For our list of the most competitive legislative and congressional seats in the state, we lifted the color scheme from the inventors of the federal terror watch, ranking districts by the threat to each incumbent, to the incumbent party, or just by the level of interest in and heat generated by a particular race, then assigning each group a nice loud color.

Yellow means there's trouble on the sidewalk. Orange is trouble on the front porch. Red is trouble walking in the door.

Incumbents' names are in bold. Open seats are rated by the apparent margin between top candidates (closer is hotter) and the threat to the incumbent party's hold on the district. Inside each color, the races are listed by district — not by heat.

Changes this week: We added HD-108 to the list — in yellow, and raised HD-107 to orange. Early voting runs through Halloween.

Enlarge Ross Ramsey

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Enlarge Callie Richmond

Vote signs outside of early voting locations in Austin on Feb. 23, 2014.

With the early voting period for the upcoming midterm elections almost halfway done, the urge to read sustainable trends in the numbers collected so far is almost irresistible.

The latest figures from the Secretary of State's Office, which collects numbers over the first three days of early voting, point to a significant increase in turnout over the 2010 midterm elections in the state's 15 most populous counties. More than 485,000 early votes were cast through Wednesday. That's 50,000 more than had been cast after the first three days of early voting in 2010.

Finding a single, consistent trend behind this increase, though, defies easy analysis. For one thing, big jumps in early voting occur in some counties but skip others entirely. Big increases were seen in GOP redoubts such as Denton and Collin counties. A significant increase was also registered in Democratic stronghold Hidalgo County.

Among the very biggest counties, a strong increase in early voting is being seen in Tarrant County — home to a vigorous Tea Party movement as well as a strongly contested state Senate contest to choose a successor to Wendy Davis. After three days, more than 59,000 early votes had been cast, up 18,000 — or 44 percent — over four years ago.

In Bexar County, voters have the eastern end of the state's only competitive congressional race, between Pete Gallego and Will Hurd, and an increasingly nasty district attorney's race in which a single donor has given close to $700,000 to the challenger. Early voting there is up more than 10 percent, to about 56,500.

Turnout has been largely static, though, in Harris, Dallas and Travis counties.

Reading more into these numbers, for now, depends on whom you ask.

The Democratic turnout organization Battleground Texas interprets the increase in turnout as a result, to a certain extent, of its voter registration efforts. Spokeswoman Erica Sackin said her group has more than 8,600 deputy registrars working across the state to get voters on the rolls. And, she noted, volunteer activity is high in some traditionally Republican counties, such as Collin and Fort Bend.

Republican political consultant Craig Murphy of Murphy Nasica points to analysis done by his firm that shows these early voters so far tend to skew Republican. In Harris County, for instance, Democrats have made a big push this cycle to get more mail-in ballots in the hands of their voters. Murphy said his numbers show the two parties are at rough parity on mail-in ballots. But Republican-leaning voters have been showing up far more frequently to vote in person.

He sees similar trends in Dallas and Tarrant counties.

In Tarrant County, more than half the early votes cast countywide have been registered in Davis' SD-10. Nearly half the voters who have cast ballots in SD-10 have a history of voting in Republican primaries, according to Murphy's analysis. He said he sees similar trends of GOP-affiliated voters showing up in strength in several battleground House contests in neighboring Dallas County.

The big question, of course, is whether these trends will hold. While it's convenient to compare numbers from this year to 2010, there are limitations to the conclusions that can be drawn.

Also, GOP and Democratic voters tend to exhibit different behaviors during early voting. Republican voters traditionally show up earlier. Will Democrats again show up en masse during the second week and thus mitigate the GOP advantage showing up in Murphy's analysis?

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This week in the Texas Weekly Newsreel: The University of Texas/Texas Tribune polls are out ahead of the general election, Ebola swirls with politics and a longtime aide to Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst pleads guilty to embezzlement of campaign funds.

You can view the video at: https://trib.it/1zmNPBx

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We went to the insiders this week with the big question of the season, now that early voting is underway: What’s gonna happen?

In our search for conventional wisdom, we did not ask the insiders how they plan to vote but who they think will carry the day.

Not surprisingly, they foresee a Republican sweep in Texas in 2014.

Only small percentages predicted Democratic winners in any of the seven non-judicial statewide contests; the best performers among the Democrats (or the worst among the Republicans, if you prefer) were Leticia Van de Putte, the San Antonio senator running for lieutenant governor, and Mike Collier, the Houston accountant who would like to be the state’s next comptroller. Their opponents are Republican Sens. Dan Patrick of Houston and Glenn Hegar of Katy.

We collected comments along the way and a full set of those is attached. Here’s a sampling:

Enlarge Emily Albracht

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Who will win the race for governor?

