Tag: Rick Perry

• AR-Sen: Cue up that old Jim Hightower saying about how there’s nothing in the middle of the road but squashed armadillos. Blanche Lincoln, already facing strong GOP opposition, is getting hit with salvos from her left flank too. The Sierra Club is running radio ads against her, attacking her opposition to allowing the EPA to regulate carbon emissions.

• HI-Sen: In case there was any doubt, the 86-year-old Daniel Inouye confirmed that he’s running for re-election and a ninth (!) term; he’ll have his campaign’s official kickoff tonight. The GOP says it’s “too early” to discuss whether they’d field a candidate to go against him. Republican Gov. Linda Lingle hasn’t made a truly Shermanesque statement, but has said that she’s concentrating on her last year in office and not running for anything else.

• MD-Sen: There were brief waves of panic yesterday generated by a rumor (originating on a right-wing local blog, who claimed to have an impeccable source) that Barbara Mikulski, 73 years old and slowly recovering from a leg injury last year, was about to retire too. The rumors were quickly rebutted by staffers, though.

• NY-Sen-B: Kirsten Gillibrand got another endorsement from one of the many Democrats associated with a potential primary challenge against her: former NYC comptroller and mayoral candidate William Thompson.

• IL-Gov: It’s the final day of counting absentee and provisional ballots in the Illinois governor’s race today, but state Sen. Kirk Dillard (who trailed by 406 votes to state Sen. Bill Brady after Election Day in the GOP primary) says he won’t concede today regardless of the final number. He’ll wait at least until Feb. 23, when counties submit reports to the state Board of Elections.

• MI-Gov: A quick change of heart for former state Treasurer Bob Bowman, who opened up an exploratory committee to run for the Democratic gubernatorial nod last week. He pulled the plug instead, offering a cryptic explanation that he “just couldn’t commit at this time.” Bowman was probably a long-shot for the nomination, although his self-financing capability could make things interesting.

• OR-Gov (pdf): It looks like most of the action in the Oregon governor’s race is in the Democratic primary, and even there, it may not be shaping up to be an edge-of-your-seat affair. Ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber released an internal poll (by Fairbank Maslin Maullin & Metz) giving him a convincing lead in the primary over ex-SoS Bill Bradbury. Kitzhaber is at 55, with Bradbury at 21 (and self-funding Soloflex founder Jerry Wilson at 2). Both are extremely well-regarded by the Democratic electorate, with Kitzhaber at 69/16 and Bradbury at 54/13.

• TX-Gov: Too bad newspapers can’t vote, because polls show Kay Bailey Hutchison losing the GOP gubernatorial primary to Rick Perry by a wide margin among actual humans. However, she swept the endorsement derby over the last few days among the state’s major papers: the Dallas Morning News, the Houston Chronicle, and the Austin American-Statesman.

• FL-25: Democrats are leaning hard on Joe Garcia for another run in the 25th, now that it’s an open seat, and it seems to be working. Garcia, the former county Democratic chair and a current Energy Dept. official, came close to defeating Mario Diaz-Balart (who’s scurrying off to the open seat in the safer 21st); he’s been talking to the DCCC in the last few days and rounding up his previous staffers. On the GOP side, state Rep. David Rivera is already in and state Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla is certainly talking like a candidate, saying he’ll give Rivera “an old-fashioned ass-whooping.”

• IL-11: This isn’t the way to start your general election campaign off on the right foot. GOP nominee Adam Kinzinger, an Air Force vet, had to revise the military credentials section of his bio after a Facebook poster called attention to possible discrepancies in his record. Kinzinger, the NRCC’s favored candidate, left some feathers ruffled on the right en route to his easy primary victory.

• MI-03: A decent-sounding Democrat is stepping forward to run for the open seat left by Republican Vern Ehlers (where Barack Obama nearly won last year, although it’s a historically Republican area with a strong GOP bench). Attorney Patrick Miles is past president of the Grand Rapids bar association, and a Harvard Law classmate of Obama. On the GOP side, state Rep. Justin Amash, who declared his candidacy the day before Ehlers’ retirement announcement, got the endorsement of western Michigan’s biggest power broker: Amway guru and 2006 gubernatorial candidate Dick DeVos.

• MS-04: Rep. Gene Taylor has perhaps the reddest district held by any House Democrat, so it’s surprising that, with the general sense of a Republican-favorable year, no prominent GOPer has tried to surf the red tide against the usually-unassailable Taylor. A local elected official has finally stepped up, though: state Rep. Steven Palazzo.

• PA-06: One other internal poll, clearly intended to scare rich guy Steven Welch from burning any more of his money against Rep. Jim Gerlach in the GOP primary. Gerlach’s poll has Gerlach leading Welch by a head-spinning 71 to 6. Somehow I can’t imagine it’s really that bad, but Welch clearly has an uphill fight ahead of him.

• PA-12: There’s a little more clarity to the developing fields in the 12th, where two prominent potential candidates said no thanks. On the Democratic side, Jack Hanna, the state party’s southwest chair, passed. And this is a bit more of a surprise, on the GOP side: Diane Irey, a Washington County Commissioner who ran a medium-profile campaign against John Murtha in 2006 (but didn’t break 40%), decided not to run either; she’s endorsing Tim Burns, Some Dude already in the race who apparently has self-funding capacity (unlike 2008 candidate Bill Russell, who just has BMW Direct in his corner). Despite the district’s recent turn at the presidential level, this is one district where the disparity between the two parties’ benches may make the difference for the Dems.

• SD-AL: The GOP already has two decent challengers in the field in South Dakota, the state’s SoS, Chris Nelson, and state Rep. Blake Curd, who brings his own money with him. A third possible entrant seems likely now: state Rep. Kristi Noem, the assistant majority leader, says she’ll announce her candidacy soon. State Reps. in South Dakota have tiny constituencies, so name rec may be an issue – but more ominously, there are also rumors that term-limited Gov. Mike Rounds may be considering the race (although he sounded pretty disinterested when asked).

• LA-LG: SoS Jay Dardenne, who recently decided against a promotion to the Senate by challenging David Vitter in the GOP primary, now has another promotion in mind. He’d like to be elected Lt. Governor, now that that job is open (with Mitch Landrieu having departed to become New Orleans mayor). Gov. Bobby Jindal will appoint a temporary successor until the November election, but what Jindal would really like is to get rid of the whole LG position altogether (although he’ll need to get the legislature to cooperate on that idea, which doesn’t seem likely).

• NH-St. Sen.: There’s a special election tonight in the New Hampshire Senate, to fill the seat left behind by Republican Ted Gatsas, elected in November to become mayor of Manchester. Democratic state Rep. Jeff Goley faces Republican state Rep. David Boutin. The election gives Democrats the chance to push their edge in the Senate to 15-9, as well as just to make an assertive statement in New Hampshire, where they face tough retentions in both U.S. House races this year.

• AZ-Sen: This is good news! For J.D. Hayworth! The right-wing anti-immigrant vote in the GOP primary isn’t going to be split. Minutemen co-founder Chris Simcox ended his bid and endorsed Hayworth, not having gotten much traction on the polling front even before Hayworth’s entry. In a close race, though, Simcox’s few percentage points could make all the difference for Hayworth. Bad news, for the GOP, though, is that Hayworth and John McCain are planning to go all Mutually Assured Destruction on each other in the primary, with Hayworth threatening that if McCain brings up Abramoff, he’ll bring up the Keating 5. Dems really need a marquee candidate here to be poised to seize the smoldering ruins.

• CO-Sen: Andrew Romanoff is rolling out more endorsements, as he seems to be finally getting his primary challenge to Michael Bennet into gear in the wake of recent polling showing him outperforming Bennet in the general election. He’s claiming the endorsement of more than two-thirds of the Democrats in the state House, including current majority leader Paul Weissman, as well as state Senate majority leader John Morse and former House speaker Ruben Valdez. Romanoff, of course, is a former House speaker himself, so he’s got an ‘in’ with the legislative types.

