Tag: Colleen Hanabusa

Senate:

• HI-Sen: Very slow fundraising quarters from Reps. Mazie Hirono and Colleen Hanabusa, despite Dan Akaka’s retirement announcement on March 2. Hirono raised around $100K and has $291K on hand, while Hanabusa took in a mere $33K and has only $72K in the bank.

More interestingly, despite Ed Case’s attempts at rapprochement, Sen. Dan Inouye still has hard feelings about Case’s primary challenge to Akaka in 2006 – and he didn’t hesitate to say so in a recent interview. He all but said that Case lied to his face when he asked him lo those many years ago if he’d run against Akaka, and then added a few remarks that made it sounds like Case had definitely not succeeded in making amends. So unless Inouye is playing some weirdly deep game here, then it looks like my fears that he’d subtly back Case seem unfounded. Good.

• KY-Sen: I don’t know if I care about this, or whether it even matters, but glibertarian maniac Rand Paul filed for re-election yesterday. I guess this means he thinks the United States won’t collapse into anarchy by 2016, but he’s probably still hoarding kruggerands (and toilet paper) just to be on the safe side.

• MN-Sen: It’s sort of easy to forget that Amy Klobuchar is up for re-election this cycle. Dedicated and hard-working, she doesn’t showboat and is a consummate team player. The fact that she crushed in her debut campaign with 58% of the vote and no Republican opponents loom even in the distant horizon definitely have the effect of putting this race on the mental back burner. But true to form, she’s taking her campaign very seriously, raising $1 million in Q1 and holding on to $2.5 mil in the bank.

• NJ-Sen: Is Republican biotech millionaire John Crowley thinking about a Senate bid – again? Roll Call notes that Crowley is stepping down as CEO of his pharma company, which could be a sign he’s interested in taking on Sen. Bob Menendez. But for some reason, the article fails to point out that Crowley was heavily recruited to run against Sen. Frank Lautenberg in 2008, and backed out at the last moment – twice. He was also talked about for a gubernatorial run in 2009 (which he obviously didn’t pull the trigger on). So we’ll see if he has the fire in the belly to actually do something this time.

• TX-Sen: Did you know that there’s already a declared Democrat in the race? I didn’t, but Some Dude Sean Hubbard is apparently running.

• WA-Sen: Sen. Maria Cantwell raised $1.2 million in Q1 and has about the same amount in the bank.

Gubernatorial:

• KY-Gov: Gov. Steve Beshear raised an impressive $1.3 million in the first three months of the year and has $3.3 million on hand.

• WV-Gov: Treasurer John Perdue is up what I think is the first negative ad of the Dem primary. He principally after Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin for taking money from utility companies who have charged jacked-up prices, accusing him (and also Natalie Tennant and Rick Thompson) of being “in the pocket” of the big energy firms. Using smokestacks as negative imagery in a state like West Virginia is certainly an unusual choice, given how many people there rely on “smokestack industries” for their livelihoods. But I guess whoever wins this multi-way primary is expecting to do so with only a relatively small plurality.

House:

• AZ-06: We previously mentioned that Republican ex-Rep. Matt Salmon was thinking about a bid to reclaim his old House seat, with Jeff Flake running for Senate, and now he’s made it official. Salmon, a member of the GOP’s class of ’94, honored a term-limit pledge and declined to run for re-election in 2000. However, he did run and lose against Janet Napolitano in the governor’s race in 2002.

• FL-14: This seems unexpected: Chauncey Goss, son of former Congressman and CIA Director Porter Goss, says he’s thinking about challenging Rep. Connie Mack in the Republican primary. Goss acknowledges that such a fight would be an “uphill battle,” but also suggests that he could wind up running in an open seat. It sounds like he thinks that a new seat could be drawn by splitting Lee County (currently the bulk of the 14th CD), but I still wonder if Mack might wind up retiring. (By the way, the current 14th was in fact the elder Goss’s seat before he was tapped to run the CIA in 2004.)

• IA-04: Ex-Gov. Tom Vilsack told a gathering of state Senate Dems that they should “stay tuned” regarding his wife’s political ambitions. That sounds to me like Christie Vilsack is very much leaning toward a run against Republican nutter Steve King. Tom also promised the race would be a “holy war,” a phrase which I sure as hell hope he a) doesn’t repeat for public consumption and b) means that Christie plans on seriously taking King the woodshed.

• MI-11, MI-Sen (?): The AP canvassed all 15 House incumbents in Michigan, and all but one confirmed they were seeking re-election. The holdout? 11th CD Republican Thad McCotter, who is in his fifth term. I’ve hesitantly flagged this item as MI-Sen as well, since it’s possible that McCotter is hedging because he’s thinking about challenging Sen. Debbie Stabenow, though he hasn’t really been talked about much.

• NM-01: Dem state Sen. Tim Keller, only 33 years old, says he won’t seek Rep. Martin Heinrich’s open House seat but will instead seek re-election next year.

• NY-10: Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries, who hasn’t ruled out a primary challenge to Rep. Ed Towns, says in a new interview that he wants the chance to serve alongside Barack Obama. So that means he’s either a) gotta run next year b) run in 2014 or c) get the Constitution amended.

Other Races:

• IN-SoS: It looks like Republicans have found a pretty simple way out of the Charlie White mess: change the law. If White, the Republican Secretary of State who is currently under indictment, gets removed from office, the next-highest vote-getter in the last election, Democrat Vop Osili, would take his place. But a bill moving through the state lege would give the governor the power to appoint a replacement instead. (It also would let the GOP avoid any related fallout from having recorded zero valid votes in the SoS contest, a race to which many other electoral perks are tied.)  Sucky for Dems, but whatcha gonna do.

• NJ-St. Sen.: Republicans are challenging Olympian Carl Lewis’s residency status, trying to get him thrown off the ballot. Lewis says he’s owned homes in New Jersey since 2005, but has voted and paid taxes in California until last year. The Secretary of State will rule by Thursday, but that decision can be appealed.

• Philly Mayor: This is definitely unusual. Former Mayor John Street just changed his party registration from “Democrat” to “independent,” which could allow him to challenge Mayor Michael Nutter for his old job, something Street refused to rule out. Also unexpectedly, Street’s wacky ex-con brother Milton, who is in fact running against Nutter in the Dem primary, got three big union endorsements last week. Seems impossible to imagine him winning next month, though, no?

• WI Recall: As expected, petitions were filed against Sheila Harsdorf yesterday, making her the fourth Republican state Senator to achieve this dubious status. And in more good news, state Rep. Fred Clark is planning an announcement for Thursday, very likely to declare a run against Luther Olsen, against whom petitions were filed on Monday. On the flipside, Republicans say they will file signatures in three Dem-held districts this week, but time is running out for them: Their deadlines are mostly April 25 & 26 (ours aren’t due until May 2).

