Is this good or bad anyone?

I dunno. You would think Ciro being ahead more than 2 to 1 so far would be good news. Not sure though.

Does anyone remember Colin Strother? He was the one who dismissed the netroots effort against Cuellar was a "one-day story."

In the 2004 election, Mr. Strother voted in Webb County, which became a scandal.

U.S. Rep. Ciro Rodriguez is expected to try to beef up his legal case against Democratic nominee Henry Cuellar today, introducing an amended lawsuit that alleges more than 500 people who voted in the primary here are registered at vacant addresses or at homes where they do not live. [...]

In one case, a primary voter with the same name as Cuellar's campaign manager, Colin Strother, is registered as living with Cuellar's parents in central Laredo.

The Cuellars, in an interview with a reporter Monday, said no one named Strother lives there.

Told of the allegation, Cuellar spokesman T.J. Connolly said that when Strother agreed to work on Cuellar's campaign, he was given a salary and the option to live in a rental property at Cuellar's parents' home.

Strother reportedly registered and voted at that address, although he has been living with his wife in another location outside of District 28 as part of her employment compensation. The two have been planning to relocate to the Cuellar residence, but furor over the campaign has kept them from doing so, Connolly said.

This wasn't the only problem in Webb County, the Laredo Times reports:

After the stunning Tuesday developments in the recount of Democratic primary ballots in Webb and Zapata counties, Laredoan Henry Cuellar increased his lead Wednesday by another four votes over Congressman Ciro Rodriguez of San Antonio. [...]

While Webb officials found an additional 115 ballots on their hands, Cuellar picked up 177 extra votes, and Rodriguez picked up none.

That morning, in neighboring Zapata, election officials found an additional 304 votes, not ballots, during its recount. This allowed Cuellar to pick up an extra 237 votes, while Rodriguez picked up 67.

And this year's race has seen major problems in early voting in Webb County. Just look at the Centenarians:

An abnormally high number of voters in Webb County aged 90 years or older prompted an attorney for the Ciro Rodriguez congressional campaign to request an investigation by the Texas Secretary of State. During the first 4 days of early voting, 93 votes were cast by people 90 or over and 51 were 100 or older.

In a message addressed to Kim Thol, Programs Specialist for the Elections Division of the Secretary of State, Luis Vera requested "an immediate appointment for an inspector for Webb County." Vera reminded Thol, "Webb County has a long history of allegations of voter fraud." In the 2004 primary election, Vera added, "the fraud made national news." He was referring to the controversial election between Henry Cuellar and Rodriguez in which ballots, "discovered" days after the polls closed, eventually swung the election to Cuellar by a narrow 58 votes.

By percentage of population = 268% early turnout:

Fifty-one centenarians - senior citizens that have made it to age 100 - have already voted in the first week of early voting in Webb County. Joining the centenarians at the polls were 93 seniors over age 90. At least that is what an attorney for a congressional candidate claims has happened in this district that stretches the length of South Texas from San Antonio to Mexico. [...]

Editor's Note: This would not be the first occasion in which citizens residing in South Texas cemeteries have been motivated to cast their ballots.

It is estimated there are 50,000 centenarians in the U.S. - about one of every 10,000 people. There are about 193,000 residents of Webb County, which would indicate a centenarian population of about 19.

Chris:

     You might want to consider recording your projected result each time you enter a new set of data.  You could then graph the projected result vs. % of the vote recorded (or number of precincts reporting) until the projected result eventually met up with the actual result at 100% reporting.  It might be interesting to see how much the projected result oscillates as results come in, as well as whether it trended up or down until it intersected with the final result.  

With 34 percent of the vote, according to AP:

Rodriguez, Ciro Dem 7,754 64.72
 Cuellar, Henry (i) Dem 3,351 27.97
 Morales, Victor Dem 875 7.30

Sounds pretty good so far.

Chris,

You might want to reconsider your projections...

With 34% of the vote counted Rodriguez has a 37% lead. I understand that these are coming from counties friendly to him, but in all my years of following elections (16 years) - i've never seen a county swing an election by that much with 34% reporting.

Webb hasn't came in with anything yet and those Ciro gains are from Bexar. Webb gave Cuellar a 10K plurality last time...

Hey can someone tell me if Chris Bell is one of the good guys in Texas or is he a DINO?

I know you're supposed to be cuatious, but it seems like Ciro is doing pretty well.

Chris Bell is one of the good guys. For a state like Texas anyway.

DINO or not, he has as much chance of winning the Governor's race in Texas Rick Santorum being enorsed by NARAL.

Same link as above...

