The gender card...

Bitter liberal columnst Bud Kennedy who is always wrong about almost everything has injected the gender card into the race for 2010 (link). Excerpt follows...

Perry is treading perilously close to the failed 1990 path of Midland oil executive and rancher Clayton Williams, a macho West Texan who lost after he refused to shake Democrat Ann Richards’ hand.

No dumbass... Claytie lost because he made a joke blurring the lines between bad Texas weather and rape, saying, "If it's inevitable, just relax and enjoy it." Rick has done nothing even remotely like that. Getting some professor up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to go on the record about how voters in the South are traditional proves nothing.

To say Rick's jabs at Kay's numerous policy flaws is sexist is the same kind of thing that drives conservatives nuts about Obama. There was a very real implication last year that has gone away for the most part but still lingers... If you oppose Obama you must be some kind of racist... if you oppose a woman politician no matter how severely flawed you must be some kind of sexist.

Bud's column is really one of the dumbest things I have ever read. Another excerpt follows...

Before Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison had even announced her campaign for governor, Perry sent an airplane buzzing overhead to taunt

her with the message "Kay Come Clean — Release Your Taxes."

Since then, Perry’s campaign has tailed Hutchi

son with a "Kay Bailout" truck billboard and dressed campaigners in pigs’ noses to accuse her of voting for "pork."

Last week, on the anniversary of the banking relief vote, Perry’s campaign put an unsmiling photo of Hutchison on a "birthday cake" and prese

nted it to her headquarters.

Those are all fun antics that have nothing to do whatsoever with gender designed to get some media attention about issues the peeps in the media don't think are important (but voters do otherwise Rick's peeps wouldn't be pushing them)... congrats Bud you just gave Rick's peeps what they wanted.

Some of the online comments from both sides of the political aisle on this stupid gender card column are spot on...

Maximus wrote on 10/4/2009 10:58:09 AM:

This is the biggest waste of space yet in the FWST, and that is saying a lot considering how long Bud has been emitting political flatulence on your page.

koperry wrote on 10/4/2009 8:26:09 AM:

Maybe he should treat her the way the left treats Palin, that's fair in the liberal handbook isn't it Bud?

ossip81 wrote on 10/4/2009 8:10:57 AM:

Oh, Bud, I like you a lot, but this was just a bit cringe-worthy. Last night I finally steeled myself and read the New Yorker expose of the Willingham case. There's a lot of evil in Perry that has nothing to do with 1960-style social mores, and that's what I'll be focusing on as I work against his re-election.

cland_1 wrote on 10/4/2009 5:49:27 AM:

With all due respect, KBH began the mud slinging and sarcastic remarks right from the start. It would be difficult to ignore and not fail to comment in kind for Gov. Perry. In today's politics there has been too much poisoning the well and too little said that person can and will do. I had a problem that I thought KBH might help me with and contacted her office twice. I never had a reply. She was too busy I assume.

klrtexan wrote on 10/4/2009 5:12:50 AM:

We need a PERSON that can do the job. We don't need a southern bell that needs Bret Butler to come save her. We don't need someone that needs to be spotted 20 yard in a race to make it seem equal. We don't need a minority that has been giving 20% to make a grade. If a women needs chivalry from a man to get her out of trouble and Git Ur Done. Then we need THAT man doing her job in the 1st place. If we need to change the rules and make adjustments so candidate has a chance, otherwise imposible. Then we do not need the pompous idiot, we need a leader.

leonardgoodman wrote on 10/4/2009 1:46:46 AM:

This isn't the YMCA. These campaigns are tough, and that's good because in theory the road to election should prepare candidates for the even tougher job of governing. And in politics -- actually in any industry --there is no man or woman or black or white or even yellow. Just competition. Now, that's naive because if you're a woman or minority in just about any industry, you have an immediate advantage. It is what it is. Second point: Chivalry is dead. It's sexist, so the argument goes. I once dated this chick who was offended I opened her door!! No embellishment. The "liberation" movement has destroyed all social mores. Third point: From what I'm hear, KBH is anything but a lady. She makes my Nancy Reagan look like Mother Teresa ... if you know what I mean. I'm staying out of this. I'm going with ... this is hard for me ... a democrat. Tom Schieffer. And if Schieffer isn't the nominee, I'm writing in Clayton Williams.

The worst part is not that Bud wrote this drivel it is that Kay's peeps are now passing it around on twitter as "evidence" that Rick is sexist. I have been around long enough to know that Republican primary voters don't like "poor me" victim cards being played especially when they are 100% unwarranted.

I know columnists get paid to write things to stir people up and cause controversy, but Bud Kennedy just plays so fast and loose with reality in attacking Rick that you have to wonder what Rick staffer ran over his dog.

Rick's jabs at Kay not releasing her taxes or being a big spending bailout voting squish are all entirely in bounds. I sound the BS alarm on Bud Kennedy, and I reject his liberal interloping attempt to throw the gender card into our Republican primary. We all should reject liberal columnists when they try to shape this race in their own image.

It is too bad one of Kay's key team members was already so eager to run with the gender card angle... something that will surely come back to hurt her in the end if her team keeps pushing this angle.