Pragmatic Politician Sharp: No Unions, No Women, No Hispanics

According to Judge Jim Sharp as quoted here (with video, to boot), Texas Democrats made one huge mistake in nominating Linda Chavez-Thompson as the Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor.

Not because she is a union labor leader – the highest ranking woman ever elected to her position in the union movement.

Not because she is a woman.

Not because she is Hispanic.

Not for any of those reasons, but for all three of them.

Texas, Sharp says, is too racist to elect an Hispanic to statewide office. Texas, Sharp says is to anti-feminine to elect a woman to statewide office. And finally, Texas is too anti-union to elect a “union boss” to statewide office.

Maybe so. Maybe he’s right. I don’t really have a whole lot of regard for the world view of the average Texan, I really don’t. But then again, had I maintained my opinion of the world view of your average American in 2008, I never would have supported Barack Obama for the presidential nomination.

But mainly, what is simply wrong with Sharp’s rather candid remarks concerning Linda Chavez-Thompson’s candidacy, as well as Bill White’s candidacy, is that this isn’t supposed to be the time to give persuadable centrists a reason not to vote for the Democratic candidates at the top of the ticket. They can come up with their own reasons, but why help them out? Why give them a pass?

And why badmouth the top of the ticket, especially when those at the bottom of the ticket are sure to benefit from voters coming out to vote for Bill White? It makes no sense at all.

And why, I ask, decry the union movement in Texas? Sharp says that union members “are my people.” I should hope so.

I should hope, for instance that Jim Sharp appreciates the support of the Texas AFL-CIO, especially after receiving a $1000 contribution from them on February 9, 2010.

I should hope, for instance that Jim Sharp appreciates the support of the Communication Workers, especially after receiving a $5000 contribution from them on March 2, 2010.

One thing you don’t want to do is to take a contribution check with one hand and then give labor unions the back of your hand with the other.

The other thing that you don’t want to do is inflame the base: the leftwing of the Democratic Party, with anti-union remarks. Not unless, that is, you have a plan to attract Republicans to your cause, because, oh yeah, the plan is that Republicans are going to be on the lookout for Jim Sharp’s name there near the bottom of the ballot and cross right over because he slammed the unions because their people are unelectable in Texas.

Now I vote a straight Democratic ticket, something that I think Jim Sharp depends on to some degree. But I am already on the lookout for Kesha Rogers’ name to deselect before I cast my straight Democratic ballot. She doesn’t deserve to be elected dog catcher.

I wonder, now, who else’s name I will be looking for when I do that?

Peppers and Pigs

I scored a killer place to sit at the recent Texas Democratic Party state convention in Corpus Christi this past weekend. Somehow my senate district delegation wrangled a section on the convention floor. So I was actually close enough to see the speakers at the podium without having to look at the screen projections.

And I was able to make videos of some of the speakers almost unimpeded. I didn’t bring a tripod though so there is a tradeoff between camera steadiness and distance. My favorite convention moment you will see in the You Tube video below. I shot lots of video but this one is definitely the fun one and the one everyone needs to see, so it has been uploaded first.

The speaker is Linda Chavez-Thompson. Chavez-Thompson, former executive vice president of the AFL-CIO, is running for Lieutenant Governor. She has a story worth repeating. She is the daughter of immigrants who had to drop out of high school to help her family in the cotton fields. At 23 she came to work for the Construction Laborer’s Local 1253 as a secretary and worked her way up the ladder to become the first “person of color” of either sex to become an AFL-CIO officer.

On Saturday, Linda Chavez-Thompson had some choice words to say about Texas’ governor, Rick Perry, and how he hopes to lure Hispanic voters to vote for Republicans.

In other words, how to convince Hispanic voters to vote against their own interests, all the time.

Here is a clip from her speech:

You know you have a really good punchline when you repeat it and you get a bigger laugh out of the audience the second time you say it than the first.