KBH helping Scott Brown when she helped accelerate Gov’t Run Healthcare?

I couldn’t believe it when I just got an email in my in box from Kay Bailey Hutchison saying “Help Elect Scott Brown” where she actually says “As you know, I have been fighting the government takeover of health care tooth and nail.” Wow, that dog won’t hunt.

Why? Well, Kay told us she is abandoning the fight against healthcare to concentrate solely on her failing run for Governor plus her vote helped accelerate the process of getting us to the point of being on the brink of government-run healthcare. Consider the following, KBH has said she will not be spending any time in DC now and Brown wins and healthcare comes back into focus (even though it has never really left) what will KBH do? Brown will not be the 41st, he’ll be the 40th because Kay will once again be AWOL from the Senate.

While I agree we need to fight for Scott Brown, I also recognize she hasn’t been in the foxhole with us so her words ring hollow.

For Kay, telling a good story is better than telling the truth

The first debate has come and gone, and the clear loser was the 16 year Senator whose votes are coming back to show Texans she has a record…one she cannot defend. 

ABORTION: We’ve talked a lot about her vote in 2003 affirming that Roe V. Wade is good law, which now is doing extensive damage to her claim of being a conservative. However, when you go back and look at her history, that vote shouldn’t come as a dsurprise considering the mounds of evidence she has given Texans that she is no social conservative. Thursday, before the debate, the Texas Right to Life sent out an email blast that included a video from 1993 where she clearly says Roe v Wade is working. For those of us who believe in life, we know it is working to do one thing: lead to more innocent babies being killed each and every day. She has also said she is for embryonic stem cell research, which has proven to be junk science compared to adult stem cell research. So on life, she receives an F for failure to believe in it.  

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: There was a heated exchange on whether or not Senator Hutchison is in favor of sanctuary cities and all the comments saying no now carries no weight when you consider her voting record. She voted against an amendment by conservative Senator Tom Coburn (roll call vote #202 in June of 2007) that would have required the enforcement of existing border security and immigration laws and Congressional approval before amnesty can be granted. According to Senator Coburn’s own press release regarding this amendment, the provisions included sanctuary city policies.  

Sen. Hutchison voted against an amendment by Sen. Tom Coburn “to require the enforcement of existing border security and immigration laws and Congressional approval before amnesty can be granted.” (Roll Call vote #202, 6/7/07)  

From Sen. Coburn’s press release regarding the amendment on 6/7/07: “These provisions of existing law include: control over maritime borders, full fencing required by law, integrated alien databases, US-VISIT program, biometric ID system, and ending ‘sanctuary city’ policies.” 

THE $700 BILLION DOLLAR BAILOUT: In yet another case of make up things on the fly hoping no one would catch you, the Senator clearly wasn’t on her game when talking about the bailout and offering all kinds of explanations that don’t pass the smell test. First, she says she didn’t vote for but half of the bailout. Problem is, everyone knows it was a $700 billion dollar account that the Government had access to doll out money. In fact, the New York Times has a track of the amount here on their website. So the claim of “voting for half that amount” doesn’t hold up.   

During the course of the part of the debate on the bailout, the question came up of supporting it after telling Texans she was against them. The Senator did, in fact, tell her constituents in op/ed piece entitled “Bailouts Hurt Taxpayers and Set a Dangerous Precedent” on September 19th writing ”It is clear that the situation is worsening and will continue to affect the broader economy….With every bailout, each American taxpayer becomes more invested in these markets…Corporate bailouts set a dangerous precedent and stand to negatively impact market dynamics over the long-term. The expectation of a bailout is an incentive for other private financial institutions to ignore risk in the future.” Then, she voted for it. 

Why, well during teh debate she pulled a play from the Obama playbook of blaming President Bush, saying it was the former President’s fault and not hers. She seems to have a lot in common with the liberal President doesn’t she. 

