Best, worst, and most surprising results from yesterday

-- Perry won without a run-off and Kay conceded fairly early, before it was known for certain whether there would be one. At least she's a quitter in that respect.

-- Bill White got 76% of the vote against his five challengers. Farouk Shami appears to have paid about $10,000 per vote with less than 13%. No one else even got to 5%.

I am both amazed at the result and disgraced in my prediction. Humble pie for a month.

-- Hank Gilbert salted away Kinky Friedman and it was as close as I thought it would be: 52-48. Linda-Chavez Thompson cruised past Ronnie Earle 53-35; Marc Katz had 12.

-- Hector Uribe barely got past Bill Burton for GLO commissioner. The percentage was 51.6 to 48.4 and Uribe trailed late into the evening.

-- Borris Miles defeated Al Edwards by eleven votes. Another incumbent in the Texas House, Fort Bend-area Rep. Dora Olivo, lost her primary challenge to Ron Reynolds.

-- Sheila Jackson Lee thumped her two rivals and drew 67% of her district's vote. I'm convinced she can have that seat for life if she wants to, and she deserves it. I hope some day I get gerrymandered back into the 18th.

-- Keisha Rogers will be the Democratic nominee for US Congress in CD-22, besting two challengers with 52%.

-- And Ann Bennett topped Sue Schechter in the race for County Clerk. 63-37, in my personal biggest shocker.

Worth noting: Reynolds, Burton, Rogers, and Bennett are all African American candidates and may have benefited from increased AA turnout across the state. Jackson-Lee's contest and the Miles-Edwards battle certainly boosted tallies in Harris County for Burton and Bennett.

Bennett will square off against TeaBagger Stan Stanart for Beverly Kaufman's old job. He trounced the establishment candidate, Kevin Mauzy 60.5-39.5. This race was already at the top of my list, but because the two expected participants were both upset, big, it becomes impossible to predict in November.

-- In other Republican results, Ed Emmett-appointed lackey Leo Vasquez got pummeled by Don Sumners 57-43 in the race for Harris County tax-assessor/collector. Oh, the woe of a having a Latin surname in a GOP primary. And beleaguered HCRP chairman Jared Woodfill enters a run-off for his job with reform candidate Ed Hubbard.

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance is ready for primary election day and reminds all of you to vote if you haven't already. Here is your Primary Day roundup.

From the Barnett Shale, TXsharon announces a new "Watchdog" for drillers and her SOS to EPA about benzene and other dangerous toxins in the Denton Creek watershed was heard. The EPA has responded! Read all about it at Bluedaze: DRILLING REFORM FOR TEXAS

After the latest prevarication on her date of departure from the Senate, PDiddie at Brains and Eggs opines: "Kay Bailey, won't you please GO HOME?!"

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme shows the Texas Supreme Court flipping the finger to Texans, yet again.

Snowmageddon may have struck Austin -- but don't let that cold, hard evidence convince you that global warming ain't real. Let Citizen Sarah (with a little help from President Obama) break it down for you at Texas Vox.

Bay Area Houston highlights yet more hypocrisy from Rick Perry with his I Came and Took It! teabagging campaign.

At WhosPlayin the recent discussion has centered around equity in the Lewisville ISD. It looks like the district may be taking a big step by considering a tear-down and rebuild of the district's oldest high school after costs for asbestos remediation and fire sprinkler installation in the old building went too high. Construction is not equity, though, and there are still issues to be addressed.

Over at McBlogger, Mayor McSleaze takes a look at the Republican HD 47 primary fight and finds it almost as entertaining as an old-fashioned pie fight.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison changes her story again about when she might leave the Senate. Off the Kuff has lost count of how many times this has happened.

WCNews at Eye On Williamson has a round up of the campaign cash and who's giving in Williamson County: Bob Perry looms large in Williamson County GOP House races.

The Texas Cloverleaf looks at the early voting turnout in Denton County and the GOP surge.

