There's definitely some Enron backlash and plenty of distrust of the motives of big bidness after that debacle, but there are so many people employed in this area by Halliburton and/or KBR, I don't think most of them would ever think twice about still voting with the right.

I expect a number of Enron victims have changed their votes, but not enough to penetrate the deeply entrenched right. We're still the buckle of the Bible belt, and much of the political loyalty down here is about religion. As you know, Texas, even in its long history as a Democratic state, was always deeply conservative. Now it simply votes officially as what it always was, red. There's still tons of loyalty to our former governor and the former chairman of Halliburton here. And closer to home, in the upcoming gubernatorial and senatorial and gubernatorial races, the incumbent Republicans have huge leads. Truly, they're not even really campaigning except for some minor ads just to keep themselves from looking smug. We'll have four more years of Governor Rick Perry, the dumbest man who ever breathed the breath of life, and Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, the dumbest woman. The Democrats will have to make headway in other places than the Lone Star State, I'm afraid.