Taking the last non-Rasmussen polls (four as maximum) and calculating the average between the key numbers of the polls we have the next rank:

(Begining from the number of democratic senate seats and the number of democratic governors what need not run for reelection this year, the first number mean the number of democratic senate seats and governors what dems would have winning until every race of the list.)

(When I tell not the number of polls is because they are four or more)

(I bold emphasize the race with a negative poll what include an outsider key value what make down the average).

RANK OF SENATE AND GUBERNATORIAL RACES BY LAST NO-RASMUSSEN POLLS AVERAGE

41 senate seats in the democratic caucus need not run this year.

07 democratic governors need not run this year.

And taking L Chafee and C Crist as friendly candidates:

42S +??.??% VT-Sen 0 polls

43S +??.??% MD-Sen 0 polls

44S +??.??% HI-Sen 0 polls

08G +38.50% AR-Gov 2 polls

09G +37.75% NY-Gov

45S +36.67% NY-Sen 3 polls

10G +23.50% NH-Gov

46S +22.75% OR-Sen

47S +21.00% NY-Sen(s)

11G +20.00% RI-Gov 2 polls

48S +19.25% CT-Sen

49S +15.67% WI-Sen 3 polls

12G +10.67% HI-Gov 3 polls

13G +09.00% AZ-Gov

14G +07.67% CT-Gov 3 polls

15G +07.50% MA-Gov

16G +07.00% MD-Gov

17G +06.25% CA-Gov

50S +06.25% WA-Sen

51S +06.00% FL-Sen

18G +05.25% OH-Gov

19G +04.00% NM-Gov 2 polls

52S +04.00% CA-Sen

53S +03.00% OH-Sen

20G +02.00% MN-Gov

21G +02.50% OR-Gov 2 polls

22G +02.00% VT-Gov 1 poll

23G +01.75% CO-Gov

54S +01.50% CO-Sen

55S +01.25% PA-Sen

56S +01.00% MO-Sen

57S +00.75% NV-Sen

24G =??.??% ME-Gov 0 polls

25G – 00.50% IL-Gov

**** – 00.75% NJ-Gov

58S – 01.50% IL-Sen

26G – 01.50% GA-Gov

59S – 04.25% KY-Sen

60S – 04.75% NC-Sen

**** – 05.75% MA-Sen

27G – 06.00% TX-Gov

28G – 06.25% WI-Gov

29G – 06.50% FL-Gov

61S – 09.25% NH-Sen

30G – 10.00% SC-Gov 1 polls

31G – 11.00% NV-Gov

62S – 11.00% IN-Sen 2 polls

32G – 11.75% IA-Gov

33G – 12.67% AL-Gov 3 polls

34G – 13.00% PA-Gov

35G – 13.00% SD-Gov 1 poll

63S – 14.25% LA-Sen

**** – 14.25% VA-Gov

64S – 15.00% DE-Sen 2 polls

36G – 15.25% MI-Gov

65S – 15.25% AR-Sen

66S – 16.00% IA-Sen

37G – 16.25% OK-Gov

…

I take as the negative outsider polls, the polls what have a difference of -9.50 or more with the average (higher with the other polls for the race).

This is a rank of outsider values:

(The first number is the difference between the outsider value and the average for the race).

– 12.50% NH-Gov by PPP

– 11.00% PA-Gov by Muhlenberg College

– 10.75% MN-Gov by Survey USA

– 10.00% NM-Gov by Survey USA

– 10.00% IA-Sen by PPP

– 09.75% OR-Sen by Survey USA

– 09.75% WI-Gov by St Norbert College

– 09.50% IL-Gov by PPP

– 09.50% OR-Gov by Survey USA

The two colleges seems local pollsters attacking the democratic prospect in PA and WI. I worry about WI-Gov race because I think should be better than this and no-one is polling the race. Without the outsider poll, the average for WI-Gov race would be – 02.25%.

Survey USA seems begin a campaign for include outsider values for the races with lower number of polls (the poll for WA-Sen was too an outsider value but is not included because they are more recent polls for the race). ME-Gov with 0 polls and VT-Gov with 1 poll are good candidates for the next Survey USA poll in this strategy.

Just Survey USA polls create the alone positive outsider values at this level (+9.50 or more) because the average between the key value of two polls is in the middle of both values and if one is included as outsider, both values get as outsiders. A third poll would show what is the real outsider value.

And PPP has too some unpleasant polls. The dems from NH (the value for NH-Sen is not an outsider but is very bad too), IA and IL (Obama’s home state) are not favored by PPP what gives to they negative outsider key values in the polls. The new PPP poll of IL-Sen and IL-Gov races included after the updates, improves the previous numbers but still makes down the average of both races to negative numbers.

