Oh, those not-campaigning Senate rivals!
Just after we tucked into bed our two Senate candidates last night, with a story about how they really, really care about Hurricane Ike victims — so much that they’ve suspended all politicking to show they’re sensitive guys — lo and behold, they’re eye gouging again!
Today’s spat? Democrat Rick Noriega’s campaign spokesman, Martine Apodaca, said he got mad this morning. He saw John Cornyn’s “Philosopher of Palo Duro Canyon” ad replayed in a story by WFAA-TV’s Brad Watson.
Apodaca said it galled to hear Cornyn’s “too much petty squabbling” lament in the ad. He said Cornyn himself played a partisan blame game this week. Apodaca said Cornyn failed to deliver a veterans’ hospital to South Texas, then blamed Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid. Apodaca’s dart riled the Cornyn camp. It’s, you might say, in Apodaca-plexy over the Noriega man’s jab.
Some background: Congress is in a big rush to finish must-do bills and go home to campaign. So this week, much as Cornyn and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison got some Hurricane Ike aid and tax credits into a tax bill yesterday, they pushed for a Valley VA hospital amendment to a defense authorization bill. Reid wouldn’t let there be a vote.
This incensed veterans’ groups.
“The Democrats do not want the Republicans to take credit for anything and viagra bestellen the Republicans don’t want to let the Democrats look good,” Veterans Alliance of the Rio Grande Valley Commander Jose Maria Vasquez told the Rio Grande Guardian.
Referring to the senators and Reps. Solomon Ortiz, D-Corpus Christi, and Ruben Hinojosa, D-Mercedes, who have a separate bill for a hospital, Vasquez said, “We don’t care who takes credit. They can call the hospital the Hutchison-Cornyn-Ortiz-Hinojosa VA hospital for all we care. We just want the damn thing.”
Clearly, Cornyn was miffed at Reid.
“I’m disappointed Majority Leader Reid refused to allow even a vote on a measure that would finally lay the groundwork for a new full-service VA hospital facility in South Texas,” Cornyn said late Wednesday. “Congressional leaders claim to be committed to meeting the needs of our nation’s veterans, but Leader Reid’s decision today indicates otherwise.”
The Texas Republican even pointed out that Barack Obama, who’d endorsed a VA hospital for the Valley during last winter’s Texas presidential primary, “did not join me in seeking to move this amendment forward.” This week, Obama and opponent John McCain have missed a lot of Senate debates and votes.
According to a Sept. 11 Rio Grande Guardian story, Vasquez and the Veterans Alliance last month asked Valley vets to call and write Reid in support of Cornyn’s amendment to the defense bill.
This morning, Apodaca of Noriega’s campaign said Cornyn had asked veterans to call and write Reid. Apodaca later appeared to retreat from that, saying he may have misread yesterday’s Rio Grande Guardian report on vets’ displeasure over events.
Still, Apodaca said, “Cornyn purports to be against this sort of petty squabbling, and then he revels in it. Every time he fails, he blames national Democratic leaders.”
Cornyn spokesman Kevin McLaughlin called Apodaca’s assertion “outrageous.”
“Rick Noriega is exhibiting the exact type of extreme partisanship and petty squabbling that has gridlocked Washington,” McLaughlin said. “He’s part of the problem, not part of the solution.”
McLaughlin said lawmakers of both parties agree that something should be done so South Texas vets don’t have to drive for hours — in some cases six hours, Cornyn says — to get medical care.
“The Noriega campaign says they have suspended their campaign and any politicking. But apparently they’re not, because they’re taking runs at John Cornyn,” McLaughlin said. “The larger question is, is Rick Noriega a man of his word? Sadly, we have learned this week that he is not.”
Apodaca replied that “the Cornyn people instinctually look for someone else to blame when they don’t get the job done.”
“Cornyn
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