Swing State Project - Polls

KY-Sen: Mixed Bag o' Nuts

Crisitunity — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 05:47:36 GMT

Opinion Research Corp. for CNN/Time (pdf) (9/2-7, registered voters, no trendlines):

Jack Conway (D): 46
Rand Paul (R): 46
Undecided: 4
(MoE: ±3.5%)

Hooray! The citizens of Kentucky have finally seen through Rand Paul's attempts to put a conventional Republican gloss on his oddball libertarianism! All the momentum is with Jack Conway! Oh, wait... what's that? It's a poll of registered voters at this late date? Taking into mind how much PPP's numbers have fallen off since the switch from a more-or-less RV model to a pure likely voter model, that should mean... aw, crap.

SurveyUSA for WHAS-TV and Louisville Courier-Journal (8/30-9/1, likely voters, 7/27-29 in parentheses):

Jack Conway (D): 40 (43)
Rand Paul (R): 55 (51)
Undecided: 5 (5)
(MoE: ±4.2%)

Oh, no! The bottom's fallen out for Jack Conway in the last month! Wait... what's that? The self-identified 47% Dem, 42% GOP, 10% Other breakdown of this poll is totally out of whack with Kentucky's historic voting patterns? (Dems have always had at least a 25% registration advantage over GOPers, and recalculation to reflect that traditional breakdown points to a 51-44 margin, according to analysis by Pete Brodnitz, of Conway pollster the Benenson Group.) Hmmm, guess we'd better get down from that ledge.

Well, how about a tie-breaker, then? On behalf of somebody called the Kentucky Leadership Council, Democratic pollster John Anzalone (I'm not sure if this is just imprecision on The Fix's part, or if he's operating truly outside of Anzalone-Liszt) is out with a poll that gives Rand Paul a 48-45 lead over Jack Conway. However... one other thing missing from the writeup of this poll is whether or not it's freakin' registered voters or likely voters! Aaaghghgh! [begins pounding head on desk] (Update: The polling memo gives us answers to two questions - it was by ALR, and its sample was of likely voters.)

Oh, by the way, at least we can be certain about one thing: how much money Jack Conway raised with his one-day moneybomb event yesterday. He set a $260K goal and went well past it, raising "more than" $300K (although it sounds like at least $45K of that was lined up ahead of schedule). As for Paul, he's up with his first TV ad of the general, highlighting his time as a physician, rather messianically titled "Gift of Sight." (No mention of his breaking with Big Ophthalmology to start his own renegade certification scheme, though.) No offical WOTSOTB, but estimates are of $250K.

ME-Gov: Mitchell Trails LePage by 14 Points

James L. — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 22:32:29 GMT

Public Policy Polling (9/2-6, likely voters, no trend lines):

Libby Mitchell (D): 29
Paul LePage (R): 43
Eliot Cutler (I): 11
Shawn Moody (I): 5
Kevin Scott (I): 1
Undecided: 12
(MoE: ±2.6%)

Good grief:

The thing drivings the GOP poll advantage in Maine are the same we're seeing everywhere: a unified Republican base, a lack of interest from Democratic voters, a strong GOP lean with independents, and the specter of an unpopular Democratic President and Governor hanging over the heads of the party's candidates.

Stop me if you've heard this one before:

The same depressed Democratic interest that helped sink the party in the Massachusetts Senate election, as well as last fall's races for Governor in New Jersey and Virginia, is showing itself in Maine. We find those likely to vote in the state supported Barack Obama by a 7 point margin in 2008, in contrast to his actual 17 point victory there. That enthusiasm gap contributes a lot to the margin of LePage's lead but make no mistake- with him winning 76% of McCain voters and Mitchell at only 52% with Obama's he'd be in the lead even if the electorate looked the same as in 2008.

UPDATE: The DGA is up with a TV spot hitting LePage on his environmental protection policies (or lack thereof).

TX-Gov: Perry, Under 50, Leads White by 6

James L. — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 21:28:54 GMT

Public Policy Polling (9/2-6, likely voters, 6/19-21 in parens):

Bill White (D): 42 (43)
Rick Perry (R-inc): 48 (43)
Undecided: 12 (14)
(MoE: ±4.2%)

PPP's switch from a registered to a likely voter model gives Rick Perry a six-point lead. Interestingly, that switch only translated into a 52-41 McCain sample from a 51-41 sample in June. However, the sample is significantly more Republican (47R-30D from 43R-37D in June) and whiter (70% from 66%).

Despite Perry's edge, Tom Jensen calls White, along with Colorado's John Hickenlooper, "one of the two strongest new Democratic candidates in the country this year". That's evidenced by White's promising 44-29 favorable rating, especially when stacked up against Perry's 36-49 approval rating. More:

The race is confounding the major trends we're seeing in most contests across the country. White is winning independents 53-34. Republicans have the lead with them most everywhere else. White's winning 82% of Democrats while Perry's getting 77% of Republicans. Republican voters are more unified than Democrats most everywhere else. But there are a lot more GOP voters than Dems in Texas so Perry's still ahead anyway.

PPP also tested the Lt. Governor's race, and finds incumbent David Dewhurst up by 54-34 on his spirited Democratic challenger, Linda Chavez-Thompson. That Bill White is poling competitively while the lower-ticketed races look like Solid R affairs is both a testament to White's strength - and Perry's weakness.

Meanwhile, PPP's Dustin Ingalls takes a look at an issue that may have some resonance in Texas this year (much as it did in 1994): term limits.

SSP Daily Digest: 9/8 (Afternoon Edition)

Crisitunity — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 19:24:30 GMT

• AK-Sen: It seems like Lisa Murkowski's meetings with the Libertarian Party didn't lead to anything conclusive (while David Haase sounded amenable, the state party sounds opposed), as the signals she's putting out now seem to point more toward a write-in campaign, if anything. According to Roll Call, she's "strongly considering it" and will have an announcement as early as tomorrow. In case you're wondering about TX-22-style hilarity ensuing, the Alaska Division of Elections confirms that a voter can spell her name incorrectly and still have the vote count, which makes the prospect of a write-in campaign for Linda Mukrosky somewhat more doable.

• CO-Sen: Ken Buck may have dirty boots, but he's been busy scrubbing his website sparkly clean. The Michael Bennet camp has been observing lots of minor changes to Buck's website to make it more mainstream-y, with softer-sounding rewrites on his issues page on Afghanistan, stem cell research, and immigration.

• DE-Sen: In another sign that the GOP primary between Mike Castle and Christine O'Donnell isn't dialing down, both Castle and the Tea Party Express (on behalf of O'Donnell) are both extending their previous ad buys, starting today and running through next Tuesday's election. Again, kudos to Hotline's Jeremy Jacobs, who knows not only the Size Of The Buy but the complete breakdown (Castle, for instance, spent $75K in the Salisbury broadcast market, $27K on statewide cable, and $43K on radio, while the TPX spent $32K on cable only). He also susses out that at the current trajectory, the TPX will reach only slightly past the halfway point on its promise to spend $250K on O'Donnell, unless they want to blow a lot of money at the last minute in the pricey Philadelphia market. Meanwhile, TPM checks out how TPX's ongoing moneybomb for O'Donnell has been going, who has raised $89K since TPX got involved. Despite O'Donnell's frequent attacks on Castle's use of out-of-state money to power his campaign, they highlighted their $250+ donors, and a grand total of one (of 56) was a Delawarean.

• FL-Sen, FL-25: Biden alert! With Kendrick Meek having raised some bucks at a New York appearance with Bill Clinton last night, now he turns his attention to an upcoming fundraiser with the VPOTUS. (Expect to see the usual GOP carping about "Big Hollywood," seeing as how the fundraiser is in Hollywood. Hollywood, Florida, that is.) 25th District candidate Joe Garcia will also be a beneficiary.

• PA-Sen: The Philadelphia Inquirer has a rundown of Pat Toomey's past history of earmarks, in of course blatant contradiction with the pledges of austerity that define his current campaign... yet another Republican example of government largesse for me, but not for thee. In his first term in PA-15, Toomey won $9 million in earmarks, including $3 million for one company (Air Products & Chemicals) that then became his single biggest campaign contributor.

• CA-Gov: Steve Poizner seems to have finally gotten the message, if a few months on the late (and tepid) side. The Republican primary loser gave his endorsement to Meg Whitman yesterday... via press release.

