz was unpopular with a lot of Republicans, Beto connected with a lot of people as liberal they could talk to and would listen to them, I think he had a real opening.
Then he became a media star … bi-coastal money started flowing in, liberal entertainment icons started raising money for him (ok, Willie was great … but the Texas outsiders, not so much), Beto started relying on Washington/DCC consultants … and the tide turned.
He wasn’t going to win Texas as a liberal bellweather. The shift in tone as his campaign nationalized killed his ability to win the votes of rural Texans. They held their nose and voted for Cruz.
Then he made his – imo clueless – run for President. I think that the consultant cast just saw they could make money off him and said “go for it Beto!”
With that, I really don’t think he’ll have a chance against Abbott, unpopular as Abbott is.
Will he help win some statehouse and Congressional seats by generating enthusiasm? Maybe. But I’m not so sure anymore.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@guachi:
I thought our chances were supposed to be pretty good considering a favorable Senate map and the fact that the ARA was passed last spring, along with the BIB and a potential BBB should get the economy booming
Another Scott
@balconesfault: Good points, but Beto is smart and will learn from his mistakes.
The GQP is imploding, also too, but of course is still dangerous.
Good, good.
Cheers,
Scott.
SiubhanDuinne
I see Sen Patrick Leahy won’t run for re-election in 2022. Any Vermonters here? I don’t know anything about the state’s politics and assume it’s a pretty safe Dem seat, but I don’t know. Do we have good candidates on the bench to replace him?
marklar
@Fair Economist: “The Republicans could be weak on a lot of issues – killing more Americans than Bin Laden every week,”
Research on risk assessment has shown that people exaggerate the risk of catastrophic events (thousands dying at once), and downplay the risk of events occurring individually (such as the deaths by COVID). We need to aggregate all those deaths into a catastrophic event.
Just imagine a campaign ad that shows the Towers falling, over and over again, with the video blended with a calendar showing the week by week deaths from COVID.
Without aggregating the deaths and relating it to easily understood quantitative data (deaths from 9/11), people won’t ‘feel’ the devastation of the pandemic.
SiubhanDuinne
@marklar:
Of course, the Repubs would attack such an ad, scathingly and ceaselessly. “How DARE you politicise 9/11!?” But it sure would be effective.
Brantl
@Mike in NC: And Nazis would outpoll Trump, BFD.
anon
@marklar: i have a banner on my deck that faces a major suburban road in metro Detroit that says “PRICE OF FREEDOM: 3xx,xxx”. I updated the original count once , then decided it wasn’t worth my time to keep updating and so it now it says “PRICE OF FREEDOM: 570,xxx”. I may update it in the next week or two to just 770,xxx to keep ahead of the count.
balconesfault
@Another Scott: The problem is that I don’t know if he can reverse his branding quickly enough for the 2022 Gubernatorial race.
By running in the National Dem Primaries he just re-emphasized to the rural Texans that they couldn’t trust him not to be “just another liberal”.
Worse yet – thanks to social media dominating the way a lot of Hispanics get their “news” these days (MSNBC had a good piece on that last Saturday which resonated with what my partner – she does media buying across Texas – had been saying for months) the big Democratic turnout from the Rio Grande Valley is no longer assured.
Beto needed to get out of the national spotlight, and get back to what had propelled him in the early part of the 2018 campaign, and get back to talking to and re-building trust with every rural and hispanic group in Texas that would let him speak. Instead he was spending time in Iowa, etc …
Geminid
@debbie: O’Rourke is a very energetic and charismatic campaigner. In such a polarized environment as we have today, that may not be worth as much as it used to be, but it’s still worth something. I think O’Rourke will at least energize the Democratic base. He’ll still need independent voters.
True swing voters are a relatively small group, but they are out there and O’Rourke will need them. I’ll be interested to see O’Rourke’s messaging. There is a notion that one cannot attract independents without sacrificing base voters, but I do not believe this. It does take good policies and shrewd messaging, and I’ll be interested to see how O’Rourke meets this challenge.
