Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Live from the Lone Star State

How’d I manage to miss this? Singer, songwriter, and comic crime novelist Richard F. “Kinky” Friedman (Ten Little New Yorkers, Blast from the Past, etc.) has qualified for a spot on the November ballot as an independent candidate for governor of Texas. He’s actually the second independent running for that position, the other being Carole Strayhorn, the mother of former White House spokesman “Stonewall Scotty” McClellan. Democrat Chris Bell and Libertarian candidate James Werner are in the race as well to replace current governor Rick Perry, a Republican and acolyte of disgraced former U.S. House majority leader Tom DeLay.

As I’ve written elsewhere, the 61-year-old “Kinkster” is “campaigning on the witty appeal of slogans such as ‘Why the Hell Not?’ and ‘How Hard Could It Be?’ (the latter an apparent allusion to Texas’ most recent two governors, Rick Perry and George W. Bush).” He’s also “promoting education reform, the abolishment of political correctness, and the ‘dewussification’ of the Lone Star State.” Hey, if bodybuilder-turned-actor Arnold Schwarzenneger can head up California, why not give cigar-chomping Kinky the keys to the Austin governor’s mansion?

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