Every Friday morning at 8:30 a.m., I join the Cardle & Woolley show, Talk 1370 Radio, in Austin to pick the week’s top Winners & Losers. It is now 17 days until the Nov. 5 election, but Texans can begin going to the polls Monday morning and since voter registration is off the charts—up almost 3 million since 2020—early voting sites will undoubtedly be busy. The election will be a fight to the finish, but the list this week also includes some winners who made history. Here’s the breakdown:
Winner: Netanyahu and the People of Israel
By killing Hamas terrorist Yahya Sinwar, the last Hamas leader who remained standing, Israel has wiped out the terrorist organization that attacked them on Oct. 7. Israel did exactly what any country should do in response to an evil terrorist attack—it completely destroyed the perpetrators. It is important to note that while the U.S. was clearly providing weapons and tactical support to Israel, the strategic victory was accomplished in spite of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not acquiesce to their demands that he pull back and go slow, including that they stay out of Rapha. If he had, Israel would not have been able to eliminate Sinwar. The Washington Post reports that Biden and Harris still believe the goal is a ceasefire. The Israelis rightly believe by destroying the Hamas and the infrastructure of Hezbollah, they have laid the groundwork for a surrender—a word that has yet to be uttered by the White House.
Winner: Elon Musk’s Rocket Returns
Most of the world has been watching space launches all our lives. Reaching for the stars is one endeavor in which humanity is united (more or less) and there’s nothing quite as glorious as watching a massive booster rocket lift a space craft into the sky. But this week we saw a spectacular change when the booster rocket did not fall away as debris, but instead floated back to the launch pad. Elon Musk has made another massive advance in space flight and it all happened in Boca Chica, Texas. So glad he’s here.
Winner: Sen. Ted Cruz’s Conservative Record (Plus he’s up by 7)
I’ve not heard anyone suggest that Cruz did not win the debate with his Democrat opponent, Congressman Colin Allred, on Tuesday, where they played out a dynamic we’re also seeing in the presidential campaign. Cruz repeatedly spoke about his record on issues that are priorities for Texans — the open border, the economy, crime rates and pushing the transgender agenda into our schools and communities. Allred, hit Cruz hard on abortion but he didn’t come close to knocking him out. Allred’s only other strategy was to level personal attacks at Cruz, calling him a “threat to democracy.” The charge was laughable. National Democrats have stopped using it on Trump because it doesn’t work.
Cruz was nicer than Allred, noting at one point that it is a testament to America that Allred, the son of a single mother from Brownsville and Cruz, son of an immigrant, are both honored to represent Texas in the U.S. Congress.
After weeks of watching the polls tighten in this race, the University of Texas Politics Poll released this morning shows Cruz with a 7 point lead. Earlier this week the Hobby Poll out of the University of Houston showed Cruz up 4. One interesting point in the Hobby Poll is that Allred and Cruz are tied among Hispanic voters. Beto O’Rourke beat Cruz by 27 points among Hispanics when he ran against him in 2018.
Loser: Vice President fails to acknowledge failures—or apologize
Fox News anchor Bret Baier’s interview with Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday worked like a Rorschach test for the country’s political pundits. Conservatives saw it as a long overdue confrontation for Harris with questions she has refused to answer and mistakes she won’t acknowledge, like how long she knew that President Biden was not on the top of his game even though she said he was. Harris supporters saw the Fox interview as an “ambush.”
The fact that she did the interview speaks volumes — it is a progressive admission that Fox, unlike MSNBC or CNN, is America’s most watched cable news network whose audience includes Democrats and Independents as well as conservatives. More than 7.1 million people watched the interview.
Harris refused to acknowledge the millions of illegal aliens who have flooded the border on her watch and she refused to specifically apologize for the deaths of three young women Baier questioned her about who were killed by illegal aliens. Instead, she blamed most everything on Donald Trump, who she mentioned 113 times in the interview.
When Baier asked her about Trump’s clearly effective ad revealing her commitment to providing sex change surgeries for illegal immigrants in prison she described it as “very remote from the concerns of the American people.” That’s a typical Democrat mistake. While the transgender issue does not rank as high as the economy, the border, and crime among priority concerns for voters, the issue provides quick insight into whether a candidate has common sense, supports women and families, and the science which dictates that one’s sex is not a choice. The fact that Kamala is running with the ‘they/them’ crowd, speaks volumes, and is one reason the newest polls show she has lost the lead she held for the past month.
Loser: The FBI crime statistics were wrong, too
Was it just a month ago that the New York Times and others reported that the U.S. Labor Department claimed almost a million more jobs had been added to the work force than were actually created? The adjusted data put a damper on the Biden-Harris administration’s insistence that their economic programs were working.
Yesterday we learned that the FBI has quietly “adjusted” the crime statistics to show that crime has actually increased by 4.9%, not decreased 1.7% as they previously reported. We all remember that how ABC News anchor David Muir “fact checked” former President Trump during his debate with Harris last month, claiming that FBI data shows “overall violent crime is coming down in this country.”
That 4.9% increase is the result of 1,197,930 violent crimes reported in 2021 and 1,256,671 reported in 2022.
Speaking of jobs, when the national jobs reports come out a couple weeks ago, I noted that it always appears to me that the Biden-Harris administration takes credit for jobs that are actually created in Texas. This morning, Gov. Greg Abbott released a report showing that Texas has outpaced the U.S. in job growth once again.
Loser: Biden Forgives More Student Loan Debt
Defying a ruling by the United States Supreme Court (would that be a threat to democracy?), the Biden-Harris Administration announced another $4.5 billion in student loan debt relief this week, bringing the total amount of taxpayer dollars used to pay off student loans to $175 billion. Vice President Harris also promised a million $20,000 loans to African-American entrepreneurs, surely related to polls suggesting she is losing the votes of black men. She says the loans are “fully forgivable.” If that’s true, is it really a loan. Isn’t it a gift? Just asking.
Winner: Sen. J.D. Vance, “Do you hear yourself.”
When ABC News anchor Martha Raddatz snarled at Republican Vice Presidential nominee J.D. Vance this week that “only a handful of apartment complexes” in Colorado have been taken over by violent gangs of illegal aliens,” Vance quickly responded: “Do you hear yourself? Only a handful of apartment complexes…”
It’s a good point. What is the acceptable number of apartment complexes that can be taken over by violent gangs of illegal aliens?
For the record, it does not appear that Raddatz ever “heard” herself.
Loser: San Jose State Women’s Volleyball Team
It all began when Boise State Women’s Volleyball Team announced it would forfeit the game rather than play against San Jose State who has a man pretending to be a woman on their team. Southern Utah, Utah State and Wyoming in the Mountain West quickly followed suit. Players at the University of Nevada also wanted to forfeit, but that was before the DEI infused university bureaucrats got in the fight. The Nevada players said that administrators at their school did not consult them before they were informed they would not be allowed to forfeit. Players still insist they don’t want to play because they don’t feel safe. Hats off to the courageous athletes who are fighting this latest battle to save women’s sports.
Game Day!
No such worries tomorrow when both the No. 1 Texas Longhorns and the No. 5 Georgia Bulldogs will take the field in Austin at 6:30 p.m. The No. 14 Aggies are playing Mississippi State at 3 p.m.
Have a great weekend.
Sherry Sylvester is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, and the former Senior Advisor to Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.
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