O’Rourke strikes me as having, most of the time, very sound political instincts. I learned some about how he formed them when I read the Wikipedia article on Congreswoman Veronica Escobar, his successor in Congress. The article describes how, in the aftermath of a liberal El Paso Mayors election defeat in 2006(?) , Escobar, O’Rourke, Steve Gomez, and Susie Bird banded together to strategize a political takeover of El Paso City and El Paso County. In a few years, they had made the strategy work. The four came to be known locally as “The Progressives.”
trollhattan
@Sean: My presumption is so long as Republicans retain their stranglehold on the Texas state house and judiciary they will maintain power by structural means–gerrymandering, voter suppression, etc. Another mountain for Democrats to climb is Hispanic outreach and engagement. Lots of enthusiastic Trump voters among that huge population, and even more who do not vote/are prevented from voting.
Since Ann Richards Texas has become more, not less Republican.
Ksmiami
Eh I live here and Texas is a disaster nightmare of a state… better to win urban and suburban seats where possible but then focus on retaining the Senate next yr. a dollar for Beto is a dollar taken from Warnock.
TxTiger
I don’t think Beto can win (sadly) but his presence on the ticket will help turnout for down ballot races that matter, especially for state legislative reps. He understands the importance of voting down the whole ballot and I hope he emphasizes it. I hold hope that we can take the Lt Gov race this way.
There is a group called Ground Game Texas, meanwhile, that is trying to get legalizing weed onto the ballot as an initiative in various locales, and that will help juice turnout for otherwise low propensity voters.
anon
@trollhattan: as much as I blame trumpist republicans, you also have to blame the upper-class white collar who lean left, but move to TX for the “low taxes” (property taxes are high and don’t have a cap on annual increases). They are contributing to the population count and to the tax revenue even if they don’t vote R
Immanentize
First, gerrymandering has nothing to do with State-wide races.
Second, gerrymandering has nothing to do with State-wide races. GOTV. spend mony, appeal to hispanic voters who are catholic and have an idea they are more white than not with appeals to healthcare, schools, and job security.
I know some savants will come in with — enthusiasm is lessened! hopelessness is increased, etc. Blah blah blah. But I should make my third point — Gerrymandering has nothing to do with State-wide elections; which is why Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina (and others?) which are heavily gerrymandered all have Democratic Governors.
Periot.
Geminid
@SiubhanDuinne: Vermont’s Congressman, Peter Welch(?), should be ready to move up. I don’t know much about him except that he’s a member of the Progressive Caucus but a few weeks ago, when Speaker Pelosi made a try to pass the infrastructure bill ahead of the BBB bill, Welch said that might not be a bad idea.
Matt McIrvin
@Another Scott: About half the responses are complaining that “guilty” is ACTCHUALLY a term that is only appropriate in criminal proceedings and not civil ones. Interestingly the news stories all put “guilty” in the headline.
WaterGirl
@Geminid:
Yes, he does. He is also authentic, which I greatly appreciate.
Did he stumble out of the gate with his presidential run? Yes, he did.
Jumping off of your comment, but not directed at you, Geminid:
But damn, I feel like we are out own worst enemies much of the time. A good/great candidate announces his run and the response is “oh, he fucked this up one time” or “he said this one thing that won’t play well” or “he can’t win”.
Geez. And people wonder why we don’t win more.
Republicans: No matter how awful their candidates are, they can can do no wrong in the eyes of Republicans.
Democrats, online at least: No matter how great their candidates are, they are imperfect and dammit let’s be sure to call out all every one of their imperfections, early and often.
dww44
I am likely one of the few who watches cable news and cable tv and note that in addition to the Fox and NewsMaxx channels, two of our local channels, the ABC affiliate and the Fox affiliate, were sold in the recent past to Sinclair who force feeds their own National Desk in the a.m. and in the evening. In addition to that the Chicago station, WGN, has apparently decided to become the source of real unbiased news (it’s conservative).
