South Texas Won’t Play Nice with Cuellar
The headline says it all: “Club for Growth Pac Makes First Ever Endorsement of a Democrat, Backing Rep. Henry Cuellar (Tx -28) for Re-Election.”
Club for Growth is a political organization that was founded by Stephen Moore, former committee staffer for Dick Armey. Here are some Stephen Moore quotes:
“We want to be seen as the tax-cut enforcer in the [Republican] party.”
“I can say this because I’m not an elected official: the most selfish group in America today is senior citizens. Their demands on Washington are: ‘Give us more and more and more.’ They have become the new welfare state, and given the size and political clout of this constituency, it’s very dangerous. One of the biggest myths in politics today is this idea that grandparents care about their grandkids. What they really care about is that that Social Security check and those Medicare payments are made on a timely basis.”
“We’re trying to let candidates know that if they ever voted for a tax increase, we’ll never support them and in fact we’ll work to defeat them. We’re trying to get the word out to even the lowest grass-roots level that if you’re a Republican you aren’t allowed to vote for taxes.”
“Reagan’s third term has arrived.” — Moore on President George W. Bush
First Tom DeLay? Now Steve Moore?
To me, the only question is whether the Cuellar switches to the Republican Party before or after the voters of South Texas throw him out of office.
[Update:] The Hill and Hotline on Call have more. The Hill gets it wrong, though, when it calls the seat lean-Republican. It’s a very safe Democratic seat. Which is why Cuellar is going to try to run away from this endorsement. But he can’t run away from his Bush/DeLay votes on Katrina cleanup, prescription drugs and Social Security.
[Update 2:] San Antonio Express-News, too. Politics1.com has comments.
[Update 3:] Dos Centavos offers his perspective on Cuellar:
Cuellar’s also sided with anti-Latino forces led by Wisconsin’s Sensenbrenner, who now wants to criminalize churches and organizations that help immigrants become acclimated to the U.S.
