CD-2 Runoff: "Merely" Lousy vs. AWFUL

"Your princes are rebellious,
And companions of thieves;
Everyone loves bribes,
And follows after rewards.
They do not defend the fatherless,
Nor does the cause of the widow come before them."
Isaiah 1:23

The Trib profiles the CD-2 Runoff:



We've discussed previously how we didn't know much about either candidate.  In that spirit, the Trib's profile helped.  The short version is that neither candidate inspires, but one is significantly worse than the other.

Dan Crenshaw is a retired Navy SEAL.  That's good (as far as it goes), but one lesson we've learned from experience is that a Special Forces background doesn't necessarily mean you'll govern as a conservative.  Crenshaw also openly admits to being endorsed by Pete Sessions in the Trib's video.

Kevin Roberts, on the other hand, is a single term state rep.  During his term in the legislature, Kevin Roberts was a reliable rent boi for Joe Straus.  You can learn everything you need to know about Kevin Roberts' awful record here.

Digging deeper into Crenshaw's endorsements, we notice a couple other interesting tidbits:

In other words, Dan Crenshaw has been endorsed by a U.S. Senator (Cotton) who's never met a war he didn't like.  He's also been endorsed by a former Congressman (Dick Armey) whose ethical issues are well remembered.  And Pete Sessions is, well, Pete Sessions....

[Note: A number of local activists we respect have also endorsed Crenshaw; we suspect that's only in comparison to the guy he's running against.]

But then you look at Roberts' endorsements:

'Nuff said.

[Note II: Roberts has also been endorsed by a number of highly questionable figures in Harris County.]

Bottom Line: If we lived in the district, we'd vote for Crenshaw.  But we wouldn't do so with enthusiasm.  Both of these candidates look like dirtbags....

Texas Punks Oklahoma -- An Open Letter to Whitney Neal

Dearest Whitney,

For some reason, you're a fan of BuzzFeed, so let me put this in terms you can understand.

Today, Texas beat OU:



Unfortunately, you're a Sooner fan:

<

To which I say:



Because Oklahoma is totally like that Scott Tenorman kid:



But, of course, there's only one way to drown your sorrows when your super lame football team loses to a super cool football team:



I hope this helps.

Sincerely,
Cahnman
Austin
October, 12 2013

Freedomworks Packs the House Tonight in Austin!!!

Tonight, in Austin, at least 120 Patriots attended Freedomworks' Come and Take It event.  The event was held to introduce Freedomworks' plan to help counter Battleground Texas.  Fortunately, with no PA system [Freedomworks' Director of Grassroots] Whitney Neal's loud mouth came in handy....:)

Whitney (pictured above) opened her presentation by highlighting how Colorado went Blue.  She described how Colorado Republicans stopped doing their job.  She made the unfortunate point about how raiding the Rainy Day Fund in Texas is similar to the fiscal shenanigans Colorado Republicans pulled in the mid- 2000's.

Next up was an update on Battleground Texas' activities.  Two factoids of note is that they're training people to start at the local level and that they have a paid staffer on every major college campus in the state.  Also, 80% of their donations are in state.

Freedomworks is using Texas as the guinea pig for their national efforts.  They're intend to open offices around the state to grow leaders from the local level.  They're also developing data-analytics software that's supposed to be awesome!

The first major action is a community building weekend October 4 - 6.  It will include training sessions on Friday night and events on Saturday.  Already, there are block-walking events planned in El Paso and the Valley.

Travis county elections trains deputy voter registrars every month on the first Tuesday.  This is a step everyone needs to take.  The next one is the Tuesday after labor day; we'll be there.

The bottom line is that at least 120 people showed up tonight to make Texas a deeper shade of Red; that can only be good news!!!

Freedomworks announces John Cornyn protests across Texas

From Freedomworks' Grassroots director:

John Cornyn  left from Senator Lee’s fight to Defund ObamaCare. 