Grab Bag:

• DCCC: I’m getting kind of tired of these “DCCC launches campaign against 25 Republicans” (and the mirror images from the NRCC), mostly because I think the amounts being spent are quite small, but anyway, here’s another one, this time about Medicare.

• Passings: William Donald Schaefer, the iconic four-term Democratic mayor of Baltimore and two-term governor of Maryland, died on Monday at the age of 89. The Baltimore Sun has wall-to-wall coverage of Schaefer’s passing, whose legendary career is hard to summarize, but you can start with the obituary at the first link.

Redistricting Roundup:

• California: Newspaper editorial pages are usually filled with some of the worst goo-goo anti-gerrymandering handwringing, so I found this op-ed by George Skelton in the LA Times to be particularly delightful. Skelton wryly observes that California Dems can’t get a tax deal done with Republicans because a key tool in their arsenal – offering to draw recalcitrant legislators good districts, and threatening them with bad ones – has been taken out of their hands. In other words, like a lot of California’s supposedly well-meaning ballot initiatives, the independent redistricting commission is also having some unintended consequences. In the end, Skelton seems to come down on the side of the commission anyway, but I think he’s right: When you limit legislators’ ability to legislate, you limit their ability to do good things as well as bad.

• Iowa: We’re done: Iowa is now the third state to complete a new congressional map, with Gov. Terry Brandstad signing off on the plans yesterday. At the bottom of the linked article, you’ll also find a list of all state House and Senate incumbents who have been thrown together in the same district.

• Missouri: Some interesting backstory on the Dem side of redistricting in Missouri. Apparently, things got nasty between Russ Carnahan and Lacy Clay just a couple of weeks ago: Carnahan asked Clay (and Emmanuel Cleaver, MO’s other Dem member of the House) to help him ask Gov. Jay Nixon to veto the state legislature’s new maps which throw Clay and Carnahan into one district together. (The seat would be heavily black, which would favor Clay.) Clay refused, leading to a heated moment on the House floor, but now apparently Carnahan has agreed not to run against him in a primary. Instead, Carnahan is supposedly being pushed toward a run in what would become the new 3rd CD, which at present is largely Todd Akin’s district. That seat could open up if Akin runs for Senate, which I’d currently say is more likely than not.

Republicans, however, have not made any peace agreements and in fact appear to be in meltdown mode. Yesterday we mentioned that Republican leaders and congressmembers were gathering to discuss the impasse between competing maps, a meeting which reportedly became “acrimonious.” I’ll let Jo Mannies and Jason Rosenbaum of the St. Louis Beacon summarize the key points of contention:

The Republican members of Congress generally want the Senate to drop consideration of its map and take up the map already passed by the Missouri House. But Senate leaders dislike some of the House’s proposed boundaries. They also say they don’t have the votes for a veto-proof majority of the House map.

I strongly suggest reading the entire Beacon article if you’re interested in this topic – it’s definitely one of the sharper tradmed pieces I’ve seen on redistricting in general this year. In any event, Republicans want a shot at over-riding a possible Nixon veto before the current legislative session ends on May 13, so time is running short here.

• New Jersey: With the Garden State losing a seat this decade, Aaron Blake runs through five different scenarios involving various incumbent-vs-incumbent matchups.

• Oklahoma: Yesterday, the state House unanimously passed a new congressional map (which makes very minimal changes to the existing district lines). Given that all five members of Congress have signed off on the plan, I’d be surprised if it doesn’t breeze through the Senate as well – but we’ve already had more than our share of redistricting surprises this cycle, so I’ve stopped calling my bookie.

• Virginia: A committee in the Republican-held House made some minor tweaks to their map, which Gov. Bob McDonnell had previously vetoed. I’m sure this is just cosmetic b.s., because McDonnell really only cares about the Dem map that the Senate produced. In McDonnell’s world, the first is a work of unparalleled bipartisanshippy beauty, while the second is a hideous Demmycrat gerrymander FROM HELL. That’s fookin’ politics for ya.

• HI-Sen: Both Rep. Mazie Hirono and Rep. Colleen Hanabusa have confirmed to Roll Call that they are looking at the Dem primary to replace retiring Sen. Dan Akaka, and Hanabusa says she’s meeting with the DSCC, presumably soon. She also says that the DS “has made it known it wants to speak with anyone interested in running, but it is not actively recruiting any one candidate” (Roll Call’s phrasing).

• IN-Sen: So GOPer Richard Mourdock raised $157K, not much better than the $125K or so he predicted (in an obvious attempt to ensure he “exceeded analysts’ estimates,” as they might say after a Wall Street earnings call). But I flag this item because Roll Call says Mourdock plans to “raise money from a national donor base starting next year.” Does this mean he’s going the Sharron Angle/Michele Bachmann/Allen West BMW Direct-type direct mail scammery? (See related bullets below.) If so, then perhaps Dick Lugar is in better shape than he might have hoped.

• MO-Sen: This is news to me: Sophomore GOP Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer is apparently thinking about a Senate bid, and has reportedly even met with the NRSC about his intentions. Dave Catanese says that “uncertainty about redistricting” is spurring Luetkemeyer to consider other options, but I’m not sure I buy that, seeing as the new maps being considered by the Republican-held legislature offer him a very comfy seat. The real puzzler is why he’s doing this when six-term Rep. Todd Akin seems to be gearing up for a Senate run, since there’s almost no way the two would want to fight it out in a primary. Maybe Lute thinks he can be Plan B if Akin demurs.

Another reason cited by Catanese (which applies equally well to both congressmen) is ex-Treasurer Sarah Steelman’s crappy fundraising. She pulled in just $186K in Q1, which would be unimpressive for a supposedly serious candidate in almost any state. If Akin gets in, I think there’s a non-zero chance that she’d drop out.

• MT-Sen: Nice: Sen. Jon Tester (D) raised $1.2 million in Q1 and has $1.5m on hand. His Republican opponent, Rep. Denny Rehberg, raised less than half that, $580K, but has $932K in the bank.

• NE-Sen: Sen. Ben Nelson raised $1 million in Q1 and has $2.3 mil on hand. His chief Republican rival, AG Jon Bruning, raised $1.5 million and has $1.2 in the bank, but Nelson pointed out that $600K was transferred from Bruning’s 2008 Senate account (when he briefly sought to primary Chuck Hagel; after Hagel announced his retirement, Bruning was squeezed out by former Gov. Mike Johanns).

• OH-Sen: Former state Sen. Kevin Coughlin, whom we’d mentioned previously as a possible candidate, has filed paperwork for an exploratory committee, joining Treasurer Josh Mandel in this in-limbo category in the GOP primary.

• TN-Sen: I feel like there’s an alternate universe not too dissimilar from our own where a Republican dude named Bob Corker is also freshman in the U.S. Senate, and he’s also up for re-election, except Corker Prime is actually vulnerable. Here on Earth, though, it really seems like Corker is well out of reach for us. He raised an impressive $1.9 million in Q1 and has over $4 million in the bank – and there are no Democratic candidates on the horizon.

