Today in Texas, a GOP gubernatorial election takes place in which the only real drama that is expected will play out is whether U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison get force Governor Rick Perry into a run-off election later this year.
This is a race in which Hutchison is the "liberal" – wait, strike that. "Least hardline conservative" might be a better appellation, as the Senator has been challenged by a 3rd party candidate, Debra Medina, that comes with the imprimatur of the tea party movement.
Some officials say that Perry, who succeeded George W. Bush in office, now has the conservative credentials to mount a presidential run in 2012. Of course, Perry is a guy who has spoken of having the Lone Star state seceding from the union, so Democrats have to be licking their chops to see him think of running for higher office.
Meanwhile in New York, former Tennessee Congressman and New York bank official Harold Ford Jr.declares in an op-ed in the New York Times that he will not run in the Democratic Primary against Kirsten Gillibrand.
The centrist Ford is also head of the Democratic Leadership Council, the moderate Democratic organization created by Al From back in 1985, after the Democrats and Walter Mondale had lost 49 states in the 1984 election. His possible entrance and now exit is interesting on several levels, such as the fact that though Gillibrand was not a member of the DLC, she could have easily fit into that group as a Congresswoman prior to being selected by Governor David Patterson to replace Hillary Clinton a little over a year ago.
Gillbrand was blasted for making some overnight conversions policy wise (such as on guns), but it was considered the "right" thing to do since she was now representing all of New York state, and not just her upstate district.
But she has been vulnerable, which is why Ford publicly flirted with entering the race in the past couple of months. In today's Times, he explains some of his positions, which no doubt angered many in the base of the party:
Voting for health care legislation that imposes billions in new taxes on New Yorkers and restricts federal financing for abortions is not good for the people of this state. Voting against critical funds necessary to ensure the survival of the financial services industry — the economic backbone of this state — is not good for the people of New York.
I was considered out of touch with mainstream Democrats when I argued against spending more than $200 million a year to hold the Khalid Shaikh Mohammed trial in New York. I was also labeled out of touch for advocating a payroll tax cut for small businesses and for putting a jobs bill before a scaled-down health reform bill. Though much more needs to be done to create jobs, I am pleased that these ideas have now become part of the Democratic mainstream.
There was considerable pressure on Ford not to run – similar to the pressure that Florida GOP chair Jim Greer put on some candidates last year here in the Sunshine State, but which backfired more on the former chairman than was the case in New York and Ford. Speculation continues to remain high that New York Daily News publisher and political pundit Mort Zuckerman may get into the race, running as a Republican. The Dems better hope he doesn't, because this could be another state that has been reliably Blue over the past decade shift into the Red.
This article appears in Feb 24 – Mar 2, 2010.