• MI-Gov: Local pollster Mitchell Research is out with what appears to be their first poll of the general election in the Michigan gubernatorial race; like most pollsters, they find Republican Rick Snyder with a solid lead. He's ahead of Democrat Virg Bernero 53-26.

• OH-Gov: Bill Clinton will be in Ohio on behalf of (Hillary endorser) Ted Strickland on the 14th, also the day of his first debate with John Kasich. Clinton will stump for Strickland in both Cleveland and Columbus.

• NC-08: With the DCCC having rolled out a GQR internal poll yesterday giving Larry Kissell a decent lead (48-36) in the 8th (on top of Kissell releasing his own internal in late August with a 49-32 lead), GOP rival Harold Johnson offered up his own poll today to show he's still in this thing. His poll from POS finds Kissell still leading, but by a more surmountable margin: 39-34.

• NV-03: Politico has details on EMILY's List weighing into the 3rd, with a two-week TV ad blitz going after Joe Heck on women's health issues (like his vote against mandated insurance coverage for the HPV vaccine). While the article doesn't have a link to the ad, let alone the Size Of The Buy, it does have a very interesting look at the advanced micro-targeting they're using, focusing on very specific TV shows as well as Hulu and Facebook users.

• OH-16: Someone get Jim Renacci a high school history textbook, stat! When asked at the candidates' first debate what he'd like to do about civil rights, the Republican challenger to John Boccieri retreated to Rand Paul-style teabagger boilerplate, saying "We need to get our federal government out of the way," and that it was better dealt with as "local issues." Yeah, because local and state governments in the 50s and 60s were the paragons of tolerance and virtue during the civil rights movement, and that federal government just came in and screwed everything up...

• DGA: If you've been wondering what they're up to at the DGA, they're out with a strategy memo that outlines the next few months. Wisely, they're most concerned with the states with the greatest population and hence greatest redistricting impact, meaning that the smaller states with Dem-held open seats (Kansas, Wyoming, etc.) have already probably been on the losing end of their triage decisions.

• TX-St. House: We at SSP have been remiss in focusing on state legislatures in the last few months (for the same reason everyone else has -- it's hard to get good intelligence on them, and there's too dang much to focus on just at the national level alone), but Burnt Orange Report has done a bang-up job profiling the race for the Texas state House, one of the few legislatures where the Dems are on the offensive and have a slim but legitimate shot at a flip. They've written up summaries of the 21 hottest races, all helpfully collected in one place at the link.

• SSP TV:
• IL-Sen: Alexi Giannoulias ad rolling out his biggest gun: backing from Barack Obama
• PA-Sen: Not one but two ads from Pat Toomey ads with pretzel logic about how his time on Wall Street tells him that one shouldn't bail out Wall Street
• WI-Sen: Ron Johnson ad hits Russ Feingold again for being a career politician
• TX-Gov: Bill White talks about border security
• VT-Gov: Dem group Green Mountain Future hits Brian Dubie on support for keeping local nuclear plant open
• FL-24: First Suzanne Kosmas ad hits Sandy Adams on teh crazy, especially the 17th Amendment
• GA-08: Jim Marshall ad tries to outflank Austin Scott on the right on the immigration issue
• MI-01: DCCC's 2nd IE ad goes after Dan Benishek on Social Security
• NY-25: Dan Maffei's first ad is anti-Ann Marie Buerkle, using Sarah Palin endorsement against her
• PA-06: Manan Trivedi's second ad this week focuses on his time as a military doctor

• Rasmussen:
• AZ-Gov: Terry Goddard (D) 38%, Jan Brewer (R-inc) 60%
• CA-Gov: Jerry Brown (D) 42%, Meg Whitman (R) 46%
• CA-Sen: Barbara Boxer (D-inc) 42%, Carly Fiorina (R) 47%
• KY-Sen: Jack Conway (D) 38%, Rand Paul (R) 51%

SSP Daily Digest: 9/7 (Afternoon Edition)

Crisitunity — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 20:09:38 GMT

• AK-Sen: Once again, the Swing State Project is proud to issue one of its once-in-a-blue-moon endorsements, and to do it for Scott McAdams, the Democratic nominee in Alaska. We're two-thirds of the way to our $2,400 goal, and we've just hit 50 contributors, so please join in!

• CO-Sen, CO-Gov: This is a real head-scratcher: Ken Buck's camp is out with an internal poll by POS... showing him losing (despite what a number of public polls have said)?!? The poll gives a 43-40 edge to Michael Bennet, with 5 going to the Libertarian candidate. Either this is an odd attempt to mess with Dems' heads, or, more likely, a message to his supporters to stop taking the race for granted and to keep the contributions flowing. UPDATE: OK, this isn't a Buck internal; it's a joint POS/Fairbank Maslin collaboration, and it's not said on whose behalf this poll was performed. One other bit of news from the poll: it also includes gubernatorial numbers, and John Hickenlooper is closing in on the 50% mark. He's at 48, to 25 for Dan Maes and 15 for Tom Tancredo.

• DE-Sen: Tax liens and penalties are sort of the common cold of political scandals, but this isn't timed well for Mike Castle, who's trying to stave off a last-minute zone-flooding from Tea Party Express on behalf of Christine O'Donnell. Castle had to make interest and penalty payments three times on his Capitol Hill pad in 2005 and 2006, although of course that pales in comparison to O'Donnell's long track record of ducking her bills. Meanwhile, we have a sense of what the Tea Party Express's fully operational battle station looks like: they've spent only $60K on O'Donnell's behalf so far, but plan to have spent $250K by the primary (including more airing of their TV spot and radio ad, as well as direct mail and out-of-state phone banking).

• KY-Sen: The moneybomb shoe's on the other foot: Jack Conway's doing an online one-day fundraising scramble today. As of 1 pm ET, the day's total was up to $130K. Meanwhile, against that moneybomb backdrop, is an instance of a paid Rand Paul staffer having gotten caught sockpuppeting over at Daily Kos, concern-trolling against Conway from the left.

• NH-Sen: A lot of money ($10K from various officers and employees) has flowed into Kelly Ayotte's campaign from a decidedly sketchy company in Texas: Tax Masters, one of those companies that relies heavily on late-night advertising to generate business for helping resolve debts owed to the IRS. The company and its CEO were charged with multiple violations of Texas's consumer protection laws, in the wake of hundreds of consumer complaints.

• OH-Sen, OH-Gov: The Columbus Dispatch offers up some truly bad numbers for the Democratic candidates in Ohio, finding Rob Portman leading Lee Fisher 50-37 in the Senate race and John Kasich leading Ted Strickland 49-37 in the governor's race (and the GOP winning all lower statewide races too), among registered voters. One important caveat, though: the Dispatch's poll are notoriously an all-mail-in survey (why not just poll subscribers to Literary Digest?!?), and have consistently ranked dead last in most of 538's pollster ratings (until the most recent installment, when they managed to leap ahead of a few other members of the rogues' gallery, including Research 2000, ARG, and Zogby Interactive).

• WA-Sen: Patty Murray leaked an internal poll today to Politico, showing that the needle has barely budged in this race between two ubiquitously-known, well-defined candidates. The Fairbank Maslin poll gives Murray a 50-45 lead, and 53/42 approval. An April internal by the same pollster, back when Dino Rossi was only considering entering the race, gave Murray an 8-point lead.

• MA-Gov: A poll from local wire service State House News Service gives a decent lead to Deval Patrick, thanks to an assist from Tim Cahill. Their first poll of the gubernatorial race has Patrick leading Republican Charlie Baker, independent Cahill, and Green Party candidate Jill Stein 34-28-18-4, among registered voters.

• MD-Gov: For every Joe Miller, there's, well, a Brian Murphy. The Washington Post takes a quick look at the upstart GOP gubernatorial candidate, whose Sarah Palin endorsement hasn't turned into much of anything (other than a way for Bob Ehrlich to burnish his moderate credentials). In the pre-primary reporting period (all of which covers the post-Palin period), he's raised only $35K, including $14K from himself, leaving him with $31K CoH. Ehrlich raised $725K over the 18-day period, taking him to $2.5 million CoH, while Dem Martin O'Malley raised $267K and has $6.5 million CoH.

