Just based on what I’m reading, I can’t imagine Hillary Clinton dropping out until PA unless she drops out in the next 2 days (her wins in TX and OH aren’t big enough to close the delegate lead without super delegates, so she has to have super delegates in large enough numbers who don’t want to honor the popular vote).

It saddens me that this is the case, because Clinton has gone hard negative and it seems to be working. That means this race is going to get uglier. The only cool thing is seeing the turnout. Check out the photos over at Balloon Juice of one TX caucus location tonight in Houston. That’s just nuts! Love seeing high voter turnout even if my candidate loses.

On the electoral front, Obama needs to get a stronger response to the kind of smears that are coming out now. While he’s stayed on the high road, she’s clearly not afraid to tear him down with personal attacks. He needs to be better responding to these things. The Republicans will be even dirtier come the general.

It seems like the county where Prairie View A&M University is located restricted early voting to one location in the district far away from the (predominantly Democratic) university. So, these students decided to march to the polling place to protest the decision. That’s an awesome display, and great to see people caring so much about their right to vote.

Nice defense in the 4th quarter, defensive genius.

By the way, Donovan McNabb, I hope you were watching. See how good you could be? Like this Vince Young guy, you can run. Unlike this Vince Young guy, you can literally own a defense with your arm. If you somehow did both in a game, you might be pretty much unstoppable. Really. Think about it. Thanks.

One last thing… A lot of people at work think my Patriot hating is because they beat the Eagles last year in the Super Bowl. Not true. The loss to the Pats sharpened the Pats hating for sure, but I was getting tired of the Pats before that. Mostly because I hate dynasties with a passion. H-A-T-E them with a passion. It’s part of why I hate the Yankees. It’s why I always rooted against the Niners in the Montana/Rice and Young/Rice days, for example. I actually liked those players, but just got tired of the predictability of the seasons…

So, obviously, I was rooting for Texas all the way tonight. And, boy, was it fun to see Texas prevail over the favorite. Cocky punks showing their three-peat signs on the sideline after Dwayne Jarrett scored the last TD. Hope they enjoyed their 10 minutes leading the game at the end there.

The Washington Post has obtained an internal Justice Department Memo that indicates that the Justice Department staff charged with evaluating whether the Texas redistricting plan violated the Voting Rights Act unanimously found that the plan did violate the act. Not that anyone in the administration cared:

Justice Department lawyers concluded that the landmark Texas congressional redistricting plan spearheaded by Rep. Tom DeLay (R) violated the Voting Rights Act, according to a previously undisclosed memo obtained by The Washington Post. But senior officials overruled them and approved the plan.

The memo, unanimously endorsed by six lawyers and two analysts in the department’s voting section, said the redistricting plan illegally diluted black and Hispanic voting power in two congressional districts. It also said the plan eliminated several other districts in which minorities had a substantial, though not necessarily decisive, influence in elections.

…

Mark Posner, a longtime Justice Department lawyer who now teaches law at American University, said it was “highly unusual” for political appointees to overrule a unanimous finding such as the one in the Texas case.

“In this kind of situation, where everybody agrees at least on the staff level . . . that is a very, very strong case,” Posner said. “The fact that everybody agreed that there were reductions in minority voting strength, and that they were significant, raises a lot of questions as to why it was” approved, he said.

The decision to override is being defended by the administration. They point out that a federal lawsuit brought by Texas Democrats was not successful, though the case is on appeal to the Supreme Court. This memo, and any evidence that the Justice Department was wary of the plan, did not come out during that case, however. In fact, “the Justice Department’s approval of the redistricting plan … was valuable to Texas officials when they defended it in court.”

You might remember that when this happened, Democratic State Reps in Texas fled to Oklahoma to prevent the state legislature from passing the redistricting bill. Now that act of desperation is put into some context. Read the article, it’s got some other interesting tidbits.

I’ve been so busy that I haven’t seen anything other that a shot here or there of cars strewn on the highways around Houston. Because I only saw the images and didn’t really have the mental bandwidth to actually have the volume turned up, I was wondering what was going on. I’m finally catching up, but assuming that most of you knew about the shortages and whatnot, I’ll skip to TNR’s article on the implications of the events in and around Houston. Good read, and I’ll let it stand on it’s own, but I do want to point out something that caught my eye:

Rita caused such panic it may come to be known as the Second Runaway Scrape, eerily like when Texans fled across the landscape in 1836, in advance of the Mexican army. Then, Texans battled Indians, cold, rain, and hunger. This time, the town of Sealy, 24 miles from Houston, looked like it was ravaged by riot: stores shuttered, gas pumps empty, garbage everywhere, desperation on drivers’ faces as they ran low on fuel under the scowl of the cops. “If it hadn’t been for Katrina, maybe I wouldn’t have been so concerned,” says Susan Clark, who with her husband Adam had fled Houston, only to make it 15 miles. “People in New York might say, ‘Take the trains,’ but we don’t have that here. I was having a fucking anxiety attack.

In the context of a hurricane, not sure the trains thing is really relevant (how many people could really evacuate this way?). The thing is, within the greater culture of America and in diverse issues such as obesity and energy policy and commerce, I think that more local light rail and subway/trolley systems are a very good idea.

When I lived in Boston, I was healthier. Not because I ate better or went to the gym more, but because I walked a LOT more. I walked to work on nice days, I walked to get groceries. I walked to have dinner or to meet friends. If friends lived far away, I took the T or the light rail out and had them pick me up. Short drives instead of long ones on the highway.

I used way less fuel because I didn’t need to drive. I actually didn’t own a car, but I realize that’s because I was in a special situation (truly urban living is different than neighborhood suburban living, for sure). It’s interesting to see that some communities are starting to see this, though. Atrios pointed out an interesting light rail development around Denver, I think. Denver, by the way, used to have ZipCar. I think they’re working on the right type of development and Atrios’s comment about reducing vs. eliminating cars is spot on.

I would totally love a way to take rail to ESPN, but the problem with a big sprawling campus is that they really need to be away from urban centers. But Hartford, man, Hartford could use a hub-and-spoke development strategy with light rail running out to the major suburbs. No one lives in the city, and it’s all cars over interstates and local highways.