Why would you not compare two red states right next to each other? Two states that have not voted for a Democratic President for ages

Actually MT voted for Clinton in 1992.  True, a large part of that was the Pert-effect, but it DID go to Clinton.

You can change coreyTX to Corey Olomon.  I've also added a user profile.

That will be a while considering he is only 23.

In Texas, you can withdraw, but no one new can enter the race after filing.  The only exception is if the person was the nominee and he either dies or is constituionally ineligible to hold the office (and the latter is every limited in what the courts have allowed to be replaced).  For all practical purposes, if the person withdraws after the filing deadline, the party is screwed if he was the only credible candidate that files.

That is common for Israeli Prime Ministers (especially those from Likud).  They almost always talk real tough before they actually have the power to do anything and once they do, the pressure from the US, Europe, the business community, etc. forces them to moderate their policies, at least to some degree.  Remember in 1999, Sharon challenged Netanyahu in the Likud primary from the right, but once he was in power and Netanyahu was not, they traded places.

What is Shinui doing now?  A few weeks ago Lapid was quoted as saying he would strongly consider an electoral alliance with a new Sharon-led centrist/secular party (especially if it contained elements the Labor Party).  Remember Shinui only got something like 2 seats less than Labor in the last election and became the third-largest party (beating out the religious parties).  If the new party can keep most of the vote Shinui got in the last election (which will be tough for Shinui to do in any event, since a lot of their vote was pure "pox on all of your houses" protest votes against the major parties and the religious parties) and get  Sharon's personal vote, I think that bloc will probably led in the seat count and almost certainly form the government (with some type of either coalition with or support from outside government with Labor and if necessary, whatever the left-wing Meretz party is calling itself now and, as a last resort, the Arab parties.

Actually they weren't total novices.  Wellstone had been a statewide nominee (for State Auditor in 82) and Murray was a two-term state Senator.

Conrad Burns doesn't!

It seems the logic is, he is better than no one.  That's true, and there isn't many people left who have not taken themselves out.  But the problem with this is, these wild rumors may keep other people from considering running and therefore if (as I expect) Affleck doesn't run then this whole thing will have produced the exact opposite effect as intended (putting another Republican seat into play).

As far as I can see, there is no evidence he is interested.  True, he has said that would like to be in Congress sometime, but that defines a LOT of people.  I won't pay any attention to this until he, himself, expresses an interest in running.

As I stated above, there are VERY few districts that the population resettlement would effect because of how gerrymandered the districts are and there are HUGE margins for almost every Republican.  It well could flip Harris County in some local races.  There is not a single countywide elected Democrat in Harris County (out of over 100 partisan elected countywide posts), but we typically get 44-47% in those races, so its possible we might win a few judges and the like, but that doesn't make up for losing a Congressional seat in LA and possibly losing the statewide elected LA Democrats.

The problem is that the majority are ending up in TX and the Republican margin here is so high and the population is so great, Texas could absorb all of the LA residence and only effect a couple of Congressional or legislative states (and those are far from certain since so far, the re-settlement has been in already Democratic districts) and not effect really any statewide races.

He has stated he favors sometype of gay marriage.

Brown was Sec of State, until he lost re-election in 1990 to now-Gov. Taft.

Just a note about your Gov. rating on your site.  You have AG Lockyer as the probable winner in CA.  He is not running (he is running, I believe, for state treasurer).  The State Treasurer and State Controller are the two Democratic candidates for Gov.