• MI-Gov: While organized labor is the biggest force propelling Dem Virg Bernero in Michigan, there's one union that isn't falling in line. The state's largest construction union, the Michigan Regional Council of Carpenters and Millwrights, is backing Rick Snyder instead. More alarmingly for Bernero, the much-larger Teamsters haven't endorsed yet and could conceivably go for Snyder too.

• MS-Gov: The 2011 election is only fourteen months away, and things are taking shape in Mississippi. Phil Bryant, the first-term Republican Lt. Governor, is taking steps to prepare for a bid. Businessman Dave Dennis also seems likely to run, while the state's great-named SoS, Delbert Hosemann, also sounds like he's interested.

• TX-Gov: We have two wildly divergent polls in Texas, both from GOP pollsters. Hill Research, on behalf of the Texas Watch Foundation (in a poll that seems primarily about homeowners' insurance reform, but where the gube race seems to have gotten thrown-in as an attention-getter), finds Rick Perry leading Bill White by only a 42-41 margin. On the other hand, GOPAC (perhaps having gotten an advance heads-up about the Texas Watch numbers) rolled out numbers showing Perry in better shape. Their poll, via Wilson Research Strategies, gives Perry a 50-38 lead over White.

• KS-04: With polling now pretty consistently showing Mike Pompeo leading Raj Goyle by single digits in the open seat race in the 4th, the last thing the Republicans can afford here is a high-profile third-party challenge on the right. That's what they might get, though, if businessman (and former Tic-Tac-Dough host) Wink Hartman follows through on threats to pick up the just-abandoned Libertarian ballot line. The state party has started scrambling to lean on Hartman to get him to stand down.

• NY-various: There's a bonanza of pre-primary fundraising reports in New York (where the primary is next week). The biggest raiser among the various Republican House challengers was Chris Cox in the 1st, who raised $103K to Randy Altschuler's $59K (although Altschuler still has a big CoH advantage). In the 23rd, the numbers were much smaller: Matt Doheny raised $41K and Doug Hoffman raised $37K, although Doheny has about three times Hoffman's CoH.

• WV-01: On the back of the DCCC's wave of internal polls today, here's one more poll that probably has to go in the "good news" file: an internal poll, from POS, has Republican David McKinley trailing Dem Mike Oliverio in the open seat race in the 1st. Oliverio leads McKinley 41-36. The only other poll of this race was an Oliverio internal last month that gave him a seemingly too-good-to-be-true 52-36 lead over McKinley, but at the very least, it seems like everyone's in agreement that Oliverio's in pole position for now.

• Ads:
• CO-Sen: The DSCC is out with an ad in Colorado, letting Ken Buck go after himself with his own words on Social Security and the 17th Amendment
• DE-Sen: Mike Castle's new ad is out; predictably, it goes after Christine O'Donnell for her crazy finances
• FL-Sen: First TV ad from Charlie Crist, stressing his (what else?) independence; also Kendrick Meek's first TV ad, which is him on a swamp boat and stressing his (what else?) Dem credentials
• MO-Sen: Roy Blunt ad about how much he loves small business
• OH-Sen: Lee Fisher's first TV ad out of the gate is negative, going after Rob Portman for being George Bush's job-exporting trade representative
• CA-Gov: Strangely sepia-toned ad is Jerry Brown's first, seemingly to remind older Californians about how much things sucked less when he was Governor the first time (SOTB: $1.2 million for one week... that's California for you)
• FL-Gov: Rick Scott's first post-primary TV ad is an attack ad against... Barack Obama? (and Alex Sink, too, I guess)
• GA-Gov: Roy Barnes goes negative against Nathan Deal on the issues of his recently-released tax returns, calling him "too corrupt even for Congress"
• SC-Gov: Nikki Haley's first TV spot, outsider-themed with a jab at Mark Sanford
• FL-22: The new Ron Klein spot is another anti-Allen West spot, but still hammering on the tax liens instead of, well, West's non-stop stream-of-consciousness crazy
• ID-01: Walt Minnick's first TV spot: please disregard the "D" next to his name, because he's independent
• IN-02: The NRCC's first television IE of the cycle, hitting Joe Donnelly for, well, being a Democrat
• IN-08: Trent van Haaften's first TV ad is a basic introductory spot
• PA-03: Kathy Dahlkemper's second ad tries to cram "jobs" in there as many times as possible
• PA-06: Manan Trivedi's first TV ad also works the outsider angle
• PA-11: Paul Kanjorski's second ad works the Social Security privatization angle, smart in such an aged district
• PA-15: Interestingly, Charlie Dent's first ad is a negative shot against John Callahan (on local property taxes), indicating he may be feeling some heat here
• WI-07: Julie Lassa's second ad goes after Sean Duffy for saying that he can't do anything to create jobs
• AFSCME: Here's the big buy of the day: the AFSCME is shelling out $1.5 million in four states (Michigan, Nevada, Ohio, and Pennsylvania) for an ad attacking Republicans for voting against the state aid package in August)

• Rasmussen:
• DE-Sen: Chris Coons (D) 37%, Mike Castle (R) 48%
• DE-Sen: Chris Coons (D) 47%, Christine O'Donnell (R) 36%
• ID-Gov: Keith Allred (D) 36%, Butch Otter (R-inc) 52%
• ID-Sen: Tom Sullivan (D) 24%, Mike Crapo (R-inc) 63%
• MA-Gov: Deval Patrick (D-inc) 39%, Charlie Baker (R) 34%, Tim Cahill (I) 18%
• NE-Gov: Mike Meister (D) 28%, Dave Heineman (R-inc) 61%
• NV-Gov: Rory Reid (D) 33%, Brian Sandoval (R) 58%
• NV-Sen: Harry Reid (D-inc) 45%, Sharron Angle (R) 45%

SSP Daily Digest: 9/7 (Morning Edition)

DavidNYC — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 12:01:00 GMT

CT-Sen: Obama alert! The POTUS is going to do a fundraiser in Stamford for Dick Blumenthal on Sept. 16th, the same day he was already scheduled to do a DNC event in Greenwich. Sorry to get all emo on you again, but if even Dick Blumenthal needs Obama's help....

DE-Sen: It's the battle of the sketchy polls! The Tea Party Express is touting a survey which supposedly shows Mike Castle up just 44-38 in the Republican primary over Christine O'Donnell. (Actually, they say Castle is at "43.7%" - too many significant digits is a classic sign of sketchiness.) Meanwhile, the Fix claims that "Internal GOP polling conducted last week showed Castle with a margin of nearly 20 points over O'Donnell." Anyhow, the TPX has no plans to evacuate in their moment of... well, we'll see if it's their moment of triumph... despite a surge of new questions about O'Donnell's fitness as a candidate. Among other things: Former aides say she never paid promised salaries on her 2008 campaign against Joe Biden, and she just received her degree from Farleigh Dickinson University last week, despite having attended 17 years ago and having repeatedly described herself as a graduate. Come on, baby, hold together!

IL-Sen: Amanda Terkel has spotted a trend among Mark Kirk's public statements: He can't shut up about the economic crisis in Greece - and Terkel thinks Kirk is attempting to link Alexi Giannoulias (who is of Greek descent) to the meltdown. Perhaps most egregious is Kirk's statement that while he "wore a U.S. Navy uniform, Alexi Giannoulias wore a basketball uniform in Greece." Really? That last part is relevant? A pretty ugly example of "othering."

LA-Sen: A little bit of Cajun-flavored cat fud: Gov. Bobby Jindal won't endorse Sen. David Vitter in his re-election campaign. Jindal claims he doesn't get involved in federal races, but WDSU has two very recent examples to the contrary. Anyhow, I can't think of too many sitting governors who haven't endorsed same-party, same-state senators, can you?

NH-Sen: Finally, a survey of the severely under-polled GOP senate primary in New Hampshire - though it's from Republican pollster Magellan, who likes to do Rasmussen-style one-day samples (a methodology that I think it's fair to say is not a best practice). Anyhow, here are the results (9/1, likely voters, May in parens):

Kelly Ayotte (R): 34 (38)
Ovide Lamontagne (R) : 21 (9)
Bill Binnie (R) : 17 (29)
Jim Bender (R) : 13 (4)
Other: 4 (4)
Undecided: 11 (15)
(MoE: ±3.3%)

UT-Sen: The battle for Orrin Hatch's senate seat - which won't take place until 2012 - is already getting ugly. Hatch is claiming that freshman Rep. Jason Chaffetz (who, you'll recall, already knocked off one sitting incumbent at a state convention in 2008) promised him he wouldn't challenge him next cycle. Chaffetz says he only pledged not to run against Sen. Bob Bennett, who of course already lost earlier this year. A Hatch spokesbot took off the gloves in response, saying: "Senator Hatch takes very seriously the principle of keeping his word. Of course, I suppose Jason can break it any time he wants to."

