"But yeah, I'm angry. I'm angry at politicians who use Jesus Christ as a marketing tool."
Dallas Morning News
Steve Blow:
Kinky's unorthodox campaign: Is that a bandwagon I hear?
09:06 PM CDT on Tuesday, October 4, 2005
It hit me with a surreal jolt – like that queasy moment you realize parents have sex.
In the same eerie way, it hit me: Kinky Friedman could be the next governor of Texas.
Kind of sends a shiver down your spine, doesn't it?
But is that a shiver of fear? Or excitement? I'm not sure.
I was certainly aware of Mr. Friedman's independent campaign for governor. But I thought it was strictly a stunt.
For those who don't know him, the cigar-smoking, 60-year-old Mr. Friedman is a comic fixture around the state. For years he led a country band, Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys. Then he wrote a successful series of mystery novels. Until lately, Mr. Friedman had written a humor column for Texas Monthly.
All that led me to take his governor talk as mostly silliness. After all, he announced his campaign for the governor's mansion by explaining, "I need more closet space."
Then the other day I saw Mr. Friedman's first campaign cartoon, and that's when it hit me: He's serious about this.
Then came the second, more shocking realization: He could win!
If Arnold "The Terminator" Schwarzenegger can be elected governor of California, and Jesse "The Body" Ventura can be elected governor of Minnesota, there's nothing to say Kinky "The Kinkster" Friedman can't be elected governor of Texas.
Look at past results. We obviously have a sense of humor.
It may seem odd that a cartoon should spark this realization. But you need to see it. You can, at www.kinkyfriedman.com.
When one of Mr. Friedman's local fans sent me the link to "I Looove Texas," I prepared to watch a political parody in the vein of the JibJab.com cartoons.
And it is funny and irreverent. (A typical Texas politician campaigns atop a bucking oil-well pump, proclaiming "Jesus es grande!" )
But there is a moment in the cartoon – where Mr. Friedman talks about Texas and independence, with the image of Sam Houston on the screen – that you realize this is no joke.
Or at least not totally a joke. The red-white-and-blue-spewing menorah at the end is probably a joke. But Mr. Friedman is clearly trying to say something serious.
"Well, I never like to use the word 'serious,' " he deadpanned in a phone chat the other day. "But yeah, I'm angry. I'm angry at politicians who use Jesus Christ as a marketing tool."
And with that, he was off and running.... "The two political parties have let us down. The Republicans and the Democrats think they have a monopoly on democracy. And as we saw in the special sessions, the only time they get off their butts is to attack each other.
"The minute there is a real alternative on the ballot, believe me, Texans are going to take it."
So, yeah, Mr. Friedman is serious. And he said the 50,000 people who have registered as volunteers on his Web site are serious.
"The public already understands. It's really just the politicians who don't get it," he said.
But an enormous obstacle stands between Mr. Friedman and all that gubernatorial closet space: State law makes an independent candidacy nigh on to impossible.
He must get more than 45,000 registered voters' signatures on a petition in just 62 days after the March primaries. And if there's a runoff, he'll have half that time.
And petition signers must not have voted in either primary. He is urging voters to stay away from the polls with a campaign called "Save Yourself for Kinky."
Getting a bead on Mr. Friedman's politics won't be easy. He supports prayer in school, casino gambling and gay marriage. He voted for Bush and Clinton.
But he said he thinks people are less interested in issues than in knowing that a candidate will speak the plain truth and run a clean, competent government.
"I'm a Jew," he says. "I'll hire good people."
And I think he's serious.
E-mail sblow@dallasnews.com
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/localnews/columnists/sblow/stories/100505dnmetblow.1262554f.html
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Politicians using Jesus as a marketing tool includes Brownwood ! More to come on this.........
Brownwood: it is very Red !!!!!!!!!!!!
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Our State Reps ( Republican Jim Keffer ) position/vote...........
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anything in the name of God.............
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" it’s kind of scary on your end of the district" quote from our Republican Congressman's ( Mike Connaway ) Chief of Staff, Jeff Burton...........
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Brownwood: as it is..........
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Bush's Supreme Court Nominee, Harriet Miers, opinion on Civil Rights & Gays
" A questionnaire filled out in 1989 by U.S. Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers is being promoted as an insight into her views on gay rights and the law. In answers to a Texas gay rights group when she was running for a seat on Dallas City Council, she said she believed gay men and lesbians should have the same civil rights as straight Americans, but that she also opposed repeal of the state's sodomy law criminalizing same-sex sexual conduct."
source: http://www.cnn.com/
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What's being written......
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As this relates to Brownwood......
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