AZ03: Crunching the PPP poll.

***cross-posted at DailyKos***

If you haven’t seen it yet, yesterday DailyKos presented a poll that was conducted for us by Public Policy Polling, a North Carolina-based Democratic polling firm. Despite it’s affiliation with the Democrats, PPP doesn’t have a big noticeable House effect though.

The poll’s results were an absolute shocker: (relatively conservative) Democrat Jon Hulburd leads the former Vice President’s son Ben Quayle 46-44 in the district that is still held by retiring Republican Representative John Shadegg, one of the most conservative Republicans in the House, in a district that has a Cook PVI of R+9- that means that in the last few election cycles it voted on average 9 points more Republican than the nation as a whole.

John McCain, who admittedly stems from Arizona, won 57% of the vote there, Bush got 54% in 2000 and 58% in 2004.  

Another note: The huge paragraph breaks are intentional. They don’t look very aesthetically pleasing, but I think that without them the numerical density of the diary would pretty much kill every reader.

In such a bad cycle as 2010, where the general consensus is that Democrats are going to lose about 50 House seats, you’d expect a Democrat to be down at least by 15-20 points here- if not more.

So understandably lots of people questioned the validity of the poll. I’m going to dig a bit into the raw data, that’s provided for all joint DailyKos/PPP polls. A big hurrah to transparency!

Still, unless you like to see a lot of numbers, you can just skip to the conclusion, in the main part of the diary (and it will be long, I guess) I describe how I got there.

Basically, the analysis will have three steps:

1) We will look at several crosstabs that PPP/DailyKos didn’t provide in their tables in the release.

2) We will look at where Hulburd and Quayle fall short of the potential ceiling for Democrats and Republicans respectively in the district.

3) We will take a sophisticated look at undecided voters and how they might break down.

Raw Polling Data  and the Question Key.

Okay, the first thing we can use this for is to provide a couple of crosstabs that PPP/DailyKos didn’t release.

They’re not very surprising: Across the board, Hulburd does a better job holding on to voters for other Democratic candidates/people who approve of Democratic politicians than Quayle does with Republicans.

Hulburd wins 91-7 among the people who vote for Terry Goddard, Quayle wins 79-10 among Gov. Brewer’s supporters. Gubernatorial undecideds break 32-10 for Hulburd.

Hulburd wins Rodney Glassman’s supporters by an almost identical 90-7 margin, Quayle wins Sen. McCain’s supporters, but only by a 72-19 margin. The support that Senator McCain still has left among moderates who don’t rubberstamp all Republicans is not transferring to Quayle.

Senatorial Undecided voters break for Quayle 36-29- fueled by some people who don’t back McCain but most other Republicans- I guess some JD Hayworth supporters are still out there.

Not very surprisingly, Hulburd wins people who see him favorably, 88-8, and loses people who don’t like him 85-11. People who are still undecided about him go for Quayle by a 55-30 margin- maybe Hulburd has some room to grow here as people make up their minds about him and Quayle.

Quayle wins people who like him by a whooping 97-2 margin. That is mostly because almost no one likes him, and if you do, you’re such a hardcore supporter that you certainly will vote for him too. He loses people who view him unfavorably 8-85, and is saved by the fact that people who don’t have an opinion on him go for him 54-11.

I’m somewhat hoping that these are low-information voters who haven’t read much about the race and just went by the Party name provided: The Republicans are strong here, so their brand isn’t as much in the gutter here as elsewhere. As media coverage will ramp up in the last two weeks, hopefully some of these will learn about Quayle’s scandals.

I’m skipping how the people who view Brewer/McCain/Goddard/Glassman/Kyl favorably/unfavorably/not at all break down, because it is totally unremarkable: People who like Democrats vote for Hulburd, people who like Republicans vote for Quayle, people who don’t have a clue vote for Quayle by a lesser margin. If you’re interested though, ask in the comments, I have the data lying around.

Now, as for Obama… Obama’s image in this district is terrible, with his approval at 38% and his disapproval at 55%.

It’s no big surprise that Hulburd managed to shore up all supporters of President Obama, he wins them 95-2: That’s a better predictor than even how people view him or Quayle!

Hulburd also manages to win over 13% of people who disapprove of Obama, a (in today’s times) relatively huge amount of cross-over. Quayle gets 75% here. Among the few people who are still undecided on how they view Obama, Hulburd wins 57-19. I guess that if in such a red district you don’t hate Obama you’re pretty much a Democrat-leaning guy.

Not very surprisingly, Hulburd wins people who disapprove of the broadly popular SB-1070 90-7, because this mostly comes down to Liberals and Hispanics. He manages to win over almost a quarter of people who LIKE the law though, losing them only 22-67. This is what keeps him alive here, as 59% of voters like the law, just 34% don’t.

