Tag: Carly Fiorina

AR-Sen: The Communications Workers of America, a union supporting Bill Halter, is firing back with an ad on black radio to combat Blanche Lincoln’s bullshit spot claiming she “stood with our president to pass healthcare reform.” CWA’s ad is in heavy rotation around the state, running “50 times a day” around Little Rock. They also have a new TV ad out, but no word on the size of the buy.

AZ-Sen: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has given its first endorsement of the 2010 cycle to Sen. John McCain – but apparently cash ain’t attached. I guess the CoC, the grand doyenne of “cheap labor conservatives,” doesn’t believe Johnny Mac’s nativist turn is for real. Given what a fraud McCain has shown himself to be from top to bottom, I guess this makes sense.

CA-Sen: No, the reason John McCain can’t be found in Arizona isn’t because they took him “to a farm upstate.” He’s out in California, campaigning with Carly Fiorina.

IN-Sen: It’s not just that Dan Coats has an unsavory record as a lobbyist – his voting record seems pretty out-of-step with the crazies who make up the modern GOP base. John Hostettler is hitting Coats (albeit in the form of a web video) for things like his votes in favor of the assault weapons ban, the Brady Bill, and the Clinton crime bill – a set of votes tradmed analysts usually like to ascribe many 1994 Dem losses to.

UT-Sen: While they haven’t picked a specific horse to back yet, the Club for Growth has nonetheless spent $133K against Sen. Bob Bennett.

AZ-Gov: Democrat Terry Goddard has finally made his gubernatorial bid official.

AL-02, AL-05: GOP State Sen. Harri Anne Smith, who endorsed Dem Bobby Bright for re-election, has been kicked off her own re-election ballot by the Alabama Republican Party in retaliation. Smith lost the GOP primary in 2008 to Jay Love and apparently is still smarting over that – but this has to sting quite a bit more. Smith hasn’t decided if she’ll run as an independent instead. (Switch! Switch!) Meanwhile, the AL GOP said that turncoat Parker Griffith could stay on the Republican ballot, despite a challenge thanks to his party-switching ways.

FL-08: I’ve totally lost track of how many Republicans are trying to challenge Rep. Alan Grayson, so what’s one more? Wealthy businessman Ross Beiling, owner of a medical parts supplier, is throwing his shrimp on the barbie.

MI-07: While two Michigan Republicans have endorsed ex-Rep. Tim Walberg in his comeback bid, five others are staying neutral in the primary, which also includes Brian Rooney, younger brother of Rep. Tom Rooney (FL-16).

NY-05: Dan Halloran, a Republican who won a Dem-held seat on the NYC City Council last year, is weighing a challenge to Rep. Gary Ackerman. Halloran, a practicing Theodist, thinks he can make Ackerman pay a price for voting in favor of healthcare reform. Ackerman, for his part, has $1.1 million on hand and the support of the Queens Independence Party. This district also went 63-36 for Obama (but notably, that’s the same percentage that Kerry got, suggesting there was something of a “conservative white ethnic New Yorkers for McCain” effect here).

NY-13: The United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1500 is backing Rep. Mike McMahon, in spite of his vote against healthcare reform, citing his support of the Employee Free Choice Act. Speaking of the CWA again, though, a day ago, its local vice president, Chris Shelton, called McMahon “the Judas from Staten Island.” Personally, I think that phrase is overused, and I’m going to start calling traitors “Brutuses.”

Across the Pond: Our friends in the U.K. have scheduled their elections for May 6th. Imagine if we only had one-month campaigns here!

• AZ-Sen: Looks like the Maverick has finally been broken (as he’s decided that it’s preferable to spend six years chewing his cud while fenced in the GOP pasture, instead of getting sent prematurely to the glue factory). In the face of a potentially serious primary from the right from J.D. Hayworth, John McCain says not only is he no longer a maverick, but he “never considered himself a maverick.” (Except for in all those campaign ads from two years ago?) In response, Hayworth said McCain is trying to “encourage amnesia.”

• CA-Sen, CA-Gov: There’s a new LA Times/USC poll of the two major races in California, with a mixed bag of results for Democrats. Like most pollsters, they find that Republican Meg Whitman has pulled into a small lead over Jerry Brown in the governor’s race, thanks to her nonstop deluge of self-funded advertising; she leads Brown 44-41, while she leads Steve Poizner in the GOP primary 60-20. On the Senate side, Barbara Boxer leads a Generic Republican by a surprisingly wide 48-34. Polling Generic R seems pretty weird, though, considering that there are only two likely opponents for her: Tom Campbell leads Carly Fiorina in the GOP primary 29-25, with Chuck DeVore lagging at 9. One other bit of good news for Dems: by a 46-29 margin, voters prefer to back a candidate who backed health care reform.

• CO-Sen: Michael Bennet is playing it safe, making plans for a petition drive to make sure his name is on the ballot in November. He needs at least 30% at the Democratic state convention to qualify, but his Plan B seems to be an acknowledgment that he may be facing a rough time at the convention too. Remember that he lost at the caucus level to former state House speaker Andrew Romanoff (whose main source of strength seems to be insiders and activists, rather than the broader population).

• IN-Sen: CQ takes a look at the NRSC’s private teeth-gnashing over the possibility that kooky ex-Rep. John Hostettler might beat ex-Sen. Dan Coats in the primary, something that can’t be ruled out in an anti-establishment year like this one. They’d then have to decide whether they want to financially prop up Hostettler, a legendarily poor fundraiser who’s relied on shoestring campaigns and religious right ground troops. Still, a reasonably competent Hostettler ought to be able to make short work of Coats in the GOP primary, given the amount of material he has to work with: for instance, it turns out that Coats, when lobbying for King & Spaulding, lobbied Congress in favor of cap and trade, the same legislation he claims he now opposes.

• NV-Sen: If there’s one reason not to quite count out Harry Reid yet, it’s his ability to bring in the campaign cash. He brought in more than $1.5 million for the quarter, giving him more than $10 million in receipts so far this cycle. Sue Lowden, ostensibly the GOP’s top contender, says she raised about $500K and will match that dollar-for-dollar from her own personal stash. Danny Tarkanian raised $445K last quarter.

• NY-Sen-B (pdf): These numbers are a little stale, but we found there were some more useful numbers buried in that Marist poll from last week where the topline was just the usual rigamarole about the Kirsten Gillibrand vs. George Pataki matchup that’s very unlikely to happen (especially not if Al D’Amato has anything to say about it). They also tested some head-to-heads with the lesser GOPers who are actually in the race: Gillibrand beats Bruce Blakeman 54-25, Joe DioGuardi 54-27, and David Malpass 54-25. They also looked at the GOP primary, finding DioGuardi winning it with 18, followed by Blakeman at 10, Malpass at 9, and non-candidate Dan Senor at 4. A permutation including Pataki finds Pataki at 62, with DioGuardi at 7, Blakeman at 4, and Malpass and Senor at 2. In other news, Gillibrand picked up an endorsement today from one of her biggest skeptics, Assemblyman and Kings Co. Dem chair Vito Lopez. Lopez had been considering backing Harold Ford Jr., way back in those heady days of February.

• WA-Sen: Dino Rossi is still saying he’s “completely undecided” about running for Senate, but will do it if he thinks he has a “50% chance” of winning. Here’s one more bit that might help move his decision along, though: financially, he’d be starting from scratch against Patty Murray, who raked in another $1 million last quarter, bringing her total war chest to $5.9 million.

• AL-Gov: I gather from the comments that SSP is full of mustache aficionados, and this news might prove heartbreaking to them: Ron Sparks shaved off his legendary ‘stache. He says this was a spur-of-the-moment decision at the barber shop (and hopefully not the result of thorough focus grouping?). I just hope Travis Childers doesn’t decide to follow suit.

• NY-Gov: Wealthy businessman Carl Paladino has decided to go ahead with his teabaggish-sounding campaign for Governor, kicking off his bid today in Buffalo. He’ll be running in the GOP primary, although he’d previously made noises about a possible independent run. Unfortunately, his rollout might be overshadowed by other news today… that he had a daughter with his mistress 10 years ago, and kept the child secret from his wife until last year.

