SSP Daily Digest: 12/3

• CT-Sen, CT-Gov: The rumors had been getting louder all week that ex-Ambassador Tom Foley would drop out of the complicated GOP Senate field, paring that field down to ex-Rep. Rob Simmons, Linda McMahon, and Peter Schiff, and head over to the seemingly easier Governor’s race instead. (Easier in the primary, at least — whatever Dem he faces in the general won’t come in with the same baggage as Chris Dodd.) Today Foley made it official, getting out of the Senate race and into the Governor’s race. Foley doesn’t have the field to himself, though, and in fact faces a formidable challenge from current Lt. Gov. Michael Fedele, who’d also been rumored to run but made it official yesterday. Fedele claims to have outgoing Gov. Jodi Rell’s support, but Rell is only saying that there are several well-qualified Republicans running.

• FL-Sen: Charlie Crist is red in the face today after it was noticed that his recorded message giving callers the number for Florida KidCare had several of the numbers mixed up, and the number he was giving out was a number for ‘hot, horny girls.’ And while we’re talking about hot, horny girls, we might as well talk about Bubba the Love Sponge. Crist’s appearance tonight on his endless fundraising carousel is being hosted by attorney Stephen Diaco. One of Diaco’s most renowned clients is the aforementioned Mr. Sponge, who once famously asked Crist “Are you a homo?” (UPDATE: The St. Pete Times apparently got its shock jocks mixed up; that wasn’t Bubba the Love Sponge, but rather “Randy and Dave” who asked that.)

• IL-Sen: With David Hoffman hitting the airwaves this week, it didn’t take long for Alexi Giannoulias to respond with his first TV spot. While Hoffman’s ad is just him intensely facing down the camera, Giannoulias is a more conventional touchy-feely bio spot that focuses on his efforts to save jobs at local company Hartmarx. Also, Jacob Meister has his own internal poll out of the Democratic primary field. Usually candidates don’t release internal polls that show them polling at 1%, but, well, Meister’s gotta start somewhere. It’s pretty well in-line with the other candidates’ internals, showing about half of voters still undecided, with Giannoulias at 33, Cheryle Jackson at 10, and Hoffman at 7.

• KY-Sen: An interesting National Journal piece on Rand Paul points to what we’ve been wondering about: whether the Paulists and the teabaggers can make common cause, despite the the ideological differences they bring to the table (if one can accuse the teabaggers’ incoherent and paranoid set of grievances to be an ‘ideology’). The answer is, yes, apparently they can, as they’re sufficiently united in their hatred of all things guvmint. Paul has apparently had some success reaching out to the tea party wing of the Republicans, and lately has taken to comparing himself to another successful upstart, Marco Rubio.

• FL-05: Florida Republican Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite isn’t really on anybody’s list of vulnerable House members, but, in case that needed to be quantified, she released an internal poll proving that. A Tarrance Group survey found her with a 62/18 approval. Her greatest concern in 2010 in this GOP-leaning district may be a primary challenge from teabagger Jason Sager, but her approval is in “the 70s” purely among conservative Republicans, so she’s probably safe on her right flank too.

• MN-06: It looks like the Democratic contest in the 6th is going to go to a primary, regardless of what happens with the DFL endorsement process. Maureen Reed says she’s won’t abide by the state party’s endorsement (which was probably already going to go to the well-connected state Sen. Tarryl Clark). Minnesota has a notoriously late primary, which could leave the primary winner with little time to replenish before the general against Rep. Michele Bachmann, but it’s possible the Minnesota primary may get moved earlier to comply with new federal election laws.

• NC-05: Rep. Virginia Foxx is protected by a deep-red district but has a great gift for inserting her foot into her mouth, so it’s always good to have a Dem on tap to go against her. The rumored candidate for 2010 may be Billy Kennedy, a former state and county Democratic party committee member and the host of a local radio talk show.

• NH-01: Manchester mayor Frank Guinta is quickly going from a solo show to Three’s Company, with businessman Rich Ashooh getting in earlier this week and now Fergus Cullen saying he’s interested in the race too. Cullen is the former state party chair in New Hampshire, and points out that offers some contrasts to the other two candidates, in terms of being more socially moderate and also being from the district’s rural part instead of Manchester.

• NH-02: Next door in the 2nd, it looks like we’re also about to expand to a three-person field on the Dem side. Katrina Swett, an attorney who lost to Charlie Bass in 2002, says she’s “very, very strongly” moving in the direction of running — this comes after people were starting to wonder where she is, despite her long-expected candidacy (she says she’s been busy with the Lantos Foundation, named after her father, former Rep. Tom Lantos). Attorney Ann McLane Kuster and state Rep. John DeJoie are already in, but Swett has the advantage of leftover funds that she stockpiled for a Senate run last year that never happened.

• NY-01: Here’s an internal in a race where the incumbent is considered potentially vulnerable: Democratic Rep. Tim Bishop, in Long Island’s 1st. The internal, taken by wealthy Republican Randy Altschuler by McLaughlin & Assocs. gives Bishop a big lead, 46-26. Still, Altschuler hasn’t introduced himself to the district yet and is likely only to gain ground, so Bishop might want to take notice that he’s polling below the magic 50% mark.

• PA-06: The Democratic primary in the 6th has suddenly escalated into a brutal barfight in the last few days, with both candidates’ camps throwing the kitchen sink and everything else handy at each other. The initial sound and fury focused on abortion, but it quickly devolved into general impugning of each other’s motives, and one of the issues then hurled by the Manan Trivedi camp via press release was the sockpuppetry engaged in here at SSP by a Doug Pike campaign official. So, that’s some food for thought for all the campaign pros (and amateurs) among the SSP readership: don’t give in to the temptation to sockpuppet, or it could actually wind up a campaign issue that bites you in the butt.

• PA-08: The Republicans found an elected official to go up against not-terribly-vulnerable Rep. Patrick Murphy in the suburban, Dem-leaning 8th: Judith Algeo, a lawyer who’s also on the Warwick Township Board of Supervisors. Warwick Twp. has a population of 12,000, though, so what little name rec that generates isn’t guaranteed to get her out of the GOP primary — there are three other candidates already, among whom attorney and Marine Reservist Dean Malik seems to have gotten the most attention.

• TN-06: Things still seem to be full speed ahead for Republican state Sen. Jim Tracy, who’s now meeting with the NRCC in Washington about the logistics of a challenge against long-time Rep. Bart Gordon in this increasingly-red district. He’d face a primary against former Rutherford Co. GOP chair Lou Ann Zelenik, though.

• TN-08: A couple more items about the newly-minted open seat in the 8th: state Sen. Roy Herron is already in the race (and out of the gubernatorial race), but he’s going to be refunding the money he raised for his gubernatorial run. On the one hand, it’s gotta suck to be giving back that $900K, but on the other hand, assumedly he can get much of that re-donated back to his new account and it does show that he knows how to raise the dough. Also, good news as the Dems seek to avoid a costly primary: fellow state Sen. Lowe Finney said that he wouldn’t seek the nomination.

• GA-St. House: It’s looking like Republican state House speaker Glenn Richardson’s resignation is imminent. People on both sides of the aisle have been urging him to step down in the wake of Richardson’s suicide attempt last month, although perhaps more damaging is the allegation that the suicide attempt was related to an affair with a utility lobbyist where there may have been some quid pro quos. (And I have to ask, thinking back to “Hot Mike” Duvall in California, is that just how utility lobbyists do business these days?)