Tag: Barbara Hafer

All that sound and fury for nothing. Babs Hafer pulls the plug on her primary bid:

Hafer’s withdrawal came less than 24 hours after she was still defiantly questioning the process by which her opponent, Mark Critz, had won the party’s nomination for a special election. On Tuesday, she was still telling reporters that she planned to run in the May primary against Critz. She filed nominating petitions to get on the ballot, but said Wednesday she was withdrawing those petitions.

“We had a spirited campaign for who would make the best nominee in the special election, but in the spirit of Jack Murtha I believe now is not the time to continue this race,” Hafer said in a statement. “I look forward to finding other ways to continue to serve the public and change this state and this country for the better.”

This is good news for Critz, who now only faces primary competition from the lesser-known threesome that is Cambria County Controller Ed Cernic Jr., Navy veteran Ryan Bucchianeri and attorney Ron Mackell Jr. While it’s pretty irritating that Hafer was continuing her attacks at fever pitch right up until yesterday, at least this is one less distraction to worry about.

UPDATE: As Adam B. notes in the comments, it looks like Hafer would have very likely been thrown off the ballot after barely filing enough signatures to qualify for the primary ballot. As you know, it’s pretty easy to challenge the validity of signatures, which is why candidates with a competent organization ensure that they file many more signatures than they actually require.

• AR-Sen: Like I always say, flip-flopping at every opportunity is the best way to win elections. Then:

Lincoln: I Will Fight Reconciliation as Tool to Achieve Health Insurance Reform

Now:

Asked twice whether she was wavering on her previous statements to vote against a reconciliation bill, Lincoln said: “I’ll wait to see what’s in it.”

Considering she already voted for healthcare reform in the first place, this actually is probably the better move for her, believe it or not. (D)

• CO-Sen, CO-Gov: More evidence that the teabaggers and assorted other movement conservative aren’t takin’ kindly to outsiders coming in and imposing Jane Norton on them. Norton lost a GOP straw poll to right-wing Weld County DA Ken Buck after a Denver candidate forum sponsored by the Tea Partiers and 9-12ers. Interestingly, no-name Dan Maes also triumphed over ex-Rep. Scott McInnis on the gubernatorial side.

• LA-Sen: Rep. Charlie Melancon is going on the offensive, having a lot of ground to make up against David Vitter if polls are any indication. He’s filed an ethics complaint against Vitter for having violated federal law by sending out fundraising appeals on official Senate letterhead.

• NY-Sen-B: Hardcore movement conservative and – get this – former chief economist for Bear Stearns (!!) David Malpass says he’s weighing a run against Kirsten Gillibrand, presumably as a Republican. Jonathan Chait hits all the high points as to how badly out-of-touch Malpass is, and Paul Krugman zings him for an especially good bit of moranocity. If I were Gillibrand, I think I’d love to go up against a mouthbreather like this. (D)

• PA-Sen: Arlen Specter got a boost from labor, with an endorsement from the United Auto Workers. Also, speaking of Pennsylvania, check out my latest installment at Salon.com, where I used the disparate polling in PA-Sen as a means of introducing the non-SSP-reading masses to the idea of polling likely voters vs. registered voters.

• WA-Sen: It looks like the NRSC hasn’t given up on trying to lure Dino Rossi into the Senate race, as Rossi has confirmed having had a conversation with John Cornyn about it. Rossi continues to maintain a “never say never” attitude about it in the face of questions. The NRSC may also have a Plan B if Rossi says no, that’s an upgrade from their current top candidate, state Sen. Don Benton. They’re also interested in former news anchor Susan Hutchison. Despite presenting a somewhat moderate profile and the advantage of running without an “R” next to her name in the nonpartisan race, she still managed to rack up only 41% while losing November’s King County Executive race. (Still, that makes her only a one-time loser, compared with Rossi’s two strikes.) Hutchison says that she’s undecided, and she’ll wait for Rossi’s decision to make her own.

• IA-Gov: One other candidate who’s not faring so well in the straw poll venue, despite an overwhelming consensus from the political establishment, is ex-Gov. Terry Branstad. He just lost a quick succession of three different county-level straw polls to social conservative Bob Vander Plaats, and these aren’t dinky rural counties either. Vander Plaats cleaned up in Woodbury County (his home turf of Sioux City), while earning narrow victories in Story County (Davenport Ames) and Dallas County (Des Moines suburbs).