It’s no big surprise that Hulburd came out in favor of the law- we might not like it, but if he came out against it, he’d probably be down by 6-7 points despite of Quayle’s weaknesses.

On a related note, this is also why Raul Grijalva seems to be in a bit of trouble. If you call for a boycott of your own constituents because of a law that is supported by a majority of voters, that will not play very well with anyone, really.

Summary: Hulburd is competitive because he does much better with otherwise Republican-leaning people than Quayle does with Democrat-leaning people, and because he supports SB-1070, which enables him to win over a good chunk of the 59% of people who support it too.

Okay, great. But this was not really in-depth analysis so far.

The next step is looking at the potential that Democrats and Republicans have in the district, and where Hulburd and Quayle fall short of it.

I did this already for my first analysis of a PPP/Kos poll, and I was pretty satisfied with the interpretative value it provided.

The potential for Democrats and Republicans is defined as follows:

People who support at least one of Hulburd, Glassman, Goddard, or Obama in 2008, or who identify themselves as Democrats are among the reachable voters for Democratic candidates. A perfect Democratic candidate without weaknesses running against a flawed Republican could win them all. Roughly 58% of voters in the district belong to the this category, which could be termed the Democratic Persuadable Voter Universe (DPVU.. okay, I love appreviations).

People who support at least one of Quayle, McCain, Brewer, McCain in 2008 or who identify themselves as Republicans are in the RPVU universe (Republican Persuadable.. okay, you know the drill). That works out to a bit less than 70% of voters in this district.

Or, put another way, 30% of voters usually vote a straight Democratic ticket, 42% of voters usually vote a straight Republican ticket, and 28% of voters are swing voters who can be persuaded by both parties.

What are the characteristics of the people who are open to Democrats, but don’t support Hulburd, and what are the characteristics of the people who are open to Republicans, but don’t support Quayle?

Let’s clarify first that the latter group is much bigger than the former. Quayle reaches only about 62% of the many voters who might have supported a good Republican candidate, Hulburd gets almost 80% of his potential supporters.

Now let’s look at the potential Dems who don’t support Hulburd.

They support Brewer over Goddard, 55-35, McCain over Glassman, 57-36, dislike Hulburd 17-26, like Quayle 58-20, Brewer 61-27, McCain 57-34, Kyl 51-23, dislike Goddard 32-53, Glassman 12-27, and Obama by a whooping 16-74 margin.  They like SB-1070 69-19 BUT they only supported McCain over Obama by a 48-40 margin.

10% of them are liberal, 41% moderate, 49% Conservative, 61% female, 31% of them still identify as Democrats, 47% as Republicans, and 22% as Independents. 79% are White, 16% are Hispanic and 5% something else. Age breakdown is pretty irrelevant because largely similar to everyone else.

Okay, I think we can put these people into a three groups.

About 55% of them are Republicans or Republican-leaning Independents who happened to like one of Glassman, Goddard or Obama in 2008.

About 25% of them are Democrats or Democratic-leaning Independents who are now in the Obama disapproval camp, but still support some statewide Democrats like Glassman or Goddard. They don’t like Hulburd, or are still undecided on the race (Remember, we’re talking about ‘NOT SUPPORTING HULBURD’-Dems, not about ‘SUPPORTING QUAYLE’-Dems. The Undecided Dems are in here, too).

The last 20% are liberal or moderatish liberal Democrats who still like Obama, and statewide Democrats, dislike SB 1070 and are generally party-line Democrats, but still don’t support Hulburd.

These are the people he can’t afford to lose- he doesn’t have to get to his ceiling of 58%, but these last 20% of people Hulburd HAS to convince.

He should also try to firm up at least a bit of support among the Dems who have soured on Obama. If he does that, he’ll get closer to the 50% mark.

Okay, let’s do the same thing for the Republican-leaning group that doesn’t support Quayle: A much larger group.

They back Goddard over Brewer, but just barely, 48-43, and McCain over Glassman, by a huge margin, 61-30.

Here we already see a key difference: The Democrats who don’t support Hulburd soured on the WHOLE ticket, voting for Brewer and McCain.

The Republicans who don’t like Quayle draw a line there, but still are relatively open to people like McCain and to a lesser extent Brewer, suggesting that they don’t want to vote for very conservative wingnuts, but are open to supporting moderate and potentially sane conservative (Kyl) Republicans.

They like Hulburd, who’s a quite conservative Democrat, by a 45-8 margin. And they fucking HATE Quayle, with 7% viewing him favorably, and 76% unfavorably. Contrast that 7-76 rating with Hulburd’s 17-26 rating among his own defectors. Quayle’s defectors hate him, Hulburd’s defectors are merely ‘Meh’ about him.