WV-Sen: Robert Byrd's family is excoriating self-funding Republican John Raese for using a photo of Dem Joe Manchin and President Obama that was taken at Byrd's memorial service earlier this year in an attack ad. Raese's campaign manager said, "That's a stock photo. We had no idea it was from the memorial service." Well, now you know.

AZ-Gov: Does this statement remind you of O.J. Simpson's ill-fated "hypothetical" book, If I Did It? Because that was the first thing I thought of:

"That was an error, if I said that," Brewer said about beheadings occurring in Arizona.

AZ-01: Ann Kirkpatrick is out with her first ad of the cycle, a pretty dull positive spot about how she donated 5% of her congressional salary... national treasury... opposed bailout... etc., etc. Ordinarily I'd just relegate this to our ad roundup at the bottom of the digest, but I also wanted to point out this great observation from SSP's own Johnny Longtorso: namely, the fact that the Navajo Nation (the largest Indian tribe in the United States) is holding its presidential election this fall, which may help Kirkpatrick on the turnout front. (Indians vote heavily Dem.) According to Wikipedia, some 130,000 Navajo live within the nation's boundaries in Arizona (it also includes parts of Utah and New Mexico), almost all of which is contained within the 1st CD.

AZ-08: You know how the WWF tried to become the WWE? Well, true hardcore wingnuts aren't content with (the bad kind of) SSP - they want SSE: Social Security elimination. Given how toxic this is in the real world (i.e., for the 99.999% of people who have never heard of John Galt), it's no wonder that Republican nominee Jesse Kelly now say he wants to "protect" Social Security. Good luck getting past statements like this one, from just last year: "If you have any ideas on that, I'm all ears. I would love to eliminate the program."

IA-01: This doesn't seem like a positive sign to me. Bruce Braley is going on the air with an ad (watch it here) hitting back against an outside group's attack ad - not something a candidate in an apparently "Safe D" race ordinarily feels a need to do. The group, American Future Fund, is accusing Braley of "supporting" the Park51 community center, though Braley has taken the standard "don't wanna deal with it" approach of calling it a local zoning issue for NYC. On the flipside, I'll take it as a good sign that Braley doesn't plan to get Martha Coakley'd. (Though doesn't it sound like Braley's "I approve this message" was recorded via cell phone? Does that mean the ad was rushed on to the air?) NWOTSOTB for Braley, though AAF claims it has spent $50K and plans to spend more.

IN-03: A common theme rears its head once more: A Republican rails loudly against bailouts, but it turns out he's been the beneficiary of government largesse himself. In this case, Dem Tom Hayhurst has been attacking GOPer Marlin Stutzman for accepting $180K in agricultural subsidies since 1995. But as the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette reports, just last month Stutzman said: "It's time to get rid of farm subsidies. The subsidies only manipulate the market."

KS-04: You know, we always love reporting on cat fud for cat fud's sake. Sometimes it's just a whiff, but other times, the cat fud can really stink up a race. Case in point: Mike Pompeo, a top competitor for GOP Dickbag of the Year, wasn't endorsed by any of the candidates he beat in the Republican primary, and even refused to return phone calls from his opponents. Now, the cats are coming home to roost, because one of those opponents, rich guy Wink Hartman, is considering re-entering the race on the Libertarian Party line. (The Lib candidate dropped out of the race for health reasons.) Hartman, who spent almost $1.6 million of his own money on the primary, notably includes among his reasons for wanting to get back in the game the fact that Pompeo "misrepresented Hartman's pro-life position and residency." The Libertarians have until Sept. 20th to decide whether to tap Hartman. In any event, this could provide a huge boost to Dem Raj Goyle, who appears to be in a surprisingly good position to stage an upset.

LA-03: In an unusual move, the Louisiana state Republican Party has formally endorsed Jeff Landry over Hunt Downer in the runoff. State parties don't typically take sides in primaries like this, but it sounds like the powers that be are eager to see Downer bail, rather than prolong the race all the way until October 3rd. I personally suspect that Downer has no chance in the second round, and I think he'll wind up playing Kevin Calvey to Landry's Jim Lankford. (Check out our OK-05 tag if the analogy isn't ringing any bells.)

NC-11: Heh - looks like Heath Shuler's suggesting he could run for Speaker of the House, clearly as a way to distance himself from Nancy Pelosi. Shuler also claimed that cats eventually turn into dogs.

NH-02: Nice - progressive fave Ann McLane Kuster raised $223K in her pre-primary report (7/1-8/25), totally kicking the asses of all the other major candidates (Katrina Swett (D): $37K, Charlie Bass (R): $57K, Jennifer Horn (R): $39K). As for cash, it goes Kuster: $450K, Swett: $798K, Bass: $312K, Horn: $32K. Even better news: Kuster is touting an internal poll from the Mellman Group showing her with a commanding 47-24 lead over Swett in the primary, which is Sept. 14th.

NY-20, NY-23: Rahm Emanuel is headlining a joint fundraiser on Sept. 19th for two upstate Dems: Scott Murphy of the 20th CD and Bill Owens of the 23rd. Murphy has $1.5 million on hand but Owens has only $600K.

PA-06: A nasty bit of racial ugliness from the campaign of Jim Gerlach. Said a spokesman about Dem opponent Manan Trivedi: "The only one who has played the race card here is him, by going to Indian-American groups to raise money."

SC-02: The Office of Congressional Ethics is investigating Rep. Joe Wilson's trips abroad - at least thirty over the last eight years - and his per diem spending habits. Wilson is a prolific traveler on the taxpayer's dime, ranking 29th among current House members and 39th among 734 members who've served since 1994, according to The State. Wilson has tried to downplay prior reports of the probe, claiming it was only about $12 spent on some cheap mementos from Afghanistan, but that's evidently not the case. Meanwhile, Dem Rob Miller has a new ad out hitting Wilson for his support of CAFTA. Check it out - I think it's pretty effective.

VA-05: In a move that vaguely brings to mind Carl Mumpower, teabagger Jeffrey Clark said he'd withdraw from the race if the party or parties responsible for disseminating information about his financial history came forward to claim responsibility. Dem Tom Perriello's campaign said it wasn't them, but Republican Rob Hurt wouldn't say anything, so Clark says he's staying in the race. Feel the Mumpower!

OH-AG: Wrapping up some odds-and-ends from their recent Ohio poll, PPP find ex-Sen. Mike DeWine leading incumbent Dem AG Richard Cordray 44-40.

DCCC: Another day, another triage story. This time, the NYT claims that "party leaders are preparing a brutal triage of their own members in hopes of saving enough seats to keep a slim grip on the majority." And while they don't have an actual quote from him, the Times claims Chris Van Hollen "conceded" that Dems "would ultimately cut loose members who had not gained ground." In response, reports The Hill:

Van Hollen released a statement saying that the story "erroneously" said that the DCCC would redirect resources to two dozen viable campaigns if a review in the next two weeks showed that vulnerables weren't gaining ground.

I have to wonder: Did the NYT really get Van Hollen wrong here, or is CVH deliberately trying to send mixed messages in order to motivate his troops through fear?

AK-Gov, AK-AL: Parnell, Young Have Wide Leads

James L. — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 20:16:25 GMT

Public Policy Polling (8/27-28, likely voters, no trend lines):

Ethan Berkowitz (D): 37
Sean Parnell (R): 55
Undecided: 8
(MoE: ±2.7%)

Of a trio of polls released in the past week, these are the best numbers for Sean Parnell (an NRSC-commissioned Basswood Research poll had Parnell up by 54-40, and Rasmussen, for whatever it's worth, had the race at 53-43). The bloom has faded a bit from the Parnell flower, though, as PPP finds that his job approval rating is at 50-36, down from 58-19 earlier in the year.