• NV-Sen: I wonder if this is the break that’ll save Harry Reid’s butt in November? (Especially if Sue Lowden winds up winning the GOP nomination, as she’s public enemy number 1 to the state’s Paulists.) The “Tea Party” has filed a “Certificate of Existence” (where can I get one of those, for whenever people doubt that I exist?) in Nevada, and will have its own candidate on the ballot in November. Jon Ashjian will reportedly be their candidate; the question still remains just how big a bite he takes out of the Republican column, though. In addition, there will also be a Reform Party candidate on the ballot and as many as five independents.

• NY-Sen-B: Mort Zuckerman? Really? Maybe he’s taking a page from friend Michael Bloomberg and realizing that, with enough money, any political office is within reach for a restless billionaire. The 72-year-old Daily News publisher and real estate baron is considering a race against Kirsten Gillibrand, although there’s no indication of which party label he’d use. He’s known as a Democrat, but it seems likely he’d pursue either an independent or Republican bid to avoid the Democratic primary (where Harold Ford Jr. already seems to be occupying the turf Zuckerman would need in order to win).

• CT-Gov: Here’s the top facepalm news of the day: Ned Lamont has hired a campaign manager as he officially kicks off his gubernatorial campaign, and he hired Joe Abbey, last seen… wait for it… helming Creigh Deeds’ campaign.

• FL-Gov: This doesn’t sound very promising either, as the St. Petersburg Times looks at the growing sense of torpor surrounding the Alex Sink campaign. Sink has had little trouble fundraising and a so-so GOP opponent, but operatives are starting to worry she’s walking a Martha Coakley-ish line on focusing on insider connections and with a lack of interest in mixing it up with voters or even developing a resonant message.

• PA-Gov: The GOP state party endorsements came with a lot less drama than the Democrats’, seeing as how they’ve had their candidates locked down for most of a year. AG Tom Corbett easily got the endorsement for governor over state Rep. Sam Rohrer, which was widely expected although it still piqued Rohrer’s handful of right-wing supporters. The most drama was actually for the #2 slot; Bucks County Commissioner Jim Cawley managed to win the Lt. Governor endorsement on the second ballot out of a crowded field. On the Democratic side, Philadelphia-based state Sen. Anthony Williams is still expressing some interest in the race, although he’s set a very high bar for entry for himself. He’s sitting $1 million already, and he says if he can get that figure up to $4 million in the next few weeks, he’ll jump in.

• TX-Gov (pdf): There’s yet another poll out of the Texas gubernatorial primaries, from a coalition of newspapers, most prominently the Austin American-Statesman. It’s right in line with the other polls out recently, with Rick Perry at 45, Kay Bailey Hutchison at 29, and Debra Medina at 7. (They don’t poll runoff matchups, or the Dem primary.) Houston mayor Bill White continues to make this a competitive race for the Dems in the general: he trails Perry 43-37, and Hutchison 42-34. Meanwhile, Debra Medina (who recently seemed to blunt any late momentum by revealing her truly kooky side) may have some good company, in the form of Democratic candidate Farouk Shami: he came out with some statements putting him in truther-curious territory as well. Shami is also about to announce the invention of a blow dryer that actually grows hair. (Why aim low, for merely Governor, if that’s true? If it’s really true, he’s about to become a trillionaire.)

• AZ-03: I’m not sure if this is the family name you really want, when running for office, but a new candidate is in the GOP field in the open seat race in the 3rd: Ben Quayle. The 33-year-old attorney, who hasn’t run for office before, is the son of former VP and frequent punchline Dan Quayle.

• FL-24: With the former CEO of the Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse chain, Craig Miller, planning to run in the 24th, Democrats are spotlighting his opposition to tougher laws on drunk driving. (As a restauranteur, he would have a financial interest in getting that extra drink into his guests.) “Once 0.08 becomes law, why not 0.05 or 0.02?” he asked in a 2000 interview.

• MA-10: The William Delahunt retirement rumors aren’t going away, and now Glenn Thrush points to a Delahunt-out/Joe Kennedy III-in/Delahunt-endorses-Kennedy master-plan in the works. Kennedy, a Barnstable County prosecuting attorney, isn’t the only Kennedy of his generation who’s a possible House candidate; Politico helpfully provides a scorecard of various other Kennedys who might run for higher office in the future. At any rate, even if Joe III doesn’t wind up in the next Congress, it’s likely Congress won’t stay Kennedy-free for very long.

• OK-05: There’s one less Oklahoma Republican in the primary for the open seat in dark-red OK-05. Corporation Commissioner Jeff Cloud cited non-life-threatening health concerns in dropping out of the race, although he plans to keep serving in his current job. Six different GOPers are in the field (perhaps most notably, former state Rep. Kevin Calvey), but no Dem has gotten in yet.

• PA-03: One other dropout from a crowded GOP field, this time for the right to take on Rep. Kathy Dahlkemper in the 3rd. Tom Trevorrow, an ophthalmologist who made a splashy entrance recently with a big serving of self-funding and some expensive consultant hires, ended his bid just as quickly, citing his father’s illness.

• RI-01: A couple big names have already gotten into the race to replace retiring Rep. Patrick Kennedy, the biggest possibly being Providence’s mayor David Cicilline (who surprised many by turning down a gubernatorial run this year). Cicilline would be the fourth openly-gay member of Congress, if elected. He’ll have to get past William Lynch in the primary, though; Lynch, the brother of AG and gubernatorial candidate Patrick Lynch, just resigned as the state’s Democratic party chair in order to run. Pretty much every prominent Democrat around is also listed as a possible candidate: Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts (who also decided against a gubernatorial run), ex-Rep. Bob Weygand (of RI-02, who lost the 2000 Senate race to Lincoln Chafee), ex-LG Charles Fogarty, and even state Rep. Betsy Dennigan, who’s currently running a primary against Rep. James Langevin over in RI-02. (Rhode Island seems like Hawaii, where the boundaries between the two districts seem like they’re of little practical importance.) On the GOP side, state Rep. John Loughlin is already in, while former Cranston mayor and Senate candidate Steven Laffey and state party chair Giovanni Cicione are also mentioned.

• TN-08: Everyone has pretty well coalesced around state Sen. (and until recently, gubernatorial candidate) Roy Herron to try to hold retiring Rep. John Tanner’s seat. Democratic state Rep. Craig Fitzhugh just announced that he wouldn’t run, and in a somewhat encouraging sign, said that his own polling showed that he wouldn’t have trouble getting past the various Republicans seeking the seat in the R+3 (but historically Democratic) district. Instead, he didn’t see a way past Herron in the primary.

• VA-05: PPP has some follow-up on its previous general election poll of VA-05, looking at the GOP primary, which has the potential to be one of the biggest flashpoints in the establishment/teabagger schism. For now, chalk this one up to the establishment: state Sen. Robert Hurt leads at 22 (leading among both moderates and conservatives), with Albemarle Co. Commissioner Ken Boyd at 12. The various members of the teabagging rabble all poll in the low single digits. With 51% still undecided, though, this is still anyone’s game once the ad wars begin.

• CA-LG: So, Arnold Schwarzenegger dialed down his banana-republic dictator act from last week, deciding to resubmit Republican state Sen. Abel Maldonado for appointment as Lt. Governor, rather than deciding to swear him in despite not getting enough votes in the Assembly to confirm him. The legislature has another 90 days to decide what to do with him.

Take these polls with a grain of salt, considering that they were taken before Debra Medina was nailed for expressing 9/11 truther-esque sentiments in an interview with Glenn Beck. If Perry can scoop up enough votes from her hide, he could avoid a runoff, but that’s a big if.

