SSP Daily Digest: 5/12 (Morning Edition)

  • CA-Gov: This video (the second one on the page) is a couple of months old but is worth watching if you haven’t seen it yet. I think it goes a ways toward explaining Meg Whitman’s glass jaw. It’s a local news piece detailing an ugly snub of the media by Whitman at a campaign stop she specifically invited the press to – and it’s about as harshly negative as a straight news piece can be. When ordinary people imagine rich douchebags behaving douchily, this is what we envision.
  • KY-Sen: Republican muckety-muck Cathy Bailey, who almost ran in this race herself, endorsed Rand Paul, while the U.S. Chamber of Commerce endorse Trey Grayson. They must love fiat currency.
  • PA-Sen, PA-07: Joe Sestak just endorsed Bryan Lentz to succeed him in PA-07… but Lentz faces zero primary opposition. The real news is that Lentz in turn endorsed Sestak, which may help him snare an extra vote or two in the Philly burbs.
  • UT-Sen: Is Orrin Hatch setting himself up to be Bob Bennett 2.0? He said that the teabaggers “don’t have an open mind and they won’t listen.”
  • FL-Gov: Rick Scott loves his chocolate milk: The uber-wealthy gubernatorial candidate (who has been flooding the Florida airwaves) opposes a Charlie Crist-backed amendment to the state constitution which would ban offshore drilling. It’s interesting to see how this is playing among conservative circles, where even Bill McCollum largely supports Crist’s idea. On the flipside, both Scott and McCollum luv Arizona’s new immigration law.
  • MA-04: Consultant and Marine vet Sean Bielat announced that he will challenge Rep. Barney Frank as a Republican.
  • MI-13: Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick may survive yet another primary. She narrowly escaped last cycle thanks to a split field again, and may yet do so again. Four opponents filed against her, including state Sen. Hansen Clarke.
  • NY-23: Keep the cat fud a-comin’: Conservative Party chair (and newfound progressive hero) Mike Long sent out a memo to North Country GOP leaders explicitly comparing Matt Doheny to Dede Scozzafava and pleding to stick with Doug Hoffman. Long points out that Doheney (who sought his party’s nomination last year) maxed out to Dede after she got the nod, and also said, “I’m going to do everything I can for her, and more.” If Doheny wins the Republican primary, it could be Hoffman’s turn to play spoiler on the Conservative line. History is definitely starting to rhyme.
  • OH-18: There were fat ladies… all around… but he never heard them singing…. State Sen. Bob Gibbs “declared victory” over a disgruntled Fred Dailey, even though official results have not yet been declared. Dailey called the move presumptuous and said the fat lady ain’t sung. The Secretary of State doesn’t have to certify results until 20 days after the election, and then, since the margin of victory was less than half a percent, we could see a recount – which might take until June. You know Zack Space is doing a happy dance.
  • PA-12: Big Dog coming to town: Bill Clinton is coming to Johnstown on May 16th to do a rally for Dem Mark Critz.
  • PA-17 (PDF): Susquehanna Polling & Research (5/7-8, likely voters, no trendlines):
  • Tim Holden (D-inc): 54

    Sheila Dow-Ford (D): 27

    Undecided: 18

    (MoE: ±4.9%)

    David Argall (R): 21

    Frank Ryan (R): 17

    John First (R): 7

    Allen Griffth (R): 5

    Undecided: 47

    (MoE: ±4.3%)

    While Dow-Ford probably can’t unseat Holden, these are some uninspiring numbers for the incumbent, who only gets 38% re-elects. Obama’s job approval is 32-56.

  • SD-AL: Chris Nelson, South Dakota’s Republican Secretary of State who is hoping to take on Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, is at least birther-curious, claiming that “many people” contacted him as SoS “asking how Obama could be on our ballot given this controversy.” Nelson’s primary opponents (who were asked the same question) didn’t take the bait, so you gotta wonder if Nelson is trying to out-teabag them.
  • NY State Sen.: Among his many un-endearing habits, Mike Bloomberg has long used his zillions to prop up Republicans in the state Senate. However, Bloombo flack Howard Wolfson is now hinting that this tradition may come to an end. His Bloombleness has already endorsed Dem Craig Johnson of Long Island.
  • NRSC: Michael DuHaime, a top strategist for Chris Christie’s gubernatorial campaign (and before that, political director for John McCain’s presidential bid), is being tapped by the NRSC to head up their independent expenditure arm this year.
  • SSP Daily Digest: 11/18

    CT-Sen: Linda McMahon has picked up a major critic in her Senate run: one of her former employees, in the form of 66-year-old former pro wrestler Superstar Billy Graham. Graham is a physical wreck from his days in the WWF, thanks to steroid abuse and a number of hip replacements, with no pension or health care from WWE. He plans to keep dogging the McMahon campaign as McMahon keeps trying to sanitize her previous career.