• NY-Gov: Andrew Cuomo may not be a declared candidate for Governor just yet, but he’s certainly fundraising like one. His camp is planning to hold a high-priced fundraiser in DC on March 22nd with some high-powered Democratic money players in attendance. (JL) Some of David Paterson’s nosediving approvals may have rubbed off a bit on Cuomo, if Marist‘s new snap poll (pdf) is any indication: Cuomo’s approval is down to a relatively human 54/39. Paterson is at an appalling 19/79, but 68% say he might as well still serve out his term with 28% saying resign. Still trying to find an upgrade from the lackluster campaign of Rick Lazio to go up against Cuomo, the GOP is meeting with conservaDem Suffolk Co. Exec Steve Levy (who’s been mulling a run in the Democratic primary) to try and get him to switch over to the GOP line to run for Governor.

• DE-AL: Republicans may have found an upgrade in the Delaware at-large seat, which has pretty much already slipped out of their grasp but where they can at least force former Democratic Lt. Gov. John Carney to work for it. They’re courting philanthropist Michele Rollins, the widow of former Republican Lt. Gov. John Rollins (and a former Miss USA) who has access to her former husband’s personal fortune.

• LA-02: Rep. Joe Cao seems to have read yesterday’s big expose of BaseConnect (the former BMW Direct) at TPM, and it seems to have been the first time he’d learned that they’re up to no good. He just severed all ties with the group, who’ve been doing his fundraising for the last year (and skimming off almost all his proceeds, which explains his terrible burn rate). Does this mean that no one from the NRCC was giving him any guidance on how to raise funds? It doesn’t seem like the kind of scam an incumbent would ordinarily fall for.

• NY-23: Doug Hoffman’s made it official – he’s going to try to win the Republican, Conservative, and Independence Party nominations, “and unite them, as one team, to defeat the agenda of Nancy Pelosi and Bill Owens.” Sounds like someone has seen the Lord of the Rings movies a few times too many. This also seems a wee bit delusional, since of course most of the Independence Party quickly embraced Owens (who seems like a good fit for them) when Dede Scozzafava abandoned the race at the last moment. (D)

• NY-29: Strike two names from the list of potential Democratic candidates for the special election to replace crumb-bum Rep. Eric Massa. Assemblywoman Barbara Lifton has announced that she won’t run for the seat, as has Monroe County DA Mike Green. (JL) On the GOP side, state Sen. Cathy Young has also just declined.

• PA-12: Barbara Hafer continues to attack the manner in which former Murtha aide Mark Critz was selected as the Dem nominee for the May special election – and by extention the people behind the process. Several Dems have gone on record expressing their distaste for Hafer’s attacks, and state party chair T. J. Rooney thinks they contributed to her being passed over. (D)

• TN-03: Democrats seem to have found a willing candidate, finally, to fill the gap in the open seat in the R+13 3rd (which looked like a promising race while former Insurance Comm. Paula Flowers was in it). Brenda Short decided to take the plunge; she used to be a Hill aide long ago for former Rep. Marilyn Lloyd (whose 1994 retirement turned the seat over to Rep. Zach Wamp, who’s finally vacating the seat to run for Governor).

• OR-Treasurer, OR-04: In something of a surprise, Multnomah County Chair Ted Wheeler today got named as interim state Treasurer, in the wake of the unfortunate death of Ben Westlund. Wheeler will still need to run again in a special election to be held as part of the November 2010 ballot; he’s confirmed he’ll run in that election but will face at least two prominent Dems: retiring state Sen. Rick Metsger (well-known from his time as local sports anchor), who filed yesterday before Wheeler’s appointment, and former Treasurer (and 2006 gubernatorial primary contestant) Jim Hill. Adding to the general sense of chaos is that it’s the last day of filing in Oregon, meaning now people are piling into Wheeler’s vacant seat as well. Finally, it looks like, with Springfield mayor Sid Leiken’s departure, OR-04 Rep. Peter DeFazio will merely face Some Dude: home-schooling activist Art Robinson.

• West Virginia: One other state where the filing deadline has passed is West Virginia. Despite the state’s red-ward trend (and significant challenges to both its Dem Reps., Alan Mollohan and Nick Rahall), one area where the GOP doesn’t look poised to make much of any progress is the state legislature, already thoroughly dominated by Democrats. In fact, if the Republicans won every race in the state Senate where they managed to field a candidate, they still would come up short on controlling the chamber. In the state House, they managed to leave 27 seats uncontested.  

