Democrat Mikal Watts — having spent $947,505 "exploring" a run for the U.S. Senate — decided not to run after all. That removes one serious opponent for U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, but the Texas Republican will still face opposition a year from now — probably state Rep. Rick Noriega, D-Houston. Full Story
To summarize: The state's senior senator won't seek reelection and might quit early, and hasn't decided whether to run for governor or to get out and earn some money in the private sector. Full Story
The state's top criminal judge has inspired a parody website and a complaint from a group of lawyers that's dead serious. Full Story
Clunky as it is, "Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District Number One" is a familiar name in election law circles. Full Story
Come March, Democratic primary voters will likely know all about U.S. Senate hopeful Rick Noriega's ties to utility companies. What voters will make of it is still anybody's guess. Full Story
Rep. Kirk England of Grand Prairie is switching parties, saying he'll seek reelection as a Democrat. There hasn't been a party switch in the Texas Legislature in a decade, and it's been a long, long time since a legislator left the Republicans for the Democrats and survived the switch. Full Story
Maybe nobody will remember this in six months, but the people who want Texans to approve $3 billion in cancer bonds are having a hard time keeping their act together. Full Story
The political air is different in sixteen legislative districts: Republicans win statewide races, but Democrats dominate in legislative contests. Full Story
Redistricting, with just a few exceptions, still has a strong hold on the makeup of the state Senate and the Texas congressional delegation. But several House members continue to confound the mapmakers, winning in districts where, on paper, they shouldn't. Full Story
We pulled the numbers from campaign reports filed with the Texas Ethics Commission and the Federal Election Commission and ranked officeholders and candidates by how much they had in their accounts at mid-year. Full Story
Nathan Hecht's battle over Harriet Miers' appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court is lasting longer than hers did. Full Story
Start with a follow-up to last week's story about the powers of the House Speaker, and the attempts to get Attorney General Greg Abbott to referee. The issue is now in the hands of the lawyers, mostly, and that means there is a large stack of briefs to go through. Full Story
Legal arguments about how the Texas House should run have picked up, but it's still too early to tell whether Attorney General Greg Abbott will weigh in and whether, if he does, it'll make any difference in the final outcome. Full Story
The state's biggest phone companies and their competitors are fighting over a fund that subsidizes companies that provide phone service where it would otherwise be unaffordable. AT&T;, the biggest, says the Universal Service Fund doesn't cover its costs. Competitors say the company gets at least twice what it should. Full Story
Republican U.S. Sen. John Cornyn won't get a cakewalk in 2008, but neither will the Democrat who faces him a year from November. Full Story
Just as state officeholders were racing to stock their election accounts by an end-of-month deadline, the state and federal courts got busy on the subject of campaign finance. The state's highest criminal court had good news for former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, while the nation's highest court had good news for corporations and unions and groups that campaign on so-called issue ads in the last week's before elections. Full Story
Gov. Rick Perry finished off a tumultuous session by vetoing 49 bills — well short of record of 82 vetoes he set after his first session as governor — and cutting about $650 million out of the Legislature's state budget. Full Story
Texas Republicans have been licking their chops lately about the prospect of a presidential race with Hillary Clinton topping the Democratic side of the ticket. Their hope? That she turns off Texas voters so badly it'll help all the Republicans and hurt all the Democrats. Full Story
One way to attract attention: Start chattering about the governor's inclination to break his 82-bill veto record. That's the signal watchers in the press and lobby are getting from Gov. Rick Perry, and it has bred a mini-industry of speculation about what might be and might not be on the chopping block. We've heard talk — thoroughly unsubstantiated and mentioned here only to illustrate the point about speculation — that Perry might whack the legislation fixing problems and making adjustments to the state's new business tax. So-called "special items" for colleges and universities in the state budget — that's where they make appropriations for specific projects and programs outside the regular operations of the schools — are on the gossip channel. And the governor has yet to sign a watered-down highway bill that went to him after he vetoed a stronger version in the final days of the session. Full Story
House Speaker Tom Craddick had the tenacity to withstand a three-day siege at the end of the legislative session, but it cost him some of his own supporters in the House. The question now is whether the next elections will replace enough of the rebels for him to hold on for a fourth term. Full Story