One thing not considered by this PPP poll are the third-party options. For a few days, it looked like Republican Bill Walker, who pulled a third of the GOP primary vote against Parnell, might run on the Alaskan Independence Party line in place of the current AIP nominee, 80 year-old Don Wright. After saying that he would bow out of the race, Wright has reversed course and now insists that he's staying on the ballot. Walker says he's still considering running as a write-in or on the Libertarian line, but that would require the consent of the Alaskan Libertarian Party and their nominee William Toien. (For their part, the Libertarians say they would "consider it".) If anything's going to happen, it'll have to happen pretty soon -- state law says that a party can replace its nominee up to 48 days before election day.

If Walker did manage to land on the Libertarian line, it might make for a more interesting general election -- recall that Democrat Tony Knowles was successful in 1994 thanks in part to vote-splitting between the GOP and the Alaskan Independence nominees.

Meanwhile, we also have some House numbers:

Harry Crawford (D): 36
Don Young (R-inc): 55
Undecided: 8
(MoE: ±2.7%)

After surviving near-death in 2008, it's looking like Don Young won't have any troubles this fall. The real marquee match-up will be the Senate race between Scott McAdams and Joe Miller.

IL-Gov: Brady Up by 5

James L. — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 20:21:56 GMT

Market Shares Corp for the Chicago Tribune/WGN (8/28-9/1, likely voters, no trend lines):

Pat Quinn (D-inc): 32
Bill Brady (R): 37
Scott Lee Cohen (I): 4
Rich Whitney (G): 2
Lex Green (L): 2

Did You Know... that Pat Quinn has not held the lead in a single poll this year?

Granted, nearly all of these polls have come from just two sources (PPP and Rasmussen), but that's really a non-comfort here given the sheer volume of them.

WA-02: Larsen Trails Koster

James L. — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 14:13:00 GMT

SurveyUSA (8/31-9/2, likely voters, no trend lines):

Rick Larsen (D-inc): 46
John Koster (R): 50
Undecided: 4
(MoE: ±4%)

This poll comes in the wake of the final top-two primary results giving Koster a 298 vote lead over Larsen. Digging deeper, though, two Democratic candidates took a full 10% of the primary vote, resulting in a final score of 52-48 for Team Blue. This is the second time that Koster has won the top-two primary vote against Larsen, the first time coming in 2000, where Larsen ultimately won the general election by 50-46.

Comparing these results to previous SUSA polls of this district in 2008 and 2006, the partisan composition of the sample isn't what's hurting Larsen; the damage is coming from Larsen's struggles among independent voters. He loses those voters by 12 points, compared to monster-sized wins among indies in the past two cycles. The 18-34 year-old vote has shrunk substantially, too, down to 13% of the sample -- leaving behind a demographic that flocks to Koster by 22 points.

You may take issue with the poll, but this one is shaping up to be a very close race.

VA-09: Boucher Up by 10

James L. — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 06:01:56 GMT

SurveyUSA (8/31-9/2, likely voters, 7/17-20 in parens):

Rick Boucher (D-inc): 50 (52)
Morgan Griffith (R): 40 (39)
Jeremiah Heaton (I): 5 (5)
Undecided: 4 (5)
(MoE: ±4.2%)

SurveyUSA again takes the pulse of the much-hyped race between veteran Dem Rep. Rick Boucher and Virginia House of Delegates Majority Leader Morgan Griffith, and finds that the needle hasn't budged significantly over the past month and a half. SUSA's likely voter universe has gotten slightly more Republican over that time, shifting from 33D-35R-29I to 32D-37R-29I, but Boucher is still strong enough in less-friendly demographics to maintain a decent lead. Boucher takes a quarter of the Republican vote and holds a one-point lead among indies -- very strong numbers compared to the performance of other Democratic incumbents playing on red turf this year.

We haven't seen a great deal of polling from this race, but all indicators are surprisingly positive for Boucher. In addition to this pair of SUSA polls, a mid-August Benenson Strategy Group internal poll for Rick Boucher gave him a 55-32 lead over Griffith. With plenty of time left on the clock, Boucher is by no means safe, but it appears he has slipped down the priority list for Republican gunners this fall.

IL-Sen: Pity the Poor Illinois Voter?

James L. — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 19:19:38 GMT

Market Shares Corp for the Chicago Tribune/WGN (8/28-9/1, likely voters, no trend lines):

Alexi Giannoulias (D): 34
Mark Kirk (R): 34
LeAlan Jones (G): 6
Mike Labno (L): 3
Undecided: 22
(MoE: ±4%)

One area where Giannoulias can gain some ground is among African American voters, who favor him over Kirk by 58-3 margin. This one is shaping up to be a battle of inches, though:

SSP Daily Digest: 9/3

DavidNYC — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 12:04:00 GMT

AK-Sen: Joe Miller sure sounds like he's measuring the drapes here, doesn't he, with his talk about how much he'd "love" to serve on the Judiciary and Armed Services committees? Donate to Scott McAdams and help make sure we force Joe Miller to make a humiliating, droopy-dog run back to Neiman Marcus to return those curtains.

DE-Sen: Oh, I'm afraid the Tea Party Express will be QUITE operational by the time Mike Castle arrives! The NYT reports that the TPX is going up with five different ads (two TV and three radio) on behalf of Christine O'Donnell, and they have a rough cut of one of the TV spots (check the link). As for how big a buy we're talking, the TPX just filed its first independent expenditure report, for $46K. Their usual practice is to dribble things out in smallish reports one at a time - but don't worry, it'll snowball.

FL-Sen: Charlie Crist is spending over half a million on a new TV buy. We don't know what ads he'll be running, but the St. Petersburg Times has some pretty good info on where they'll appear (notably in Dem-leaning markets). Check the link for full details.

WI-Sen: GOPer Ron Johnson raised $1.2 million between July 1 and Aug. 25th, while Sen. Russ Feingold took in $920K. Johnson also loaned his campaign another $2.9 million out of his own coffers (which of course have been greatly bolstered over the years by government loans and grants to his plastics company). RonJo has been outspending Feingold, though, and has $1.6 mil in the bank compared to the senator's $3.1 mil.

FL-Gov: Alex Sink has a new ad, touching on the oil spill and calling for a diversification of Florida's economy. NWOTSOTB, but the spot is apparently airing in Florida's panhandle.

GA-Gov: Nathan Deal just performed a classic document dump - and not one that's likely to help him. He made public 28 years of his personal income tax returns, but none of this has anything to do with his auto salvage business which was the focus of a probe by the Office of Congressional Ethics.

CO-04: The House Race Hotline reports that the NRCC has reserved over $1 million in air time in the 4th CD. Let's see if they actually come through with all that scrilla, though.

FL-08: Put away your can openers - no cat fud here. All six of Dan Webster's Republican primary rivals have endorsed him, including teabagger Patricia Sullivan. However, Peg Dunmire is still in the race, on the actual Tea Party line.

IN-02: Joe Donnelly has a new spot out (NWOTSOTB), hitting Jackie Walorski for her support of a 23% national sales tax (as well as her desire to eliminate the home mortgage interest deduction). This issue is one that helped sink GOPer Tim Burns in the PA-12 special, so it has potency. I know that sometimes when Dems sink their teeth into this one, weenie liberals like to whine that what Republicans really mean is that they want to replace other taxes with this one. You know what? Let them make that argument. You don't need to make it for them.

IN-09: Republican Todd Young has a new ad out, featuring footage of Baron Hill imperiously telling a journalism student that she couldn't videotape a town hall. NWOTSOTB, but CQ notes that the spot is "currently airing only in the Louisville, Ky. market."

LA-02: With Al Franken acting, you know, senatorial, it looks like Joe Cao has decided to take up the mantle of Stuart Smalley. Sayeth Cao: "I love the president, and I believe he truly likes me." What a wiener.

MA-09: Labor activist Mac D'Alessandro scored the endorsement of NARAL in his primary bid against anti-choice incumbent Rep. Stephen Lynch. D'Alessandro raised $178K in the pre-primary period (7/1-8/25) and had $158K on hand for the stretch run. Lynch took in only $66K but had a million bucks in the bank.

NJ-03: Dem Rep. John Adler received the endorsement of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, which did not back anyone in the race two years ago. They also say they'll provide financial help. (The Courier Post notes that the district includes Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst.) Adler's also got a second negative spot out, hitting Republican Jon Runyan for his minimalist voting record. NWOTSOTB, and get a load of this stonewalling: "Campaign manager Geoff Mackler would not disclose the size of the buy, where the ads were committed to air or for how long they would air, saying he does not discuss strategy with reporters." But I don't think that should be the end of the story for a journalist. Hell, one of my jobs on a campaign I worked on in the 90s was to track down enemy ad buys. Reporters can do it, too. (And BTW, if you haven't seen Adler's first ad, I highly recommend you do so.)