The Democratic nominee in the special election for the 12th will be former John Murtha district director Mark Critz:

The state Democratic Party’s Executive Committee on Monday selected Mark Critz to be the party’s nominee in the race to replace John Murtha, choosing the congressman’s district director over former state Treasurer Barbara Hafer, a Democratic official has told PoliticsPA….

Critz will now be placed on the May 18 special election ballot to determine who will serve out the remainder of the late congressman’s term in office. He will face Republican Tim Burns or Bill Russell, depending on whom Republican conferees select during their meeting Thursday.

This was looking pretty well sewn-up over the weekend, when delegates from around the 12th picked Critz. The state executive committee had the final say, though, and there were whispers over the weekend that they might look elsewhere than Critz, who opponents say shares some of his former boss’s ethical baggage.

Rivals Barbara Hafer and Ryan Bucchanieri still plan to contest the Democratic primary for the regular November election, meaning that Critz could still be in the Neil Abercrombie-esque position of winning a special election and losing the primary on the same day. UPDATE: The vote count’s out: it was Critz 30, Hafer 18, Bucchanieri 1.

RaceTracker Wiki: PA-12

• AR-Sen: Local publication Talk Business has polled Blanche Lincoln’s approval on a regular basis for the last year, and she’s in the worst shape yet, they find: her approvals are down to 38/56, down from 45/45 three months ago.

• CO-Sen: After Rasmussen showed him in not-so-good shape over the weekend, Michael Bennet is out with his own internal poll from Harstad Research showing him up (barely) over Jane Norton. He leads Norton 41-40, and claims a 41-31 edge among independents. (If that disparity doesn’t seem to pencil out, that’s because the poll includes more registered Republicans than Democrats, reflecting the state’s registration balance.) The poll’s a little weird, though: it’s a combination of two different surveys, one in January and one in February, and there are no details on his primary matchup with Andrew Romanoff.

• FL-Sen: John Cornyn is sorta-kinda walking back the NRSC endorsement of Charlie Crist in the Florida Senate race, saying that was made before anyone had an inkling it would turn out to be an actual race. He didn’t rescind the endorsement, but made clear the NRSC wouldn’t be spending any money trying to affect the primary between Crist and Marco Rubio.

• NJ-Sen: Here’s some welcome news: after receiving treatment for stomach cancer, Frank Lautenberg is back on the job. He was back on the Hill late last week, and participated in a St. Patrick’s Day parade over the weekend.

• NY-Sen: Good news for Chuck Schumer, I suppose. Conservative pundit Larry Kudlow confirmed that he isn’t currently planning to challenge Schumer in the Senate this year. So, Schumer goes from a race against a guy he was beating by 40 points, to having no opponent at all.

• OH-Sen: There will be only two Democrats on the ballot for Senate this year: Lee Fisher and Jennifer Brunner. The other two random interlopers who popped up several weeks ago, TJ Johnson (a former Fisher underling whose presence briefly aroused some suspicions of shenanigans) and Charlena Bradley, didn’t have the signatures to qualify for the ballot.

• OR-Sen: Law professor Jim Huffman, who most people became aware of only when Rasmussen polled him against Ron Wyden, went ahead and made it official: he’s running for Senate. Blue Oregon has a nice rundown of his strange campaign kickoff at a heavy machinery dealer (shades of Carly Fiorina?), intended to showcase how the stimulus hasn’t worked (except for the little detail that the same machinery dealer credits the stimulus for saving jobs there…).

• WI-Sen: Another Tommy Thompson acquaintance is fanning the flames, saying he’s “very seriously considering” a Senate bid and “could” soon form an exploratory committee. I’m not sure “could” is very newsworthy, but we’ll continue to keep an eye on the situation.

• AK-Gov: Appointed Gov. Sean Parnell’s GOP primary opponent, former state House speaker Ralph Samuels, raised some eyebrows with his prodigious fundraising. However, it looks like Parnell is still in good shape as far as the voters are concerned, at least according to an internal poll taken by Republican firm Basswood. They find Parnell with a 71/8 favorable and leading Samuels in the primary 69-9 (with 4 for Bill Walker).

• CA-Gov: Insurance Comm. Steve Poizner has been making some strong moves to the right lately in order to differentiate himself from Meg Whitman, even flip-flopping on abortion. (He got a 100% rating from Planned Parenthood six years ago, but now he’s against any government funding for abortion.) While he still lags in the polls, it’s at least gaining him some traction on the endorsement front, as he got the nod from the California Republican Assembly (which also endorsed Chuck DeVore on the Senate side) and from Rep. Tom McClintock.

