Wow - what a race!

Actually you could say that three times. Three races - House 63, JP 4 and Commish 4 - are all going to runoffs. No surprise there. Anytime you have that many candidates with no incumbents, and anytime the candidates are roughly equals in funding and energy, you're going to have close races.

But the split in House 63 was remarkable -- 24.6%, 23.6%, 23.1%, 15.1% and 13.6%. In the end, I voted for Anne Lakusta, but I still couldn't make up my mind going into the polling place. I just thought she would be stronger on schools.

Now it's down to two. Unless Grunden requests and wins a recount, our two finalists are Lakusta and Tan Parker. I think Lakusta has her work cut out for her, because I think Parker will be the stronger finisher in a one-on-one race. He ran the best campaign, to be sure, considering he had no previous experience as an office-holder coming into the race.

What I'd like to see Parker do is challenge Lakusta on schools. Tan, what can you do to make our schools better? That is my question. I think it's a sentiment running very strong with Texas voters (note the stunning Grusendorf defeat in Arlington's House 94). I don't think Lakusta would have garnered as many votes as she did without voters showing a primary concern for education, and funding. If Tan can wrest the education issue from Lakusta, he can win the runoff 60-40 or better.