Tag: Todd Tiahrt

AZ-Sen: Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? J.D. Hayworth thinks so!

CT-Sen: Dave Weigel tweeters that Rob Simmons will “make statement on the future of his campaign” at 9am today. What could this mean? A) He’s getting married to Ginny Brown-Waite; B) he’s announcing endorsements from Nikolai Volkoff and the Iron Sheik; or C) he’s bailing out of the race in the face of Linda McMahon’s zillions of dollars and new party endorsement. The Connecticut Mirror says it’s option C. If so, that would pretty much just leave Paulist weirdo Peter Schiff in the mix against McMahon.

IA-Sen: Dem Roxanne Conlin has launched her first TV ad of the campaign, a biographical spot. Of course, no word on the size of the buy. I think Conlin will need to go sharply negative against Grassley if she wants to make a real dent in his poll numbers.

KS-Sen: Todd Tiahrt’s probably wondering what exactly he did wrong on the way to (probably) losing the Republican nomination: “Didn’t I out-teabag him my whole career?” I guess it doesn’t matter. SurveyUSA now has him down 52-29 to fellow Rep. Jerry Moran in the GOP primary. Two months ago he trailed “only” 42-32. The primary here isn’t until Aug. 3rd, but Tiahrt’s consistently crappy polling is going to make it hard for him to make the case that he can turn things around before then.

NV-Sen: Because we like to keep track of such things, we note that the Tea Party Express – the shady, consultant-backed apparatus that appears to be trading on the “Tea Party” name in order to drum up business – has already spent $300K on behalf of Sharron Angle in the GOP primary. If she pulls off an upset against Chicken Lady, the TPE will have a nice notch in its belt – and will probably be able to put the fear of god into a few Republican candidates here and there.

KY-Gov: Freshman Rep. Brett Guthrie says he won’t seek the Kentucky governor’s mansion in 2011, but didn’t rule out an eventual run some point in the future (he’s 46 years old).

OH-Gov: A group backed by the DGA and the American Federation of Teachers called “Building a Stronger Ohio” is going up with a $300K ad buy on behalf of Ted Strickland which is likely to hammer John Kasich some more. (You may recall that Strickland’s first ad out of the box blasted Kasich for his Wall Street ties.) Nathan Gonzales reports that this new group has $1.7 million in funding (so far), so more and bigger buys are probably on the way.

AL-05: Turncoat Parker Griffith just loaned his campaign $75K ahead of the June 1 primary, on top of $180K he loaned himself earlier.

HI-01: In light of Charles Djou’s 40% plurality win, his conservative record, and the fact that we’ll have a normal election in November, we’re moving this race back to Tossup status.

NC-08: Now that their attempt to create a third party in North Carolina has fizzled, SEIU is scaling back their plans. Instead, they are trying to recruit former Larry Kissell staffer and Iraq War vet Wendell Fant to challenge his old boss (who of course voted no on healthcare reform) as an independent.

PA-11: Some Dude Brian Kelly managed to score 17% in the Democratic primary against Paul Kanjorski, despite refusing all financial contributions. Now, he’s gone and endorsed Republican Lou Barletta. Kanjorski was in trouble anyway, but this certainly doesn’t help.

PA-12: Mark Critz’s impressive eight-point win, combined with the fact that he’ll get square off again in November against a guy he already beat soundly (Tim Burns), has us convinced that this race should be Lean D. It’s been a very long time since anyone won a special and then lost the subsequent rematch – Wisconsin Dem Peter Barca was the last to do so, in 1993/94. However, Barca won his special by just 675 votes, while Critz cruised by over 10,000.

VA-05: Saying he would “rather see Tom Perriello for two more years than the wrong conservative there for 20 years,” teabagger Jeffrey Clark says he’ll launch an independent bid if the hated Rob Hurt wins the GOP primary.

WI-07: Dem state Rep. Louis Molepske says he won’t challenge state Sen. Julie Lassa in the primary, more or less clearing the field for her. The picture on the GOP side is less clear, where state Rep. Jerry Petrowski is still considering a bid, even though Ashland DA Sean Duffy has been running for a while (and has some establishment support).

• AR-Sen: Labor seems quite keen to finish the job against Blanche Lincoln in the runoff; the AFSCME just anted up $1.4 million for the coming weeks. This includes not just an IE blitz on the state’s inexpensive airwaves, but also 30 staffers on the ground, with a particular emphasis on driving up African-American turnout. Meanwhile, Mark Blumenthal took an in-depth look at the AR-Sen poll released yesterday by DFA giving Bill Halter the lead; he had some of the same issues with question order that we did.

• KS-Sen: Rep. Jerry Moran is out with an internal poll from POS that gives him a dominant lead over fellow Rep. Todd Tiahrt in the GOP primary for the open Senate seat. Moran leads 53-27, including a similar 51-33 among those who are “favorable” to the Tea Party movement (despite Moran being somewhat more moderate than the social conservative Tiahrt… Moran’s appeal to them may be that Tiahrt is one of those pork-hugging Appropriators).

• KY-Sen: Quickest post-primary implosion ever? Rand Paul, after getting bogged down by questions yesterday over his feelings about the Civil Rights Act, dug his hole even deeper on the Rachel Maddow show last night. He tried to walk that back today on safer turf on Laura Ingraham’s show, saying that he would have voted for it in 1964 and wouldn’t support repeal of anti-discrimination laws today, although he also said that it was a political mistake to go on a liberal talk show in the first place. Democrats like John Yarmuth and Jim Clyburn are still going on the offensive, while Republican leaders like Jim DeMint and John Cornyn are busy mumbling “no comment.” Even Jeff Sessions is backpedaling. Nate Silver is circumspect about how much damage this may have actually caused Paul in Kentucky, but casts some very suspicious eyes in the direction of Rasmussen’s new poll of the race today.

• NV-Sen: Busgate seems to be the second half of Sue Lowden’s quick one-two punch to her own nose. Having been called out that her name is on the donated campaign bus’s title (despite previous contentions that it was leased), she’s now admitting that she “misspoke” about her bus. The FEC is starting to take up the matter.

• PA-Sen: Biden alert! Looks like the White House is eager to move past that whole Arlen Specter endorsement, as the Vice-President (and Scranton favorite son) is gearing up to campaign on behalf of Joe Sestak.

• WA-Sen: I’m just getting more and more confused about the state of the Republican field, as Sarah Palin, out of pretty much nowhere, gave an endorsey-supporty-type thing in favor of Clint Didier today. Is this a shot across Dino Rossi’s bow to keep him from jumping in (which is locally rumored to be imminent), an endorsement after finding out that Rossi isn’t getting in (which competing local rumors also assert), or just Palin marching to the beat of her own off-kilter drum? Didier, in case you’ve forgotten, is a long-ago NFL player turned rancher who, of the various GOP detritus in the race right now, has been the one most loudly reaching out to the teabaggers. The Rossi-friendly Seattle Times must see him as at least something of a threat, as they recently tried to smack him down with a piece on the hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal farm subsidies Didier has enjoyed.

• AL-Gov: A little more information is surfacing on that shadowy birther group, the New Sons of Liberty, that’s been promising to dump seven figures in advertising into the Republican gubernatorial field. The group has a website up now, and it lists a real-world address that’s the same as Concerned Women for America, a group who’ve been supportive of Roy Moore in the past.

• GA-Gov: Insider Advantage has another look at the Republican gubernatorial primary in Georgia. They don’t see much of note, other than a bit of a Deal uptick: Insurance Comm. John Oxendine is at 23, followed by ex-Rep. Nathan Deal at 15, ex-Sos Karen Handel at 14, Eric Johnson at 5, Jeff Chapman at 2, and Ray McBerry at 2. (April’s poll had Oxendine at 26, Handel at 18, and Deal at 9.)

• MA-Gov: Grace Ross, the other Dem in the primary (and the 2006 Green Party candidate), has had to pull the plug on her candidacy, lacking the signatures to qualify. Incumbent Deval Patrick, whose political fortunes seem to keep improving, has the Dem field to himself now.

• NY-Gov: Suddenly, there’s a fourth candidate in the GOP gubernatorial race. In a year with no Mumpowers or Terbolizards, this guy may be the winner for this cycle’s best name: M. Myers Mermel. He’s a Westchester County businessman who had been running for Lt. Governor and reportedly had locked down many county chairs’ support in that race but inexplicably decided to go for the upgrade. This comes on top of word that state GOP chair Ed Cox, worried that the Steve Levy thing may have blown up in his face, has been trying to lure yet another guy into the race: recently-confirmed state Dept. of Economic Development head Dennis Mullen. Frontruner ex-Rep. Rick Lazio is undeterred, naming his running mate today: Greg Edwards, the county executive in tiny (by NY standards) upstate Chautauqua County.

