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 Editorials | At Issue | September 2006 
Characters Animate Texas Race
 Miguel Bustillo - LATimes
| | Texas gubernatorial candidate Kinky Friedman, left, makes a campaign stop with former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura this week. (AP/Eric Gay) |
Houston - Kinky Friedman, the musician, mystery writer and self-styled Jewish cowboy running for governor of Texas, was stumping for votes in a smoky beer bar called the Flying Saucer and spraying one-liners like a Gatling gun.
Rick Perry, the Republican governor, "had done a pretty good job - as a cheerleader at Texas A&M," Friedman joked to raucous applause.
Perry had served on the Aggies' pep squad, an apparent political no-no in this macho slice of the Lone Star State.
Friedman then introduced his guest of honor, Jesse Ventura, fresh off the beaches of Baja California. Sporting a nascent attempt at dreadlocks and a braided beard, Ventura told the under- 40s crowd that it felt like 1998, when he stunned the U.S. by wooing enough disaffected voters to win the Minnesota governorship.
"We haven't had an independent governor in Texas since Sam Houston," Ventura said in his wrestler's growl.
But he predicted that "Kinky will win - if you have a big voter turnout."
The barroom appearance was another odd moment in a four- way race for governor that has begun living up to its billing as one of the most colorful contests in recent Texas history.
In addition to the GOP incumbent and the cigar-chomping comedian, there is Carole Keeton Strayhorn, another independent candidate who waged a losing battle to be called "grandma" on the ballot, and Democrat Chris Bell, who is pushing a "Don't Mess With Ethics" reform plan, a play on the state's famous anti-litter slogan, "Don't Mess With Texas."
Whether the Texas campaign will be close as well as colorful remains to be seen.
Polls have consistently shown that Perry, who experts say lacks the folksy charisma that popularized former governors such as the late Ann Richards, is vulnerable to defeat. Some surveys gauge his support as low as 31 percent.
Yet with a little more than a month left in the race, no challenger has made a move, raising the likelihood that a splintered vote will get Perry re-elected.
A Survey USA poll two weeks ago showed Perry with 35 percent of the vote, followed by Bell and Friedman with 23 percent each and Strayhorn with 15 percent.
A fifth candidate, Libertarian James Werner, is trailing far behind but hopes to play the spoiler.
Texas political experts said that while Perry maintains a sizable lead, many voters are undecided. All four major candidates have enough money to run TV spots, making it impossible to predict who will come out on top.
"Nobody has gotten quite close enough to scare" Perry, said Bruce Buchanan, a political-science professor at the University of Texas at Austin. "But we have not seen the heaviest barrage of attack ads, and in a multi-candidate race, it's not always the person launching the attacks who winds up benefiting."
Strayhorn - the Texas comptroller who calls herself "one tough grandma" - initially was considered the most serious challenger, thanks to a combination of personality, a hefty war chest and an insider's knowledge of statehouse politics. But her campaign has not taken off.
As Friedman and Ventura ate breakfast with reporters Wednesday, a waitress passed Friedman a note, telling him that she and all the Republicans she knew were planning to vote for him.
"This is what's going to win the election right here," Friedman said. "Rick Perry is a nice guy, but he doesn't know the waitress' name. I know the waitress' name - and I might even ask for her phone number." |
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