Next it was the “Perry supported it too” claim. Upon further review, this claim doesn’t hold water either. The Senator was referring to a letter that Governor Perry co-authored with the head of the Democratic Governors head that the Austin American Statesman reported their spokesman Brian Namey said was “not an endorsement of any particular plan” on October 3rd of 2008.  In fact, Governor Perry issued a release on the subject saying:  

“In a free market economy, government should not be in the business of using taxpayer dollars to bail out corporate America. Congress needs to take off its partisan gloves and work together to bring both short and long term stability to the credit markets. They need to stop blaming each other and start thinking about solutions that put the taxpayers of this country first.”  

SO, first it was half the bailout she voted for….then she says she didn’t say she was first against it but voted for it…then it was President Bush’s fault…then it was Governor Perry endorsed too…none of which is true.  

ELIMINATING SUPPORT FOR ACORN: This one didn’t garner much attention because of the timing but goes to the point of being out of touch with your own record and actions. It was funny she brought this up because the Senator got into a lot of hot water for skipping a vote to de-fund ACORN because she was holding a fund raiser in Dallas and “monitoring the situation.”  As the Dallas Morning News wrote,  

 ”If it wasn’t ACORN, it would have been something else. The fact that the first Senate vote Kay Bailey Hutchison missed since entering the governor’s race happened to be on ACORN — a group Republicans love to hate — was just a bonus….Perry’s team didn’t mention this, but Hutchison has one of the Senate’s worst attendance records this year, skipping 6.7 percent of roll call votes. Only seven colleagues have worse records. And she missed a vote on Tuesday, on yet another issue that is dear to Republicans – involving “earmarked” spending in a transportation bill.”  

I bring up the Dallas Morning News here, because at one point she wanted the audience to know it was the paper of record in attacking Governor Perry. Be sure not to throw stones in glass houses Kay! 

DOES TEXAS GET $0.92 OR $0.70 BACK FOR TRANSPORTATION: “…when I came to congress I fought hard with congressional delegation to get 92 cents and it’s on TxDOT website,” said Senator Hutchison during the debate. Now, to put this in context, it was related to the answer from Governor Perry about accepting some of the federal bailout money – you know the part that didn’t come with messy strings attached designed to force the State to operate as the Federal Government and the Obama Administration would like it to. Texas is a donor state, which means your tax money goes to DC and only a partial amount comes back - so you are subsidising other states with your tax dollars. In trying to explain the donor state and explaining it would be nice for our Senior Senator to fight and get us our own money back, Kay threw this infamous quote back. 

Problem is, like always, she’s wrong. “The state receives only a 70 percent return for highway programs. … For each dollar Texans pay in federal motor fuels taxes, the state has returned to it only 70 cents for highway programs and 8 cents for transit programs” according to the Texas House Research Organization report from February 23, 2009.  And when you go to the TxDOT website as she asks you to, you’ll find “When discretionary funds are counted, Texas gets back 70 cents per dollar for highways per “The Unreliability of Federal Financing” report from February of 2006…adding ” when you subtract the funding that Congress directs towards non-construction purposes in SAFETEA-LU, Texas is left with only $0.30 of every Texas federal dollar to address our true highway expansion needs. A fact that is lost on someone who has been in DC for the last sixteen years who wouldn’t understand the ramifications of her votes on the citizens she is supposed to represent. 

So, as you can see, her rhetoric during the debate doesn’t match her record. As she continues, these points will come back to haunt her and her poll numbers will continue to decline. The question then comes, will she remain in the race or decide to spare the party further damage. Considering she is in this for herself, one can only assume she will continue down a self-serving path of destruction to KBH and the Texas GOP.

Where can Hutchison possibly go from here?

For those who are involved in the Republican Party, it is known that there are three legs to the stool: Fiscal, Social, and National Security. Now  for races on a state level, only the first two legs receive attenion….and will the candidates get questioned on. So, considering national security will not be playing a big roll in the Texas Governor’s race, Senator Hutchison’s campaign is perhaps the most dire of straits since it began.

