"Waiting for 'Superman,'" a film suggesting charter schools as a major alternative to failing public schools, was shown to an invitation-only audience at the Alamo Draft House theater in South Austin on Monday, followed by a panel consisting of Texas Association of Business President Bill Hammond, Austin ISD Superintendent Meria Joel Carstarphen, and AISD Trustee Cheryl Bradley. Several school lobby officials were present -- making for some groans whenever charter schools were presented as a viable alternative.

When we reported the first three days of early voting totals (LSR, 10/22/10), we concluded that early voting totals were off the charts -- double the 2006 numbers in some counties.

It appears that trend has held up, according to the Texas Secretary of State's office, which had figures on its Web site through Oct. 27 (Wednesday) at the time of writing.

Fully 1,283,229 early votes were reported as of the latest figures (15.39 percent of 8.3 million registered Texas voters). Compare this to the last gubernatorial contest in 2006, when 757,558 early votes were cast on the third-to-last day in that election (making up for 9.31 percent of 8.1 million registered voters in the state).

"I don't want to get in to the same thing as the Trans-Texas Corridor," said Rep. Ed Kuempel (R-Seguin) at a meeting of the House Transportation Funding Subcommittee this morning in regard to emerging plans to build high-speed rail lines in Texas.

Then, what could be interpreted as an omen by anti-toll activists and other opponents of large transportation projects occurred: A cell phone rung, playing an orchestral version of "Texas Our Texas."

Kuempel, who not only received flack in the '80s for high-speed rail but also in the middle of the last decade for support of the Trans-Texas Corridor, made the best of it, stood up, saluted, and sung along a few bars, drawing laughter. The longtime Representative was a leading voice of caution Tuesday morning, as the subcommittee discussed rail developments -- including the development of the Texas Rail Plan.

The King Street Patriots, the Tea Party group responsible for assisting Harris County Tax Assessor-Collector Leo Vasquez in exposing tens of thousands of examples of duplicate and incorrect information on voter registration forms in August, is busy fending off legal attacks from the Texas Democratic Party recently.

State Democrats are attempting to expose a connection between Vasquez, the Republican Party, and the King Street Patriots (an outgrowth of a lawsuit which attempted to prove a connection between Green Party ballot petition efforts and the GOP). King Street is calling those efforts an attempt to "silence a group of volunteer citizens" concerned with voter fraud designed to favor the Democratic Party. Below are a few developments:

Young Conservatives of Texas (YCT) claimed last week the Libertarian Party of Texas borrowed "entire swaths of content" from YCT's "Legislative Ratings for the 81st Legislature" for the party's "Texas 2009 Legislative Scorecard."

"As for crediting us, they said that they looked at the research. And they lumped us in with a half-dozen other groups," McDonald said, via an e-mail to LSR. "They didn't look at us for research, they directly copied the whole damn thing (or at least the parts they agreed with)."

Of 26 pieces of legislation from the 81st Session appearing in the Libertarian Scorecard, 14 of them were the same as YCT's document or featured minor changes, new introductory sentences, etc.

Texans For Lawsuit Reform PAC, a group which pushes for limits on civil litigation, has certainly spent a lot of money on elections this cycle: with $3.32 million in its coffers and spending millions in mostly Republican House races so far.

But that's not nearly as much as plaintiff attorneys, a TLR-PAC press release claims, with an estimated $13.6 million given to candidates across the Lone Star State -- much of which was through "deceptively named groups that mask the source of the contribution on candidate reports." [...]

It's a higher sum than ever before for "the trial lawyers, TLR-PAC  said. But to say the plaintiff attorneys are all supporting liberals --whereas defense attorneys are the benefactors of conservatism -- is a misrepresentation, argued Mark McCaig, a former State Republican Executive Committee member.

A gubernatorial race debate hosted by KLRU-TV in Austin last night featured, as expected, an incumbent-free panel.

Republican Gov. Rick Perry held true to his word that he would not debate Democratic nominee Bill White unless he released certain tax records from when he held federal office. But the Perry vacuum made for a unique opportunity for both Libertarian candidate Kathie Glass and Green Party nominee Deb Shafto to appear as the alternatives to White.

"If we share the same goals, I'm not just another choice: I'm your only choice," crowed Glass, an attorney who asserted that she was the candidate of limited government.

It appears that Farouk Shami, hair care product magnate and former Democratic candidate for governor, has crossed the party line and endorsed Rick Perry.

A spokesperson for the Bill White campaign was not immediately available for comment by time of writing. Below is the release from the Perry campaign ... followed by a rather memorable campaign video from Shami's primary run.

Gov. Rick Perry and Comptroller Susan Combs signed the Texas Conservative Coalition's "Pledge with Texans" on Oct. 11. 

The pledge, signed by 58 legislators so far, supports: balancing the budget without raising taxes; limiting federal intrusion; improving election integrity; cutting taxes; and securing the Texas border. ...

A federal judge ruled Oct. 14 to allow the Florida lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the federal healthcare reform bill’s individual mandate. Twenty states, including Texas, are a party.

U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison called the ruling is "another key victory in the battle to reverse the negative consequences of the Obama health care law."