U.S. House, District 28 In: 24%
Ciro Rodriguez, D 9,696 60.3%
Victor Morales, D 1,051 6.5%
Henry Cuellar, D (I) 5,320 33.1%

Ciro's lead narrowed a bit. I think the "24% in" is obviously a typo.

"In case you are wondering..."

I was wondering. Now I can just go back to worry.

I think the hope is that Webb county votes less for its homeboy since he hasn't voted in their interest.  It would also make sense that Cuellar made gains in the rest of the district since he is the incumbent. That said I think the entire election rides on the Webb results.

How long are they going to hold the Webb Co. results up their sleeve? Fuckers are counting votes across the district before releasing.

Chris,

Does your model account for the overall decreased voter turnout?  Turnout appears down across the district, which means that even an 85% blowout in Webb county might not carry as much "oomph" as last year.

am i reading this right?  21,000 early democratic primary votes were cast in webb county?

http://www.webbcountytx.gov/Elections/PD F/030706%20-%20EV%20Totals%20-%20Demo.pd f

I'd like to go deeper and note that the problem isn't simply Webb Co. expected returns.  Ciro is polling lower in EVERY county than he did in '04, and Cuellar is polling higher in every county except 1 than he did in '04.  My projection with 57.6% reporting is Cuellar: 56.2%, based on comparison of all counties from '04.

Here's what I got...

143/276 reporting. (52%)

56% to 36% for Ciro.

Of the 133 precints yet to report:

30 are from Webb (Cuellar strong hold)
23 are from Atascosa (Cuellar strong hold)
7 are from Zapata (Cuellar strong hold)

21 are from Bexar (Ciro strong hold)
21 are from Guadalupe (Ciro strong hold)
24 are from Wilson County (Ciro strong hold)

The others are a mixed bag - supporting either/or.

Which means of those votes still left to come in 66 precints are from Ciro strongholds to only 60 for Cuellar.

And Cuellar still has to make up a 20% deficit.

Ciro Rodriguez, D 12,116 57.3%
Victor Morales, D 1,470 7.0%
Henry Cuellar, D (I) 7,544 35.7%

I don't like watching Ciro's lead get smaller and smaller. At least Morales seems to be catching up enough to maybe force a runoff.

Let's put some real numbers on this, based on Chris's comments above.  If Webb Co is 30% of the voter population and Cuellar gets 85% of the votes from the county, and 50000 votes are cast, then Ciro needs to be up by 12750 votes elsewhere.  

(50000*30%*85%)

That's easier for me to think about than 73% of Webb Co if we are not going to get Webb reports before I go to bed here in the Atlantic time zone.  Yawn.

It can't be that our side blows at getting the vote out, or that wingers are more dependable voters ... it MUST be that the other side cheated.  After all, wasn't President Kerry put in office with that "incumbent under 50 percent in the polls" rule and all the other bullshit we tell ourselves?  Say hello to a (very) small taste of what it's gonna feel like when "No Chance" Santorum cruises back in and Lieberman beats Lamont by about 70-30.  I should have saved my fifty bucks for Ciro and went to Atlantic City, where suckers win at least once in a while.  Sorry to be bitter; but sometimes I hate this country.  Bush-kissers still rule, I guess.

why is webb taking so long to report?

Lyndon Johnson was "elected" to the US Senate in 1948 by buying off South Texas bosses and getting the amount of votes needed to beat overwhelmingly popular and favorite in the election, then-governor Coke Stevenson. Johnson "won" by 48 votes.

For more info, read "Lyndon Johnson: Means of Ascent" by Robert Caro.

I know everyone's focused on TX-28, but it looks like Barbara Ann Radnofsky and Gene Kelly are headed for a runoff for the Senate nomination.

I haven't been commenting, but I've been watching those goose eggs in Webb County all night, looking at Swing State Project, and thinking to myself, "Well, if you don't fix something, it usually stays broke."

They stole the 2000 election in broad daylight.  And we haven't fixed our election system since.  There aren't a whole lot of other elections happening tonight, so maybe this one will wake some folks up who've still been asleep till now.

And maybe, just maybe, the fraud attempt this smells like from 1200 miles away or so will not succeed, and we will get the best of both worlds.

And maybe pigs will fly to see the ice capades in hell.

And Bush just happens to be in TX because his staff forgot to ask in time for an absentee ballot.  I'm sure that he is prolly asleept at the moment.

Well, that stings, to say the least.

Well Cuellar just passed Rodriguez and appears to be flying toward the homestretch.

Looks to me like there will be a runoff.  I think a lot of the projections are based on really untight data.

Ciro leads 12,495 votes to 7,939 (Morales gets 1,544).

Precints yet to report: 116.

66 from Webb-Atascosa-Zapata. Cueller strongholds.

50 from Bexar-Guadalupe-Wilson.