Starting with Fiscal Conservatism, there isn’t a case that can be made that she falls in line with the fiscal cons in this race. As recently as this last week, Stephen Moore wrote a piece for the Wall Street Journal where he said:

Mr. Perry is rated one of the top conservative governors in America, winning kudos for turning down federal stimulus funds on grounds that the temporary money would permanently ratchet up state spending. Peggy Venable, Texas director of Americans for Prosperity, says: “Thank goodness we didn’t take those funds. We would have had to raise our unemployment insurance tax on employers if the governor had taken stimulus money.”

Texas is now ground zero for the revolt against Obamanomics and it’s clear that Mr. Perry’s stand for states rights against Mr. Obama’s constant threats has made him a state hero. “Why would Texas vote out one of the best governors in America?” asks Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform. It’s a good bet they won’t.

Senator Hutchison is trying to make the case that she is the true conservative, that Governor Perry has no track record…but when you read two stalwarts in the conservative spectrum (Stephen Moore and Grover Norquist) making a firm case that her accusations don’t hold water, you have to be extremely worried if you support Kay.

But just saying the Governor isn’t conservative isn’t Kay’s only issue, because when you examine her record – one can argue that it doesn’t fall on the side of fiscal conservatism either.

One – the Citizens Against Government Waste has given Kay piece of kryptonite she has to be hating hearing, being nominated as a Porker of the Year award.

Two – voting for $700 billion in federal bailouts after telling everyone you wouldn’t does not give her a case for being a fiscal conservative. During the debate, she made the argument that she had to vote for it because President Bush sold her a bad bill of goods and the Republicans were making the wise decisions. Problem is, many in the conservative movement has rightly made the argument that the GOP lost it’s way fiscally and embracing that way by Hutchison will not win favors amongst the Tea Party movement.

Now on to  the problems with the Social Conservatives in Texas. Thursday before the debate, Texas Right to Life sent out a mass email showing in her own words that Kay Bailey Hutchison agrees with abortion by saying “I agree Roe v Wade is working very well.” This is precisely why social conservative leaders Kelly Shackleford, Kyleen Wright, Ann Hettinger, and Joe Pojman have all come out strongly endorsing Governor Perry over Senator Hutchison. They have known all along that the Senator has a record of voting against life and for abortion, which I have written about here.  Here is the video that was included in the mass email:

Considering this was distributed to hundreds of thousands of Texas GOP Primary voters, the Hutchison camp had to know that abortion would come up in the debate. When it came time for candidate specific questions, Dave Montgomery asked the Senator to clarify her position on abortion (19:30 in) and whether it should remain in force or be overturned as written in the Texas GOP platform. “let me say my record is one of always coming down on life.” A question she should have been ready to answer but failed to four times.  

Click Here to watch the debate, Abortion question comes in at 19:30

“let me say my record is one of always coming down on life” was the first thing out of her mouth, perhaps she doesn’t understand her record doesn’t match her rhetoric. As I outlined in a previous post on how abortion will play a big role in this primary, Senator Hutchison voted to affirm Roe v Wade as good constitutional law with her Sense of the Senate vote in 2003.  Four tries and now answer, in fact Shelly Kofler said “is that a yes or no to this” and the Senator couldn’t answer. It’s hard, because she is trying to run away from her own record and Texans know that.

So when it comes to the two most important aspects of conservatism in a State Gubernatorial race, the Senator’s record is far from conservative and you’ve seen more and more Kay supporters switch and poll numbers reflect that. The bottom line is there is no explanation she can possibly give right now that will erase the fears Texas GOP voters have that she is anything but a Republican in Name Only (RINO) and that Governor Perry has the true conservative bona fides. If this race comes down to, as many predict, a decision on whether or not Republicans will vote (which by the way, 99% of all candidates for Republican office advocate to be a conservative) with conservatism in mind – Senator Hutchison’s chances are bleak at best.

Two Days, Two Broken Promises from KBH

And now we have this, FOX News of El Paso is reporting that Senator Hutchison has gone back on yet another promise…this time to resign her Senate seat. No wonder Bill White switched to the Governor’s Race:

Yesterday, I pointed out how the 16 year Senator has a growing credibility gap because what she says is being proven to be false, misleading, or a blatant lie by the Texas press. Now, her camp is saying FOX News is lying about this. What’s their motto, We Report – You Decide….hmm fits here doesn’t it.

