Tag: George Pataki

• IA-Sen/Gov: The newest Des Moines Register poll by Selzer & Co. has some appalling numbers for Democrats. In the Senate race, Chuck Grassley leads Democratic challenger Roxanne Conlin 57-30. And in the gubernatorial race, incumbent Dem Chet Culver trails Republican ex-Gov. Terry Branstad by almost as wide a margin, 57-33 (with Culver also trailing conservative GOPer Bob vander Plaats 45-37, although Culver beats several other GOP minor-leaguers). A 24-point beatdown is hard to believe given Culver’s poor-but-not-abysmal 40/49 approval rating, and this is way out of line with R2K‘s polling last month, but this being Iowa, I’d be hesitant to bet against Selzer. (Discussion already well underway in desmoinesdem’s two diaries.)

• IL-Sen: Rep. Jan Schakowsky, who was considered a likely candidate in this race for a long time but eventually backed down, endorsed state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias in the Democratic primary. Giannoulias now has the endorsement of five of Illinois’s twelve House Dems. Also today, Patrick Hughes, the conservative alternative to establishment GOP pick Rep. Mark Kirk, is in DC looking for support from conservative movement poohbahs. The DSCC has a well-worth-seeing video out detailing Kirk’s transparent shift to the right (especially his pleas for help from Sarah Palin) as he seeks to fight off primary challenges.

• MA-Sen: The voter registration deadline to be able to participate in the primary special election to replace Ted Kennedy is this Wednesday. The primary itself is Dec. 8.

• NY-Sen-B, NY-Gov (pdf): Siena’s monthly look at the Empire State shows a little improvement for Kirsten Gillibrand, who now narrowly leads ex-Gov. George Pataki, 45-44. She loses 49-43 to Rudy Giuliani; weirdly, while the rumor mill has until very recently had Pataki likelier to make the Senate race than Giuliani, Pataki now seems much likelier to run for President, while Liz Benjamin is now wondering if Giuliani‘s recent bout of national security saber-rattling shows he’s more likely to run for Senate than Governor.

Meanwhile, Siena has yet another installment in the ongoing David Paterson implosion. Paterson’s approval is down to 21/79, 69% would prefer to elect someone else, and he now loses the Democratic primary to Andrew Cuomo by a 59-point margin (75-16) while, in a first, also losing the general to Rick Lazio (42-39) as well as, natch, Giuliani (56-33). Cuomo defeats Giuliani 53-41 and Lazio 67-22. Latest Cuomo rumors involve him trying to assemble a whole slate to run with, and central to that is recruiting outgoing NYC comptroller William Thompson to run for state comptroller. Having the African-American Thompson on a ‘ticket’ with him would take some of the awkwardness out of Cuomo elbowing aside an African-American governor to avoid a replay of the 2002 gubernatorial primary. Cuomo also wants a female AG (possibly Nassau Co. DA Kathleen Rice) and an upstate LG to balance everything out. Still, that would set up a hot Democratic primary between Thompson and incumbent comptroller Thomas DiNapoli; there’s some tension between Cuomo and DiNapoli, though, so that’s another instance of two birds, one stone. Finally, in case there were any doubts, Hillary Clinton confirmed that she has no intention of getting in the gubernatorial race.

• SC-Sen: Lindsey Graham, although not up until 2014, could be going the way of Olympia Snowe. There are leaks of private polls showing that more Republicans oppose Graham than support him, and that his support among independents is dwindling too. I guess that’s what happens when you vote the party line only 93% of the time.

• TX-Sen: Little-noticed in the announcement on Friday that Kay Bailey Hutchison was going to delay her resignation until after the gubernatorial primary election in March means that, unless she does it immediately afterwards, the special election won’t be held until November 2010. Conventional wisdom is that this is good for the GOP, as the seat will be easier to hold as part of a larger election instead of on its own. (Of course, that assumes KBH resigns at all assuming she loses the gubernatorial primary, which somehow I doubt.) The Austin American-Statesman also has a good rundown on what the delay means to all of the potential players in the special election.

• ME-Gov: The Maine governor’s race may well wind up as crowded as the one in Minnesota: we’re up to 21 candidates, although most of them are minor. One more medium-to-big name is getting in today on the Dem side, though: John Richardson, the former House speaker and current commissioner of the state Dept. of Economic and Community Development. Current Conservation Commissioner Patrick McGowan is also looking likely to get in the Dem field.

• WY-Gov: Former US Attorney Matt Mead has formed an exploratory committee to run for the Republican nomination in next year’s gubernatorial race in Wyoming. He joins state House speaker Colin Simpson and ex-state Rep. Ron Micheli in the hunt. Mead, you may recall, was one of the finalists to be picked to replace Craig Thomas in the Senate, but that post went to John Barrasso.

• IL-11: This isn’t the way to get your campaign off on the right foot: Adam Kinzinger, who has the insider backing for the GOP nomination in the 11th, stormed out prior to a debate held by Concerned Taxpayers United against his primary competition when one of them, David McAloon, had a staffer with a video camera present. The base in the district is already suspicious of Kinzinger, and ticking them off this way can’t help.

• NY-25: One race in a swing district that hasn’t been on anyone’s radar is NY-25, held by freshman Dem Dan Maffei. He’s drawn two potential challengers, wealthy ex-turkey farmer Mark Bitz and former Syracuse Common Councilor Ann Marie Buerkle. Bitz hasn’t held office before, but says he’s prepared to loan himself a “substantial amount” of money. He’ll need it, as Maffei has been one of the freshman class’s top fundraisers.

• TN-01: Fans of wingnut-on-wingnt action may be disappointed to hear that it sounds unlikely for ex-Rep. David Davis to take on slightly-more-mainstream Rep. Phil Roe (who knocked out Davis in a 2008 primary) next year. Although he’s been staying visible at local tea parties, Davis is focusing on paying down campaign debt from last time.

• UT-02: It doesn’t sound like Rep. Jim Matheson is going to face a primary over his health care vote after all; state Sen. Scott McCoy said he didn’t intend to go after Matheson, citing the difficulty of a run given the overall composition of the GOP-leaning district.

• Biden Alert: Joe Biden is in the midst of a western swing, doing a Sunday fundraiser for Rep. Dina Titus. Today he’s holding events for Ann Kirkpatrick, Harry Mitchell, Martin Heinrich, and Harry Teague, bringing the total to 26 for vulnerable House Dems he’s campaigned for. Biden will also be in Connecticut next month for a Chris Dodd fundraiser.

• NRCC: To avoid a repeat of NY-23, the NRCC has basically turned the vetting process over to Grover Norquist and friends. Norquist said that at a recent meeting between the NRCC and conservative movementarians, 40 recruits were discussed and they apparently all met the litmus test (although Norquist grudgingly admitted that some of the northeasterners were “as good as it gets”).

• WATN?: Ex-Rep. Bill Jefferson’s going to the big house. On Friday, he was sentenced to 13 years in prison after his August conviction for money laundering and wire fraud; this is the longest sentence ever handed out to a former Congressman.

• Maps: As if electoral junkies didn’t have enough online tools to geek out over, now there’s this: super-helpful step-by-step instructions on how to generate a county-by-county map of the country on, well, whatever topic you want, using only free tools instead of expensive GIS software.

• Site News: We were so busy following the off-year elections that we didn’t notice it at the time, but last month, the Swing State Project welcomed its seven millionth visitor. (Number six million came this past March.) Thanks, everyone! (D)

• CA-Sen, CA-Gov: A new LA Times/USC poll (conducted by GQR and POS) finds a dead heat in the GOP Senate primary: conservative Assemblyman Chuck DeVore and vapid ex-HP CEO Carly Fiorina are deadlocked at 27 each (despite the fact that DeVore is almost entirely unknown, with favorables of 6/4 — the deal is that Fiorina is, other than Ahnold, the state’s only political figure with negative favorables, at 9/12). They also looked at the GOP field in the governor’s race and find ex-eBay CEO Meg Whitman leading the field at 35, followed by ex-Rep. Tom Campbell at 27 and Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner at 10. No general election matchups, but probably the most disspiriting number of all is that a whopping 80% of all Californians think the state’s best days are behind it.

• FL-Sen: This seemed already pretty well established when they ran an anti-Crist ad last week, but it was made official today: the Club for Growth endorsed Marco Rubio in his primary challenge to Charlie Crist. Mmmmmm… cat fud.

• IL-Sen: State treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, whose easy path to the nomination seems to have gotten at least something of an obstacle in its way with the candidacy of former Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman, got a key endorsement: Rep. Luis Gutierrez. Giannoulias now has the endorsement of four of the state’s House Dems.

• KS-Sen: Also on the endorsement front, Rep. Jerry Moran got one today in the Kansas Senate GOP primary from Arizona’s Rep. Jeff Flake. Kind of odd, as Flake is one of the most conservative House members and Moran is the ‘moderate’ option in the race, but Flake is more on the libertarian side of things rather than a theocon.

• MA-Sen: Finally, something is happening in the sleepy Massachusetts Senate special election Democratic primary. Rep. Michael Capuano hit AG Martha Coakley from the left, attacking her for support for the death penalty, and the PATRIOT Act (Capuano was one of the few to vote against it). And now Coakley is saying she would have voted against the entire health care bill because of the Stupak poison pill, for which Capuano is now attacking her from the right (or at least the pragmatic).

• MT-Sen: Republican Rep. Denny Rehberg pushed back a bit against rumors last week that he was gearing up to run for Senate against Jon Tester in 2012, saying he had no “immediate” plans to run. Rehberg didn’t categorically rule it out, though.

