The Texas Department of Economic Development could get a new board of directors and be stripped of two of its highest-profile programs if a recommendation from the state’s Sunset Commission gets into print as a final report and through the Legislature next session.

Expect a photogenic skirmish for the benefit of the TV cameras when the Republican Attorneys General Association, or RAGA, gathers at the end of the month at the Barton Creek Resort in Austin. Texas AG John Cornyn is one of the founders of the GOP group and is a member of its executive committee. With the group holding its spring conference in a presidential candidate’s back yard, a couple of non-profit outfits — Texans for Public Justice and the Center for Public Integrity — are taking shots at him and the group, calling it everything from a bad idea to a protection racket.

You know it’s an upset when the winner, the loser and the allegedly dispassionate observers are all surprised on Election Day. Nobody even came close to predicting the result of the GOP primary in the 3rd Senate district. In fact, operatives in both campaigns were expecting a runoff and hoping, respectively, for a narrow win that would avoid an April contest.

If you haven’t heard of David McQuade Leibowitz, you haven’t been in front of a television set in Bexar County, Texas. The San Antonio trial lawyer is mounting a Democratic primary challenge against Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, who won office in a special election in November. And if money is the mother’s milk of politics, Leibowitz is one big, big baby: He’s loaned himself $429,000 and a boatload of that money is going into television advertising.

Rep. Kent Grusendorf, R-Arlington, has politically remade himself a couple of times. He was an elected member of the State Board of Education in the mid-1980s when reformers led by Ross Perot successfully pushed the idea of an appointed board. Having lost that job, he ran for the state Legislature, where he was in the middle of the education reform and school finance wars waged from the late 1980s into the 90s. Then he became something of a partisan, a move that cost him some of his clout and that he’s apparently ready to abandon. He says it was fun, but he wants to go back to the education concerns that attracted him to government in the first place.

Will voters in California buy another George W. Bush transformation, or will John McCain be more persuasive with his drumbeat about things like the Texas governor’s appearance at Bob Jones University in South Carolina? McCain got a win in Michigan while pounding Bush for intolerance, a charge that temporarily stuck in spite of Bush’s reputation here as a Republican who can attract more than the GOP’s traditional share of votes from Hispanics, African-Americans and women.

A reform aimed at John McCain’s conversion of campaign money from his Senate account to his presidential account could affect the future plans of Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas and others who have entertained the notion of someday running for state offices. In the days leading up to the South Carolina primaries, Gov. George W. Bush proposed ending the conversion of funds from one federal political account to another. As the Bush forces like to say, the biggest contribution in McCain’s presidential campaign is from McCain’s Senate account. The argument is a long-winded way to tie his shoelaces together on campaign finance reform.

The Republican presidential primary might turn out to be a race between incoming votes for the candidates on one hand, and public and press scrutiny of U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona on the other. He hid in the sun until late in the race, protecting himself from the kind of intense attention that can kill an insurgent campaign, and the Bush folks didn’t have him on their radar until he was well into the fight. They were paying attention to Steve Forbes, the spoiler four years ago. McCain is benefiting at this stage from voters’ willingness to look at something fresh. He might hold up just fine when people begin to look more closely. Or, he might turn into Ross Perot, who was initially attractive to the press and the public before close attention revealed his quirks and drained his support.