NH-01, NH-02: John DiStaso has an asburd wealth of updates on New Hampshire's two House races, including word that Charlie Bass is set to release his first ad (watch it here), a $40,000 buy on New Hampshire TV. There's also news of a GOP primary poll in the 1st CD, taken by Cross Target on behalf of the right-wing group Americans for Prosperity. Sean Mahoney is at 33, Frank Guinta at 26, Rich Ashooh at 10, and Bob Bestani at 5. Mahoney's been out with a positive/negative ad comparing his record to Guinta's, making it clear that he thinks this poll is right about who the real contenders are. Guinta apparently has a new response ad coming this week.

NY-24: Mike Arcuri is up with a new ad, a positive bio spot. NWOTSOTB, though he has two slightly different versions, one of which is airing in Utica, the other Syracuse (see both here).

PA-07: A nice break for Dem Bryan Lentz: After a series of adverse rulings, Pat Meehan's campaign withdrew its legal challenge to the candidacy of Jim Schneller, a teabagger who petitioned his way on to the ballot... thanks to a lot of help from Lentz supporters.

PA-10: Interesting: Back when he was a US Attorney, Tom Marino served as a reference for a casino application for a man his office was investigating. In fact, the news was so explosive it led to the DOJ transferring the investigation to another office - and to Marino's resignation as USA. Back in May, though, Marino told a radio host that the DOJ had given him written permission to provide that reference, but he hasn't produced it (yet). Dem Chris Carney is hitting him for this, asking, "Where's the letter?"

WI-08: Steve Kagen is up with his first ad, and it's a good one. Among other things, he touts the fact that he has refused congressional health coverage until everyone in America has health insurance. He also refers to himself as "Dr. Steve Kagen," which is probably a helpful alternative to "Congressman" these days.

Enthusiasm Gap: Tom Jensen takes a look at a painful "what if" - as in, what if there were no enthusiasm gap between Democrats and Republicans this year? Among other things, he thinks Alex Sink would have a double-digit lead and that Elaine Marshall would be running slightly ahead of Richard Burr. But check out his full chart.

Dumping Ground: We've brought up some serious methodological issues in the past that we have with those zone-flooding American Action Fund House race polls, so it's best if we just confine the following to their own quarantine zone. (Those issues, by the way, included extremely aged samples and the fact that the GOP pollster, Ayres McHenry, asked respondents about their opinion of the healthcare bill right before diving into the topline match-ups.)

AZ-01: Ann Kirkpatrick (D-inc) 41%, Paul Gosar (R) 47%

AZ-05: Harry Mitchell (D-inc) 44%, David Schweikert (R) 50%

AZ-08: Gabby Giffords (D-inc) 46%, Jesse Kelly (R) 46%

CA-11: Jerry McNerney (D-inc) 44%, David Harmer (R) 45%

CA-47: Loretta Sanchez (D-inc) 45%, Van Tran (R) 43%

CO-03: John Salazar (D-inc) 43%, Scott Tipton 51%

CO-04: Betsy Markey (D-inc) 39%, Cory Gardner (R) 50%

NM-01: Martin Heinrich (D-inc) 49%, Jon Barela (R) 41%

NV-03: Dina Titus (D-inc) 45%, Joe Heck (R) 48%

OR-05: Kurt Schrader (D-inc) 44%, Scott Bruun (R) 36%

KY-Sen, KY-Gov: Paul Leads by 5, Beshear by 6

James L. — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:09:55 GMT

Braun Research for cn|2 (8/30-9/1, likely voters, 8/16-18 in parens):

Jack Conway (D): 37 (42)
Rand Paul (R): 42 (41)
Undecided: 20 (16)
(MoE: ±3.5%)

Braun Research continues their biweekly polling odyssey of Kentucky with a freshly-baked survey showing Rand Paul bouncing back to a five-point lead. For those keeping score, these cn|2 polls have bounced back and forth, from 3 and 10-point Paul leads in their first two rounds, to a 1-point lead for Conway two weeks ago.

I'm not too sure if you can stitch together a narrative from high-MoE sub-samples like these, but it's still interesting:

Paul picked up support from the last poll in Conway's two stronghold areas from the primary, including his backyard of the 3rd Congressional District that covers Louisville. The cn|2 Poll shows Paul leading Conway by 10 points in the 6th Congressional District that covers Lexington and Central Kentucky.
The poll results for congressional districts has a margin of error of about 8.8 points in this cn|2 Poll.
Conway has narrowed previous gaps in the 2nd Congressional District in west-central Kentucky from eight to four points. And support for the Democratic candidate has swung 17 points in the 5th Congressional District - which covers Eastern Kentucky - over the last two weeks. He went from being down three points to going up 14 points in this latest poll.

This is the second poll in a row where Braun found Conway surging in the Eastern 5th CD. A month ago, Conway trailed Paul by 14% in that district, and now leads by the same margin. Are we seeing the effect of Rand Paul's call to pull federal funds from local anti-drug initiatives (a particularly salient issue in Eastern Kentucky) at play here? While still respecting that portly margin of error, I'm guessing so.

Meanwhile, we also have some gubernatorial numbers (no trend lines):

Steve Beshear (D-inc): 44
David Williams (R): 38
Undecided: 15
Steve Beshear (D-inc): 49
Phil Moffett (R): 29
Undecided: 19
(MoE: ±3.5%)

By a 44-36 margin, voters say that Beshear deserves a second term. Considering the carnage we're seeing for other incumbent Dem governors this year, those numbers could be a lot worse. Nevertheless, this should be a very competitive race, although likely less so if the tea-flavored ticket led by businessman Phil Moffett can win the primary against state Senate leader David Williams. Remember -- this off-year race is only a year away!

One red flag about this, though, is that I suspect that Braun is using the same likely voter sample for the Senate race as for the Governor's race. Perhaps two separate samples would have yielded similar results, but I don't think this is the most methodologically precise approach.

For their part, the Williams campaign has released an internal poll taken by some firm called Got-Focus, showing Beshear down by 4.

SSP Daily Digest: 9/2 (Afternoon Edition)

Crisitunity — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 19:03:59 GMT

• DE-Sen: Christine O'Donnell's radio interview on a local station yesterday should answer any doubts about whether or not the new Tea Party fave is ready for prime time (the answer: she isn't). Mostly it's notable for how testy it got, but also for O'Donnell pushing back on rumors that Mike Castle is gay - rumors that apparently no one has ever heard until O'Donnell brought them up in the first place. At any rate, Castle isn't content to just stand back and let her dig her own hole: not wanting to fall into the Lisa Murkowski trap, his camp confirms that his last-minute pre-primary ad buy will be negative against O'Donnell. He also said he won't be debating with (or otherwise even talking to) O'Donnell... ordinarily a safe decision for a quasi-incumbent, but who knows, maybe a mid-debate implosion by O'Donnell would be all Castle needs to put this one away.

• FL-Sen: Charlie Crist's out with an internal today from Fredrick Polls, and while it gives him the lead, it's a small enough edge compared with his rather robust leads pre-Dem primary that it shouldn't fill anybody with much confidence about where his trendlines are headed. He leads Marco Rubio and Kendrick Meek 35-34-17. That comes against the backdrop of getting squeezed in both directions, with the NRSC "pledging" (I don't know what that means, but it's not actual reservations) $2.5 million for the race, and Meek airing a new radio ad going after Crist's GOP past, airing Crist's own words, including calling himself "pro-life" and a "Jeb Bush Republican." At least Crist is getting some backing from one rather unusual corner: state Sen. Al Lawson, who just lost the FL-02 primary to Allen Boyd, just endorsed Crist.

• NY-Sen-B, NY-Gov: Maybe I should've been patient yesterday instead of complaining about Quinnipiac's lack of New York primary numbers, because they rolled them out today. At any rate, they find, as I'd suspected, things tightening in the GOP gubernatorial primary: Rick Lazio leads Carl Paladino 47-35. ("Tightening" may not be the right word, as this is their first look at the NY-Gov primary, but it's what other pollsters have seen.) In the Senate special election, Joe DioGuardi leads David Malpass and Bruce Blakeman, 28-12-10. And in another sign that Democratic voters are only dimly aware that there's an election this year, fully 77% of Dem voters have no idea who they'll vote for in the Attorney General's race. Kathleen Rice leads Eric Schneiderman by a margin of 4-3. (That's not a typo.)