• AL-07: Terri Sewell, the one candidate in the race with money, is out with an internal poll from Anzalone-Liszt showing a three-way dead heat. Sewell is tied with Jefferson Co. Commissioner Shelia Smoot at 22 apiece, with state Rep. Earl Hilliard Jr. at 20. Attorney Martha Bozeman is at 7. By contrast, a Smoot poll from April had Smoot in the lead, at 33, to Hilliard’s 28 and Sewell’s 9. The intervening event? Sewell hit the TV airwaves; she’s likely to be the only candidate able to do so.

• AR-01: This is charming: when a state Rep., Tim Wooldridge (one of the two contestants in the Democratic runoff in the 1st) proposed a bill changing the method of execution in Arkansas to public hanging. Now, granted, several other states do allow hanging as alternate method (both blue states, oddly enough), but public hanging?

• LA-03: Hunt Downer, the former state House speaker, has been acting candidate-like for a while, but is finally making it official, filing the paperwork to run in the Republican primary in this Dem-held open seat. Downer seems like the favorite (in the primary and general) thanks to name rec, although he’ll need to get by attorney Jeff Landry in the primary, who has a financial advantage and claims an internal poll from April giving him a 13-point lead over Downer.

• NY-15: There’s one more Dem looking to take out long-long-time Rep. Charlie Rangel, who’s looking vulnerable in a primary thanks to ethics woes. Craig Schley, a former Rangel intern, announced he’s running (he also ran against Rangel in 2008). With the field already split by Vince Morgan and Jonathan Tasini (UPDATE: and Adam Clayton Powell IV), though, that may just wind up getting Rangel elected again.

• PA-12: PPP has more interesting crosstab information from PA-12, showing the difference candidate quality, and appropriateness for the district, can make. Tim Burns had 27/52 favorability among self-declared “moderates,” while Mark Critz had 67/27 favorables. (Guess who won?) Compare that with Scott Brown in Massachusetts, who had 62/31 favorability among moderates. And here’s an interesting tidbit: the NRCC spent fully one-tenth of its cash on hand on PA-12. (In order to get spanked.)

• VA-02: A lot of Republicans who’ve lent support to Scott Rigell in the primary in the 2nd may be wondering what they’re getting themselves into, as more detail on his contributions record comes out. Not only did he give money to Barack Obama in 2008 (as has been known for a while), but he also contributed to Mark Warner and in 2002 gave $10,000 to a referendum campaign that would have raised sales taxes in the Hampton Roads area. If he hadn’t already kissed Tea Party support goodbye, it’s gone now.

• Turnout: The WaPo has interesting turnout data in Arkansas and Pennsylvania. Arkansas turnout, juiced by the competitive Senate campaigns, was actually higher than the 2008 presidential primary.

• House GOP: That highly-touted ban on earmarks imposed on its members by the House GOP leadership? Yeah, turns out that’s just kind of more of a “moratorium” now. One that’s set to expire in January, so they can resume appropriating away once the election’s over.

AR-Sen: While offering a commencement address at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, Michelle Obama gave a shout-out to all the Democratic bigwigs sharing the dais with her: Gov. Mike Beebe, his wife Ginger, Sen. Blanche Lincoln, Sen. Mark Pryor and even state AG Bobby Dustin McDaniel. Everyone, that is, except for Lt. Gov. Bill Halter, who was also on stage. Stay classy, Michelle.

KS-Sen: The not-particularly pleasant GOP race to succeed Sam Brownback has gotten even uglier, with Rep. Todd Tiahrt accusing frontrunner Rep. Jerry Moran of pulling “a John Kerry” flip-flop on tax cuts. Moran, leading in the polls, has largely been sticking to a Rose Garden strategy and refusing to respond to Tiahrt’s provocations.

NV-Sen: Sue Lowden’s mom must have taught her as a child that if you pick at a scab repeatedly, it will heal faster. That can be the only explanation for Lowden’s newest TV ad, in which she brings up the damn chicken business yet again!

PA-Sen: Joe Sestak now has a four-point lead over Arlen Specter in Muhlenberg’s tracking poll, 46-42. A day earlier, Sestak took his first-ever lead in public polling in the tracker. Also, here’s a good observation: Specter voted against Elana Kagan when she was nominated to be Solicitor General. Now that it looks like she’s going to be tapped for the Supreme Court, he’ll have to very publicly flip-flop on this one barely a week before the primary.

UT-Sen: As you probably saw by now, longtime Utah Sen. Bob Bennett was denied renomination at the GOP convention this past Saturday. Instead, businessman Tim Bridgewater and attorney Mike Lee will duke it out in a June 22nd primary. Lee seems to be the teabagger fave, as he immediately garnered Jim DeMint’s endorsement once he made it past the third and final round of voting.

Meanwhile, Bennett is still holding out the possibility of waging a write-in campaign – which is not out of the question given that Utahns in general like him a lot more than Republican convention delegates. My understanding, though, is that he could only run as a write-in in the general election, not the primary.

Anyhow, while Bennett’s never self-funded before (so far as I know), he is actually extremely wealthy, with assets potentially in excess of $30 million. If turnout is about 600K voters and a Dem can get a third of that, then Bennett only needs 200K to win a squeaker. On the flipside, John Cornyn is pledging to support the GOP nominee, and in modern times, I think only Strom Thurmond has gotten elected to the Senate via write-in. But nevermind all that – do it, Bob… for America!

FL-Gov: Surely by now you’ve heard about anti-gay activist George Rekers’ European escapades with a young man he hired from a site called Rentboy. If not, read this now. The story just got a lot better, though, with word that Florida AG Bill McCollum once paid Rekers at least $60,000 to serve as an expert witness for the state’s attempt to ban gay adoptions. Rekers’ testimony was rejected by the judge as not credible, and the ban was found unconstitutional. All in a day’s work!

KY-Gov: Kentucky’s gubernatorial seat isn’t up until 2011, but a trio of media outlets commissioned a poll from Research 2000 nonetheless. It finds Gov. Steve Beshear leading House Speaker Greg Stumbo in a hypothetical primary, 55-28. In the general election, it shows Beshear up 44-37 over GOP Ag. Comm’r Richie Farmer. Beshear’s job approval is 46-43 and he has $1.9 million in the bank.

NY-Gov: Ordinarily, you need 25% of the weighted delegate vote at a state convention to qualify for the ballot in New York. But because Steve Levy is not yet a registered Republican, GOP rules require him to get 50%. It sounds, though, like there may be some movement afoot to more or less knock that requirement back down to 25%.

CT-05: Some Dude Kie Westby is dropping out of the crowded GOP race to take on Rep. Chris Murphy. Westby endorsed state Sen. Sam Caligiuri on his way out. Quite a few Republicans remain in this primary.

MD-04: State Del. Herman Taylor says he’s challenging Rep. Donna Edwards in the Democratic primary. It sounds like Taylor might be taking Edwards on from the right, saying she’s “out of touch with the business community” (those are the Maryland Gazette’s words, not necessarily his). Meanwhile, it sure sounds like Edwards herself has gone native: Despite the fact that she owes her seat to a primary challenge, she now says “it would be ‘very hard’ for her to support a primary challenger like herself,” according to The Nation. It never changes.

MI-09: Former state Rep. Rocky Raczkowski put out an internal poll showing him up 26-15 over businessman Paul Welday, with a whole lotta people undecided.

NY-23: Like some kind of Archie Comics love triangle involving Betty, Veronica, and Jughead, newcomer Matt Doheny is wooing the Club for Growth away from their former not-so-golden boy, Doug Hoffman. (The Club now says it’s “hard to say” whom they will endorse, if anyone.) Maybe toss in Moose, too, since the Conservative Party is making it extra-interesting by sticking with Hoffman.

PA-12: This ain’t good news for Team Blue: Dem Mark Critz reported having just $73K in the bank in his pre-election FEC report, while GOPer Tim Burns has $308K. I don’t feel too good about this one.

UT-02: In case you missed it, Dem Rep. Jim Matheson is being forced into his first-ever primary come June 22nd, thanks to the vote taken at the state’s Democratic convention this past weekend. Retired teacher Claudia Wright nabbed 45% of the delegates on Saturday, clearing the 40% hurdle to get her name on the primary ballot. The winner will take on ex-state Rep. Morgan Philpot, who has raised just $27K so far. Wright has raised $9K, while Matheson has taken in a million bucks and has $1.4 mil on hand.

