I take special pride in writing this post because the topic is about two organizations that I have worked for and together, have been incredibly successful. So indulge me. -kt

Democratic Senate nominee Rick Noriega passed the $1,000,000 mark yesterday in funds raised and processed online through the online fundraising powerhouse, ActBlue.com. That now makes him the #1 largest (non-presidential) online fundraiser with ActBlue since its inception. In fact, Noreiga alone is responsible for 1.75% of all funded raised through ActBlue, ever. And with 11,200 donors he has one of the most diverse and largest contributer pools of any candidate.

That's all to say, that even without many people's blessing, support, or full on assistance to take back Texas, Rick Noriega and his team are proving that a draft started by the Texas Netroots has resulted in a very real broad based effort to change the direction of our state.

That's very real and Sen. Cornyn better come to terms with it.

John Cornyn was right in saying that maybe he needed a new staff because his ridiculous convention video is turning out to be a real bomb of hilarity- and not in a good way.

Consider the following...

Evan Smith, Texas Monthly.

He Puts the “Corny” in Cornyn

If not for tort reform, John Cornyn could sue the makers of this video shown at the state Republican convention for — what? Malpractice? Wrongful death of his image? The deliberate infliction of pain and suffering on the voters of Texas? Or maybe he could sue his own campaign staff. Because this is just cow-pie-awful.

The first paragraph from this article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram says it all.

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, voted to approve $165 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but provided one of 22 votes against the domestic spending measure that is paired with the war spending bill.  The Senate bill would add about $50 billion through 2017 for veterans' education benefits.

John Cornyn provided one of just 22 votes against this bill which was an expanded version of the GI Bill, called the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Act, to increase education benefits for veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Even Texas' other Senator, Kay Bailey Hutchison voted for it along with many of the Republican Senators up for re-election this year who are trying to moderate their positions in an election year.

But not John Cornyn.

(From the diaries -- kos)

I'd like to announce some really great (and even surprising) poll results regarding the Texas Senate race here in Texas. The following poll was conducted a couple weeks ago by Lake Research, a highly regarded polling firm. Analysis of each major point will be below the section.

The survey was conducted among 500 registered voters in Texas who are likely to vote in the 2008 General Election.  The survey was conducted November 13-18, 2007. The margin of error for the full sample is +/- 4.4 percentage points.

A few hours ago Rick Noriega filed the paperwork necessary at the Texas Democratic Party headquarters here in Austin in his efforts to take on Sen. John Cornyn as a Democratic candidate for change here in Texas.

"It's time that we quit having show horses and that we have work horses for the people of the state of Texas," Noriega told an enthusiastic group at the Democratic Party headquarters.

Party chairman Boyd Richie said he wasn't endorsing Noriega in the primary, but spoke beside him at his news conference and called it "an exciting day."

In launching his campaign he spoke to some of the principal reasons for why he's running.

This editorial cartoon ran in this past Sunday's San Antonio-Express News after President Bush's fundraiser for Junior Senator John Cornyn last Thursday. Rick Noriega's US Senate campaign responded with our own Stamp Out Bush effort with over 1,000 donors answering the call. Thank you to the donors, Democracy for America, John Kerry, Wes Clark, VoteVets.org, Richard Morrison and all those who endorsed the effort. You made a picture with Bush worth 1000 donors.

Given that I work for both Rick Noreiga and serve on Democracy for Texas's steering committee which submitted the proposal that drew Netroots Nations' eye to Texas, I could not be happier right now! We're going to have one heck of a time here in the Lone Star State when Netroots Nation is in Austin, TX from July 17-20, 2008.

Below is a statement on behalf of Rick Noriega's campaign regarding the announcement.

Over at the Texas blog, Burnt Orange Report, writer Phillip Martin was absolutely right in his post that the Texas of today is a world of difference from the Texas of 5 years ago. That year we saw the rise of John Cornyn from Attorney General to U.S. Senator, defeating Ron Kirk 55-43. But thanks to hard work by a dedicated group of Democrats, the world of 2008 will indeed be very different than the world of 2002. 