• WI-Sen: Ron Johnson has been outspending Russ Feingold 3-to-1 on the TV airwaves, which goes a long way to explaining why this is a tied race, but that may not matter much if he keeps stepping on his own free-market-fundamentalist message. Johnson found himself, in a recent radio interview, tying himself into knots by praising Communist China for having a more favorable investment climate for business than America, in part because of its "certainty." So, let's see... to stop America's descent into socialism, we need to become more like the Communists, because the path to freedom is actually through the kind of "certainty" that comes from a command economy? Finally, this is probably too little too late, but Terence Wall, the guy who dropped out in a huff from the GOP field after the state convention, is now publicly touting the idea of a write-in campaign in the upcoming primary. I don't know if he actually thinks he has a shot against a stumbling Johnson or is just engaged in some last-minute sour grapes.

• WV-Sen: Joe Manchin continues to rake in the bucks in the West Virginia Senate special election. (Facing self-funding John Raese, the money issue is the main threat to Manchin... well, that, and the perilously low approvals for national Dems here.) He reported raising $393K last week, bringing his total to $1.5 million. Raese reported $717K, but $520K of that was self-funded, with only $22K from donors.

• AZ-Gov: This may not get much press in the wake of her amazing debate performance, but Jan Brewer is also engaged in an interesting strategy of retaliation, pulling her campaign ads off the local CBS affiliate, whose news department dared to question Brewer's relationship with a key advisor who's also connected to private prison company Corrections Corporation of America, which stands to make significant money incarcerating illegal immigrants rounded up under Arizona's SB 1070. That's not the same station whose reporter aggressively questioned Brewer post-debate last night... my advice to Brewer would be to go ahead and stop advertising on all local network affiliates as punishment. That'll show 'em!

• CO-Gov: This may be kind of repetitive, but Dan Maes again turned down calls to drop out of the race today, after former state Senate president John Andrews withdrew his endorsement and told him to get out. Andrews wasn't alone in the endorsement rescinding department: it looks like the whole ooops-no-I-actually-wasn't-an-undercover-cop-in-Kansas thing was the fridge too far for former GOP Senator Hank Brown, who is now saying he's "looking around" for a new candidate. Meanwhile, on the touchy subject of water law, maybe Maes should take a page from Scott McInnis and just plagiarize all his work on the subject, as at least that way he wouldn't appear completely ignorant of the law. He just introduced an entirely new water law doctrine with his proclamation that "If it starts in Colorado, it's our water" - ignoring the 7-state compact on use of Colorado River water and the whole concept of prior appropriation. As much as I'd like to see Jan Brewer using the Arizona National Guard to invade Colorado and reclaim its water, I don't think the courts would let it get to that point.

• FL-Gov: Alex Sink is expanding her current TV advertising buy, throwing another $600K into keeping her introductory spot on the air in a number of non-Miami markets. Oddly, Rick Scott has been taking the week off since the primary, at least from advertising.

• OR-Gov: John Kitzhaber has finally decided to go negative on Chris Dudley... it might be too little too late, but at least he's recognizing what he needs to do (as recently as last week, he negged a DGA ad that went negative on Dudley... and this is the first time he's aired a negative ad since 1994). The ad attacks Dudley for having "never managed anything" and never "shown much interest in Oregon" before (as seen in his decision to live in income-tax-free Washington while playing for the Trail Blazers).

• CT-04: Republican state Sen. Dan Debicella offers up a recent internal poll, via National Research. It has him within 4 points of Rep. Jim Himes, trailing 42-38 (the same 4-point margin seen in the recent round of AAF polling).

• FL-25: Here's an offensive opportunity for House Dems that nobody should be writing off. Joe Garcia posted a lead in a recent internal poll (taken in wake of the primary, and revelations about various unsavory moments from Republican opponent David Rivera's past) for his campaign. Garcia leads by 4 points in the poll from Benenson, 40-36 (with 5 for the Tea Party candidate and 1 for the Whig).

• MO-03: Republican challenger Ed Martin got the endorsement of the Missouri Farm Bureau, a change from their backing of Russ Carnahan in previous cycles. Carnahan didn't show up for his meeting with the Farm Bureau, although it's unclear whether that's why he didn't get endorsed or if he felt the endorsement was already lost.

• NH-02: EMILY's List, Planned Parenthood, and NARAL are all coordinating their efforts in favor of Ann McLane Kuster ahead of the Dem primary in the 2nd, where's she's running against Katrina Swett, who has supported parental notification laws. In addition to a joint rally, they're sending out a joint mailer together.

• PA-12: The NRCC is out with a poll, via POS, of the 12th, giving Tim Burns a small lead in his rematch against special election victor Mark Critz. Burns leads 48-43, quite the reversal from Critz's 53-45 win in May. (Bear in mind that POS's final released poll before that election gave Burns a 2-point lead.)

• Rasmussen:
• AK-Sen: Scott McAdams (D) 44%, Joe Miller (R) 50%
• FL-Gov: Alex Sink (D) 44%, Rick Scott (R) 45%
• WA-Sen: Patty Murray (D-inc) 46%, Dino Rossi (R) 48%

OH-Sen: Fisher Falls Back Behind Portman

Crisitunity — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:53:49 GMT

Public Policy Polling (8/27-29, likely voters, 6/26-27 in parens):

Lee Fisher (D): 38 (40)
Rob Portman (R): 45 (38)
Undecided: 18 (22)
(MoE: ±4.5%)

Since Ted Strickland and Lee Fisher have tended to move up and down in concert with each other in polling, it was a pretty foregone conclusion, based on yesterday's PPP OH-Gov numbers (and also more generically on PPP's switch to a likely voter model, and that that generates a sample that went 48-45 for John McCain in 2008), that things would have gotten worse for Fisher. They have: his 2-point lead has turned into a 7-point deficit. Fisher's favorables are now negative at 24/32, while Portman is at 29/28.

A lot of Fisher's problem is that many Dems (21%) are still undecided, and assuming they break his direction, that should push his numbers up. But that still isn't enough to push him back into the lead, based on Portman's 43-30 lead among independents.

VA-05: Perriello Getting Crushed in Latest SUSA Poll

James L. — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:19:53 GMT

SurveyUSA for WDBJ-TV Roanoke (8/31-9/1, likely voters,

Tom Perriello (D-inc): 35 (35)
Rob Hurt (R): 61 (58)
Jeff Clark (I): 2 (4)
Undecided: 2 (3)
(MoE: ±4%)

Brutal stuff. It's worth mentioning that last time, we mentioned some issues with the crosstabs, including Hurt's big support among younger voters. Those issues persist in this poll.

It's worth mentioning that Perriello fared more favorably in the most recent American Action Forum poll, trailing Hurt by 43-49 -- and that poll, conducted by a Republican firm, tested the top line match-up right after asking a question about the healthcare bill.

Could things really be this bad?

UPDATE: Dana has one more issue regarding the poll: a very optimistic voter turnout prediction.

MN-Gov: MPR Poll Shows a Tie Game

James L. — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 00:27:26 GMT

Minnesota Public Radio/Humphrey Institute (8/25-29, likely voters, 5/13-16 in parens):

Mark Dayton (D): 34 (35)
Tom Emmer (R): 34 (31)
Tom Horner (IP): 13 (9)
Undecided/Other: 19
(MoE: ±3.6%)

One red flag from this poll is its sample composition -- it pegs the Minnesota midterm electorate at 46% Republican, 41% Democratic, and 13% independent. An early August poll by SurveyUSA had a partisan composition of 36D-32R-28I, and showed Dayton leading by 46-32. Indeed, Dayton has been leading in the last five polls of the race, the last three of which by margins varying between 9 and 14 points -- and that includes Rasmussen. So I'm not convinced by this poll's top lines, especially considering the pounding that Emmer's been taking on the airwaves in the past two weeks.

That's not to say that Dayton is incapable of fumbling this one -- it's just that most of the evidence suggests that he has yet to do so.