WV-01: I was wondering when this was going to happen: The DCCC has finally sent some help to Rep. Alan Mollohan, who faces a stiff primary challenge from the right in the form of state Sen. Mike Oliverio. The election is tomorrow, though, so I wonder if, Coakley-style, this assistance is going to be too little, too late. While I carry no brief for Mollohan, he is almost certainly better than Oliverio, who is buddy-buddy with the state GOP.

Meanwhile, on the GOP side, the cat fud is flying fast and furious. Attorney Mac Warner says he won’t support ex-state Rep. David McKinley if he wins the nomination, claiming McKinley’s “gone way over the line in personal attacks and distortions of the truth.” (Welcome to politics, bub.) In general, the primary has been very negative, with much of the fire aimed at McKinley.

New Jersey: A New Jersey appellate court dinged Chris Christie’s attempt to unilaterally restrict campaign contributions by unions, saying that legislation would instead be required.

Polling: Tom Jensen, who has penned many dour but accurate notes about the rough shape Dems find themselves in this cycle, draws together some surprising threads and finds recent good polling news for Team Blue in five senate races.

• FL-Sen: With drillin’ and spillin’ suddenly on everyone’s minds these days, the Florida legislature’s Dems are trying to force newly-minted independent Charlie Crist’s hand on the drilling issue. They plan to ask Crist to call a special session to take up a constitutional amendment on banning drilling close to Florida’s shoreline. With Crist having taken pretty much every possible position on drilling already, who knows what he’ll do… obviously, he’s flexible. Meanwhile, with Crist out of the GOP picture, Jeb Bush is now free to publicly out himself as the Marco Rubio supporter that anyone with a pulse has known he’s been along.

• KS-Sen: Although it’s a little late in the game, the Dems actually landed a bona fide state legislator to run for Senate (one of their biggest recruiting gaps this cycle). State Sen. David Haley of Kansas City, who’d been rumored to be interested many months ago, now says he’ll take the plunge, giving the Dems at least something of an upgrade from retired newspaper editor Charles Schollenberger. Haley hasn’t fared well in his last couple attempts at a promotion, though; he lost both the 2002 and 2006 SoS races. Meanwhile, over on the GOP side, Rep. Todd Tiahrt has settled into an underdog position against Rep. Jerry Moran, but he’s trying to rally the social conservative grassroots. Religious right leader James Dobson (last seen pulling a weird switcheroo in the Kentucky GOP primary) cut a radio ad on Tiahrt’s behalf.

• NY-Sen-B: Could the GOP manage to coax one more second-tier contender into the Republican field to go against Kirsten Gillibrand? Orange County Executive Ed Diana is reportedly “gearing up” to challenge Gillibrand, although he hasn’t made a final decision. Diana would have at least one leg up over David Malpass, Bruce Blakeman, and Joe DioGuardi: he’d be the only one to currently hold elective office (although Orange County, in the Hudson Valley, makes up less than 2% of New York’s population).

• PA-Sen, PA-Gov (pdf): Today’s daily hit from the Muhlenberg/Morning Call tracker: Arlen Specter has a slightly bigger lead over Joe Sestak, at 48-40. Dan Onorato is at 34 in the governor’s primary, followed by Joe Hoeffel at 11, Anthony Williams at 9, and Jack Wagner at 8.

• WI-Sen: As was generally expected, Oshkosh businessman Ron Johnson seems to be ready to launch his Senate bid on the Republican side, with an official announcement in the foreseeable future. Johnson apparently is on good terms with the teabagger community, unlike other GOP candidates Dick Leinenkugel (a veteran of the Jim Doyle administration and thus an impure collaborationist) and Terrence Wall.

• AL-Gov: Here’s a smackdown for Rep. Artur Davis: the United Mine Workers, which had previously done a joint endorsement of Davis and Ron Sparks, pulled its Davis endorsement and will endorse Sparks solely. (Sparks also got the UAW’s endorsement last week.) Davis did manage to score one other endorsement, though, from equal pay activist Lilly Ledbetter (whose namesake bill is one of the few pieces of marquee Democratic legislation that Davis actually voted for this cycle).

• FL-Gov: Rick Scott, the former health insurance exec and professional anti-HCR astroturfer who just got into the GOP gubernatorial primary, is bringing a whole lot of his own money with him. AG and presumptive nominee Bill McCollum may need to start looking back over his shoulder: Scott has either bought or reserved $4.7 million in airtime for the coming months. That’s about as much money as McCollum has raised since entering the race.

• NY-Gov: The RGA left Steve Levy hanging, in a big way. Levy had (laughably) claimed last week that the RGA had promised him $8 to $10 million for his gubernatorial run as an incentive to get into the race and save the GOP from the specter of Rick Lazio. RGA chair Haley Barbour (not publicly, through back channels) said, um, no: the RGA is neutral in the primary, and will spend in that race only if it looks close down the home stretch. With state chair Ed Cox having put his credibility on the line to bring in ex-Dem Levy (who’s sucking in both GOP primary and general election polls), the NYT is reporting that’s created something of a “war” within the state party, to the extent that Michael Steele had to head to New York for a recent emergency intervention with Cox. When Michael Steele is suddenly the voice of reason, you know you’re doing it wrong.

• FL-Sen: That bell is tolling pretty loudly for Charlie Crist right about now, although it’s unclear today whether it spells a switch to an independent Senate bid (keep your fingers crossed) or an exit (if only temporarily) from politics. Crist’s camp has pulled all of its GOP-primary-related ads from Florida television. Florida junior Senator/Crist errand boy George LeMieux is downplaying this, saying no switch is imminent, but the NRSC is leaning on Crist even more heavily than before, trying to disabuse their endorsee of the idea of an indie bid.

• IN-Sen: I wonder if this will boost John Hostettler with his fundraising by hooking him up with a national base, or if he’s going to be more Peter Schiff than Rand Paul in the end? The former Rep., in his run for the GOP nomination in Indiana, now has the endorsement of Rep. Ron Paul, bringing together two of the very few GOPers to vote against the Iraq War. Meanwhile, state Sen. Marlin Stutzman, the dark-horse third-wheel in the GOP derby, is hitting the TV airwaves with an introductory ad, banking much of his small warchest on getting his name rec out of the basement with the primary only weeks away.

• KS-Sen: Rep. Mike Pence weighed in on the GOP field in Kansas, endorsing Rep. Todd Tiahrt over fellow Rep. Jerry Moran. There’s something of a social/fiscal conservative split on this race, where social conservatives love Tiahrt but fiscal hawks don’t, based on his long career on the goodie-doling Appropriations Committee. If nothing else, it’s interesting to see Pence, who tries to have a foot in each camp, choose sides, as he gears up for a possible presidential bid. Meanwhile, Moran is going up with his first TV spot, with a big buy in the Kansas City market.

• KY-Sen: More tasty cat fud in Kentucky, where Rudy Giuliani just endorsed Trey Grayson and, in doing so, slammed the bejesus out of Rand Paul on the 9/11 front, saying that Grayson “is not part of the ‘blame America first’ crowd that wants to bestow the rights of U.S. citizens on terrorists and point fingers at America for somehow causing 9/11.” Just the kind of softening-up of Paul we need for the general election.

• NY-Sen-B, NY-Gov: Siena’s latest poll of the Empire State doesn’t contain any big surprises; even David Paterson’s 17/83 job rating isn’t that surprising anymore. In their first look at the post-George Pataki Senate landscape, they find that Kirsten Gillibrand is cruising against all of her seemingly interchangeable third-tier opposition; she beats Joe DioGuardi 46-27, Bruce Blakeman 46-26, and David Malpass 46-24. DioGuardi, apparently with the name rec that comes with a celebrity daughter (or maybe it’s from the two terms in Congress in the 1980s), has the edge in a Pataki-free GOP primary, winning with 24 to 7 for Blakeman and 5 for Malpass. On the gubernatorial side, Andrew Cuomo fares even better than Gillibrand, beating Rick Lazio 61-24, Steve Levy 58-23, and Carl Paladino 64-19. Lazio still has the edge in the GOP primary, at 29 with 15 for Levy and 13 for Paladino.

• WA-Sen: Strange that it takes a foul-mouthed blogger to notice the clues that Dino Rossi isn’t running that the Beltway press seems oblivious to. Goldy notices that minor candidate Chris Widener, another personal friend of Rossi, is saying the same thing as state Sen. Don Benton: if he’s running, why the hell isn’t he doing me the favor of calling me up and telling me to get out of the way? (Well, maybe because he’s a jerk?) Even more telling is that another minor GOP candidate, former NFL player Clint Didier, has commercial real estate mogul Kemper Freeman (one of Rossi’s big-name donors and a major insider player in the state GOP), as his campaign chair.