They’re split on Brewer, giving her a 42-47 rating, and Kyl, who gets a 42-44 rating from them, but like McCain, 58-31. They also like Goddard, 53-32, and are not sure about Glassman, giving him a 20-19 rating.

Even though they don’t support Quayle and like many more moderate Democrats like Goddard and Hulburd, they’re not too fond of Obama though, who gets a 40-48 rating from them. Also, they back the SD-1070 bill, though to a lesser extent than the electorate as a whole, 53-34.

They voted for McCain in 2008, giving him 57% of their votes to Obama’s 31%.

10% are liberal, 57% moderate, and 34% Conservative, 56% female, 24% Democrats, 57% Republicans (!) and 19% Independent. 80% are White, 14% Hispanic, 6% Other, age breakdown is unremarkable once again.

So… essentially we have similar groups here, but the breakdown is a bit different. And we have one new group.

30% are essentially Democrats who happen to like a Republican (mostly McCain) but generally vote party-line on most cases.

About 40% are Republicans who generally support the party line, like Kyl and Brewer and SD-1070, but are disgusted by Quayle and therefore don’t support him. These are the people who like Brewer and Kyl and McCain, but not Quayle.

About 15% are moderates who generally support the middle-of-the-road candidate everywhere. They supported McCain in 2008, still love him, but they also like Goddard and back him over Brewer. They’re not really down on Glassman, but would never back him over McCain. They don’t like Obama, but they do like Hulburd, who’s running as a moderate Democrat supporting SB 1070, which they also like, and against an inept wingnut like Quayle.

And about 15% are Democrats who have soured on Obama, and vote much like the moderates.

All of these people have one thing in common: They hate Dan Quayle, which is why he’ll have a very hard time winning them over. He’ll get some of them because a lot of these people still don’t want a Democratic Congress and will- disgusted- still back him, but not that many.

Here’s an interesting statistic:

Looking at all moderate AND liberal Republicans, who make up about 18% of the sample, Quayle wins just by a measly 48-42 margin. That means that almost half of the moderate Republicans have abandoned him, that is huge.

As a comparison, looking at all moderate and conservative Democrats, a subsample that’s about the same size as the moderate and liberal Republicans, Hulburd wins 84-10. If the candidates were equally appealing, these numbers should be roughly the same. There you can see the huge difference between the candidate’s qualities.

Summary: While Hulburd still has some work to do with winning over some Democrat-leaning voters who still hold out on him, especially those who still like the other Democrats on the ticket, the main point here is just how unpopular Quayle is. Lots of conservative Independents and moderate Republicans and even conservative Republicans who usually are very open to Republican candidates have left his campaign. Some of them are already on board with the Hulburd campaign, some are still out there and thinking about their choice.

Okay, the last thing we’ll do is look at the Undecided voters. For that we need an advanced tool, a so-called Logistic Regression.

The short story is, without going into the math details, we’re looking at the voters who already have decided, and try to discern WHY they voted that way. We do that by looking at the other responses they gave in the poll. If they disapprove of Obama, voted for McCain, and are Conservative Republicans, who support Brewer over Goddard, we can be pretty sure that they will support Quayle: And we can quantify that and give them a certain probability that they will support Candidate A or B.

The result of this is some output that probably few of you would understand, so I’m not going to copy it here. If you want to see it, leave a message in the comments and I’m going to post it there.

The model has an adj. r² of .81 though, for the stats guys, which means that it explains 81% of the variance in the dependent variable (If the voter supports the Democrat).

Okay, the results here are not as good. The model projects that Hulburd will draw only 42% of the remaining undecided voters, with 58% going to Quayle. The main reason for that is that there are many people like #648 among the Undecided voters: She’s a white, conservative Republican aged 65+, voted for McCain and still likes him. She dislikes Obama, likes SB1070, and she doesn’t like Goddard- she doesn’t like Gov. Brewer either though. That’s why she’s undecided on the Gubernatorial race while she’s voting for McCain. She doesn’t like Quayle, and has no opinion yet on Hulburd.

The model assigns her a 76% chance that she finally will come home and vote for Quayle though, voting party line over her personal feelings.

For others the choice goes the other way. #644 has a similar profile: She, too, is a female senior white Conservative who dislikes Quayle and likes SB1070. But, she likes Hulburd too, while #648 was just undecided on him. And, she’s different on the gubernatorial race. While #648 disliked both Goddard and Brewer, she likes them both- still, she’s voting for Brewer. OTOH, she’s not as warm towards McCain anymore, having no opinion about him and still being undecided on the Senate race.

For her, the model thinks, her high opinion of Hulburd and her dislike of Quayle could make a difference, so the model gives her a 75% chance of voting for Hulburd and 25% for Quayle.

