Ezra wonders. It's true that Texas has a weak governor position, which is to say that he or she doesn't get to pick department heads. But being governor makes you the single most powerful person in your state. You don't have to travel as much. You still make plenty of appointments, like judges, and if it's a big state you could have a good platform to launch national ambitions, which is much harder to do as one of 100 in the Senate, and a backbencher at that.
All this was why I figured that Charlie Crist would remain as Florida's governor instead of running for the Senate. The GOP must have promised him the moon if he ran, and ultimately they couldn't deliver for him. I used to think Crist was the most likely bet to restore sanity to the national GOP, but he's quickly become the symbol to the base of the corrupt Republican machine instead of a talented, moderate conservative who can win broad support. One by one, the GOP is sacrificing its most promising potential leaders in order to glorify nonstarters like Palin and Steele. This isn't the way back to long-term viability.