• FL-Gov: I’m wondering if Bill McCollum’s lead role in the pursuit of the GOP AGs’ lawsuit over HCR is suddenly taking a toll on him (voters are opposed to the suit by a 54-40 margin), or if Quinnipiac got an unusually Dem-friendly sample (it’s the same one that found Kendrick Meek with 4 of Marco Rubio in a head-to-head, and Obama gets a 48/46 approval). Either way, Quinnipiac has the nicest numbers we’ve seen out of the Florida gubernatorial race in a while. McCollum leads Democratic state CFO Alex Sink by just 40-36. McCollum leads state Sen. Paula Dockery 56-7 in the GOP primary; Sink leads Dockery 37-28.

• MD-Gov: Usually when a heavyweight jumps into the field, the random odds and ends get out, but the opposite happened in Maryland. Shortly after Bob Ehrlich got in, little-known rich guy Brian Murphy just announced his candidacy today. Murphy will be running against Ehrlich from the right and has the support of former state GOP chair James Pelura. Murphy also got a vote of confidence from former state Del. Carmen Amedori, who dropped her long-shot bid against Barbara Mikulski to sign on as Murphy’s Lt. Governor running mate.

• CA-36: At the state convention, incumbent Rep. Jane Harman managed to ward off Marci Winograd’s attempts to deny Harman the state party’s endorsement. After a floor fight, Harman won the endorsement with a 599-417 vote. The two will still face off in the Democratic primary (in a rematch of 2006).

• GA-09: Here’s a problem for Georgia Dems: they lost their only candidate in the 9th, pastor Mike Freeman. His name will still remain on the ballot for the May 11 special election to replace Nathan Deal, but he leaves behind a hole for the general election. Not that the absence of a Dem in this R+28 district would be noticed much, though.

• MA-09: Rep. Stephen Lynch has dodged a primary challenge so far, following his vote against HCR, but it seems like organized labor has found a candidacy that might stick. Mac d’Alessandro, a regional director for the SEIU, says he’ll take a shot at Lynch in the Democratic primary, although he has only a couple weeks to round up the necessary 2,000 signatures.

• MN-01: The Republicans had their endorsement convention for the 1st District and gave their nod to state Rep. Randy Demmer. While Demmer is hardly anyone’s idea of a moderate, he’s less polarizing than his main rival, former state Rep. Allen Quist (a Michele Bachmann ally). Quist sounds like he’ll honor the endorsement and not run in the primary.

• MN-02: On the Dem side, though, former state Rep. Shelley Madore has decided to keep running in the primary even though the DFL endorsement went to Dan Powers.

• NH-01: In a surprise to almost no one, Sean Mahoney (who made a big show of quitting his committee position on the RNC recently, ostensibly to protest Michael Steele) announced that he’s going to run in the GOP primary in the 1st for the right to take on Rep. Carol Shea-Porter. The primary that looked like a victory lap for former Manchester mayor Frank Guinta last year is now a four-way bar brawl instead.

• NY-24: Rep. Mike Arcuri is, all of a sudden, sounding kind of Stupak-ish in the wake of his getting bruised by all ends of the spectrum after his ill-advised ‘yes’ to ‘no’ switch on HCR; he won’t commit to running for re-election just yet. Either he’s particularly thin-skinned and vindictive about getting his widdle feewings hurt, or he’s looking at some particularly unappetizing polling numbers, especially if the Working Families Party runs someone against him.

AR-Sen: Bill Halter has a new ad up going after Sen. Blanche Lincoln for her vote in favor of TARP – aka the bailout. As is all too often the case with these kinds of reports, there’s no indication of how big the ad buy is.

CA-Sen, CA-Gov: Man, the news cycle moves fast these days. The RNC bondage-themed nightclub scandal (which I’m sure you’ve read all about) already had some same-day blowback. GOP senate candidate Chuck DeVore says he’s “severed all ties” with Erik Brown, a consultant who seems to be responsible for the expenses racked up at Voyeur West Hollywood. The Daily Caller (which broke the story originally) also says that Brown did work for Republican gubernatorial hopeful Steve Poizner. Meanwhile, Politico’s Dave Catanese tweets that freshman Sen. Claire McCaskill is sending out a fundraising email for Barbara Boxer.

CT-Sen: In the somewhat strange Connecticut Republican senate primary, Paulist economist Peter Schiff has put out his first TV ad… and it doesn’t mention that he’s a Republican. Schiff is spending half a mil to run the ad statewide for two weeks. Schiff also promised to run in the August primary even if he doesn’t get the party nomination at the May convention.

KS-Sen: Things have gotten a little worse for Todd Tiahrt in his race against Jerry Moran in the GOP primary to succeed outgoing Sen. Sam Brownback: SUSA now shows Moran up 42-32. Two months ago, Moran led by seven points – and by just three two months before that. The Kansas primary is not until August 3rd, so Tiahrt still has time, but he doesn’t seem to be gaining much traction.

KY-Sen: Now things are getting good:

Trey Grayson, Kentucky’s secretary of state, used his latest ad to again hammer his rival, Bowling Green eye surgeon Rand Paul, on national security issues.

“Paul even wonders whether 9/11 was our fault,” a female announcer says in the spot that began airing Thursday. The commercial then shows Paul speaking at a Blue Grass Policy Institute forum in March 2009, saying: “Maybe some of the bad things that happen are a reaction to our presence in some of these countries.”

I just hope that Grayson doesn’t nuke Paul before our nominee (hopefully Jack Conway) gets a chance to pummel him in the general.

NC-Sen: A good get for former state Sen. Cal Cunningham: Gen. Wesley Clark endorsed his fellow Army veteran for the Democratic senate nod. Interestingly, Clark specifically noted Cunningham’s support for ending “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

NY-Sen-B: Marist finds ex-Gov. George Pataki with the narrowest of leads over Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, 47-45, essentially unchanged from last month’s 48-45 margin. This is all well and good for Republicans, but Pataki hasn’t given the slightest indication that he’s interested in running.

GA-Gov: Looks like Nathan Deal didn’t quit quite fast enough. The Office of Congressional Ethics found (according to the NYT) that Deal “appeared to have improperly used his office to pressure Georgia officials to continue a vehicle inspection program that generated hundreds of thousands of dollars a year for his family’s auto salvage business.”  I wonder how much of an impact this will have in the governor’s race, though, since Deal had mostly been floundering in the polls. Maybe it’ll just be the final nail in his political coffin – a suiting end for a party-switching ex-Democrat.

IA-Gov: GOP ex-Gov. and comeback hopeful Terry Branstad is up with his first TV ad of the campaign. No word on the size of the buy, though.

MD-Gov: The Baltimore Sun profiles would-be GOP gubernatorial candidate (and ex-gov) Bob Ehrlich and finds that his current job is “‘rainmaker’ for the Baltimore branch of North Carolina-based law firm Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice. Ehrlich describes his job as being ‘the face of the firm,’ with his duties including ‘speeches, coffees, dinners, lunches, meetings.'” Sounds like Ehrlich’s been working on honing his Dan Coats/Tommy Thompson pedigree.

FL-08: Rep. Alan Grayson, one of the wealthiest members of Congress and a man who has largely self-funded his past campaigns, raised almost half a million dollars in a recent “moneybomb.”

NY-13: It looks like the GOP has some primary woes of its own in the 13th CD. Though the Republican establishment is coalescing around former FBI agent Mike Grimm, lawyer Michael Allegretti is vowing to fight on. He’s recently gone up with an ad on cable (so presumably a small buy) demanding repeal of the healthcare reform bill.

NY-23: Hah! Could the unlikable Doug Hoffman foment yet another right-wing split? Hoffman is laying claim to the Conservative Party line in this fall’s election, and he’s making the argument that whoever runs for the Republicans will need both lines in order to win. (Pretty plausible!) This is pissing off local GOP leaders, though, who are taking this as a threat to nominate Hoffman – or else face yet another divided ballot. This is some Fancy Feast-level cat fud we’re talking about.

NY-29: A more complete list of candidates interviewed by upstate Dems as potential nominees for the special election to fill ex-Rep. Eric Massa’s seat:

Mary Wilmot, an aide to Gov. David Paterson, Assemblyman David Koon of Perinton, past candidate for state Senate and businessman David Nachbar of Pittsford, Southern Tier native Matthew Zeller, and Michael McCormick of Allegany County

Wonder if we might be missing a name, though, since yesterday word was that the Dems would be interviewing six people.

