The cumulative and canvass reports are now available on the Harris County Clerk website, meaning I can finally get started on some precinct analysis. I've got numerous tasks in the queue as you know, but for now, here's an observation that I could have made before but didn't think about till now: There were 601,186 votes cast in Harris County. Of those, 283,528 were straight-ticket votes for a Republican or Democrat (there were 3,052 straight-ticket Libertarian votes). That's 47.2% of the total, which is a little down from 2002, but basically in line with historic norms for non-Presidential year elections. Had Chris Bell received nothing but straight-ticket votes in Harris County, he'd have gotten 24.8% of the total (he actually got 34.5%). Remember all those polls that had him in the 15% range? This is why I never believed them.

Oh, and Dems had more straight ticket votes than Republicans did - 145,865 to 137,663. For what it's worth.