Here’s the Texas-sized round-up:

Research 2000 for Daily Kos (2/8-10, likely voters):

Rick Perry (R-inc): 42

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 30

Debra Medina (R): 17

Undecided: 11

Rick Perry (R-inc): 43

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 33

Undecided: 24

Rick Perry (R-inc): 44

Debra Medina (R): 23

Undecided: 33

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 38

Debra Medina (R): 30

Undecided: 32

(MoE: ±4.9%)

General election match-ups:

Bill White (D): 42

Rick Perry (R-inc): 46

Undecided: 12

Bill White (D): 41

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 47

Undecided: 12

Bill White (D): 43

Debra Medina (R): 44

Undecided: 13

(MoE: ±4%)

Hamilton Campaigns (D) and Public Opinion Strategies (R) for the Texas Credit Union League (1/3-4 & 6, likely voters):

Bill White (D): 51

Farouk Shami (D): 19

Felix Alvarado (D): 7

Undecided: 16

Rick Perry (R-inc): 49

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 27

Debra Medina (R): 19

Undecided: 5

(MoE: ±4.9%)

University of Texas/Texas Tribune (2/1-7, likely voters):

Bill White (D): 50

Farouk Shami (D): 11

Someone Else: 9

Undecided: 30

(MoE: ±6%)

Rick Perry (R-inc): 45

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 21

Debra Medina (R): 19

Undecided: 16

(MoE: ±5.1%)

General election match-ups:

Bill White (D): 35

Rick Perry (R-inc): 44

Someone Else: 8

Undecided: 12

Bill White (D): 34

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 43

Someone Else: 9

Undecided: 14

Bill White (D): 36

Debra Medina (R): 36

Someone Else: 8

Undecided: 21

Farouk Shami (D): 25

Rick Perry (R-inc): 49

Someone Else: 15

Undecided: 14

Farouk Shami (D): 23

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 49

Someone Else: 15

Undecided: 14

Farouk Shami (D): 24

Debra Medina (R): 40

Someone Else: 14

Undecided: 22

(MoE: ±3.5%)

And, in the (increasingly unlikely) event of a special Senate election, U-T took a crack at that one, too:

John Sharp (D): 29

David Dewhurst (R): 15

Michael Williams (R): 3

Florence Shapiro (R): 2

Elizabeth Ames Jones (R):  2

Roger Williams (R): 1

Craig James (R): 1

Undecided: 47

(MoE: ±3.5%)

PPP (pdf) (2/4-7, likely voters)

Bill White (D): 42

Rick Perry (R-inc): 48

Undecided: 10

Bill White (D): 38

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 45

Undecided: 17

Bill White (D): 38

Debra Medina (R): 44

Undecided: 18

(MoE: ±2.8%)

PPP (which had surprising Republican primary numbers yesterday, showing Kay Bailey Hutchison imperiled as far as even making it to a runoff) has some pretty encouraging numbers for Democratic candidate Bill White in the general election. White’s losing, but by a 6 or 7 point margin, a good showing in a generally conservative state like Texas. (On the down side, there aren’t a lot of undecideds here, especially in the Rick Perry matchup, so you have to wonder where the last few votes that would get him over the top might come from.)

Interestingly, unlike a lot of other polls which have shown Hutchison, who passes for a “moderate” by Texas standards, outperforming in the general, PPP finds everyone performing about the same vis-a-vis White, not just the very conservative Rick Perry but even the around-the-bend conservative Debra Medina. Perry’s approvals, a woeful 33/50, seem to be holding him back; KBH is at least in positive territory at 40/37, while Medina and White benefit from not being as well-known, at 32/13 and 34/17 respectively.

In other news, White just got the endorsement of the Texas League of Conservation Voters, while his primary opponent, Farouk Shami got a noteworthy endorsement of his own: from the Mexican American Democrats, who liked how his personal story represents “what the American Dream is all about.” I don’t think either of those endorsements can compete with the one Rick Perry just pulled in, though: the mighty Home Scholers.

RaceTracker Wiki: TX-Gov

PPP (pdf) (2/4-7, likely voters)

Rick Perry (R-inc): 39

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 28

Debra Medina (R): 24

Undecided: 10

(MoE: ±4.8%)

(Medina supporters only: who is your second choice?)

Rick Perry (R-inc): 43

Kay Bailey Hutchison (R): 39

Undecided: 18

(MoE: ±9.7%)

Bill White (D): 49

Farouk Shami (D): 19

Undecided: 24

(MoE: ±4.9%)

I don’t think anyone was expecting this: PPP takes a look at the primary races in the Texas governor’s race, and finds Debra Medina, the Paulist candidate who was something of a nobody before the debates, making a huge impact in the race. Not only is her presence almost certainly going to force a runoff now — with Rick Perry unlikely to top 50% — but it’s now at least conceivable that she and not Kay Bailey Hutchison could be the one who makes it to the runoff with Perry. There must be a major freakout going on at KBH HQ today; this is all a bit reminiscent of what must have happened last month with the Martha Coakley camp, when the nice lady who’d been coasting for a while finally looked in the rear view mirror and realized that object was closer than it appeared.

What I find baffling, though, is how Medina supporters will split if she doesn’t make it into the runoff. You’d think that Medina’s right-wing followers would all pile into the Perry camp, given a choice between Perry’s anti-Washington posturing and KBH’s decades of insiderness. Nope: it’s almost an even split, with a narrow edge to Perry… suggesting that Medina is tapping into a lot of generalized anti-Perry sentiment too, or maybe just that the voters have a really superficial understanding of the differences between the candidates. (Of course, now maybe the more interesting question we should be asking is: how would KBH supporters split if she didn’t make it into the runoff?)

Finally, there’s the little matter of the Democratic primary. Houston mayor Bill White isn’t currently making it over the 50% mark against hair product magnate Farouk Shami, but he’s almost there, with a sizable number of undecideds left to break.

RaceTracker Wiki: TX-Gov

• CA-Sen: Possibly the most bizarre political ad (well, web video) of all time has just gotten unveiled by the Carly Fiorina campaign, which makes their “Carlyfornia Dreaming” website look reasoned and well-thought-out. I mean, they’re going to be studying this in political rhetoric classes 50 years from now, as an example of what not to do. Not only is the imagery laughable (check out the glowing-eyed demon sheep at 2:24) but the metaphor completely falls apart (Tom Campbell is a “FCINO” (financial conservative in name only) and thus a crafty wolf, while good politicians are a herd of helpless mindless sheep?).

• CT-Sen: Even Rasmussen can’t find a way to put a happy face on the tombstone piledriver the Connecticut GOP suffered with the Chris Dodd-for-Richard Blumenthal swap. They find Blumenthal leading ex-Rep. Rob Simmons 54-35 and Gorgeous Lady of Wrestling Linda McMahon 56-36. Simmons is actually very well-liked, at 60/26 favorables, but that’s no match for Blumenthal at 70/27.

• IL-Sen: Republicans can content themselves with Rasmussen’s first post-primary poll of the Senate field; they find GOP Rep. Mark Kirk leading Dem state treasurer Alexi Giannoulias 46-40. This, of course, doesn’t jibe with not only last week’s PPP poll (with a 42-34 Alexi lead) but the last Rasmussen poll of the general, from December (with a 42-39 Alexi lead). Both those polls predate the strangely-timed consent decree between the FDIC and the Giannoulias-family-owned Broadway Bank, so it’s possible Giannoulias might have taken a hit from that. Also, Rasmussen’s numbers aren’t that far off from an internal (pdf) from Magellan that the Kirk campaign was quick to release yesterday: 47-35. One suggestion that might cast a little doubt on the samples, though, is Barack Obama’s approval ratings in his home state, oddly low at 54% and 51% respectively, only a few points ahead of his national average.

• IN-Sen: Ex-Sen. Dan Coats is leaving himself a lot of elbow room with the way he’s carefully phrased what he’s doing: “as I test the waters for a potential challenge…” I realize that SSP is pretty much powerless to change the nature of the political discourse, but we’re getting very tired of the whole “I’m not running, but I’m running, wink wink” kabuki that seems to be standard practice these days (John Boozman, we’re talking to you too). We fully intend to change the rating on this race, but not until Coats truly and officially gets in. At any rate, Coats may be wise leaving himself an escape hatch, if the dribs and drabs like this one keep piling up: one of his lobbying clients has been Hugo Chavez-connected oil company Harvest Natural Resources (but, then, making nice with Chavez is IOKIYAR, I guess).  