OH-16, OH-18: CQ: “Businessman Jim Renacci, who is taking on freshman Rep. John Boccieri in the 16th district, and state Sen. Bob Gibbs, who is running against two-term Rep. Zack Space in the adjacent 18th district, established a joint fundraising committee, ‘Gibbs-Renacci for Congress’ and will split the proceeds evenly.”

PA-06: Manan Trivedi is chipping away at Doug Pike’s big lead among organized labor. He picked up a couple of local union endorsements, from the Transport Workers and the Iron Workers.

TN-08: Republican potentates are showering even more love on Steve Fincher, this time in the form of a campaign tour with GA Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (of “Obama is uppity” fame). Fincher has a lot of money, but like almost every GOP candidate with establishment backing, he faces a primary from ever-truer conservatives.

Census: There’s some speculation that anti-government attitudes (and paranoid black-helicopterism) might be the cause of low Census response rates in Texas. Though the biggest challenge for the Census is typically presented by undercounted groups like blacks and Latinos, some of the lowest response rates are in fact coming from very Republican counties. It’ll be very interesting to compare response rates and voting history when all is said and done.

Redistricting: Nathan Gonzales has a detailed look at the powers that are gathering on both sides for the upcoming post-census redistricting battle.

• AR-Sen: Bill Halter’s netroots haul has crested $1 million, between MoveOn and ActBlue (led by the PCCC and Daily Kos). On top of all that, the Sierra Club is joining the fray, with its own attack ads against Blanche Lincoln over her attempts to limit EPA regulation. The ads don’t mention Halter by name, though.

• AZ-Sen: John McCain is getting the newest GOP sensation, Scott Brown, to come to Arizona to stump for him. Because, you know, nothing says “Hey teabaggers, vote for me instead of J.D. Hayworth!” than bringing in the New England RINO who gladly took all the teabaggers’ money and support and turned around and voted for a Democratic piece of legislation on his first week on the job.

• CO-Sen: Having seemingly scored big time with his public option letter (at least to the extent of raising his previously very low profile), Michael Bennet seems to be getting very ambitious. The freshman Senator just unveiled a comprehensive package of Senate reforms that he’s authored that’s aimed squarely at undoing the quagmire that the Senate has become, including filibuster reform, eliminating anonymous holds and private-sector earmarks, and barring lawmakers from lobbying… for life.

• KS-Sen: Rasmussen finds that (big surprise) all the action in the Kansas Senate race is the GOP primary (although they didn’t bother polling the hotly-contested primary). Rather than test possible candidate state Sen. David Haley, they just take the “Generic D” route, and find both Reps. Jerry Moran and Todd Tiahrt beating G.D., 51-26 and 50-29 respectively.

• ND-Sen: The Dems’ leading candidate for contesting the likely takeover of the open Senate seat in North Dakota by Republican Gov. John Hoeven decided against a run, probably sensing the long odds. Former AG Heidi Heitkamp said no (on her brother’s radio show), although rumors suggest she’s interested in running for Governor in 2012, meaning she probably wouldn’t want a big defeat as people’s last memory of her. State Sen. Tracy Potter is already in for the Dems, and businesswoman Kristin Hedger may also get in, as she said she’d defer only to Heitkamp.

• NY-Sen-B: Is Kirsten Gillibrand going to actually be able to waltz to re-election, or will some other moneybags celebrity pop out of the woodwork next week? After having sent Harold Ford Jr. packing, now billionaire publisher Mort Zuckerman decided against a Republican bid (couching it oddly, in that being a Senator would take up too much time from his actual day job). Zuckerman is wise to save his money, as Rasmussen finds Zuckerman losing to Gillibrand 47-36 (not as bad as Marist yesterday, but still not encouraging). Rasmussen also finds Gillibrand beating even George Pataki, 44-42 (although for some reason they don’t poll actual candidate Bruce Blakeman).

• NY-Gov: When it rains, it pours, for David Paterson. The New York State Commission on Public Integrity just released its finding that he violated state ethics laws for securing World Series tickets for himself and friends and then falsely testifying under oath about it. That gets sent over to Andrew Cuomo’s desk on top of the whole meshugas about the state police, which kept building today with the resignation of state police superintendent Harry Corbitt. Maurice Hinchey just publicly said what I’ll bet most other New York Dems are privately thinking: he’s glad he won’t have to run with Paterson upticket from him.

Meanwhile, there’s a ton of snap polling out today about Paterson, of varying degrees of badness for him. Quinnipiac finds his approval at an all-time low of 24/62, although voters say 61-31 he should finish his term rather than resign. SurveyUSA, however, finds a plurality for resignation: 47 say resign, 44 say stay. Rasmussen finds 28 say resign, 53 say stay. Rasmussen also threw in some numbers for the gubernatorial election in November, finding Cuomo winning against Republican Rick Lazio, 55-30. They also tested out gadflyish businessman Carl Paladino, who’s made noises about running. With Paladino as the R, Cuomo wins 56-27, and with Paladino as an I, Cuomo is at 50, with 19 for Lazio and 15 for Paladino.

• OK-Gov: Here’s a path for Democrats to win the Governor’s race in Oklahoma, according to Rasmussen: find a way for state Sen. Randy Brogdon to win the GOP primary. Unfortunately, it seems like the very conservative Rep. Mary Fallin is well on her way to winning the primary against the ultra-conservative Brogdon. Fallin beats Democratic Lt. Gov. Jari Askins 51-37, and AG Drew Edmondson 51-36. Brodgon, however, loses to Askins 42-39 and beats Edmondson 42-41.

• PA-Gov: Quinnipiac released the gubernatorial half of its Pennsylvania poll, and Arlen Specter’s bounce doesn’t seem to have rubbed off much on the Democrats running for Governor… although their main problem, as always, seems to be that no one knows who they are. In the primary, “don’t know” dominates at 59, followed by Dan Onorato is at 16, Jack Wagner at 11, Joe Hoeffel at 10, and Anthony Williams at 2. AG Tom Corbett has no problems on the GOP side, beating state Rep. Sam Rohrer 43-5. In head-to-heads, Corbett beats Onorato 42-32, Wagner 42-30, and Hoeffel 41-30.

• TN-Gov: Here’s another state where it’s still just too damn early to be polling the gubernatorial race. MTSU doesn’t even bother with head-to-heads in the Tennessee race, but finds that Republican Knoxville mayor Bill Haslam (who’s been spending heavily on advertising) has a bit of a leg up, in that he’s the least unknown of the myriad candidates (19% of respondents were actually able to name him). Mike McWherter is the best known Dem (although that may be because he shares a last name with his dad the ex-Gov.).

• HI-01: We’ve gotten confirmation that the May 22 special election to replace resigned Rep. Neil Abercrombie will be an all mail-in affair, saving the state some money but possibly scrambling the parties’ GOTV plans. This election and the special election in PA-12 four days earlier pose a quandary for the NRCC — spend money they don’t really have, in order to take advantage of what seems to be nationwide Republican momentum… or fess up that they really don’t have much chance in either of these districts and save their money for November (or worse, spend the money and lose anyway, as with NY-20 and NY-23). NRCC spokesperson Paul Lindsey seems to telegraph which way the NRCC is leaning: “Considering that one district is the birthplace of President Obama and the other gives Democrats a voter registration advantage of more than 130,000, it is not lost on anyone that we face an incredible challenge in both races.”

• NY-15: Charles Rangel has finally put down his gavel as Ways and Means chair, after he was found to have violated ethics rules. He says it’s a temporary “leave of absence,” but the House’s presiding officer said “the resignation is accepted,” suggesting something more permanent. This comes in the face of a growing wave of opposition within his own party, with a number of members returning his PAC money (ranging from the very vulnerable, like Walt Minnick, to the theoretically vulnerable, like Niki Tsongas). Also, perhaps symbolically important, it came after Artur Davis (running for Alabama governor) became the first CBC member to call for Rangel to give up his gavel.

• OK-02 (pdf): The 2nd seems like a strange choice of a place to poll, but I guess it’s a good test case in terms of a Democratic Rep. in a dark-red district that hasn’t been on anyone’s radar screen as being vulnerable (in the face of utterly no-name challengers). True to form, Dan Boren doesn’t have much to worry about this fall. He’s having no trouble against his anonymous opponents, beating Dan Arnett 49-22, Daniel Edmonds 44-28, and Howard Houchen 48-26. (Teabagging independent Miki Booth pulls in 7 or 8 in each matchup.) Much of that has to do with the level of opposition, but Boren is the first incumbent Rep. PPP has found who’s polling above 50 in terms of approval, at 51/33. Boren’s occasional, um, departures from the party line can be better understood in terms of Barack Obama’s disturbingly low 27/65 approval in the district.