Cornyn should be doing everything he can to fight Obama’s health care takeover. Yet pressure from Mitch McConnell made him squirm, and Cornyn abandoned Senator Lee.\ 

We need to find out why he refuses to stand with Mike Lee and do everything he can to protect Texas from ObamaCare. 

Will you join activists from across the Lonestar State as we pay a visit to John Cornyn’s district offices? 

Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and Rand Paul are doing everything possible to stop ObamaCare from being implemented. Yet the GOP Establishment is working to stop them. 

John Cornyn is standing with the Republican elites instead of Texas. And you deserve to know why. 

Texans need answers on why their Senator is standing with the Republican Establishment instead of Texas. Join me and other activists as we visit his district offices to find out why.

You can find Senator Cornyn office locations here.

Freedomworks Talks Battleground Texas

This is a few weeks old, but we didn't see it during the abortion debate:



Highlights:

•  Activists are getting turned off by the GOP's shenaningans.
• Personal Note: DUH 

•  The state GOP has yet to reveal their plan.

• 9.5 million Latinos in Texas but only 2.3 million voted last year

• A clear, consistent message of limited government and economic opportunity appeals to all demographic groups.

• For the Record: Colorado was NEVER a solidly red state

Senator Ted Cruz: The Secret Freedomworks Speech

Senator Ted Cruz made an unannounced visit to the Freedomworks Texas summit today:




Highlights:

•  We're winning and it's because of what folks like us are doing

•  The Obama people tried to protest the Senator's office in Dallas and Tea Party folks outdrew them 3:1.

• There are few things elected officials like less than getting heat from their constituents.

• "We've had five or six lunches with a bunch of Republican Senators standing up and looking at Rand [Paul] and Mike [Lee] and me and yelling at us at the top of their lungs...I mean really upset...and they say 'look, why did you do this, as a result of what you did, when I go home my constituents are yelling at me that I've gotta stand up on principle!"
• I'm really not making that up.

• Before you did that [threatened to filibuster gun control legislation] the politics were great, the Dems were the bad guys and the Republicans were the good guys; now we just look like a bunch of squishes.
• "Well, there's an alternative, you could just not be a bunch of squishes."

•  Gun control isn't over.

• How do you get something bad passed in Washington?!?
• You do it fast and in the middle of night.

• Success begets success; if we stand up once, we'll do it again. 

Update: Welcome New York Times readers.

Update II: Welcome NRO readers; thanks Ramesh Ponnuru!!! 

Tea Party will tame Mitt; an open letter to James Taranto

Dear Sir,

Yesterday, in your Best of the Web column, you engaged in the following speculation:

Since the House is expected to stay under Republican control, Romney may actually turn out to be the one who has the skills to tame the Tea Party.

Over my dead body.

The Tea Party is currently pulling Mitt, along with a number of U.S. Senate candidates, across the finish line.  When Mitt wins, which he will, Mitt will owe us.  We intend to collect.

One dirty little secret about the Tea Party is that we didn't arise in response to Barack Obama, we arose in response to TARP.  To be sure, Obamacare resistance put us on the national radar, but we were around before that.  The Tea Party cannot wait to hold a Republican President accountable.

I addressed this topic at length last month, but once we get into year two and three of President Mitt's administration, policy will take a major Tea Party shift.  We'll probably pass Paul Ryan's budget in year one, but in year two we will come back and demand Congress pass Rand Paul's budget followed by the Uproot and Overhaul proposal from Rick Perry's Presidential campaign.  Over the next decade, the Tea Party will follow Ted Kennedy's legislative strategy in reverse; take what you can get, then immediately ask for more.

In his speech at FreePAC Dallas July, Sen. Mike Lee pointed out that it took 15 years to get from the original Boston Tea Party to ratification of the Constitution.  America's founders got the country where it needed to get, but it didn't happen overnight.  This is a long-term fight, and the Tea Party is not going anywhere.

