Not that shocking. Pete Gallego is a really poor candidate. He has now lost three straight elections if memory serves me right. I am sure having the incumbent Democrat go to jail, forcing the special election did not help. Also Pete Flores earned it, he has a solid background but he also was extremely involved in campaigning at the grassroots level and personally met a large number of the people in his district. Gallego's assumed he would win based on the special election runoff results.
Civil war, but thousands of people leaving. It's the people leaving and coming to the US/Europe that I thought we were talking about.
I dunno too much about politics and races. But i will say , I know Beto's name fairly well. I don't have the slightest clue who Cruz ran against last time. Beto is doing a fantastic job getting his name out there and name recognition is fairly important, I'd assume. I remember seeing his name posted in hallways at U of H in like 2016/ early 2017 ... he's been putting himself out there for a while . I think he's built up a lot of momentum. I think he wins it
As a side note, when I hear the same story time after time from teachers I start to think that since they are the one doing the actual job, maybe they are onto something when it comes to the arena of education. Teachers across the board on average have been making less money than they have in the past and this is a many decades wide trend. Is the military being as efficient as they can be? How many businesses really are being as efficient as they can be? It isn't something unique to teachers but it is always brought up about education. Most likely, the teachers were making more actual income when you were in school than they make now in the same district. Also there are more strains and responsibilities on teachers than in the past. Most of the studies show that there isn't any simple way. There has been some very positive correlation between less structured schooling and less standardized testing and student performance. At the end of the day, it comes down to society deciding how important education really is. If it is important, then teacher salaries should go up, which will attract better candidates. Also there is a correlation between the level of respect being a teacher holds with society and the performance of the students in some studies. That is to say that when teaching has some degree of prestige and the pay is higher, it appears to be that the quality of the teacher increases and the performance of the students increase. Personally I have no problem with teachers starting at $60,000 a year. You will have more teachers with post graduate education degrees, you will have happier and less stressed teachers. However, I believe that quality of education is one of the most important things in our society. I believe that it would help the general economy, decrease crime and result in those that need mental health intervention being identified earlier. I believe that the teaching profession should be valued the same way engineers, lawyers and accountants are. People should be proud to say they aspire to be a teacher and not have it be a fall back profession. At some point there are diminishing returns, I think that is something that most people can agree with. However I do not believe that we are close to that point. Most of my concerns are not the facilities, but the quality of education and the priority that it holds. In the USA teachers have less respect than any other first world country I have visited, done business in or lived in. Further, with more households having both parents work, I would argue that the quality of education, and the ability of schools to offer assistant to students is as high as ever. Everything changes from generation to generation, as society changes, culture changes, the economy changes and technology changes. Yet little funding or time is put into reforming school. What worked 50 years ago does not work well now. Those countries that have invested the time and money, and made it a high priority have seen strong benefits over the last 20-30 years.
I don’t support him anymore. I met him at a charity dinner and he was actually a really cool guy in person.
They better drop in BLOTUS to plug up the hemmoraging stat. Maybe blast some commercials with his family that resemble hostage confessions from N. Korea.
SERIOUS QUESTION: How big of a deal would it be for BETO to win? What are the real world consequences? Rocket River
RCP still has him up by 4.5 and this poll seems like an outlier because it shows Lupe Valdez with a LOT more support than any poll ever.
Puts a seat in the Dem column that no one expected. Would be the first Dem to win a statewide office in a few decades that could help to energize the down ticket races.
It would be a pretty big deal. Cruz is a nationally known politician that was close to being the Republican nominee 2 years ago. A Cruz loss likely means a very strong national showing by Dems which effect what Trump can do. Also if O’Rourke wins you have a new front runner for the Democratic nomination. Hypothetically if O’Rourke won the DNC nomination, it could mean Texas in the electoral college would go blue... combine that with NY, Calif and Illinois; and he would be hard to beat in the electoral college. Just those 4 states are nearly 150 votes out of the 270 needed to win. A lot of it is pie in the sky but the possible ramifications are large.
Massive consequences. John Tower won the first statewide elections for Republicans in 1961. They didn't win another until 1978 but Tower kept winning re-election. Having a statewide elected official means the Democratic party can actually raise money properly, develop a bench for other statewide seats and get voters to start getting used to voting for a Democrat again. Bill Clements doesnt win in 1978 without Tower first getting elected. And Clements was the one that opened the floodgates for Republicans in Texas but it all started with John Tower. Once Tower shattered the Democrats' aura of invincibility, other strong Republicans started running which enabled them to eventually win. Tower's win also correlated with Republican wins in Congressional and state legislative seats. There were a grand total of 2 Republicans in the state house when Tower won. They slowly started winning more seats once Tower broke through. You just have to win once to start getting voters to feel ok with electing Democrats statewide. And most importantly, winning statewide gives Democrats hope for something bigger. That leads to better candidate recruitment, higher voter turnout, and ultimately a stronger and more competitive party.