Gubernatorial:

• MO-Gov: Gov. Jay Nixon lapped his likely Republican opponent, Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder, on the fundraising circuit, pulling in over twice as much money over the last six months, $1.7 million to $770K. Nixon also has a big cash-on-hand edge, $2.1 mil to $900K.

But other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the show? Well, pretty terrible, actually – Kinder’s had just an awful few weeks in the press. After the St. Louis Post-Dispatch revealed his penchant for spending taxpayer money to stay in luxury hotels to attend baseball games and society balls, Kinder promised to reimburse the state $35K… but two weeks later, he still hasn’t. That nimbus definitely isn’t moving anywhere just yet, and it’s his own damn fault. Let’s hope he runs the rest of his campaign the same way.

• NC-Gov: This just doesn’t seem good. Gov. Bev Perdue, whose public image has already suffered enough damage, was out-of-state Saturday afternoon when a series of deadly tornadoes touched down in North Carolina. She was attending a horse race in Kentucky and didn’t make a public appearance back home until 11pm that night. I’m not going to predict what this will mean for Perdue, but it can’t be helpful.

• WV-Gov: SoS Natalie Tennant’s first ad is a hokey spot set on a farm, in which she decries politicians wasting money… and a cow can be heard to moo. (Or a bull. I don’t know. It has horns. But small ones. So maybe still a cow? Do bulls moo? I’m from the city – sue me.) Tennant is generally seen as the candidate with the greatest appeal to liberals (yes, there are some in West Virginia), so she’s clearly trying to play against type here.

House:

• AZ-08: Rep. Gabby Giffords raised $358K in Q1 and has $556K in the bank.

• CA-19: Freshman GOP Rep. Jeff Denham (I admit it – I had already forgotten who he was and had to Google him) is already making a name for himself. That name is “idiot.” He staged a mega-lavish DC fundraiser in January when he was sworn in which featured singer Leann Rimes and spent an amazing $212,250 on the event. Total raised? $212,900 – which means he netted exactly $650. That’s quite the feat. It’s even more amazing when you consider it was all supposed to benefit a joint fundraising committee for 11 GOP frosh. To rub it in, Michael Doyle of the Modesto Bee archly observes: “If the $650 netted from outside contributors were to be divvied up evenly, each of the 11 GOP lawmakers would receive $59.”

• CA-36: Janice Hahn outraised Debra Bowen in Q1, $273K to $195K, and has about double the cash-on-hand, $171K to $93K. Surprisingly, Marcy Winograd managed to raise $50K. (And if you care, Republican Craig Hughey lent his campaign $250K.)

Bowen also put out an internal from the Feldman Group. In a test of apparently all the candidates who have filed, she and Hahn tie for 20, with Republican Mike Gin the next-closest at 8 and Winograd at 6. The memo also says that in a two-way runoff, Bowen leads 40-36 with 16% undecided. The poll also claims that Hahn’s unfavorability rating is “double that of Bowen,” but a self-respecting pollster really shouldn’t include such tripe, because the refusal to release actual numbers means we’re talking about something like a 12-to-6 comparison (i.e., meaningless). As mi hermano G.O.B. Bluth would say, “COME ON!”

• FL-08: Hah! Does Daniel Webster want to lose? The GOP freshman raised just $30K in Q1, but the really funny part is that the guy he defeated, Alan Grayson, raised more! Grayson took in $38K, apparently from small donors who hope he’ll make a comeback bid.

• FL-22: Allen West raised a seemingly-impressive $434K in Q1, but as you know, he’s a major practitioner of the churn-and-burn style of shady direct-mail fundraising, and it really shows in his burn rate. He spent an amazing $266K last quarter, which both as a raw total and a percentage rate is exceedingly high… but see the MN-06 and NV-02 items below.

• IA-04: Interesting, though not surprising: Politico says that DCCC chair Steve Israel warned Christie Vilsack off of challenging Dave Loebsack in the new 2nd CD, assuring her that the D-Trip would back the incumbent. He also apparently promised to support her if she took on Rep. Steve King (as she supposedly might do), though who knows what kind of $ that might translate into.

• IL-03: Insurance exec John Atkinson, who is apparently challenging Rep. Dan Lipinski in the Democratic primary, raised $535K in Q1, including $312K from his own pockets. Lipinski raised just $138K but has $637K on hand.

• MN-08: Freshman GOPer Chip Cravaack raised just $121K in Q1 – so why are we having such a hard time finding a Dem willing to take this guy on?

• MN-06: Michele Bachmann raised a MIND-OBLITERATING $1.7 million in the first quarter… and yes, I’m being sarcastic, because she also managed to spent $756K. Of course, netting a million bucks ain’t bad (and she has $2.8 mil on hand), and if she truly pulls the trigger on a presidential run, I’ll bet the spigots will open even wider. But that’s still quite the burn rate.

• NV-02: Sharron Angle makes Allen West look as parsimonious as Scrooge by comparison. Everyone’s favorite nutter (okay, it’s a multi-way tie, but you know you love her) raised an amaaaaaaaaazing $700K in Q1, but spent an actually amazing $550K, mostly to BaseConnect, the scam artists formerly known as BMW Direct. She has only $176K in the bank.

• NY-26: Republican Jane Corwin is not fucking around: She raised just $102K in Q1, but gave her own campaign a whopping million dollars. Yow. Meanwhile, Crazy Jack Davis has raised zilch, but has loaned himself $1.5 mil and already spent $1.4 mil.

Other Races:

• Denver Mayor: SSP commenter Kretzy has a really good run-down on the May 3rd Denver mayor’s race, necessitated by John Hickenlooper’s ascension to the governor’s mansion. I won’t try to summarize it – you should just click through. Timely, too, because SUSA has a poll out on the race, showing James Mejia and Chris Romer tied at 22, with Michael Hancock next at 18. Again, read Kretzy’s summary if you want to know more about these people.

• Wisconsin Recall: Signatures were filed yesterday to force a recall election for a third Republican state senator, Luther Olsen, and Dems expect to file petitions for Sheila Harsdorf today. (Number of Dem state sens who’ve had petitions filed against them so far: 0.) Also, the state’s Government Accountability Board says it will try to consolidate the recalls into as few elections as possible.

Grab Bag:

• DSCC: In an item about Herb Kohl raising $0 last quarter (he can cut himself a fat check any time he pleases, so this isn’t meaningful), Dave Catanese says that DSCC chair Patty Murray said “she was confident all of the remaining incumbents were running for reelection.” Kohl is the most obvious candidate for retirement, and of course Murray could be wrong, but maybe this is it.

• Fundraising: The NYT has a list of fundraising by freshman Republicans, and also notes that IN-08 Rep. Larry Bucshon took in just $45K. Not really wise for a guy whose district is likely to be made at least a bit more competitive. The Fix also has a fundraising roundup.