We Democrats HAVE to do something to get our voices heard, otherwise everyone now believes that Biden is a massive failure as is Kamala Harris (that from CNN) and that we are all evil Socialists.
Last week on the Chris Hayes show, David Plouffe said that the problem for Democrats is that our megaphone works during Presidential campaigns but shuts down afterwards, while the conservative media amp it up to destroy our elected leaders. We have to do something and do it starting now. Maybe we can’t buy and field our own media outlets, but surely the national Democratic party could convene a group whose sole focus would be messaging to combat the constant conservative onslaught. Our own Lincoln Project and put some effective spokespeople on the tv and media outlets post haste. Biden maybe can ignore the polls but we cannot.
OGLiberal
@PJ: Couple of things. Outside of medical you still can’t buy it here in NJ so, yeah, legal, but still illegal to sell/buy outside of medical. Second, I think a lot of people – count me in this group – thought that Murphy was going to win running away. As a result, some folks – not me – may have ditched out of voting.
I think Steve Sweeney actually lost because of underestimating his opponent. Sweeney is terrible but the guy who beat him is more terrible and I’d rather have a Dem, even if that Dem is Sweeney.
OGLiberal
@PJ: Couple of things. Outside of medical you still can’t buy it here in NJ so, yeah, legal, but still illegal to sell/buy outside of medical. Second, I think a lot of people – count me in this group – thought that Murphy was going to win running away. As a result, some folks – not me – may have ditched out of voting.
I think Steve Sweeney actually lost because of underestimating his opponent. Sweeney is terrible but the guy who beat him is more terrible and I’d rather have a Dem, even if that Dem is Sweeney.
OGLiberal
The judge in the Rittehouse case threw out the gun charge. While just a misdemeanor, it was the one charge that I don’t think was even in question – he was not 18, he had a gun…no dancing aroud that. This judge really wants this kid to walk, doesn’t he?
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: There is a lawsuit being tried now in a Charlottesville federal court. The plaintiffs are people injured in the August 12, 2017 ” Unite the Right” rally, suing rally organizers. The intent is to bankrupt them. The trial has been going on since October 25, and will run several more days before the matter goes to the jury.
Jinchi
This.
Beto is a rare politician who is willing to challenge an incumbent against long odds, and he is unapologetic about his ideology. My guess is his chances of winning in Texas are about 20%, and a lot of that has to do with where we are as a nation in the next year. If Democrats are fortunate enough to run solid candidates in long-shot races like that, they’ll likely win those races a significant percentage of the time.
The down-ballot advantage may be even more important. Nothing will depress party turnout more than having the party abandon a race, entirely. Democrats keep talking about the impending flip of Texas from red-to-blue (any year now). That’s not going to happen until they make serious challenges up and down the ballot and build up a strong bench of candidates for voters to support.
Go Beto!
marklar
@SiubhanDuinne: “Of course, the Repubs would attack such an ad, scathingly and ceaselessly. “How DARE you politicise 9/11!?”
I thought of that as I was writing it. It’s a feature– not a bug. The criticism would result in the ad being shown over and over again within the Foxmax bubble. It could turn out to be the first time the COVID statistics are actually shown to their viewership.
Jinchi
I saw that headline, but didn’t see any mention of the justification. It really undermines the argument that the judge’s defenders make that he’s simply playing this by the book.
Another Scott
@dww44: There are people out there doing the work. We need to increase their visibility.
Maybe https://twitter.com/Eleven_Films
Maybe https://twitter.com/donwinslow
(They’re both in the ‘hurry up and do more’ camp, and that’s often appropriate for advocates.)
Cheers,
Scott.