• NH-Sen: He’s been acting like a candidate all year, but Ovide Lamontagne made it official: he’s running for the GOP Senate nomination in New Hampshire. Lamontagne, a lawyer who defeated the establishment candidate in the GOP gubernatorial primary in 1996 (and went onto get demolished in the general), is probably the highest-profile primary challenger to establishment choice ex-AG Kelly Ayotte.

• NY-Sen-B: In case it wasn’t clear that ex-Gov. George Pataki is interesting in running for President, not Senator, he’s making another appearance in Iowa tomorrow, addressing the Scott County GOP Ronald Reagan Dinner in Davenport.

• PA-Sen: Here’s a blast from the past, as one Arlen Specter opponent passed the torch to another. Lynn Yeakel, who lost the 1992 Senate race to Specter by only 3% amidst the media-designated “Year of the Woman,” threw her support to Rep. Joe Sestak in the Democratic Senate primary on Friday.

• NV-Gov: Las Vegas’s colorful Democratic mayor Oscar Goodman is still mulling over whether to get involved in the gubernatorial race (and sounding pretty lukewarm about it), but he says if he does it, it’ll be as an independent and not as a Democrat, setting up a confusing anything-can-happen three-way in yet another state.

• VA-Gov: Here’s a guy to add to the top of the “Do Not Hire” list right next to Bob Shrum: pollster David Petts, who it turns out is largely responsible for the Creigh Deeds strategy of going nonstop negative against Bob McDonnell, focusing on independents, and distancing himself from Barack Obama.

• IL-07: It was decisionmaking day for Rep. Danny Davis (who had previously signed up for both his House seat and Cook Co. Board President, but had to withdraw one filing today), and it’s a bit of a surprise: he’s running for re-election to the House. He had apparently become worried about the possibility of splitting votes with multiple other African-Americans in the race, so he heads back to his nice safe seat in the House. (The question will now be how many of the prominent local politicos who filed to run for the open seat primary now drop out.)

• IL-10: Democratic State Rep. Julie Hamos, who netted a big cash haul last quarter, is the first to hit the airwaves for the fast-approaching House primary against Dan Seals. She’s running a TV spot touting her stand on health care.

• LA-02: So I guess the future isn’t Cao, anymore? Rep. Joe Cao has drawn a lot of heat for his aisle-crossing on health care, but it doesn’t look like he’ll suffer any meaningful consequences from leadership, and he’s even pushing back against Michael Steele’s comments about “coming after” moderate rank-breakers, in understated fashion, saying “He has the right to come after those members who do not conform to party lines, but I would hope that he would work with us in order to adjust to the needs of the district and to hold a seat that the Republican party would need.” Also, Cao has picked up an unusual ally: Alaska’s Rep. Don Young is defending Cao’s vote and even stood watch over Cao as he cast his vote, fending off the horde of GOP arm-twisters.

• NY-23: One of the lingering questions from last week: what the heck happened to all those Doug Hoffman voters that the polls showed? Mark Blumenthal assesses that most voters simply were in flux over that last weekend of polling as two separate events scrambled the status quo, and only made up their mind shortly before voting — and that, in the end, Scozzafava voters disliked Hoffman more than they disliked Owens.

• PA-11: Hazleton mayor and narrow 2008 loser Lou Barletta is still trying to decide on a rematch with Rep. Paul Kanjorski. He’s set a timeline for a late November decision.

• CA-LG: Moderate Republican state Senator Abel Maldonado seems to have the inside track on getting appointed as California’s new Lt. Governor (left vacant by John Garamendi’s election to the House), according to rumormongers. Maldonado seems the likeliest because he’s about the only Republican who can clear the Democratic-controlled legislature, and Dems like the idea because he’d leave behind a Dem-leaning Senate district on the central coast that would be a good pickup target in a special election. There’s also one other GOP-held vacancy coming up in the state Senate (SD-37, a traditionally Republican area in the Inland Empire but one where Obama won), vacated by John Benoit (who became a Riverside Co. Commissioner). Democratic Palm Springs school board member Justin Blake is already running there (along with possibly three different Republican Assemblymen), so there may be two good opportunities for Dems to get closer to the magic 2/3s mark in the Senate.

• NY-St. Ass.: As the orgy of own-eating continues, the rest of the Assembly’s GOP leadership is considering stripping Dede Scozzafava of her status as minority leader pro tem (in retribution for her Bill Owens endorsement). If they do, start counting down the days until she switches parties.

• TX-St. House: Hopes still persist that the Dems can flip the Texas state House in 2010, where they were down only 76-74, but that got pushed back to 77-73 last week when long-time Democrat Chuck Hopson, representing a very conservative rural area in NE Texas, switched to the Republicans. Hopson still might not be able to save his butt; a GOP primary challenger, Michael Banks, already jumped in for 2010.

• HCR Vote: The AFSCME and HCAN are running “thank you” ads in 20 different districts for vulnerable Dems who voted for health care reform.

• Parties: I suppose it was only a matter of time before some clever wingnut figured this out. A conservative Orlando lawyer registered an official “Tea Party” with the secretary of state, making it one of 32 minor parties recognized in Florida.

• Polling: PPP wants your help! They’re asking for polling suggestions in their blog comments, and also have a poll up on where to go next (Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Missouri, or Ohio?).

• FL-Sen: It looks like the Club for Growth has decided to weigh in on the Florida Senate primary, and they’re doing so with a vengeance, with a TV spot going after Charlie Crist’s embrace of the Obama stimulus package. Crist himself has been trying for the last few days to walk back his stimulus support — despite statements on the record from February saying that if he’d been in the Senate, he’d have voted for it. Crist now says he wasn’t “endorsing” it and just playing along so Florida would get a good share of the bennies. (I’m sorry, but my 5-year-old comes up with more convincing excuses than that.)

• NY-Sen-B: Former Gov. George Pataki is reportedly telling friends he’s not that interested in becoming Senator at age 64, and has his eye set a little higher: a presidential race in 2012. The idea of the wooden, moderate Pataki going up against Huckabee and Palin seems a little far-fetched, but a clue in support of that idea is that Pataki joined the Romneys and T-Paws of the world in calling new Manchester, New Hampshire mayor Ted Gatsas to congratulate him. (In case you aren’t connecting the dots, Manchester’s mayor has an outsized influence on NH’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary.)

• AZ-Gov: Appointed incumbent Republican Governor Jan Brewer says she’ll run for a full term in 2010. She already faces several minor primary opponents, and may face off against state Treasurer Dean Martin. Her likely Democratic opponent, AG Terry Goddard, who has had a significant lead over Brewer in recent polls, has to be feeling good about this.

• CA-Gov: Capitol Weekly, via Probolsky Research, takes another look at the primaries in the California gubernatorial race, and find free-spending ex-eBay CEO Meg Whitman opening up a lead on her opponents. Whitman leads with 37, against ex-Rep. Tom Cambell at 15 and Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner at 6. (Their previous poll, in June, gave a small lead to Campbell at 13, with 10 for Whitman and 8 for Poizner.) On the Dem side, ex-Gov. Jerry Brown led SF Mayor Gavin Newsom 46-19; the sample was completed shortly before Newsom’s dropout last Friday.

• MD-Gov: A poll of the Maryland governor’s race from Clarus Research has a mixed bag for incumbent Dem Martin O’Malley. He defeats ex-Gov. Bob Ehrlich without too much trouble in a head-to-head, 47-40, and he has decent approvals at 48/40. Still, on the re-elect question, 39% want to see him re-elected and 48% would like someone new. That would potentially present an opportunity for the Maryland GOP — if they had someone better than Ehrlich to offer, but he’s really the best they have. (By contrast, Barb Mikulski, who’s also up in 2010, has a 53/36 re-elect.)

• OR-Gov: Moderate Republican state Sen. Frank Morse — who, without Rep. Greg Walden or state Sen. Jason Atkinson in the race, might actually have been the GOP’s best bet — said no thanks to a gubernatorial race despite some previous interest; he’ll run for re-election in 2010. Former Portland Trail Blazers center Chris Dudley has formed an exploratory committee to run in the Republican field, though.

• PA-Gov: Here’s an interesting development in the GOP primary field in Pennsylvania: a very conservative state Rep., Sam Rohrer, is scoping out the race and has formed an exploratory committee. Rohrer isn’t well-known outside of conservative activist circles and his Berks County base, but against the moderate Rep. Jim Gerlach and the generally-conservative but ill-defined AG Tom Corbett, he seems like he could peel off a decent chunk of votes on the far right.

• VT-Gov: Add two more Democratic names to the lengthening list in the governor’s race in Vermont. Former state Senator Matt Dunne officially got in the race, and another state Senator, Peter Shumlin, is planning to announce his bid in several weeks. Dunne lost the Lt. Governor’s race in 2006 to current Republican LG Brian Dubie, who is the only declared Republican candidate to replace retiring Gov. Jim Douglas.

• WI-Gov: Rumors keep flying of the Obama administration leaning on ex-Rep. and Milwaukee mayor Tom Barrett to run for Wisconsin governor. WH political director Tom Patrick Gaspard met with Barrett. With Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton having recently and surprisingly dropped her bid, Barrett has a free shot if he wants it.

• AZ-03: Dems seem close to pinning down a candidate to run against Rep. John Shadegg in the Phoenix-based 3rd. Lawyer, businessman, would-be-novelist, and former Gary Hart staffer Jon Hulburd is prepping for the race.

• FL-05: The blood is already flowing down Republican streets in the wake of the NY-23 debacle, even a thousand miles away. Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite, hardly the first name that comes to mind when you think of moderate Republicans (although she is a Main Street member), is now being challenged by a political newcomer in the GOP primary, Jason Sager. One of Sager’s key talking points is Brown-Waite’s support of Dede Scozzafava, on whose behalf Brown-Waite campaigned last week. And more generally, RNC chair Michael Steele (who one week ago was supporting Scozzafava) is flexing his muscles, telling moderates to “walk a little bit carefully” on health care or “we’ll come after you.”