• NY-Gov (pdf): Two more polls on David Paterson’s standing find voters fairly split on whether he should stay or go. Siena finds 55% think he should serve the rest of his term while 37% say resign (and only 21% saying he should be impeached if he doesn’t resign), while SurveyUSA finds 45% say he should remain in office and 50% say resign. (He has a 25/66 approval according to SurveyUSA and a 21/67 favorable according to Siena.) Siena also looks at November’s race, finding Andrew Cuomo leading Rick Lazio by an unsurprising 63-25 margin.

• OR-Gov: The state Republicans held their annual Dorchester Conference, which included a gubernatorial straw poll after appearances from the candidates. In a bit of a surprise, Allen Alley (considered the old-school moderate in the race, to the extent that he used to be deputy chief of staff to Democratic Gov. Ted Kulongoski) dominated, winning with 225 votes to 165 for substance-less former NBA player Chris Dudley. (Former state Sen. John Lim got 47, and antitax weirdo Bill Sizemore got 1.) Meanwhile, over on the Dem side, a lot of big labor endorsements got rolled out, and the two candidates both got their fair share. John Kitzhaber got the muscle – AFL-CIO and Teamsters – while Bill Bradbury got the brains: the Oregon Education Association and American Federation of Teachers. Finally, Oregon lost a well-liked political figure who briefly ran for Governor in 2006: Republican state Sen.-turned-Democratic state Treasurer Ben Westlund, who died from a recurrence of lung cancer over the weekend.

• CA-47: Businessman and veteran Quang Pham was mounting a strong challenge, at least on the fundraising front, in the GOP primary to Assemblyman Van Tran, to the extent that the NRCC took notice and put him “On the Radar.” However, he bailed out of the race on Friday, citing the need to get back to his day job, although he may also have been concerned that the three Vietnamese candidates competing in the primary might split the vote to the extent that it would let no-name Anglo Kathy Smith with the primary.

• IA-03, MO-04: Two old guys who’ve been on everybody’s retirement watch lists despite continuous reassurances that they’re running for re-election made it about as official as can be. Leonard Boswell and Ike Skelton have both filed to run one more time.

• KS-04: State Sen. Dick Kelsey, one of half a dozen Republicans fighting for the open seat in the Wichita-based 4th left behind by Rep. Todd Tiahrt, has suspended his campaign. He cited his wife’s health problems, and reserved the right to get back in the race later.

• MA-10: Some comings and goings in the Democratic field in the now-open 10th: as expected, Norfolk County DA William Keating is confirming he’ll run for the Dem nod. However, oft-mentioned state Rep. Ron Mariano said he’ll pass on the race.

• PA-12: As we wait for a verdict from the state Democratic Party’s executive committee, here’s some interesting scuttlebutt. Pa2010 cites an unnamed high-level party insider as saying it’s “highly unlikely” that Mark Critz (former John Murtha district director) gets picked by the state committee, which has the final decision despite the local party’s choice of Critz over the weekend. He cites concerns over Critz’s electability stemming from tax problems at a company he’d helped run. Pa2010 also hears rumors that Cambria County Controller Ed Cernic Jr., who made little impact at the local convention, could wind up being the compromise pick, as he fits the district’s blue-collar pro-life pro-gun mold better than Barbara Hafer but without Critz’s possible baggage. We’ll know soon whether this is actually happening, or the source was just a guy with an ax to grind.

• DCCC: The D-Trip has named Bruce Braley, Allyson Schwarz, Patrick Murphy, and Donna Edwards as chairs of this cycle’s Red to Blue program. While the DCCC has announced some “races to watch,” it hasn’t officially named anyone to R2B yet. Also, Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Steve Israel “will take on additional responsibility this cycle with Democratic incumbents who are not on the DCCC’s Frontline Program.” I don’t know if this means helping folks like Ike Skelton who are vulnerable but not on Frontline, or harassing the crap out of safe members who haven’t fulfilled their dues payments. Hopefully both. (D)

• Fundraising: With Bill Russell back in the news with the PA-12 special election, TPM’s back on the case of shady GOP fundraising firm BMW Direct, which raises big bucks for gullible candidates with high-profile opponents and keeps almost all of the money for itself. They’ve changed their name to BaseConnect, but are up to the same old tricks. And I actually feel a little bad about this… Rep. Joe Cao looks like he’s gotten tangled up in their web, which explains his fundraising “success” and his near-total burn rate.

• State legislatures: In the diaries, Johnny Longtorso has a comprehensive look at the legislatures that the Dems control and are defending in the 2008 election. There are major redistricting stakes at issue in many of the races, including some where the odds don’t look too good, especially Pennsylvania’s House.