• LCV: The League of Conservation Voters is launching a $250K radio ad campaign targeted at four members of the House who voted in favor of a bill that would bar the EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions. The ads are hitting two Republicans running for Senate, Denny Rehberg and Dean Heller, as well as Energy Cmte Chair Fred Upton (R) and Jason Altmire (D). Here’s a sample ad (targeted at Heller), which I actually find kinda weird and confusing.

• Passings: Former Rep. Harold Volkmer, who represented mostly rural northeastern Missouri’s 9th CD for ten terms, passed away at the age of 80.

Redistricting Roundup:

• Colorado: Now this at least is a fight that makes sense: Republicans control the Colorado House, while Dems control the Senate – and tempers have already exploded with the release of proposed redistricting plans from both sides. (See yesterday’s digest for the maps.) Speaker of the House Frank McNulty flipped out, accusing Democrats of drawing districts that would benefit two legislators in particular: Senate President Brandon Shaffer and Sen. Morgan Carroll.

However, Carroll said she has no plans to run for Congress, while the Dem point-man on redistricting, Sen. Rollie Heath, pointed out that the new 4th CD (which McNulty thinks Shaffer wants to run in) has a 10 percent GOP registration edge… in other words, not the kind of seat you’d drawn for yourself if you were an ambitious Democrat. So either McNulty is just a garden-variety moran, or he’s just trying to cast fact-free aspersions against the other side. We’ve seen a lot of this kind of crap from Colorado Republicans already, so door number two is a definite possibility (but of course, it’s not mutually exclusive of door number 1).

• Missouri: Trying to unlock a stalemate that seems remarkably picayune to outsiders such as myself, Republican power brokers in Missouri met yesterday to talk things over. Among the participants were most of the Republicans in the state’s congressional delegation, the heads of the state House and Senate, and the chair of the MO GOP. No sort of deal has been announced as yet.

• Virginia: Hah – so much for lawmakers racing back to work to deal with Gov. Bob McDonnell’s veto of their redistricting plans. Legislators had planned to be off this week, so rank-and-file members declined leadership’s entreaties to show up.

Public Policy Polling for Daily Kos/SEIU (3/24-27, Hawaii voters, no trendlines):

Ed Case (D): 52

Linda Lingle (R): 35

Undecided: 12

Colleen Hanabusa (D): 51

Linda Lingle (R): 40

Undecided: 9

Mufi Hannemann (D): 47

Linda Lingle (R): 40

Undecided: 14

Mazie Hirono (D): 52

Linda Lingle (R): 40

Undecided: 9

Ed Case (D): 50

Duke Aiona (R): 35

Undecided: 15

Colleen Hanabusa (D): 48

Duke Aiona (R): 43

Undecided: 9

Mufi Hannemann (D): 42

Duke Aiona (R): 42

Undecided: 16

Mazie Hirono (D): 49

Duke Aiona (R): 42

Undecided: 10

Ed Case (D): 53

Charles Djou (R): 35

Undecided: 12

Colleen Hanabusa (D): 50

Charles Djou (R): 40

Undecided: 10

Mufi Hannemann (D): 46

Charles Djou (R): 40

Undecided: 14

Mazie Hirono (D): 51

Charles Djou (R): 40

Undecided: 9

(MoE: ±3.3%)

In the wake of Sen. Dan Akaka’s retirement announcement, Beltway pundits started talking up the chances of Linda Lingle, the recently termed-out Republican governor. This chatter ignored quite a few things: the fact that Lingle left office pretty unpopular after eight years (41-56 job approvals); that 2010’s massive red tide failed to wash up on Hawaii’s shores (GOP Rep. Charles Djou lost to Colleen Hanabusa; Dem Neil Abercrombie won the gubernatorial race over then-Lt. Gov. Duke Aiona in a landslide); and that a dude named Barack Obama would be on the top of the ticket next year (the native son won by 45 points in 2008).

Now, to imagine Lingle might be competitive, there’s one more piece of evidence that will have to get ignored: this poll. With her underwater 41-51 favorable rating, she can’t crack 40% against any Democrat, even the least popular among them, former Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann (39-48 favorables). And indeed Hanabusa, Rep. Mazie Hirono, and ex-Rep. Ed Case all clear 50 against her. If Lingle’s own internal polls are showing markedly different numbers, then I think she’s deluding herself. Of course, Aiona fares only slightly better, while Djou does no better than Lingle, but if Hawaii Republicans want to take on a hopeless suicide mission, they’re welcome to do so.

One final note: If you weren’t familiar with Hawaii politics, you might take a look at these numbers and say, “Wow! Who is this Ed Case guy? He performs the best of all the Dems, and does really well among independent voters!” These things are true, but don’t be fooled: Ed Case has a long conservative pedigree as scion of the (now-defunct) Democratic Leadership Committee, the same corporatist outfit which more or less gave Joe Lieberman a reason for being. I won’t spill a lot of electrons on him right now, but I’m sure commenters will regale you with his greatest hits. I am somewhat surprised to see his favorables are so strong (51-30), despite running in a nasty special election last year which tarnished both Djou (40-47) and Hanabusa (45-41).

But while these numbers might offer Case an “electability” argument, all Dems are clearly capable of winning – and what’s more, Case would have to make it out of a primary first. So it’s important to look at each Dem’s favorables among members of their own party:

Hirono: 72-16

Hanabusa: 65-19

Case: 50-30

Hannemann: 44-44

That’s going to be tough for Case to pull off (and Hannemann, too – his negative primary against Abercrombie last year seems to be hurting him). But Hirono and Hanabusa should talk, though, and figure out which of them ought to run, because in a multi-way race, Case could definitely sneak through, and we definitely do not want that.

• ME-Sen: The attempt to primary out Olympia Snowe by the state’s various fractious Tea Party factions seems to be sputtering, partly for lack of a credible challenger to rally around (with Some Dude Scott D’Ambroise the only one officially in the race right now) but also as the various Judean People’s Front and People’s Front of Judea wings of the ‘baggers start to increasingly turn their fire on each other rather than on Democrats and alleged RINOs.

• MI-Sen: Joining a major law firm after an electoral loss isn’t, in itself, dispositive of future political runs a few years down the line. But observers are taking the decision by former AG Mike Cox (who lost last year’s GOP gubernatorial primary) to join a Detroit law firm as an indicator that he isn’t considering the 2012 Senate race.

• MO-Sen: There are increasing signals that Jim Talent may not run for Senate in 2012, after all. Dave Catanese talks to various Show Me State insiders who say that Talent hasn’t been doing the behind-the-scenes reaching-out that one usually does at this point, and they point to him not only having got caught off guard by Sarah Steelman’s abrupt early entry into the primary but also his close relationship with Mitt Romney. Talent is currently traveling with Romney in an advisory role in Afghanistan, and there’s speculation his 2012 plans may involve hitching his wagon to Romney in the hopes that he’s the next President and that a Cabinet role (SecDef?) may be in the offing.