Still, among all undecided voters, on average 58% will break for Quayle and 42% for Hulburd. That almost erases Hulburd’s lead. Allocating the undecided voters results in a result of 50.1% for Hulburd to 49.9% for Quayle.



Summary: The demographics and responses of the remaining undecided voters suggest that Ben Quayle will gain the majority of their votes, 58-42. Allocating the undecideds that way results in a essentially tied race, 50.1-49.9% in favor of Hulburd.

Conclusion: The results of the PPP poll look pretty reasonable. Voters of all colors dislike Quayle and many of them follow this up by voting for Hulburd. Almost half of moderate Republicans vote for Hulburd, as do many voters who favor the SB-1070 bill. Hulburd’s conservative profile makes him a viable alternative for Republicans and conservative Independents who dislike Quayle, while he still holds the liberal part of his base together. Hulburd wins over many Conservatives and Republicans, while Quayle gets almost no cross-over support. That makes Hulburd competitive in this race where the fundamentals favor Quayle: 42% of voters here usually vote straight-ballot GOP– compared to 30% who do the same for the Democrats. But Hulburd wins over most swing voters.

The upside for Quayle in this poll is that the Undecided voters in this poll largely favor him, I project 58% of undecided voters to break for Quayle and 42% for Hulburd. This makes the AZ-03 election an absolutely tied race, with outprojecting the undecideds 50.1% voting for Hulburd and 49.9% for Quayle.

This race should come down to a couple of thousand votes, unless Quayle succeeds in making an argument that GOP voters and Conservatives should somehow forget their feelings for him in the ballot box.

PA-Sen: PPP Sees Sestak Pull Into Small Lead

Public Policy Polling (10/17-18, likely voters, 8/14-16 in parens):

Joe Sestak (D): 46 (36)

Pat Toomey (R): 45 (45)

Undecided 9 (20)

(MoE: ±3.7%)

It was reasonable to expect Joe Sestak to make a late move in the polls in the general election against Pat Toomey as he did against Arlen Specter in the general election (recall that he didn’t pull into contention there until the last few weeks), given his strategy of lying low, waiting until people are actually paying attention, and then barraging the electorate with a well-chosen salvo of ads. Other than a couple of easily-dismissed Dem internals last week, though, there was no evidence this was having any effect this time around… until now.

Today’s results are quite the turnaround since the last PPP poll. Part of that is that the enthusiasm gap seems to have gotten alleviated very quickly. It’s been two months since PPP last polled, so we can’t tell whether this was gradual, over the last few months — as yesterday’s AFL-CIO memo that discussed this race, and talked about how union members were finally coming around to Sestak, mentioned — or suddenly. But at any rate, we’ve gone from a 1-pt McCain electorate last time, to a 49-45 Obama electorate now. On top of that, Sestak has consolidated his base and improved his standing among independents: while Sestak was getting only 64% of Dems last time, now he’s getting 77%. And his 50-23 deficit among indies last time, he’s now down only 49-48.

This may still seem to have a whiff of outlier to it until we get some confirmation from other sources… that’s pretty stark when you look at how little impact it had on the overall trendlines in this often-polled race. However, PPP has tended to be the first to spot things this cycle, ranging from MA-Sen to both the Raese surge and plunge in WV-Sen lately, so while I’ll again caution about not getting overly confident in pulling this one out, I suspect this is the beginning of some real tightening.

SSP Daily Digest: 10/19 (Morning Edition)

What better way to celebrate SSP’s seventh birthday than to give you another firehose blast of polls?

AL-02: Greenberg Quinlan Rosner (D) for the DCCC (10/9-12, likely voters, 9/26-28 in parens):

Bobby Bright (D-inc): 51 (52)

Martha Roby (R): 39 (43)

(MoE: ±4.9%)

AR-01: Anzalone Liszt for the DCCC (10/11-13, likely voters, 9/13-16 in parens):

Chad Causey (D): 44 (46)

Rick Crawford (R): 42 (44)

(MoE: ±4.9%)

AR-01: Talk Business Research and Hendrix College (PDF) (10/14, likely voters, 8/17 in parens):

Chad Causey (D): 34 (32)

Rick Crawford (R): 42 (48)

Ken Adler (G): 4 (4)

Undecided: 20 (20)

(MoE: ±4.7%)

AR-02: Talk Business Research and Hendrix College (PDF) (10/14, likely voters, 8/17 in parens):

Joyce Elliott (D): 38 (35)

Tim Griffin (R): 50 (52)

Lance Levi (I): 3 (3)

Lewis Kennedy (G): 3 (1)

Undecided: 7 (9)

(MoE: ±4.6%)

AR-03: Talk Business Research and Hendrix College (PDF) (10/14, likely voters, 8/25 in parens):

David Whitaker (D): 21 (31)

