If she does make that call, she has the best shot at doing so since Ann Richards became in 1990 the last Texas Democrat to occupy the governor's chair. Ann Richards started off her campaign in a 27 point hole against GOP nominee Clayton Williams but eventually won.
It didn't hurt that Williams was pissing everyone off in the state with his rape joke and refusing to shake Richards' hand after a debate.
If Wendy Davis jumps into this race, it's because she thinks she can win and even better, she's won seven consecutive political races including her runs for the Fort Worth City Council. She's won two races in a Fort Worth area state senate district that leans Republican but is a microcosm of the state with large pockets of Latino, African-American and progressive voters. She won twice in that state senate district that prior to her running and winning it in 2008 was a GOP bastion with a coalition of Democrats, independents and reality based Republicans.
Because of her heightened name recognition in the wake of her 11 hour filibuster against the unjust and draconian abortion clinic bill she has raised over $1 million with the ability to raise more nationally.
Davis is only trailing Greg Abbott, who has been in office 12 years as the Republican AG by single digits and has much better name recognition statewide than he does. Should she jump into the race she has plenty of time to make that deficit up and get her message out there.
I submit Davis' message will resonate with Texans tired of the conservafool social agenda coming up in every legislative session in Austin.
"What they care about is public education," she said in a recent interview. "Can their child go to college, is there a path for their child's future? Is there a path for them to have a good job, are they going to have adequate healthcare? These are things that really matter to people. Are we creating the type of climate to keep a healthy workforce and a vibrant economy, that's what people care about and that's what they want their leaders to be in the business of talking about.
So I think that we're going to see, if there is a statewide campaign, we'll see that the expression of that come out in many, many ways."
We have problems in this state that require adult leadership to solve. In Wendy Davis we may have the right person to drive that message home. It also doesn't hurt the last time Texas had a female Democratic governor in Austin she wiped out a $6 billion deficit piled up by Bill Clements (R) and turned it into a $2.5 billion surplus. Ann Richards also had the most diverse cabinet in Texas history, in addition to us in the Lone Star State seeing many groundbreaking firsts under her leadership.
I'd like to see that happen for Texas again.
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