Of course all the races with positive average are races for fight and try win. And someone of the races with negative average can be too for fight but the democratic candidates need emerge. In the poll of the diary are included the 20 first races with negative average in the moment of write the diary (before the updates).

I will update the diary with the results of the new polls while the diary continues in the frontpage of SSP. I include too the reference of the NJ-Gov, MA-Sen and VA-Gov races with the average of the last four polls just before the elections of 2009 and 2010.

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MN-6 is a combination of suburbs and exurbs of the Minneapolis/St Paul metro area, the St Cloud metro area, and rural towns and townships.  I divide out the St Croix River area into its own category because all along the river, it has a distinctive DFL tinge/dominance and it is clearly a different segment of voters compared to other areas of similar distance to Minneapolis/St Paul and with similar population density.  Once urban sprawl expands further east, Im sure that’ll change.  (Note that my decision on what is an exurb vs rural vs suburb is subjective and you can argue both ways for some of them.)

I labeled the counties on the map and tried my best to darken the county lines to differntiate.  St. Cloud city proper is divided up between three counties so reference this map if you care to see the line divisions more clearly.

I graduated from high school in St Michael-Albertville, a pair of exurbs right on the border of the district that would be considered the NW edge of the metro.  These exurbs are full-blown tea-bagging country where repealing parts of the constitution is quite popular.  CNN’s polling on tea baggers lays out the key demographics of a tea-bagger and this article was actually a bit of a light bulb in realizing why my hometown was so conservative.   One key factor is making more money than average, which is true for these exurbs, as per these wikis, St. Michael, Andover, Elk River, and Ham Lake. But there is also another section of exurbs where being rich and conservative doesn’t make them a tea-bagger but more so by what is discussed in this NYT article; white, lower educated and religious.  Minnesotans do attend church at a higher rate then the rest of the country, making the exurbs probably even higher on average when you break down the attendance level by region.  And, this area is not Scandinavian Lutheran, but rather German Catholic, which makes them a much more conservative religious bunch than religious people in MN as a whole, and even more so when you take out the popular progressive Catholic churches in the Twin Cities.  From my personal experience, the case with these exurbs is that it’s a combination; they are more highly educated like most Minnesotans are, so they make more money yet are much more religious and this religiosity is of a more conservative nature, which turned them into fundamentalists in many regards of their thinking.

The exurbs make up 31.63% of the total vote in the district, the largest individual area to rack up votes.  And with Minnesotan’s superiority in political activity, these exurban areas are a hotbed for tea-baggery.  But the exurbs can only carry so much; the rest of the district will make an incumbent like Bachmann always a fair target in any election cycle in a district with this build.

Below the jump we get into the good stuff.

The Basics of the District

The next three maps show the presidential results for the past two cycles and the 2008 congressional results.  The 2004 presidential map is broken down by city instead of precinct due to so many cities changing their precinct layout between those 4 years.  Here is a 2008 results map broken down by city for easier comparison between 2004 and 2008.

Bush v Kerry 57%-42%

McCain v Obama Results 53%-45%

Bachmann v Tinklenberg Results 46%-43%

The Democrats are mainly confined to St. Cloud (54%/44% Obama), the suburbs (50%/48%), and the St Croix River area (51%/47%) with them only totaling 38.73% of the vote, though.  McCain racked up much bigger margins in all his areas, winning the St. Cloud area by 13%, the exurbs by 16%, and the rural areas by 22%!  This district does a great job of being a vote sink for the bigger suburbs that have grown rapidly and become much more Dem-leaning over the last decade by combining them with large swaths of the far reaches of the metro area.  This is also seen with MN-2 and MN-3.

By looking at the Congressional results, it becomes apparent where Tinklenberg really did well and ate into the GOP vote, or at least where the GOP voted Indy instead for Bachmann.  The next set of maps will compare these drop-offs.

Drop-Off Analysis

The next three maps show the drop-off from McCain-to-Bachmann voters, Obama-to-Tinklenberg, and then the overall advantage a precinct had for a party.  

McCain v Bachmann Drop-off

Obama v Tinklenberg Drop-off

Overall Average Advantage

As a background of Minnesota politics, we have the Independence Party which attracts a much more significant amount of protest votes than third party candidates in other states.  WIth Bachmann being such a character, she is going to make a lot of Republicans not like her, which resulted in Bachmann underperforming McCain by 6.92%.  This also occurs on the DFL side as Tinkenberg underperformed by 1.17%, even while Tink is a perfectly inoffensive candidate.