• FL-08: The NRCC has found a couple willing patsies to go up against Rep. Alan Grayson, whom they’ve been interviewing this week. The two contenders are businessman Bruce O’Donoghue (who owns a traffic-signal business… odd, but I guess somebody has to make them) and first-term state Rep. Eric Eisnaugle. (Carpetbagging real estate developer Armando Gutierrez Jr., radio talk show host Todd Long, who nearly beat then-Rep. Ric Keller in last year’s GOP primary, and three anonymous teabaggers are all in the race, but clearly not striking the NRCC’s fancy.) Attorney Will McBride (whose name you might remember from 2006, when he ran in the GOP primary against Katherine Harris) also talked with the NRCC this week, but just pulled his name from contention today.

• MN-01: Another potential challenger to Rep. Tim Walz popped up: former state Rep. Allen Quist. Quist, who ran in gubernatorial primaries twice in the 1990s, is from the state party’s right wing and is a key Michele Bachmann ally (his wife used to Bachmann’s district director). Republican Lt. Gov. Carol Molnau has also been interested in the race.

• MS-01: After all that work to clear the path for state Sen. Alan Nunnelee in the GOP primary in the 1st, the Republicans may still see a contested primary. Former Eupora mayor Henry Ross is seriously considering the race, and making preparations. This may not result in a pitched rural vs. suburbs battle like the previous primary, though; Eupora (pop. 2,400) is near the district’s southern end, near Columbus. Nunnelee is from the Tupelo area, which is also Democratic Rep. Travis Childers’ base.

• NH-02: Katrina Swett has been slow to get into the field in the Democratic primary for the open seat in the 2nd, letting Anne McLane Kuster raise more than $200K unimpeded and secure the EMILY’s List endorsement. Swett may be ready to make a move, though, as she’s been touting a GQR internal poll giving her a 20-point lead in the primary over Kuster. (The actual polling memo hasn’t been released, though, as far as I know.)

• NY-23: Doug Hoffman already has a key House leadership backer for a 2010 race: Indiana’s Mike Pence endorsed Hoffman.

• PA-06: Looks like we have a real race in the Dem primary in the 6th. State Sen. Andy Dinniman, one of the biggest fish in the district and someone who had considered running himself, endorsed physician Manan Trivedi instead of presumed frontrunner Doug Pike. One advantage that Dinniman sees is that Trivedi hails from Reading in Berks County, the part of the district where Dems have traditionally been the weakest.

• Turnout: If you’re wondering what the crux of what happened on Tuesday is, it boils down to terrible turnout. (And it’s pretty clear that higher turnout benefits Democrats, as younger and/or non-white voters who tend to be less likely voters are more likely to vote Democratic.) In Virginia (where the outcome seemed clear long ago), turnout was the lowest in 40 years, including a 10% falloff in key black precincts. And in New Jersey, turnout was also a record low for the state, even though the race was a tossup — indicating a lack of enthusiasm for either candidate. If you want to dig into exit polls for a post-mortem, the New York Times has them available for New York, New Jersey, and Virginia.

• 2010: The White House (or at least David Axelrod) wants to nationalize the 2010 elections, as a means of fixing the Dems’ turnout problems from this week. Expect to see Obama front and center in the run-up to next year’s elections.

• Illinois Filings: With Illinois’s first-in-the-nation filing deadline for 2010 having passed, as usual, our filings guru Benawu is on the scene with a recap in the diaries; check it out.

• CO-Sen: Former state Sen. Tom Wiens made it official; he’s entering the Republican field in the Senate race. With former Lt. Governor Jane Norton wearing the mantle of establishment anointment in this race, Wien’s entry may actually help Norton, by taking non-Norton votes away from conservative Weld County DA Ken Buck. Wiens is a wealthy rancher prepared to put up to half a million of his own dollars into the race.

• FL-Sen: If anyone has to sweating the movement conservatives’ takedown of the pre-selected moderate establishment candidate in NY-23, it’s gotta be Charlie Crist. Here’s one more thing for him to worry about: his job approval according to a new St. Petersburg Times poll is only 42/55. They don’t have him in as dire straits against Marco Rubio in the GOP primary as a number of other pollsters, though — Crist leads Rubio 50-28 — but the ultimate indignity is on the question of whether respondents would choose Crist or Jeb Bush to lead Florida right now, 47% opt for Bush (with 41 for Crist). On the Dem side, Rep. Kendrick Meek leads newly-announced former Miami mayor Maurice Ferre 26-6.

• IL-Sen, IL-07: There a lots of interesting plot lines forming as today is the filing deadline in Illinois. But the big one is: what the hell is up with Patrick Hughes? The real estate developer was considered to be the right-wingers’ go-to guy to against alleged moderate Rep. Mark Kirk in the GOP primary, but now rumors are swirling that he doesn’t have the signatures to qualify. There also seem to be some major ball-droppings for progressives: there’s nobody challenging Rep. Dan Lipinski in the primary in IL-03, and there’s nobody, period, to go up against GOP Rep. Peter Roskam in the R+0 IL-06. In the 7th, where it’s unclear whether Rep. Danny Davis will be coming back or not (he’s filed for his seat, but also for Cook County Board President), he’s facing primary competition from only one elected official: state Sen. Rickey Hendon (Cook Co. Deputy Recorder of Deeds Darlena Williams-Burnett is also a big name, but I don’t think deputy recorder is an elected position). Hendon says he’ll bail out and run for Lt. Governor if Davis sticks around.

Meanwhile, on the Senate front, state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias is touting his own internal poll from GQR giving him a 3-point edge on Rep. Mark Kirk in a general election, 46-43. The same poll finds less-known Democrat former Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman trailing Kirk 48-39.

• IN-Sen: Research 2000 (on behalf of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, rather than Kos) found last week that Blanche Lincoln was in serious trouble electorally and that her troubles would mount if she opposed health care reform. They also looked at Evan Bayh, and they found that, a) he’s not in trouble (62/30 approvals, although no head-to-head test against his erstwhile opponent, state Sen. Marlin Stutzman), and b) a majority wouldn’t be moved one way or the other by his health care actions.

• MA-Sen: The start of debates haven’t done much to reshape things in the Democratic primary in the special election in the Bay State. AG Martha Coakley holds a 25-point lead over Rep. Michael Capuano, according to an R2K poll commissioned by local blog Blue Mass Group. Coakley is at 42 and Capuano at 16, with Stephen Pagliuca at 15 and Alan Khazei at 5. Only 52% of Coakley’s voters are firm about it, though, but that’s not much different from any of the other candidates.

• FL-Gov: That aforementioned St. Petersburg Times poll also looked at the governor’s race, and they gave Democratic CFO Alex Sink her first lead in a while; she’s up a single point on GOP AG Bill McCollum, 38-37. More trouble for McCollum: state Senator Paula Dockery, as threatened, now appears to be jumping into the Republican primary, which had been painstakingly cleared for him.

• MN-Gov: If a candidate falls in the Minnesota gubernatorial Republican field, does it make a sound? State Rep. Paul Kohls dropped out, having not gotten much traction according to recent straw polls. That leaves approximately eleventy-seven zillion Republicans left in the hunt.

• VA-Gov: He’s dead, Jim. Four more polls on VA-Gov are out:

YouGov (pdf): McDonnell 53, Deeds 40

Mason-Dixon: McDonnell 53, Deeds 41

PPP (pdf): McDonnell 56, Deeds 42

SurveyUSA: McDonnell 58, Deeds 40

• MI-07: Unseated wingnut Tim Walberg — who’d like to get his job back from freshman Dem Mark Schauer — has some company in the GOP primary next year: attorney and Iraq vet Brian Rooney (the brother of Florida Rep. Tom Rooney) is getting in the race. It’s not clear whether Rooney is any more moderate than Walberg, though; he’s an attorney for the right-wing Thomas More Law Center, the theocons’ answer to the ACLU.

• NY-23: A few more odds and ends in the 23rd. One more key Republican endorser working for Doug Hoffman now is Rudy Giuliani (like George Pataki, not the likeliest fellow you’d expect to see make common cause with the Conservative Party — with neither of them having ruled out 2010 runs, they seem to want to be in good graces with the national GOP, who are all-in for Hoffman now). Rudy’s crack team of robots is making calls on his behalf. Another possible useful endorsement: Watertown’s mayor Jeff Graham is now backing Hoffman. Former candidate Dede Scozzafava, on the other hand, is now cutting robocalls on Democrat Bill Owens’ behalf. Finally, here’s an ill omen on the motivation front: sparse turnout was reported for Joe Biden‘s appearance on behalf of Owens.

• PA-06: One more Republican is getting in the field in the open seat race in the 6th: Howard Cohen, a consultant who is the former Revenue Secretary from the Dick Thornburgh administration decades ago. He’ll face a financial gap against pharma exec Steven Welch, and a name rec gap against state Rep. Curt Schroder, though.

• AL-AG: One incumbent who looks badly endangered going into 2010 is Alabama’s Republican Attorney General, Troy King. Having buddied up with the state’s trial lawyers (thus angering the local business establishment) and also pissed off many local DAs by interfering in their cases, King has lost most establishment support in the upcoming GOP primary against Luther Strange. Two of Strange’s biggest backers are both of the state’s Senators, Jeff Sessions and Richard Shelby.