Old School
@OGLiberal:
Seems to have been a poorly written law:
Geminid
@Jinchi: The Texas vote in last year’s Presidential election was Asshole, 52%, Biden 46.5. One way of looking at this is that 5.5% is a big margin. Another way of looking at it is that for every 26 Texans who voted Republican, over 23 voted Democratic. That, to me at least, makes this look more like a solvable problem.
Jinchi
Yeah, it’d be really bad news for Abbott if the grid collapsed again this winter.
UncleEbeneezer
@WaterGirl: Thank you. Beto has that one thing, charisma, that you can’t manufacture in a Dem factory. We should use it to build Dem infrastructure and GOTV in Texas. Whether he wins or not, I’m glad he’s running. It will bring excitement to Texas Dems and maybe get some soft Republicans, Independents and swing voters who may lean conservative but be ready to ditch Abbott.
Will
Beto has zero chance. He threw away ever winning a state wide election in Texas when he said he was going to confiscate people’s guns. It doesn’t matter how crappy Abbot is, he could shoot someone in the middle of the street in broad daylight while being broadcast live to every home in the state and he would still win. They are going to bury Beto with everything he said in his presidential campaign. Beto can’t run from it, the soundbites are all there. The more he tries to walk it back, the more wishy washy he will sound. He is in a no win situation and this is just more consultants wanting money so they blow smoke up his ass about how he has a chance.
Martin
Thank god. I think we stand a good chance of winning with Beto.
Immanentize
The same people telling us Georgia could not go blue state-wide seem to have clear, if uninformed, opinions about Beto’s chances in Texas.
Jinchi
And it’s important to remember that Democratic turnout in Texas in an off-year election is probably considerably lower than during the presidential. Giving Democrats a reason to get to the polls is critical for more than just the governor’s race. Turnout the year Abbott originally won (2014) was 34%. In the 2020 presidential election it was 67%.
WaterGirl
@Martin:
I agree. Cue all the hopelessness, pre-disappointment and criticism. Oh wait, it has already started.
* Narrators from 2020: “We will never win the runoffs in Georgia.”
Illinois got one thing right with their Lotto program:
You can’t win if you don’t play.
WaterGirl
@Jinchi:
Is that democratic turnout or turnout in general?
debbie
@Jinchi:
Wish I could remember the guy’s name, but a state official acknowledged recently that nothing had been done to strengthen the grid over the past year.
trollhattan
@Jinchi:
Haven’t they already convinced Texans that the blackout was the Democrats’ fault? Republicans are never the cause of bad things. How can they be?
PJ
@Jinchi: This is the thing – some Democrat has to run for Governor in Texas. Why not Beto? If there’s a better candidate, let them run against him in the primary. “It’ll damage the ultimate winner, blah,blah, blah.” Who cares? It’s a long shot for any Dem to win Texas, might as well go for it.
(FWIW, I don’t believe having 20 Democrats run for President in 2020 damaged Biden’s chances in the general election.)
Another Scott
@WaterGirl:
Democrats are Doing it Rong, Part MMXXI
(The following is more about the state of political reporting in general, not about anything in particular here:)
I think it’s funny that lots and lots of people were saying that Beto should have run against Cornyn rather than for President (and maybe that would have made sense, maybe not), but now that he’s running in another state-wide race, he’s pre-doomed. No matter the choices, our guys and gals always seem to make the wrong one!!
;-)
Godspeed, Beto!!
Cheers,
Scott.
Leto
@Old School: You can’t open carry in the state under the age of 18. Wisconsin state law 948.60(2)(a) states: “Any person under 18 years of age who possesses or goes armed with a dangerous weapon is guilty of a Class A misdemeanor.” There are some exceptions, but those exceptions don’t fit what happened. But the judge is determined to let the kid walk, so /shrug.
debbie
@Leto:
Doesn’t crossing state lines also come into play?
Gin & Tonic
Young, charismatic, talented Democrat with wide appeal and proven fundraising ability decides to run for a long shot seat.
B-J: fuck it, it’s hopeless.
Great.