• OH-Sen: With Mike DeWine having passed on a rematch against Sherrod Brown, the speculation has turned to newly-elected Lt. Gov. and former Auditor Mary Taylor. It sounds like she’s game; local insiders are saying she’s at “90%” in terms of likelihood of running. She may not have the field to herself even if she does, though; another newly-elected statewide GOPer, 33-year-old state Treasurer Josh Mandel has been impressing the local GOP in his first week on the job and is starting to attract some buzz for a quick promotion.

• WY-Sen: Wyoming promises to be the least dramatic state in the 2012 election, so PPP’s decision to poll here this early seems a little odd. At any rate, they find Wyomingites love their politicians: outgoing Dem Gov. Dave Freudenthal gets a 71/18 approval, making him the nation’s most popular governor, while the state’s two GOP Senators, John Barrasso (69/25) and Mike Enzi (63/24) are the nation’s two most popular Senators. Despite his popularity (and, well, despite the fact that he’s never expressed any interest in running for federal office), Freudenthal loses a hypothetical 2012 matchup against Barrasso, 56-36, thanks to the GOP’s huge registration advantage here.

• RI-Gov: There’s already one Dem reportedly gearing up for the 2014 Governor’s race: state Treasurer Gina Raimondo, who’s build a war chest and getting friendly with DC consultants. (Alternatively, she could also be running for Senate in 2014 instead, if Jack Reed isn’t running again.) No mention of whether she’d be challenging new indie Gov. Lincoln Chafee (last seen more or less declaring war on local talk radio) from the left or the right (as Frank Caprio tried to do, and failed).

• FL-14: With Rep. Connie Mack IV looking like one of the House’s likeliest retirements right now (in order to pursue a Senate bid against Bill Nelson), speculation has already begun about who’ll fill his seat. One thing is pretty predictable, given the Fort Myers-area district’s R+11 bent and lack of any Dem tradition or bench: it’ll be a Republican. GOP names to watch include ex-state Rep. Dudley Goodlette and Lee Co. Commissioner Ray Judah. The most prominent name, though, may be former Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp (though he might have trouble getting out of a GOP primary unless he can find a way to wash the stank of the Charlie Crist administration off his suit). State Sen. Garrett Richter (whose district closely overlaps the 14th) says no thanks to the race.

• HI-01: GOP ex-Rep. Charles Djou, seeming a bit testy after the abrupt end to his very short tenure in the House, seems to have thrown all that feel-good ohana crap out the window in his exit press conference, blaming Dem successor Colleen Hanabusa in advance for expected future failures. He may feel free to speak his mind as he also says he has “no plans to run for any political office ever again.”

• NM-01: Rep. Martin Heinrich has already drawn some seemingly-credible Republican opposition for 2012, although he has the kind of district that seems much safer for a Dem in a presidential year than last year’s narrow win. Republican Albuquerque city councilor Dan Lewis has formed an exploratory committee.

• State legislatures: Two state House speaker elections are in the news today. The big one may be in Texas, where an expected coup from the right against GOP speaker Joe Straus didn’t ever seem to materialize. He got the support of 70 of 100 GOP House members in a pre-vote caucus, and then was easily elected to another term by the whole House. Meanwhile, in Oregon, an unusual power-sharing arrangement was cobbled together with a surprising degree of civility and equanimity, as the parties figure out how to grapple with a never-before 30-30 tie. GOPer Bruce Hanna and Dem Arnie Roblan will be co-speakers, handing the gavel to each other on alternating days.

• Special elections: Two southern states have special elections scheduled today, although there should be very little drama in any of the elections, as these are Republican-leaning districts replacing promoted Republican legislators in lightly-contested races (and icy conditions should reduce turnout to microscopic levels). In Mississippi, the races are to replace Alan Nunnelee in SD-6 and Steven Palazzo in HD-116. (With a recent party switch by state Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, the GOP is poised to tie the state Senate with today’s election.) In Virginia, the races are to replace Robert Hurt in SD-19 and Morgan Griffith in HD-8.

• Primaries: In a nice bit of symmetry, two states are going in very different directions with their primary election rules. In Idaho, where the GOP seems fearful of meddling in its primaries by the state’s Democrat (I think his name is Jerry), the state GOP is pushing to change from open primaries to closed primaries. Meanwhile, in Louisiana, after a period of closed primaries for federal-level offices (which was extremely confusing, since they kept using open primaries for state offices), they’re expecting federal approval of a switch back to all open primaries this month. The state legislature has already approved it, but as a VRA state, they’re waiting for DOJ preclearance.

• Redistricting: Finally, here’s some redistricting news. Bob McDonnell has thrown a bone to fans of redistricting reform with the creation of a new redistricting commission with 11 members. It’s not a very interesting bone, though, since the commission’s role is purely advisory and the commission doesn’t even have a budget. Meanwhile, the Hill looks at what might happen to the House districts in New Jersey, a state where the hard work is actually done by commission (which has traditionally focused on incumbent protection, but has to eliminate one seat this year). For now, everyone is waiting for more complete Census figures to see if the population stagnation was more concentrated in the state’s north (which would probably hit the Dems) or the state’s middle (which would hit the GOP).

AZ-Sen, AZ-Gov (Public Policy Polling for Daily Kos): Rodney Glassman (D) 38, John McCain 56; Terry Goddard (D) 44, Jan Brewer (R-inc) 52

GA-Sen, GA-Gov (Landmark Communications): Michael Thurmond (D) 35, Johnny Isakson (R-inc) 56; Roy Barnes (D) 39, Nathan Deal (R) 47

GA-Sen, GA-Gov (SurveyUSA): Michael Thurmond (D) 34, Johnny Isakson (R-inc) 58; Roy Barnes (D) 39, Nathan Deal (R) 49

HI-Gov (Ward Research): Neil Abercrombie (D) 51, Duke Aiona (R) 43

HI-01 (Ward Research): Colleen Hanabusa (D) 45, Charles Djou (R-inc) 48

IN-Sen (EPIC/MRA): Brad Ellsworth (D) 35, Dan Coats (R) 53

LA-Sen (Magellan): Charlie Melancon (D) 35, David Vitter (R-inc) 52

MA-04, MA-10 (UNH for the Boston Globe): Barney Frank (D-inc) 46, Sean Bielat (R) 33; Bill Keating (D) 37, Jeff Perry (R) 33

MD-01 (OpinionWorks for the Baltimore Sun): Frank Kratovil (D-inc) 40, Andy Harris (R) 40

MD-Gov (Abt SRBI for the Washington Post): Martin O’Malley (D-inc) 54, Bob Ehrlich (R) 40

MI-01 (EPIC/MRA): Gary McDowell (D) 40, Dan Benishek (R) 42

MI-03 (Public Opinion Strategies (R) for Justin Amash): Pat Miles (D) 30, Justin Amash (R) 49