• ME-Init: Two more polls on Maine’s Question 1 (where “yes” is a vote to overturn the state’s gay marriage law), both pointing to an excruciatingly close vote. PPP (taken over the weekend) sees it passing 51-47, while Research 2000 (taken last week) gives a tiny edge to “no,” 47-48. (R2K also confirms that Olympia Snowe’s numbers are way off; the once bulletproof Snowe now has approvals of 50/44.)

• NYC: Three more polls all show Michael Bloomberg with an easy path to a third term, beating Democratic comptroller William Thompson. Bloomberg leads 50-38 according to Quinnipiac, 53-42 according to SurveyUSA, and 53-38 according to Marist (pdf).

• Mayors: There are fresh polls in a few other mayoral races. In St. Petersburg, Florida, one of the most hotly contended races around, Bill Foster leads Kathleen Ford 48-44 according to SurveyUSA. (Foster leads among both blacks and conservatives.) The racially polarized race in Charlotte gives a small edge to the conservative white candidate, Andy Lassiter, who leads 50-46 over Anthony Foxx. And in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, all we know is that someone with a difficult-to-spell last name will be mayor. Matt Czajkowski leads Mark Kleinschmidt 45-44. (Czajkowski seems to be the conservative and Kleinschmidt the liberal.)

• State legislatures: In case there wasn’t enough to focus on tomorrow, Josh Goodman points to five legislative special elections tomorrow. The big one is Michigan‘s 19th Senate district, which was vacated by Democratic Rep. Mark Schauer. Republican former state Rep. Mike Nofs may have an edge for the pickup against Democratic state Rep. Martin Griffin, at least based on fundraising. There are also Dem-held seats up in Alabama’s 65th House district, Missouri’s 73rd House district, and Washington’s 16th House district (the reddest Dem-held seat in Washington), and a GOP-held seat in South Carolina’s 48th House district. (UPDATE: TheUnknown285 points us to a whopping seven legislative seats up from grabs in Georgia, too, in his diary.)

• NRCC: Pete Sessions Deathwatch, Vol. 1? This seems odd, given that he’s had some pretty good success on the recruiting front, but apparently the behind-closed-doors potshots are hitting NRCC head Sessions just as heavily as they did Tom Cole last cycle. The complaints aren’t about recruiting, though, but rather about fundraising, where the NRCC is still lagging the DCCC despite the superficial conventional wisdom that Republicans come into 2010 with momentum, and about not keeping enough of a lid on all those nagging intraparty skirmishes that somehow only the blogosphere ever seems to notice.

• Polling: Mark Blumenthal has a thought-provoking piece on polling the cap-and-trade issue. The key problem: no one knows exactly what it is (reminiscent of polling the public option question, too).

• Voting: States are still trying to figure out what to do about the new federal law intended to make sure that military ballots from overseas get counted. At least a dozen states are now actively considering moving their September primaries up in the calendar to comply (including Minnesota, Vermont, Delaware, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin).

• VA-Gov: It’s grown exceedingly hard to see a path to victory for Creigh Deeds in Virginia’s gubernatorial race. The polls aren’t closing (if anything, the gap may be widening), and there’s less than two weeks until election day. What’s more, the highest echelons of the Democratic Party are now distancing themselves from Deeds, saying he rejected Barack Obama & Tim Kaine’s “road map to victory.” The Swing State Project is therefore changing its rating on this race from Lean R to Likely R. (D)

Also, while the second-guessing has begun, PPP suggests that it’s just a bad year for Dems and/or a strong opponent in Bob McDonnell: they found that if Tim Kaine had been able to run for re-election, he’d be losing too, 51-43. Nevertheless, 57% think that governors should be able to run for re-election in Virginia (which is the only state left that doesn’t allow gubernatorial re-elections), with 35% opposed. Still, Kaine probably wouldn’t be running anti-cap-and-trade ads as Deeds is doing in the state’s southwest; with the public option already with the Deeds’ bus treads all over it, it’s one more reason for the Democratic base to lose interest in him.

• CA-Sen: The war between movement conservative candidate Chuck DeVore and the NRSC just keeps building. DeVore is calling attention to a seemingly loose-lips quote from Carly Fiorina that “the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee has encouraged me to enter the race, reaffirming my belief that Chuck DeVore cannot beat Barbara Boxer,” which he says contradicts the NRSC’s claim they haven’t endorsed in the race. Of course, that’s not really an endorsement per se, but his camp also claims that the NRSC has rebuffed his attempts to dialogue with them.

• IA-Sen: Wealthy attorney and one-time Democratic gubernatorial candidate Roxanne Conlin seems to be moving closer to a matchup with Chuck Grassley. She’s says she’s “more likely than not” to step up. While Grassley would start out with the edge, it would push one more competitive race onto the map for 2010.

• MA-Sen: Rep. Michael Capuano pulled down the endorsement of the state’s biggest union in his Democratic primary bid in the special Senate election: the 107,000-member Massachusetts Teachers Association. Capuano has a 96% rating from the MTA’s national affiliate, the National Education Association.

• NV-Sen: Former Assemblywoman Sharron Angle has made it official: she’s getting into the Nevada Senate race. She had sounded hesitant earlier, but she’s emboldened either by her fundraising or by the general climate for conservative candidates right now to jump in. This sets up a confusing and potentially bloody 5-way primary in the Nevada GOP primary (although there’s likely to be some field winnowing before then), and potentially, Angle could sneak through with, say, 33%, if she consolidates the hard-right/Club for Growth/teabagger vote (remember that she was the CfG’s candidate in the open seat primary in NV-02 in 2006, where she barely lost to Dean Heller). With the opposition consisting of an establishment-backed but empty-suitish candidate in Sue Lowden, a random rich guy (John Chachas), a random name-recognition guy (Danny Tarkanian), and Mark Amodei as seemingly what passes for a moderate in the race, she seems likeliest to become the standard-bearer on the movement conservative right, especially if she somehow gets a CfG endorsement again. And the hard-right Angle would be a rather less imposing general election candidate for Harry Reid than, say, Lowden.

• NY-Sen-B: Former Governor George Pataki seems to be taking note of polls showing him competitive with Kirsten Gillibrand in the Senate race, although he doesn’t sound enthusiastic about it. His spokesperson tells the Daily News that he’ll make a decision about the race in the coming weeks, but “friends” say that he’s leaning toward “no.”

• UT-Sen: The name of Tim Bridgewater (the former Utah County GOP chair who’s lost several primary elections) surfaced earlier in the year in connection with a GOP primary challenge to Bob Bennett in the Senate race, but faded away as AG Mark Shurtleff seemed to gobble up all the oxygen to Bennett’s right. Suddenly, Bridgewater’s back, saying he’ll join the primary field.

• GA-Gov: Rasmussen has another poll of the gubernatorial primaries in Georgia; the only news is that Thurbert Baker seems to be gaining on ex-gov Roy Barnes. Barnes still has a big lead on the Dem side at 43 (42 in August), followed by Baker at 19 (up from 9 in August), David Poythress at 4, Dubose Porter at 4, and Carl Camon at 3. On the GOP side, Insurance Comm. John Oxendine is in command at 27, with Karen Handel at 12, Nathan Deal at 9, and Eric Johnson, Ray McBerry, and Austin Scott all at 3.

• IL-Gov: Rasmussen also looked at the Illinois governor’s race, apparently as part of their IL-Sen sample from last week; since nobody seems to know who any of the Republicans are, they just ran a Generic D/Generic R ballot, which Generic D won, 43-36. Incumbent Dem Governor Pat Quinn clocks in with approvals that are much lower than any other pollster has seen, at 45/53.

• ME-Gov (pdf): PPP polled the Maine governor’s race as part of its poll on Question 1, and finds what R2K found a few weeks ago, which is that nobody has any idea what’s going on. As with R2K, they found “not sure” dominating the head-to-heads and even the favorability questions. Unlike R2K, though, they found that moderate GOP state Sen. Peter Mills matches up well against the Dems, beating state Sen. President Libby Mitchell 34-31 and ex-AG Steve Rowe 33-25. Mitchell beats rich guy Les Otten 34-26, but Otten beats Rowe 28-26. Meanwhile, one more sorta-prominent Republican now says he’s seriously considering the race: Steve Abbott, who’s currently Susan Collins’ chief of staff.

• NJ-Gov: Two more polls split the difference between Jon Corzine and Chris Christie in New Jersey. Democracy Corps, who’ve usually been Corzine’s most favorable pollster, finds a 3-point race, with Corzine at 42, Christie at 39, and Chris Daggett at 13. SurveyUSA, on the hand, has tended to lean toward Christie and continue to do so, giving him a 2-point lead, with Christie at 41, Corzine at 39, and Daggett at 19. Christie, for his part, is turning for help to the one Republican in New Jersey that most people still like: ex-Governor Tom Kean, who just cut a TV ad on Christie’s behalf.

• RI-Gov: Businessman Rory Smith has announced his candidacy on the Republican side for Rhode Island governor. Insiders are comparing him to current GOP Gov. Don Carcieri, who was also a little-known businessman before winning in 2002; unlike Carcieri, though, Smith is socially liberal. He may have the field to himself; little-known state Rep. Joe Trillo, who was viewed as the default frontrunner after former Senate candidate Stephen Laffey declined, recently said that he too is leaning against the race.

• AK-AL: Trouble just keeps following Republican Rep. Don Young around, and there’s more of it today. A retired oil industry exec from VECO, Bill Allen, told the Justice Department that his company gave paid for fundraising events for Young to the tune of $130K to $195K, and also gave gifts to Young which didn’t get disclosed. This provides the first hard evidence linking Young to the same VECO scandal that took down Ted Stevens last year. Young has not been charged in the matter, although suspicion was cast his way in previous VECO-related testimony. Young, who narrowly won in 2008, faces another competitive race in 2010 (assuming he’s still in office at that point) from Democratic state Rep. Harry Crawford.