• WI-Sen: If you’re looking for a tea leaf on whether or not ex-Gov. Tommy Thompson is interested in taking on Russ Feingold this year, look no further: he just took a position as an advisor to a hedge fund. He’ll consult with Peak Ridge Capital Group on agribusiness matters. Not only will that keep him occupied in the near future, but it’s not really the kind of thing you want on your resume if trying to run at a time of anti-banker agitas. (Another hint: the talk of an ex-Rep. Mark Neumann switch from the Governor’s race, to a rematch with Feingold, suddenly bubbling up.)

• IL-Gov: We have winners in the gubernatorial primaries, as all of Illinois’s precincts reported by the end of the day yesterday. Pat Quinn wound up with a more than 8,000 vote margin over Dan Hynes (good for 50.4%), and Hynes conceded this morning. On the Republican side, state Sen. Kirk Dillard didn’t make up as much ground in Cook County on fellow state Sen. Bill Brady as anticipated, and Brady wound up finishing with a 406-vote margin. There’s no automatic recount law in Illinois, so it’s up to Dillard to decide whether or not to proceed with a challenge.

Meanwhile, down the ballot, both parties seem somewhat aghast at the winners of their Lt. Governor primaries. News came out today that pawnbroker Scott Lee Cohen, winner of the Democratic nod, was arrested four years ago for misdemeanor assault after holding a knife to the throat of a girlfriend (who had also been convicted of prostitution). Needless to say, Quinn is already distancing himself from Cohen, calling on him to step aside. (Although Governor and Lt. Governor are elected separately in primaries, they’re then lashed together as a ticket for the general, which is how Rod Blagojevich and Quinn got put together despite their antipathy – I’m not sure if any other state does it that way.) Which isn’t to say that the Republicans fared much better on that front, nominating random teabagging businessman Jason Plummer (who, like Cohen, won by pouring his own money into the race) instead of state Sen. Matt Murphy.

• NY-Gov: I can’t see this being of any interest unless something goes seriously wrong and we somehow wind up with a David Paterson/Rick Lazio matchup and we need to shunt off some right-wing votes to get Paterson over the hump. But now there’s a teabagger-linked rich guy, Buffalo real estate developer Carl Paladino, saying that he’s considering a gubernatorial run, and that he “would go in as a pure independent.”

• PA-Gov: Allegheny Co. Exec Dan Onorato has the big financial edge in the Dem gubernatorial primary, and now he has some key labor backing as well. The Teamsters are the first major union to endorse in the primary, and they went for Onorato.

• TX-Gov: Looks like there’s going to be a crazy Wang Dang Tango at Rick Perry’s Houston rally on Sunday: not only is Sarah Palin going to be there to endorse Perry, but so too is the Motor City Madman, the Ten Terrible Fingers of Doom, the Rock ‘n’ Roll Caveman: Ted Nugent (who plans to perform). In case you’re wondering where the normally reserved and understated Nugent stands on all things political, he recently said: “I think that Barack Hussein Obama should be put in jail. It is clear that Barack Hussein Obama is a communist. Mao Tse Tung lives and his name is Barack Hussein Obama. This country should be ashamed. I wanna throw up.”

• AR-01: The first Democrat making moves to replace retiring Rep. Marion Berry is Berry’s very own Chief of Staff, Chad Causey, who has already scheduled a fundraiser. State Sen. Steve Bryles, state Rep. Keith Ingram, and former state party chair Jason Willett are other Dems publicly eyeing the race. For the GOP, broadcaster Rick Crawford probably won’t have the race to himself, with state Sen. Johnny Key interested. Princella Smith is also likely to get in – she’ll definitely need a new job starting in November, as she’s currently a staffer to Rep. Joe Cao.

• FL-24: The 24th seems like an apt target for Republicans, with a Republican lean and freshman Rep. Suzanne Kosmas not quite finding her footing – but fundraising has gone poorly for the two GOPers in the race, state Rep. Sandy Adams and Winter Park city councilor Karen Diebel, neither of whom has broken into the six digits in the last few quarters. The NRCC is now touting the likely entry of Craig Miller, the former CEO of Ruth’s Chris Steakhouses. He’s never held office before, but at least he brings his own money with him.

• NC-10: In the dark-red 10th, the only way odious chickenhawk Rep. Patrick McHenry is going to get dislodged is in a GOP primary – and it’s starting to look like that’s a possibility this year. Not one but two different opponents have outraised him (although mostly by dipping into their own wallets): dentist and Iredell Co. Commissioner Scott Keadle and businessman Vance Patterson. Keadle has some electoral experience, coming within 14 points of Mel Watt in NC-12 in 1998, during the brief period when the frequently-modified VRA district had a sizable white plurality. Keadle claims to be coming at McHenry from the right, which is hard to fathom as McHenry is already one of the most stridently conservative members of the House.

• NH-01: Another one-time NRCC fave who’s fallen by the side of the road somewhat as he’s put up quarter after quarter of mediocre fundraising is former Manchester mayor Frank Guinta. Sensing an opening, several other contenders have gotten into the GOP field; one, Richard Ashooh, has been exploring the race but made it official today. He comes with his own set of insider credentials, though: he’s the VP of governmental relations for large locally-based defense contractor BAE Systems.

• NY-23: Talk about not learning from the past. If Assemblyman Will Barclay wins the GOP nomination, he may find himself getting Scozzafavaed by the same guy. Doug Hoffman plans to run on both the Republican and Conservative lines, but Conservative party chair Mike Long says he’ll continue to back Hoffman on the Conservative line even if Hoffman loses the Republican primary.

• Redistricting: There’s still a chance to get on the newly-created California legislative redistricting board. The deadline to submit an application is Feb. 12. The state is taking notice that 73% of applicants are non-Hispanic whites and 70% are males, neither of which is very representative of the state’s makeup, and is shelling out for a last-minute outreach campaign to bring in some more minority applicants. Part of the problem is that applicants can’t have run for office or worked for a politician, which filters out many of the most politically engaged in minority communities. At any rate, it’s an opportunity to get more progressives behind the wheel of shaping a more competitive legislative map for next year, so any SSPers in the Golden State are urged to apply.

• Election Results: With 99.1% of precincts reporting (97 remain, apparently mostly in Cook County), both sides of the governor’s race remain too close to call. Democratic incumbent Pat Quinn has declared victory, sitting on a 7,000 vote lead (50.4%-49.6%) and with the remaining precincts in Cook County likely to go his way, although Dan Hynes hasn’t conceded yet. On the GOP side, we’re looking most likely at a recount, as state Sen. Bill Brady leads fellow state Sen. Kirk Dillard currently by a 751-vote margin (20.3%-20.2%), as they both squeaked past the two presumed frontrunners, former state party chair Andy McKenna and former AG Jim Ryan. The fact that the remaining votes are from Cook County, however, may be poised to help the moderate suburbs-based Dillard, though, rather than the conservative downstate Brady, so this race seems likely to get even closer (Nate Silver actually projects a one-vote victory for Brady based on broader Cook County trends). Recount procedures make it sound like a protracted process – an initial vote tally won’t happen until March 5, and then the process “could take months to complete” – giving Quinn a big headstart on whoever the GOP victor turns out to be.

As expected, Alexi Giannoulias and Mark Kirk are the Senate nominees, although both won their races with somewhat underwhelming percentages (39% for Giannoulias, and 57% for Kirk, who could have been in more trouble had the teabagging right coalesced behind one person in particular). Conservatives did triumph over establishment candidates in several GOP House primaries, though, as Bob Dold! beat state Rep. Beth Coulson in the 10th, and state Sen. Randy Hultgren beat Ethan Hastert in the 14th.

In Florida, as expected, state Sen. Ted Deutch easily won the special election primary to succeed Rep. Robert Wexler, beating former Broward Co. Commissioner Ben Graber 86-15. It looks like he’ll face Republican Ed Lynch (the 2008 nominee), who defeated Joe Budd by only 46 votes (but with only 8,000 total GOP votes, that’s outside the margin for an automatic recount). And here’s a surprise out of Kentucky: Democrats picked up a state House seat in the dark-red HD 24, which was recently vacated when Republican Jimmy Higdon got promoted to the state Senate in another special election. Terry Mills won, 54-46, based on an overwhelming edge (89-11) on his home turf of Marion County, reminding us that, at the end of the day, all politics is local.