As for the maps, I see three noteworthy areas where drop-off breaks from the average.  The exurbs in Northeast Wright County (my old stomping grounds) are where Bachmann does a bit better than the average.  This area is the most tea-baggish from extensive anecdotal evidence so I’m not very surprised; this is really her base.  However, the advantage is around 2% and makes up only a handful of cities, so this doesn’t help Bachmann too much.  And, these are areas that are trending away from the GOP as they grow in population.

The three densely populated suburbs show some major dissonance, with Woodbury and Anoka having much fewer ticket splitters for the GOP compared to the DFL by a pretty wide margin.  But what makes that more interesting is that Blaine is an identical suburban city but actually saw a DFL advantage.  Tinklenberg was mayor of Blaine from 1987 until 1996 so what appears to be found is an area where there is a definite home-town advantage occurring.

The other area is obviously St. Cloud and it’s surrounding area.  In both territories, Tinklenberg improved on Obama’s percentage of the vote and in the surrounding St. Cloud area, Bachmann lost 3% more McCain voters than the district average.  This is also where our likely nominee, state senator Tarryl Clark, represents.  This along with the suburbs are the two areas I chose to investigate further.

Another thing to note is that it appears stronger Obama districts posted a stronger Pres-Cong drop-off advantage for the Republicans.  I would hypothesize that the swing voters all swung Obama and then many of them swung to the Indy Party for the Congressional.  This can be seen with some of the St. Croix River areas, in St. Cloud, and also seems to be tied to why the suburbs are worth investigating.

Percentage of Overall Third-Party Vote in Suburbs

Here I wanted to check to see if the percentage of votes for the Independent varied from the district average when looking at precincts that also varied from the drop-off average.  And the results are conclusive that nope, not at all.  St. Cloud and St. Cloud area showed similar results; both had a similar drop-off pattern, one had higher Indy voters, one had less than average.

For the next maps, I compare what percentage of the Indy Congressional vote is made up of people who voted for McCain as well.

Suburban Vote Analysis

Percentage McCain Voters Make-up of Indy Vote

Obama/Indy votes were on average much more prevalent in the two suburbs of Anoka and Woodbury.  Tink still won these two cities by decent margins, 4.8% and 5.9% respectively, but this goes along with what I mentioned earlier; precincts that Obama won decisively have worse drop-off margins.  When the GOP is already getting beat, you can only get so much drop-off before you hit the base GOP support in any given area.   And swing voters most likely went for Obama more so in these areas, which then probably lead to a larger drop-off in the Congressional.

The real story though is how Tinklenberg’s home-town advantage resulted in very solid results in the +50k pop. city of Blaine.    When the numbers are averaged out for Anoka and Woodbury, the GOP have a 35.29% advantage in make-up of Indy vote compared to the district average in these big city suburbs.  Blaine had a 7.9% DFL advantage compared to the district average, thus giving Tinklenberg a home-town advantage where 42.38% of the Indy vote is made up of vote McCain voters rather than what should have been Obama voters.

St. Cloud+Area Vote Analysis

Percentage GOP Voters Make-up of Indy Vote

Tarryl Clark will be our nominee here and is starting to look to the general election against Bachmann.  She was elected in a special election and sworn in for the 2006 legislative session starting in January, and is currently number two in the state senate DFL leadership.  Clark should be able to clean-up in her home-town and be able to resonate as the St. Cloud candidate in the rest of the St. Cloud area.  (Anyone know the last time St. Cloud sent one of their own to Congress?)

Running the home-field advantage numbers from Tink’s performance, if the electorate were to be exactly the same for Clark, she’d gain 1525 votes in St. Cloud and 2446 votes in the St. Cloud area, giving Clark a grand total of 3971 more votes.  When you subtract out the loss of a home-town advantage in Blaine (989 votes), having a home-town advantage in St. Cloud based off the 2008 electorate gives the DFL a net plus of 2982 votes, or just under half of the total vote needed to beat Bachmann in the 2008 cycle.  I also believe she could do better home-town advantage wise, as this a small-town atmosphere and a home-towner can really exploit that.

*Note that the precinct on the left hand border is left white because there were no third party votes cast in the Congressional.

Conclusion

Clark is certainly running in a year that’ll be much tougher than it was for Tink, but I’m optimistic for a few reasons.  First, from the data I’ve presented, she stands a great shot at picking up votes from her home-town advantage vs other DFL candidates, her fundraising is out of this world, she’s actually attacking Bachmann and because of that, I think she will do a better job overcoming the national environment.  This race can’t be one of GOP vs DFL, it needs to be Michele Bachmann vs Sane Opponent.  If Clark can properly frame this race and stay on the offense, hopefully Bachmann will be the Musgrave of 2010.