• OH-Gov: In response to pressure to release his financials, John Kasich released his 2008 tax returns. Kasich earned $615K from now-kaput Lehman Brothers in 2008, including $183K base and a $432K bonus (but no “golden parachute” as Lehman Brothers collapsed). Oh, by the way, he also earned $265K as a Fox News commentator, $166K in speaking fees, $62K as an associate for Schottenstein Property Group, $45K as an Ohio State Univ. lecturer, $77K for being on the board of directors of two companies, and $122K in interest and dividends. Just your average teabagging Joe Lunchpail.

• HI-01: Charles Djou is trying to get some mileage out of the fact that neither Ed Case nor Colleen Hanabusa lives in HI-01. This kind of thing usually doesn’t matter much even in most other states, and seems to matter even less in Hawaii, though, where the island of Oahu gets split between the two districts and no one seems to care that Mazie Hirono lives in the 1st instead of HI-02.

• CO-04: Rep. Betsy Markey is near the top of most people’s vulnerable Dems lists, especially after her pro-HCR vote, but her cash haul may go along way toward allaying fears. She pulled in $505K, with $355K of that coming between Mar. 21 (the HCR vote) and Mar. 31. Her vote (plus being in Sarah Palin’s sorta-metaphorical crosshairs) seems to have helped, not hurt. Likely GOP opponent Cory Gardner raised only $75K last quarter after the HCR vote.

• ND-AL: One GOPer who is doing well on the fundraising front is state Rep. Rick Berg, who pulled in $483K in the first quarter. $330K of that came in the last 10 days of the quarter, although that seems to have more to do with his winning the state party’s endorsement rather than the HCR vote. Most of the rest of that took the form of $100K from his own pocket. Between this and the downdraft from John Hoeven at the top of the ballot, looks like Rep. Earl Pomeroy’s in for a real race this year.

• PA-06: Doug Pike picked up another labor endorsement, and it’s a big one: the AFL-CIO. They also backed Paul Kanjorski in the 11th, who’s being challenged by Corey O’Brien in the primary.

• RI-01: Here’s one more huge House Democratic fundraising haul, although this isn’t a race that the DCCC has been sweating too hard. Providence mayor David Cicilline pulled in a huge $725K (although some of that was checks re-written away from his mayoral fund to his newly-established House fund). His main Democratic rival, former state party chair William Lynch, raised $230K (including $100K of his own money).

• TX-17: Bill Flores pulled in an endorsement that will help in his GOP primary runoff against Rob Curnock, from perhaps the most unlikable man in the entirety of American politics, ex-Sen. Phil Gramm. In fact, that district may be conservative enough that it might still be a positive in the general.

• LA-LG: Republican SoS Jay Dardenne’s plan for an easy upgrade to the position of Lt. Governor (left vacant by Mitch Landrieu’s move to mayor of New Orleans) ran into a bit of a snag. He’s facing GOP primary opposition now from the state GOP chair, Roger Villere.

• CA-Init: Proposition 15 looks to be the only interesting initiative on the June primary ballot in California, and it lays some important groundwork for countering the flood of corporate money into elections. The Fair Elections Act, as it’s called, is a pilot program for public financing of state races; if passed, it’ll publicly fund the 2014 and 2018 Secretary of State races, which, if successful, could lead to a broader system.

• Fundraising: There are a number of other fundraising roundups today, courtesy of National Journal’s Reid Wilson and also the crew at TPM. Other highlights include Tom Campbell, Pat Toomey, Bob Dold!, Colleen Hanabusa, Bruce O’Donoghue, and various OR-Gov contestants.

• Teabaggers: Ed Kilgore continues his hot streak of dismantling the myth of the teabaggers, pointing to today’s Gallup/USA Today poll as more evidence that they’re nothing more than louder, angrier Republicans (who’d like access to a time machine). Only 7% say they’re Democrats, and while many say they’re independents, all evidence suggests they’re not from the center but those indies who think the GOP is too establishment, too liberal, or just too unsalvageable.

• RNC: You might remember several weeks ago the RNC lost a case in the D.C. District Court, squelching their desires for unlimited “soft money” contributions, which they felt they should be able to do in the wake of Citizens United. The RNC has decided to go ahead and appeal the case to the Supreme Court, although it doesn’t seem likely it’ll be decided in time for this year’s general election. (If you’re wondering why the case is bypassing the DC Circuit, McCain-Feingold allows challenges to it to leapfrog directly from the trial level to SCOTUS.)

• Census: Here’s an interesting tidbit: despite her early anti-Census fearmongering, Michele Bachmann’s district is actually well outpacing much of the nation on Census form return rates. Counties in her district have had an especially high return rate, ranging from 68-71% (compared with the current national average of 50%). Perhaps Republicans have decided it’s better in the long-term to, y’know, get conservative parts of the country to get accurately represented, rather than to try to appeal to the black-helicopters fringes, if Karl Rove cutting an ad urging Census participation is any indication.

• O2B: Finally, over at the Great Orange Satan, there’s an open call for nominations for the Orange to Blue program. Stop by and suggest some names of candidates who should get the netroots’ financial help this year.

The daily digest is so hunormous today that we had to CHOP IT IN HALF!

AR-Sen: Chris Cillizza’s incredibly annoying Mr. Rogers wallpaper tweets that Bill Halter raised $2 million in his first month on the trail.

AZ-Sen: This Roll Call piece has some interesting tidbits about the nascent Democratic (yes, Democratic) primary in the Arizona senate race. Tucson city councilman Rodney Glassman is all but running, and he has some personal wealth due to his family’s farming business. He also has the backing of Rep. Raul Grijalva (Glassman was once a Grijalva aide). Some other Dems, however, are talking up the potential candidacy of Nan Stockholm Walden, who is also wealthy and is a well-connected Democratic donor. The knock on Glassman is that he’s young and inexperienced; the knock on Walden is that she was a registered lobbyist for several years. Glassman says he’ll run no matter what Walden decides, and I think a primary here could actually be helpful if it stays clean.

On the GOP side of things, John McCain says he raised $2.2 million in the first quarter and has $4.5m on hand. Primary opponent J.D. Hayworth, meanwhile, seems like he hasn’t been doing quite so hot on the money front.

CA-Sen: A whiff of extra-special dumb: Carly Fiorina sent around an email to supporters describing Passover as a time to “break bread.” Of course, the one thing that Jews don’t eat on Passover is… bread. Trying to wiggle their way out of this one, a staffer tells TWI: “We meant all bread, leavened and unleavened, and matzo is just unleavened bread so that’s what we meant by that.” That still doesn’t work.

CT-Sen: GOP hopeful Linda McMahon is taking heat from opponent and ex-Rep. Rob Simmons for her $10,000 donation to the DCCC in 2006. Not only should this make McMahon suspect to Republicans, argues Simmons, but he seems to be tying that donation to the fact that he himself lost in 2006, perhaps nudged out the door by McMahon’s very own cash. (Considering Simmons came up just 83 votes short, he may have a point.)

FL-Sen: The joke is that when the New York Times finally gets to writing about a hitherto underground phenomenon (steampunk, miracle fruit, etc.), that’s the moment it becomes mainstream and therefore loses its cool. Marco Rubio’s “NYT moment” happened months ago, so anyone endorsing him at this late stage is about as cool as your mom using Facebook. Welcome to the club, Sen. Tom Coburn. Meanwhile, Charlie Crist’s old buddy, former FL GOP chair Jim Greer, is under criminal investigation for some sort of self-dealing.

KY-Sen: I think this is where Paulists probably part ways from teabaggers: Rand Paul thinks the government “shouldn’t be involved” in requiring people to wear seat belts. Not really sure ultra-libertarian whackness like this plays too well in most quarters. Please, please let this guy win the GOP primary. Incidentally, Paul says he’s raised $600K in the last quarter (lower than I would have thought), but also says he’s spent almost all of it. Apparently, though, he’s pre-paid for “the next six weeks of activity” (until the primary), perhaps locking in lower rates on things like TV ads.

