‘Food fighter’ Bell throws his onion into the gubernatorial ring (John Kelso, Austin American-Statesman, via BOR)
Which brings us back around to former U.S. Rep. Chris Bell, whose nickname ought be “Who’s He?”
Bell, who seems like a really good guy, and that might be the problem, is a Democratic candidate for governor.
Bell has all the name recognition of, uh, of, uh . . .
Bell is so hard up for press attention and name recognition that last week he took me on a tour of his old college haunts back in the late ’70s at the University of Texas.
And his people called me to set this tour up. This wasn’t even my idea.
Among our stops was the Burger King at Guadalupe and 27th streets, where Bell got busted for being involved in a food fight with a bunch of other frat rats and spent the night in jail.
[snip]
“People are a lot more likely to read about a food fight than his position on taxes,” said Jason Stanford, Bell’s press guy. “This could go down on my record as one of the dumbest things to do in politics, but it should make for a good column.”
It was a good column — good for quite a few laughs, which I guess is what a newspaper wants from a humor columnist. But generally, I think most political strategists would prefer people laughing WITH their candidates, not AT them.
Of course, the Bell people have to take some chances. They have a lackluster candidate with no name ID. Kinky Friedman is raising more money. And as Evan at PvW recently pointed out, a guy by the name of Felix Alvarado enjoys numbers comparable to Bell’s in at least one poll.
None of that is good news for Team Bell.
3 comments On Oooh, A Food Fight
I hope they weren’t throwing around nachos.
So they’re saying his name doesn’t ring a bell with people yet?
I actually kinda had high hopes for the campaign before this asinine stunt. He’s a pretty good speaker, not great, but pretty good, and his "New Mainstream" slogan and the ideas behind it are good. But you’re absolutely right about the "laughing with, not at" part. So now his name ID will be as the guy who spent time in jail for a food fight. This is the kind of thing the Perry team will have an absolute field day with. Hell, this is the kind of thing any competent campaign staff would have a field day with, and the kind of thing a competent campaign staff would have never done in the first place.
His was always a long shot candidacy at best, but this may stick a fork in him.
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