    FL-Sen: Charlie Crist is dropping the smiley above-the-fray approach; he’s promising to step up direct engagements with Marco Rubio, now that it looks like we’ve got a real race on our hands. Crist will go after Rubio for failure to move important pieces of conservative legislation during his time as state House speaker.

    KS-Sen, KS-04: This seems to exist mostly as whispers and rumors, but there’s word that Rep. Todd Tiahrt, not getting much traction in polls or fundraising or endorsements, may drop out of the GOP Senate primary against Rep. Jerry Moran. (Tiahrt’s people pushed back against the idea, saying they’re relying on movement grassroots forces that things like “polls” don’t pick up on. They actually also tried redbaiting Moran over his sponsorship of legislation to allow American travel to Cuba, indicating they won’t go quietly.) The question of Tiahrt running for House instead also presents a conundrum for state Rep. Raj Goyle in KS-04, who’s turning into one of the Dems’ best 2010 challengers — would Goyle be better off running in an open seat, or against the 16-year vet Tiahrt in what’s shaping up to be an anti-incumbent year?

    KY-Sen: There had been some talk about Cathy Bailey (a wealthy Bush Pioneer and W’s ambassador to Latvia), back when the GOP was still casting about for an alternative to Jim Bunning. All of a sudden, she’s back, saying she’s considering the race and sounding none too pleased with Trey Grayson (too “moderate” for her tastes) and Rand Paul (too “extreme”). I can’t see her winning the primary, but with her money, she could conceivably peel away enough mainstream GOP votes from Grayson to flip the primary to Paul.

    MT-Sen: It looks like Max Baucus may have suffered some residual damage from his high-profile role in health care reform; he’s down to 44% approval, from 67% approval at this point two years ago, according to an MSU-Billings poll. He’s lagging all other statewide officials, including Jon Tester (56/25) and Brian Schweitzer (62/20). The problem seems to be that Baucus gets only 67% approval among Dems, compared with 81% for Tester and 82% for Schweitzer; a plurality of Montanans, including 73% of Dems, support a public option, so Baucus’s decline among Dems doesn’t seem hard to diagnose.

    NC-Sen: Former Lt. Gov. Dennis Wicker said he won’t be running for Senate, although he’d strongly considered it. With Rep. Bob Etheridge’s recent “no” also, it’s looking more and more like SoS Elaine Marshall will have a lightly contested path to the Dem nomination (her main opponent is attorney Kenneth Lewis).

    NH-Sen: One other important “no” in a Senate race: RNC member and one-time House candidate Sean Mahoney, who had been making lots of candidate-like noises, said he won’t run in the GOP field. If you look a few moves ahead in the chess game, that’s good news for us, as having Mahoney out of the race means fewer votes split on the field’s right flank, giving right-winger Ovide Lamontagne a stronger shot at taking out establishment fave Kelly Ayotte, which would give Dems a much weaker opponent in the general.

    WI-Sen: Former Gov. (and brief presidential candidate) Tommy Thompson isn’t ruling out a Senate bid, although it seems unlikely; he’ll make a decision “next year.” Thompson’s rather strange statement is that he’s “looking at governor, looking at senator, and looking at mayor of Elroy. One of the three.” Seeing as how this is similar to the NY-Sen-B or ND-Sen races (an unlikely challenge to materialize, but one that would be a hot race if it did), SSP is moving the Wisconsin race back on to the big board, as a Race to Watch.

    WV-Sen: Congratulations to Robert Byrd, who hit an astonishing milestone today: the longest-serving Congressperson of all time. Byrd (a Representative from 1952-1958 and a Senator since 1958) has been in Congress for more than 25% of Congress’s existence.