Many people were scratching their heads Wednesday morning (or late Tuesday night), when we realized that South Carolina Democrats had nominated a literal “Some Dude” – an unemployed veteran living with his father – who somehow managed to front the $10,000 needed to run.

South Carolina State Senator Robert Ford weighed in on the matter later on Wednesday, remarking:

No white folks have an ‘e’ on the end of Green. The blacks after they left the plantation couldn’t spell, and they threw an ‘e’ on the end.

(If you’re wondering about the title, Gadsby is a 260-page novel that contains no instances of the letter E.)

Both Greene and Vic Rawl were relative unknowns and we’ll assume no voter knowledge of either candidate . Given the campaigning by both candidates (or lack thereof), I think this is a relatively tenable assumption.

So, let’s start at the county level – what’s the relationship between the percent of non-white registered voters and the percentage Greene received?

Here are two maps, with the non-white voter percentage on the left and Greene’s percentage on the right.

Is there a relationship? Maybe – hard to tell. Tom Schaller goes into this in more depth than I do.

However, thanks to the relatively good South Carolina State Election Commission website, we can go further to the precinct level. The geographic data for mapping precincts simply isn’t available, but we can still look at the numbers. (Sidenote: Absentees and provisionals can’t be attributed to a specific precinct and are tossed from here on out.)

Here’s a scatterplot of the non-white RV percentage and the percentage that Greene received on Tuesday and a simple regression line through it. Below that are the Stata output from a simple regression taking the non-white RV% as the independent variable.

The regression tells us two things:

• For every 1% increase in the non-white percentage of RVs, Greene’s percentage can be expected to increase 0.22%.
• For a hypothetical county with 100% white RVs, Greene’s expected percentage should be (!!) 51.6%.

But is the relationship there? Hard to say – it is statistically significant, but the R-squared is a measly 0.1425, meaning the other 85.75% of variance in Greene’s percentage is explained by something else.

Statistics disclaimer: Go ahead and skewer me for using a linear regression. (What else was I going to do?) I know the estimators here are going to be far from unbiased – that’s a picture-perfect example of heteroskedasticity if I’ve ever seen one…

I’m hesitant to rely solely on percentages though – there were plenty of precincts with few RVs and where few votes were cast (as you can tell by the 100% Greene precincts floating along the top edge). We can also consider this in terms of numbers: the number of non-white RVs and the number of votes for Greene in a given precinct.

Now, the regression tells a few things again:

• For every additional non-white voter, Greene’s vote count can be expected to go up 0.09. (Keep this in context of 24% voter turnout between both primaries!) This effect, again, is statistically significant, and very much so.
  

• For a hypothetical precinct with no non-white RVs, Greene will receive 7.8 votes.
  

• 62.6% of variance in Greene’s vote totals by precinct can be explained by the number of non-white RVs.

So again, is the relationship there? I think the second method presents a stronger case for the “E”-phenomenon than that first. But that said, is this instance of identity politics any more extraordinary than other instances? Does this have to do with voters having very little information (paging Scott Lee Cohen)? The second analysis, I might add, is also confounded in part by varying turnout across precincts…

Robert Ford may be on to something, but it’s all hard to say. (Lastly – if you haven’t realized the difficulty in writing with no Es, this post excluding Stata outputs, contains 438 of them.)

• AR-Sen: Bill Halter is “mulling” an endorsement of Blanche Lincoln, and wants a sit-down with her before doing so. Frankly, it’d be a big surprise if he didn’t endorse her: it didn’t seem like any more negative a race than usual by today’s standards; labor made its point and is probably eager to move on; and Halter would probably like to run for something else at some point.

• LA-Sen: Charlie Melancon has, well, a crisitunity on his hands with the oil spill in the Gulf. It gives him the chance to go on the offensive against David Vitter (who’s been trying to limit BP’s liabilities, and who’s also taken to Twitter to tout Louisiana seafood (now pre-blackened) as safe). But he has the tricky task of keep his district’s oil-and-gas dependency in mind; he’s aggressively calling Vitter a “liar” now… but only because Vitter has been saying that Melancon supports the Obama administration offshore drilling moratorium.

• NC-Sen: Bob Menendez continues to play favorites in the NC-Sen runoff, although it wasn’t with a large sum of money: Menendez’s PAC (not the DSCC) gave $5,000 to Cal Cunningham last week, as well as the same amount to Blanche Lincoln.