Finally, last night was caucus and straw poll night in Minnesota. Only 80% of precincts have reported yet – I guess they go to bed early in Minnesota – but the straw poll in the Democratic governor’s race points to only a lot of chaos at this point. Minneapolis mayor R.T. Rybak led with 21.8%, followed closely by state House speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher at 20.2%. However, “uncommitted” is a solid 3rd at 15%, there are five other candidates who managed to break 5% (John Marty, Tom Rukavina, Paul Thissen, Matt Entenza, and Tom Bakk), and ex-Sen. Mark Dayton doesn’t even seem to be bothering with the whole process, planning on going straight to the primary, so there’s not much clarity on how the field will shake out. The GOP field seems much more clear-cut, where former state House minority leader Marty Seifert beat state Rep. Tom Emmer 50-39, with the rest of the field in the low single digits.

• AZ-Sen: With the imminent entry of ex-Rep. J.D. Hayworth into the Republican primary against John McCain, we’re already looking at dueling internal polls. McCain offers up a poll from POS, giving him a 59-30 lead over Hayworth. Hayworth has his own poll from McLaughlin, which, not surprisingly, shows him much closer, trailing 49-33.

• FL-Sen: Kendrick Meek, NASCAR dad? Meek plans to call attention to his campaign by shelling out to be the lead sponsor of Mike Wallace’s car in an upcoming race at Daytona.

• IN-Sen: With the surprising announcement by ex-Sen. Dan Coats last night that he’s interested in a comeback and would start seeking the signatures to qualify for the Indiana GOP nod, the oppo pretty much writes itself. For starters, Coats can’t even sign his own petition – he’s been a registered voter in Virginia for more than a decade, not Indiana. And what’s he been doing for much of that time? Lobbying… for King & Spalding, on behalf of nice people like the Carlyle Group and Bank of America. The Plum Line also points to Coats accusing Bill Clinton of “wagging the dog” when he started going after al-Qaeda in 1998, allegedly to distract the press from his peccadilloes… and we all know how that turned out.

• ND-Sen: Democrats have, well, somebody ready to go if ex-AG Heidi Heitkamp doesn’t get into the Senate race to replace retiring Byron Dorgan. State Sen. Tracy Potter, who represents Bismarck, will be announcing his candidacy on Friday. Other potential candidates seem to be holding back, waiting to see what Heitkamp does; she’s been strangely silent since initially expressing interest in the seat last month.

• NY-Sen-B: Quinnipiac’s first poll of the New York Senate race after the Harold Ford Jr. boomlet began finds, well, pretty much what everyone else has found: Kirsten Gillibrand beats him by a wide margin but doesn’t break 50%. Gillibrand beats 36-18, with Jonathan Tasini at 4. Quinnipiac also tests general election matchups against Republican port commissioner Bruce Blakeman (they don’t even bother testing ex-Gov. George Pataki, who doesn’t seem to be making any moves to get into the race). Gillibrand beats Blakeman 44-27, and Ford beats him 35-26. Gillibrand is slowly gaining some more name rec, up to a 42/28 approval. Blakeman may not have the GOP primary to himself, though, as a strange blast from the past is re-emerging to say he’s interested in the race: ex-Rep. Joseph DioGuardi. In case the name doesn’t ring a bell, DioGuardi served in the House representing Westchester County from 1984 to 1988, when he was defeated by Nita Lowey.

• NY-Gov: The same Quinnipiac sample looks at the governor’s race, finding huge approval gaps between Andrew Cuomo (54/16) and David Paterson (34/49). Cuomo wins the Democratic primary 55-23. Cuomo beats Rick Lazio 57-25, while Lazio manages to get past Paterson 40-39. There’s also one other bit of good news for Cuomo (who’s seemed gunshy about taking on Paterson, perhaps out of bad memories of his race against Carl McCall). The poll asked if his candidacy would be “racially divisive,” and respondents answered “no” by an 80-14 margin, including 73-22 among African-Americans. Marist (pdf) also just released the gubernatorial half of its recent Senate poll, finding generally similar numbers. Cuomo wins the primary 70-23. Cuomo beats Lazio 64-27, while Lazio edges Paterson 46-43.

• TN-Gov: Add one more candidate running for higher office who’s publicly copped to being birther-curious: Lt. Gov. (and GOP gubernatorial candidate) Ron Ramsey. Not having made much of an impression in terms of polling (where Rep. Zach Wamp has an edge) or fundraising (where Knoxville mayor Bill Haslam is cleaning up), this seems like the most attention Ramsey has gotten so far.

• TX-Gov: Here’s more evidence that the Texas GOP gubernatorial primary may be headed for a runoff: the new Rasmussen poll of the primary doesn’t have anyone coming even close to 50%. Incumbent Rick Perry leads at 44, with Kay Bailey Hutchison lagging at 29, and Paulist insurgent Debra Medina all the way up to 14 on the strength of some buzz coming out of her debate performances. KBH may be counting on a runoff as her only way left to salvage this race, but somehow it seems like, in a runoff, Medina votes are a lot likely to gravitate toward the secession-invoking Perry rather than consummate DC insider Hutchison. In the general, all three defeat Democratic ex-Houston mayor Bill White, although, as one would expect, KBH puts up the biggest margin: 49-36. Perry wins 48-39, while Medina wins by only 41-38.

• AR-02: One of the non-Tim Griffin candidates in the Republican field, David Meeks, dropped out of the race today, probably realizing he was in over his head with the kind of attention open seat races get. One other candidate, restaurant owner Scott Wallace remains, and he may well carry the teabagger flag against Beltway creature Griffin. Realizing the best way to win this is by painting Griffin as insider, the DCCC is turning their attention to Griffin’s past as GOP behind-the-scenes fixer, calling attention to his efforts at voter suppression. Over in the diaries, ARDem takes a look at the developing Dem field, which currently contains state House speaker Robbie Wills, liberal state Sen. Joyce Elliott, and retiring Vic Snyder’s chief of staff, David Boling. It won’t contain, however, Little Rock mayor Mike Stodola, or Public Service Commissioner Paul Suskie, who had seemed to be laying the groundwork for a run.

• CA-12, CA-AG: False alarm: Rep. Jackie Speier is staying put in the 12th District, where’s she been in place for only a couple years. Rumors that she was about to move over to the state AG’s race had many of the state legislators on the Peninsula angling to replace her.

• GA-04: In the wake of an internal from Rep. Hank Johnson showing him crushing his three opponents in the Dem primary in this solidly-blue district in Atlanta’s suburbs, one of those opponents got out of the way: DeKalb Co. Commissioner Lee May. May is an ally of former DeKalb Co. CEO Vernon Jones, so it’s possible that he’s getting out of the way primarily so that Jones can get a bigger share of the non-Johnson vote.

• MA-10: With the general sense that this is the most vulnerable district in Massachusetts (as seen with its votes in the Senate special election last month), Republicans are taking more of an interest in challenging Rep. William Delahunt in this usually-ignored seat. Former state treasurer Joe Malone is probably the biggest name to express interest, but at least one other credible contender, state Rep. Jeffrey Perry, is already announcing his candidacy. State Sen. Robert Hedlund is also expressing some interest.

• NJ-07: One big hole in the Dems’ recruitment schedule has been the 7th, narrowly won by freshman GOP Rep. Leonard Lance in 2008. They’ve managed to fill the gap with Ed Potosnak, who’s elevated slightly above Some Dude status by the full Rolodex he brings with him after working for a number of years as a Hill staffer for Rep. Mike Honda.

• PA-11: Lackawanna Co. Commissioner Corey O’Brien has a compelling argument for why he should win the primary in the 11th: he says Rep. Paul Kanjorski has “zero” chance of defeating Republican Lou Barletta in their third face-off, citing Kanjorski’s low approval ratings. O’Brien has been fundraising well ($180K last quarter, not far from Kanjo’s $237K) and recently hit the airwaves with a small cable buy for his first TV spot.