MN-Gov (St. Cloud State University): Mark Dayton (D) 40, Tom Emmer (R) 30, Tom Horner (I) 19

NE-02 (Wiese Research): Tom White (D) 39, Lee Terry (R-inc) 44

NY-Sen-B (PDF) (Marist): Kirsten Gillibrand (D-inc) 56, Joe DioGuardi (R) 38

OH-Gov (U. Cincinnati for Ohio media): Ted Strickland (D-inc) 47, John Kasich (R) 49

OR-Gov (Elway Research): John Kitzhaber (D) 45, Chris Dudley (R) 44

OR-01, OR-05 (Elway Research): David Wu (D-inc) 51, Rob Cornilles (R) 38; Kurt Schrader (D-inc) 50, Scott Bruun (R) 38

SC-Gov (Insider Advantage): Vincent Sheheen (D) 37, Nikki Haley (R) 51

SD-AL (Mason-Dixon): Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-inc) 43, Kristi Noem (R) 45

SD-AL (Nielson Brothers): Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-inc) 42, Kristi Noem (R) 40

TX-Gov (University of Texas): Bill White (D) 40, Rick Perry (R-inc) 50

Bonus: UT also tested a wide range of down-ballot races.

VA-02 (Christopher Newport University): Glenn Nye (D-inc) 41, Scott Rigell (R) 42

Margins & Errors: The DSCC supposedly has some internal with Alexi Giannoulias up 2 in IL-Sen, but this is some NRCC-style crap with no details other than the toplines… Some MI-Gov poll shows that the race still sucks… Frank Guinta is touting an internal in NH-01 that supposedly has him up 53-37, but there isn’t even word of the pollster’s name

• AK-Sen: Congrats to Scott McAdams, who just cleared the McMillion hurdle with $1 million in fundraising so far. The majority of contributions were from Alaska, with 88% contributions of $200 or less.

• KY-Sen: Matt Taibbi’s new Rolling Stone article as he works the Rand Paul beat is a must-read even if it doesn’t have any revelations as freaky as the “Aqua Buddha” story, although there’s some vague and anonymous racism from the newsletter that his snarky secret society put out. The prize-winning quote, though, deals with the Tea Partiers don’t seem terribly phased by any of this:

(“Well, I used to use that cologne myself,” was the response of one Tea Partier to a question I posed about “Aqua Buddha”)

• MO-Sen: American Crossroads has declared victory in Missouri, and is pulling out of advertising there, where Roy Blunt has a consistent but single-digit lead. (As for the actual party committees… well, it’s probably not relevant, seeing as how Crossroads and its ilk have made them basically irrelevant this year.)

• NV-Sen: Harry Reid racked up a couple endorsements from the big-in-Nevada gaming industry, including PokerPAC. He also got the endorsement of the former chair of the RNC, Frank Fahrenkopf, who warned of the threat Sharron Angle (with her ties to anti-gambling Gary Bauer) might pose to the state’s gaming industry.

• PA-Sen: Ah, sweet Schadenfreude. The Club for Growth is having to plug $1 million into the Pennsylvania Senate race in order to bail out their former boss, Pat Toomey.

• WI-Sen: Yet another story with Ron Johnson with his hand in the trough he so regularly decries: he says he’s not quite sure how five of his employees (and 10 dependents) at his plastics firm Pacur wound up on BadgerCare, the state’s health insurance program for the poor. That would seem to contradict previous statements from the Johnson camp that all Pacur full-time employees are covered by the company’s plan.

• AZ-07, AZ-08: I know John McCain has refudiated all his old mavericky ways, but did he actually have to go so far as to violate his signature piece of mavericky legislation, the McCain-Feingold Act? He recently cut spots for GOP candidates in the 7th and 8th, in which he and Jon Kyl appeared, and paid for them out of Friends of John McCain (his campaign committee). Dems have filed FEC complaints against McCain, saying that if he coordinated with the Ruth McClung and Jesse Kelly campaigns, he would’ve been limited to $4,800 contributions to each (they’d be legal independent expenditures if there was truly no coordination).

• CO-03, CO-04: The gang-that-couldn’t-shoot-straight strikes twice, in two different neighboring Old West districts. In the 3rd, an anti-abortion group has been hitting the airwaves attacking Ken Salazar. That’s fine, but Ken Salazar is the Secretary of Interior. His brother (the one with the mustache) is John Salazar, the Rep. from the 3rd. OK, understandable, since they’re brothers… but how do you explain the confusion in the 4th, where not just some outside group but the Cory Gardner campaign mixed up Betsy Markey with Massachusetts Rep. Ed Markey? They accused her of voting for the Obama budget, which she didn’t; that was the other Markey.

• FL-25: I don’t know how far this will get, but give local Dems in south Florida credit for audaciousness. A Joe Garcia backer filed a lawsuit trying to get David Rivera removed from the ballot. The suit alleges that Rivera should be removed because of state election finance disclosure irregularities, concerning Rivera’s mysterious claims of being a contractor to USAID despite USAID saying he wasn’t. While they cite a comparable case where a state senate candidate was recently stricken from the ballot from similar problems, I’m wondering if it may be too late to do anything about that even if it succeeds on the merits (although if it only serves to move the USAID deception into the spotlight, that’s good too).

• MO-04: More triage news… on the Republican side? Despite news of a Vicky Hartzler internal poll yesterday that showed a tied race, the NRCC is packing up, at least from the Kansas City market. I wonder if that has more to do with feeling neighboring KS-03 is locked down, as there are other smaller media markets in the 4th where they might still spend, but I think this has to count as at least a partial pullout.

• SD-AL: This is an interesting counterpoint to the anti-Pelosi (or at least Pelosi-skeptical) tide that seems to be rising among threatened Blue Dogs, including Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (who’s in the skeptic camp): GOP challenger Kristi Noem is saying that if she wins her race, she’s not sold yet on John Boehner as Republican leader, but would like to see who else might run. Recall that Noem previously politely told Sarah Palin to stay far away from her race, so this isn’t the first time she’s pantomimed independence.

• Early voting: There’s been some buzz today about a CBS News story that says that Dems are doing better than expected in early voting, although it’s kind of shy on actual numbers. It mentions that Dems have outpaced GOPers in early voting in Iowa, Maryland, North Carolina, and Clark Co., Nevada, while there’s a Republican edge in Florida and Colorado. Jon Ralston, of course, has more data on Nevada, while Politico has some Iowa tidbits, involving early ballot requests in IA-03 (where 50% of requests are from Dems, but where Dems are 36% of the electorate) and IA-02 (51% of the requests, 38% of the electorate).