MO-Sen: One last odd-n-end from PPP’s MO-Sen poll: Roy Blunt is under 50% against his unknown GOP primary challenger, Chuck Purgason – he leads 48-18. Purgason’s favorables are just 7-9 (not a typo), so obviously there’s a chunk of Republicans out there who just hate Blunt.

NC-Sen: Former Charlotte Mayor Harvey Gantt will endorse attorney Ken Lewis, who is seeking the Dem senate nomination. Gantt himself ran for the Senate twice, losing two close races to the unthinkably odious Jesse Helms. Meanwhile, GOP Sen. Richard Burr says he’s raised $1.4 million in the first quarter and is sitting on a $5.3 mil warchest. No word yet on any of the Dems.

TX-Sen: It looks we will have Kay Bailey Hutchison to kick around some more – for at least the next two years. She announced yesterday that she’ll serve out the remainder of her term, which ends in 2012. I wouldn’t be surprised if she subsequently changed her mind (at least, after this November), but for now, that means TX-Sen comes off our “Races to Watch” list.

WI-Sen: Richie rich Terrence Wall says he’ll stay in the GOP primary even if ex-Gov. Tommy Thompson gets in. Wall had kind words for Thompson, and also thanked him for drawing Democratic fire, but it sounds like Wall wants to present himself as the “true conservative” option.

CA-Gov: Meg Whitman is the latest moron-American to jump onto the “healthcare reform is unconstitutional” bandwagon, agreeing wholeheartedly with a supporter who asked at a campaign event if she would “force your attorney general to file suit” against the legislation. (Of course, CA’s governor can do no such thing.) I really can’t wait until these idiots get punked out of court.

PA-Gov: Some fundraising numbers from some of the big players in Pennsylvania’s gubernatorial race – click the link for details. One of them, Dan Onorato, is up on the air with his first TV ads. No exact word on the size of the buy, but supposedly the ads are in “heavy rotation around the state,” which could cost $1 million.

• CA-Sen (pdf): The apparently nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California has put out another statewide poll, and the numbers look very similar to those in the Field Poll last week. Barbara Boxer is in a dead heat with Tom Campbell, down 44-43, and not faring much better against Carly Fiorina, where Boxer leads 44-43. (She led Campbell by 4 and Fiorina by 8 two months ago.) Boxer’s doing better against Chuck DeVore, with a 46-40 edge. The big change from the Field Poll is that PPIC finds Fiorina actually in the lead in the GOP primary, the first pollster to see that in a while; she’s up 24-23-8, an improvement from January’s 27-16-8 Campbell edge. Are reluctant social conservatives getting off the fence and behind Fiorina, sensing DeVore isn’t gaining traction? Or did the Demon Sheep ad actually sway some ovinophobic voters?

• KY-Sen: Jack Conway’s on the air with a TV spot in the wake of the health care vote, trying to get some mileage out of Democratic primary opponent Dan Mongiardo’s stated opposition to the bill that passed.

• NY-Sen-B: Wall Street exec David Malpass, fresh off his smashing success as chief economist of Bear Stearns, looks like he’s doubling down on trying to be the GOP nominee to go against Kirsten Gillibrand. He’s promising $1 million of his own money to kick-start his campaign, where he first needs to get out of a primary against Bruce Blakeman and Joe DioGuardi.

• UT-Sen: It’s all still anecdotal, but the preliminary reports for how caucus night went for Bob Bennett sound pretty bad. Observers report strong anti-Bennett sentiment in general, although what might save him is that there was no coalescing behind any of his particular challengers. Turnout was maybe twice that of caucuses two years ago, suggesting a highly-motivated anti-Bennett base.

• CA-Gov (pdf): PPIC also has California gubernatorial numbers, again similar to the last Field poll. Meg Whitman’s outspending of Jerry Brown by a 200:1 margin or so is definitely paying temporary dividends, as she’s leading the gubernatorial race 44-39 (up from a 41-36 Brown lead two months ago). Brown leads Steve Poizner 46-31, basically unchanged from two months ago, suggesting this change is pretty Whitman-specific and not an across-the-boards phenomenon; Whitman leads Poizner 61-11.

• GA-Gov: Republican Governor Sonny Perdue is engaging in a remarkable end-run around Democratic AG Thurbert Baker, appointing a “special attorney general” to join in the suit against the health care reform brought by Republican AGs after Baker refused to do so and called it “political gamesmanship.” If nothing else, the fireworks between Perdue and Baker ought to raise Baker’s profile (who’s currently lagging in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, but might be poised to make an impact if he switched to the mostly-vacant Senate race).

• MA-Gov: Here’s some trouble for independent gubernatorial candidate Tim Cahill: the SEC has charged that John Kendrick, an executive with Southwest Securities, won $14 billion in bond deals after co-sponsoring a fundraiser for Cahill. That’s a violation of federal rules against contributions to officials who oversee bond sales. The SEC says that the Cahill campaign (which is returning the contributions) didn’t break any laws by accepting the money, though.

• OH-Gov, TX-Sen: Two more GOPers who still seem to be charging full speed ahead on “repeal” are Ohio’s John Kasich and, more interestingly, John Cornyn, who’d been cited in Ezra Klein‘s piece yesterday, on the GOP’s rapidly dialed-down rhetoric, as supporting only piecemeal tinkering but now seems to be reversing course again.

• WY-Gov: Whoops, that was a short-lived candidacy-to-be. Wyoming Democrats looking for a gubernatorial candidate are back to square one after attorney (and gubernatorial progeny) Paul Hickey reversed course and said “no” to a run.

• CO-07: Tom Tancredo weighed in with an endorsement in the Republican primary field in the 7th and, guess what… he endorsed the white guy. He gave the nod to former John McCain campaign official Lang Sias, despite Tancredo’s general antipathy toward all things McCain.

• HI-01: State Sen. Colleen Hanabusa is finally making some moves in the special election to replace resigned Rep. Neil Abercrombie. She’s out with her first TV ads, for the all-mail-in election with a May 22 deadline.

• NY-13: More blowback for Rep. Mike McMahon for his “no” vote on HCR, which could cost him the Working Families ballot line and/or get him a primary opponent. NYC council speaker Christine Quinn has backed out of a previously planned fundraiser for McMahon, citing his vote.

• SC-05: The NRCC seems to be feeling confident about state Sen. Mick Mulvaney, their challenger to Rep. John Spratt in the reddish 5th. They’ve promoted him to the 2nd level (“Contender”) in their 3-tiered fundraising pyramid scheme for challengers.

• Illinois: We Ask America seems to be taking great pains to confirm that, yes, they really are a legitimate pollster. I don’t know if they’re helping their case by releasing results with two significant digits, but they have a lot of Illinois House race data; we’ll leave it to you to decide how much salt you want to apply. Perhaps weirdest, they have teabagging businessman Joe Walsh leading Melissa Bean in IL-08 by 38.33%-37.61%. They also have leads for GOPers in the 11th (Adam Kinzinger leads Debbie Halvorson 42-30, way worse than Kinzinger’s own recent internal) and the 14th (Randy Hultgren leads Bill Foster 38-36), while Dems lead in the 10th (Dan Seals beats Bob Dold 40-37) and the not-on-the-radar 17th (Phil Hare leads pizza parlor owner Bobby Schilling 39-32).

• CA-Init: It’s been confirmed that the initiative to legalize the possession and sale of marijuana in California has qualified for the ballot in November. A 2009 Field Poll shows such an initiative could actually pass, with 56% of Californians supporting such an initiative. Of course, it’s unclear how such a change in state law would mesh with federal law, but if nothing else, it may help motivate a lot of bong-toting slackers to get off their couches to vote in November who otherwise might not vote (and cast votes for Jerry Brown and Barbara Boxer while they’re at it).

• DCCC: Freshman Rep. Jared Polis has been a strong fundraiser (and has his own fortune, too), and he’s looking to spread the wealth. His joint fundraising committee, the Jared Polis Majority Fund, has already distributed $400K this spring to the DCCC, to vulnerable incumbents (Frank Kratovil, Betsy Markey, Scott Murphy, Bill Owens, Tom Perriello, Harry Teague, Dina Titus), and to four up-and-comers (Ami Bera, Steve Pougnet, John Carney, and David Cicilline).