Steve Womack (R): 59 (55)

Undecided: 20 (14)

(MoE: ±4.2%)

AR-04: Talk Business Research and Hendrix College (PDF) (10/14, likely voters, 8/25-26 in parens):

Mike Ross (D-inc): 52 (49)

Beth Anne Rankin (R): 34 (31)

Joshua Drake (G): 3 (4)

Undecided: 11 (16)

(MoE: ±4.2%)

CA-47: Public Opinion Strategies (R) for Van Tran (10/13-14, likely voters, no trendlines):

Loretta Sanchez (D-inc): 39

Van Tran (R): 39

Ceci Iglesias (I): 5

Undecided: 17

(MoE: ±5.7%)

FL-Sen: Suffolk (10/14-17, likely voters, no trendlines):

Kendrick Meek (D): 22

Marco Rubio (R): 39

Charlie Crist (I): 31

Undecided: 6

(MoE: ±4.4%)

FL-Gov: Suffolk (10/14-17, likely voters, no trendlines):

Alex Sink (D): 45

Rick Scott (R): 38

Undecided: 13

(MoE: ±4.4%)

Misc.: In the AG race, Pam Bondi (R) leads Dan Gelber (D), 38-30. Also, a poll by Voter Survey Service (aka Susquehanna) for the right-wing Sunshine State News site has Adam Putnam (R) leading Scott Maddox (D) in the Ag Comm’r race, 40-35. Tea Party candidate Ira Chester takes 14%.

MA-Gov: Public Opinion Strategies (R) for Charlie Baker (10/11-13, likely voters, no trendlines):

Deval Patrick (D-inc): 35

Charlie Baker (R): 42

Tim Cahill (I): 10

(MoE: ±3.5%)

MA-10: MassINC Polling Group for WGBH (10/13-15, likely voters incl. leaners, no trendlines):

William Keating (D): 46

Jeffrey Perry (R): 43

Other: 5

Undecided: 4

(MoE: ±4.9%)

MI-Gov: Foster McCollum White and Baydoun Consulting (D) (PDF) (10/7, likely voters, no trendlines):

Virg Bernero (D): 37

Rick Snyder: 50

Undecided: 13

(MoE: ±2.1%)

MO-Sen: Public Policy Polling (D) (PDF) for Robin Carnahan (10/17-18, likely voters, 8/14-15 in parens):

Robin Carnahan (D): 41 (38)

Roy Blunt (R): 46 (45)

Jerry Beck (C): 3 (5)

Jonathan Dine (L): 3 (3)

Undecided: 7 (9)

(MoE: ±3.9%)

NM-Gov: SurveyUSA for KOB-TV (10/12-14, likely voters, 5/23-25 in parens)

Diane Denish (D): 42 (43)

Susana Martinez (R): 54 (49)

Undecided: 4 (8)

(MoE: ±3.9%)

Note: Among the 13% of respondents who say they have already voted, Martinez has a 60-36 lead.

NY-25: Siena (10/10-12, likely voters, no trendlines):

Dan Maffei (D-inc): 51

Ann Marie Buerkle (R): 39

Undecided: 10

(MoE: ±3.9%)

Note: Maggie Haberman tweets that Karl Rove’s American Crossroads plans to get involved here.

NY-Gov: New York Times (PDF) (10/10-15, likely voters, no trendlines):

Andrew Cuomo (D): 59

Carl Paladino (R): 24

Undecided: 12

(MoE: ±3%)

OR-04: Grove Insight (D) for Peter DeFazio (10/11-12, likely voters, no trendlines):

Peter DeFazio (D-inc): 53

Art Robinson (R): 39

(MoE: ±4.9%)

OR-05: Moore Information (R) for Scott Bruun (10/13-14, likely voters, no trendlines):

Kurt Schrader (D-inc): 40

Scott Bruun: 44

(MoE: ±5.7%)

PA-15: Muhlenberg (PDF) (10/5-13, likely voters, 9/11-16 in parens):

John Callahan (D): 32 (38)

Charlie Dent (R-inc): 49 (49)

Jake Towne (I): 5 (3)

Undecided: 13 (10)

(MoE: ±5%)

UT-Gov: Dan Jones & Associates for the Deseret News/KSL-TV (10/11-14, “active voters,” 10/7-13 in parens):

Peter Corroon (D): 33 (31)

Gary Herbert (R-inc): 58 (52)

Undecided: 6 (13)

(MoE: ±4%)

Note: The Deseret News says that Dan Jones has also done polling for Herbert. Should we be regarding them as an (R) pollster?

UT-Gov: UtahPolicy.com/Western Wats (9/30-10/3, likely voters, no trendlines):

Peter Corroon (D): 27

Gary Herbert (R-inc): 58

Undecided: 12

(MoE: ±4%)

Note: Dan Jones also has UT-Sen numbers. UtahPolicy.com also has UT-Sen, UT-01, and UT-03 numbers.