KBH Credibility Gap continues to grow

As every new television ad comes out (or claim on anything) from the Team Kay campaign, it seems independent news agencies are quickly pointing out a serious problem for the 16 year veteran of Washington DC: she cannot be trusted to tell the truth.

Her latest ad (Kay Bailey Hutchison Transportation Ad) talks about tolling exiting roads in Texas, but as WFAA-TV in Dallas pointed out, KBH again isn’t telling the truth:

In her latest TV ads and speeches, Hutchison claims Perry wants to change some freeways to toll roads.Yet, when asked by News 8 to point out just one highway in Texas that TXDOT is recommending to strictly change from a freeway to a toll road Hutchison didn’t answer directly…Hutchison can’t identify any because there aren’t any.  TXDOT confirmed it is not considering tolling existing free lanes anywhere in the state. Even if it did, a 2005 law backed by Perry would require a countywide vote.

That’s right, in 2005 Governor Perry backed a law that made tolling a local issue…local control is a core Republican idea and being in DC for sixteen years shows Senator Hutchison is out of touch with what has been going on in Texas. But that’s not all that’s wrong with her ad either, she talks about big government land grabs but fails to point out that:

“On Sept. 24, 2009, Sen. Hutchison opposed an amendment by Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn to protect land owners and prohibit the federal government from spending $400 million during the next year to acquire additional private property. Among those who supported Sen. Coburn’s initiative to prohibit using these funds for further government acquisition were Texas’ other senator, John Cornyn, and senators from other agriculture-rich states including Arizona, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming.”

Once again, the Senator has a huge credibility gap that she is hoping is not looked at by the Texas Republican Primary voters.

But as I pointed out in an earlier blog post, she has a track record of “serious misleading of the facts” which is a nice way of saying lying. And we learned today, that another news organization has pointed out what you hear from Kay Bailey Hutchison cannot be trusted…because in this case, it cannot be verified. KENS-TV pointed out this in a story they ran today:

Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison’s internal poll was leaked to the media and it shows the race between her and Governor Rick Perry is neck-and-neck. Professor Jim Henson of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas cautions against putting too much stock in the numbers because Hutchison’s campaign has answered few specific questions about the numbers. “If nobody will own the numbers, it’s hard to know what to do with them.  Without transparency about the actual numbers, you’re left to speculate.”

Her biggest bombshell of the day, however, was a little nugget from the Associated Press:

DALLAS (AP) — Three days before her debate with Gov. Rick Perry, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison says her campaign has momentum and that she is “peaking at the right time.” Hutchison told dozens of supporters at her Dallas campaign headquarters Monday that she will spend “every waking moment” campaigning for governor in the March 2 Republican primary. Hutchison said she probably will miss some votes in Washington as she turns her focus to the campaign.

Now, remember, she’s promised us (the Voters of Texas) in her first ad “I am going to do everything I can to stop the government take over of healthcare” but now she says that she is going to spend “every waking moment” campaigning for governor? Someone needs to tell the 16 year Senator that the healthcare battle isn’t over and ask her why she has given up “doing everything [she] can” for Texans? Should Scott Brown beat Martha Coakley in Massachusetts – health care immediately goes back to the front burner. This will become Kay’s Katrina moment, right? We have already witnessed her fight, it helped accelerate the process of us getting a vote when she couldn’t come up with a consistent story as to why she voted to end a GOP led filibuster.

Abortion Sure to be Issue in Governor’s Race

Texas is known as a very conservative state and an important part of its moral fabric is an opposition to abortion…so it is only logical that this issue will play a big role within the race for Governor both in the spring and the fall.

What spurred this post was a news story my Pastor recently sent me about the largest abortion clinic coming to Houston, a city in my state – a conservative state like Texas. Houston, remember, is the home of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bill White. As Mayor, one of his appointees lead the charge to have this murder machine built: Elena Marks. Marks, until recently, was White’s Director of Health and Environmental Policy and is the Chairwoman of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

From CNS News: “Planned Parenthood is renovating a former bank, turning it into a 78,000 square foot facility that will include a surgical wing equipped to provide late-term abortions.”