• IL-08: On the “some dude” front, businessman (and apparently, not the former Eagles guitarist) Joe Walsh (who ran unsuccessfully against Sidney Yates in the 9th back in the 90s) announced that he’ll run against Melissa Bean in the 8th.

• NY-23: Now that all the cool kids are endorsing Doug Hoffman, the floodgates are starting to open among the cognoscenti of the conservative movement: Rick Santorum endorsed, and so too did former presidential candidate Michael Steve Forbes. Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty, who seems like he’s still trying to decide whether to be establishment or movement in 2012, has his finger in the air but said he’ll probably endorsed and gave a clue by saying he had issues with the way Scozzafava got the nomination.

• VA-05: Also on the “some dude” front, businessman and first-time candidate Ron Ferrin got into the overstuffed Republican field to go against freshman Rep. Tom Perriello. State Sen. Robert Hurt seems to have the inside track, though.

• VA-St. House: One other worry for Democrats in Virginia is that Creigh Deeds’ seeming negative coattails could cost them some seats in the state House of Delegates (where the GOP has a 53-43 edge, with 2 R-caucusing indies and 2 vacancies). Not Larry Sabato gives a preview of the hot races there, helpfully breaking it down into Tossup, Lean, and Likely for us. They see 2 GOP seats and 3 Dem seats as leaning toward takeovers, with 5 true tossups, but a strong McDonnell performance could push things more in the GOP direction.

• Campaign Finance: Here’s an interesting development on the campaign finance arena, although experts are still trying to sort out just what it means. The FEC won’t appeal an appellate court decision that would allow outside groups to spend significantly more money on elections. The case was brought by EMILY’s List; the decision allows them and other 527s to use soft money (in addition to hard money) to pay for ads and GOTV. The Obama administration’s Solicitor General, Elena Kagen, however, can still appeal the case without the FEC’s involvement.

• 2010: It sounds like some of the more timid members of the House Democrats were in need of a pep talk, so Chris Van Hollen of the DCCC sent around a memo with a nice list of bullet points on why 2010 won’t be 1994.

• FL-Sen: Marco Rubio continues to rack up goodwill among the far right, pulling in an endorsement from Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe. Rubio has already gotten a Jim DeMint endorsement; can Tom Coburn be far behind?

• LA-Sen: Southern Media and Opinion Research has a poll (conducted on behalf of local businessman Lane Grigsby, a big Republican donor — you might remember he personally dumped a ton of money into LA-06 last year) of the LA-Sen race that shows numbers remarkably similar to what else we’ve seen. They have David Vitter beating Charlie Melancon 48-36 (while Rasmussen had it at 46-36 a couple weeks ago, and a Melancon internal from last month was 47-37).

• NC-Sen: Erskine Bowles, the guy so pathetic he managed to lose to both carpetbagger Liddy Dole and anonymous Richard Burr, now has nothing but praise for his one-time opponent, saying “I’ve had a chance to work with this guy for four full years and nobody works harder or smarter for North Carolina than Richard Burr does.” At least the DSCC remembers how the game is played, taking Burr to task for voting against the stimulus and now touting his delivery of $2 million in grant money to a local fire department from the stimulus funds that he didn’t vote for.

• NV-Sen: In an indication of just how deep the non-aggression pact between Harry Reid and John Ensign goes, now John Ensign’s parents (who apparently just love to bail out troubled politicians) both contributed the maximum amount to Reid in the third fundraising quarter. Meanwhile, Ensign himself says he’s still willing to campaign on behalf of the Republican nominee against Reid, if he or she just asks. (My advice to Ensign: don’t sit by the phone waiting for those calls.)

• SC-Sen: This is the kind of praise you might not really want: two Republican party chairs from rural counties wrote an op-ed in the Times and Democrat defending Jim DeMint from charges that he didn’t bring enough pork back to South Carolina, saying that Jews got wealthy by watching their pennies and that DeMint was doing the same. The authors later apologized, and, to his credit, DeMint deplored the remark.

• WA-Sen: Here’s some help from Joe Biden for someone who probably doesn’t need the help: Patty Murray, who’s facing very little in the way of opposition and is sitting on more than $4 million CoH. Biden will be appearing at a Seattle fundraiser on Nov. 6. (If you’re wondering who’s stepped up to go against Murray so far, it seems like the GOP’s best prospect right now is Chris Widener, a motivational speaker and president of personal development company Made for Success who’s currently exploring the race. He’ll have to sell a whole lot of Successories posters to be able to compete financially.)

• FL-Gov: Fresh off a disappointing third fundraising quarter, Florida AG Bill McCollum may be facing another dose of bad news — state Sen. Paula Dockery says she is now “leaning very heavily” toward challenging McCollum for the GOP gubernatorial nomination. (J)

• MN-Gov: One more name on the already excruciatingly-long list of gubernatorial candidates in Minnesota: former DFL state Sen. Steve Kelley (who lost the 2000 Senate primary to Mark Dayton in an almost-as-large field). It sounds like he’s trying to brand himself as the “green” candidate this time.

• NJ-Gov (pdf): One more New Jersey poll to add to the pile today, from Monmouth University. They find the race a flat-out tie, with 39 for Jon Corzine and Chris Christie, and 14 for Chris Daggett. (Christie led 43-40-8 one month ago.) In terms of favorables, they both suck: Corzine is at 37/51 and Christie is at 40/41. Corzine did make at least one new friend, though: Michael Kenneth Williams (better known as Omar from The Wire) offers his endorsement.

Meanwhile, Christie now is suffering from a further expansion of the Michele Brown story (remember, she’s the one who got an undisclosed $46K loan from Christie), and, already losing ground in the polls, the timing couldn’t be worse. The New York Times revealed today that, despite their claims otherwise, Brown in fact used her position as Christie’s deputy at least two times to aid the campaign, taking control of a FOIA request about Christie’s stint as US Attorney and pushing up the schedule on the arrests for the 40-person corruption sting so that the arrests would occur before Christie’s permanent successor took over, so he could get the credit.

• NY-Gov, NY-Sen-B (pdf): Yet another Siena poll shows David Paterson in deep doo-doo. The most noteworthy thing about this poll may be that Rudy Giuliani seems to be improving his lot, although he still isn’t taking any steps toward running for anything; Giuliani trails Andrew Cuomo only 50-43 (and beats Paterson 56-33, naturally), and also matches up well against Kirsten Gillibrand for the Senate race, winning that one 53-36. (Other matchups: Cuomo beats Paterson 70-20 in the primary. Cuomo and Paterson both beat Rick Lazio, 66-21 and 39-37. And George Pataki beats Kirsten Gillibrand, 46-41.)

• SC-Gov: Could the end of the road finally be approaching for Mark Sanford? (Assuming that Sarah Palin suddenly shows up and does something else stupid yet captivating, probably not.) A resolution of impeachment will be introduced in the GOP-held legislature during a special session next week. However, actual proceedings, if any, won’t occur until the full session in January.

• VA-Gov (pdf): Two new polls are out in Virginia, and neither one offers Creigh Deeds much cause for optimism. Clarus finds a 49-41 advantage for Bob McDonnell (up from a 42-37 edge last month). And Christopher Newport University for WVEC and the Virginian-Pilot finds, in their first poll of the race, a 45-31 lead for McDonnell (with a lot of undecideds). Meanwhile, former governor Doug Wilder continues to somewhat less than useless in this race, saying that Virginia “won’t sink into the seas” if McDonnell wins.

• AL-07: An internal poll from state Rep. Earl Hilliard Jr. gives us our first insight into the Democratic field in the open seat in this dark-blue district. Jefferson County Commissioner Shelia Smoot leads the field with 24, followed by Hilliard at 17, former Selma mayor James Perkins Jr. at 9, and attorney Terri Sewell at 4. Smoot, who may be the most progressive candidate in the field, benefits from high name recognition (68%), thanks to also being a radio talk show host. Sewell has much lower name recognition (32%) but a big fundraising advantage over everyone else; she’s probably the most moderate option, as seen in her close links to outgoing Rep. Artur Davis and her connections to Birmingham’s business community.

• CA-44: There seems to be some confusion as to whether or not the FBI is investigating GOP Rep. Ken Calvert. Calvert’s investment group apparently bought land that had been slated for development as a public park, which a grand jury found was in violation of state law. Whether or not the FBI is now involved, it’s the kind of publicity that can’t be good for Calvert, who’s facing a tricky rematch against Bill Hedrick in California’s Inland Empire.

• KS-04: One other internal poll to discuss, this time in the Republican field in the 4th. State Sen. Dick Kelsey (who paid for the poll) leads the field at 17, trailed by state Sen. Jean Schodorf at 15, businessman Wink Hartman at 8, and RNC member Mike Pompeo at 6. Whoever wins faces off against Democratic state Rep. Raj Goyle, who’s been on a fundraising tear all of a sudden.

• MN-03: State Sen. Terri Bonoff, who lost the endorsement to Ashwin Media in 2008, is still “open” to running against freshman Republican Erik Paulsen in 2010, which would boost this race back into the top tier. Other Democrats interested in the race include Jim Meffert and Maureen Hackett.

• ME-Init (pdf): PPP polls Maine on Question 1 (the gay marriage initiative) and finds the state evenly split. 48% are in favor, and 48% are against. With a clear party line vote set, it looks like it’ll come down to independents, and they’re currently 50-44 in favor of the initiative (and thus against gay marriage).