VA-05: Roanoke College (10/5-14, likely voters, no trendlines):

Tom Perriello (D-inc): 40

Rob Hurt (R): 46

Jeffrey Clark (I): 1

Undecided: 13

(MoE: ±4.1%)

WI-Gov: St. Norbert College (PDF) for Wisconsin Public Radio (10/12-15, likely voters, 3/23-31 in parens):

Tom Barrett (D): 41 (28)

Scott Walker (R): 50 (44)

Undecided: 6 (17)

(MoE: ±5%)

Margins & Errors: The Fix publishes an alleged WA-Sen poll without either field dates or sample size… Bill Kristol (yeah, that Bill Kristol) claims he has his hands on an OH-10 poll – he has the n, but won’t say the pollster’s name, who paid for the poll, or when it was taken… Pollster.com has a PDF from ccAdvertising with numbers for WV-Sen, WV-01, and WV-03 – but not only does ccA report to hundredths of a percent, they get taken to the woodshed by Mark Blumenthal for refusing to divulge the poll’s sponsor

AZ-03: Dem Jon Hulburd Leads Brock Landers by 2

Public Policy Polling for Daily Kos (10/16-17, likely voters):

Jon Hulburd (D): 46

Ben Quayle (R): 44

(MoE: ±3.8%)

Whoa. When Republicans have someone like Raul Grijalva on his heels but are having trouble locking down this conservative Phoenix-area district, you know that frat boy Ben Quayle has some serious residual issues leftover from his primary performance — a performance that was catastrophic in every way, except for the fact that he actually won over a highly fractured field. Indeed, PPP finds Quayle’s favorables at an extremely bruised 34-52 (compared to 33-20 for Hulburd). Hulburd wins moderates by 66-27, independents by 50-36, and even takes away 18% of Republicans.

Looks like you can mark this one down on the (very) small list of GOP-held House seats that Republicans actually should be concerned about.

FL-Gov: Sink Stops Leaking, Floats Back Up

Public Policy Polling (10/9-10, likely voters, 8/21-22 in parentheses):

Alex Sink (D): 46 (36)

Rick Scott (R): 41 (30)

Undecided: 14 (22)

(MoE: ±4.6%)

How I feel about this race seems to change weekly, if not daily… and that seems largely dependent on which particular pollsters (and how they model the electorate) are offering results that week, and who’s dominating the advertising tempo that week. That seems to be the only explanation for how last week Rick Scott seemed to be taking over, but now (especially with Sink’s damning 2-minute ad about Scott’s Medicare fraud running now) — between a 4-point Mason-Dixon lead, a 1-point deficit in Quinnipiac (down from a big Scott lead in their first post-LV-switch poll), and even a 3-point ballgame in Rasmussen this week — the needle seems to be swinging back to Alex Sink.

As always, the picture of the trendlines (here dialed up to more sensitivity) is worth a thousand words. Click here for trendlines (and dial it up to “more sensitivity” for full effect of the last few weeks).

As for PPP’s specific numbers, the gap is still about the same; their old post-primary numbers don’t add up to 100 because Bud Chiles was drawing 8 (which seems to have been equally allocated between Sink and Scott with his departure). Sink’s favorables are 44/38 compared with 33/52 for Scott; helping Scott, though, seems to be progress uniting Republicans behind him (he pulls 77% of GOPers, up from 57% post-primary, while Scott’s at 76% of Dems), and a decidedly Republican-leaning likely voter pool (the sample went 51-44 in favor of McCain in ’08).

AK-Sen: Miller Leads, But…

Public Policy Polling for Daily Kos (10/9-10, likely voters, no trendlines):

Scott McAdams (D): 26

Joe Miller (R): 35

Someone else: 35

Undecided: 5

(MoE: ±2.4%)

In looking at PPP’s poll released yesterday (on behalf of our Orange Overlords), let’s walk step-by-step through what they’re doing in this basically impossible-to-poll race. Their approach is fairly similar to what Ivan Moore did a few weeks ago: first run a heat without Lisa Murkowski. (The difference here is that PPP specifically ask “someone else,” while Moore only seemed to let people volunteer that on the first round.) With this approach, it’s a tie between Miller and “someone else.”

PPP then asked the “someone else” voters who they were planning to vote for: indie Tim Carter, indie Ted Gianoutsos, Libertarian Frederick Haase, write in Lisa Murkowski, or write in someone else? Murkowski won that round with 95%, with 2 going to Haase, 1 to Gianoutsos, 0 to Carter, and 2 to write in someone else. That was then imputed to find these results:

Scott McAdams (D): 26

Joe Miller (R): 35

Lisa Murkowski (WI): 33

Undecided: 4

(MoE: ±2.4%)

Miller leads narrowly, despite his atrocious 35/58 favorables among the general electorate – the worst PPP has found for a Republican senate candidate this year, including Christine O’Donnell. (Contrast that with 48/46 for Murkowski and 44/26 for McAdams, probably thanks to his cheerful ads.)

