Kinky Friedman is Revolutionary ! (see Orwell's quote below)

IS KINKY SERIOUS ?
Wednesday, May 03, 2006

He has been called a straight shooter and the anti-politician, but will voters actually take him seriously when they go into the voting booths in November? Independent candidate for Governor Kinky Friedman has been touring the state trying to drum up signatures to get on the ballot, and he was in Wichita Falls again today. Many people say they are behind Friedman and like his campaign, but is this just entertainment or is it the real deal?
We talked to a political science professor at MSU today who says that believe it or not, Kinky Friedman has a good shot at the Governor`s office. Friedman is not on the ballot yet, but if he gets there, many say his chances of winning are not that remote.
Kinky Friedman says he tells it like it is and he has been touring the state to try to become the first independent Governor voted into office since Sam Houston. But will voters buy it?
MSU political science professor Dr. Michael Flavin says, "The odds are heavy against him because he is not a Democrat or a Republican once he gets on the ballot, but nonetheless, he could be a revolution. There could be a revolution here in Texas."
Doctor Michael Flavin says Friedman does have at least a chance to become Governor because of appearances like the one today at MSU. Flavin says Friedman`s anti-politician attitude might pull votes across party lines from those who are fed up with business as usual in Austin. People who come to see him say it is his "tell it like it is" attitude that has won their vote.
Flavin says a large election turnout could work in Friedman`s favor, but first comes job one, getting on the ballot. Friedman says he needs about 46,000 signatures to get on the November ballot. He says he will have 100,000 by May 11th when petitions must be turned in.

source: http://www.kfdx.com/news/default.asp?mode=shownews&id=11756

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George Orwell rightly said, "In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act."
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Independents Try to Shake Up Texas Race
By MICHAEL GRACZYK
The Associated Press
Friday, May 5, 2006; 6:15 PM

AUSTIN, Texas -- In a small, windowless room in an industrial part of town, with rock music softly thumping in the background and two mirrored disco balls spinning overhead, Kelley Lowes is working for a man who hopes to be Texas' first independent governor since Sam Houston, and its first ever named Kinky.
Humorist, author and songwriter Kinky Friedman is looking to oust Republican Gov. Rick Perry, as is fellow independent Carole Keeton Strayhorn, the state comptroller who bills herself as "one tough grandma." With 45,540 valid signatures apiece, they would set up a wild four-way race Nov. 7 in the nation's second-biggest state.
Lowes is painstakingly typing and double-checking names from handwritten petitions for Friedman, logging long hours before Thursday's deadline.
"You never quite realize how big a deal this is," said Lowes, a 20-year-old University of Texas student from Houston.
Friedman's first name alone _ no one calls him by his birth name, Richard _ is enough to make this an unusual race. It will be even more so if he and Strayhorn, mother of outgoing White House press secretary Scott McClellan, join Perry and Democratic former congressman Chris Bell on the ballot.
"We've never seen anything like this," says Gary Halter, a Texas A&M University political science professor and author of a textbook on Texas politics and government.
No independent has been elected Texas governor since state hero Houston won in 1859. Friedman and Strayhorn insist they'll have no trouble meeting the signatures threshold and scrutiny by secretary of state auditors, but both campaigns are being coy about disclosing the number of petitions they'll be submitting in the next week.
"All we're saying is we've got tens of thousands of petitions," Mark Sanders, Strayhorn's spokesman, said.
"I'm comfortable," Friedman's political consultant, Laureen Oliver, says. "He will be on the ballot."
It could take a while to find out. Although Strayhorn has sued Secretary of State Roger Williams to speed up the verification process using statistical sampling, Williams wants signatures checked one by one, a process that could take two months.
Bell is looking to rebound, having been voted out of Congress after the state's congressional districts were redrawn under a plan led by former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.
The three challengers are targeting an incumbent who has won all seven of his previous campaigns for elected office, starting with the state House.
Perry, a 56-year-old former Democrat, went from lieutenant governor to the top job in 2000 when then-Gov. George W. Bush won the presidency, and was elected to a full term four years ago. Re-election would clear the way for him to become Texas' longest-serving governor.
His campaign started the election year with $11.5 million in the bank. Strayhorn, a 66-year-old former Democrat-turned-Republican who turned independent to avoid a likely primary loss to the incumbent, had raised $8.1 million.
Bell and Friedman were far behind. Friedman's fundraising efforts include the sale of campaign gear, with a talking Kinky Friedman action figure the biggest seller at $29.95 a pop, campaign officials say.
Halton, the Texas A&M professor, believes the race is Perry's to lose _ especially if he succeeds in an overhaul of school financing that is one of several issues over which he and Strayhorn have clashed.
The state Supreme Court has said the current school funding system amounts to an unconstitutional state property tax, and has given lawmakers until June 1 to replace it.
An ongoing special legislative session on school funding is the fourth Perry has called since 2004. The three previous sessions ended in failure, giving critics fodder for attacks on Perry's leadership.
In this special session, a Perry-backed plan that includes a property tax cut and expanded taxes on business and cigarettes cleared the Texas House. In the Senate, however, a raucous disagreement over wealth sharing Friday threatened to derail attempts to meet the court deadline.
"This proposal of his, if he gets it through, then there's not going to be the challenge to him as a do-nothing governor," Halton said.
Bell is seeking traction in a state where Republicans hold every statewide elected office and control both legislative houses.
He asked Ronnie Earle, a Democrat and the Travis County prosecutor who obtained indictments against DeLay, to begin a criminal investigation against the governor, suggesting a campaign organized to support Perry's tax plan amounted to illegal corporate campaign contributions.
"Rick Perry is taking ethics lessons from Tom DeLay," said Bell, who two years ago, in his only term in Congress, filed the first ethics complaint against DeLay.
Perry downplayed the allegation, saying, "Take the source of the complaint appropriately."
All the verbal flailing involving his rivals hasn't been lost on Friedman, who in the 1970s toured with Bob Dylan, counts Bush and former President Bill Clinton as fans of his mystery novels where he's the hero detective, and who's enlisted several veterans of former pro wrestler Jesse Ventura's successful independent run for Minnesota governor in 1998.
Always in black cowboy garb and grasping a Cuban cigar, the populist Friedman labels Republicans and Democrats the Crips and Bloods, battling in a turf war like the famous street gangs.
"I'm the only one running who has no political experience whatsoever," the 61-year-old says. "And politics is the only field in which the more experience you have, the worse you get."
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On the Net:

Friedman campaign http://www.kinkyfriedman.com

Strayhorn campaign http://www.carolestrayhorn.com

Perry campaign http://www.rickperry.org

Bell campaign http://www.chrisbell.com

source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/05/AR2006050500916_pf.html