• SC-Sen: The slow-motion trainwreck of Alvin Greene’s media rollout continues apace in South Carolina, with last night’s go-nowhere interview with Keith Olbermann taking the cake. (Gawker concludes he may actually be, instead of a plant, just “some random dude.” Glad to see our phrasing’s catching on.) Jim DeMint is, for his part, denying that he put Greene up to this, while other Republicans are helpfully suggesting that Democrats may have put Greene up to it instead, in order to give Vic Rawl a visibility boost (because unopposed candidates don’t appear on the ballot). The Rawl campaign has had elections experts look over the voting patterns to try to figure out what happened, and they’ve already raised one odd red flag: the strange shift from the early absentee votes (where Rawl dominated) to votes cast on Election Day (which Greene won).

• UT-Sen: Bob Bennett, after hinting at it several weeks ago, went ahead and endorsed Tim Bridgewater today. Bridgewater is one of the two quasi-insurgents who finished ahead of Bennett at the state GOP convention, and will be competing in the primary against Mike Lee.

• CA-Gov: I think Godwin’s Law might not yet have been enacted when Jerry Brown was Governor the first time, but he might want to familiarize himself with it, after he was caught referring (apparently in jest) to Goebbels in reference to Meg Whitman’s saturation advertising. Speaking of which, Whitman just launched her first TV ad post-primary, in which (big surprise) she hates on taxes.

• FL-Gov: Looking for something that’ll stick against moneybags Rick Scott, Bill McCollum is now trying to attack him on his pro-life credentials, saying that Columbia/HCA hospitals performed abortions while Scott was CEO.

• OR-Gov, OR-Sen: SurveyUSA is out with a poll in Oregon that has a whiff of outlier to it (as any poll that’s about six points to the right of Rasmussen tends to): they find Republican candidate Chris Dudley leading Democratic ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber 47-40. Part of the problem for Dems might be that the poll has third-party Progressive candidate Jerry Wilson racking up 6%, which is assumedly coming out of Kitzhaber’s column. But the crosstabs have Dudley winning 44-43 in the Portland area, which, given that area’s sheer blueness, seems very odd (as counterpoint, Gordon Smith won the Portland area (Multnomah, Clackamas, and Washington Counties) 50-46 in 2002 en route to a 56-40 victory statewide, the Republicans’ high-water mark for about the last 25 or so years). They also have Ron Wyden leading Jim Huffman 51-38 in the Senate race (with 4 for a Libertarian and 2 for a Green), which also seems strange.

• SC-Gov: Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, who crashed and burned his car/plane in 4th place in the GOP gubernatorial primary, threw his support to 2nd place finisher Gresham Barrett for the runoff. He said Barrett was the only one he “could trust.”

• TX-Gov: The Green Party has agreed that it temporarily won’t put forth any candidates until there’s been a hearing in the lawsuit filed by the state Democrats. The lawsuit concerns whether the Greens unlawfully accepted a corporation’s help in obtaining the signatures it needed to (surprisingly) qualify for a ballot line in Texas.

• AL-02: The Tea Party Express weighed in with an endorsement in the Republican runoff in the 2nd, and they aren’t supporting the NRCC-backed establishment candidate, Montgomery city councilor Martha Roby. Instead, they’re backing billiards entrepreneur Rick Barber. Their beef with Roby seems to be that she backed a budget pushed by then-Montgomery mayor, now-Rep. Bobby Bright.

• KS-02: You may remember Sean Tevis, who became a netroots fave based on his clever cartoon depictions of his campaign and raised a surprising amount of money that almost let him knock off an incumbent in a red legislative district. Well, he’s moving up a level this year; he’s decided to run in the 2nd, against Lynn Jenkins (or Dennis Pyle, if he successfully teabags Jenkins). He still faces two other Dems, Cheryl Hudspeth and Thomas Koch, in the primary.

• NC-08: The SEIU looks like it’s going through with its strange plan to launch a third-party bid against Larry Kissell in the 8th; they submitted 34K signatures to qualify Wendell Fant for the ballot, much more than the necessary 17K. (The SEIU had previously tried to get a whole third party a ballot line, but that signature drive came up short.) Perhaps even stranger, Fant hasn’t agreed to run, at least not yet; he didn’t show up at the ballot-submitting press conference. Fant, it turns out, is an ex-Kissell aide who may have an axe to grind after getting dismissed for using a work computer to work on his own VA case.

• NJ-06: Diane Gooch, the self-funder who was expected to easily win the GOP nomination in the bluish 6th to go against Rep. Frank Pallone, is instead finding herself having to request a recount. Anna Little has declared victory, based on the 78-vote margin, after spending $22K to Gooch’s $430K.