• NJ-St. Ass.: While everyone has been focused on the governor’s race, there are also races for all the state Assembly seats in New Jersey in a few weeks as well. Republicans need to pick up eight seats in order to tie the Assembly (with a current Democratic advantage of 48-31). However, the fundraising advantage falls to the Democrats: taken together, Assembly Democrats have raised $6.8 million and spent $4 million, while Republicans have raised $2.9 million and spent $1.2 million. The financial disparity is especially pronounced in the “sleeper” districts where Republicans are counting on being able to make gains.

• Fundraising: There’s an interesting CQ piece on the sudden burst of fundraising among the Indian-American community, as that affluent and educated group gradually becomes more politically engaged. As you might have guessed, strong nationwide fundraising among Indian-Americans is what’s driving the surprisingly strong hauls from Ami Bera in CA-03, Manan Trivedi in PA-06, and Raj Goyle in KS-04.

• AZ-Sen (pdf): John McCain is probably safe for re-election in 2010. PPP released the second half of their Arizona sample, and find McCain beating two strong opponents who seem to have no intention of running anyway: Sec. of Homeland Security and ex-Gov. Janet Napolitano (53-40) and Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (57-30). He also leads Tucson city councilor Rodney Glassman, who is at least a rumored candidate, 55-25. McCain only has 48/42 approvals, but with kind of a bipartisan spin: an unusually low 65% of Republicans approve, while an unusually high 32% of Democrats approve.

• IL-Sen: Facing some unrest on the right flank, the RNC’s Michael Steele has withdrawn sole support from Rep. Mark Kirk in the Illinois Senate GOP primary, according to the Chicago Observer. He’s back to a neutral position, which certainly counts as a victory for Patrick Hughes, who’s been gaining some momentum at coalescing the party’s right-wing. Considering how Kirk acted when Andy McKenna was going to run, is another temper tantrum in the offing? On the Dem side, Alexi Giannoulias got the endorsement of the SEIU, which led his new rival, former Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman, to “go there,” invoking the specter of Rod Blagojevich, who was elected via SEIU support.

• NH-Sen: This isn’t going at all according to plan for Kelly Ayotte (or the NRSC). Yet another random rich GOPer is showing up to scope out the Senate race, the third in a week. Today it’s Jim Bender, an investor who used to be the CEO of Logicraft in the 1990s.

• OH-Sen: Everyone forgets about wealthy auto dealer Tom Ganley in the GOP primary in Ohio against establishment pick Rob Portman, probably because he doesn’t have a built-in constituency. Looks like he’s trying to hook up with the teabaggers as a result, positioning himself as a populist alternative to the free-trading Portman. Ganley is also getting some help from a Republican insider: an endorsement from Bay Buchanan (sister of Pat), pleased by Ganley’s anti-immigrant rhetoric.

• WV-Sen: Looks like Robert Byrd’s stay in the hospital was a lot shorter than his stint this spring; he was released today.

• GA-Gov: Strategic Vision looks at the primary fields in the Georgia governor’s race, and finds not much has changed since last time. For the Dems, ex-Gov. Roy Barnes is at 45%, with Thurbert Baker at 30, David Poythress at 5, and Dubose Porter at 2. (It was 45-29 last month.) For the GOP, Insurance Comm. John Oxendine leads at 38, with Karen Handel at 15, Nathan Deal at 10, and four other guys in single digits. (Oxendine was at 39 last month, although Deal was in 2nd last month at 13, so maybe he took a minor hit from that corruption probe.) No head-to-heads yet, unfortunately.

• MI-Gov: Here’s another poll of a potentially exciting gubernatorial race, but primaries only. An Inside Michigan Politics finds a tight GOP primary, with AG Mike Cox in the lead at 27, followed by Rep. Pete Hoekstra at 23 and Oakland Co. Sheriff Mike Bouchard at 15 (with businessman Rick Snyder and state Sen. Tom George each at 2). Lt. Gov. John Cherry is at 40 in the Dem primary with only light opposition from state Rep. Alma Wheeler Smith (9) and former state Rep. John Freeman (8). A March poll from the same pollster had Cox at 17 and Hoekstra at 15 (but both losing to Oakland Co. Exec L. Brooks Patterson, who isn’t running).

• NJ-Gov: Two very different pictures from partisan pollsters of the New Jersey governor’s race out there. First comes one from Democracy Corps, who have the race as close as anyone has had it since early spring: Chris Christie leads Jon Corzine and Chris Daggett 40-39-11, and Christie has net negative favorables for the first time, at 32/34. (Their poll two weeks ago had Christie up 41-38-10.) The other is Strategic Vision, who see Christie up 46-38-8. Still an improvement from their last poll in July: 53-38-5… like most pollsters, they see Corzine essentially unable to move up, but succeeding in dragging Christie’s numbers down. One more bucket of mud for Corzine to throw at Christie arrived yesterday: news that Christie owned stock in Cendant Corp. at the same time as he was investigating them through the US Attorney’s office.

• NY-Gov, NY-Sen-B (pdf): Marist has a poll out that finds New Yorkers thinking that Barack Obama should butt out of New York governor’s race, by a 62-27 margin. Nevertheless, only 25% think David Paterson should run next year (63% say no); they just want him to arrive at that decision on his own. While the poll doesn’t contain gubernatorial matchups (not that we need any more of them), it does have some Senate numbers, confirming other local pollsters, finding the not-running Rudy Giuliani beating Kirsten Gillibrand 51-40 and the probably-not-running George Pataki beating Gillibrand 45-41.

Meanwhile, the NYT has a profile of a rather melancholy Paterson, saying “I didn’t sign up for this.” They also have a quote that could be seen as hopeful that he may still bail out on seeking another term: “if I got to a point where I thought that my candidacy was hurting my party, obviously it would be rather self-absorbed to go forward.” (Unless he’s made peace with just being self-absorbed.) If you’re wondering what’s taking him so long to make a decision, though, Josh Goodman has a nice pithy summary of the decisionmaking process, not just for Paterson, but all the race’s players:

Paterson thinks he can beat Lazio, but not Giuliani, so he doesn’t want to decide whether he’s running until Giuliani makes up his mind. Giuliani thinks he can beat Paterson, but not Cuomo, so he doesn’t want to decide whether he’s running until Cuomo makes up his mind. Cuomo thinks he can beat anyone, but doesn’t want the messiness of a primary battle, so he doesn’t want to decide whether he’s running until Paterson makes up his mind.

• VA-Gov: It looked briefly like ex-Gov. Doug Wilder might endorse Creigh Deeds after all, but today he backed down and said he won’t endorse. Wilder also leveled some criticism at Deeds for proposing tax increases to fix northern Virginia’s increasingly dire transportation problems. It’s a wtf? moment from the mercurial Wilder, whose endorsement would do a lot to move African-American turnout for Deeds, where he hasn’t generated much excitement yet.

• MO-04: No surprise here, but state Sen. Bill Stouffer made it official that he’ll be taking on 17-term Dem incumbent Ike Skelton in the dark-red 4th. Christian Right former state Rep. Vicky Hartzler is already in the race; Stouffer, however, seems to be working more of a fiscal discipline angle.

• PA-07: While state Rep. Bryan Lentz seems to have the inside track on the Dem nomination (despite no formal announcement), another Democrat is getting in the race: Teresa Touey, a political consultant who has worked for Joe Sestak and Ted Kennedy. One problem for her, though: although she is a native of the 7th, she’s been living in Massachusetts since the early 1990s.

• NYC-Mayor: Quinnipiac finds mayoral results in line with just about everybody else: incumbent Michael Bloomberg leads Dem comptroller William Thompson 52-36, with Conservative Party candidate Stephen Christopher pulling in 2.

• Redistricting: Roll Call has a detailed piece on how the parties are ramping up financially for the post-2010 redistricting fights. A new 501(c)(4), euphemistically titled Making America’s Promise Secure, with Newt Gingrich and Trent Lott among its founders, will be coordinating the effort (since campaign reform passed since 2002 prevents the RNC from using soft money to spearhead the effort now). The DCCC’s counterpart is the National Democratic Redistricting Trust, although a 527, the equally euphemistic Foundation for the Future, looks like it’ll do the financial heavy lifting.

• CO-Sen: Former state House speaker Andrew Romanoff officially kicked off his primary challenge to Michael Bennet yesterday, with appearances in Pueblo, Colorado Springs, and Denver. Romanoff, however, wasted no time in demonstrating that he won’t be running to Bennet’s left, saying that he’s opposed to the card-check portion of EFCA. If he isn’t going to run to Bennet’s left, that leads to the question of: what other kind of an angle can he work, other than just “it’s my turn?”

• IL-Sen: Here’s an interesting development in the Illinois Senate race: EMILY’s List has weighed in, endorsing (surprise) Cheryle Jackson. EMILY’s List isn’t always a magic bullet in these type situations (see Tinker, Nikki), but it does expose Jackson to a nationwide base of donors. Politico does observe something odd, though: EMILY’s List hasn’t endorsed a female Senate candidate who seems to have at least somewhat better odds of making it out of her primary… Jennifer Brunner.

• NY-Sen-B (pdf): Some leftovers from yesterday’s Marist poll of NY-Gov: Kirsten Gillibrand is still having some growing pains, with an approval of 26% excellent or good, 38% fair, and 9% poor (with 27% not sure) and losing a head-to-head against ex-Gov. George Pataki, 48-44 (Pataki has been completely silent on the issue, but you’ve gotta wonder if the consistent numbers are getting him more interested). For yucks and giggles, they also matched Gillibrand up against Eliot Spitzer in a Dem primary, which she won 57-29. (Spitzer also loses a primary to David Paterson 60-31, and receives a general “no” on the issue of running again, 27/69.)