• PA-11: Lackawanna County Commissioner Corey O’Brien got some help from the left as he fights a primary battle against crusty Rep. Paul Kanjorski; he got the endorsement of two local unions: the Northeast Pennsylvania Building and Construction Trades Council, and the Scranton Building and Construction Trades Council.

• PA-12: Bill Russell released an internal poll showing him beating Tim Burns in the GOP primary in the 12th. That’s not really the newsworthy part; what’s interesting is his internal pollster is Zogby. The pollster that everyone treated as an oracle in 2004 has been reduced to polling on behalf of BMW Direct’s direct-mail-scam frontman? Lord, how the mighty have fallen.

• Census: Guess who’s finally learned to love the Census? Michele Bachmann! Probably after some of her staffers showed her a puppet show spreadsheet showing how a combination of not enough residents in her district + a Democratic governor and legislature = no more MN-06. At any rate, she’s planning to vote for a largely symbolic resolution to encourage Americans to participate in the Census.

• AZ-Sen: Tensions between John McCain and Arizona’s state GOP chair Randy Pullen (who’s more linked to the conservative grassroots than McCain’s camp) are reaching a head; Pullen pulled his endorsement of McCain after the two scuffled over money for party GOTV efforts. McCain is planning a weird end-run around the state party involving funneling money through the Yuma County GOP. It remains to be seen whether J.D. Hayworth will benefit from the inside-baseball civil war; Hayworth, meanwhile, is finding that birtherism doesn’t play as well once you’re on the big stage instead of the AM-radio fringes: he’s trying to walk back his previous birther-curious remarks, just saying he was trying to “provoke conversation.”

• FL-Sen: There might be some legs to the Marco Rubio expenses story that go beyond his use of the GOP state party’s credit card. Now he’s admitting that he double-billed both state taxpayers and the state GOP for eight different flights he took while state House speaker.

• KS-Sen: Here’s one less thing Republican Rep. Todd Tiahrt has to worry about: the Appropriations Committee veteran was cleared by the House Ethics committee over his links to sketchy lobbying firm PMA. Rep. Jerry Moran won’t be able to use that against him in their Senate primary, but regardless, Tiahrt is still having trouble keeping pace with Moran in the polls.

• KY-Sen: Here’s a strange exchange between the Trey Grayson and Rand Paul camps. After Paul accused Grayson of having voted for Bill Clinton, Grayson responded that Paul voted for known whackjob Ron Paul for President, to which Rand said “It’s hard for me to imagine anyone not voting for his own father.” Meanwhile, Grayson is also still hitting Paul hard over the coal issue, and that could be an issue that, assuming Paul wins the primary, his Democratic nominee could keep getting a lot of mileage out of.

• MD-Sen: Rasmussen actually bothered polling the Maryland Senate race, although they only used “Generic Republican” as Barbara Mikulski’s opposition. She still wins easily, 54-36. Queen Anne’s County Councilor and wealthy physician Eric Wargotz is moving toward entering the race, and former state Del. Carmen Amedori has already filed, so why the use of Generic R, though?

• NY-Sen-B: Harold Ford Jr. keeps bumping back his timeline on announcing his plans on whether or not to challenge Kirsten Gillibrand in the Democratic primary (ostensibly because he doesn’t want to do so while David Paterson is dominating the news). Given the unprecedented badness of his campaign rollout — which may have just gotten worth with the news that his Merrill Lynch salary is $2 million, exclusive of bonuses — he may be mulling whether or not go through with it after all.

• OH-Sen: Rob Portman is drawing fire for his plans to address Cincinnati-area anti-tax group COAST and raise money for them, which has a history of inflammatory statements. COAST’s website refers to Ohio’s General Assembly as “Nazis.” They also referred to Ted Kennedy as a “shovel-ready project.”

• PA-Sen: I’m not sure voters care much about this kind of process stuff, but Arlen Specter is landing some hard blows on Joe Sestak for paying his staffers so poorly (effectively below the minimum wage), especially while Sestak’s three siblings (who are effectively the topmost tier of his campaign) make much more. Still, the rate at which the Sestak campaign is shedding staffers suggests something’s amiss at camp Sestak.

• WI-Sen: Politico is reporting that Tommy Thompson seems to be taking some serious steps toward a Senate run against Russ Feingold, at least to the extent of securing financial pledges and attempting to round up former staffers. Some insiders remain skeptical that the 67-year-old Thompson, who put forth a rather doddering image amidst the crash and burn of his 2008 presidential run, will actually pull the trigger.

• IA-Gov: I wonder if this was who Ed Fallon had in mind when he said someone should primary Chet Culver in the gubernatorial race. Jonathan Narcisse announced that he’ll take on Culver in the Democratic primary, focusing on educational issues. Narcisse, as a former Des Moines school board member and publisher of several independent newspapers, seems at least one step up from Some Dude status (although there’s still a strong whiff of gadflyishness here).

• IL-Gov: This Friday, March 5th, is the deadline for the Illinois State Board of Elections to certify the results of February’s Republican gubernatorial primary. According to unofficial tallies (not disputed by either campaign), Bob Brady has a 247-vote lead on Kirk Dillard. Dillard’s camp doesn’t sound very optimistic – they seem to be holding out hope that a previously-unknown error will crop up in their favor. A spokesman says that Dillard might consider seeking a recount if the margin is less than 100 votes, but even that, they say, is not a “magical number.” (D)

• KS-Gov: Rasmussen has been nothing if not thorough in the last few months, and now they’re the first pollster to look at a race that everyone has regarded as a foregone conclusion: the Kansas governor’s race. They find Republican Sen. Sam Brownback leading Democratic state Sen. Tom Holland 55-33. Given the source, that’s actually better than I would have expected.

• MN-Gov: While state House minority leader Marty Seifert has taken on something of presumptive GOP frontrunner status, his closest competition, state Rep. Tom Emmer, is far from dead. Emmer just got the backing of two local Republican heavyweights, former Rep. Vin Weber, and RNC committee member and former gubernatorial candidate Brian Sullivan.

• NY-Gov: Even though he’s already pulled the plug on his re-election bid, there’s still a lot of pressure on David Paterson to resign in the wake of the scandal involving a domestic violence allegation against a top aide. He’s refusing, though; when asked whether resignation was off the table, he responded “I don’t even know why it’s on the table.”

• TN-Gov: One more Democrat pulled the plug on a gubernatorial bid today: state Senate minority leader Jim Kyle. Kyle cited poor fundraising (as he can’t raise during the legislative session), as well as long odds in both the primary and general. With state Sen. Roy Herron already out (to pursue TN-08), this leaves only two contestants for the Democratic nod: former state House majority leader Kim McMillan, and businessman and gubernatorial progeny Mike McWherter.

• AL-05: Rep. Parker Griffith is up with his first TV ad already, trying to portray the former Howard Dean supporter as opposed to the “radical Obama-Pelosi liberal agenda.”

• GA-07: With the retirement of Rep. John Linder, all sorts of conservative state legislators are being considered as potential candidates in suburban Atlanta, most prominently state Sens. Don Balfour (who just confirmed his entry) and David Shafer. This is also outgoing SoS Karen Handel’s turf, but she’s apparently not interested in abandoning her stalled gubernatorial campaign for the House. Former Atlanta Braves pitcher Jon Smoltz has already ruled out a bid, but one other blast from the past whose name is floating up is former Christian Coalition head Ralph Reed.

• HI-01: It’s official: Rep. Neil Abercrombie’s last day on the job was yesterday. Today he’s filing his papers to run for Governor instead.

• MA-10: Maybe this is an indication that Rep. William Delahunt is sticking around for another term, as his rumored successor (in the event of a Delahunt retirement) Joe Kennedy III said today that he won’t be running for Congress next year. Kennedy says he plans to focus on his day job as assistant district attorney in Barnstable County, but is interested in a future run.

• NY-01: In case the race in the 1st wasn’t complicated enough, with three different credible Republicans jostling in the primary and an Assemblyman considering joining them, now there’s news that a Suffolk County Legislator (i.e. county councilor) is considering the race, as an Independent. Jay Schneiderman is a former Republican who’s now in the county legislature on the Independence Party line. Initially this seems positive, as a third party might split the anti-Tim Bishop vote, but Bishop has been elected in the past on the Independence as well as the Democratic Party line, so it could actually complicate things for Bishop if Schneiderman secures the IP line.