Now some will argue that abortion in the first few weeks isn’t murder (a point I will never concede and one I will argue against later)  the so-called “late-term abortions” most certainly are.  I will not repeat the words here, but after seeing the image and descriptions here – there aren’t enough words in the dictionary to describe this deplorable act.

Why is this important?  Well…as we learned with Barack Obama, the company you keep are a barometer of your own character and White is trying to sell him as a moderate and not the liberal he is. Add to the fact he is trying to pass himself off as a man of faith. However, appointing someone building a murder machine of 78,000 square feet, does not make you a moderate in Texas.

White appears to be the likely Democratic nominee, which means he has to firm up his liberal base and more than likely won’t run from appointing a radical leftist to be a part of his administration. That will become a sore point for Kay Bailey Hutchison for a multitude of reasons.

- …the last thing that Kay Bailey Hutchison wants as part of the debate are social issues because she is not a social (nor really a fiscal) conservative. There are two things that clearly show (even her own admission she is pro-choice) why she doesn’t fall on the of conservative side when it comes to abortion: The first one was the bill presented to the Senate banning partial birth abortion. One the vote itself, signed into law, Project Vote Smart shows Senator Hutchison neither sponsored (like her fellow Republican Senator from Texas John Cornyn) nor voted for the bill. An even more important part of the legislation was the “Sense of the Senate concerning Roe v. Wade,” which says “the the decision of the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade (410 U.S. 113 (1973)) was appropriate and secures an important constitutional right; and such decision should not be overturned.” Known as the Harkin Amendment, Kay Bailey Hutchison voted with the liberal Republicans in making it known she believed abortion on demand should be legal.Another problem is the Senator’s assocation and help with the organization The Wish List. The sole purpose of this group is to get pro-abortion women elected as Republicans in the House and Senate. It is one thing for them to identify you and support you…but being a board member is another thing.

Perry, on the other hand, has a strong track record when it comes to supporting life. When Fort Hood shooter Maj. Malik Nidal Hasan went on a rampage, he murdered a soldier who was pregnant. Under a Texas Law signed by Governor Perry, Hasan would be charged with an additional count for the unborn baby. This is why I say that regardless of how many weeks, it’s a human and deserves protection. Perry also has fought for an ultrasound bill that would show a woman wanting to abort a baby an ultrasound in hopes she will not go through with the procedure.

- …it’s also known that Bill White had inside information from Kay Bailey Hutchison from when she was going to resign. In February of 2009, White sent out a fundraising letter in which he said he was told by Senator Hutchison she would resign. Problem is, she hadn’t announced any intention of resigning and is in fact dodging the question. It wasn’t until July that she made national news by telling WBAP’s Mark Davis during an interview “The actual leaving of the Senate will be sometime — October, November — that, in that time frame.” This was the first record of her announcing, even though she later changed her mind saying it would happen after the primary. This has led many to believe that KBH has been working with Bill White to coordinate the two helping the pro-abortion liberal.

So this issue on the surface is more thorny for White but has ties to Hutchison. As I mentioned before with Ronnie Earle’s race having consequences for KBH, so does Bill White. Something that is surely to come up in debates and already has within conservative circles…which is why activists in East Texas aren’t supporting Kay Bailey Hutchison.

Seems the only thing Hutchison has to offer is distortions

Serious Misrepresentation of the Facts

That’s how the Dallas Morning News puts it when talking about Kay Bailey Hutchison’s attack on Governor Perry on the gasoline tax. Kay’s camp out there trying to make stick that the Governor wants to raise the gas tax…sadly, like most of all that comes out of Kay’s campaign…it’s just not true.