• NV-03: Americans for Prosperity has Dina Titus in its sights; they’re taking out a $100K ad buy on network and cable (thanks, LVRJ, for actually reporting the details!), still harping on Titus for her vote in favor of health care reform.

• NY-13: Because the Republican/Conservative field in the 13th had some wiggle room to get even more messed-up, now another guy is trying to get in on the action. It’s Lou Wein, who’s going to try to petition his way onto the ballot against Michael Grimm and Michael Allegretti, each of whom have their own clique of powerful backers. Wein is more of a loose cannon — he’s best-known for winning 4% statewide in a 1990 gubernatorial bid on the Right-to-Life line, as well as an unsuccessful 1977 mayoral bid —  but if he can pick up the teabagger banner, he might make some waves here.

• VA-05: Jim McKelvey’s up to something weird here; we just don’t know what yet. He says he’s going to make up his mind this weekend whether or not to endorse Rob Hurt, to whom he finished 2nd in the GOP primary. His latest action is a head-scratcher: he’s starting his own PAC, the Take Our Country Back PAC, in order to “seek out, support, educate, train and elect conservative candidates on the local and state level in the fifth district and throughout Virginia.”

• Arizona: Here’s an interesting piece of data that should hearten Terry Goddard and Rodney Glassman: there’s been a surge in Latinos registering as Democrats since the passage of Arizona’s new immigration law. This shouldn’t be a surprise, as it closely mirrors what happened in the wake of California’s Prop 187 in the 1990s. The surge is also demographics-driven, given the fast Latino growth in Arizona, and in fact nationwide: the Census Bureau reports that, for the 2009 estimate, minorities will make up 35% of the nation, way up from 21% of the nation in the 2000 census. While much of that comes from increases in Latino births, a lot of it also has to do with more Americans self-identifying as multiracial.

• Governors: Josh Goodman does some number crunching and guesses that, with all the open seats and expected turnover this year, we’re on track to have 28 new Governors. That would be an all-time record for gubernatorial turnover (the previous record, 27, goes back to 1920).

• When Animals Attack: Best wishes for a quick recovery to Rep. Anthony Weiner, whose photo op went awry yesterday, ending with him getting stabbed in the hand by the horn of a large mohair goat. Apparently the most dangerous place to be is not between Weiner and a camera… so long as you’re a goat.

In my last diary, I predicted all of the Senate and Governor races for which the primaries have concluded.  I indicated that guessing at the winners of future primaries was too speculative even for me.  I have come to the conclusion, “Why the hell not?”  So here they are.  And I’m only tracking the two-way vote unless otherwise indicated (FL-GOV, FL-SEN, MA-GOV, MN-GOV, RI-GOV).

Overall I am seeing a net loss of three seats in the Senate (we lose AR, CO, DE, IN, ND, and NV, and pick up FL, KY, and MO) and one governorship (we lose IA, IL, KS, OK, PA, TN, and WY, and pick up CA, CT, FL, HI, MN, and RI).  Pickups are in bold.  Any races that are not accounted for below are in my previous diary:

http://www.swingstateproject.c…

AK-SEN – Murkowski (R) 68, McAdams (D) 32 – Complete mismatch.

AZ-SEN – McCain (R) 59, Glassman (D) 41 – McCain consolidates Republicans.

CO-SEN – Buck (R) 53, Bennet (D) 47 – CO more conservative than most think despite Obama win.

CT-SEN – Blumenthal (D) 57, McMahon (R) 43 – Comfortable win for Blumenthal.

DE-SEN – Castle (R) 52, Coons (D) 47 – Coons grows on DE electorate, but not enough.

FL-SEN – Crist (I) 40, Rubio (R) 39, Greene (D) 20 – Crist caucuses with Dems.

GA-SEN – Isakson (R) 59, Thurmond (D) 41 – Easy win for Isakson.

HI-SEN – Inouye (D) 67, Roco (R) 33 – No problem here.

KS-SEN – Moran (R) 62, Schollenberger (D) 38 – May be generous to Schollengerber.

LA-SEN – Vitter (R) 53, Melancon (D) 47 – Melancon is handling BP crisis well, but LA too red.

MD-SEN – Mikulski (D) 60, Wargotz (R) 40 – Comfortable win for Mikulski.

MO-SEN – Carnahan (D) 51, Blunt (R) 48 – Don’t think much of Blunt as a candidate.

NC-SEN – Burr (R) 54, Marshall (D) 46 – Love Marshall but this is not the year in NC.

NH-SEN – Ayotte (R) 55, Hodes (D) 44 – NH seems to love Ayotte for some reason.

NY-SEN (A) – Schumer (D) 64, Townsend (R) 35 – Routine win for Schumer.

