The Wendy Davis dilemma

Bryan Preston:

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Ever since Ann Richards, Texas Democrats have attacked their Republican rivals with a mix of disdain and insults. That hasn’t really worked for them and it won’t work on Abbott at all. Abbott also ticks all the issue boxes for a majority of Texans — pro-life, pro-jobs, pro-border security, pro-Second Amendment, anti-taxes, anti-Washington — while Davis has to convince enough Texans that she isn’t just another creature of the national Democrats. That will be difficult, because that’s exactly what she is. Davis has to create some distance between herself and the Obama-created Battleground Texas group to be viable, while depending on the same group for the bulk of her organizational muscle. That’s no easy task, and so far Davis just doesn’t look like she’s up to it. If she can’t finesse her own campaign, how can she present herself as a plausible governor of the nation’s second most populous state? 

Davis will not have the level of money that Abbott will have, she does not have a well-organized state party, and her mouth has become her own worst enemy. Tweeting that Greg Abbott, who is paraplegic and confined to a wheelchair,has not “walked a day in my shoes” is but the latest Davis howler. Whether that line was a sly nod to the pink shoes that made her a media star or not, it was definitely dumb. Saying that Abbott, who spent a year in rehab after the accident that paralyzed him, does not know struggle is just stunningly stupid.
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She is off to a bad start and it will be difficult for her to recover.  She needs a campaign staff to script her message and she will need to be more disciplined.  Most of her current problems are self inflicted.  Abbott continues to run a positive campaign that mostly ignores her.  But even beyond the gaffes the core problem with her campaign is that she is a liberal trying to hide her liberal ways.