Sincerely,
Adam Cahn
Austin, TX
November 1, 2012

President Mitt: The Long Haul

I want to touch on an aspect of Mitt that many have missed: over time, I think President's Mitt's administration will be more open to conservative influence than any administration in recent memory.

As I said when I endorsed him, I only have two expectations for President Mitt: sign the legislation a conservative Congress sends him and be a better Commander-in-Chief.  Any other domestic policy leadership Mitt shows is a bonus.  I also think that, given his business background, Mitt might produce many Tea Party friendly outcomes for different reasons than tea partiers might name.

That's fine.

Big picture items will dominate President Mitt's first year: Economic Recovery, Entitlements, Cleaning up the mess abroad, Vladimir Putin, and Repealing Obamacare.  I'm not sure anything Congress and President Mitt produce that first year will set hearts afire, but it'll be good enough.  The 60 to 70 percent of what we want that we'll get under President Mitt is a lot better than the zero percent we'll get in an Obama second term.

Once we get into year two and three of President Mitt's administration, however, I think we could see policy take a major Tea Party shift.  The silver lining of the late Bush/Obama spending spree is that it woke up the conservative grassroots.  The conservative grassroots is more engaged than we've been in a long time.  We've learned that it's not enough to elect our candidates, we have to influence the policy-making process as well.  We're not going anywhere.

The tea party is going to grow more mature and sophisticated over the next five years.  As Sen. Mike Lee pointed out at FreePAC Dallas, it took 14 years to get from the Boston Tea Party to the Constitution.  Tea Partiers understand this is a long term fight, and we're in it to stay.

President Mitt's first year will be (a lot) better than the alternative.  It might not be great, but it'll be good enough.  From year two onward, however, a maturing Tea Party could exert tremendous influence over his administration.

FreePAC: Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)

"You might be an economic illiterate if you think roads cause business success and not the other way around":


Highlights:

• Obamacare isn't about Health Care, it's about limited government of any sort.
• The General Welfare clause was meant to be limited, otherwise why enumerate?!?
• The Feds sent $600 Million to dead people over the last decade

FreePAC: Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT)

Awesome speech from Sen. Lee:

Highlights:

• Had the Boston Tea Party been a one off event, it'd be forgotten.
• From the Boston Tea Party (1773) to Constitutional ratification (1788) took 15 years.
• "What's coming up this fall and in future cycles is going to make 2010 look like a Sunday picnic."

FreePAC: The Five Steps to Repeal Obamacare

Last night, Dean Clancy, spoke; for some reason, I can't find any video, but he spoke about the 5 steps to repeal Obama's Health Insurance Protection Racket.

• Stop the Exchanges in Your State --  The exchanges created in the law have to be established at the state level and they can be stopped there; we've taken care of that in Texas. 

• Stop the Medicaid Exansion in Your State -- Again, we've taken care of that in Texas 

• Hold the House

• Win the Senate

• Win the White House 

It's really that simple.

FreePAC: Glenn Beck's Hyperactive, Goober-tastic, Keynote Address

Glenn Beck in fine form:

FreePAC: Dana Loesch

Dana Loesch kicks the corrupt media's ass:

Highlights:

• Today's headlines are tomorrow's history.
• "We are the counterculture movement."
• We'll police the government AND we'll police the media.
• We don't need the press.
• "We'll report on us until we force you to as well."

For the record, I also love those pink heels, and I'm not ashamed to say so!!!

FreePAC: C.L Bryant

Wow, just wow:


Here's the preview for Runaway Slave:

FreePAC: John Fund on Voter Fraud

Last night, I heard John Fund speak at FreePAC
 A few highlights:

- Not only is voter fraud a problem, but our elections systems are sloppy as well.

- In 2008, Al Franken won (and became the 60th vote for Obama's Health Insurance Protection Racket) by 312 votes; 1200 Felons voted in that election.