• PA-06: Those cryptic comments by Lower Merion Twp. Commissioner Brian Gordon about dropping out seem to have panned out: he pulled the plug on his short-lived bid for the Democratic nod without endorsing. Gordon seemed to have gotten in too late to pose much of a threat to Doug Pike and Manan Trivedi.

• Filings: Campaign Diaries looks at the results from the close of the filings period in North Carolina. There’s really not much of note here: the Republicans didn’t seem to score any top-tier candidates in any Dem-held districts (although Tim d’Annunzio, in NC-08, at least seems to be willing to spend his own money). Also, it looks like Rep. Walter Jones, an iconoclastic Republican in a deep-red district, has avoided a major primary challenge (although he is still facing a GOP primary challenge from the Democrat he easily defeated in 2006 and 2008, Craig Weber).

• Polltopia: I’m not really sure who to cheer for in a fight between Stu Rothenberg and Scott Rasmussen, but it’s still on. Rothenberg started it with his dissection of Rasmussen’s WI-Sen poll, wondering how the hell a majority of voters could have an opinion about unknown candidate Dave Westlake; Rasmussen fires back, saying look at the “strong” opinions instead of the “somewhat” favorables or unfavorables.

• WATN?: Here’s one more Republican ex-Rep. heading to the pokey. John Sweeney pled guilty to driving while intoxicated, and faces 30 days in Saratoga County jail.

• Redistricting: Dave’s App (thanks to Dave & Jeff) now has partisan data for Texas and California. There are also a few new features, which you can read more about in Dave’s diary. (D)

• Meta: Can you believe it’s the first anniversary of the Daily Digest? (Pardon me while I laugh sadly at my initial plan to have it be “four or five” bullet points.)

• AZ-Sen: Ex-Rep. J.D. Hayworth has made it pretty clear already that he’s taking on John McCain in the Republican Senate primary, and now he’s made it official when he’s going to make it official. The launch date for his campaign: Feb. 15.

• CT-Sen, CT-02: Ex-Rep. Rob Simmons did a whole lot of bobbing and weaving when an interviewer yesterday kept pressing him on the issue of whether he’d consider dropping down to run for his old House seat again (although a spokesperson followed up afterwards, saying he will not running for anything else, “period”). The idea has to be tempting to Simmons, though, who just watched his Senate dreams vaporize with Democratic AG Richard Blumenthal’s entry, and who may by enviously eyeing efforts by some of the other 2006 victims (like Mike Fitzpatrick) to turn back the clock.

• KS-Sen: There’s still six months to go before their Republican Senate primary, but time’s running out for Rep. Todd Tiahrt to make a move against fellow Rep. Jerry Moran. Moran leads this month’s SurveyUSA poll 40-33 (two months ago Tiahrt pulled within 3, but that’s the closest he’s been). Moran is currently up 38-23 in the state’s northeast, which will be the decisive region (as they each have their respective districts already locked down).

• NV-Sen: File this under “it’s bad news even if you have to be out there repeatedly saying this,” but Harry Reid again denied (this time to Las Vegas political reporter Jon Ralston) that he’d drop out of his fizzling Senate race to make way for a different candidate. On the GOP side, one potential opponent, Sue Lowden, is up with her first TV spot, a soft-focus biographical ad. Taking note of these developments, no doubt, are Dick Durbin and Charles Schumer; insiders are observing that the two of them are both busy doling out campaign cash to their colleagues in order to build loyalties for what looks like the fight to be the next majority leader.

• NY-Sen-B: In case you missed it, last night’s point-by-point dismantling of Harold Ford Jr. by Stephen Colbert is a must-see. It clearly wasn’t the coming-out gala that Ford had envisioned.

• UT-Sen: The establishment is riding to the rescue for Bob Bennett, who could be threatened in this year’s primary if the teabagging rabble somehow coalesced behind one of his many opponents. The NRSC just handed $43K to Bennett’s campaign (an important sign to other institutional contributors), and Newt Gingrich is headlining a big-bucks fundraiser for Bennett.

• CA-Gov: Republican pollster McLaughlin & Associates (apparently not working on behalf of any of the candidates) released a poll of the Republican gubernatorial primary, finding zillionairess Meg Whitman leading zillionaire Steve Poizner, 39-12. Apparently they were in the field when Tom Campbell bailed out, as they also offer up a three-way head-to-head, which was 31 Whitman, 17 Campbell, 5 Poizner.  

• CT-Gov: A couple comings and goings in Connecticut today: as expected, Danbury mayor Mark Boughton got in the Republican field. On the Democratic side, state Sen. Gary LeBeau, who’d been polling in the low single digits, dropped out. In a moment of unusual honesty for a politician, LeBeau said, “The state has no idea who Gary LeBeau is.”

• OR-Gov: This is a bit of a surprise, but in the wake of Al Gore’s endorsement, it’s certainly an indication that ex-SoS Bill Bradbury (something of an underdog in the Democratic primary against ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber) has some powerful friends back in DC. Howard Dean will appear at several fundraisers for Bradbury in Oregon next week.

• FL-08: Here’s another surprise: brash 20-something real estate developer Armando Gutierrez dropped out of the GOP field in the 8th, despite having attracted a lot of favorable buzz and even picked up a few endorsements from members of Florida’s House delegation. The national party never warmed up to him, though, seemingly put off by his line-crashing, and he may have finally gotten the message, between the NRCC’s preferred pick, businessman Bruce O’Donoghue, officially filing yesterday, and the endorsement by neighboring Rep. Cliff Stearns of yet another Republican in the crowded field, state Rep. Kurt Kelly.

• FL-19: In all the madness over the Illinois primaries today, it’s been almost universally forgotten that the primary in the safely-blue 19th to replace resigned Rep. Robert Wexler is also today. It’s hardly worth a look, though, as state Sen. Ted Deutch pretty much has it locked down, having raised many times more money than anyone else and nailed down the establishment endorsements. Former Broward Co. Commissioner Ben Graber is the only other candidate of note.

• IN-04: Despite the advantages that his statewide profile brings him, SoS Todd Rokita won’t have the GOP field to replace retiring Rep. Steve Buyer to himself. He’ll have to face state Sen. Brandt Hershman too. Hershman has one key advantage himself: he works as an aide to Buyer, and has Buyer’s backing.

• NV-03: Here’s some good news for ex-state Sen. Joe Heck: he just got $10K to go toward his campaign against vulnerable Dem freshman Rep. Dina Titus. The bad news is: that $10K came from the PAC of John Ensign, who just won’t stop trying to make himself useful to Nevada’s other Republicans despite the fact that he’s about as popular as shingles right now. But then Heck got some more good news: he won’t face a seriously contested primary, as self-funding businessman Rob Lauer dropped his teabaggish challenge to Heck to run for SoS instead.

• NY-13: A lot of people are asking who Michael Grimm is, after he banked over $300K last quarter to go up against Democratic Rep. Michael McMahon. He’s a former FBI agent, who apparently has a lot of friends in high places… in places outside of his district. Only $3,500 of that amount came from within the actual district, and $2,000 of that was from Staten Island Republican guru Guy Molinari.

• NY-14: Live by the primary challenge, die by the primary challenge. Rep. Carolyn Maloney now faces one of her own, a well-funded challenge from the apparent right from 30-something attorney Reshma Saujani, who has previously raised serious dollars within the Indian-American community for other Democratic candidates. Saujani, believe it or not, is running on an unashamedly pro-Wall Street platform (although this is maybe the one district in the country where that might still work).

• PA-06: Two more prominent local Democrats who had endorsed Doug Pike when he was the only game in town have switched their endorsements to Manan Trivedi instead. Significantly, they’re both in Berks County (which is also where Trivedi is from, and which is where Dems have tended to run the weakest in the district in the past): Reading mayor Tom McMahon and Berks Co. Commissioner Kevin Barnhardt.

• TN-01: Would you believe that there’s a Republican who lost in one of the wave elections who isn’t running for something this year? However, before you get too excited, it’s ex-Rep. David Davis, who’d been mulling a third matchup against Rep. Phil Roe, who knocked him off in a GOP primary in this super-red district in eastern Tennessee. The not-insane Roe may be the best we can hope for in this district, especially compared with Davis, who’d been making outreach to the local teabaggers in preparation for another run.