• DNC: I guess the DNC is feeling its oats these days, or just figuring that the best defense is a good offense: they’ve doubled the number of GOPers on the receiving end of pro-HCR attack ads for their “no” votes. They’ve added Pat Tiberi, Lee Terry, Dan Lungren, Mary Bono Mack, and Charlie Dent.

• Census: Remember the Census? It’s back! In Pog form!

• CA-Sen, CA-Gov: Lots of pollsters that I’ve never heard of seem to be coming out of the woodwork to poll California lately, and here’s yet another one of them: some firm called ccAdvertising. They polled the Republican primaries, finding, on the Senate side, that Tom Campbell leads at 24, with Carly Fiorina at 12 and Chuck DeVore at 8. On the gubernatorial side, Meg Whitman leads Steve Poizner 40-15.

• CO-Sen: Tonight is the first step in the Colorado caucus process, with precinct-level gatherings. The results are non-binding, really more of a straw poll than anything, but are monitored as a sign of candidates’ strength. (Of course, in 2004, neither Ken Salazar nor Pete Coors won the caucuses yet went on to win their primaries.) The bigger hurdle is in May, when candidates must clear 30% at the state assembly to make the primary ballot (although those that don’t can still get on by collecting signatures). With the Governor’s race pretty much locked down, there’s still action aplenty on both the Dem and GOP sides in the Senate. Michael Bennet comes into tonight’s caucuses with a boost: he just got the endorsement from the state’s AFSCME, which may help fight the perception that rival Andrew Romanoff is labor’s one horse in the race.

• CT-Sen: Paulist economist Peter Schiff is finally dipping into the spoils from his moneybombs, running ads on Connecticut radio introducing himself to Republican primary voters and touting his having predicted the financial crisis of 2008.

• ID-Sen: Democrats are already way ahead of where they were in their last race against Mike Crapo in 2004: they’re actually fielding a candidate. Two, in fact, have filed, although they’re little known: Tom Sullivan and William Bryk.

• IL-Sen: Rep. Mark Kirk is up with his first TV spot for the general election campaign, calling himself an “independent-minded Republican.” Having beaten back various teabagger challengers in the primary, he’s now free to label himself as such.

• MD-Sen: File this under news of the weird: Bob Ehrlich is confirming he’s interested in running for office this year, but one idea he’s floating is running for Senate against Barbara Mikulski instead of for Governor against Martin O’Malley. That’s a very strange choice, as Mikulski is more popular than O’Malley and generally considered unassailable, but maybe Ehrlich thinks he can goad the 73-year-old Mikulski into retirement.

• NC-Sen: Two polls of the Democratic primary in the Senate race show fairly different pictures, with the main difference being how well Cal Cunningham is keeping pace with Elaine Marshall. PPP’s most recent poll of the primary shows Cunningham gaining four points from last month, trailing Marshall 20-16, with 11 for Kenneth Lewis (up from 5). On the GOP side, Richard Burr is at 58%, with his minor rivals all in the low single digits. Marshall, on the other hand, released her own internal yesterday, from Lake Research. The poll’s a little stale (in the field mid-February), so if the PPP poll reflects late movement to Cunningham, Marshall’s poll wouldn’t capture it. At any rate, her internal has her up 31-5 over Cunningham, with Lewis at 4.

• NJ-Sen: A weird-ass ruling from a New Jersey appellate court says the Tea Party may proceed with collecting recall petitions to recall Bob Menendez. The court, however, stayed its own decision in order to allow Menendez to appeal, presumably to a federal court which will disabuse the state judges of the notion that one can recall federal officials. (Adam B. points to the crux of the case here and here).

• AL-Gov, AR-Gov: Financial filings for gubernatorial candidates in Alabama and Arkansas are both available. In Alabama, Tim James ($2.6 mil) leads the GOPers, while Artur Davis ($2.1 mil) has the most cash among the Dems. In Arkansas, Mike Beebe is sitting on $1.2 million (having raised $313K in February); his opponent, Jim Keet, hasn’t been in long enough to report.

• ME-Gov: It looks like there won’t be a Green Party candidate on the ballot this year; Lynne Williams suspended her campaign after failing to gather the 2,000 required signatures. That’s good news for Dems, as this could turn out to be a close race (although with this little information and the fields this cluttered, who the hell knows?) and Greens often poll well in Maine, getting 9% of the vote in the convoluted 2006 gubernatorial election.

• PA-Gov (pdf): There was a gubernatorial portion to that poll from Republican pollster Susquehanna released yesterday, too. As with every poll of this race, undecideds are still very heavy, but Republican AG Tom Corbett leads Democratic state Auditor Jack Wagner 37-26, and leads Allegheny Co. Exec Dan Onorato 39-24. Wagner has been dominating in terms of getting the endorsements of county-level party apparatuses, and he picked up one more yesterday, getting the nod from Cambria County (i.e. Johnstown) Democrats.

• WY-Gov: To almost no one’s surprise, Republican state House speaker Colin Simpson pulled the trigger, officially entering the gubernatorial race. (If his name sounds familiar, he’s the son of popular ex-Sen. Alan Simpson.) He faces three other high-profile GOPers, while Democrats, sorting out what to do after Dave Freudenthal’s late decision not to seek a third term, are still lining up a candidate.

• AK-AL: Rep. Don Young is refusing to get with the program, as far as the GOP’s new self-imposed ban on earmarks goes. Considering that Young seems most valued by his constituents for his ability to bring home the bacon (which may have saved his bacon twice, in both the primary and general in 2008), that may actually be the politically savvy thing for him to do.

• HI-01: The first debate was held in the special election in the 1st, and it may be most interesting in that ex-Rep. Ed Case was trying to stake out positions that sound pretty, well, Democratic. Case spoke out in favor of both health care reform and the stimulus package. Moderate Republican Charles Djou tried to differentiate himself by railing against both.

• IA-03: I don’t know if this is just one ex-wrestling coach sticking up for another, or if there’s an establishment movement afoot to coronate Jim Gibbons in the 3rd, but ex-Speaker Dennis Hastert is showing up to host a Des Moines fundraiser for Gibbons tomorrow. They’ll be joined by ex-Rep. Greg Ganske.

• PA-07: I love the smell of cat fud in the morning. While former local Fox affiliate news anchor Dawn Stensland didn’t file to run in the Republican primary as has been rumored, now she’s not ruling out an independent, teabagger-powered run instead. While she hasn’t begun gathering signatures, she is looking to move into the 7th. Even if she only garners a few percent, that could still tip the balance in what promises to be a very close race between Democrat Bryan Lentz and GOPer Pat Meehan.

• House: The Hill has an interesting survey of eight different primaries where the one participant’s vote on TARP could weigh heavily on the results (as it seemed to do in the Texas gubernatorial primary). Most are on the GOP side, but one Dem race to watch is PA-11, where Paul Kanjorski, the chair of the House subcommittee on Capital Markets, was one of TARP’s architects.

• NRCC: The NRCC is threatening to go on the air against Dems who change from “no” to “yes” votes on HCR, targeting them with the dread “flip-flop” label that served them so well in 2004. They have 42 Dems in mind to target, although there’s still the little wee matter of the NRCC finding the money to pay for the ads.

• NY-St. Sen.: Tonight’s the special election in SD-13 in Queens, where Hiram Monserrate is trying to win back the seat he just got kicked out of after his assault conviction. Monserrate, now an indie, is running against Democratic Assemblyman Jose Peralta. Peralta had a dominant lead in the one poll of the race made public.

• Ads: With the Demon Sheep and Boxer Blimp ads having established Carly Fiorina’s campaign as the new gold standard in bizarre advertising, Huffington Post has a nice wrapup of some of the other craziest political ads of the last few years, ranging from the well-known (Mike Gravel skipping rocks, Big John Cornyn) to the “huh?” (Nancy Worley on strangling cats).

• TV: Obsessive-compulsive political junkies and opposition researchers alike are dancing a jig right now, as C-Span has announced that it’s releasing its entire archives onto the Web. All 160,000 hours worth. (If you don’t have a calculator handy, that’s 18 years.)