A large part of that has to do with President Bush. Having ridden sky-high approval ratings into the 2002 elections, he naturally helped prop up John Cornyn and every other Republican that ran (and sadly won) in so many Senate races that year. Now, Bush is no longer popular. In fact, there is not a single state in which he has over 50% approval anymore. Not one. In Texas, Bush's approval is just above 40%. That's now below John Cornyn's last measured approval of 43%.

I promise not to deluge anyone with just Rick Noriega stories now that I'm back in Texas supporting his campaign, but I really do want to talk about this. I'm a Democracy for Texas steering committee member which is why I'm additionally excited.

Democracy for America, the 700,000 person national progressive membership organization that was born out of Howard Dean's campaign, is doing something very big that affects Texas. They've put out the call, asking if DFA as a national organization should endorse Rick Noriega and make him their first Senate endorsement for 2008. That's huge- and it's totally possible.

Go here: http://www.democracyforamerica.com/...

Answering the call to serve.

That's the slogan for Rick Noriega's campaign for US Senator in Texas. Today it rings true for me.

I am excited to announce that I have taken leave from ActBlue, where many of you have come to know me, in order to join Rick Noriega's US Senate campaign as the Online Coordinator. While ActBlue will continue to help us change Democratic politics, I'm headed to my homestate to help change the direction of our country in a more specific way. Rick Noriega is an amazing progressive grassroots candidate and he's going to defeat Republican John Cornyn next year and become the first Democrat to win statewide in Texas since 1994.

But before that can happen, I have to fly to Texas. I'm writing you now from the Boston Airport where I will soon board a flight to Austin with my cat (Catfish). As you can see, she's handling it quite well. But we have a challenge for you...

The great thing about the DNC meeting and the mix of candidates who are official or maybe not quite yet, is that you can donate to all of them regardless of status through ActBlue- right now, today! For instance, for those that may want to encourage Clark to run, contribute to the Draft Clark page.

The Draft Funds for Clark and Gore work like this- you can donate now and the money is held for them. If they become an official filed candidate, all the money gets transferred to their account. If they choose not to run, then your donation gets transferred to the Democratic National Committee. It's win-win if you are a supporter of a Democratic candidate.

Below are other pages for 2008 candidates and Draft Funds.

I've experienced the value of both BlogPAC and ActBlue and would like to encourage those that may wonder what's up with today's project to check it out and donate.

I used to be the editor of the Burnt Orange Report in Texas, one of today's announced recipients of BlogPAC money. Actions like that help to reduce our overhead costs, allowing us to fund our direct e-mail campaign instead (which raised funds for directed Student GOTV projects).

Funding ActBlue allows for some great things as well. It not only helps us activate more states for contributions (Virgina is on and Mississippi is next) but add talented folks to the staff. One of those happens to be me and having just graduated, I couldn't be more excited. Also brought on board was Nate Thames another recent grad & activist from Kansas. Together we're helping to make new projects happen and get way ahead for the 07-08 cycle.

Joining up with WOAI-TV, Survey USA has released a public poll of TX-23.

Filtering: 1,000 Registered Voters from Texas's 23rd Congressional District, chosen using Registration Based Sample from Aristotle International, were interviewed 12/1/06 through 12/3/06. Of them, 471 were judged to be "likely" voters. Crosstabs reflect Likely Voters. Margin of Sampling Error: ± 4.6%

Bonilla (R) 53%
Rodriguez (D) 46%
Undecided 1%

Bonilla gets 70% of White votes. Rodriguez gets 72% of Hispanic votes. In SurveyUSA's turnout model, 59% of likely runoff voters are white, 36% are Hispanic. If Hispanics, who are 55% of the population in TX 23, make up more than 36% of those who vote in the Runoff, the contest will be closer than SurveyUSA's numbers here show.

