It would not surprise me if he runs unopposed in the primary, which should tell you a lot about the state of the Democratic Party.

Or the state of Texas.  

The honorable representative from Midland is Mike Conaway (not Conway). He was the accounting brains behind Bush's oil exploits in Midland, and that was his entire campaign strategy.

Under the 2000 districting map, Midland and Lubbock were in the same congressional district. In fact, for as far back as I can remember, Midland and Lubbock have been in the same congressional district. The two cities have a lot in common, so that arrangement has usually made quite a bit of sense. The big problem, though, is that Lubbock has its own political machine which is entirely wrapped up by the local real estate establishment (*). Lubbock has been the traditional home of the region's Congresscritter, and it wasn't about to let go of that mantle. So even though Lubbock is as right-leaning as cities come, and even though Conaway ran in the primary as "Bush's best bud from the Arbusto days," it wasn't enough....Naugebauer (who--can you believe it?!--is a Lubbock real estate man) got the primary nod and the seat vacated by retiring Congresscritter Larry Combest, who retired the spring following the 2002 midterms.

Meanwhile, the state Reps take the statehouse; the ever-admirable Pete Laney (D) is ousted as House Speaker; Midland's Craddick (R) strong-arms into the power seat; redistricting happens; and Bush's money man gets that seat he was promised.

Don't know specifically what ties Craddick has in other shady Bush family financial dealings, but I for one am comforted by the fact that it wasn't cronyism but rather Conaway's expert and knowledgable managing of Arbusto's books which qualifies him to sit in the Congress. At least he wasn't made Treasury Secretary.

(*) Lubbock's current mayor is the scion of the city's largest and best-known residential development firm. Naturally, the city has planted economic development zones right on top of said scion's family's interests and even used some eminent domain leverage to vacate an entire neighborhood (admitedly a slum, and no one cried much) which will now be redeveloped (by said scion's said family's business) into some nicer and pricier properties. And this isn't a scandal in Lubbock because (a) that's just how it's always been done, and how they always will be done while the land oligopoly holds the reins, and (b) in all fairness, the obligatory recusals were in place and the changes really are to the betterment of the city.

Another aspect of Henry Cuellar's election is that traditionally San Antonio which is where his district is, is mostly Hispanic. And southwest Texas is almost all Democrat because of that fact. The man Cuellar replaced was a mentor and freind of Cuellar. He even helped Cuellar when he sought State office and lost. But after he lost the State race, Cuellar turns around and stabs his freind in the back and beats him in the primary for the congressional seat. He is a sleaze.

But don't forget Henry Bonilla, a Republican "Hispanic", His District is the perfect example of political gerrymandering which totally dilutes the democrat vote, but because he is hispanic people believe that the rural areas of his district ar well represented. He is strictly party line, never goes against the GOP agenda even at the cost of his minority constituents.

You guys are all wrong.  First off, buck and Vampa, Cuellar is being challenged by not one, but two other Democrats.  Ciro Rodriguez, who lost to Cuellar in the '04 primary, and State Rep. Richard Raymond, who represents Cuellar's old State Rep. district.  If you followed Cuellar's '04 House race, you'd know that Ciro had actually won by a couple of hundreds votes when several ballot boxes were 'found' a few days after the election, giving Cuellar a couple hundred vote lead.  The courts threw out the subsequent lawsuit and, bam, Cuellar's a Congressman.

 

So thanks for your ripping of Texas and the Democratic Party, but here, you can have it back.

 

Txexspeedy, Cuellar's district is split between Laredo (Texas bordertown of about 250,000) and Southern San Antonio.  So it's not mostly Hispanic, it's overwhelmingly Hispanic.  Another reason for Cuellar's victory is that since TX CD-28 has been around in some version of its current state, it's been represented by a congressman from San Antonio.  Cuellar is Laredo's first hometown Congressman.  This led to higher than expected turnout in Laredo, offsetting the larger population San Antonio portion.

 

Finally, Cuellar's district was another, intended consequence of DeLay's redistricting.  Cuellar took on Henry Bonnilla in '02, losing 52-48.  Bonilla's '02 district encompassed North San Antonio, primarily white, Republican territory, and all of Laredo, with some rural counties inbetween.  Bonilla overwhelmingly won San Antonio, Cuellar overwhlemingly won Laredo, and because there's more people in Northern San Antonio than in Laredo, Bonilla came away with a victory.  DeLay, and Texas Republicans went to great pain to protect Bonilla, keeping his Northern San Antonio base intact while splitting Laredo in half , into what is now Bonilla's and Cuellar's districts.  Cuellar's victory over Rodriguez can be directly linked to DeLay's redistricting too.  As can Al Green's.

 

Yes, Bonilla represents a good chunk of minorities, even in his new district, but that's not who he's trying to represent, or who he's looking to get his votes from.  His northern SA base gets him nearly all the votes he needs, and so long as he can just pull the baseline 30-35% Republican vote everwhere else, he can win his district again and again.

You forgot:

Pete Sessions vs. Martin Frost.  Both were incumbents and were redistricted into a blood red district with the intent that Sessions(R) would knock off Frost(D).

It worked, Rep. Sessions is in Congress, Martin Frost is out of work.

DeLay's folks used a lot of pack-and-crack redistricting of Latinos, AAs (and also paying attention to the alliances of these groups to liberal white sections of the district)  --- to achieve a partisan end.

The dissenting judge on the Appeals Court, T. John Ward, wrote that the new Texas map lines would "crush these minority voters' participation in the political process."   [January 2004]

The DoJ's preclearance of the map was a travesty of justice by political appointees.

Cuellar's win was in the cards because DeLay redrew that district with the aim of unseating liberal Ciro Rodriguez.  That was a big prize for DeLay.

Cuellar, a "DINO." has been a long-time Bush supporter.  His top contributor was <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/races/contrib.asp?ID=TX28&a mp;cycle=2004&special=N">a bank that</a> favors Republican candidates, International Bank of Commerce ("International Bancshares Corp") also was the vault where the disputed ballots were held in the race.  Get it?

Of the fruits two are already members of the Taiwan Congressional Caucus, Al Green and Kenny Marchant.  This so-called bi-partisan group is nothing more than the lobbying arm of the pro-independece Formosan Association for Public Affairs.Delay's Taiwan connections run deep and counter to stated US policy toward both mainland China and Taiwan.I wrote it about here:http://www.sinomania.com/CHINANEWS/Is_Tom_Delay_A_Patsy_For_Taiwa n.html

One of the things Republicans have done that is very cleaver in districting is creating "tortured" districts which virtually guarantee a minority victory for Congress.  However, it takes blacks out of lots of other districts thereby assuring more Republicans getting elected to state legislatures and the House.  So far this has passed Constitutional muster.