• IL-Gov: State GOP chair Andy McKenna, who briefly provoked a Mark Kirk temper tantrum when he said he’d run in the Illinois senate primary, has decided he still really wants to run for office, and instead has headed over to the Governor’s race, where there was no top-tier candidate or even clear frontrunner. This seemed to spook one of the candidates, suburban state Sen. Matt Murphy, who bailed out of the race and signed on as McKenna’s running mate. While McKenna has the fundraising connections and can self-fund as well, McKenna has never won a race (he finished 4th in the GOP Senate primary in 2004, meaning he lost not only to Jack Ryan but also Jim Oberweis), and he’ll still have to face DuPage County Board Chair Bob Schillerstrom (who has at least 900,000 constituents) as well as a gaggle of other state Senators. (H/t GOPVOTER.)

• MI-Gov: SoS Terri Lynn Land has signed onto Oakland Co. Sheriff Michael Bouchard’s ticket as his running mate. Land, you’ll recall, was widely expected to run for Governor but surprised everyone by endorsing Bouchard instead. (There was a brief rumor that she’d run in MI-03 after a Vern Ehlers retirement, but that doesn’t seem to be happening.)

• NH-Gov: Rasmussen throws in gubernatorial numbers as part of its sample from Sep. 14 that found Kelly Ayotte up on Paul Hodes by 8 in the Senate race. The results help cast a little more doubt on the composition of that particular sample, as the state’s widely popular Democratic Governor, John Lynch, leads former Senator John Sununu (who I’ve never seen mentioned in connection with that race) by only 48-43. Lynch beats the only announced candidate, businessman Jack Kimball, 52-31, and vaguely interested state Senator Chuck Morse 51-29.

• NJ-Gov: PPP tried out some alternate scenarios in New Jersey involving replacement Democrats for Jon Corzine (although Corzine hasn’t made any moves to get out, and it’s unclear why he would at this point, with his numbers improving somewhat). The bottom line is, it wouldn’t help anyway; Rep. Frank Pallone loses big-time to Chris Christie 43-23 (with Chris Daggett at 15). Newark mayor Corey Booker doesn’t fare much better, even though he has very high approval ratings: he loses 41-33-13.

• OR-Gov: We’ll definitely have a contested primary on the Democratic side, despite the entry of heavyweight ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber. Former SoS Bill Bradbury is staying in the race, preparing to announce today, and yesterday releasing a video endorsement from his most prominent backer, former Gov. Barbara Roberts, who preceded Kitzhaber in office. Meanwhile, Kitzhaber released a literal shitload of endorsements yesterday, with many of the state’s key Democrats (AG John Kroger, Treasurer Ben Westlund, Superintendent of Education Susan Castillo, Multnomah County Chair Ted Wheeler, ex-Portland mayor Vera Katz, ex-Rep. Darlene Hooley) and some names who’d been bandied about as possible candidates (state Sen. Mark Hass, Portland city counilor Randy Leonard) on board — not a lot of oxygen left for Bradbury, or for Rep. Peter DeFazio, if he still wants to get in.

• PA-Gov: Scranton mayor Chris Doherty is almost certain to run for the Democratic nod for Governor, insiders are saying. He’s staffing up (including some heavy hitters, including media pro Tad Devine) and polling.

• TX-Gov: Rasmussen’s new poll of the Texas governor primary on the Republican side has a big surprise: it’s the first poll in ages (since May) to give a lead to Kay Bailey Hutchison. KBH leads incumbent Rick Perry 40-38, with somebody named Debra Medina, who’s from the Ron Paul wing of the party, pulling in 3% of the vote… apparently pulling in enough of Perry’s base of teabag/secession nuts to flip the race to KBH. Rasmussen’s May poll had Perry up 42-38.

• CA-42: Republican Rep. Gary Miller has drawn a wealthy primary challenger, Lee McGroarty, an executive with an investment firm. Ethical clouds related to real estate deals have followed Miller, but he’s probably more vulnerable to an anti-insider primary challenge than a Democrat in this R+10 Orange County district.

• NY-23: After Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts dropped their barely-explicable holds on the confirmation of Rep. John McHugh for Secretary of the Army, the New York Republican was confirmed last night. The three candidates — Democrat Bill Owens, Republican Dede Scozzafava, and Conservative Doug Hoffman — now are waiting to see when the special election is scheduled. State law requires David Paterson to schedule the election between 30 and 40 days from his announcement of the date, so in order to schedule the election on the regular election day of Nov. 3 (like everyone expects will happen), he’ll need to delay the announcement for at least another week.

• Campaign Finance: Last month, a federal judge ruled that Connecticut’s relatively new campaign matching fund system violated the First Amendment, saying it impermissibly put unfair burdens on “hopeless” minor party candidates that it did not also place on equally hopeless major party candidates running in uncompetitive districts. (The decision was in part based on the Supreme Court case that struck down the federal Millionaire’s Amendment last year.) AG Dick Blumenthal is appealing to the Second Circuit. Meanwhile, some folks in Arizona are concerned that this ruling might implicate their own public financing system. (D)

• CA-Sen (pdf): According to the Public Policy Institute of California, Barbara Boxer is holding fairly good approval ratings, as she approaches a possibly competitive (and definitely expensive) re-election: 53/32, really no different from her stodgier colleague Dianne Feinstein, 54/32. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who isn’t running again, fares much worse: 30/61.

• CO-Sen: As we’re staring down the barrel of a competitive Democratic primary in the Senate race, three of the state’s five House Dems have gotten behind incumbent appointee Michael Bennet (John Salazar, Jared Polis, and Betsy Markey), along with fellow Sen. Mark Udall. However, Diana DeGette and Ed Perlmutter are staying neutral. Other Bennet backers include current state House speaker Terrance Carroll.

• IL-Sen, IL-Gov: The Cook County Dems made their endorsements in the 2010 primaries, which are less than half a year away. No major surprises: they endorsed state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias for Senate and incumbent Pat Quinn for Governor. That rankled Quinn’s rival, Comptroller Dan Hynes, who hit Quinn for seeking machine backing when, back in his reformer days, Quinn had been an advocate for open primaries. Meanwhile, in the Senate primary, upstart Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman is taking the clean politics approach, saying that he’ll accept no PAC money for his campaign.

• MA-Sen: The fields are starting to solidify in Massachusetts: Rep. John Tierney, from MA-06 in Boston’s northern suburbs, decided against a run. He has less money than his fellow House members and polled in the single digits in the lone poll of the primary. Rep. Richard Neal is the only House member left who initially seemed like a potential candidate (mostly because of his bankroll), but his silence in the last week has been telling. On the GOP side of the aisle, state Senator Scott Brown got in the race over the weekend; with Mitt Romney, Andy Card, Kerry Healey, and Christy Mihos out, Brown is about as good as it’s going to get for the Republicans.

• NH-Sen: Here’s one more Republican from the Republican wing of the party pondering a run in the New Hampshire Senate primary: businessman and RNC member Sean Mahoney. Mahoney says he’s gotten a push from the conservative grassroots to run, as many of them seem uneasy with the Beltway coronation of Kelly Ayotte, whose inability to take a position… any position… is taking on epic proportions. (If Mahoney’s name seems vaguely familiar, he lost the 2002 NH-01 GOP primary to Jeb Bradley.)

• NY-Sen-B, NY-Gov: Here’s the rumor du jour, and it’s a doozy: Rudy Giuliani is being pushed by state GOP leaders to run for Senate against Kirsten Gillibrand instead of for Governor; apparently the state GOP is convinced that Andrew Cuomo, not David Paterson, will be the Dems’ nominee next year. Nobody has polled Gillibrand/Giuliani before, but that seems like it would be a close race, if the Gillibrand/Pataki numbers are any indication (of course, there’s a big stylistic difference between the vanilla George Pataki and the dictatorial Rudy, just that they’re both known quantities at this point). Perhaps (between this rumor and Rudy’s failed coup against Ed Cox) sensing that the Rudy won’t be getting into the Governor’s race — or maybe just because of his own special brand of tone-deafness — ex-Rep. Rick Lazio made his formal announcement today that he’s running for Governor.

• AZ-Gov: In the “blast from the past” file, former Governor Fife Symington is now considering a comeback by running in the GOP primary against appointed Governor Jan Brewer. That’s the same Symington who was forced out of office in 1997 after conviction for bank fraud, although his conviction was overturned on appeal and he was subsequently pardoned by Bill Clinton. Strangely, we could see a re-run of the 1990 gubernatorial election, if Symington and Dem AG Terry Goddard face off against each other again.

• NJ-Gov (pdf): One more poll (from Monmouth) showing Chris Christie with a persistent, but shrinking, edge over Jon Corzine in the New Jersey gubernatorial race. Among likely voters, Christie has a 47-39 edge (with 5 for Chris Daggett), much better than August’s 50-36 Christie lead but comparable to July’s 45-37 lead. Hold onto your hats, though: among registered voters, Corzine actually leads, 41-40 (with 6 for Daggett). In the fine print, Corzine is continuing to solidify his standing among Democrats, up to 77% among Dems (up from 73% in August and 67% in July). The challenge here, apparently, will be getting those Dems in the ‘unlikely voter’ column to show up.

• OR-Gov: John Kitzhaber doesn’t seem like he’ll have the Dem primary to himself: former SoS Bill Bradbury looks like he’s on track to run. Bradbury has hired a campaign manager, and announces that Kitzhaber’s predecessor as Governor, Barbara Roberts, will be on hand for his announcement next week. One other possible challenger in the Dem primary, one that no one had thought of before, is Clackamas County Commission Chair Lynn Peterson. Peterson is 40 and still building her reputation; cynics’ knee-jerk reaction might be to think she’s angling for the Lt. Governor slot, but Oregon doesn’t even have a Lt. Governor. Finally, everyone’s still waiting to see what Rep. Peter DeFazio does; he was supposed to have made a decision by Labor Day but says he’ll keep on anaylzing his choices.