• WV-03: A credible challenger to Democratic Rep. Nick Rahall sneaked under the rope at the filing deadline: former state Supreme Court justice Elliott Maynard. Maynard was, until recently, a Democrat, but switched parties pushed along largely by his perception of Democrats’ anti-coal environmental policies (and no doubt also influenced by West Virginia’s reddish turn over the last decade).

• OH-SoS: This was painless and easy: not only did a more progressive alternative to conservative state Rep. Jennifer Garrison get into the Secretary of State race – Franklin Co. Court Clerk Maryellen O’Shaughnessy – but she won’t even face a contested primary. Getting the message that her establishment support was practically nil, Garrison got out of the race. Meanwhile, on the Republican side, the GOP establishment seems to have settled the trouble it was having finding a replacement Auditor candidate after Mary Taylor ditched the job to run for Lt. Governor. They got Delaware Co. Prosecutor Kevin Yost to switch over from the AG’s race, where he was facing ex-Sen. Mike DeWine in a primary. That caused a lot of consternation among the state’s right-wingers, though – they were looking forward to Yost picking off the unacceptably moderate (and generally underwhelming) DeWine in the primary. Both the SoS and Auditor positions are key from a redistricting perspective, as along with the Governor they control the state’s legislative redistricting process.

• Republicans: If you haven’t checked out the details of Research 2000’s in-depth poll of the state of what Republicans believe today, please do. Although I’m not really still sure what to do with all this knowledge… except maybe acknowledge that you can’t negotiate with such irrational actors.

• Redistricting: CQ’s Josh Kurtz takes an interesting look at redistricting in California over the decades, as seen through the prism of a new book that covers the many ups and downs of legendary California Rep. Philip Burton. Will it be an incumbent protection map or an aggressive push, and how will the state’s fast-growing Latino population be accommodated?

• CO-Sen, CO-Gov: After some flirtation with the idea of switching over to the open seat Governor’s race, or even endeavoring to become Lt. Governor, former State House speaker Andrew Romanoff announced yesterday that he’s going to keep doing what he’s doing (despite having made little headway at it so far): challenging appointed incumbent Michael Bennet in the Democratic Senate primary. Romanoff also threw his support to Denver mayor John Hickenlooper in the gubernatorial primary.

• FL-Sen: I wonder if we’ll see more of this from insurgent Democratic candidates. Former Miami mayor Maurice Ferre, looking for some sort of angle to use against front-running Rep. Kendrick Meek for the Democratic Senate nomination, has come out against the current health care reform plan (although not against HCR in general), calling it “a special interest plan that raises taxes and favors insurance and pharmaceutical companies.”

• KS-Sen: The PMA scandal has mostly left House Democrats tarred with its brush, especially crusty old-school guys from that Appropriations clique, like John Murtha and Pete Visclosky. However, it’s now expanding to take in a key Republican member on Appropriations – one who’s in a tight battle for a promotion to the Senate and can’t afford to get besmirched in any way. The House ethics panel is now looking at the links between Rep. Todd Tiahrt’s donations and defense earmarks.

• NY-Sen-B: Rasmussen checks out the race that’s suddenly on everyone’s mind (and that doesn’t even exist yet, although Harold Ford Jr. just took a monthlong leave of absence from Merrill Lynch to “explore” the race – I wonder if he’ll be doing most of his recon by helicopter). They find numbers very similar to local pollsters Marist and Siena: Kirsten Gillibrand beats Ford, 48-23 (with a surprisingly large 10 for “some other,” presumably Jonathan Tasini although maybe it’s more just “anybody else, please”). Where Rasmussen parts ways with the other pollsters is Gillibrand’s high favorables (and high knowns, period): they have her at 59/27.

• OH-Sen, OH-Gov: Take this with a bag of quick-melting rock salt, if you choose, as it’s a poll commissioned by Ohio Right to Life and conducted by Republican pollster Wenzel Strategies. Still, the numbers clock in pretty close to what Rasmussen has been seeing lately. They see John Kasich with a 43-33 lead in the Governor’s race, and Rob Portman up in the Senate race: 37-31 over Lee Fisher and 40-35 over Jennifer Brunner.

• MD-Gov: One more poll, and it actually shows a Democrat in reasonably good shape. Incumbent Gov. Martin O’Malley is up 9 points against the GOP’s best possible offering, potential candidate ex-Gov. Bob Ehrlich, 48-39, according to local pollster Gonzales Research. (Gonzales saw it an 11-point race last September.) O’Malley’s approvals (46%) could use some improvement, but considering that Ehrlich hasn’t sounded likely to get in (although he might be doing a rethink given last night’s events), there are certainly many other races higher on the worry-about list.

• AL-05: If Rep. Parker Griffith thought he’d be welcomed with open arms into the Republican fold, well, he’s got another thing coming. The only good news for him from last night’s meeting of the Madison County (i.e. Huntsville) Republican Executive Committee was that, in the end, they decided not to attempt to get Griffith removed from the primary ballot as a Republican. The real question of the meeting, though, was whether it would be better strategy for Republicans to try to beat him in the primary or via an independent candidacy in November.

• AR-02: Democratic candidates who sound committed to running to replace retiring Rep. Vic Snyder are already piling up – and we haven’t even gotten to Lt. Gov. Bill Halter or ex-Gen. Wesley Clark yet. State House Speaker Robbie Wills today stopped short of saying he’s running, but says he’s “excited” about running. State Sen. Joyce Elliott also sounds very likely to run, while Public Service Commissioner Paul Suskie is in the “seriously considering” stage.

• AZ-03: On the other side of the aisle and of the country, Republicans from the deep local bench are piling into the open seat race in the 3rd, vacated by Rep. John Shadegg. Paradise Valley mayor Vernon Parker is ending his long-shot gubernatorial campaign and heading over to the 3rd, and he’s being joined by state Sen. Jim Waring (who’s dropping his state Treasurer campaign to do so). They join already-in state Sen. Pamela Gorman and state Rep. Sam Crump.

• IL-10: State Rep. Julie Hamos and Dan Seals continue to split key endorsements in their primary fight for the Democratic nod in the open 10th. Hamos got the endorsements of both the Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times, while Seals picked up the smaller-circulation Daily Herald’s endorsement.

• ND-AL: Add one more confirmed name to the list of GOPers sniffing out the at-large House seat in North Dakota, hoping John Hoeven’s Senate bid gives them some coattails against the entrenched Democratic incumbent, Rep. Earl Pomeroy. Former House majority leader Rick Berg kicked off his campaign yesterday.

• TN-04: Rep. Lincoln Davis has been pretty much assured a bumpy ride, thanks to Tennessee’s rapidly-reddening status. He got a new Republican challenger today, in the form of attorney Jack Bailey. It’s unclear whether the never-before-elected Bailey will be stronger than physician Scott DesJarlais (or can even get past him in the primary), but he’s a former Hill staffer (ex-CoS for Missouri Rep. Scott Akin) so he probably still has a full Rolodex for fundraising purposes.

• TN-08: State Sen. Roy Herron keeps looking like he’ll have an easy path to the Democratic nomination to replace retiring Rep. John Tanner. Former state Rep. Phillip Pinion, an oft-floated name, said he wouldn’t get into the race.

• OR-Init: Oregon voters have a chance to deal a major setback to the coalescing conventional wisdom that voters prefer service cuts to tax hikes to plug state budget gaps, with Measures 66 and 67. The state legislature passed raises in the $250,000-plus tax bracket and certain corporate income taxes, which are now subject to a people’s veto (via an all-mail special election with a deadline of Jan. 26). Well-regarded local pollster Tim Hibbitts, paid for by a coalition of local media, finds both measures passing: 52-39 for 66 and 50-40 on 67.

• Mayors: One other election result from last night: Jefferson Co. Commissioner William Bell defeated attorney Patrick Cooper in a runoff, to become Birmingham, Alabama’s new mayor, 54-46. Cooper had won the most votes in the general, but Bell seemed to consolidate previously-split African-American votes.

• Polltopia: One more interesting follow-up on the increasing democratization of polling (on the heels of yesterday’s piece by Mark Blumenthal): the Hill looks at the increasing move by groups like Firedoglake and the PCCC toward commissioning polls – and even has an anecdote about PPP’s Tom Jensen getting berated by a nameless Beltway person for broaching the unmentionable and polling potential alternatives to Harry Reid.

• Social media: At some point during the flurry of activity yesterday, Swing State Project shot past 1,000 Twitter followers (gaining more than 100 yesterday alone). Not a follower yet? Check us out. You can also receive SSP updates via Facebook, if you’re one of those Luddites who like to read things that are longer than 140 characters.