Betty
@Will: There is a response he could make to that. The massacre in El Paso hit him hard and he reacted in horror. He could say he overreacted and knows confiscating guns is not a wise thing.
Jinchi
@PJ:
I agree. I think Beto will bring more Democrats out next November.
Citizen Alan
@trollhattan: Ann Richards beat Clayton Williams by less than 100k votes because in 1990, rape jokes were still beyond the pale. Today, Texas Republicans would proudly put Williams’ tasteless joke on bumper stickers and t-shirts.
trollhattan
Then there’s stuff like this.
Values schmalues, somebody’s gotta get paid.
Jinchi
Turnout in Texas is historically low in non-presidential elections. In 2014, turnout in the general election was 34% of registered voters (4.7 M / 14 M). The turnout for the primaries was miniscule (750,000 R) vs (200,000 D).
Mid-30s turnout is pretty typical for the governor’s races in Texas. (2018 was a rare exception).
https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/historical/70-92.shtml
SiubhanDuinne
@OGLiberal:
The judge doesn’t have just his thumb on the scale, he’s leaning on it with his entire body.
I heard a little bit of the prosecution’s summation before they broke for lunch. I know it’s popular to say he’s not doing a good job, but he came across as clear and reasonable and persuasive to me.
It goes without saying, IANAL. But if I were on the jury, I think he’d get a “guilty” vote from me, based on what I’ve seen and heard so far.
James E Powell
O’Rourke can make a game of it if he can get a crusade going.
Let Jesse explain.
We need a border narrative to supplant “build a wall” & “Democrats want open borders with hordes of horrible brown people to replace the white race” narratives.
Old School
@Leto: IANAL, but your link also states:
And s. 941.28 is:
My understanding is that they argued that Rittenhouse’s weapon was not short-barreled, so the only part that applied was:
UncleEbeneezer
OT but:
Marc Maron’s podcast did a really great episode on “Cancel Culture” in comedy, with a couple comedy/entertainment historians.
TLDL- this thing where entertainers whine about how they are so persecuted and can’t joke about anything anymore (jokes about Black people, women, LGBTQ etc.) has been around FOREVER!
Like all the way back to the Will Rogers, the 1930’s, and even 1905!!! Vaudeville talent literally made this same complaint when people started objecting to BlackFace!
This shit is cyclical and it always springs up when the people who are the butt of the jokes (women, Black people etc.) suddenly get increased access to voice THEIR opinions.
Very good listen.
Another Scott
@debbie: Someone in a dick_nixon thread said that the gun was in Wisconsin (apparently bought for him by someone else, which is seemingly illegal), so he didn’t bring it into the state. Which also seems hinky as hell…
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
balconesfault
@trollhattan: Guillen had the 2nd highest ranking among all Dems by the Eagle Forum in the 2019 session … haven’t seen scoring for 2021 but it seems like switching to R isn’t a big leap.
Plus some of the redistricting changes (like moving Zapata County out of the district) makes it much more difficult for a Dem to win.
OGLiberal
@SiubhanDuinne: I did not watch any of it but I’d find it hard to acquit the kid on all charges. And screw his little cry show. That said, my guess is that this kid walks – no conviction on anything. And then he’ll become a minor wingnut celeb a la George Zimmerman. (hell, he already is) Happy to be proven wrong but don’t think I will be.
Soprano2
@UncleEbeneezer: This is one of Bill Maher’s hobby horses. It’s my belief that he’s just mad that he can’t use the same jokes he used 20 years ago anymore because today’s college kids don’t find them funny. There are plenty of comedians who figure out how to be funny, why not look at what they do instead of whining all the time?
burnspbesq
@Fair Economist:
Abbott is smart enough to realize that if he runs against Beto, he’s in trouble. He will ignore Beto and run against Biden, and it’s likely to work notwithstanding the favorable demographic changes (substantially all of the population growth between 2010 and 2020 was in the 20 most populous counties, most of which are blue to purple).
