Chad’s Morning Brief: Welcome to 2014, Texas Elections in Full Swing, and Other Top Stories
Here is your Morning Brief for the morning of January 2, 2014. Give me your feedback below and tune in to The Chad Hasty Show for these and many more topics from 8:30 to 11am. Remember, you can listen online at KFYO.com or on your iPhone/Android with the radioPup App.
2014
Welcome to 2014! I hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year's Day filled with family, friends, and yes, football. Now we get to look ahead to 2014 and see what the year will bring us.
The last time I was on the air I gave my predictions for the new year. Today on the show we will talk a little bit more about the year ahead and what could happen. I still believe that we will see the Lubbock City Council turn even more liberal. We will see the continued failure of Obamacare and a growing divide within the Republican Party.
When the midterms roll around, I believe the Republicans will keep the House but the Democrats will hold onto the Senate. Unless of course Republicans will fight and bring up the right issues in 2014. If they hammer the Democrats on Obamacare and the fact that people are worse off now than they were years ago, they might just have a chance of taking the Senate.
What do you see happening in 2014? We will talk about it today.
Texas Governor's Race Heats Up
As 2013 gave way to 2014 articles started popping up about the race for Texas Governor. The Texas Tribune published their latest take on the race yesterday. The Tribune laid out what each campaign will attempt to capitalize on in 2014.
State Sen. Wendy Davis, who got off to a slow and often rocky start in her race for Texas governor, will ring in the New Year with a much bigger bank account and an aggressive new strategy designed to keep front-running candidate Greg Abbott on the defensive.
For Abbott, a three-term attorney general, it’s steady as she goes: He’ll keep unveiling carefully crafted policy initiatives and tying Davis to President Obama while remaining hyper-cautious in his own dealings with the news media — lest he become the first Republican in nearly a quarter-century to blow a governor’s race.
Welcome to the marquee political contest this year in Texas, where the gubernatorial primaries are all but decided and both candidates are looking toward a November showdown with knives drawn.
“I’m looking for both of the campaigns to get very aggressive as soon as they find it strategically sound,” said Jim Henson, a Texas Tribune pollster and the director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin. “I would expect that ethics and character are going to be big parts of both of those efforts.”
For the Abbott campaign, that means making the most of Davis’ private dealings as a lawyer, particularly her partnership with Gov. Rick Perry’s former chief of staff, Brian Newby, and their long list of public-sector clients who have interests before the Texas Legislature.
The Davis campaign, meanwhile, is hammering Abbott over his role — or lack thereof — overseeing the troubled Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas, whose former chief commercialization officer was indicted over allegedly lax vetting procedures related to a cancer research grant.
Polls show it's still Abbott’s race to lose. But the Republicans are facing something Texas hasn’t seen in years: a Democrat who is about as recognizable to Texans as their own standard-bearer. Davis, a Harvard-trained lawyer, became an instant celebrity after waging an 11-hour filibuster of a restrictive abortion bill over the summer.
Her stardom didn’t change the conservative leanings of the Texas electorate, of course. But it gave her a head start because one of the most important tasks for any campaign is boosting name ID, and for Davis that was accomplished literally overnight.
While Davis may have more name ID than previous Democrats who recently ran for Governor, it may not be helping her very much. Davis is raising money but she is traveling to places like Boston and San Francisco to raise it. How much money can Davis actually raise in Texas? That answer will be key in seeing just how much support she actually has.
Other Top Stories:
These and many more topics coming up on today’s edition of The Chad Hasty Show. Tune in mornings 8:30-11am on News/Talk 790 KFYO, streaming online at kfyo.com, and now on your iPhone and Android device with the radioPup App. All guest interviews can be heard online in our podcast section after the show at kfyo.com.
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