More endorsements for Paul Sadler from the past week. Here’s the El Paso Times:
Paul Sadler
We need a U.S. senator who will work on border issues with our members of Congress in Dists. 16 and 23. We are endorsing Democrats Beto O’Rourke and Pete Gallego in those districts, respectively.
We like that Sadler, since leaving the Texas Legislature in 2002, has worked to promote clean and affordable energy. In our case, that would be solar energy. We have more than 300 days of bright sunlight each year and should be one of the nation’s hot spots for developing new methods to create the renewable energy that can be harnessed from the sun.
Sadler is a strong advocate for U.S. military veterans, of which there are some 70,000 in this immediate area.
We believe Sadler will work with our elected congressmen to bring a full-fledged VA hospital to El Paso. Sadler advocates increased VA funding.
We also like Sadler’s views on health care. He staunchly opposes efforts to allow insurance companies to deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions and to drop policy holders who get sick. He says politicians should stay out of women’s health care.
A strong El Paso vote for Paul Sadler will be a loud vote heard throughout Texas.
We are an important part of this large state, and we believe Paul Sadler is the best choice to carry our message in the U.S. Senate.
And the San Angelo Standard-Times:
If there was a “golden era” of Texas politics, it was the 1990s, when the two major political parties shared power and smart, competent leaders worked cooperatively to solve problems.
One of the key players of that time was Paul Sadler. A Democrat from Henderson, in East Texas, he joined former San Angelo state Rep. Rob Junell and other lawmakers who set aside party and ideological chest-beating and tackled big issues in serious fashion. They were equally committed under Democratic Gov. Ann Richards and Republican Gov. George W. Bush.
That record leads the Standard-Times editorial board to recommend Sadler as the next U.S. senator from Texas.
We are impressed with Republican Ted Cruz’s rise to prominence and count his primary win over Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst as one of the most remarkable upsets in Texas political history. However, the tone of his campaign has been combative and divisive, and precisely the opposite is needed now in the U.S. Senate.
I’m not quite that misty-eyed about the 90s in Texas politics, but whatever works for you. The EPT endorsement was noted by Texas Monthly, which observed that Sadler was defeating Cruz in newspaper endorsements around the state; they quoted this post of mine in making that observation. The San Angelo endorsement came after they posted, as did another ringing recommendation of Sadler by the better-late-than-never Austin American-Statesman.
Since his primary runoff victory over Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, Republicans have considered Ted Cruz a rising star in national politics. With the growing adoration have come guest spots on news talk shows and a prime-time speech at the Republican National Convention.
This is all well and good for Cruz, but Texas needs a capable legislator. And in the race to replace retiring Republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, Democrat Paul Sadler is the candidate with the impressive legislative record. He’s our choice for U.S. Senate.
[…]
We endorsed Cruz over Dewhurst in the Republican primary because we found his passion for policy and his willingness to engage on the issues refreshing. Cruz is sharp; he keeps you on your toes. We respect his role in the debate over the size and power of the federal government. But we disagree with him on many issues.
And Cruz, the state’s former solicitor general who served in the George W. Bush administration, has no experience as a legislator. Unlike Sadler, Cruz knows little about the nuts and bolts of writing and negotiating legislation. Sadler, however, understands that reaching compromise on bills involves difficult give-and-take work. If Washington is to move past the obstruction of the past several years, compromise cannot take place when it is defined as Cruz defines it: only when the other side sees things your way.
Cruz is ambitious. There is nothing wrong with ambition, but Texas doesn’t need a senator who will stick to extremes to win invitations to the Sunday morning talk shows. We need a senator whose best work takes place on Capitol Hill paying attention to the hard details that go into representing the needs of a growing state and strengthening our nation’s future. We need a legislator with experience and skill, one who will seek out responsible, pragmatic solutions to the state’s and nation’s problems.
We therefore recommend Paul Sadler for U.S. Senate.
Not too shabby. All this stands in sharp contrast to the Chron’s limp and misguided endorsement of Cruz, which they base on the hope he will be transformed by the Magic Bipartisanship Fairy into something he isn’t. I’ll say again, all things considered, this is a strong statement of just how outside the mainstream Cruz really is.
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I’m a Republican and I find voting for Sadler is a no-brainer. If you think Cruz is going to be flexible and work to actually Legislate, as the Chronicle is admittedly hoping against hope for, you just aren’t paying attention. I wish the Dems could have funded this race because I think there was opening here, even if not to win but to make a statement for stronger competition going forward. The Republican Party in this state desperately needs a competitive Democratic Party.