As HL Mencken once famously said, "Never overestimate the intelligence of the American people". We are not sure why he added the geographic limitation, but the US is does tend to be a world leader in most things.
We have, of late, deferred to our US based bloggers for insights on the curiosities of that country. With reference to the remarkable Tom DeLay we have passed the ball to the blogger at the epicenter, “our man in Sugar Land’, MikeVotes.
The voter endorsement of the former majority leader's bid for return to the house in the next election, and no doubt high office, is mind blowing. He beat three challengers in his first electoral outing since being indicted.
I guess, at best, it shows the belief in innocence until guilty is proven. Either that or it shows just how ready voters are to accept corruption as nothing more than ‘the way things get done’.
Meanwhile DeLay still faces trial in Texas on charges alleging he funneled illegal corporate money to state legislative candidates in 2002.
Good old Tom doesn’t have it all his own way. A documentary is to be released soon, called "The Big Buy: How Tom DeLay Stole Congress," which promises to ‘join the dots’.
The films release is coming up at the Angelica Theater in the heart of Tom’s electoral district. “After the opening, the documentary will be released in DVD form and be distributed in video stores and on a website, www.tomdelaymovie.com. ” Part of the release plan is to organize thousands of viewing parties in private homes and churches in Texas and across the country instead of a movie-theater release…” Anti-DeLay film hits close to home The Hill
So we should all keep our eyes on Born at the Crest of the Empire, ‘our man in Sugar Land’ for the early reviews of this promising production. Thanks Mike…
Zen and the Art of Motor Cycle Maintenance
2 months ago
3 comments:
Sorry I haven't responded, I've been a little under the weather.
First, just a little general Texas politics. Tom Delay's district, as it stands now, consists largely of a far out, very white, but pretty wealthy suburb of Houston. It's edge is about 30 miles from where I am near downtown Houston. There are also some rural areas in there, that vote dem, but really, that district is rich white suburb, republican even for Texas. All the fundraising, all the gatherings are held in sugarland, SUV's jamming the parkinglots like you can't imagine.
I don't know if there's really anything similar in non sunbelt states.
Now, to the specifics of the primary, Texas primaries are very poorly attended affairs. My local precinct had less than a hundred people vote where they had close to 2,000 in the 2004 election.
So, people with established politically active support tend to win easily. It's a little different in this case with Delay being involved, but it still stands generally true.
Now, for this primary and election, Delay had 1.6 million on hand on Jan 15 and raised hundreds of thousands leading up to that date. His challenger had a total of 70,000.
And, I know nothing about this guy, his primary challenger, but with that kind of money, he had no support from the money guys or political players or organizations in the district. No advertising, nothing.
So, that Delay beat this guy isn't all that surprising considering he had the money and organization to get voters out.
I wouldn't make too much of it at this point, this challenger really never had a chance. The big challenge will be in Nov. when Delay faces a seasoned politician (Lampson)who has been raising money neck and neck with Delay.
Bottom line, what I'm trying to say is that with the poor turnout in the primaries, it was really about money and organization for Delay to beat a no name with no support. If 5% of the voters voted, I would be surprised, and those in the suburbs probably turned out much heavier than the rural folks. So, the result could be easily skewed by getting any kind of a turnout, and just robocalls reminding people to vote could've made the difference. Put another way, if Delay did well at one or two big churches, that alone could account for the result.
Plus, there were others on the ticket that split the anti-delay vote. The thing to make a point of is how many Republicans combined across the four challengers voted against Delay in a primary that culls the most Republican of Republicans.
So, I would say, don't blame the people of Sugarland for this one. I doubt that the result reflects the broader view. November will be a far better place to judge them.
Hope that made sense. I'm on a little cold medicine right now and kinda blurry.
Mike
Thanks mikevotes. Hey, sick or not, we could outdo CNN here with our on the ground team.
Even stuffed with pseudoephedrines you make a lot of sense.
Yeah, I was afraid they were going to nail me on some sort of meth charges for buying my cold medicine.
Mike
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