GOP governor's candidate Debra Medina spent $2,437 on clothing for herself from her political donations, generally considered an ethics no-no. The state Ethics Commission has issued opinions, following the law that campaign contributions can't be converted to personal use of a candidate. On clothing, the rule of thumb is that shoes, dresses, suits and whatnot would only be appropriate for a campaign appearance and couldn't be converted to everyday wear.
Medina's folks said all that was taken into consideration. She went to Dillards, Nordstroms, The Limited and a few other places to pick up clothing for her campaign stops. Campaign manager Penny Langford Freeman said the clothing items won't be worn by Medina other than for campaign appearances. After the campaigning is over, she said they'll be donated to charity.
Yawn. Not every candidate is wealthy enough to buy the kind of clothes that look good on television. Appearance is a huge part of this game, and I am not going to begrudge a candidate especially a woman candidate for using some private campaign money to pay for improvements to her appearance. Medina looked very nice on stage at the first debate... and that was an important part of her upstaging the other two in many minds... although I thought she did struggle a little too much and kind of try to hide her position on the drug legalization question for someone who is "not a politician."
I also think the person in the middle of a three person stage is going to shine unless the outer people are both attacking the middle person. In this case, it was Medina talking mostly out to the crowd, occasionally attacking Rick on her left, with Rick and Kay arguing literally over her...
I think psychologically that made a big difference on perceptions. I wonder how the next debate will look from a placement stand point... I have already read somewhere that it won't have any audience at all which probably helps Kay since the audience laughed at her answers so much in the first debate. It might also help Rick because he won't be trying to connect with people in the audience... something that he achieved but something that didn't look as good through the camera filter...
I was in the audience at the debate and Rick Perry looked just as siily if not more so. In fact I watched the debate on my computer just to see how he came across on camera.
ReplyDeletehmm...what would she use our tax dollars for? steak dinners?
ReplyDeleteLOL, steak dinners. I seem to remember a recent story about Rick Perry going to Vegas for a bachelor party and paid for his trip with taxpayer's money.
ReplyDelete