    KS-Gov: Kansas Dems have finally nailed down a solid candidate to take on retiring Sen. Sam Brownback in the gubernatorial race. Retired pharmaceutical company executive Tom Wiggans will carry the flag for the Democrats in this uphill fight. (H/t Mike Nellis.)

    NY-19: I was tempted to put this story on the FP just so I could run the headline “Ball busted!” Roll Call is sounding pretty pissed off at having gotten initially snookered by Greg Ball and his sketchy poll from yesterday. His internal poll only sampled two-thirds of the district (Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess Counties), oversampling Republican Putnam County and leaving out Orange and Rockland Counties altogether, counties where Hall won last year. Ball’s backers say they’ll do a more traditional poll soon and are still pleased with their findings.

    PA-10: Good news for the GOP: they’ve found an elected official who’s interested in going up against Blue Dog Dem Chris Carney in the sprawling, red-leaning 10th, where they’ve been struggling with recruitment. The bad news is: Snyder Co. Commissioner Malcolm Derk is 27 (and is hard-pressed to look 17 — check out the photo at the link), and Snyder County, deep in the hills, has a population of 38K and is at the wrong end of the district from the population centers.

    WI-08: A line is forming among GOP challengers to Rep. Steve Kagen, and now there’s a former state legislator among them. Ex-state Rep. Terry McCormick served three terms and then lost the 2006 primary in WI-08 against then-state Rep. John Gard when it was an open seat, and now she’s back for another try. There are a couple county supervisors in the race, but the NRCC seems to like Reid Ribble, a businessman who can bring his own money to the race.

    CA-St. Ass.: Republican Orange County Supervisor Chris Norby finished first in the special election (to replace “Hot Mike” Duvall) in AD-72 last night. His 37% wasn’t enough to avoid a second round. He’ll face Democrat John MacMurray (who finished second at 27%) and a Green Party candidate; two other Republicans, Linda Ackerman and Richard Faher, pulled in 20% and 13% respectively, so if Norby consolidates the GOP votes in this red-leaning seat (which falls within CA-40 in the US House) he’s on track to holding the seat.

    NRCC: Pete Sessions, emulating the Dems’ spread-the-field strategy of recent cycles, says he wants to have 435 districts that Republicans are playing in. He may have missed an important piece of information: the Illinois filing deadline is past, and the Republicans are already guaranteed not to be playing in IL-01 and IL-04. Well, 433 is close.

    Mayors: There are dueling internal polls of the upcoming Houston mayoral runoff, one of the two big mayoral races left on the table (Atlanta being the other one). City controller Annise Parker leads former city attorney Gene Locke, 47-34 in her own poll, while in Locke’s poll, Parker has a narrower 43-39 lead.

    Demographics: NDN, a liberal think tank that spends a lot of time on Latino issues, has done some projecting of 2010 re-apportionment, and likes what it sees. They see Texas gaining four seats, and possibly three of those could be drawn as Hispanic-influence seats in Dallas, Houston, and the Rio Grande Valley. They also see Florida gaining a seat, and recommend creation of a Hispanic-influence seat in central Florida (where much of the state’s growth, both overall and among Hispanics, has been).

    Parties: CNN has a poll that points to the current disparity between the parties: Democrats are a lot more tolerant of the big tent. 58% of Dems prefer to see nomination of candidates who can beat the Republicans, even if they don’t agree on all the issues, while 51% of Republicans prefer to see candidates who agree with them even if they have a poor chance of beating the Democrat.

    Votes: Donkeylicious has an interesting project reminiscent of SSP’s own PVI/Vote Index, looking at Dems and seeing how they match up with their districts’ leans. A lot of the same names show up among bad Dems as we found, but they do some interesting breaking things down by region and by freshman or sophomore status.

    SSP Daily Digest: 6/16

    AR-Sen: The leader of Arkansas teabaggers’ movement, Tom Cox, has decided that he’ll run for the GOP nomination for Senate to run against Blanche Lincoln. Cox is the owner of Aloha Pontoon Boats, where he had a little trouble last year with a federal raid turned up 13 illegal immigrants working for him… which doesn’t sound like it’ll play well with his ideal base voters. In the primary, he’ll face off against an anti-semitic state senator and some Huckabee buddy who owns a food safety company.