NY-SEN (B) – Gillibrand (D) 60, Malpass (R) 40 – No problem for Gillibrand.

OK-SEN – Coburn (R) unopposed

UT-SEN – Bridgewater (R) 65, Granato (D) 35 – It’s Utah.

VT-SEN – Leahy (D) 62, Britton (R) 38 – It’s Vermont.

WA-SEN – Murray (D) 52, Rossi (R) 48 – Rossi a three-time loser.

WI-SEN – Feingold (D) 53, Johnson (D) 46 – Feingold will win another tough race.

AL-GOV – Bentley (R) 56, Sparks (D) 44 – Alabama too tough this year.

AK-GOV – Parnell (R) 62, Berkowitz (D) 38 – Parnell very popular.

AZ-GOV – Brewer (R) 52, Goddard (D) 48 – One of the most interesting races in the country.

CO-GOV – Hickenlooper (D) 51, McInnis (R) 49 – Hickenlooper popular enough to overcome environment.

CT-GOV – Lamont (D) 52, Foley (R) 47 – Dem lean of the state gives Lamont the edge.

FL-GOV – Sink (D) 44, Scott (R) 43, Chiles (I) 13 – Scott’s emergence is a gift to the Democrats.

GA-GOV – Oxendine (R) 51, Barnes (D) 48 – Barnes runs as well as you can in GA this year.

HI-GOV – Abercrombie (D) 57, Aiona (R) 43 – Either Dem should win this comfortably.

KS-GOV – Brownback (R) 60, Holland (D) 40 – Brownback a lightning rod, but will win easily.

MA-GOV – Patrick (D) 43, Baker (R) 38, Cahill (I) 17 – Patrick seems to be peeling away Cahill voters.

MD-GOV – O’Malley (D) 51, Ehrlich (R) 48 – Huge Dem lean in Maryland has only gotten bigger.

MI-GOV – Bernero (D) 52, Hoekstra (R) 48 – Bernero is a unique, outsider candidate who can catch on.

MN-GOV – Dayton (D) 45, Emmer (R) 40, Horner (I) 15 – Dems still have the edge in MN.

NH-GOV – Lynch (D) 55, Stephen (R) 44 – No 50-point margin for Lynch this time.

NY-GOV – Cuomo (D) 67, Lazio (R) 33 – Hopefully Cuomo helps downballot candidates.

OK-GOV – Fallin (R) 55, Edmondson (D) 45 – Edmondson runs as well as you can in OK this year.

RI-GOV – Caprio (D) 43, Chafee (I) 40, Robitaille (R) 17 – Caprio $$$ edge too much.

SC-GOV – Haley (R) 53, Sheheen (D) 47 – Have a feeling Haley will take more hits, but win.

TN-GOV – Haslam (R) 56, McWherter (D) 44 – TN too tough this year.

UT-GOV – Herbert (R) 67, Corroon (D) 33 – Easy win for Herbert.

VT-GOV – Dubie (R) 52, Markowitz (D) 48 – Dubie very popular up there.

WI-GOV – Barrett (D) 50.1, Walker (R) 49.9 – Good matchup between two good candidates.

WY-GOV – Micheli (R) 63, Petersen (D) 37 – Bless Petersen’s heart for running here.

As you know, Floridians are disproportionately affected by the actions of British Pretoleum that led to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  I’m talking to Floridians every day who enraged at BP and want to make sure that BP pays the full price for it’s actions.  I’m listening.

I also want to listen to you.  I’m going to be one of the leading voices in holding BP accountable.  I want your feedback.  Tell me actions you’d like to see taken to make sure that BP pays the price for this oil spill.

(Transcript of video below…)

Rep. Kendrick Meek on the BP Oil Spill

America’s Future Now Conference

June 9, 2010

Human error, criminal activity, British Petroleum — one of the biggest companies on the face of the earth, eleven people died, individuals are still affected by it, people have lost their jobs and they’re still giving dividends.

Ladies and gentlemen, your purpose right now is greater than ever.  You are supposed to make people like me uncomfortable.  You are supposed to make corporate executives uncomfortable.  You are supposed to push for folks who can’t push for themselves. And so I come today to tell you to keep up the good work. Continue to challenge us and continue to make us better. Continue to be “yes I know what you did yesterday, but what are you going to do tomorrow.” Continue to make sure that individuals are sitting on the edge of their seats versus leaning back in their seats when it comes down to meeting the needs of individuals who cannot help themselves.

British Petroleum, as far as I’m concerned, there shouldn’t be any caps as it relates to liability.