SSP Daily Digest: 9/1 (Afternoon Edition)

Crisitunity — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 19:00:04 GMT

• DE-Sen: Wow, the mounting establishment/teabagger war in the GOP Delaware primary is actually getting physically violent. A Christine O'Donnell supporter got into a scuffle with a tracker from the state GOP party who was videotaping O'Donnell at a candidate forum

• IL-Sen: The Constitution Party is still trying to get back on the ballot in Illinois, maybe most notably in the close Senate race where Randy Stufflebeam would be their candidate. They're going to court to get back on the ballot after the state Board of Elections kicked them off for not having enough valid signatures.

• NV-Sen: School's out for the summer/ school's out... forever! The latest daily nugget of crazy from Sharron Angle is her recounting last week of her struggles back in the state legislature in 2003 against a supplemental budget bill that would have paid for emergency funding to make sure that the state's public schools could actually open at the start of the school year. Meanwhile, Harry Reid is continuing his apparently successful advertising strategy of letting Angle say the usual things she says, and just turning them straight into his own ads against her, as with his newest ad launched this week.

• NY-Sen-B, NY-Gov: Despite the utter lack of drama in the big races in the Empire State, Quinnipiac just keeps polling it. (I guess that's OK; we'll take good news where we can get it.) In the governor's race, Andrew Cuomo beats Rick Lazio 57-25 and Carl Paladino 60-23. (Unfortunately, there aren't GOP primary numbers, as it'd be interesting to see, as other pollsters have seen, whether Paladino might actually be able to overtake the insufficiently-crazy Lazio for the nomination.) In the Senate race, Kirsten Gillibrand beats Bruce Blakeman 44-26, David Malpass 45-24, and Joe DioGuardi 43-28.

• CO-Gov: If either Dan Maes or Tom Tancredo is going to drop out and stop their tragic pas de deux, it'd better be soon. Friday, it turns out, is the last day before the November ballot printing is finalized. Meanwhile, here's the kind of headline you don't want to see when you're already fighting public perception that you're a bit of a paranoid wackjob who thinks that bicycles are a United Nations plot:

GOP gubernatorial candidate Maes backs off claims of undercover police work

• KY-Gov: The establishment slate for Kentucky Republicans for the off-year gubernatorial race (only a year from now!) seems like it's officially coalesced. David Williams, the state Senate president, will run for Governor, and Agriculture Commissioner Richie Farmer (who'd been a rumored governor candidate himself) will run for Lt. Governor. They'll still have to get past businessman Phil Moffet, running under the teabagger banner, in the GOP primary before facing Steve Beshear, who'll be seeking re-election. A recent poll had Farmer and Beshear neck-and-neck, but there hasn't been any Beshear/Williams polling yet.

• MA-09: Mac d'Allesandro's against Stephen Lynch in the Dem primary in the 9th is raising some decent cash in the late innings. Since July 1st, the SEIU, MoveOn, and Act Blue have raised $178K for d'Allesandro.

• PA-06: DNC ~~DGA~~ head Tim Kaine heads to Philly to fundraise on Manan Trivedi's behalf, as part of a tour on behalf of Asian-American Dem candidates. Trivedi's also had help on the stump this week from Bob Casey and Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

• RGA: Good thing the RGA already has an unprecedented amount of money squirreled away... because they're going to have to give a decent chunk of it to Chris Bell, the ex-Rep. who was the 2006 Dem gubernatorial candidate in Texas. A Travis County judge ordered the RGA to pay Chris Bell a cosmic $2 million because of campaign finance violations in the '06 election (where the RGA gave an undisclosed $1 million to Texans for Rick Perry).

• WATN?: This isn't really FL-Sen anymore, but Jeff Greene is insisting on staying in the limelight even as his vomit-covered yacht sails into the sunset. In fact, the phrase "vomit-covered yacht" is really what's at stake here; he says he's following through with a libel suit against the St. Petersburg Times and Miami Herald over their reporting of his many foibles. Good luck proving actual malice!

• Maps: They're rapidly scrolling their way down the front page, so if you haven't had a chance to check out jeffmd's maps of Alaskan elections past, do it now. Begich/Stevens, Murkowski/Miller, and Young/Parnell all played out in similar ways, geographically, so if you're wondering what Scott McAdam's path to a win might look like, check it out.

• Ads:
• NH-Sen: We told you a few days ago that Ovide Lamontagne was finally going on the air; his first ad is a talk-to-the-camera introductory spot.
• PA-Sen: The DSCC is out with another ad, attacking Pat Toomey on the derivatives trading issue.
• WI-Sen: Russ Feingold's new ad is testimonials from a variety of (as C. Montgomery Burns would say) Joe Lunchpails and Sally Housecoats.
• IN-02: Jackie Walorski is out with an introductory bio spot.
• NE-02: Tom White is also out with an introductory bio spot, carefully steering clear of anything Democratic-sounding.
• NJ-03: John Adler may actually win the advertising day today, with a negative spot that slams Jon Runyan for his tax break for his "farm" (a.k.a. McMansion plus one donkey).
• NV-03: Dina Titus hits Joe Heck for comments that "it's not Congress's role to create jobs." (This comes on top of the AFSCME's huge buy of anti-Heck ads.)

• Rasmussen:
• LA-Sen: Charlie Melancon (D) 33%, David Vitter (R-inc) 54%
• OH-Gov: Ted Strickland (D-inc) 39%, John Kasich (R) 47%
• PA-Gov: Dan Onorato (D) 37%, Tom Corbett (R) 50%

OH-Gov: Teddy Ballgame Down 10

James L. — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:08:47 GMT

Public Policy Polling (8/27-29, likely voters, 6/26-27 in parens):

Ted Strickland (D-inc): 40 (41)
John Kasich (R): 50 (43)
Undecided: 10 (16)
(MoE: ±4.5%)

This does not bode well:

The race has pretty much shaped up as a referendum on Strickland and that is not to the incumbent's advantage. Only 34% of voters in the state approve of the job he's doing while 52% disapprove. Republicans are now almost universal in their disapproval of him at 83% while Democrats are a little more divided in their support of his work at 67%. Independents go against him by a 59/26 margin as well.

The biggest change since PPP's last poll of this race, before they had shifted over to a likely voter model, is that Kasich went from a 73-12 lead among Republicans in June to an 89-5 advantage now. All this while Strickland claims the support of 78% of Democrats and the sample went from voting for Obama by 50-44 to having pulled the lever for McCain by 48-45.

Ted Strickland has run a good campaign, but he can't make the weather.

PA-Sen, PA-Gov: Enthusiasm Gap Drags Down Sestak and Onorato

Crisitunity — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 14:30:00 GMT

Ipsos for Reuters (8/27-28, likely voters, no trendlines):

Joe Sestak (D): 37
Pat Toomey (R): 47
Undecided: 15
(MoE: ±4.9%)

Ipsos strikes in another state with another of their interesting both-LV-and-RV polls. The enthusiasm gap seems as big here in Pennsylvania as it does anywhere: the LV model spells certain doom for Dems, with Joe Sestak falling into a double-digit deficit against Pat Toomey, while the RV model (MoE 4%) says this is still a perfectly salvageable race, with Toomey leading Sestak 40-37. (Unfortunately, the LV model is the one that counts in the end.) Any remaining Arlen Specter fans won't feel vindicated by this poll: if Specter were running against Toomey, he'd be losing just as widely, 52-40.

Maybe realizing that the strategy he used so effectively and efficiently against Specter in the primary (wait, wait, wait some more, and then unleash a massive, expertly targeted salvo in the closing weeks) won't work if he gets himself in too deep of a hole beforehand, Joe Sestak is breaking open the piggybank and going on TV. His first ad is anti-Toomey spot, working the Wall Street angle (already thoroughly explored by the DSCC). It's a buy through Sept. 6th, for a total of $111K, with ads running in the Pittsburgh, Johnstown, Harrisburg, and Wilkes-Barre markets (not Philly, where presumably he's better known).

Dan Onorato (D): 34
Tom Corbett (R): 49
Undecided: 16
(MoE: ±4.9%)

Same deal with the gubernatorial race: the LV model yields a 15-point lead for GOP AG Tom Corbett over Dem Dan Onorato. Switch over to a registered voter model, and it's only a not-bad 43-37 advantage for Corbett. Again, plans of getting all those RVs to magically show up aren't really hopes you should hang your hat on, at this point in the game, though.