I Think We're A Lone Now

In the last week or so, Dems have been quoted in several papers about their hopes of making TX blue in the near term. But on the House side, the results from 11/4 don't exactly give them much '10 hope.

-- Even though Pres-elect Obama earned 44% (six points better than John Kerry's 38% in '04), that top-of-the-ticket strength didn't help downballot. Only four incumbent GOPers performed worse in '08 than they did in '06, and two of them (John Culberson (R-07) and Michael McCaul (R-10) were heavily targeted by Dems. Despite that, McCaul and Culberson enjoyed comfortable victories. And GOPers may have even found an old/new target in Chet Edwards (D-17), who took only 53% against an underfunded challenger.

-- But demographics and redistricting may help Dems in the long run. Seven GOPers sit in seats where minorities represent over 30% of the CD, and both of those numbers are only going to go up. And Dems are inching closer to taking the state House, and if they do in '10, they may succeed in pushing McCaul into more Dem-friendly Austin territory in post-'10 redistricting. On 11/4, he lost that area by a 60-35% margin. Regardless, the '12 map threatens to look a lot different than Tom DeLay's (R) controversial '04 map that enabled GOPers to pick up four seats.