So I’m going to tell you right now, Ladies and Gentlemen, this is bigger than what we’re used to.  We have the environment that has been affected and we will not know the true damage to aquatic life for years to come.  At the same time, we have the conservatives that are saying “less regulation.”  Ladies and gentlmen, less regulation brought about the fall on Wall Street. Less regulation killed those coal miners. Less regulation killed those 11 individuals that worked on that platform.  Less regulation brought about this disaster, ladies and gentlemen.

Every last dividend that BP wants to give out should go towards cleaning up this Gulf and making sure that these families are made whole, to be able to teach that in this country corporate greed will not go unpunished and individuals should go to jail and individuals should pay the price for what they’ve done.

My track record speaks to the fight.  I have a 100% Sierra Club record — not after the spill, but before the spill.

I am glad that one of the first pieces of legislation that left the house was the Climate Change bill and that I voted for that legislation, because I can stand on solid ground, not only having a 100% Sierra Club record, not only having a history against offshore oil drilling off the coast of Florida, but also standing up when very few were there.

But I will tell you, as long as I have a card to vote in the United States Congress and when I get a voting card to vote in the United States Senate, British Petroleum will not sleep well, because they know that there’s a 6’3″, 250-pound member of Congress that’s thinking about them and that’s on them and will make them accountable in this disaster.  Thank you.

Sign my petition calling for a moratorium on new offshore drilling

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In my latest U.S. Senate projections, posted a few weeks back, I opted to move the Louisiana race, between Republican incumbent David Vitter and Democratic challenger Charlie Melancon, from “Lean GOP” to “Safe GOP.” In fact, it was one of five particular races I gave special attention, given its notable shift in ranking amid my projections.  I moved this race further into red territory, given a) most polling conducted on the match-up has shown Vitter with upwards of a 30 point lead, b) Melancon’s campaign hadn’t ignited much excitement, and c) it appeared as though Louisiana voters had forgotten about or outright forgiven Vitter for the infidelity controversy that plagued his Senate tenure a few years back.

It’s now more than a week into June, and I feel this race deserves a second look.

Why? Because, while Sen. Vitter is doing incredibly well, given the shaky press coverage he’s garnered in recent years, the recent BP disaster has finally given Congressman Melancon, whose district has perhaps been most hard-hit during the crisis, his moment in the sun. And, what a tremendous job he has done.

While both Vitter and fellow Sen. Mary Landrieu deserve kudos for their PR handling of the BP crisis, it has been Melancon who really struck a chord, with both Louisiana’s residents and the nation, on this issue. He gave heartwrenching testimony to Congress regarding the oil spill’s impact upon the people of his district, and he’s hit the cable news circuit, establishing himself as one of the most affective communicators on the issue. I must admit, I’ve been quite moved by Melancon’s work in the past weeks, and I will be rooting for him for the remainder of this political season.

Of course, this begs the question – can Charlie Melancon really defeat David Vitter? Is this still a “Safe GOP” race?

Truthfully, at this point, it’s difficult to tell. LA-Sen has been a gravely-underpolled race, with only the conservative-leaning Rasmussen bothering to conduct polling on it this year. The last time a non-partisan outlet polled it was all the way back in July, 2009 (!), while Public Policy Polling showed Vitter with a 12 point lead. Which, for the record, only constitutes a “Likely GOP” ranking in my methodology, not “Safe GOP.” Rasmussen, for the record, found Vitter with a 24 point lead in both February and March, before giving up on polling the state.

With no help from the pollsters, it’s difficult to get a solid grasp on this race. In all likelihood, Vitter is still ahead, and at least by double-digits. 24 points, though? That’s probably a stretch. A 24-point lead in Louisiana means Vitter trimming a quarter of Democrats from Melancon, and that’s awfully unlikely.

Indeed, the potential good news for Melancon is that Democrats make up a plurality – about 40 percent – of the Louisiana electorate. The bad news? About a third to a fourth of those Democrats are conservative ones, “Blue Dogs” if you will. And the Republicans? They’re some of the most conservative in the country. The non-affiliated voters, who make up a fifth of the electorate, are also right-leaning.

If I had to take a stab on the outcome of this race, I imagine it looks something like…

Democrat – 40%

GOP – 38%

Independent – 22%

Melancon – 85%/10%/46% = 48%

Vitter – 15%/90%/54% = 52%

Which, would of course make this a bonifide toss-up. Despite my voter model, I suppose Vitter is perhaps ahead by more. If only Rasmussen would release its internal numbers, which it, unfortunately, does not. For the time being, I’ll give the benefit of doubt to Sen. Vitter, but Melancon could be on the rise.

http://polibeast.blogspot.com/…