As the Democrats take over Congress, there are some members from Texas who will be wielding some of the newly-obtained power or are in a position to make some moves this session.

This morning, President Bush announced that he will submit a five-year budget proposal that will balance the federal budget by 2012. The Congressional Budget Office projects the deficit for the current budget year will come close to $286 billion, while they see it reaching $1.76 trillion within the next ten years. Something must be done in order to get these numbers under control.

Today is when the Democrats roll into town, and tomorrow they take over Congress. However, the first 100 hours legislative blitz doesn't begin until next Tuesday, for various reasons. Democrats plan on getting some laws together on 9/11 Commission recommendations that never got any play, raising the minimum wage, stem cell research, and prescription / Medicare drug price negotiation regulations.

All over the state, county governments are being sworn in. This includes Dallas County, where the government flipped from Republican to Democrat. In case you hadn't heard. I think the self-awareness displayed by the party representatives in that article is refreshing - obviously nothing about Democratic advances can be taken for granted, and they seem ready to approach the challenges inherent to actual governance responsibly.

I wanted to take a moment to highlight Who's Blue? - a feature of this project that we're excited about, but what it actually is may not be clear. Who's Blue? is a podcast that we produce once a week, an interview with a leader in the Democratic party. This week's interview features a conversation with State Representative Mark Strama.

Paul Burka discussed what he's heard as Craddick's Plan B on his blog yesterday, and the Republican version of musical legislative seats makes sense - if Craddick can't keep the Speakership, then some shucking and jiving ensures the status quo is maintained when Craddick throws his support to a kinder, gentler Republican (Keffer) or not (King), and in return gets to chair Ways and Means.

I am pleased to welcome you both to 2007 and to The Texas Blue.

2006 was a long year with many victories and some requisite defeats. There was also a seemingly unending string of things to discuss concerning Texas politics, so much so that a few of us decided we needed a centralized place to have those discussions - about big ideas, where we're going, and where we'd like to be.

This isn't really unexpected, but Craig Watkins fired some people ahead of taking over as Dallas District Attorney tomorrow. No man is an island, and a District Attorney is usually driven to surround himself with team players, especially after the office changes political affiliation. An exception to the party rule occurred in my own Denton County, when Paul Johnson got rid of 25 people after his primary win over Republican incumbent D.A. Bruce Isaacks.

Combing through a Texas news cycle in which the politics coverage is dominated by the Race for Speaker, I discovered some hilarity in the Austin American-Statesman: Tom Craddick is going grassroots, and having a big old phonebank for some GOTV action.

Reports are flying from every source about Tom Craddick's sudden but not entirely unexpected difficulties in his race for Speaker of the Texas House. First McCall, then Talton, and now Jim Pitts have announced that in one capacity or another, they are all running against Craddick. Everyone claims to have pledges from this rep or that rep and everyone says they have the votes to win.