READY, FIRE, AIM: A Sucker in a ‘Tootsie Pop’ World

I’m reaching out to ask you to split a donation between my campaign and my good friend Gina Hinojosa’s campaign for governor…

— from an email sent by the James Talarico senate campaign

Let me give you a bit of advice.

If you aren’t getting enough emails and text messages, just give $5 to the ‘Talarico for Senate’ campaign. You will get a dozen emails and text requests every day, asking for another donation.

Mr. Talarico is running for one of Texas’ two seats in the U.S. Senate. His “good friend” Gina Hinojosa is running for Governor of Texas.

These people wholeheartedly subscribe to the biblical message:

Ask and ye shall receive…

They ask and ask and ask, and never take ‘No’ for an answer.

My mistake was, I thought it would be funny if the Senator from Texas and the Texas governor had non-American names.

I mean, “Abbot” and “Paxton” are such typically American names.  But ‘Talarico’ and ‘Hinojosa’ feel so much more exotic, and would make it a trip to Texas feel like a trip to a foreign country.

Not to suggest that a trip to Texas isn’t already a trip to a foreign country, even though they sort of speak English there.

But I guess I didn’t realize that James and Gina actually thought they could win their races against actual Republicans.

From the latest email message:

All eyes are on the Lone Star State this November, and all the pressure is on Gina and me to lead this ticket to victory. Both of our races are in a dead heat, and a new poll this week even has Gina leading Greg Abbott — the first time he’s ever been down in the polls in any of his four gubernatorial campaigns.

You might ask why a person living in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, would have the slightest interest in what happens in Texas.

You would ask this only if you were unaware that Pagosa Springs is economically and socially a part of Texas.  Yes, we’re officially outside the physical borders of Texas, but during the summer months, 50% of the license plates in the City Market parking lot are white with black lettering.

This is in sharp contrast to the very popular Colorado license plate that’s black with white lettering.  Obviously, a bold statement by local residents that we’re the opposite of Texans.

Black and white aside, the important colors at the moment are red and blue. Red being Republican-leaning, and blue being Democrat-leaning.

Colorado used to be ‘purple’, but over the past decade has become ‘blue in the center, surrounded by red’…

…similar, in some ways, to the way a Tootsie Pop has a colorful hard candy shell around a chewy chocolate core.

Colorado’s “hard candy shell” has become thinner in recent years — so, more Tootsie and less Pop — and the Denver government is now totally dominated by Democrats who can pretty much ‘have their way’ with the state’s residents.

In Texas, meanwhile, the Republicans have for many years been ‘having their way’ with those residents. So it’s been a bit of a surprise to have a couple of renegade Democrats — James Talarico and Gina Hinojosa — running neck and neck with their Republican opponents.

This is partly, I suspect, because the Republicans nationally have royally screwed up the economy and given the GOP a bad name, heading into these midterm elections.

Nevertheless, I’m sorry that I donated to the Talarico campaign (it was sort of as a joke, as mentioned) because now my phone is constantly telling me that I have another text message or another email message, and I know what the message is.

They think I’m a sucker.