From The Dallas Morning News: BOTTOM LINE: Saying a gas-tax increase would be Perry’s “first order of business” is simply untrue. If it were true, Perry would have tried for one in his decade as governor. Beyond that, none of the statements provided by the Hutchison campaign as support for its claim includes a clear call to raise gasoline taxes. “Accessing every pot of money that is available” doesn’t mean Perry prefers gasoline taxes over tolls or other revenue, as Hutchison suggests.

Sadly, once again the Senator has been caught lying. Soon, her sixteen plus years of being in Washington D.C. will come to a close and she will fade away into the sunset into the scrapheap of Texas politics.

Kay Bailey Hutchison comes to East Texas and brings with her bigger government

A good friend of mine works for one of the Tyler stations and told me about Senator Hutchison’s press conference today by saying “she’s just really cold and doesn’t have any energy at all.” He wasn’t talking about her policies (can’t really because she doesn’t have any, but I’ll get to that in a minute) but rather her demeanor…he just didn’t think she had it in her, saying “looks like she is just phoning it in.”

On to what she had to say…”"When I take the oath of office as governor, the Trans-Texas Corridor will be officially dead, and I can promise you it will not be dead until I am governor of Texas.” Two problems with this…first, the plan is already dead. While I know it’s easier for Kay to criticize rather than actually introduce something new and visionary, it is a lot easier to stop misleading voters into thinking the program is still alive. Second…ee can argue whether or not the TTC was the best plan, but at the end of the day … it was a plan! She has no plan when you look at it in its whole.

But as the Perry campaign pointed out, there were other misleading (lies) comments from the Senator…

Below is a fact check on Sen. Hutchison’s transportation proposals:

Sen. Hutchison wants to “kill the Trans-Texas Corridor.”
FACT: The Transportation Commission has recommended to the Federal Highway Administration to disapprove construction of TTC-35. The project is dead.

Sen. Hutchison offers several proposals to “reform private highway financing,” but most are already in practice or provided under current law:

• Sen. Hutchison says, “No state contracts should reduce the speed limit on public roads”
FACT: They don’t – the Transportation Commission currently has the discretion to set speed limits. No contract provides a decrease in the speed limit for public roads.

• Sen. Hutchison says, “No existing free road should be tolled.”
FACT: This is current law under Transportation Code, Chapter 228.201.

• Sen. Hutchison says, “Existing rights-of-way should be used for necessary capacity expansion”
FACT: This is a current practice of TxDOT.

• Sen. Hutchison says, “Private contractors should not be awarded exclusive concessionary rights along frontage roads”
FACT: This is specifically not allowed under Proposition 11, the constitutional amendment championed by Gov. Perry and approved by voters this November.

• Sen. Hutchison says, “Local communities should have the right to determine whether new roads should be tolled or publicly constructed.”
FACT: This is currently the practice of TxDOT, which has a policy to defer to the local communities in matters of tolling, whether or not to construct, and the setting of toll rates and other business terms.

• Sen. Hutchison says, “The ability to restrict construction or expansion of public roads under a Comprehensive Development Agreement should be reformed, including preservation of the right to assume public ownership and operation of the toll project in the future.”
FACT: This is current law, as the public never relinquishes ownership, Texas Transportation Code, Chapter 223.206

Sen. Hutchison wants to “call for greater consistency in the planning stages by developing commonly understood forecasts for revenues, population growth, and other factors, so that regional planning organizations can rely on uniform assumptions when developing long term plans…”
FACT: These provisions are currently being evaluated by the rule review committee at TxDOT in response to proposals included in the TxDOT Sunset bill from the 81st session.

Sen. Hutchison says Texas should “Require Additional Accountability In Measuring Results”
FACT: Per Senate Bill 1, Riders 19 and 35 from the 81st session, Texans can find and track project progress and completion on TxDOT’s website (www.dot.state.tx.us/project_information/project_tracker…).

Sen. Hutchison wants to “Stop Highway Fund Diversions.”
FACT: Gov. Perry has been a longtime advocate of ending budget diversions. In 2007, he presented a budget that would have ended diversions from Fund 6 (the state highway fund) bringing the total Fund 6 appropriations to $6.5 billion, but the Legislature did not include this provision in its final budget. In 2009, Gov. Perry continued to advocate better truth-in-budgeting and signed a budget for 2010-11 that ends more than $300 million of the diversions from Fund 6, putting these funds back into building and maintaining Texas roads.