• Redistricting: Eager not to get behind the redistricting 8-ball in 2012 like they were ten years ago, the DLCC has launched a $20 million push aimed at keeping control of state legislatures in key states. They point to “swing” chambers in 17 states that have the capacity to affect almost half of all House seats. Dem-held chambers they’re focusing on are the Alabama State Senate, Colorado State Senate, Indiana House, Nevada State Senate, New Hampshire State Senate, New York State Senate, Ohio House, Pennsylvania House, Wisconsin Assembly and the Wisconsin State Senate, while GOP-held chambers are the Michigan State Senate, Missouri House, Oklahoma State Senate, Tennessee House, and the Texas House.

CA-Sen: No one does weird-ass like Carly Fiorina, who has another web video out that hails from the land of the bizarre.

CO-Sen: Seventh CD Rep. Ed Perlmutter has endorsed Sen. Michael Bennet over Andrew Romanoff in the Dem primary.

FL-Sen: It looks like Marco Rubio is finally starting to come in for some serious scrutiny. The St. Pete Times has a lengthy examination of the corporate money that has flowed Rubio’s way, and the irregularities which have riddled his campaign finance reports.

IL-Sen: Alexi Giannoulias says he’s going to return all campaign contributions from, as Politico puts it, “accused bank fraudster Nick Giannis and his family.”

IN-Sen: Ah, this is good. Dan Coats is trying to run as hard as he can against the bailout… but back in 2008, he was lobbying the government on behalf of a hedge fund which owned 80% of Chrysler – a huge recipient of bailout funds. (He didn’t do a very good job, it seems, considering that the fund, Cerberus, has its equity stake wiped out.) As Texas Dem astutely noted the moment Coats rumors started flying, “Usually retired senators get rich in some unseemly way that makes them unelectable in the future.” Sure looks like the case here.

NY-Sen-B: I hope all those Democrats who supported Mike Bloomberg over the years are happy: The NYT has an in-depth look at Bloombo’s hostility to Kirsten Gillibrand, and all the candidates he has tried to push into running against her. The latest is his own girlfriend, Diana Taylor. The Times fails to find any rational reason for why His Bloominess has chugged so much haterade, but devtob points out that they ignored a key item: Bloombo was a big backer of Caroline Kennedy, who of course was snubbed in favor of Gillibrand.

RI-Sen: Don’t look to retiring Dem Rep. Patrick Kennedy to share any of his spoils with the DCCC. Calling his decision not to seek another term in the House more of a “sabbatical” than a retirement, Kennedy says he plans to transfer his $500K campaign purse into an interest-bearing account, just in case he should need it for a Senate campaign someday. This is total bullshit. (Thanks to SSPer Andrew for this one.) (JL)

ID-Gov: Dem Keith Allred has made it official. Allred, a former Harvard professor, had spent five years running a non-partisan “citizens group” called The Common Interest which he left to pursue a gubernatorial run.

MI-Gov: Virg Bernero locked down another big union endorsement: the AFL-CIO took a vote, and it was “overwhelming” (their words) in Bernero’s favor. The United Auto Workers union, itself a member of the AFL-CIO, had already gotten behind Bernero, but now the entire umbrella organization (which also includes AFSCME, IBEW and AFT) is doing so. Bernero’s been running exactly the sort of populist campaign his supporters would have hoped, lately proposing that Michigan establish a state-run bank, modeled after the Bank of North Dakota.

NM-Gov: Doña Ana County District Attorney Susana Martinez won the support of 47% of the delegates at the state GOP convention this past weekend, while former NM Republican Party chair Allen Weh pulled in 26%. Pete Domenici, Jr. took less than 5%, but still plans to file petitions to get on the ballot. Because Martinez and Weh got over 20%, they only have to file half as many signatures, but as Heath Haussamen points out, no candidate who hasn’t scored 20% at the convention has ever come back to win the nomination.

OH-Gov: A voluminous auditor’s report on the demise of Lehman Brothers was published last week, documenting all of the company’s shady financial practices which led to its doom. Why does this matter to the Ohio governor’s race? John Kasich was a managing partner at Lehman for several years, right up until the bitter end in 2008. Ted Strickland is putting some pointed questions to Kasich, whose response so far has been extremely feeble.

FL-08: Sarah Palin’s gotten mixed up in the race to take on Rep. Alan Grayson, firing some broadsides at the Democrat during a recent trip to Orlando. Grayson did not let this challenge go unanswered.

KY-03: Tacked on to a Louisville mayoral poll, SUSA included a sort of unusually-worded question about Dem Rep. John Yarmuth’s re-elects. They asked voters if they would vote for or against Yarmuth “no matter who else is on the ballot,” with a not sure “until I know who else is on the ballot” option. Yarmuth scored 27-23-48. It still seems that Yarmuth’s only challenger so far is a dude who owns a bunch of Pizza Huts.

NY-14: EMILY’s List has finally done something right: They’re endorsing Rep. Carolyn Maloney, a longtime advocate for women’s issues, in her primary fight against Some Dude Reshma Saujani.

NY-23: After months of sounding pretty serious about a bid, state Assemblyman Will Barclay has decided to pass on a race against Dem Rep. Bill Owens. Barclay’s exit greatly improves the chances of Club For Growth nutter Doug Hoffman in the GOP primary, where his main rival now appears to be investment banker Matt Doheny, who lost the special election nomination to Dede Scozzafava last fall. (JL)

OK-05: The Republican primary to succeed Mary Fallin in the House just gets bigger and bigger. State Rep. Shane Jett is now the sixth candidate in a field that includes state Rep. Mike Thompson, former state Rep. Kevin Calvey, and Some Other Dudes. (JL)

IL-Lt. Gov: The 38 members of the IL Dem central committee will hold interviews with prospective candidates around the state next week and then pick a replacement Lt. Gov. nominee on March 27.

Research 2000 for Daily Kos (3/8-10, likely voters, 8/9-12, 2009 in parentheses):

For CA-Gov:

Meg Whitman (R): 52 (24)

Steve Poizner (R): 19 (9)

Tom Campbell (R): NA (19)

(MoE: ±5.0%)

Jerry Brown (D): 45 (42)

Meg Whitman (R): 41 (36)

Jerry Brown (D): 48 (43)

Steve Poizner (R): 33 (34)

(MoE: ±4.0%)

In the Republican primary, both candidates are becoming better well known, though Tom Campbell’s exit from the Governor’s race seems to have benefited Meg Whitman quite a bit. Whitman seems to be going for the “moderate” mantle here, with Poizner running to her right.

Gov. Moonbeam continues to lead Whitman narrowly and Poizner by a somewhat larger margin. Poizner’s posturing may be hurting him in the general election though, as his favorables have moved from 35 to 37, while his unfavorables have jumped from 27 to 40, putting him in net negative territory. Poizner had been keeping pace with Indies at 36/35, but Brown’s taken the clear advantage, with Indies now breaking 46/30 in his favor.

Whitman has made herself better known, with “no opinion” of her down to 14 from 29; her favorables are now a solid 51/35 (up from 41/30). Brown’s also in net positive territory though, at a solid 52/40.

For CA-Sen:

Tom Campbell (R): 33 (NA)

Carly Fiorina (R): 24 (29)

Chuck DeVore (R): 7 (17)

(MoE: ±5.0%)

Barbara Boxer (D): 47

Tom Campbell (R): 43

Barbara Boxer (D): 49 (52)

Carly Fiorina (R): 40 (31)

Barbara Boxer (D): 49 (53)

Chuck DeVore (R): 39 (29)

(MoE: ±4.0%)

The biggest news in the primary is former 15th CD Rep. Tom Campbell’s entry into the race, where he’s leapfrogged into first place, with his gain coming at both Fiorina and DeVore’s expense.

Campbell – with his base in Santa Clara County – carries his strength to the general as well. Somewhat troubling for Dems is his strength among Independents, where he narrowly edges Boxer 45-43. Carlyfornia Dreamin has turned somewhat into the Pacific Coast Gaffeway recently, and it’s taking a toll on her favorables. Fiorina was already in negative territory at 22/29 in August, but she’s not exactly winning people over. She’s added +13 to her favorables, but +14 to her unfavorables.