Bonilla gets 94% of Republican votes. Rodriguez gets 89% of Democratic votes. Independents split. Bonilla wins by 25 points among higher-income voters, and by 15 points among middle-income voters. Rodriguez wins by 25 points among lower-income voters.

TrueBlueAction.com announces ciro.onlinephonebanking.com is up and running!

OnlinePhoneBanking the most efficient and effective way for folks anywhere in the state (or country) to help Democrat Ciro Rodriguez defeat Republican Henry Bonilla. The netroots worked hard for Ciro last time, and with this new tool, we can turn netroots passion into grassroots action!

Learn more about TX-23: Democrat Ciro Rodriguez v Republican Henry Bonilla

Make simple calls to voters in any precinct in TX-23 to identify Democrats for GOTV, from the comfort of your home, right now, using OnlinePhoneBanking's tools. Choose any precinct, and if you want, choose any demographic in that precinct - women, men, seniors, youth, anyone, and more. TrueBlueAction provides tools, scripts and data, you provide the volunteer effort and the data that helps Democrats!

The election date has been set for Tuesday December 12th for the District 23 Congressional Runoff between Democrat Ciro Rodriguez and Republican Rep. Henry Bonilla. Early Voting is set to run for just one week from December 4-8. It is the earliest day possible that it could have been called with the intent of giving the advantage to Henry Bonilla.

That's 3 weeks folks- 2 weeks until people start voting. As soon as ciro.onlinephonebanking.com is up and running, that will be the best way you can help us win in this tight electoral frame. Thousands of people making GOTV calls through this innovative new Texas tool can make a huge impact, especially if you cannot donate or come to the district. Otherwise, you can still donate to Ciro online or sign up to volunteer online.

Good news out of TX-23. As of today, all of Ciro Rodriguez's former Democratic challengers in the open primary for TX-23 have now endorsed his campaign. Third place finisher Lukin Gilliland has offered up his northside campaign headquarters and staff.

"The Republican leadership has failed, as signaled by the November elections. Uniting the Democrats behind one democrat in this Congressional election is important so that we may continue the change of direction in our country," said Uresti.

The Urestis' endorsement is an important lynchpin in Rodriguez's plan to unite Democrats to defeat Republican Congressman Henry Bonilla. Senator Carlos Uresti represents a district that mirrors the boundaries of the 23rd Congressional District and Albert Uresti garnered the second most votes among Democrats in the special election contest that ended November 7, 2006.

Below is an update from a friend in the know down in San Antonio.

Here's the lowdown as of sometime today... DCCC people were flying into town today to tell Ciro's what's going down.  If he liked it and was willing to play by the rules, fine.  If not, they're gonna pack it up.  I'll probably have more information on this meeting sometime later on this week.

From what I hear, the D-trip might just run this entire campaign as an independent expenditure.  Let Ciro try and raise some money so he can do his own thing, but run mail, field (the real field program) and any other media stuff through the d-trip. The DCCC is bringing in a top notch field person to run their show and that'll be that.  If there is one way to win this district with Ciro at the helm, this is basically the way to do it.

This story is a must read if you are curious at all to the working of the run-off in TX-23 and why things have been slow to develop. In short, if Ciro seriously wants to win the race, he's going to have to come to terms with the reality that letting his wife wield great power over his campaigns has to end. Sadly, when running in one of the largest congressional districts in the county in terms of land area, Ciro's door-to-door mantra will not win it for him in a one month campaign that spans 20+ counties.

Ciro is an amazing progressive and his heart and votes are in the right place. If we are going to win this election, we should be well advised to understand why certain people that can help (like the DCCC) are asking the questions they are before investing. Bonilla will be toast in 2008 if he's not removed next month. It's not a matter of if but rather when and by whom. And as I'm sure anyone in San Antonio can attest to, there are plenty of personalities that have various interests in outcomes either way in this run-off election.