Sen. Hutchison says, “Over the last 10 years, our transportation system has languished in neglect”
FACT: Over the last 10 years, Texas has built 5,426 new lane mile of non-tolled highways (92% of total lane miles added) and 472 new tolled lane miles (only 8% of total new miles added), despite the fact that Texas is shortchanged by Washington for road construction and maintenance – Texas receives only 70 cents for every dollar sent to Washington for these projects.

Sen. Hutchison says, “The state should explore ways for traditional hubs such as airports and rail stations to link through intermodal connectors”
FACT: Sen. Hutchison is describing a procedure that already exists. Regional Mobility Authorities (RMA) are statutorily authorized to link multiple modes of transportation such as highways, airports, rail stations, public transit. The RMA model also consolidates responsibility for those modes under a single locally appointed board.

Sen. Hutchison says, “TxDOT should assist in relocating urban freight rail networks to relieve metropolitan roadway congestion and increase safety” and wants to “Renew Emphasis On High-Speed And Commuter Rail.”
FACT: While rail networks are an important part of our state’s transportation infrastructure, Sen. Hutchison offers no way to pay for these projects. Her passenger and freight rail proposals would cost tens of billions of dollars. Revenue from the state’s traditional funding sources – state gas taxes and vehicle registration fees – are constitutionally prohibited from funding rail and raising taxes is not the answer to solving our transportation challenges.

So, as usual, the Senator misleads and borrows…throws them in a blender…and calls them “new plan.” Reading this makes me realize she’s been in Washington D.C. for sixteen years. Everything resembles bigger government and offers nothing new. Well, she does offer toll roads but is against the TTC. Sadly, she has failed to get us the money in return in tax dollars – which would have helped us fix the problem. Sending a dollar to DC and only getting seventy cents in return is not fighting for Texans.

Got an interesting phone call tonight

I know I am on several GOP call lists, I’ve got local calls before asking if I was supporting candidate A or candidate B. Tonight, well, it was just a little different.

Someone called the house saying they were calling on behalf of Governor Kay Bailey Hutchison’s campaign…and the first thing that came to mind is, hmmm isn’t Kay Bailey a Senator? Not that big a deal, just awkward.

What was a bigger deal is they start telling me “did you know that Kay did this…” and “did you know that Kay did that…” One that stood out was leading the fight over keeping Texas from having a state income tax. Being involved, I asked the caller “did you know that all the Republicans fought against it, it’s in the platform?” only to get a long pause and a “I’m sorry, well did you know Kay did….” and at that point I knew this was a fishing expedition rather than a call for support. The person calling didn’t seem to be too much into Kay and didn’t know much about the facts…no sense in saying what else she waas created because all that was really created tonight was a good (well bad) case of heartburn.

I bring this up because my son sent me an email today that a blog he follows Rick vs Kay talking about a new internal poll generated by the Perry campaign showed him up 49-36 which mirrors a Rasmussen poll. Worse is those who responded saying they have only seen KBH’s ads picking the Governor by 6 points and those who have seen both have him up by nearly 20. This after Kay outspent Perry three to one.  I guess that vote against the GOP for the filibuster keeping healthcare on the sideline didn’t work out well for her.

My guess is if both campaigns keep working the way they have done so far, meaning Kay continues to have no message and falters and Governor Perry stays on message and keeps his mistake-free campaign moving, that the Governor will win come March. I am sure KBH will surely go negatative (well nuclear compared to the negative campagin run so far) and that will not go over well…meaning she’s in real trouble.

Kay Bailey Hutchison: Putting Self Ambition ahead of Texas Republican Party

There is something to be said about one’s own desires and dreams. However, there is also something to be said about leadership and putting the movement ahead your own selfish ambition – something Kay Bailey Hutchison evidently doesn’t understand.