The wildcard is Trump. If he becomes convinced that Abbott is a likely challenger in 2024, he might decide to kneecap Abbott. If there is a significant enthusiasm gap, then all bets are off.
Matt McIrvin
I think Beto is almost certainly doomed but somebody’s got to do it. With Beto you get turnout that will probably help some downballot races, and we get the message out there and set up a better situation further down the line. Republicans run doomed candidates all the time because they’re taking the long view. You have to contest them all, and do it seriously.
Matt McIrvin
…Like I said when I was being mopey in another thread, we might have to have “color revolutions” in a dozen or two dozen states down the line, if democracy is utterly broken there and a majority of the population comes to agree that things are wrong. But you don’t swing the majority electorally or no without putting your ideas out there somehow in the meantime. I think we have to stop thinking about every election being the last clear chance, start to think about how we turn the US population around over the next 25 or 50 years.
Geminid
So WTOP featured O’Rourke’s announcement on the the 2pm national news, with a soundbite. O’Rourke said he was running because “Texans always rise to the occasion,” like Texans did last year when they came to each other’s aid during the freeze, while Republican politicians were laying down on the job. I thought that was a good positive theme, as well as a good line of attack
debbie
@Another Scott:
Kinda points to the whole thing being planned, no?
burnspbesq
@Ksmiami:
Bullshit. A dollar for Beto is a dollar taken from your self-indulgent consumption. Suck it up, asshole. This is too fucking important to do otherwise.
PST
@Old School: I just took a look at the poorly written misdemeanor gun law at issue in the Rittenhouse case. It really is poorly written. There is a proviso that reads:
So guilt depends on violation of one of these other three statutes. So I took a look at them. The first has to do with short barrels, which the gun in question apparently did not have. The second only applies to those 16 or under, not 17-year-olds. The third isn’t a criminal statute per se. It is a requirement of a certificate young persons must have to apply for a hunting license, and I guess the defense argument is that Rittenhouse never applied for one so he can’t be out of compliance. Believe me, I’m not trying to side with the defense here, but just report on what the judge based his order on.
Anon
@burnspbesq: lol, kneecap Abbott. I see what you did there
WaterGirl
@Ksmiami: If you’re concerned about dollars for good senator, like Rev. Warnock, there is a golden opportunity right now to multiple by a factor of 6 – every dollar donated up to a $50 donation gets multiple by 6. Getting out the Native vote in Wisconsin will absolutely help the chances of getting a Democratic senator to replace an awful Republican one.
There’s $425 left of angel match money from angel #6. There are no more angel matches waiting in the queue. Still 6 angels for one fundraising campaign is absolutely amazing, and i thank every single one of them.
FOUR DIRECTIONS – WI
Double-Match Fundraising
$1 becomes $6.
$5 becomes $30.
$10 becomes $60.
$15 becomes $90.
$25 becomes $150.
$35 becomes $210.
$50 becomes $300.
Old School
@WaterGirl:
Watergirl’s error corrected.
WG: Now no one will ever know!
WaterGirl
@Old School: damn, you beat me by a second. I was already correcting that – I hoped before anyone would notice my mistake.
Sometimes I see red when Ksmiami is being defeatist, and for a moment I thought we were still in AZ! :-)
Omnes Omnibus
@WaterGirl: WisDem online fundraiser last night netted $85k. Can we top that?
Ksmiami
@Will: Agreed. Ideally we would field a Hispanic prosecutor type as a governor etc
Ksmiami
@WaterGirl: not being defeatist- just trying to make sure resources are allocated to races we can win
WaterGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: That’s awesome news about WisDems! How was it?
I should have promoted that on the front page.
Apparently next time you need to send me an engraved invitation if it would be helpful for me to do that. :-)
WaterGirl
@Ksmiami: I can’t speak to your intentions, but I can speak in practical terms to the way what you say is being received.