• CA-LG: Is San Francisco mayor (and gubernatorial race dropout) Gavin Newsom actually thinking about a run for the dead-end job that is California’s #2? Officially he’s not interested, but he hasn’t said no, and a new public poll from Tulchin gives him a big lead in a hypothetical LG primary, with Newsom at 33 against the two declared candidates: Los Angeles city councilor Janice Hahn at 17 and state Sen. Dean Florez at 15. Meanwhile, the state Senate this week takes up the issue of filling the current vacancy in the LG’s chair (vacated by now-Rep. John Garamendi); there’s actually talk of blocking Ahnold appointee state Sen. Abel Maldonado, despite that getting the moderate Republican Maldonado out of his seat would open up his Dem-leaning district for a takeover and help push the Dem edge in the Senate toward the magic 2/3s mark.

• CT-AG: The story of Susan Bysiewicz just gets stranger and stranger; she decided that rather than run for governor, she’d prefer to run for AG, but now the job’s current occupant, Richard Blumenthal, says that possibly she can’t. An AG opinion interprets state law requiring ten years of legal practice as unclear and urges a declaratory ruling on Bysiewicz’s case from a court. Bysiewicz, for her part, said she won’t seek the declaratory ruling and is simply plowing ahead with her AG campaign, although it’s possible one of the other candidates in the race might force the issue in the courts.

• Polltopia: The skepticism toward those SurveyUSA polls commissioned by Firedoglake continues to grow, this time from political science professor and frequent Pollster.com contributor Alan Abramowitz. His gravest concerns are with the leading questions in the issues portions of the poll on health care reform, but he also points to serious problems with the samples’ compositions that we were quick to flag. He observes that the samples deeply underrepresent younger votes, and that the youth subsets are so small that there’s no good way to “weight up” younger voters to a more proportionate level.

• AR-Sen: Despite the seemingly imminent entry of Rep. John Boozman into the GOP field in the Arkansas Senate race, soon-to-be-former-frontrunner state Sen. Gilbert Baker says he’s staying in the race. The alternative would be to run for Baker, who represents Little Rock suburbs, to run for the open seat in AR-02 instead – but there he’d face a tough primary against Beltway GOP favorite Tim Griffin, who’s already established a solid fundraising foothold. (Some of the seven dwarves in the GOP field, who seem concentrated in the state’s right-leaning northwest, may be interested in switching to Boozman’s open seat in AR-03, though.) And unbelievably, yet another Republican is interested in getting in the Senate race: former NFL player Jim Lindsey is readying for a bid. Lindsey is a real estate developer and former University of Arkansas trustee.

• AZ-Sen: Sarah Palin is still dancin’ with the one who brung her. She announced yesterday that she’ll appear on behalf of John McCain, who plucked her from near-obscurity and is now needs a favor of his own as he’s facing a primary challenge from the right from ex-Rep. J.D. Hayworth. Needless to say, this provoked a lot of disappointment from her supporters among the teabagging set, who would prefer to see her stab McCain in the back and then field dress him.

• CO-Sen: With right-wingers filled with antipathy toward establishment choice ex-Lt. Gov. Jane Norton, there’s been a lot of casting about for an alternative. Weld County DA Ken Buck seems more and more like he’ll be that guy, as he’s been making common cause with the Paulists, who are now planning to pay for a statewide advertising campaign on Buck’s behalf. Meanwhile, on the Dem side, primary challenger Andrew Romanoff is trying to energize his sleepy campaign with a big hire – pollster Celinda Lake, whose previously sterling reputation got driven off a cliff with her handling of the Martha Coakley campaign.

• CT-Sen: There’s not much left to see for the 2010 race, but everyone’s thinking ahead to 2012, with the new rumor afoot that – with the Senate Kennedy-free for the first time in more than half a century – Ted Kennedy Jr. may run against Joe Lieberman in 2012. Lieberman himself is up to his usual asshattery, speculating out loud that he could conceive of becoming a Republican, and also saying that he might support Linda McMahon in the 2010 race… seeing as how Richard Blumenthal (tepidly) supported Lamont in the 2006 general while McMahon supported Lieberman. Apparently Lieberman learned his politics from watching the Godfather: it’s not business. Just personal. (Lieberman also seems to be a believer in leaving the cannoli, and taking the guns.)

• FL-Sen: In the wake of new polling showing him falling behind Marco Rubio in the GOP Senate primary, the questions are getting louder about whether Charlie Crist might consider running as an independent instead. He said no to that idea… but people are noticing he didn’t rule out switching parties altogether. With Crist appearing side-by-side with Barack Obama today in Florida (something he wouldn’t consider doing if he saw any hope in trying to compete with Rubio – who just got the endorsement of ur-conservative Steve Forbes — on conservative bona fides alone), could that actually be a consideration? If so, he’d need to switch parties by April 30.

• MA-Sen: There are a couple more retrospectives worth reading on Massachusetts, as people try to make sense of the mixed messages sent by exit polls (with one particularly intriguing tidbit: 52% of Scott Brown voters approved of Ted Kennedy’s performance). Mark Blumenthal also looks at the shift in polling over the last few weeks, wondering again about the differing results gotten by live interviewers vs. robocallers, while also pointing to questions of how much pollsters’ views of a race can actually change the overall momentum of the race (fundraising and perception-wise) and thus become a self-fulfilling prophecy. And get ready for the teabaggers’ week-long love affair to end very soon: Scott Brown (who apparently has some self-preservation instincts) just served notice on the GOP that he won’t always vote with them.

• ND-Sen: This isn’t going to make the teabaggers any happier: Gov. John Hoeven, now running for the Senate, joined the Democratic Party in 1996 (at a time when he was head of North Dakota’s state-owned bank), ditching them in 2000 for his gubernatorial run. With Hoeven already on their naughty list for his insufficiently anti-government stances, now he’s just going to get more wrath.

• NH-Sen: Former AG Kelly Ayotte is wielding an internal poll by the Tarrance Group that gives her a big edge in the GOP primary against her challengers. She leads Ovide Lamontagne, coming at her from the right, 43-11. Random rich guys Bill Binnie and Jim Bender clock in at 5 and 3 apiece. No general election numbers were released.

• NV-Sen: One more disastrous poll for Harry Reid, which came out from Research 2000 a few days ago. This poll closely echoed one from PPP a few weeks ago that tested alternative Democrats, and finds that only Las Vegas mayor Oscar Goodman beats the Republicans (while Rep. Shelly Berkley and SoS Ross Miller don’t fare much better than Reid). Unfortunately, this was all rendered moot a few days ago by Goodman’s announcement that he wasn’t going to run for either Governor or Senator. Reid loses 52-41 to Danny Tarkanian and 51-42 to Sue Lowden. Berkley loses 46-40 to Tarkanian and 45-40 to Lowden, while Miller loses 44-36 to Tarkanian and 43-37 to Lowden. Goodman beats Tarkanian 44-41 and Lowden 44-40. Rep. Dina Titus, facing a tough re-election of her own, doesn’t seem to think much of Reid’s chances anymore: she publicly said “Reid is done; he’s going to lose.”

• NY-Sen-B: One other Research 2000 poll to talk about: they looked at the Democratic primary in New York, and find about what everyone else has found. Kirsten Gillibrand leads ex-Rep. Harold Ford Jr. by a 41-27 margin (with 3 for Jonathan Tasini), looking solid but still with a ton of undecideds. This also exists merely at the level of rumor, but with the potential presence of Ford scrambling things for the ever-so-briefly-thought-to-be-safe Gillibrand, sources say that Democratic Rep. Steve Israel (who got dissuaded from a primary challenge) and Republican ex-Gov. George Pataki (who hasn’t sounded interested until now) are both giving the race a little more consideration.