• AR-02: Politico has an unusual rumor: former US Attorney and former Karl Rove right-hand-man Tim Griffin is considering a run against Democratic Rep. Vic Snyder in the Little Rock-based 2nd (which, in wake of 2008, is, at R+5, the most Dem-friendly district in Arkansas). Considering that Griffin had earlier pondered and declined a run in AR-Sen, the step down doesn’t make much sense at all, as he’d most likely have a better shot against the vulnerable Blanche Lincoln, who hasn’t polled well lately. The entrenched Snyder may create the appearance of being vulnerable because of his bank account, but that’s mostly because he refuses to fundraise during off years.

• IL-10: State Rep. Beth Coulson, running for the GOP primary nod for the open seat in the 10th against several self-funders, got endorsements from two members of the GOP House delegation: fellow suburban moderate Judy Biggert… and, in an apparent nod to the reality of what works in the 10th, from the state delegation’s wingnuttiest member, John Shimkus, last seen ducking out early from Obama’s health care address to beat the lines at the urinal.

• WI-03: State Sen. Dan Kapanke gives the GOP a rather strong candidate against Rep. Ron Kind (or more ominously, an open seat, in case Kind decides to run for Governor). However, Dems succeeded in taking Kapanke down a peg and dinging him for $38,100 ($100 in statutory damages plus $38K in legal fees) for violating state open records laws.

• NYC: One more poll of the Democratic primaries for the city offices, before tomorrow’s election. The mayor’s race is actually the least interesting, with Comptroller William Thompson beating city councilor Tony Avella 46-17. Ex-PA Mark Green has pole position in the Public Advocate’s race, but the question is whether he can beat the 40% threshold in order to avoid a runoff. Currently, he’s at 36%, with city councilor Bill DeBlasio at 20%. The Comptroller’s race is almost certainly headed for a runoff, but city councilor John Liu seems to be breaking out from the pack, at 34%; he leads Melinda Katz at 23% and David Yassky at 19%. In case you’re wondering what’s up with the Manhattan DA race, there is one recent poll of the race, an internal from the Cyrus Vance Jr. camp. It gives Vance a 30-24 edge over Leslie Crocker Synder, with Richard Aborn at 15.

• Census: The Census Bureau is severing its relationship with ACORN, which was working with the Census to promote Census participation. Loosely translated, Director Robert Groves said that the organization was enough of a distraction that it was becoming a net liability instead of asset in terms of getting people to participate in the Census.

• AR-Sen: Blanche Lincoln is getting yet another challenger, except this time it’s a Democrat: Bob Johnson (no, not that Bob Johnson… he’s the Arkansas Senate President, and former Arkansas House Speaker). Surely the netroots will rejoice that conservadem Lincoln, known for her foot-dragging on EFCA, is getting a primary challenge. Um, except there’s the small fact that Johnson would be running against Lincoln from the right. (Johnson held a fundraiser for Republican state Senator Gilbert Baker last fall, who may well be the Republican Senate nominee.)

• FL-Sen: One more fossil got unearthed by Charlie Crist as he seeks applications for potential Senate replacements for Mel Martinez: former Representative Lou Frey, a 75-year-old who served in the House from the Orlando area from 1968 to 1978. Crist is still planning to interview current Rep. Bill Young, as well as former Reps. Clay Shaw and Mike Bilirakis. Follow the link to see all 10 current possible replacements.

• IL-Sen: With the Democratic Senate field suddenly down to two candidates, Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias and local Urban League president Cheryle Jackson, there’s still some of the inevitable casting-about for someone else going on. An unnamed “top Dem” is reportedly encouraging Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart to make the race. Dart is a former state legislator who made big news recently for suspending foreclosure evictions.

• MO-Sen: Michael Steele just referred to Roy Blunt as crap. Well, not in the most literal sense. There was an extended toilet metaphor on a conservative radio talk show and Steele went along with the host’s anti-Blunt anti-insider arguments. Still, the Carnahan ads write themselves.

• NY-Sen-B: Kirsten Gillibrand got yet another endorsement from her House colleagues, from freshman Rep. Eric Massa. Siena is also out with a new New York poll. Gillibrand trails the unlikely-to-run ex-Gov. George Pataki in a hypothetical head-to-head, 42-39 while whomping the only slightly-less-likely-to-run Rep. Peter King, 46-24. (They didn’t poll the Dem primary, where Jonathan Tasini is Gillibrand’s last challenger standing.)

• CA-Gov: Meg Whitman’s campaign strategy seems to be to duck debates and let her money do her talking for her instead. Here’s another eyebrow-raising development, that’s potentially a good line of attack for Dems (or her primary challengers): Whitman didn’t register to vote in California til 2002 (or as a Republican until 2007), and has missed voting in more than half the elections since then, including the 2003 recall.

• MA-Gov: Rasmussen looks at the Massachusetts Governor’s race, and finds I-turned-R Christy Mihos leading incumbent Dem Deval Patrick 40-35, up from a 41-40 lead in June. Patrick leads Republican Charlie Baker 40-39. The utility of this poll is close to zero, though, seeing as how it leaves out likely D-turned-I candidate Tim Cahill, whom polls have found either absorbing enough anti-Patrick votes to let Patrick squeak through, or else winning outright.

• NY-Gov: There’s a certain role about holes, shovels, and not digging that David Paterson seems to be forgetting. He lashed out at critics saying he should stand down for re-election, accusing them of racial bias, and even launched into the media for their coverage (which I don’t think has ever ended well for a politician). The aforementioned Siena poll finds Paterson losing the Dem primary to Andrew Cuomo 65-23, and the general to Rudy Giuliani 56-33 (although he does beat Rick Lazio, 38-37). Cuomo beats Giuliani 53-40, and beats Lazio by a hilarious 66-16 (OK, that’s not as hilarious as the GOP primary, where Giuliani beats Lazio 73-6, with 8 for Erie Co. Exec Chris Collins).

• SC-Gov: Cue up the “frequent flier” jokes. Turns out Mark Sanford, already known for his little jaunt to Argentina and his overeager use of state planes, has also failed to disclose at least 35 flights on private planes that should have been listed on ethics forms or campaign disclosures as ‘things of value.’

• IN-09: Could we really see Hill/Sodrel 5.0? American politics’ most repetitive rivalry may well continue on into 2010, as GOP ex-Rep. Mike Sodrel says he’ll weigh another bid against Rep. Baron Hill in the 9th as soon as he’s done with the book that he’s coloring writing.

• MI-13, 14: Detroiters are feeling surly about their Representatives, it seems. A poll by Deno Noor Polling finds both Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick and John Conyers with negative re-elect numbers: 27/58 for Kilpatrick and 40/44 for Conyers. Not a surprise for Kilpatrick, whose son got bounced out as Detroit’s mayor and who barely survived a primary herself last year, but it’s a new development for Conyers, the second-longest-serving House member; assumedly, this has a lot to do with the conviction of his wife, ex-city councilor Monica Conyers, on bribery charges.

• OR-04: I’d be sad too if I was watching my once-promising House bid crash and burn more than a year out from the election. Republican Springfield mayor Sid Leiken teared up repeatedly during a news conference where he finally announced that he didn’t have documentation for the $2,000 in cash that somehow found its way from his campaign to his mother. He’ll repay the $2,000 out of pocket, he says, but the Sec. of State investigation continues.

• PA-07: Here’s a good photo op for Dem state Rep. Bryan Lentz, running to succeed Rep. Joe Sestak. He’s appearing at the White House to discuss energy policy with Obama administration officials and other energy policy leaders.

• VA-05: Conventional wisdom seems to be coalescing around state Sen. Robert Hurt as GOP nominee; one GOP operative says he’s “60% leaning toward the race.” His state Senate district overlaps about one-quarter of the 5th. State Del. Rob Bell, who was frequently mentioned earlier, seems hard-pressed to win his off-year re-election this year and turn around and take on Rep. Tom Perriello. Two other state Senators sound interested, Frank Ruff and Steve Newman, but sound likely to defer to Hurt if he gets in.

• Seattle Mayor: Primary elections in Seattle were last week, and in typical Washington fashion, ballots from the all-mail-in election are still being counted. In a serious surprise, two-term mayor Greg Nickels won’t be coming back, as he finished third in the top-two nonpartisan primary at 25%. No worries, as he’ll be replaced by someone just as, if not more so, liberal, although someone who’s never held elective office before: the top 2 are local Sierra Club president Mike McGinn (at 28%) and T-Mobile VP and big-time Obama bundler Joe Mallahan (at 27%).

Meanwhile, the King Co. Executive race is down to two. It’s the first time it’s been an officially nonpartisan position (after a GOP-led initiative to change it to nonpartisan passed, as this is the only way a Republican will ever get elected), but everyone still knows that former news anchor Susan Hutchison (who got 37%) is the Republican and county councilor Dow Constantine (who got 22%) is the Democrat. That looks daunting at first, but there were no other major Republicans and three other top-tier Dems in the race (county councilor Larry Phillips, state Sen. Fred Jarrett, and state Rep. Ross Hunter). The four Dems put together got 56%, so, no, King County isn’t going to elect a Republican in November.

• Polltopia: Where should PPP poll next: New Jersey or Virginia? You decide. (Tom Jensen says they’d planned to do New Jersey but skipped it to do Arkansas this week, where he hints at some blood-curdling numbers.)