Not to mention that your premise is wrong. Do you have a crystal ball that allows you to KNOW that Beto can’t win? That allows you to know that Beto running and campaigning won’t help in the state legislature and in other down-ballot races?
I didn’t think so.
Kay
@Leto:
We better get used to it. Any reaction to an armed Right winger other than immediate, complete compliance with their orders will result in them claiming self defense and getting off for (your) murder.
They can chase you in a truck, shoot you dead in broad daylight if you resist and then claim self defense. People have two choices- they can comply with whatever order the armed person issues or the armed person shoots them. They’ve essentially deputized half the country to give orders to the other half.
It’s all the issues with police shootings, just extended to anyone who wants to call themselves “police”.
There’s another high profile case coming right behind this one. Another Right wing instigator who is claiming self defense as a get out of jail free card for murdering someone. They don’t do any fighting at all- all you have to do is resist and they shoot you.
debbie
@Ksmiami:
No one thought Warnock would win. Why defeat a person before the race even begins?
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: George Zimmerman was, after all, not a cop, just a wannabe.
Kay
@Matt McIrvin:
Zimmerman, Rittenhouse, the murder of Arbery. They deputize themselves as some sort of legitimate law enforcement, demand compliance from people who (understandably) don’t recognize this power they have granted themselves, shoot the unarmed person dead and then claim self defense.
It’s a demand that we comply. That we accept their authority. Arbery fought back. He wouldn’t allow himself to be taken into custody by three armed men. They killed him for it.
Kay
@Matt McIrvin:
The idea that Rittenhouse only happened because of BLM protests is nonsense.
There weren’t any BLM protests in the case of Zimmerman. There weren’t any BLM matters protests when Arbery was shot dead. The commonality between the cases is armed person assumes some kind of law enforcement authority they don’t hold and in the course of acting on this “authority” they kill someone. Then they claim self defense. The message they’re sending is “comply, or we’ll kill you and not only that, we’ll get away with it”.
J R in WV
@Jinchi:
Like so much legal stuff, it has to do with tiny details: In this case, the length of the barrel was such that the weapon was legal to hunt with, rural voters want kids to hunt with their grandfather, thus the gun was legal for a kid to be holding during a riot. Strange? yes…!!
Another Scott
@Matt McIrvin: I’m old enough to remember when some young governor from Arkansas was doomed in deciding to run against an incumbent president with 90+% approval…
Politics changes quickly. Beto has a good shot.
Cheers,
Scott.
J R in WV
@Ksmiami:
So, not to be rude, but how much are you giving the GA senator races? Anything?
Geminid
Ragnarok Lobster is bringing his usual nuanced approach to the Texas Governor’s race:
WaterGirl
@Geminid: I tried to find this using Google, do you have a link?
Another Scott
@WaterGirl:
I can’t find the particular tweet (it’s a sea of retweets), but Mr. Lobster is:
https://mobile.twitter.com/eclecticbrotha
HTH.
Cheers,
Scott.
Geminid
@WaterGirl: I just entered “Ragnarok Lobster Twitter” about an hour ago, and those tweets were featured at the top. I look him up a lot. He’s pretty good, and funny in a sarcastic way. Besides tweeting, Mr. Lobster works a civil service job at a police station somewhere in ChicagoLand.
Another Scott
@WaterGirl:
Here ya go:
HTH!
Cheers,
Scott.
WaterGirl
@OGLiberal: This comment was in SPAM. Not sure why, but you are free now.
WaterGirl
@Old School: hahaha
WaterGirl
@Geminid: I did that before asking, and I could not find that tweet. :-(
WaterGirl
@Another Scott: Thank you! Got it!
Just for grins, i went to his twitter account again, and I still couldn’t find it that way. Twitter and I don’t get along that well, apparently.
Another Scott
@WaterGirl: Twitter is absolutely horrible for searching. At least in the web interface. E.g. one sees a screen full of words, but the browser search returns nothing. It takes work to break that. Grrr…
Cheers,
Scott.