This week on Left of College Station, Teddy makes the case for Brazos County Democrats to vote in the Republican primary, and releases the L o C S Democratic primary candidate endorsements. Left of College Station also covers the debate in the Texas A&M student senate over the anti-discrimination policy.

Pollchecker over at TexasKaos calls out McCain on using Texas health care as an example of "success". And he wonders why he is not president?

Neil at Texas Liberal offered up his 2010 Democratic Primary slate. Neil also noted that Texas Liberal passed one million page views. Thanks to everybody who has read the blog.

Sunday Funnies

Just go TF away, Kay

The woman is completely neurotic.

With four days to go before the gubernatorial primary, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison this morning bought herself as many as eight more months in the Senate. Speaking on WBAP's Mark Davis Show, she said she plans to resign from the Senate
"sometime this year before the November elections."

That's a rather significant amendment to her most recent public posture. In November, at a Republican gathering in Galveston, she said she would resign after the primary, win or lose. And she has repeated that privately to GOP donors and supporters.

Technically, the term "after" can encompass two minutes, two months or two years. And it was always safe to assume the Galveston declaration left wiggle room in case of a runoff six weeks after the March 2 primary.

But there's no denying that the impression Hutchison left was that she would resign soon after the primary. Soon as in days or weeks, not seven or eight months.

Republicans are speculating openly that she will concede defeat to Governor MoFo next Wednesday even if she forces him into a run-off. That's laughable -- but tells you two things: the degree to which the Perry campaign and its supporters control the narrative, and how wishy-washy they ALSO believe she is.

This marks at least the fifth iteration of Hutchison's resignation plans. Last summer she said she would resign by the end of November. ("The actual leaving of the Senate will be sometime -- October, November -- that, in that time frame," she said, also on the Mark Davis Show.)


That turned into, by November she would announce her plans for when she would resign. Then came, she would stay in the Senate long enough to fight Democratic health care reform and cap-and-trade legislation and then resign. And then the declaration in Galveston in mid-November.

Texas Railroad Commissioner Michael "Stepin Fetchit" Williams has been lobbying so hard to get the appointment that he will positively have a stroke if she doesn't ultimately quit.

I still believe that Kay Bailey has been direct about one thing: her desire to leave Washington. After all these years she ranks among the most ineffectual senators in the entire body, and that was displayed again last week when she tried and failed to sway rookie Scott Brown on the jobs bill cloture vote. She then left town to continue her campaign to lose the primary to Perry, skipping the final vote on the jobs bill altogether. The governor has capitalized on the anti-Washington rabies rampant throughout his party and mercilessly satirized her in video. She spent 16 years building a reputation as the "most popular Texas politician" (do you remember how often that line has been repeated ... until very recently?) only to have it torn to pieces by the Perry attack machine.  She is likely demoralized and perhaps a little bitter over the developments of the past few months.

Considering she has repeatedly stated that one of her missions in  staying on was to "fight government-run healthcare", in the wake of another disastrous performance by Congressional Republicans and with the legislation moving ahead via reconciliation she could easily decide to cut-and-run as early as ... say ... next month, no matter what happens next Tuesday (but this probably depends on how quickly and successfully Senate Democrats get something done on healthcare reform ... no predictions there).

If she makes a run-off with Perry and does not concede it, does she resign from the Senate next week and go all-out for Austin? More spin-eculation suggests she's running low on funding. Irrespective of how much or how little money she has, she can't weather the criticism if she bolts now. She's not quitting until she knows her gubernatorial fate with certainty, and even then will wake up each morning with some different idea, as Todd Gillman at TrailBlazers noted in the first excerpt.

Kuffner has more, including the video of the Clash's "Should I Stay or Should I Go?" I expressed my preference in the headline, and since Perry gets to pick her temp fill-in as well as the date of the special election to permanently replace her, the speculation can shift to how much she cooperates with the governor on "what's best for Texas" and the Republican Party going forward after March 2 ... or after her run-off defeat.