Chuck DeVore continues to be a non-factor in the general, he’s also in net negative territory at 34/42. If by some miracle he pulls it out of the primary, I think we’ll be looking at something similar to Boxer-Jones in 2004.

Barbara Boxer’s favorables aren’t the best at 50/45, but that’s more than Carly or Chuck can claim. DiFi’s not doing much better though, at 49/44, though Obama remains popular at 60/32 (which is probably keeping has national approval from dropping into the 40’s).

RaceTracker Wiki: CA-Gov | CA-Sen

CA-Sen: Arianna Packard, granddaughter of Hewlett-Packard co-founder David Packard, is slamming Carly Fiorina for “almost destroying” HP. Packard, who had pushed for Fiorina’s ouster from the company in 2005, is supporting rival Chuck DeVore in the GOP primary. (P.S. Carlyfornia just officially filed to run.)

FL-Sen: Tom Jensen is such a tease:

We are going to have absolutely brutal numbers out on Charlie Crist tomorrow.

Here’s a little preview: among Republican primary voters 19% would like to see him as Governor a year from now, 14% want him in the Senate, and 56% want him out of elected office.

If there is any path to his winning office in Florida again – and there may not be – it’s as something other than a Republican.

NC-Sen: Attorney Ken Lewis scored a pretty good endorsement in his uphill Dem primary against Elaine Marshall and Cal Cunningham: Rep. Mel Watt (NC-12) has given Lewis his backing. Watt is the second member of Congress to support Lewis; Rep. G. K. Butterfield, another CBC member, had previously endorsed.

ND-Sen: Former SoS candidate and businesswoman Kristin Hedger (D) is passing on a run to replace the retiring Byron Dorgan. Still, Dems do have a candidate in state Sen. Tracy Potter.

NV-Sen: Huzzah! Harry Reid has officially filed for re-election!

AL-05: This is bipartisanship you can believe in, my friends: Dems and conservatives alike, some 400 strong, protested John Boehner and Parker Griffith outside of a closed-door fundraiser the Minority Leader held in Huntsville for the newest, and least-popular, member of his caucus.

LA-02: CQ Politics sat down for an interview with state Rep. Juan LaFonta, who is aiming to take down GOP Rep. Joe Cao. (So is fellow state Rep. Cedric Richmond.)

PA-06: Doug Pike has proposed a “positive campaign agreement” to Manan Trivedi, his rival for the Dem nomination to take on erstwhile Rep. Jim Gerlach this fall. Trivedi hasn’t made a formal decision yet, but his manager said of Pike’s offer: “It certainly sounds like someone who’s afraid of his own record.”

SC-05: After Dem Rep. John Spratt’s anemic fourth quarter filing prompted renewed speculation that the veteran incumbent may be heading for the exits this year, he’s taking some positive steps towards a re-election bid. Spratt’s office says that the congressman “intends to run again” and will hold a fundraiser at DNC headquarters this week. (JL)

Census: Only one Representative voted against a non-binding resolution to promote participation in the Census last week… did you guess Ron Paul? You guessed right! Memo to U.S. Gov’t: Keep your nose out of my gold bullion stash! Be really curious what happens to this fucking weirdo in redistricting. In less wacky Census news, the Census Bureau started sending out advance notification letters to 120 million households today. Research shows that these letters boost response rates.

Polling: Jed Lewison has some great visualizations of exactly how stark Rasmussen’s “house effect” is.

Voting: This is a good bit of news (and shows you why having Dems in charge of Washington still matters, even if they can’t seem to get anything done in Congress): The Obama DoJ blocked one of the biggest voting machine makers, Electronic Systems & Software, from purchasing Premier Election Solutions (an arm of Diebold). Had the deal gone forward, ES&S would have controlled 70% of the voting machine market. Hooray for competition!

• AR-Sen: Blanche Lincoln is up with her first ad, as she runs for the Republican nomination for the Senate race. Wait… what? She’s running as a Democrat? Hmmm, that’s not what her ad says, as it’s a list of every which way she’s bucked the Democratic party line in the last year (and closing by saying “I don’t answer to my party, I answer to Arkansas”). That’d make sense if she were running in the general election, but there’s a little matter of her having to get out of the primary first… Meanwhile, the base continues to abandon Lincoln; today it was EMILY’s List, who say they won’t be lifting a finger to help Lincoln. She may still get a lifeline from Bill Clinton, though, who’s continuing to back her. And Bill Halter better be committed to seeing this Senate primary thing through, because state Sen. Shane Broadway just filed to run to keep the Lt. Governor spot in Democratic hands.

• CA-Sen, CA-Gov: Republican polling firm Magellan (apparently not working on behalf of any candidates) issued more polls of the two Republican primaries in California. The polls are pretty much in line with what everyone else is seeing: on the Senate side, Tom Campbell leads at 33, followed by Carly Fiorina at 20 and Chuck DeVore at least cracking double-digits at 11. For the gubernatorial race, Meg Whitman is cruising, beating Steve Poizner 63-12.

• CT-Sen: When it comes to the Connecticut senate race, Dick Blumenthal is the Superfly TNT. Hell, he’s the Guns of the Navarone. In fact, he lays a massive mushroom cloud on Linda McMahon (60-31), Rob Simmons (58-32) and Peter Schiff (57-27) alike — and yes, this is according to Rasmussen. (D)

• IL-Sen: In an interview with the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board, Alexi Giannoulias said he believes his family’s bank is likely to get EATED (as Atrios would say) by the FDIC in the coming months. Perhaps worse, the Trib says that Giannoulias isn’t being forthcoming about what he knew about the bank’s loans to convicted bookmaker and pimp (i.e. mobster) Michael “Jaws” Giorango. Ugh. (D)

• KY-Sen: If the Dems are seeing a bit of an uptick in selected polls lately, they aren’t seeing it in Kentucky yet, at least not if Rasmussen has anything to say about it. Rand Paul leads Jack Conway 46-38 and Dan Mongiardo 49-35, while Trey Grayson leads Conway 45-35 and Mongiardo 44-37. Not much change in the trendlines, except for, oddly, Mongiardo’s standing vis-à-vis Grayson improves while Conway’s slips. Meanwhile, Conway is hitting the airwaves with a new TV spot, wisely taking Jim Bunning’s one-man crusade against unemployed people and hanging it around the necks of Paul and Grayson.

• NJ-Sen: Apparently the 2010 elections are just too boring. Farleigh Dickinson University tested Sen. Bob Menendez versus his 2006 opponent, Tom Kean, Jr., finding a tie (39-38 for Kean, with 17% undecided). Seriously, though, testing horserace numbers this far out just seems silly. Can you imagine what similar polls would have shown for the GOP in 2004? (D)

• NV-Sen: Jon Ralston sits down for a chat with erstwhile Tea Party candidate Scott Ashjian, a.k.a. the only man who can inadvertently save Harry Reid. Ashjian, a wealthy contractor (whose company has more than its share of complaints and liens), plans to fund his own way, and discounts claims that he’s somehow being put up to it by the Reid camp as a vote-splitter.

• NY-Sen-B: Sigh, what could have been… Harold Ford Jr. met with Karl Rove in 2004 to discuss the possibility of running for Senate in Tennessee in 2006… as a Republican. Ford isn’t denying the meeting, but, in his, um, defense? says that it was Rove’s idea.

• UT-Sen: Bob Bennett keeps on being a punching bag for the GOP’s right wing, and today the Club for Growth weighed in with an anti-Bennett ad, airing on (where else?) the Fox News Channel in Utah. It’s targeted purely at state GOP insiders, urging them to send anti-Bennett delegates to the state nominating convention. The CfG hasn’t settled on one particular candidate they’re for; all they know is who they’re against.