    FL-Sen: The movement conservatives continue to square off against the establishment in the GOP Florida Senate primary. Jim DeMint, probably the most conservative senator by most metrics and with a sizable grass roots following, just endorsed Marco Rubio.

    IL-Sen: Rep. Mark Kirk still refuses to say what exactly he’s doing, but he promises that he’s raising money “for a big campaign.” (His last few House races have been big-money affairs, so who knows what that means?)

    KS-Sen: Dems seem to be moving closer to actually having a candidate in the Kansas Senate race: former newspaper editor Charles Schollenberger, who formed an exploratory committee.

    KY-Sen: State Senate President David Williams had publicly contemplated getting into the GOP primary against Jim Bunning, even meeting with the NRSC, but he said yesterday that he won’t run. He refused to officially endorse anybody, but said he was most excited about philanthropist and former ambassador Cathy Bailey among the possible candidates.

    NY-Sen-B: Rep. Carolyn Maloney has set a July 4th deadline for deciding whether or not to run in the Senate primary. Meanwhile, Kirsten Gillibrand picked up two endorsement from groups with a lot of on-the-ground firepower: New York State United Teachers and (cue the Phase 5 wingnut freakout) ACORN. Rep. Peter King, on the GOP side, set his own deadline, saying he’ll decide whether or not to run by Labor Day. Also today is word that Barack Obama had King in his sights as he cut a swath through Northeast Republicans by offering him a job — in his case, ambassador to Ireland, which King declined.

    PA-Sen: Looks like that Act of God never happened, because Rep. Joe Sestak is actively staffing up for a Senate primary challenge to Arlen Specter.

    WV-Sen: With 91-year-old Robert Byrd having been in the hospital for nearly a month now and not planning an immediate return to the Senate, there have been some behind-the-scenes discussions of what happens if he can’t return to office. West Virginia state Democratic party chair Nick Casey is seen as the consensus choice to serve as placeholder until the 2010 election, if need be.

    AZ-Gov: This can’t be helping Jan Brewer (the Republican SoS who ascended to the governor’s mansion to replace Janet Napolitano) as she considers whether or not to run for a full term: she’s in a standoff with her Republican-controlled legislature over the budget, almost single-handedly leaving the state on track to a government shutdown.

    FL-Gov: David Hill, a top GOP pollster in Florida, is leery about the chances for AG Bill McCollum (who’s already lost statewide twice, and now is trying to transparently reboot himself as a Charlie Crist-style moderate) in the gubernatorial election. He says he’s been actively encouraging state Senator Paula Dockery to follow through on jumping into the primary.

    KS-Gov: Sen. Sam Brownback got some good news: SoS Ron Thornburgh decided to get out of the GOP primary, leaving Brownback a clear path. (Not that Thornburgh was going to pose much of a threat, which is why he got out.) And finally a Democratic state Senator, Chris Steineger, seems to be getting into the race for Team Blue — although he sounds like a bit of a loose cannon, having pissed off most of the state party establishment at various points.

    MI-Gov: George Perles, the 75-year-old former football coach at Michigan State and currently an MSU trustee (which is a statewide elected position) announced that he’s running for the Democratic nomination. He joins Lt. Gov. John Cherry in the field, who seems to have most of the establishment backing so far.

    MN-Gov: Contrary to earlier reports, Rep. Michele Bachmann hasn’t quite ruled out a bid for Governor in 2010, what with Tim Pawlenty stepping down. She expresses her ambivalence with some nice Harlequin romance novel phrasing: “If my heart moved in the other direction and I had the tug, I’d do it. I wouldn’t be afraid to run for office. I just don’t feel the tug.”

    NV-Gov: Another GOPer is sniffing out the governor’s race (kind of a no-brainer, given the world of shit Jim Gibbons is in): Reno mayor Bob Cashell, who was last seen endorsing Harry Reid a few weeks ago. Of course, there’s the risk that if too many credible GOP challengers get in, Gibbons has a better shot at surviving the primary via a badly split vote… although facing a wounded Gibbons in the general would probably be the best scenario for the Dems.

    SSP Daily Digest: 5/6

    PA-Sen: In a big diss to Arlen Specter, the Democratic caucus last night voted to slot Specter into the most junior spots on his committees for the remainder of this Congress. The issue won’t be revisited until after the midterm. This strips Specter of one of his strongest re-election arguments: seniority, and the power to make things happen that comes with it (especially on his Appropriations subcommittee… although that’s not as huge a problem in a big state like Pennyslvania as it would be in an Appropriations-dependent state like Alaska).