• SSP TV:

• CO-Sen: Women’s Voices Women Vote Action Fund is out with a “high six-figure” buy in Colorado, with the first TV ad to take on Ken Buck’s failure to prosecute that 2005 rape case (the “buyer’s remorse” incident)

• KY-Sen: The DSCC hits Rand Paul on his support for the 23% sales (aka “fair”) tax

• NV-Sen: Sharron Angle wonders how Harry Reid made all that money in her new ad (helpful fact from Jon Ralston: he was a millionaire even before he was in the House)

• WV-Sen: Outsourcing seems to be the hot button issue coming out of focus groups that works for the Dems these days, as the DSCC keeps hitting John Raese on it with their new spot

• AZ-03: Jon Hulburd has another TV ad against Ben Quayle, poking at his values and overall maturity

• HI-01: Colleen Hanabusa’s new ad has a special guest star in the form of Barack Obama

• IN-09: The SEIU goes after Todd Young on Social Security privatization

• NH-01: Carol Shea-Porter, in her own ad, also works the SSP angle against Frank Guinta

• VA-05: Is the DCCC trying to drive up indie teabagger Jeffrey Clark’s numbers? They’re out with a spot hitting Robert Hurt for all the tax-raising he did in the state legislature

• Rasmussen:

• IL-Gov: Pat Quinn (D-inc) 37%, Bill Brady (R) 45%, Rich Whit(n)ey (G) 2%, Scott Lee Cohen (I) 6%

• MO-Sen: Robin Carnahan (D) 43%, Roy Blunt (R) 52%

• ND-AL: Earl Pomeroy (D-inc) 42%, Rick Berg (R) 52%

• NY-Sen-B: Kirsten Gillibrand (D-inc) 54%, Joe DioGuardi (R) 33%

• SC-Gov: Vincent Sheheen (D) 38%, Nikki Haley (R) 47%

The DCCC is out with seven new polls showing five Democratic incumbents in the lead, and two challengers giving GOP incumbents serious races:

AZ-05: Benenson Strategy Group for the DCCC (10/3-4, likely voters):

Harry Mitchell (D-inc): 46

David Schweikert (R): 39

(MoE: ±4.9%)

HI-01: Global Strategy Group for the DCCC (10/4-6, likely voters):

Colleen Hanabusa (D): 48

Charles Djou (R-inc): 44

(MoE: ±4.9%)

IA-03: Bennett, Petts and Normington for the DCCC (10/3-4, likely voters):

Leonard Boswell (D-inc): 49

Brad Zaun (R): 41

(MoE: ±4.9%)

IL-14: Benenson Strategy Group for the DCCC (10/4-6, likely voters):

Bill Foster (D-inc): 48

Randy Hultgren (R): 38

(MoE: ±4.9%)

NC-07: Grove Insight for the DCCC (10/3-5, likely voters):

Mike McIntyre (D-inc): 52

Ilario Pantano (R): 41

(MoE: ±4.9%)

NC-11: Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research (10/4-6, likely voters):

Heath Shuler (D-inc): 54

Jeff Miller (R): 41

(MoE: ±4.8%)

PA-15: Grove Insight for the DCCC (9/27-29, likely voters):

John Callahan (D): 43

Charlie Dent (R-inc): 45

(MoE: ±4.9%)

Of course, I’d like to see the internals they’re not releasing, too…

Public Policy Polling for Daily Kos (10/2-3, likely voters, no trend lines):

Colleen Hanabusa (D): 48

Charles Djou (R-inc): 47

Undecided: 5

(MoE: ±3.9%)

It looks like Charles Djou and Colleen Hanabusa are in a game of jump ball here, which is a better result than I had been expecting for Team Blue here. If turnout were at 2008 levels, as Jed L. says, Hanabusa would be leading by 54-40.

Bonus finding: In the gubernatorial race portion of this poll, Duke Aiona and Neil Abercrombie are tied at 48-48. Considering this is Abercrombie’s old district, this could mean that the Governor’s race is a lot closer than previous polls indicated.

AK-Sen: Man, we are seriously close! Just $195 away from our goal of raising $2,400 for Dem Scott McAdams in the topsy-turvy Alaska senate race. We have 64 contributors right now – I’d love to see us get to 70 before all is said and done. And if we hit our target now, you get to stop seeing nags from me!

DE-Sen: One final (?) independent expenditure report from the Tea Party Express, good for another $20K of media on Christine O’Donnell’s behalf. Damn this one ought to be exciting tonight.

CA-Gov: Gah, this is just unspinnably bad. Meg Whitman releases an ad featuring footage of Bill Clinton attacking Jerry Brown in the 1992 presidential primary, so what does Brown do? He calls Clinton a liar – and manages to make a crack about Monica freakin’ Lewinsky. (Talk about stuck in a time warp.) After a day, Brown finally apologized.

FL-Gov: Alex Sink secured endorsed from two top law enforcement groups: the Fraternal Order of Police and the Police Benevolent Association. Her campaign says it’s the first time in two decades both orgs have endorsed a Dem (the FOP hasn’t does so in 16 years).

KS-Gov: Live by the bailout, die by the bailout. Dem Tom Holland smacked Republican Sam Brownback during a recent debate for supporting a $200 billion bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – leaving Brownback to sputter that he voted against the bailout. Well, yeah, he voted against the infamous TARP. But Holland had him dead-to-rights on a separate vote, from July of 2008, which did in fact provide money to prop up the two government-sponsored mortgage enterprises.

ME-Gov: Watch GOP nominee Paul LePage get seriously testy when reporters ask him about the fact that his wife received homestead tax exemptions for properties in both Maine and Florida in 2009. (More details here.)

FL-02: Hah! This is why it pays to keep good records! Republican Steve Southerland claimed on a radio show that he had never donated money to Allen Boyd – so Boyd’s campaign dug up a $100 check from 1997 (!) that Southerland had made out to Boyd. Nice work!

FL-08: Tea Party candidate Peg Dunmire is out with her first TV ad of the cycle – notable, of course, because you don’t often see third-party candidates on the air (especially two months out from election day), and also because Dunmire has claimed she plans to put $250,000 of her own cash into the race.

IL-14: Idiot: GOPer Randy Hultgren made two separate contributions (totaling $2,000) to his federal campaign committee… from his state campaign committee. That, my friends, is not allowed (and which is why Hultgren is returning the money).

MI-01 (PDF): Republican Dan Benishek is touting an internal poll from TargetPoint Consulting, showing him with a 54-31 lead over Dem Gary McDowell. The polling memo is written in a pretty grossly sycophantic way, and my spidey sense is twigged enough for me to wonder if the ballot test was asked up top, or after some axe-grindy “issue” questions.

TN-04: Republican Scott DesJarlais is touting an internal poll from Public Opinion Strategies, showing him four points behind Dem Rep. Lincoln Davis, 45-41. Note to TargetPoint Consulting: This is how a polling memorandum should look.