This contrasts a bit with Moore’s approach, which was to remind voters of Murkowski’s presence, ask all voters “stay the same” or “write in Murkowski,” and impute based on that, which seemed to yield a more pro-Murkowski result (44-36 in her favor). I don’t know which approach is the most optimal (maybe PPP’s, since it doesn’t prompt everyone that Murkowski’s in the race, only nudges them in that direction with “someone else” and the follow up question, which may more accurately reflect voting-booth dynamics where there’s no reminder about Murkowski), but at any rate, they’re both better than other polls which just list Murkowski with everyone else.

Ethan Berkowitz (D): 42

Sean Parnell (R-inc): 51

Undecided: 7

Harry Crawford (D): 36

Don Young (R-inc): 58

Undecided: 6

(MoE: ±2.4%)

PPP also looks at the much-less-complicated Governor and House races, and, as one would expect, finds the incumbent Republicans in command here, although Ethan Berkowitz still looks surprisingly lively in the gubernatorial race.

NV-Sen: Angle Wins Money Battle, Loses Polling War

Public Policy Polling (10/7-9, likely voters, 7/16-18 in parentheses):

Harry Reid (D-inc): 47 (48)

Sharron Angle (R): 45 (46)

Other: 5 (-)

None of these: 2 (-)

Undecided: 1 (6)

(MoE: ±4.4%)

The story today in the Nevada Senate race is Sharron Angle’s fundraising total: $14 million for the quarter, a huge amount by anyone’s standards (although Scott Brown raised more than that in one month, but that was a special election with nothing else on the table nationwide). I have to wonder if that’s any sort of game-changer at this point, though: what is she going to do with that much money that she couldn’t do with one-half as much? Every possible square inch of ad space must already be reserved for the next few weeks. I mean, she could buy everyone in Nevada their own TV, but it’d still show whatever ads are already reserved.

Today’s PPP poll kind of flew under the radar as a result, partly because it didn’t show anything new (the same 2-point Harry Reid lead they saw last time, and the same +2 to – 2 band that pollsters always seem to see this race in). What’s maybe the most remarkable number here? Things are incredibly locked in: there’s only 1% undecided. Angle can’t win simply by picking up every undecided; she’d need to grab some of the “other” or “NOTA” voters too, or flip some Reid votes. Angle perceptions are pretty set, though: she’s considered “extremist” rather than “mainstream” by a 53-39 margin, with only 7% unsure, and her unfavorables are over the 50% mark (41/53). Not that Reid fares much better at 44/52, the kind of numbers that incumbents don’t usually survive (and that’s confirmed by a hypothetical match against the slightly less-objectionable Danny Tarkanian, which Reid loses 49-43).

Bear in mind that, compared with PPP’s West Virginia poll where the enthusiasm gap mysteriously (and perhaps too-optimistically) vanished, it’s in freakin’ full effect here. They find a +2 Obama electorate (48-46) instead of the 12 points he actually won by in ’08… and in spite of that, Reid is still clinging to a lead. (In fact, PPP imputes a 52-42 Reid lead under ’08 conditions.) As you probably already know, this will be all about turnout, and whether the hotel union-powered turnout machine in Las Vegas is as skillful at turning out votes as it’s been in recent years.

WV-Sen: Manchin Pulls Back Into Lead, Says PPP

Public Policy Polling (10/9-10/10, likely voters, 9/18-19 in parentheses):

Joe Manchin (D): 48 (43)

John Raese (R): 45 (46)

Undecided: 7 (10)

(MoE: ±2.8%)

PPP was the first pollster to see the once-thought to be a slam-dunk West Virginia race going in Republican John Raese’s direction, and now they see it swinging back in Joe Manchin’s favor. (Of course, the only polls in that intervening period all came from Rasmussen, so who knows how much substance there was to all that Raese momentum.) There’s much less enthusiasm gap in this poll: the sample of LVs went for John McCain in 2008 by 11 points (compared with McCain’s actual 13 point victory, or the 23 point spread in the previous PPP poll).

