In the post below this one, I examined the voter numbers in the state of Texas -- and for me it seemed that the Democrats actually have a viable path to victory this year. But I wrote that before hearing of the latest gaffe made by Wendy Davis.Wendy Davis, the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination for governor, made her name as a progressive in the state senate. She did this by standing up for women's rights by filibustering an odious GOP bill that would close most clinics in Texas offering abortion procedures.
Texas Democrats were excited. They thought they had finally found someone willing to stand up and fight for progressive values -- and many begged Davis to run for governor. Democrats had visions of a candidate who would offer Texans a real choice.
Previous gubernatorial candidates for the party had been "Blue Dogs" (conservative Democrats) -- candidates who ran to the right in an attempt to draw right-wing support away from the Republicans. These candidates (and their advisors) had the mistaken belief that no candidate could win in Texas with appealing to the right-wingers in the state. The problem these candidates had is that right-wingers simply won't vote for a Democrat, even one who runs on right-wing "values". After all, if it's a right-wing candidate they want, they have plenty of real ones in the Republican Party.
The only hope Democrats have to win is to run candidates that offer the voters a real choice -- a choice between Republican right-wing policies and Democratic progressive policies. In the last few elections, only slightly more than half of Texas' registered voters bothered to go to the polls and vote -- and there's a good reason for that. They had no real choice, since both the Republican and Democratic candidates were pandering to the right. The Democratic path to victory is to excite those non-voters by offering them an alternative to the failed right-wing politics of the GOP.
Unfortunately it seems that advisors have convinced Wendy Davis that she must go down the same road of previous failed Democratic candidates, and move to the right with her campaign. I have noted before on this blog that women's rights no longer seems to be a concern for the Davis campaign (and is not even mentioned on her campaign website). Then she endorsed a super-rich "Blue Dog" for the party's senate nomination, a candidate who is far from progressive on most issues -- and she did that even though there is a good progressive candidate (Maxey Scherr) running against that "Blue Dog".
Now she has come out with a stance that is anathema to those who begged her to run for governor. She told the Associated Press that she is in favor of allowing Texans to openly carry weapons (giving people the right to openly wear a gun on their hip in public). This is just crazy. Texas (or any other state) doesn't need a bunch of gun-nuts openly carrying weapons -- and that is not just the view of progressives, but of most police departments in the state.
One is tempted to say it would put Texas back in the days of the "wild west", but the truth is that most cities in that "wild west" did not allow the open carrying of weapons within the city limits. They knew allowing that was just an invitation to trouble (in spite of what Hollywood movies would have you believe).
This ridiculous stance taken by Wendy Davis will not get her any right-wing votes. The NRA has already come out and labeled it as election-year posturing. But it could discourage other Texas voters -- those who have been waiting for a real choice. Why should they bother to vote if their only choice is between two candidates both supporting right-wing policies?
This is very disappointing. Wendy needs to fire her campaign advisors and once again find her progressive roots. Pandering to the right has not worked for previous Democratic candidates, and it won't work this year. It is just the same old path to defeat. And if she can't right her own campaign, she could drag some other Democrats down with her.
(The caricature of Wendy Davis above is by the inimitable DonkeyHotey.)
