I know better than to get my hopes up. I've seen Democrats snatch defeat from the jaws of victory before. But let's face it, the handwriting on the wall does indeed seem to favor the donkeys this time around. Exhibit A: Look at the current polling on Majority Watch. Of the 54 House districts that RT Strategies/Constituent Dynamics is polling, 26 of them are projected to flip from one party to the other (27, if you count the Vermont seat that Independent Bernie Sanders is giving up, although he was functionally a Democrat). Of those 26, not one of them is projected to flip D to R. They're all predicted to go from Republican to Democrat. And that's not even counting Tom DeLay's former seat in TX-22, which seems certain to flip to Democrat Nick Lampson (EDIT: Or maybe not – see my new post on this race in the "Key Texas Races" section). Now of course, several of those races are within the margin of error, so a few could stay in Republican hands. But since the Dems need 16 to take back the House, that's a pretty healthy bit of breathing room. On top of that, there are five seats that are considered dead heats at the moment – and all five are currently in Republican hands. So put another way: Of the 202 currently Democratic seats, not one is under threat. The question is not whether the Democrats will gain, it's just whether they will gain enough. Any Yella Dog has to like those odds.

Week 8, Halloween week, brings some truly scary matchups. Taylor Field in Seguin, where No. 8 Westlake tries to hold off the charging Seguin Matadors and monstrous linebacker Marcus Richardson, last week's TexasFootball.com's Player of the Week for his frighteningly complete performance (16 tackles, one sack, two forced fumbles, one fumble recovery) in Seguin's 28-20 win over Austin High? A Seguin win basically hands them the 25-5A title. Or perhaps House Park, a house of horrors tonight for either Elgin or McCallum, who come in with identical 6-1, 5-0 records, tied for the top spot in 17-4A? Up north, Cedar Park, one of two remaining unbeatens in Central Texas, tangles with 14-5A surprise Westwood (6-1, 3-1) at Round Rock ISD Stadium, and minus RB Taylor Smith to boot.

With $5 million in repairs and improvements promised within for Austin Studios, Prop. 4 would be a shot in the arm to Austin's film scene. Understandably, the local film community is psyched about the proposition, and is pulling out the stops in promoting the prop. The talented crew at 05min Productions recently created an eye-popping, retro-chic commercial endorsing Prop. 4 on behalf of I'm for 4 PAC. And unlike those infamous “Vote for 4” fortune cookies reported earlier here, it has a campaign finance disclaimer prominently attached at the end.

But a completely different problem is – the clip appears to be a copyright infringement on the film it samples. The commercial is composed of clips from the 1970 Sidney Portier film They Call Me Mister Tibbs, sequel to the Academy Award winning In the Heat of the Night. Ingeniously, 05min Productions edited scenes from the film where its characters discuss the fate of their own Prop. 4. It's an ingenious repurposing of the original film, seamlessly pulled off.

Heh. Just wanted to write that.

Headed downtown to see if I can't scrape up a couple of tickets to the cold, wet, but playable game that could clinch the World Championship for the St. Louis Cardinals over the mighty Detroit Tigers. Will be watching the game regardless in the city, somewhere, probably in various places, at some point with my dad.

As you might recall, I attended game 4 with my game 5 tickets last night. The Cards got a win - a big win - and one more, even as sloppily charmed, will keep them from having to travel back to Detroit, where it is -294 with the wind chill and snowing Chinese stars and car batteries.

I met a girl named Maggie last night who liked the way I rhythmically banged on a Busch Stadium trashcan while Adam Wainwright went about getting five outs for the win. We had a lot of fun, and everybody celebrated afterward as if the Cardinals had indeed finished the thing, including my mom, a veteran of now four World Series since 1982 ('82, 1985, 1987, and 2006; she sold her 2004 tickets to Red Sox fans).

Due to an editing error, this week's paper version of the Chronicle accidentally cut Mary Beth Harrell's name off of our list of endorsements. So, lest anyone think we've retracted it: The Austin Chronicle enthusiastically endorses Mary Beth Harrell for Congressional District 31, which stretches from the Williamson County portion of North Austin, through Fort Hood, and up to Erath County. She is the best choice over that district's current wretched excuse for a congressman, John Carter. For the full-length text of our endorsements, click here.

The Ice Bats began their season with an exciting 3-2 shootout victory over the Bossier-Shreveport Mud Bugs at the noisy Chaparral Ice Arena last Saturday in front of a capacity crowd. Winning their first home game against the defending Northern Conference champs was nice, but keep in mind that the Mud Bugs were playing with a depleted roster due to immigration problems. Gotta keep those hockey-playing terrorists at bay. Still, we'll take the win, especially after a painfully slow start last year.

This weekend finds the Bats playing in an unusual home-road-home series of games. The home games are tonight at 7:30pm vs. the Lubbock Cotton Kings and Sunday at 4pm hosting the Laredo Bucks.

The Austin Music Hall will host Latin Explosion II tonight at 7pm. Both main event fights feature hometown boys, with local pugilist Brian Vera (11-0, eight knockouts) defending his middleweight title against Jose Spearman (27-12-4) of Indianapolis in an eight-rounder. The co-headlining brawl features Ray Lino Garcia (5-0) of Austin and Josh Burns (3-4-5) of Dallas in a junior middleweight contest. The Austin Music Hall is located at 208 Nueces.

In other boxing news, tickets are currently on sale for The Final Chapter Continued. Evander "The Real Deal" Holyfield (39-8-2, 26 knockouts) will face off against "Fast" Fres Oquendo (26-3) in a 12-round heavyweight bout. Holyfield is a four-time heavyweight champion but some insiders question whether he is too old to be in the ring and worry for his health and his legacy. Regardless, this pay-per-view fight will be going down at the Alamodome in San Antonio on Friday, Nov. 10. Tickets available from Ticketmaster.

Warning that "seven bad bonds enable seven bad habits," Travis County Libertarian Party schoolmarm Wes Benedict announced today his party opposes all seven City of Austin bond propositions. (On an unrelated note, WTF's up with the SRV statue on their website? Perchance, if the bonds do pass, would it be said "the sky is crying?")

Their brutal opinion, prop-by-prop, after the jump...

On the heels of W's recent assertion that he's "never been stay the course" comes this bruising campaign commerical from the Democratic National Committee.