Flowering Judas

Today what we've been hearing for a while hit the news:

State District Judge Susan Hawk Wednesday announced her campaign for Dallas County district attorney...

On Tuesday Hawk mailed a letter to Gov. Rick Perry resigning from her felony court post.

She’ll also renounce her membership to the Democratic Party and once again become a Republican.

Well, she never really changed. Elected as a Repugnant in 2002 and 2006, she switched only for 2010 when it was obvious to several they had to switch or be defeated.

Hawk intends to mount a campaign that exposes Watkins as unqualified for his job.

That won't work. Period. Can you spell DNA exoneration of the innocent? But that's not really what the Rethuglicans have in mind. It's 1990.

That year Ann Richards was elected Governor. She picked up lots of independent voters, but what really upset the mammoth party was the number of good quiet north Dallas housewives who secretly voted for Ann. And that meant they did not vote straight party, and that hurt their other candidates on the unenlightened side.

This year they see Wendy Davis, and see how her stand motivated women, and they remember Ann and fear the same thing happening again. Putting this youngish blonde white woman on the ballot for DA is an attempt to bring some of those ticket splitters back. This not only may help them in the DA race, but since that contest is not at the bottom of the ballot, they figure they'll keep a few voters back on that side in the lower contests, like County Judge, Clerk, Treasurer, and several county courts.

It's not an insane strategy. It may mean we have to work harder, but their history of actually keeping their voters in line when they try a diversity outreach here in DFW is dismal. More than once they have promised the moon to some minority / woman candidate, who then saw lots of those voters sit on their hands precinct by precinct, and crashed and burned in the election. Their base has a big chunk of bigots of various kinds: racist, sexist, etc. "All isms are alike", as Jean Ball says.

They may not even control their own candidates. One who was already running for DA is not on board:

Hawk will be opposed in the March GOP primary by Dallas lawyer and former county prosecutor Tom Nowak.

Nowak, who in 2010 was fired by Watkins after attending a Republican election night party, dismissed Hawk as an opportunist.

“Dallas County Republicans won’t be fooled by this,” Nowak said. “By having her run against me, I’m sure the Dems hope to have two Democrat candidates in the general election, but I’m confident Republican voters will see through the ruse…I don’t think that changing your beliefs depending on the political winds is an example of integrity in a leader.”

You know, it's really all about him. Can you spell self-obsession? That primary will be fun to watch.

Oh, and by the way, Ms. DINO already had a Democratic Primary opponent. She stopped by the party office today to leave some literature to be passed out at the Pride Parade this weekend. Her name is Stephanie Mitchell.