• GA-Gov: PPP follows up its Georgia general election numbers from yesterday with a look at the Republican gubernatorial primary. (The Democratic primary seems to look like an adequately foregone conclusion to them.) No surprises: Insurance Comm. John Oxendine leads at 27, followed by Karen Handel at 19, Nathan Deal at 13, Austin Scott and Eric Johnson at 3, and Jeff Chapman and Ray McBerry at 2.

• MD-Gov: There’s been lots of focus on the leaked RNC strategy document today, mostly for its rather shameless descriptions of its fundraising plans. There are a few noteworthy strategic items here, though — maybe most interestingly, they’ve totally left Michael Steele’s home state of Maryland off the list of gubernatorial races they’re pushing. It remains to be seen whether it’s because Bob Ehrlich isn’t getting in after all, they don’t think he has a ghost of a chance, or just general RNC bungling. (Also interesting: on the Senate side, they’re even targeting Charles Schumer, but they’ve left off Patty Murray, which may suggest it isn’t getting any better for the GOP than Don Benton in Washington.)

• MI-Gov: Two endorsements in the pipeline in the Michigan gubernatorial race. Mike Huckabee weighed in on the GOP side, picking AG Mike Cox, calling him the “pro-life, pro-gun” candidate over the probably more right-wing Rep. Peter Hoekstra. (I’m not sure how much pull Huckabee has in Michigan. As for me, I’m waiting to see who Ted Nugent endorses.) On the Dem side, this is still purely rumor, but the word is that the United Auto Workers plan to endorse Lansing mayor Virg Bernero (who showed he had their backs with his passionate televised defenses of the auto bailout). The stamp of the state’s most powerful union would go a long way toward uniting union backing behind one Dem.

• NY-Gov: The clock seems to be ticking even louder for David Paterson, as today one of his top aides, spokesperson Peter Kauffmann, resigned and distanced himself. Kauffmann said that, in light of the ethics ruling about the World Series tickets, he could no longer “in good conscience continue.”

• OH-Gov, OH-01: VPOTUS Watch: Joey Joe Joe Biden Shabadoo will visit Cleveland on March 15 to do a fundraiser for Gov. Ted Strickland. He’ll also be doing a separate event for Rep. Steve Driehaus. (D)

• AR-01: The fields for both sides in the open seat left behind by Rep. Marion Berry are slow to take shape, but it looks like the Democrats found a decent-sounding candidate who can bring some of his own money with him. Terry Green, an orthopedic surgeon with his own practice, has filed, sounding some populist notes in his first comments to the press.

• IL-08: Ah, the party of fiscal responsibility. Joe Walsh, the GOP’s candidate in the 8th, stopped making mortgage payments on his Evanston condominium in May 2009 and lost it to foreclosure in October. Putting a positive spin on it, Walsh says “This experience helped me gain a better appreciation for the very real economic anxieties felt by 8th District families.”

• MI-03: Here’s a positive development: Democrats are actually lining up to contest the R+6 open seat in Grand Rapids left behind by retiring GOP Rep. Vern Ehlers. Former Kent Co. Commissioner Paul Mayhue is about to enter the Dem field, where he’ll join attorney Patrick Miles.

• MI-06: Ex-state Rep. Jack Hoogendyk, who was badly beaten by Carl Levin in 2008’s Senate race, is now setting his sights on knocking off incumbent Rep. Fred Upton in the Republican primary. Hoogendyk, who has yet to make a decision on the race, sent out an email to supporters blasting Upton for his votes in favor of TARP, No Child Left Behind, and S-CHIP. Upton’s district has an even PVI, and went for Bush twice by seven-point margins before Obama won the district by a comfy 54-45 spread in ’08. (J)

• NH-01: A run in the 1st by RNC committee member Sean Mahoney is now looking much likelier, even though he’d scoped out the race and decided against it last year. Last year, it was looking like former Manchester mayor Frank Guinta had the nomination to himself, but Guinta’s bad fundraising and bad press have lured a few other contenders into the GOP field.

• NY-15: With Charlie Rangel’s position looking increasingly precarious, CQ takes a look at some possible names who might replace him, should he decide not to seek another term (including state Sen. Bill Perkins, Assemblymen Keith Wright and Adriano Espaillat, and city councilors Inez Dickens and Robert Jackson). He already has a few primary challengers – former aide Vincent Morgan and possibly Assemblyman Adam Clayton Powell IV. Meanwhile, the chairmanship of Rangel’s Ways & Means Committee has hopscotched around in the last few days, to California’s Pete Stark and today to the less-controversial Michigan’s Sander Levin. The chair of this powerful committee (which oversees tax laws) tends to rake in tons of campaign contributions – and dole them out to fellow caucus members, so it’s worth keeping an eye on who actually replaces Rangel on a permanent basis. (This is also why so many peeps have returned money to Rangel – because he’s given out so much.) (D)

• New York: Could he really be eyeing a comeback? According to Time Magazine, Eliot Spitzer is “bored out of his mind” these days, but also says he doesn’t want to subject his family to the inevitable ugliness that would ensue if he ran for something again. Meanwhile, former Spitzer confidante Lloyd Constantine, the man Spitzer called right before the news of his involvement with prostitutes broke, has turned on his former mentee with a new tell-all book. The stars are definitely not aligned for Spitz, if they ever were. (D)

• Maps: You know you love them (otherwise you wouldn’t be at SSP). And jeffmd has a whole new bunch of ’em, looking at the results of the Texas Republican gubernatorial primary and how they might translate into the general.

• Healthcare: The Wall Street Journal has a chart laying out how members of the House might vote on the next iteration of the healthcare reform bill, listing public statements (if any) they’ve made since the last vote. This really should be in wiki form, though – for instance, they don’t have Mike Arcuri’s remarks (see Morning Digest). (D)

• Redistricting: The NYT takes a look at the people who applied for a spot on California’s state legislative redistricting commission. Fourteen spots have been set aside for ordinary citizens… and 31,000 people (including probably at least a few SSPers!) applied. Progress Illinois also has a detailed look today at the new proposals underway to make the redistricting process fairer (or at least less random).

• Blogosphere: Finally, we’re sad to see one of our favorite blogs apparently calling it quits. Over the last two years, Campaign Diaries became a must-read, both for insightful analysis and for making sure that no comings-and-goings in any races fell through the cracks. We wish Taniel well in his next endeavors.

• AZ-Sen: It’s getting to the point where the real question is, is there any key establishment Republican left who hasn’t endorsed John McCain in his GOP primary duel with J.D. Hayworth. Apparently, the specter of teabagger revolt over snubbing Hayworth isn’t too intimidating to anybody. Today, it was Minnesota governor and likely presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty who gave McCain the thumbs-up.

• CA-Sen: There was a Senate component to that poll of Republican primary voters by M4 Strategies on behalf of the Small Business Action Committee, too. They find ex-Rep. Tom Campbell in the lead at 32, with Carly Fiorina following at 19 and Assemblyman Chuck DeVore at 11.

• FL-Sen: You’ve probably already seen these rumors, but in case you hadn’t, Jack Furnari, a conservative activist and a regular contributor to the Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel’s political blog, says that multiple sources have told him that Charlie Crist is preparing to cast off his scarlet “R” and run for the Senate as an indie. Crist‘s communications director, however, says this is a “patently false rumor.”

• KY-Sen: Rand Paul is already making a strong push for the finish line in the May 18 Senate GOP primary. He’s begun reserving $332K in airtime for the weeks before the primary. So far, the moneybomb-propelled Paul has already spent $291K on TV ads while Trey Grayson is just getting started, with a $17K buy, which may explain some of the disparity between the two in the polls right now.

• NC-Sen: Lots of numbers out of North Carolina to look at this morning. Most notably, Rasmussen looks at the general election, finding Richard Burr with a sizable edge over both Democratic challengers; Burr leads SoS Elaine Marshall 50-34 and leads ex-state Sen. Cal Cunningham 51-29. Civitas doesn’t have general election numbers, but looks at the Democratic primary, where they find a whole lotta undecideds: Marshall leads Cunningham 14-4, with Cunningham actually being outpaced by attorney Kenneth Lewis at 5. (PPP, who polled the primary last week, seems to have pushed leaners harder, with Marshall at a whopping 29, followed by Cunningham at 12 and 5 for Lewis.) Finally, Elon (pdf) doesn’t have any head-to-heads at all, but has some approval numbers: Richard Burr is generates a whole lot of indifference, with favorables that work out to 30/23, with 29 for “don’t know” and 19 for “neither favorable/unfavorable” (which is interesting — I’d like to see more pollsters include “meh” as an option). Burr also has an ominous 24% re-elect (with a 51% “time for someone new”). Elaine Marshall’s favorables are at 19/8.