DCCC: Reid Wilson has a detailed report on the D-Trip shifting ad money around, but really, it doesn’t sound very good to me. In the waning days of WWII, my dad (in Poland) would tune in to Nazi-censored radio reports about the German troops “consolidating their positions” or “shifting to more strategically advantageous territory,” etc. It was all bullshit-speak code for “we’re retreating.” So you tell me if you think the DCCC is reducing its ad buys in Arizona because vulnerable Dems there “are running stronger than expected campaigns,” or if that, too, is bullshit. Similarly, should we be happy that the Dems are cancelling buys in North Dakota? Of course, those radio broadcasts my dad listened to were in fact good news….

Chicago-Mayor: I don’t know if we’ll be able to keep up with what I’m sure will be an avalanche of candidacy announcements, but former Sen. Carol Moseley Braun says she’s throwing her hat in the ring for the Chicago mayor’s race.

SSP-TV (written by James L.):

AL-02: The DCCC, as part of its huge $1.2 million ad reservation on behalf of Dem Bobby Bright, is hitting Martha Roby for being funded by “special interests working to privatize Medicare.” The ad is no longer publicly available on YouTube, though.

AZ-01: Rogue dentist Paul Gosar hits Democrat Ann Kirkpatrick over spending in irritatingly-produced ad

AZ-05: David Schweikert attacks Harry Mitchell on taxes, bailouts, the stimulus, and (ironically) negative ads

AZ-08: Republican Jesse Kelly dubiously claims that he’s running to protect Social Security (despite last year saying: “I would love to eliminate the program.”)

CT-04: Dan Debicella goes after sophomore Dem Rep. Jim Himes on the usual GOP complaints

FL-22: Allen West hides the crazy in his new ad, instead hitting Dem Rep. Ron Klein on the economy

HI-01: Democrat Colleen Hanabusa reintroduces herself to voters

IA-03: GOPer Brad Zaun calls fans of government shrinkage to join his campaign

IL-10: Bob Dold! points the finger at Cap and Trade and Healthcare Reform for economic malaise

NM-02: Steve Pearce says he’ll create jobs somehow

MI-07: Mark Schauer gets a bunch of angry seniors to berate ex-Rep. Tim Walberg over his scary views on Social Security. I like this one.

MO-03: Republican Ed Martin airs his first ad touting his efforts to save jobs

OH-01: Dem Steve Driehaus says that Steve Chabot won’t stand up to the Tea Party

SC-02: Joe Wilson, via a retired General, hits Democrat Rob Miller on receiving fundraising assistance from MoveOn.org. His second ad touts his job platform. On a related note, Joe Wilson has a startlingly robotic voice – he sounds like something a Macintosh LC 630’s speech synthesizer would be spitting out in 1994.

UT-02: Republican Morgan Philpot urges change in his first spot, and says that he’s gonna “wear this sucker out” in ad #2

WI-08: Roofing contractor Reid Ribble touts his record of teaching high school volleyball

NRCC ads: AL-02, AZ-01, CA-11, FL-02, KY-06, MS-01, TX-17, VA-05, WI-07

AK-Sen: On the topic of Lisa Murkowski’s declaration that she’s “still in this game” and her outreach efforts to a polite but seemingly unenthused Alaska Libertarian Party, The Mudflats sums up the situation pretty well:

   * She’s not technically in the race right now

   * She’s not out of the race

   * She’s not a quitter

   * She is who she is

   * She will likely not run as a Libertarian

   * She will likely not run as a write-in

   * She doesn’t know what she’s doing

NH-Sen: Businessman Bill Binnie is throwing down another $500K of his own money, with the GOP primary just a week in the way. Though ex-AG Kelly Ayotte leads in what little polling there’s been, I think this race is still up for grabs.

NV-Sen: The LVRJ has a detailed profile on Sharron Angle’s tumultuous years in the state Assembly, where votes in the 42-member body were often “41 to Angle.”

CO-Gov: Some Colorado Republicans are suing to try to knock Tom Tancredo off the ballot, saying his candidacy violates the American Constitution Party’s bylaws. Even if they’re right, I wonder if they have standing.

FL-08: Alan Grayson claims he raised half a million bucks in August, and says he has more than a million on hand, despite prepaying for a bunch of television advertising.

FL-24: GOPer Sandy Adams (and the NRCC, apparently) are touting a Public Opinion Strategies internal which has her leading Rep. Suzanne Kosmas 49-37.

HI-01: Colleen Hanabusa outraised Rep. Charles Djou in the pre-primary fundraising period, $330K to $206K. But Djou has slightly more cash on hand, $428K to $404K.

NY-14: Some Democrat she is. When asked by a reporter if she would vote for her opponent – not even endorse, just vote – in the general if she lost the primary, Reshma Saujani said she “didn’t know” whether she would pull the lever for Rep. Carolyn Maloney. I’ve been adamantly opposed to Saujani’s candidacy since I first learned about her, and with good reason. But this may be the most disgusting thing she’s said so far. How can I possibly trust the Democratic bona fides of someone who can’t even say if she’ll vote Democrat in her own district? And no, her campaign’s belated attempt to claim she’ll “vote a straight ticket” does not assuage me in the least. When the cameras were rolling and the pressure was on, Saujani admitted she wasn’t a team player. We don’t need people like her in Congress.

Turnout (PDF): According to data compiled by the Center for the Study of the American Electorate, the “average percentage of eligible citizens who voted in the primaries of each major political party” shows more a greater share of Republicans voting in primaries this year than Dems for the first time since 1930. Of course, 1930 was a pretty good year for Dems… but the trendlines are not inspiring.

SSP TV:

GA-Sen: GOP Sen. Johnny Isakson, not a guy you traditionally think of as being endangered (if you’ve ever even heard of him) touts his conservative record

NH-Sen: Paul Hodes compares Washington to… a hot dog eating contest

NV-Sen: Harry Reid continues to produce some of the best negative ads of the cycle

OH-Sen: We mentioned this ad in yesterday’s digest, wherein Lee Fisher sez: “Congressman Rob Portman knows how to grow the economy… in China!” Our update is that a GOPer says the buy is for $1.4 million and that the ad is running in Columbus and northern OH

FL-Gov: Alex Sink responds to Rick Scott’s attack ads, which she says are all about Obama, not Florida

CA-11: Jerry McNerney’s first ad, touting his support for veterans’ causes (I like that he has an actual veteran do the talking – much better than the usual candidate bragging or hackneyed voiceover)

CA-45: Dem Steve Pougnet is on the air with his first ad, kicking off a reported $100K/week TV & radio ad blitz from now through election day

CO-04: Betsy Markey has an anti-spending spot

NM-01: Republican Jon Barela has an ad complaining about the debt

NM-02: Harry Teague is up with his first ad of the cycle, a surprisingly authentic 60-second spot that’s worth watching

NM-02: Meanwhile, Americans for Job Security hits Teague over his vote for cap-and-trade (a “one-week” buy)

NY-02: If Steve Israel is worried enough to go up on the air….

VA-02: Glenn Nye touts his work to keep an aircraft carrier at Hampton Roads