• PA-Sen, PA-Gov (pdf): Franklin & Marshall’s previous polls in Pennsylvania have tended to have unusually high undecideds, suggesting that they don’t do any pushing of leaners at all – but this may have reached an all-time high with their new poll. Most notably, they find Allegeheny Co. Exec Dan Onorato completely dominating the Democratic gubernatorial primary… at 10% (more than doubling up on Jack Wagner, Joe Hoeffel, and Chris Doherty, all at 4)! They also find similarly low numbers in the Senate race, where Republican ex-Rep. Pat Toomey leads incumbent Dem Arlen Specter 45-31 and Rep. Joe Sestak 41-19 (?!?), and where Specter beats Sestak in the primary 30-13. (They didn’t do a general election poll in the Governor’s race, but find Republican AG Tom Corbett leading his remaining rival, state Rep. Sam Rohrer, 23-5 in the primary.)

• UT-Sen: The Mason-Dixon poll that gave us some (not so good) gubernatorial results also threw in some vague questions about the Senate race too. Incumbent Bob Bennett leads a Generic R in the primary, 46-27, and a Generic D 53-26 in the general. Nevertheless, Bennett drew yet another primary opponent, albeit someone seemingly of the Some Dude variety: local businessman Christopher Stout.

• WI-Sen: Wherever there’s a vacillating Republican needing convincing to get into a Senate race, there’s Rasmussen. (Whaddya wanna bet they have a Patty Murray/Dave Reichert poll in the field right now?) Contrary to PPP’s view of the race, Rasmussen finds ex-Gov. Tommy Thompson leading incumbent Dem Russ Feingold, 47-43. They find Feingold with a perplexingly low 47/48 approval.

• CT-Gov: Is ex-Rep. Chris Shays looking to get into the Governor’s race? Suddenly, it sounds like he’s at least thinking about it, saying he’d like to do it but not sure if it’s feasible. He’s currently in Washington as head of the Wartime Contracting Commission, meaning he’d need to re-establish his Connecticut residency, but given his long-time popularity in his district (which eventually got too blue for him to hold) he might have a leg up on the so-so GOPers already in the field.

• FL-Gov: Quinnipiac released the gubernatorial half of its Florida poll yesterday, finding that Republican AG Bill McCollum has a somewhat bigger lead on Democratic CFO Alex Sink, 41-31 (McCollum led 36-32 in October). Sink leads state Sen. Paula Dockery 35-29, but considering that McCollum leads Dockery 44-6 in the GOP primary, that configuration doesn’t seem likely.

• MI-Gov: Two guys who had been unlikely candidates for the Democratic nomination for Governor both announced they wouldn’t run. Rep. Bart Stupak is the big name to say “no,” which is good as far as the DCCC is concerned, as he’s needed to hold down the fort in his R+3 district. The other is Detroit Pistons head of basketball operations Joe Dumars, who probably realized he’d get pretty banged up out there without Bill Laimbeer to run interference for him. One other interesting rumor of who might run, though, is ex-Rep. Joe Schwarz, the GOP moderate who got bounced out in a 2006 Club for Growth-fueled primary by Tim Walberg. And get this… he’s talking about running as an independent. Could he actually peel off enough center-right votes for the Dems to salvage this race?

• NY-Gov: Research 2000’s New York poll also looked at the Democratic gubernatorial primary, finding AG Andrew Cuomo defeating incumbent David Paterson, 63-19. Paterson is laboring under 34/54 approvals. The GOP primary to see who gets flattened by Cuomo is looking pretty uneventful: Erie Co. Exec Chris Collins, who continued to express vague interest despite having gaffed his way out of contention several months ago, finally pulled the plug on his exploratory committee. That leaves ex-Rep. Rick Lazio as the only major GOPer in the race, to few people’s enthusiasm.

• TX-Gov: Looks like Gov. Rick Perry isn’t much of a fan of the librul media, or at least he realizes that his key demographics aren’t really the newspaper-reading types. He’s decided not to sit for editorial board interviews prior to their pre-primary endorsements.  

Believe it or not, the world continues to turn today, even outside Massachusetts…

• Site News: A minor site change: We’ve had to disable HTML on user bio pages (like this one). We apologize if this winds up killing your links or spewing ugly HTML characters in your bio, so you may want to edit yours if so. You can still post links – they just won’t be HTML-ized. The reason we did this is because spammers have been exploiting the bio pages to post links to their own sites. It’s easy for us to catch them when they post comments or diaries, but harder to stop them from creating new accounts. This takes away their incentive. Suck on it, spammer scum! (D)

• NV-Sen: I don’t know what you envision when you see “probe” and “John Ensign” in the same sentence, but this is rich: the FBI is getting involved in the investigation, indicating this may go beyond the Senate Ethics Committee, headed in the direction of a criminal inquiry. The Feds have been contacting former aides about the Hampton affair.

• NY-Sen-B: Ex-Rep. Harold Ford Jr. just seems to be digging his self-inflicted hole deeper, as he runs damage control from the NYT profile that portrayed him as a helicopter-riding, pedicure-getting richie-rich. For his new interview with the Daily News, he insisted that it be limited to his rationale for running, not “issues” (issues, of course, are for the little people). Still, that contrasts with his defense of the pedicure thing, about which he said: “This race isn’t about feet, it’s about issues.” Meanwhile, observers are wondering if Al Sharpton (who has endorsed Kirsten Gillibrand) is telegraphing a potential switch in sides.

• IA-Gov: Ex-Gov. Terry Branstad is out with an internal poll showing him in commanding position in the Republican primary as he seeks to regain his old job, despite the discomfort some social conservatives have with him. Branstad polls at 62%, followed by Bob Vander Plaats lagging at 18%, with Christopher Rants at 4 and Rod Roberts at 2.

• IL-Gov: Next door in Illinois, though, where things don’t seem quite as settled in the Republican primary, three different candidates are citing polls that claim to have them in the lead. State Sen. Kirk Dillard has an internal that has him leading at 22, with state party chair Andy McKenna at 14 and ex-AG Jim Ryan at 10 – which is odd, since the Chicago Tribune’s poll several weeks ago gave Ryan a substantial lead and saw Dillard in fourth place. McKenna also claims to have a poll with him in the lead, although he didn’t even bother giving any details. Dillard seems to be the “moderate” horse in the GOP race, with endorsements from ex-Gov. Jim Edgar, Rep. Judy Biggert, and even the Illinois Education Association (hopefully only as far as the primary goes).

• TX-Gov: Rasmussen is out with fresh polls of the Texas governor’s race, and this time, they’re even doing the general, now that it got competitive, with the entry of Democratic Houston mayor Bill White. As one might expect, both incumbent Rick Perry and GOP primary rival Kay Bailey Hutchison lead White, and KBH overperforms Perry. Hutchison leads White 52-37, while Perry leads 50-40. (In the unlikely event White faces off against Paulist activist Debra Medina, he wins 44-38.) More interestingly, Medina seems to be getting a serious foothold in the GOP primary, which seems like it has the potential to push the Perry/Hutchison battle to a runoff, keeping Perry below 50%. Perry leads Hutchison and Medina 43-33-12.

• MI-Gov, MI-13: The amazingly brief gubernatorial campaign of state Sen. Hansen Clarke ended yesterday, after about one week in existence. It seems like party insiders steered him in a different direction, saying that he’s been offered big financial support if he takes on vulnerable (in a primary) Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick instead, and he says he’s strongly considering that race now. Kilpatrick (mother of embattled former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick) nearly lost a 3-way primary in 2008.

• AZ-03: One aspiring House Republican didn’t wait long to announce her run to fill the recently-vacated seat of Rep. John Shadegg. State Sen. Pamela Gorman announced her campaign.

• MI-07: One more race that hasn’t drawn much scrutiny yet but where it looks like Dems will have to play hard defense is in the 7th. Freshman Rep. Mark Schauer faces a rematch with ex-Rep. Tim Walberg, who is now promoting his own internal poll showing him with 46-37 edge over Schauer. There’s been some establishment skepticism over whether the polarizing Walberg is “electable” enough, which may really be the point of the poll: it also shows attorney Brian Rooney, the supposedly more palatable (but currently less-known) GOPer, trailing Schauer 39-31.

