By Maggie Lineback

It has turned out to be a beautiful day. After our 9 am live shot in Austin, the 10, 11 and 12 o’clock hours didn’t want us so we were free to make our way to Houston. That’s where we will be doing an overnight shift tonight.

With no hits to worry about, the long drive through Central Texas was relaxing. I hadn’t seen this part of Texas before. Most of the country is pretty flat grassy land punctuated by small undulating hills, like a gentle swell. It’s easy to drift off into your own thoughts. Wildflower season must be on its way because I saw small orange flowers dotting the highway. Kris Gutierrez found a country station on the radio. I’m not a big fan of country, but after a bunch of road trips with Kris, it’s growing on me. A little.

We stopped for lunch at a Whataburger restaurant, a chain that started here in Texas. Kris Gutierrez thinks it has the best fast food burger. A freelance photographer who works with us says no way- In and Out is best. I, being the only one with truly refined taste in this crew, prefer White Castle.

We make it to Houston in time for our last hit of the day. The polling station is seeing steady traffic. The spokesman for the Harris County Clerk says in a normal primary no one would be here at this time of day. The crowds come before work and after. We will be long gone by the time the post work crowd gets here. We get a few hours off before we come back in at 10pm for our overnight shift.

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By Maggie Lineback

7:32 a.m. I am convinced television news is not possible without massive quantities of caffeine. This morning proves it. Our first liveshot is at 6am again, this time is front of a polling station in Austin. But this morning, as opposed to yesterday, the Election Link Vehicle has decided to bestow its goodwill upon us and come up without a hitch. We do the hit then race across town to the Travis County Clerk’s office where they are loading up extra voting machines to send to polling places that might need them. Banner turnout is expected Texas wide. The polls open at 7am local time.

9:30 a.m. We just finished up a live shot outside a polling location in Austin. About 50 people were lined up when it opened. Business has been brisk. We have done three out of three live shots with no issues and are now on our way to Houston.

From outside and inside the Travis Co Clerks office where they are fielding election day calls. Also, outside a polling location.

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By Maggie Lineback

There’s a story about the Texas Rangers that goes something like this. A Texas town calls for help because of a riot over a boxing match. The train arrives, the town is anxious and a lone Ranger steps off the train. The townspeople are perplexed- where is the rest of the help? The Ranger replies, “You got one riot? You need one Ranger.”

Texans are prone to hyperbole by nature but there’s no exaggerating the Texas Rangers’ impact on law enforcement and popular culture. They started out as a voluntary militia to protect frontier settlers and have become an elite law enforcement unit. Rangers have to spend years as police officers before they can even apply to become Rangers. There are only about 100 or so of them across Texas.

But that’s not how you know them. You know them from TV and movies- the Lone Ranger, Walker Texas Ranger- a guide here says 300 movies have a character in it who is a Ranger.

We come here because it’s a convenient stop between Dallas and Austin- and it’s cool. I also get my first chance to off road in the ELV. Actually, it’s just onto the grass but we leave tracks that make me cringe when we finally head to our next stop- Austin.

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By Maggie Lineback

8:45 am ET: We are cursed. Our first live shot was supposed to be at 6am at a 24 hour coffee shop called Cafe Brazil. It’s in the Uptown section of Dallas. When we arrived, it was coming down so hard we could barely see the road. Apparently, the Election Link Vehicle is cantankerous when it comes to weather. We beg. We plead. No dice. I feel like if we just get out of Dallas, our luck will change.

9:33 am ET: Hurrah! Live television. It was only a thirty second hit but we actually made it.

We are in Waxahachie, TX which is about 30 miles south of Dallas. There’s a quaint town square with a big courthouse. We stopped in to the Courthouse Cafe where locals are grabbing breakfast and a cup of coffee. That sounds like what we will do right after Kris Gutierrez does a radio hit. There is nothing like chicken fried steak for breakfast!

12:12 ET: Every once in a while you come across something completely unexpected.

For example, you wouldn’t expect to find a large Czech population in say, Texas, but pull into West, TX and before you can say Jak Se Mas (how are you?) you’d be disabused of that notion. Apparently a good percent of the people here can trace their roots back to Czech farmers, ranchers and shopkeepers who settled in the area en masse in the 1890s.

The highlight of West for most travelers is the Czech stop and Little Czech Bakery. And the highlight of the bakery is a delicious little concoction called the Kolache. It’s a special type of dough filled with savory or sweet stuff. The sausage and cheese kolache is the big seller.

Evelyn in the bakery says she will be heading out to vote tomorrow. She will also be attending a caucus for the first time and she’s pretty excited about it. She won’t be alone. In bigger counties some of the caucus organizers are worried there won’t be room for everybody at some locations.

We’re getting pea-sized hail. As previous noted, all sorts of things seem to go wrong with ELV in weather. Now the “link wireless” that less us ditch cables is on the fritz. So we are going old school and hooking the camera to the Election Link Vehicle.