    KY-Sen: There’s another potential GOP primary challenger to Jim Bunning sniffing out the race, in case SoS Trey Grayson doesn’t show up despite having opened an exploratory committee. Cathy Bailey hasn’t held elective office before, but she’s strong on the fundraising front. She was a Bush Pioneer in 2000, and was rewarded for that with a post as Ambassador to Latvia. She’s married to the former CEO of Providian as well, so she can self-fund if need be.

    NC-Sen: Kenneth Lewis, a Durham attorney and fundraiser for Barack Obama, is telling state Democratic Party leaders that he will run against Richard Burr next year. Still no word on state AG Roy Cooper’s intentions. (J)

    IL-Gov: DuPage County Board chair Robert Schillerstrom is setting up an exploratory committee to run for the GOP nomination in the 2010 gubernatorial race. He’ll join state Senator Bill Brady, who’s already in the hunt. Brady has the “my turn” advantage, having finished 3rd in the 2006 primary, but the suburban Schillerstrom would have the population advantage over downstate’s Brady.

    NJ-Gov: The Democratic Governors’ Association has been reading the Gray Davis playbook (or maybe my advice?): they’re going hard after Chris Christie this month with an ad barrage in order to damage Christie in the hopes of getting the much less-known and more-conservative Steve Lonegan the GOP nomination instead. The Corzine camp is not involved in the efforts, which aims at Christie’s strength: questioning his supposed corruption-fighting credentials as U.S. Attorney.

    VA-02: Ex-Rep. Thelma Drake announced she won’t seek a rematch against Rep. Glenn Nye, who upset her in 2008. This may actually be bad news! for Nye, as there are potential GOP candidates more impressive than the polarizing Drake waiting in the wings. Nye has to be bolstered, though, by the blue shift in this now R+5 district, narrowly won by Obama.

    MN-06: Maureen Reed, a former Univ. of Minnesota regent who ran for Lt. Gov on the Independence Party ticket, will be running in MN-06 in the DFL primary in 2010. While she might not make it through the primary, especially if Elwyn Tinklenberg runs again and/or state Senator Tarryl Clark runs, I’m taking this as a positive sign, in that the IP might not be looking to shoot us in the foot this time. (See also Populista‘s diary.)

    NRCC: The NRCC has launched another offensive on what they perceive as vulnerable (or at least soften-up-able) Dems, with radio ads against Marion Berry, Charlie Melancon, Earl Pomeroy, Zack Space, and John Tanner. Space is the only one who’s on Frontline, but Berry, Melancon, and Tanner are all in districts that moved sharply toward McCain in 2008. The ad attacks the Blue Dogs for being “lap dogs” on the Obama budget.

    Gay marriage: The gay marriage train just keeps building up speed, picking up one more state today. After some public hemming and hawing, Maine Governor John Baldacci signed gay marriage legislation this morning after it passed both chambers of the legislature. (Discussion underway in David Kowalski‘s diary.)

    King County Executive: The first poll is out in the race to lead King County (which puts you in charge of 1.8 million constituents, and is a frequent stepping stone to Washington governor). In a bit of a twist, the Republican (it’s an ostensibly nonpartisan race, but everyone knows who’s what) is in the lead in this dark-blue county: former TV news anchor Susan Hutchison is at 20%, followed by two county councilors from Seattle proper (Dow Constantine at 6 and Larry Phillips at 5) and two Eastside state legislators (Fred Jarrett at 7 and Ross Hunter at 3). All the Dems (each of whom is largely unknown outside his district) added up together beat the widely-known Hutchison, though, so whichever Dem survives the primary seems likely to pull this out in the general election, in Nov. 2009.

    Mayors: Republican Dan Sullivan beat Democrat Eric Croft to replace Mark Begich as Anchorage mayor yesterday, 57-43. (Sullivan has the advantage of being the son of former mayor George Sullivan.) Discussion underway in benjso99‘s diary. Also, yesterday in Detroit, Dave Bing defeated newly-minted mayor Ken Cockrel by 4 points. (Which makes him the second legendary NBA point guard to ascend to mayor, following Sacramento’s Kevin Johnson.)