In their writeup, PPP seems to attribute this at least in part to the “hicky” ad scandal; that may have played a role, but I think that’s just one more brick in building an Raese-as-outsider narrative where news about his Florida residency and his inherited wealth may have played a greater role, where steady anti-Raese advertising succeeded in driving up his negatives (as he was sort of a tabula rasa, Ron Johnson-style generic R businessman at the time of the last poll). Raese’s favorables have dropped significantly (especially with independents), from 41-35 to 39-46 overall. Manchin remains very popular as Governor (68/22), which actually becomes a bit of a weakness in a way; it leaves him susceptible to what seems to be the GOP’s strongest argument at this point: you like him as Governor, so keep him there (as seen by people’s responses to the question “Would you rather have Manchin as Governor or Senator?” to which they respond Governor, by a 47-38 margin).

WA-08: DelBene Within 3

Public Policy Polling for Daily Kos (10/9-10/10, likely voters, no trendlines):

Suzan DelBene (D): 46

Dave Reichert (R-inc): 49

Undecided: 5

(MoE: ±3%)

Despite this race flying almost completely under the radar until a few weeks ago — when a SurveyUSA poll found a 7-point gap and then a Suzan DelBene internal found a 4-point race — the race in the 8th is looking surprisingly competitive all of a sudden. That’s probably thanks to a decidedly lackluster performance from Dave Reichert this year (as seen by the unexpected loss of support from his usual best friends at the Seattle Times) as well as DelBene marshaling her resources for a major ad pounding at the end. PPP finds an even closer race now, with DelBene down by only 3, seemingly thanks to a reduction in the amount of ticket-splitting that has traditionally helped Reichert (as DelBene is winning Obama voters 80-15). (And if you’re wondering, there’s no SurveyUSA-style generational weirdness here; DelBene wins 62-19 among the 18-34 set.)

There’s one disconcerting number in the crosstabs, and that’s that within the district, Patty Murray and Dino Rossi are tied 49-49. Since this district is basically the bellwether for the state (Obama won the state 57-41, and won the 8th 57-42), that extrapolates out to a more or less tied race statewide. On the one hand, that’s bad news, as it would seem to confirm that general sense that Murray has lost some ground from her seeming spike last month. But on the other hand, that’s good news, as it confirms that this isn’t an overly Dem-friendly sample, and if Murray improves a few points and brings some more DelBene voters along with her, that can move DelBene even closer to 50%.

UPDATE: H/t to Minnesota Mike in comments, who points out (via the truly helpful Washington SoS website) that Rossi won 51-48 in the 8th in the 2008 gubernatorial race (which Chris Gregoire won 53-47), and by 54-44 in the 2004 gubernatorial race (which Gregoire won 48.87-48.87). That may actually be a better benchmark than Obama numbers, come to think of it — as, very importantly, Rossi is from the 8th, as he used to represent the Issaquah-based 5th LD in the state Senate. So if he’s tied in his own neighborhood, he’s probably lagging the 50% mark by a bit statewide.

CO-Sen, CO-Gov: Small Lead for Bennet, Big Lead for Hickenlooper

Public Policy Polling (9/30-10/2, likely voters, 8/7-8 (RVs) in parentheses, gubernatorial numbers here):

Michael Bennet (D-inc): 46 (46)

Ken Buck (R): 45 (43)

Undecided: 9 (12)

John Hickenlooper (D): 47 (48)

Dan Maes (R): 13 (23)

Tom Tancredo (C): 33 (22)

Undecided: 7 (7)

(MoE: ±3.4%)

Michael Bennet has the slimmest of leads in Colorado according to PPP, the pollster who’ve tended to be the most favorable to him. It’s an enthusiasm gap thing, although not as bad as in the midwest: if their August RV model were used, Bennet would lead 47-44 (and if the 2008 turnout model were used, he’d lead 50-41). Bennet’s approval is 35/49, while Buck is at 41/46.

On the gubernatorial front, Dan Maes has collapsed even further as his amateur-hour campaign leaks air; he’s down to 12/58 favorables (from 23/38 in their last poll). In a way, that’s bad news for John Hickenlooper, who needs a healthy split between the two conservatives instead of seeing Maes dwindle down into single digits, which may actually be possible given the current trajectory. Hickenlooper’s personal popularity (51/37) seems like it’ll be enough to help him weather even a complete Maes collapse, though.

Harstad Strategic Research (10/3-4, likely voters, no trendlines):

Michael Bennet (D-inc): 44

Ken Buck (R): 41

Other: 3

Undecided: 13

(MoE: ±4.4%)

For good measure, there’s also a poll of the Senate race out from Democratic pollster Harstad giving Michael Bennet a 3-point lead, and also finding Ken Buck with a 31/41 favorable. (Apparently this poll is from the Bennet campaign, though the memo doesn’t explicitly say.) I’m still not feeling terribly optimistic about this race, given that most other pollsters looking at this race have given Buck a mid-single-digits lead — and a leaked Dem poll with a 3-point lead doesn’t do much to encourage more optimism, but at least it plus the PPP poll show that the race is still in tossup territory.