• "It's not going to be as close as Democrats would like to think - not this time at least. "

• "What will be Battleground's excuse? It surely won't be lack of money. "

• "Abbott never had to run the race he and his team were prepared to run. Davis and her team ran a race that they'd like to forget. "

• "Duh"

• "Another repub sweep. For all of her star power on the East and left Coasts, Davis has run a terrible campaign."

• "You could've saved us time on all of these questions by offering a straight-ticket button--after all, that's what most voters are going to do!"

• "Its a Republican sweep and the Democrats and their allies in the media will respond as if it was somehow unfair -- but its just democracy. Democrats keep trying to win by changing the messenger -- Tony Sanchez, Trial Lawyer Bell, Trial Lawyer White, Wendy Davis -- but the problem isn't the messenger its the message. Texans are not going to vote for big spending, pro-trial lawyer, liberal, abortion on demand candidates, no matter who they are. "

Enlarge Emily Albracht

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Who will win the race for lieutenant governor?

• "Note to Battleground TX and Hollywood liberals: Next time, study where the levers of power reside in Texas before picking a candidate to fund."

• "By a bigger margin than Abbott..."

• "Even though the polls show a double digit lead for Dan Patrick, I can't bring myself to check the box beside his name even though this is just a survey. "

• "I'd much rather discuss A&M football on a Monday at the office. "

• "Van de Putte's inability to build any fire and momentum is the biggest surprise and disappointment of the cycle."

Enlarge Emily Albracht

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Who will win the race for attorney general?

• "Not sure who will be happier when Paxton wins: The TEA Party or the Texas media who gets to write about his lingering ethics issues."

• "Defaming attempts by the Republican left didn't work. Thank goodness. Paxton is a principled, courageous conservative."

• "Shame."

• "Anybody voting for Paxton is seriously delusional; an electorate that puts party first over felonious activity needs a serious gut check. "

• "Biggest victory by the most unqualified candidate for this job in recent history. D stands for dead. "

• "I bet Sam Houston gets the closest to 48"

Enlarge Emily Albracht

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Who will win the race for comptroller?

• "This is the one office where it is easier to assess a candidate's qualifications and where qualifications should prevail but won't. "

• "Best qualified candidate on the ballot for either party. "

• "Let's be honest here: Hegar is a political hack with no experience handling multi-billion dollar budgets while Collier is actually a CPA and knows how to crunch numbers, but we find ourselves in a position where, once again, the electorate puts party first over common sense. "

Enlarge Emily Albracht

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Who will win the race for land commissioner?

• "Didn't George P. already win this seat back in March?"

• "Without my vote. No more Bushes."

• "George P was affable enough until he refused to endorse his own father for President. Thanks for the reminder that there is craven. And then there is Bush craven. "

• "Actually like this guy; he's got the money and prestige but he also brings some class sometimes missing from our candidates and definitely a more practical approach as a Republican-Wish he and Straus did more together; maybe they will!"

Enlarge Emily Albracht

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Who will win the race for agriculture commissioner?

• "Sid Miller: Because traditional animal husbandry is between one heifer and one bull."

• "Really? He hasn't really campaigned on the issues and when he does, he doesn't understand what the office is responsible for and appropriations."

• "Like my ballot. I'm skipping this race."

• "Finally an Ag Commissioner who can actually drive a tractor."

Enlarge Emily Albracht

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Who will win the race for railroad commissioner?

• "Finally, new blood!"

• "We have railroads? Do they transport oil?"

