As we all know, Cruz beat Beto last night in a tighter race than anyone could have imagined a year ago.  In his victory shout, Cruz actually offered a fragment of an olive branch to Beto supporters saying, “I want to also say millions across this state were inspired by his campaign. They didn’t prevail and I am grateful the people of Texas chose a different path.   But let me say to all of those who worked on his campaign, all of those who were inspired that I am your Senator as well. My responsibility is to represent every Texan.”  Questions for Raphael – does this mean you’re going to stop trying to destroy health insurance and public schools in Texas?  I doubt it.  Are you going to stop demagoguing and spending all of your time running for president in Iowa?  No way.

In more dark news, Kim Olson lost to the worst human being in Texas, Sid Miller, and all other statewide offices were kept in the death grip of deplorables.  It’s so depressing.  I’m reading that turnout was even larger than in 2014 AND 2016, but straight party voting was the kiss of death to really good statewide candidates on the Dem side.

One really bright spot, though, was that “Liberal Lizzie Fletcher” decisively beat John Culberson.  Lizzie is a real breath of fresh air, and the message was clear that Houstonians are sick and tired of being unrepresented by an unresponsive, out of touch career politician.  Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on your way out the door, John.

Dems also had strong showings in Dallas and Tarrant Counties as well as in Harris and Fort Bend. At a minimum, the Dems wrested control of the House of Representatives from Republicans, so at least one part of the legislative branch will begin doing its job holding His Orangeness in check.  That should prove to be ugly, but I’m looking forward to the entertainment value.

All in all, though, I am personally sick to death of Texas being controlled by stupid people.  I’m sick and tired of the Texas Democratic Party being the millstone around great candidates necks instead of the wind at their backs.  I’m tired of poor turnout that simply hands races to the Repubs.  Yeah, I’m still in the ditch, but I’m still here.

Culberson is in serious trouble for the first time since he started his decades-long camping trip on Capitol Hill.  Culberson, known for being a smartass on social media and for his pet projects that do nothing for Houston, is being challenged by practicing attorney Lizzie Fletcher whose calm voice (completely devoid of nonsensical talking points) is giving Culberson a real run for his money.  Culberson is a horrible congressman who has not yet been held to account for killing mass transit funding, ignoring our massive flooding problems (until a good part of his own district went underwater during Harvey), taking money from special interests like the NRA and big pharma and voting for their profits rather than his constituents.

Welp, ol’ John got a wake-up call this time.  He’s finally realized that his idiotic support for Cheeto Jesus, and his own name brand deplorable ideas is not helping.  Fletcher has taken the fight right to Culberson, shaming him for his own lame record of pet projects, voting against FEMA funding and infrastructure projects.  She’s taken advantage of Trump’s unpopularity, successfully branding Culberson as a clueless partisan, completely out of touch with his own district.

Lizzie’s strategy is working.  Culberson is backing away from Trump so fast that he needs flashing lights and a beeper tied to his backside.  Perfect example – Trump is coming to Houston on Monday to infest the Toyota Center in support of Ted Cruz Grandpa Munster, and suddenly Culberson has an urgent need to attend a neighborhood meeting about flooding.  Culberson has been smeared with the filth of Trumpland, but his problem is that it won’t wash off.  Because of that, he’s trying to stay as far away from Trump as possible, while hurling invectives at Lizze like, “Lying Lizzie Fletcher”, and “Liberal Lizzie Fletcher” from dark money PACs trying to run interference for him.

Nothing cleans like sunlight.  Finally the Dems have a bright ray of sunlight in Lizzie Fletcher.  That’s why Culberson is cowering in the corner, afraid of his own record.  If nothing else, the entertainment value is pretty high.

UPDATE:

There has been a question from one of our readers about how a toad like Culberson can be re-elected so easily.  It’s called gerrymandering, which the Republicans have raised to an art form for the last 20 years.  Gerrymandering either packs minority or similarly situated groups into one district, or more often spreads them out to dilute their voting influence.  It’s classic voter suppression, taking away people’s Constitutional right to vote (or more accurately, makes voting useless).  Culberson’s 7th district is one of the worst gerrymandered districts in Texas:

This district dilutes the urban vote, which tends to lean Democratic, by a torturous path through distant suburbs and even rural areas.  According to fivethirtyeight.com, the 7th district gives the Republicans an 88% likelihood of winning.  On average Texas gerrymandering is designed to for R+10, which means to win, you have to beat the Republican by 10% to overcome the gerrymandering advantage.  Texas is one of the worst states for gerrymandering, born out of one-party rule and corruption since the late 1990s.

John Culberson, $32,900; Henry Cuellar – $32,400; John Cornyn, $10,000.  These are the contributions from private prison company GEO Group who operates immigrant detention centers all over Texas.  Let’s be clear here – GEO is a private contractor that runs federal prisons and detention centers for profit.  How do they profit?  By keeping bodies behind bars and spending as little as possible on their welfare.  Abrogating its responsibility to look after the welfare of those in federal custody is one of the most disgusting policy decisions made by our government.  It’s a human rights violation and it’s immoral. Also, it started long before Trump infested the White House, but he’s accelerated conversions of big box stores into prisons at an alarming rate.

In the meantime, politicians (Republican for the most part) have blocked prison and immigration reform or opposed the outlawing of this practice.  The reason?  Millions of dollars filling the pockets of jerk-offs like those named above.  Cuellar is an anomaly among Dems; he vehemently opposed president Obama’s efforts to reform the immigration system and is unpredictable in his public statements.  He’s certainly not helpful.  Culberson and Cornyn, however are blocking the door to ANY humane or just solution.

The proliferation of new Desert Sands Trump Tent Resorts and Trump Big Box Internationals have finally awoken Republicans in Congress.  Even Ted Cruz took a few minutes off from running for president in 3 years to wring his hands and declare he’s going to introduce legislation to fix a problem that was completely caused by Trump’s poor decision to take the advice of his in-house white supremacists.

In the meantime, the border crisis worsens.  Innocent lives are being permanently damaged and it’s going on before our very eyes even as I type these words.

If you’d like to tell these politicians what you think of them taking dirty private prisons for profit money, here are their phone numbers:

John Cornyn – 202-224-2934

John Culberson – 202-225-2571

Henry Cuellar – 202-225-1640