With Kay Bailey Hutchison’s decision to move back to Texas (maybe) and run against an incumbent member of her own party (something no Senator has ever done before), she is hurting the Party she says she represents by taking campaign funds from important Texas House races which in turn hurts us when it comes to redistricting…possibly costing  Texas up to four Congressional seats.

Consider the district to my east, Texas House District 11. Democrat Chuck Hopson won in 2008 by 120 votes…or less than one percent of the vote. The good news is we closed the gap from 2006 and now Hopson has switched over to the GOP. Not all will switch, so more work is to be done in increasing our majority in the Texas House.

This is important because redistricting Congressional districts happens in the Texas House, and we’ve got a razor thin margin there and could use more to ensure those new Congressmen are Republican and not Democrats. Before I talk about the problem for districts like the TX 11th, it’s important to remember that we’ve been down this road before and are all thankful for the leadership provided by Governor Perry.

Turn back the clock to 2003 when for the first time in Texas we had a Republican as Governor in Rick Perry, Lt. Governor David Dewhurst, AND Speaker of the Texas House Tom Craddick. While Texas was pretty much a reliable state, you wouldn’t have known from our Congressional Delegation which favored the Democrats. Governor Perry, at a heavy price, understood that and made a point in getting the redistricting reflective of the political makeup of the state…and he should be thanked for that.

This is a very important fact to consider for the die-hard activists like myself around the state because we are on the front lines ever election. We understand how much Governor Perry risked to make sure the Congressional district lines were drawn to truly represent the political landscape of Texas. Under his leadership, calling special sessions to get the work done, we now have more Republicans in the Congress to help battle the liberal socialistic takeover of America. And with more and more people moving to Texas, a thousand a day, we’re set to get four more – which means we need a leader to fight for us again.

During this battle, there was one person who was eerily silent during this whole period: Kay Bailey Hutchison. The only person who seems to not know this is her spokesman Joe Pounder who said “”Because Texas was and still is a Republican state, Senator Hutchison supported redistricting efforts earlier this decade. Before the redistricting effort, Republicans were severely underrepresented in Congress and that needed to be corrected.” Of course, like much of the time this year, Kay was AWOL during this event.

The Dallas Morning News cataloged the AWOL KBH during the process on their trailblazers blog:

Did Hutchison believe – in 2003 – that congressional boundaries in Texas should be redrawn before 2011? She didn’t say publicly at the time. Here’s a typical story from the time:

September 6, 2003, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, by Jack Douglas Jr.
“Hutchison for governor?; GOP senator noncommittal about possible race against Perry”

…Hutchison would not say whether she supports the redistricting push. But the senator said, “I do believe it’s very important for us to keep what has always been a Texas tradition” — cooperation between Republicans and Democrats in office.

Sept. 21, 2003, Dallas Morning News
Staying above the fray; Texas Republicans in Congress back remap but hesitate to take part

…Texas’ U.S. senators, both Republicans, have avoided the fray. Analysts say that makes sense. Any support they offer would risk backlash from independents, minorities and conservative Democrats, and any criticism would alienate fellow Republicans.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison faces an extra complication. Because some Republicans want her to challenge Gov. Rick Perry in 2006, when both face re-election, any statement would be parsed for signs she intends to take him on. She declined to discuss the issue.

Now that you know how important redistricting is, and how silent KBH was during the process last time, you have to ask yourself “Why is Kay Bailey Hutchison taking funds away from people who could be backing the Texas House candidates?” That’s a good question.

When we can win districts like the TX 11th, why is she putting self ambition ahead of the Republican Party? The question gives us the answer: self-ambition and no loyalty to the Republican Party. That is demonstrated in her actions of saying she will never help anyone who would oppose the liberal Diane Feinstein and not working with the GOP Senate Leadership and voting against a filibuster that accelerated Government run healthcare.

So, her single-minded desires will take money away from house races and thus risk losing the redistricting battle to Democrats. Her accusations of Perry hurting the party are both inaccurate and ring hollow. Just another reason why this race is important for the future of Texas.