Our thanks to this week's participants: Gene Acuna, Cathie Adams, Victor Alcorta, Clyde Alexander, George Allen, Jay Arnold, Charles Bailey, Dave Beckwith, Andrew Biar, Allen Blakemore, Tom Blanton, Chris Britton, Blaine Bull, David Cabrales, Raif Calvert, Lydia Camarillo, Kerry Cammack, Janis Carter, William Chapman, Beth Cubriel, Randy Cubriel, Denise Davis, June Deadrick, Nora Del Bosque, Glenn Deshields, Holly DeShields, Tom Duffy, David Dunn, Richard Dyer, Jeff Eller, Jack Erskine, John Esparza, Jon Fisher, Norman Garza, Dominic Giarratani, Bruce Gibson, Stephanie Gibson, Eric Glenn, John Greytok, Clint Hackney, Bill Hammond, Susan Hays, John Heasley, Ken Hodges, Steve Holzheauser, Laura Huffman, Deborah Ingersoll, Cal Jillson, Jason Johnson, Bill Jones, Mark Jones, Walt Jordan, Lisa Kaufman, Robert Kepple, Richard Khouri, Tom Kleinworth, Ramey Ko, Sandy Kress, Nick Lampson, Pete Laney, James LeBas, Luke Legate, Leslie Lemon, Myra Leo, Ruben Longoria, Matt Mackowiak, Luke Marchant, Mike McKinney, Steve Minick, Bee Moorhead, Mike Moses, Steve Murdock, Keir Murray, Keats Norfleet, Pat Nugent, Todd Olsen, Gardner Pate, Jerod Patterson, Robert Peeler, Bill Pewitt, Tom Phillips, Wayne Pierce, Allen Place, Royce Poinsett, Gary Polland, Jay Pritchard, Jay Propes, Karen Reagan, Patrick Reinhart, David Reynolds, Carl Richie, Grant Ruckel, Tyler Ruud, Jason Sabo, Luis Saenz, Andy Sansom, Jim Sartwelle, Barbara Schlief, Stan Schlueter, Bruce Scott, Robert Scott, Steve Scurlock, Ben Sebree, Bradford Shields, Christopher Shields, Julie Shields, Jason Skaggs, Ed Small, Martha Smiley, Larry Soward, Dennis Speight, Tom Spilman, Jason Stanford, Bob Strauser, Colin Strother, Michael Quinn Sullivan, Sherry Sylvester, Gerard Torres, Trey Trainor, Vicki Truitt, Corbin Van Arsdale, Ken Whalen, David White, Darren Whitehurst, Woody Widrow, Seth Winick, Peck Young, Angelo Zottarelli.

Enlarge Todd Wiseman

Saturday, Oct. 25

• Ending date for money reported on 8-day out campaign fundraising report

Sunday, Oct. 26

• GOP SD-2 candidate Bob Hall fundraiser; 501 Yacht Club Dr., Rockwall (3-5 p.m.)

Monday, Oct. 27

• 8-day out campaign fundraising reports due
• GOP HD-149 candidate Al Hoang meet and greet with guest U.S. Rep. John Culberson; 3423 Shadowmeadows Dr., Houston (6-7:30 p.m.)

Tuesday, Oct. 28

• State Rep. Borris Miles, D-Houston, fundraiser; 110 E. Ninth St., Austin (4:30-6 p.m.)

Wednesday, Oct. 29

• State Rep. Armando Walle, D-Houston, fundraiser; 110 E. Ninth St., Austin (5:30-7 p.m.)

Thursday, Oct. 30

• State Rep. Giovanni Capriglione, R-Southlake, wine tasting fundraiser; 77 Piazza Ln., Colleyville (6-9 p.m.)

The finger-pointing continued after the infection of two health care workers with the Ebola virus in Dallas. But questions were also raised as to whether state leaders used all the tools at their disposal to contain those who might have been exposed. And the state's task force on Ebola met, where it was emphasized that the state must be better prepared for future outbreaks of infectious disease.

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst's former adviser Kenneth "Buddy" Barfield pleaded guilty on Tuesday to charges of wire fraud, making a false tax return and embezzlement of funds contributed to a federal candidate. As part of the plea, Barfield admitted to taking $1.8 million from two Dewhurst campaign accounts from 2008 to 2012.

House Speaker Joe Straus took a position contrary to the increasingly popular stance in his party that the job-creating incentive Texas Enterprise Fund should be shut down. Straus, in remarks on Thursday at the annual meeting of the Texas Taxpayers and Research Association, said the program should be reformed but not necessarily eliminated.

Tonight's debate between Republican U.S. Sen. John Cornyn and Democratic challenger David Alameel will be seen in English after all. The Univision affiliate in Dallas planned to broadcast the debate dubbed into Spanish on Saturday. But The Texas Tribune will livestream the encounter, as will KUVN 23 Univision.

Disclosure: Univision is a corporate sponsor of The Texas Tribune. A complete list of Tribune donors and sponsors can be viewed here.

Roberto Dominguez of Elsa was appointed by Gov. Rick Perry to the board of the Office of Violent Sex Offender Management for a term to expire Feb. 1, 2016.

Elizabeth “Christy” Jack of Fort Worth was reappointed by Perry to the board of the Office of Violent Sex Offender Management for a term to expire Feb. 1, 2016.

Maggie Jaramillo of Richmond was appointed by Perry as judge of the 400^th Judicial District Court in Fort Bend County for a term to expire at the 2016 general election.

Jeff Meador of Austin was appointed by Perry to the Texas Lottery Commission for a term to expire Feb. 1, 2015.

GOP nominee for lieutenant governor Dan Patrick won the endorsement of the Texas Right to Life Political Action Committee.

GOP nominee for railroad commissioner Ryan Sitton won the endorsement of U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas.

Democratic nominee for HD-94 Cole Ballweg won the endorsement of the Texas Municipal Police Association and the Texas RN/APRN PAC.