• PA-04: Republicans are banking on former US Attorneys to get them back a few House seats in the Keystone State, and they got one of their desired recruits. Mary Beth Buchanan, one of the chief enforcers among the “loyal Bushies,” has apparently decided that she’ll take on Rep. Jason Altmire in the GOP-leaning 4th in Pittsburgh’s suburbs, and may announce her candidacy later this week.

• WV-01: The NRCC had hoped to put a scare into longtime Democratic incumbent Alan Mollohan, frequently drum-beating his name as a potential retirement. Unfortunately for them, Mollohan has filed his paperwork to seek a 15th term in Congress. (J)

• OH-Lt. Gov: Ted Strickland announced today that he’s tapping ex-Franklin Co. Judge Yvette McGee Brown to be his running mate. Brown is the president of the Center for Child and Family Advocacy, a Columbus organization based at the Nationwide Children’s Hospital. (J)

• Mayors: Another election to keep an eye on is a runoff for Birmingahm’s next mayor. The seat became vacant in October upon the conviction of Larry Langford on corruption charges. Langford and other insiders have endorsed William Bell (who currently holds Langford’s former seat on the county conmission). Naturally, Patrick Cooper is running against Bell on a change platform. The campaign has been full of nasty accusations and innuendo with many glad it’s coming to an end. (T)

• Polltopia: Mark Blumenthal looks at the rapidly reducing cost of polling, and only sees even more of a proliferation of it in the near future as robo-calling gets within the reaches of the masses, even the crazy bloggers. Even Rasmussen is getting into the act, with plans to spin off a new service that will allow anyone to poll on anything for a fee of $600. That leaves Blumenthal wondering how to screen in the future for proper quality and against abuse of time-honored standards.

• MA-Sen: We’re half a week away from the primary special election in Massachusetts, and AG Martha Coakley is still in the catbird’s seat, at least according to an internal poll from her own camp (conducted by Celinda Lake) that got leaked to Chris Cillizza. Coakley’s at 41, with Rep. Michael Capuano at 21 (consistent with other polls seeing a last-minute surge by the Congressman), Stephen Pagliuca at 10, and Alan Khazei at 7.

• TX-Sen, TX-Gov: This has been broadly telegraphed already, but Houston mayor Bill White made it official today at a press conference: he’s dropping out of the Senate special election that looks less likely to ever happen, and getting into the Governor’s race instead. A Democrat has not won statewide office in Texas since 1994, but White is well-funded and, assuming he faces Rick Perry in the general, his centrist competence may match up well against Perry’s quick-draw conservatism. Also, I’m not the first wag to notice this, but it’s snowing today in Texas, so cue up all the jokes about hell freezing over and Democrats getting elected. (UPDATE: Former Ag Commissioner candidate Hank Gilbert is dropping out of the Dem field in the governor’s race today and heading for another Ag Comnissioner race, which probably isn’t a surprise. However, this part is a surprise: he’s endorsing hair-care guru Farouk Shami instead of White.)

• MN-Gov: Rumors were starting to pop up (via Politico, natch) that Republican ex-Sen. Norm Coleman was trying to raise his profile in preparation for a gubernatorial run. Coleman himself, however, said that’s not the case; he’s focusing on some think-tank work in Washington for now and will look at the “political horizon” later.

• OR-Gov: Here’s a surprise on the fundraising front: Republican Chris Dudley, who’s never run for office before and whose main claim to fame is being the Portland Trail Blazers’ designated free-throw-misser in the late 90s, filed records he already has $340K banked for a still-unannounced gubernatorial run (more than John Kitzhaber’s $280K). Worth noting, though: more than half of that came from only three huge donations, including $100,000 from Dudley’s ex-agent. (An interesting tidbit: $5,000 came from ex-teammate Terry Porter.) Also, Dudley is quickly swinging establishment endorsements his way, including from moderate state Sen. Frank Morse, who was briefly rumored as a candidate himself, and former House majority leader Wayne Scott, who is trying to walk back his previous endorsement of Allen Alley. However, as the Oregonian’s Jeff Mapes points out: “None of them have a firm idea of where Dudley will come down on the issues.”

• PA-Gov: Dan Onorato has been teasing a big endorsement this weekend, but he pulled aside the curtain a day ahead: it’s Rep. Patrick Murphy, which is especially helpful for Onorato as he seeks to gain ground in the Philly suburbs to expand beyond his own Pittsburgh base. On the GOP side, there have been growing calls from newspaper editorial boards for Tom Corbett to either resign as AG or get out of the gubernatorial race, citing the conflict of interest in Corbett having accepted donations from those he’s now charging with crimes in the Bonusgate saga. Yesterday, the Lancaster Intelligencer-Journal joined in.

• SC-Gov: Two items of sort-of-good, or at least somewhat-less-bad, news for Mark Sanford: first, most of the 37 ethics charges against Sanford were dismissed by a state legislative panel. Nine of the charges (involving use of state aircraft) still stand, though, and on Monday, the panel meets again on whether to refer impeachment charges to the full Judiciary committee. And second, a Rasmussen poll finds a narrow plurality saying “no” to the issue of whether he should resign (41-42), and a 36-49 response to the question of whether he should be impeached if he doesn’t resign. 54% say he is “about as ethical” as other politicians.

• TN-Gov: The Democratic gubernatorial field in Tennessee is rapidly shrinking this week: not only did state Sen. Roy Herron jump out to pursue TN-08 instead, but businessman Ward Cammack pulled the plug yesterday after no progress on the fundraising front. That leaves beer baron and gubernatorial progeny Mike McWherter, state Sen. minority leader Jim Kyle, and former state House majority leader Kim McMillan in the hunt.

• CO-07: There’s another Republican entrant in the 7th, where Aurora city councilor Ryan Frazier recently dropped down from the Senate race to take on sophomore Democratic Rep. Ed Perlmutter. Lang Sias, an Iraq vet who worked on veterans’ outreach for the McCain campaign, is getting in the race; he’s also getting some big-name help, including former RNC press secretary Alex Conant.

• IA-03: State Sen. Brad Zaun officially kicked off his campaign yesterday; he’ll face wrestling coach Jim Gibbons for the GOP nod to take on the perpetually shaky Leonard Boswell in the Des Moines-based 3rd.

• IL-14: The GOP field is getting re-arranged in the 14th, and there’s some strategic thinking behind it. Businessman Jim Purcell dropped out, probably because nobody knew who he was, but specifically argued that he didn’t want to split the anti-Ethan Hastert vote, saying that the Hastert name would be poison in the general election. Presumably, his absence will benefit Hastert’s main challenger, state Sen. Randy Hultgren.

• TN-08: TPM has a nice expose of the NRCC’s efforts to not-so-subtly gay-bait state Sen. Roy Herron, who just took over the helm for the Dems in the race in the 8th. They’re trying to get mileage out of Herron’s personal blog, asking why he’s allegedly so focused on his “body image” and then asking (on the issue that Herron has never been a businessman) “So why can’t Roy Herron just be straight with West and Middle Tennesseans and admit it?”

• Polling: I know Rasmussen gets a lot of grief in the comments (and on the front page sometimes, too), so it’s worth taking a look at a recent piece of Mark Blumenthal wondering “Why is Rasmussen So Different?” His answers center on their likely voter model (which should come as no surprise to SSP readers) and also the way they ask their approve/disapprove questions. The article also has a very helpful chart showing the “house effects” of all the major pollsters, showing Rasmussen one of the rightmost, right next to Zogby and Harris. (Interestingly, the graph also shows PPP skewing right-of-center… and Fox News skewing a bit left.)

• Maps: I also know that SSPers like maps, so here are some maps courtesy of the Seattle Times of last month’s King County Executive and Seattle mayor’s races. The KCE results are kind of a no-brainer — the more rural you are, the more likely you were to vote for losing quasi-Republican Susan Hutchison. The Seattle mayor results are very interesting, though, showing the more likely you are to have a scenic view from your house, the more likely you were to vote for Joe Mallahan, showing some class-based fissures between the coalitions of establishment progressive Mallahan and anti-establishment victor Mike McGinn.