This is it — primary day in Alaska and Florida. The biggest prize of the day is the AK-AL primary, where scandal-tainted GOP Rep. Don Young is facing a stiff challenge from Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell. If Young can hold off Parnell, Democrats stand a good chance of taking out Young in November; if the primary goes the other way, this will be a tougher but still doable race. Ethan Berkowitz and Diane Benson will face off for the Democratic nod tonight.
And while few expect indicted Sen. Ted Stevens to lose his primary against beardo Vic Vickers and businessman Dave Cuddy, his performance might give us a better reading on the level of discontent with Stevens among the GOP base in Alaska.
In Florida, the hottest action may be in the 8th District, where Charlie Stuart, Mike Smith, and Alan Grayson are vying for the Democratic nomination to take on GOP Rep. Ric Keller, and the 16th District, where the GOP is battling through a three-way primary to take on Democratic Rep. Tim Mahoney.
Care to make any predictions for any of these primaries?
Polls close in Florida at 7pm Eastern, and in Alaska at 12am Eastern. We’ll be rolling with liveblog coverage for both of these states later in the evening, so be sure to check back with us then.
C’mon. You can hang on so we can crush you in the fall. Please!
I’ll go
Young: 45.5
Parnell: 44.5
LeDoux: 10
And after seeing the amount of money Grayson is spending I’ll say
Grayson: 38
Stuart: 35
Smith: 27
I’ll probably be proven wrong as Stuart crushes them all though but I want to make a bolder pick beacuse all my “safe” picks have been wrong.
All right here we go, really tough ones that could go either way…
AK-AL
Young: 46%
Parnell: 42%
LeDoux: 12%
FL-08
Stuart: 45%
Grayson: 35%
Smith: 20%
Rooney will win the FL-16 primary and Ted Stevens holds on in Alaska with 65% of the vote.
Parnell 46
Young 44.5
LeDoux 9.5
As much as I’d love to see one of us do it, either way I’m gonna love seeing Young taken down a notch (or eight). There better be a video camera at his concession speech (either tonight or in November or when he feels like it). He always struck me as the type of person, if you broke up with them, he’d deny it for a few months, then start sending you mixtapes.
As for Senate:
Stevens 57
Cuddy 19
Vickers 17
The others divvy up the remaining 7 percent.
Charlie Smith, Young, Stevens, Keller, and Rooney.
Since I know nothing about the Florida primaries.
Alaska Senate (Republicans):
Stevens: 65%
Cuddy: 25%
Vickers: 10%
Alaska-At Large (Republicans):
Young: 46%
Parnell: 44&
LeDoux: 10%
I’m pretty sure Begich and Berkowitz will squeak through their primaries no sweat. Unfortunately, I can’t stay up and join the festivities of monitoring the live results coming in, since the first polls don’t close until 12 midnight.
Have fun, y’all!
Senate: Stevens 63%, Cuddy 25%, Vickers 9%, Rest 3%
House: Young 45%, Parnell 44%, LeDoux 11%
I don’t even think he could win in November, from listening to him in one of the debates. His first ad was good, the second ok, but I don’t think they will be enough for him to win this primary. Stuart has also spent quite a bit on television ads and he has the Graham-endorsement one out.
Everybody else has predicted a close race. I’m going to predict that Parnell outperforms his polling.
Parnell: 53
Young: 43
LeDoux: 4
For the senate, I’m only going to predict the results for Stevens and “Other”, since it doesn’t seem to be worthwhile tracking down all the various longshots and reading up on them.
Stevens: 65
Other: 35