• WI-Sen: Republican real estate developer Terrence Wall, thanks to his own money, is the most imposing candidate currently in the race against Russ Feingold in Wisconsin, and he has his own internal poll out courtesy of POS. It suggests that Feingold shouldn’t take his re-election campaign for granted even if Tommy Thompson doesn’t make a surprise re-entry into the political arena; Feingold leads Wall by a 46-39 margin.

• AR-Gov: Looks like the Republicans have found someone willing to take one for the team and run against Democratic incumbent Gov. Mike Beebe, who usually polls as the nation’s most popular governor. Former state Sen. Jim Keet says he’s “90% certain” he’ll run. Keet (who’s a personal friend of Beebe) offers a rationale for his candidacy that seems in line with his chances of winning: “If we don’t have candidates that are willing to stand up despite the odds in both parties, then we’ll never have the best possible government. It’s good to have competing views and candidates on both sides of the aisle.”

• MD-Gov: Rasmussen takes its first look at the Governor’s race in Maryland, where incumbent Dem Martin O’Malley may face a rematch with ex-Gov. Bob Ehrlich (who hasn’t declared anything, but is starting to act candidate-ish). Their results are right in line with most other pollsters, who’ve seen an O’Malley lead in the high single-digits over Ehrlich; Rasmussen says it’s 49-43.

• NH-Gov: With a late entry, it looks like the Republicans are getting an uprgrade in their race against Democratic Gov. John Lynch, another incumbent considered mostly unassailable. The state’s former health and human services commissioner, and loser of the 2002 and 2008 NH-01 GOP primaries, John Stephen, says he’ll give it a whack. (Ex-Rep. Jeb Bradley, who won both those primaries, is chairing Stephen’s campaign.) Social conservative activist Karen Testerman is probably the best-known GOPer in the race so far.

• SD-Gov: Rasmussen had good news for Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin yesterday, and they have some more positive data for the Dems, this time in the gubernatorial race. State Sen. minority leader Scott Heidepriem actually leads against two out of three Republican opponents; he leads state Sen. majority leader Dave Knudson 34-31, and teabagging state Sen. Gordon Howie 37-29. Unfortunately, Heidepriem trails the Republican field’s most likely frontrunner, Lt. Governor Dennis Daugaard, 41-32.

• TX-Gov: It looks like the DGA is seeing the same polls that we’re seeing. Feeling bullish on ex-Houston mayor Bill White’s chances in the gubernatorial race, they’ve pumped $500K into White’s campaign. White, at $5.4 million, already has doubled up on cash against his likely opponent, incumbent GOP Gov. Rick Perry (who’s at $2.5 million, and may get further drained if he doesn’t avoid a runoff in his primary).

• FL-25: A name recognition poll of possible Republican replacements for Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (by Republican pollster Hill Research) seems to give a name rec edge to potential candidate state Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla, with 39/9 favorables. State Rep. David Rivera, who’s already made his candidacy official, is a bit less known, at 24/5. The best-known person polled is Miami-Dade Co. Commissioner Joe Martinez (at 34/17), who hasn’t really expressed much interest yet.

• KS-04: SurveyUSA has another poll in Kansas, where there’s a competitive GOP primary in three different open House seats. Today, they focused on the Wichita-based 4th. I’m wondering if businessman Wink Hartman has been advertising while everyone else has been silent, because that’s the only explanation I can think of for his big lead. Hartman is at 36, beating all his insider opponents: state Sen. Dick Kelsey is at 11, with state Sen. Jean Schodorf and former RNC committeeman Mike Pompeo both at 10. (Either that, or people think they’re voting for Wink Martindale.)

• NY-15: With Rep. Charlie Rangel having been on the wrong end of an Ethics Committee ruling yesterday, names are starting to trickle in from fellow House members who want him to put down his Ways and Means gavel. Paul Hodes (running for Senate in NH) was the loudest, along with Bobby Bright and Gene Taylor. Newly-elected Mike Quigley is the only safe-seat Dem to chime in, at least so far.

• PA-12: One more big development in the “race” in the 12th, where candidates are jostling to get picked by committee to run in the May 18 special election. Former Lt. Governor Mark Singel suddenly pulled his name out of consideration, which may suggest that there’s a lot of insider movement toward John Murtha’s former district director, Mark Critz. Singel threw his support to Critz, who previously got the endorsements of two other possible candidates, Joyce Murtha and moneybags businessman Mark Pasquerilla. With Westmoreland Co. Commissioner Tom Cesaro also withdrawing his name, it looks like it’s heading down to a choice between Critz and former state Treasurer Barbara Hafer for the Dem nomination. (Hafer, in fact, is now saying she’s likely to run in the primary for Nov. even if she doesn’t get the special election nod.)

• RI-01: It looks like the fight for the Democratic nomination in the open seat in the 1st is going to be a mostly two-way fight between Providence mayor David Cicciline and former state party chair William Lynch. Two other Dems who had a shot at making the race interesting, long-ago ex-Rep. Robert Weygand and investment banker Nicholas Pell (grandson of Sen. Claiborne Pell), have said no.

• SC-02: No lie: GOP loudmouth Joe Wilson is actually getting a primary challenge. Businessman Joe Grimaud, who lost the 2001 special election primary to Wilson, said he’ll try again in 2010. Grimaud, who can self-fund, said he’s sympathetic to the teabaggers but admits there isn’t much ideological daylight between him and Wilson.

• GA-LG: It’s a family affair: Carol Porter, the wife of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Dubose Porter, declared her candidacy for the Democratic Lt. Governor nomination. Considering that Dubose Porter is polling only in the single digits in the gubernatorial primary, though, it doesn’t seem like a husband-and-wife team in charge is that likely regardless of how Carol Porter does.

• TX-Board of Educ.: Josh Goodman points out how the real drama in next Tuesday’s primary election won’t be the gubernatorial primary but rather the Republican fights for a number of seats on the Texas Board of Education between moderates and conservatives. Social conservatives are close to a majority on the board, but it sounds like moderates may be able to pick up a few seats, swinging the board (crucial for the tenor of school textbooks not just in Texas but nationwide, given how many students are in Texas) away from its love of creationism.

• Redistricting: Illinois may be following the lead of a number of other states in trying to make the redistricting process a bit less partisan. Legislative Democrats are pushing a plan to have maps drawn by a special master appointed by two Supreme Court justices in case the legislature deadlocks on maps. The current plan, believe it or not, lets one party (if there’s a deadlock) have the final say on redistricting based on which party’s name gets drawn at random. Republicans (who can probably see they aren’t going to control either chamber of the legislature any time soon) would like to go further than that, all the way to an independent redistricting commission.

• Votes: National Journal has released its annual vote ratings on who’s most liberal and most conservative, based on key votes. In the House, most liberal is a tie between Rush Holt, Gwen Moore, John Olver, Linda Sanchez, Jan Schakowsky, Louise Slaughter, Mel Watt, and Henry Waxman, while most conservative is a tie between Trent Franks, Doug Lamborn, Randy Neugebauer, Pete Olson, John Shadegg, and Mac Thornberry. (Worst Dem honors go to Bobby Bright, to the right of 11 Republicans.) In the Senate, Sherrod Brown, Roland Burris, Ben Cardin, Jack Reed, and Sheldon Whitehouse share liberal honors, while Jim Inhofe stands alone in crazy-town. And here’s why Evan Bayh won’t be missed: he earns the Senate’s worst Dem nod, worse than Joe Lieberman and Olympia Snowe while tied with his own freakin’ colleague Richard freakin’ Lugar. (DW-Nominate scores for 2009, more comprehensive although much less user-friendly, also came out a few weeks ago.)