If you're thinking of coming down to the Driskill to celebrate, please don't – they couldn't possibly fit one more Democrat into their ballroom. The scene here is just insane. A solid mass of humanity that sends up an ear-splitting roar every time another state goes for Obama. Oh, darn: MSNBC just called Texas for McCain. No surprise there, but the vote totals are closer than they should be: McCain 54%, Obama 46%.

All the presidential hub-bub doesn't drown out the fact that there's a three city issues on the ballot. First off, so much for the "no-brainer" argument: Early voting on Prop. 2 (the Stop Domain Subsidies amendment) stands at:
For: 91,390; 48.13%
Against: 98,483; 51.87%
Total Votes Counted in this Race: 189,873 Prop. 2? Doesn't that mean there's a prop. 1? Early voting for the establishment of an independent city auditor is up 72%-28%, and even in a tough economy, the AISD tax raise is looking like a shoe-in, running with 59% approval.

...at Ben & Jerry's ice cream on West Fifth St., where they're giving away a scoop to anyone that voted today. Just before 8pm the line was snaking through the parking lot.

The mood here at Dog & Duck is getting more intense--somewhat because there's an epic election happening, and more so because the wireless connection keeps pooping out (okay, that's just me freaking out about that), but mostly it's because everyone needs to pee. The line for the bathroom is beginning to compete with the line for the bar, and when I say "bathroom," I mean singular, because the girls room is broken. But no worries. Curtis the plumber will save us. Curtis is the new Joe, and I like him so much better.

Oops, reality sets in. Although performing well in Travis County, Larry Joe Doherty is behind after some other counties come in. Republican incumbent Congressman Michael McCaul is winning big in Harris' early voting, with 61,588 votes to Doherty's 29,125. Most of the rural counties have not come in yet.

Overall, after early voting:
McCaul 50.7%
Doherty 46.7%

Important: Bastrop County still hasn't reported. Democrat Ted Ankrum narrowly won Bastrop in 2006.

UPDATE: I won't make a definitive call, but it's hard for me to imagine Doherty can pull this off. It's only early voting numbers, but it's hard to imagine he can take back all of the current 11,006-vote deficit.

Incumbent Republican Pct. 3 Travis County Commissioner Gerald Daugherty appears to be in big trouble after early voting. Democratic challenger Karen Huber currently leads 51% to Daugherty's 45%. Libertarian Wes Benedict could be making the crucial difference, currently holding the other 4%. "It sound good," Huber just told me by phone, "but we need to see some precincts come in. I'm cautiously optimistic."

Rick Noriega is most likely going down in defeat tonight. Early voting statewide currently shows Cornyn 52%, Noriega 45%, and the Libertarian Schick at 2%.

Early voting results are in, and it's looking pretty comfortable for House Democrats in Travis. The ony close result is House District 47, where Donna Keel (and all that Craddick-friendly money) has pulled in 47% to Rep. Valinda Bolton's 53%: A comfy margin for the incumbent, but there's still all of today's votes to be counted. That said, Keel woud have to take a monster share of election day ballots to take the race, but there's 43 precincts to come in. After that, the nearest local race is (not unexpectedly) Donna Howard in HD-48 who, at 56%, is 16 points clear of Pamela Waggoner. See below the break for early voting results, or visit our election page. UPDATE: The must-watch race in Williamson County's HD-52 is a knife-edge, with Democrat Diana Maldonado running 50% to GOPer Bryan Daniel's 46%.

Democrat Larry Joe Doherty should be feeling good about the early voting results from Travis County. In his Congressional District 10 challenge to incumbent Republican Michael McCaul, he has taken 63% of the early vote. Back in 2006, Democrat Ted Ankrum only got 56% of Travis' early total, and was then swept away by McCaul once the other counties came in. Asked if they had a specific target for the Travis early vote, Doherty spokesman Jon Niven replied, "We were just shooting to do best we could. We knew the votes were there, we just had to get them to polls. And that was our field team, that did a dynamic job." Now, Doherty has to worry about how Harris County and the rural counties in the district will treat him, and whether his Travis lead is enough to hold off the more conservative parts of the district. "Obviously that’s going to be more of an uphill battle over there but we feel we've done great job on both ends of the district," Niven said. "The district was gerrymandered to be a difficult one to campaign in, but we’ve been traveling up and down the 160 miles of asphalt to make our impact known on both ends."