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Sat May 31, 2008 at 05:43 PM CDT
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( - promoted by Matt Glazer)
CROSS-POSTED AT DAILY KOS
As you all probably know, I am the Democratic Nominee for the 151st Civil District Court of Harris County, Texas. This is the county that contains Houston. It is a huge county, with 1.9 million voters. Bigger than many states.
For about 15 years, since Ann Richards was defeated by Shrub, the Republicans have dominated this state, and this County. There are zero county-wide Democratic office-holders. Our County Judge (head county official), Sheriff, DA, County Attorney, Tax-Assessor/Collector, County Clerk, District Clerk, all of our county court and district court judges, appellate judges and all through the state Supreme Court are all Republicans.
Houston, in contrast, has a Democratic Mayor (Bill White) and a Democrat dominated City Council.
Read about what's coming in 2008 below: |
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| Well, 2008 is shaping up to be very different. In 2006, as many of you know, Dallas County turned blue. There was a tremendous amount of effort and money put into Dallas County, and all of the Republican judges in contested elections lost to their Democratic challengers. The key was pushing straight-ticket voting rather than each candidate pushing for their own individual success. Another key was changing Dallas demographics, in which a lot of the conservative voters left for Collin County or elsewhere. In Harris County, in 2006, though, we only had a few judicial candidates rather than the full slate they had in Dallas. The candidates ran hard, but came up just short, averaging 48% +. One candidate, Jim Sharp, a court of appeals candidate, running in a 10 county area, actually beat his incumbent Republican opponent in Harris County. Great candidate, great name (a lot of people think he's John Sharp, former Democratic statewide office-holder) so he probably gets some small boost from that. I firmly believe that if we had had a full slate in Harris County in 2006, we would have won some races simply by virtue of having more people out campaigning and bringing friends, colleagues and family to the polls. The shock of Dallas County in 2006 spurred a lot of people in Harris County to run this time. We now have a full slate of judicial candidates. Rather than facing a ballot with a bunch of uncontested Republican county-wide candidates, we have candidates running in every race. Every judicial race, and all of the above-listed county administrative positions. I have been religiously blogging about my campaign at
www.engelhart4judge.com.
Here's my banner.
You can contribute at my site, too, if you like :^P So, why do I say that something is happening? Well, it's become obvious that the Republicans are running scared. Democrats are running a coordinated campaign with the Harris County Democratic Party. We will have the resources and the GOTV organization to beat the Republicans. And, we have Rick Noriega running hard for US Senate, and he's from Harris County, and he'll help GOTV for sure. I've heard that 25% of the state Democratic vote is from Harris County. And, as in the rest of the country, the Republican party is even suffering as a brand in Harris County. My incumbent Republican opponent is afraid to admit she is a Republican and is attempting to run as non-partisan. Even thought it is only May, she had not primary opponent on March 4, but she already has yard signs out. I have only seen 2, but there is just something about them that seems, well . . . off. Can't put my finger on it . . . can you? Something's missing . . .  Oh yeah, it's her party affiliation. Nowhere does her yardsign say she's a Republican. Imagine, in Harris County, Texas, Republicans are afraid to say they are Republicans and are attempting to run as non-partisans. It's absolutely mind blowingly amazing to me that they have gone this route. It's even more amazing that they think it could work. It can't. No one will remember their names, and if they are not telling people to vote for Republicans in a venue where the majority vote straight-party, then what good does making the sign do in the first place? Nothing, that's what.
Democrats will sweep Harris County, Texas in 2008 like they did in Dallas County in 2006. |
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