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By Maggie Lineback

So we are sitting in an empty parking lot trying to get the Election Link Vehicle to work. Our audio tech dubbed it the Urban Assault Vehicle but right now we are in danger of assaulting no one. We drove to this lot a couple miles away from the Farmers Market to see if maybe there was something blocking the signal—in the middle of a parking lot with no structures or trees nearby we should have no such problems.

The scene is surreal. I hear someone on a loud speaker. I figure it’s some kind of political rally. But when I look up I notice barbed wire and realize there a homeless shelter across the street. There are dozens of men listening to a preacher. We could use a little divine intervention ourselves.

This is a picture of the Election Link Vehicle in a Dallas parking lot as we try to figure out what’s wrong. Its markings were stripped off after the Phil Keating trip cross-country. We feel very stealthy. With the DC plates, we could be a Secret Service vehicle. Our photographer said yesterday someone thought we were a storm chasing vehicle. (Read more about Phil Keating’s trip, CLICK HERE!)

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By Maggie Lineback

The Farmer’s Market in Dallas has been here for years—since the forties to be exact. The city says it’s the nation’s largest centrally located working farmer’s market. When we arrive at 6:30 on Sunday morning, it’s still dark and hardly anyone is here yet. A couple farmers are unloading corn on the wholesale side of the market. Soon individual vendors start to trickle in to their stalls. The market opens at seven and one vendor tells me they expect a good day today, since the weather is supposed to be warm.

This time of year, local hucksters get most of their fruit and veggies from warehouses nearby. Much of the produce you see in the stands comes from California this time of year, but soon Texas farms will be producing more of the stuff for sale here.

These people work hard. They’re here day in and day out, all day. The market’s open seven days a week. They say in terms of politics, there’s one big issue for them—the economy. Slight shifts can make or break their business.

As for us, our first live shot was at 7:45am EST, 6:45 our time. It didn’t happen because of technical issues. The fact that we can go live at all from what’s basically a tripped out Expedition is still something I’m trying to get my head around. Usually it takes a big sat truck and at least a half hour or an hour of set up time and cable runs to get things up and running. Going into it, I figured we’d have glitches at some point or another. I guess it’s best for us to figure them out at the front end of our three-day trip. But for the poor producers in NY who were counting on these live shots for their show, they probably feel much differently.

Check out some of the pictures..

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By Maggie Lineback

There’s early voting in Texas, so for eleven days ending the Friday before March 4th, voters can avoid the mad dash on Tuesday and head to the polls at their leisure. But a funny thing happened on the way to the precinct. There’s been something of a mad dash EVERY day of early voting. Election workers knew they were in for it from day one. We were in Harris County (Houston) and the head of the elections told us the first day numbers were higher than the ones from the last day of early voting in the previous primary. That’s important, since the last day of early voting is usually when they see the big numbers—because procrastinators like me finally figure they’d better go down and vote. But in this election, the numbers have started and remained solid each and every day.

When I went down to vote (a full day before the deadline, thank-you very much) a poll worker toll me they’d had about eight or nine hundred people come through each day. And that’s just one precinct. But it’s not an anomaly. Across Texas, the same thing is happening. The Texas Secretary of State says in the fifteen counties with the most people, the vote’s been building, from about 80,000 to 140,000 voters casting their ballots each day.

The head of elections in Dallas County, Bruce Sherbet, told me he’s just thankful there is early voting. He says it gives his department a sense of what to expect Tuesday. He adds, “Can you imagine this kind of event if there was only an election day only?”

There’s no such heads up for the people organizing Tuesday night’s precinct conventions (caucuses.) In Texas, Democrats split their delegates between the primary and the caucuses. You go to vote at the polls and then come back to your polling place at 715pm to caucus. Unfortunately for organizers, the decision of where to hold the caucuses was made months ago, before anyone knew Texas would be a big deal. The Chair of the Party in Harris County told me usually only a few of the party faithful- at most ten or twenty- show for the precinct conventions. Now, in every speech, you’ll hear both campaigns urge their voters to caucus. So how many will follow through? 50? 500? Who can tell? Organizers are anxious there may not be room for everyone.

What’s driving all this? Experts say it’s the excitement that the Texas primary might actually decide something. I, for one, can’t wait till Tuesday.

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By Lee Ross

We made it. The Pacific Ocean is right here with the beautiful brown sand beaches. The waves crashing upon the shore with a constant but not threatening presence. That’s it.

The team stops for one last snapshot!

For 15 days we traversed America. From the steps of the Capitol where the next president will be sworn into office in less than 11 months to here, where we saw as much as we could in between. It has been a fun and exhausting trip. I hope you have enjoyed following us on our journey Across America. We certainly enjoyed making the trip.

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By Lee Ross 

Our first stop in the L.A area was at the Los Osos High School in Rancho Cucamonga.  Here we met with four bright and articulate student who later this year will cast their first ballots for president. I don’t think its a stretch to say we were all impressed with these yound adults who effectively expressed their concerns about the economy and the war in Iraq. We also heard a little bit about their anxiousness in not yet hearing back from college admission offices.  Good luck!

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