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Ed. Note: In case anyone missed it, be sure to watch Governor Rick Perry admit to raising business taxes instead of taking the free federal stimulus dollars. Key Point: The criticism on Hutchison -- and it's a legitimate one -- is that she is living in Washington D.C. and doesn't pay attention to what's actually going on here in Texas. That's true -- she's so bad at responding about issues back home in Texas that it takes her eleven days to respond to one of the most obviously idiotic public policy campaign proposals Perry has offered up in the 147 years he has been Governor.
- Question: How long does it take Kay Bailey Hutchison to run a poll to tell her what to think?
- Answer: Apparently, 11 days. Which is why she won't win the primary against real-time Rick.
 Last week I reported on Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison's cowardly comeback to Rick Perry:
"I hope that the Governor has carefully thought through the potential outcomes of today's decision. With the state unemployment fund dangerously close to falling below the legal threshold, it is imperative that the Governor does nothing that potentially burdens small businesses with higher taxes in tough economic times or pushes those who have recently become unemployed and their families into further economic peril," said Hutchison, in a statement.
I said then that I didn't think she had done polling to determine what she actually wanted to say -- which is why she gave such a non-real statement to Perry's remarks. But magically -- a full eleven days after her initial remarks -- she finally comes around to talk about the issue. Only, because her campaign is being run out of Washington D.C., it took her eleven days. And her remarks came at a time and place when Governor Perry was right next to her -- meaning she couldn't even "win" a news cycle with her poll-approved message. From Wayne Slater of the Dallas Morning News: "A leader would be taking time to look at all aspects and coming up with a better solution," she told reporters. "I would hope he is looking for innovative ways not to dock the taxpayers of Texas with $555 million turned down." Perry defended his action and suggested the senator, a fellow Republican, stay out of state business. "The last thing we want is Washington coming down here to Texas and telling us how to run our state," he said. [snip] In rejecting the unemployment money, Perry seeks to cast himself as anti-Washington – a potentially appealing message to the conservative base in the 2010 GOP primary. In his brief response to Hutchison's comments Monday, Perry said the word "Washington" seven times.
Congratulations, Coward Kay. You managed to finally speak out in a venue/forum where Governor Rick Perry also appeared. AND, he was able to stay on a much simpler message than you. Governor Perry is a total failure and his decision is completely wrong, but Hutchison is explaining -- and therefore losing -- this round of press. If it always takes her eleven days to get her poll-approved message out there, she's going to be defeated in the primary. Remember what I said before -- Rick Perry is a cyborg. Cyborgs are bad policy-makers because they have no soul; Perry is programmed to care about "wealth" and nothing else. But cyborgs are machines, and can compute campaign strategies and travel campaign miles much faster and much better than scared, cowardly D.C.-bound wimps like Hutchison.
And so long as her Junior Texas Senator, Republican John Cornyn, is declaring that she will stay in D.C. -- both to protect the man that made him, Rick Perry, and to protect against the possibility of having 60 Democrats in the U.S. Senate -- then she suffers the "coward" label not only because she has to be told what to think, but because it looks like she wants to put herself first and not risk losing her old job to win this one (which screams, "I choose Washington over Texas" so loudly that it will be an upset if Perry DOESN'T win the primary). From a Roll Call article early last week (via Daily Kos): Republican sources in Washington, D.C., on Monday predicted that the Texas Republican will continue to serve in the Senate, resigning only if she wins the Lone Star State governor’s mansion in November 2010. Hutchison had been expected to resign her Senate seat in the coming months to focus on her campaign full time. Should Hutchison still decide to step down, she would likely do so at the end of this calendar year, setting up a May 2010 special election to fill out the remainder of her current term, which expires in 2012. Gov. Rick Perry (R) would presumably appoint someone to replace Hutchison in the interim, as state law empowers him to do. "I think she won’t resign before the end of the year, if at all," one Republican operative based in Washington said Monday afternoon. Are the operatives quoted in the piece working for Senator John Cornyn, or had they been instructed by someone on his staff to push the piece out there? Of course! But why isn't Senator Hutchison getting press on her side? She's been in Washington for 126 years. Why -- even after she gets her poll-approved messages finalized -- is she only delivering her message at a location where Perry can easily knock her back? Here's why: because Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison is a coward. She won't resign and run because she's scared of losing -- it happened in 2002 and 2006. And she won't issue immediate statements against Rick Perry's ridiculous policies because she needs to wait eleven days to get them approved first. Governor Rick Perry is going to win the Republican primary. Democrats need to realize that, prepare accordingly, and stop cowering at the notion of a Hutchison candidacy. It doesn't look good when we mimic the cowardice actions of those we are gearing up to defeat. Finally -- for more on the story, here's a cool newspaper-blog-video about the remarks made by Governor Rick Perry and Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison at Monday's Texas Daily Newspaper Association event from R.G. "get those blgogers of of my lawn!" Ratcliffe of the Houston Chronicle:
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First of all, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison's 
Texas Governor Rick Perry has rejected $555 million in unemployment benefits that Texas was supposed to receive from the federal stimulus money. In a dramatically irresposible and craven attempt to appeal to Republican primary voters, Governor Rick Perry said "thanks but no thanks" to help Texas workers who don't have a job.