I don't know much about Beto O'Rourke, but it's my sense that he's the sort of Democrat who isn't quite conservative enough to win statewide in Texas. It's also my sense that he's a lifelong occupant of that sparsely populated lower-right quadrant where all the voters aren't. This recent report encourages me in those views:
I understand why an ambitious Texas Democrat might have echoed Republicans by calling for painful austerity at a time when it could have throttled our recovery. It was bad and wrong, but it was also Texas.
But now we're way past Texas. And I completely don't get the enthusiasm Beto seems to arouse. I wonder if the enthusiasm will last.
Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke campaigned during his 2012 congressional race on a platform that called for "significant" spending cuts and tax increases to balance the federal budget, along with possibly changing Social Security to address the United States' "extravagant government" and "out of control" debt.
. . . The deficit and debt became a lightning rod in the race in which O'Rourke, who had just left the El Paso city council, unseated eight-term incumbent Rep. Silvestre Reyes in the Democratic primary for Texas's 16th district. Republicans, who controlled the House of Representatives at the time in the summer of 2011, had demanded a deficit reduction plan from then-President Barack Obama in exchange for raising the debt ceiling.
The report goes on to explain that O'Rourke beat the eight-term Democratic incumbent by running to his right, arguing for big spending cuts including entitlement "reforms".. . . The deficit and debt became a lightning rod in the race in which O'Rourke, who had just left the El Paso city council, unseated eight-term incumbent Rep. Silvestre Reyes in the Democratic primary for Texas's 16th district. Republicans, who controlled the House of Representatives at the time in the summer of 2011, had demanded a deficit reduction plan from then-President Barack Obama in exchange for raising the debt ceiling.
I understand why an ambitious Texas Democrat might have echoed Republicans by calling for painful austerity at a time when it could have throttled our recovery. It was bad and wrong, but it was also Texas.
But now we're way past Texas. And I completely don't get the enthusiasm Beto seems to arouse. I wonder if the enthusiasm will last.