The average weighted lead for Ciro in those precints are:

Ciro 59.4%
Cueller 32.5%
Morales 8.1%

So assuming Ciro maintains those numbers in the outstanding 50 precints. That means Ciro Rodriguez will have a projected lead of (minus the outstanding 66 [Cueller] precincts in Webb-Atascosa-Zapata):

Ciro 16,485 (57%)
Cueller 10,122 (35%)
Morales 2,088 (8%)

Which means that in order to avoid a run-off and win the election outright, Cueller will have to win 97.6% of the vote in the outstanding precints. In order to win the election outright and avoid a run-off Ciro would have to keep Cueller under 71%. In order to surpass Ciro in overall vote total Cueller would have to get 85%.

My projection is this:

A RUN-OFF

Ciro Rodriguez 47%
Henry Cueller 45%
Victor Morales 8%

What happens if nobody gets 50% or more?

Progressive Blue

As someone who was 100% behind Ciro as a great way of teaching democrats to be real democrats...we didn't get beat by the other side...more democrats voted for the other guy.

I seriously doubt republicans in TEXAS would have their affiliation be democrat for the rest of the year just to vote for a congressman.

This is how elections work. Democrats in that part of texas prefer a democrat like Cuellar and it's obnoxious for us on a blog to decide who they should have voted for.

Why is Webb County showing 0 precincts reporting and yet:

WEBB    8,145    454    789    9,388    0    30
Early    8,145    454    789    9,388    ...    ...

Isn't it very possible that Webb has tampered with the ballot box again?

It's important to remember that we haven't lost all of the recent elections.  Remember Tim Kaine?  And there have been others that we've won when we weren't supposed to.

It's possible that the Rodriguez campaign simply wasn't a good one.  It's also possible that Cuellar is simply a very popular guy in his district, and a photo with Bush isn't going to do any damage.  Finally, perhaps it just wasn't enough to have the netroots et al on one side and an incumbent on the other from the same party.

We really need to remember that this wasn't truly a Dem-vs. Republican matchup that would have leveraged the current public dissatisfaction with Bush and the GOP.  Rather, it was a primary, one in which many voters probably didn't see a whole lot of reason to get off their asses and oppose the incumbent.

I would like to know, however, where things fell through when it came to the ground game, particularly GOTV.

Are Republicans and Independents allowed to vote in a Democratic Primary?

If they are--then Ciro did not have a chance.

Look it's not over until Cueller gets over 50%. There will be a run off.

check the totals by county.

All the other races got more votes than the House race.  It is about 3000 short.  There should be 14000-16000 votes cast, not 9300.

Also, both candidates are under 50% by my math.

Another stunning victory for the netroots.  When are we going to win one of these things?

A sports cliche' would serve us well - don't get too high after wins, and don't get too down after losses.  As passionate as we all are about politics to be posting here, it does absolutely no good to get down in the dumps about this, or 2004, or 2000, or 1994, or on and on.  What will serve us well is to pick right up keep fighting.  Starting tomorrow.  And likewise, when we finally do "win" and get back on top later this year, and in 2008, it will serve us well not to get too giddy and drunk on enthusiasm while losing sight of what got us there.  We'll live to fight another day, to be sure.

Somebody mind telling me how this works out?  Did they just make up the numbers?

U. S. Representative District 28               
    Henry Cuellar - Incumbent        8,145    86.75%    8,145    86.75%
    Victor Morales        454    4.83%    454    4.83%
    Ciro D. Rodriguez        789    8.40%    789    8.40%
                -----------        -----------   
        Total Votes Cast        9,388        9,388

        Precincts Reported        0    of    30 Precincts    0.00%

http://204.65.107.70/dem1county239.htm

Progressive Blue

Atascosa now fully reported.  Looks like Ciro basicly broke even on election day.  Not willing to bet that happens in LaSalle, Zapata and Webb, though.

Seems to me that the vote totals for Webb county THIS year (9388 votes) are being incorrectly tabulated as ALL early votes.

Consider that in 2004 there were 15,300 votes total in Webb County.

Seems to me that the hysterical depression being moaned and groaned about is premature and foolish.

People need to relax - especially YOU Chris Bowers. As an opinion leader in this community, you have a responsibility to remain relatively calm and cool in these kinds of situations.

It's not "over" until the election is certified.

Your "model" and your "projections" mean nothing until the votes are counted.

Comparisons of last election and this election, given that the turnout varies immensely and variably across precincts and counties are meaningless.

Why not save the self-immolating hyperbole for later.

And that goes DOUBLE for the Diebold is satan crowd.

Grow up, people.

Observe, learn, adapt, and keep fighting.

Yeah, and we all know how well that turned out.