From Roll Call:

Local Democratic officials Saturday picked Mark Critz, a former top aide to the late Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), as their preference to be their nominee for the special election to replace Murtha on May 18.

Critz defeated former state Treasurer Barbara Hafer (D) and other Democrats in Saturday’s vote, and he is expected to be confirmed by statewide party officials later this month.

“The vote taken today is a non-binding recommendation,” said T.J. Rooney, the state Democratic chairman. “That said, the members of the Executive Committee will certainly take these results under consideration this Monday when they decide our nominee. It should be noted that the final decision rests solely with the 50 members of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party Executive Committee … We look forward to a spirited campaign confident that the good people of the 12th District will cast their votes for the Democratic nominee.”

So not quite a done deal, but pretty close. The final tally was:

Mark Critz: 47
Barbara Hafer: 22
Ed Cernic: 14
Ryan Bucchianeri: 1

Hafer has said she’ll seek the party’s nomination for the November general election. The primary for that will be held the same day as the special (May 18), so we could wind up with a split – Critz winning the special but Hafer winning the G.E. nod. While that kind of thing does happen on occasion, it’s not terribly common, and I hope it doesn’t happen here, as I think that would make things more difficult for Dems in the fall.

UPDATE: Just what we needed! Hafer’s team is already slinging mud against Critz.

AR-Sen: SSP hero and perfect fuckup Bill Sali held yard sales to raise money for his flailing campaign. GOP senate hopeful Kim Hendren is doing him one better: He’s selling five of his black angus cows. Moo.

KY-Sen: Like rival Jack Conway, Dem Dan Mongiardo is making a small, made-for-media ad buy criticizing Jim Bunning’s fight against unemployment benefits, and specifically calls out teabaggers. Mongiardo being Mongiardo, though, his spokesbot can’t resist taking a douchey shot at Conway’s ad. Seems like sour grapes, since Conway’s team thought of the idea first.

NY-Gov: Headline for the times, from the Times: “Paterson Still Governor, for Now.” Also, Generalissimo Francisco Franco still dead. Only one of these statements is likely to remain true for much longer.

TX-Gov: The battle lines have been drawn, and it’ll be secessionista Rick Perry vs. former Houston Mayor Bill White. Rasmussen sees Perry leading 49-43, not much changed from the 47-41 he had it in late February. White has 54-34 favorables, while Perry is at 54-46. Though since Ras (contra every other pollster) likes to look at only “very favorable” and “very unfavorable” scores, it’s worth noting that Perry is at just 18-23 by that metric, while White is at 25-13. Whoops!

AL-05: Minority Leader John Boehner is bringing his orange perma-tan with him to Alabama to do a fundraiser for turncoat Parker Griffith. Griffith’s two teabaggy opponents are furious about this turn of events and trying to get some mileage out of casting Griffith as the establishment choice. With DC as toxic as it’s ever been, maybe that’ll work. Still, I think Griffith is most likely to be defeated if the uber-wingnuts unite around a single candidate (see IL-14).

FL-08: Dem Rep. Alan Grayson released a stunty poll of the Republican primary in his race… but included his own name – and he’s leading the pack. I’ve never heard of the pollster, Middleton Market Research, but their CEO is listed on LinkedIn as a “Senior Account Executive at To be determined.”

FL-17: Another candidate got into the race to replace Kendrick Meek today: North Miami City Commissioner Scott Galvin. Galvin is the first white candidate in this 58% African American district.

GA-09: GOP Rep. Nathan Deal now says that he’ll delay his resignation from the House until March 31st, so that he can vote against any healthcare legislation. This is probably a stunt to help Deal impress the Republican electorate, since he’s trailed badly in all polling for the GA-Gov GOP nomination. Deal doesn’t want to stay too much longer, though, since he’s just one step ahead of an Ethics Committee investigation.

MS-01: Ah, cat fud. FOX Newser Angela McGlowan, a GOP candidate vying to take on Travis Childers, won’t commit to backing the establishment favorite, state Sen. Alan Nunnelee if he should win the primary. This is exactly what the Republicans don’t want, of course, since a bitterly divided primary in 2008 helped hand this seat to Childers in the first place. It’s all the more remarkabe given how much effort the NRCC put into clearing the field for Nunnelee. I almost wonder if state Sen. Merle Flowers, who deferred to Nunnelee but did not endorse him, might be re-considering.

NY-29: Is this going to get worse before it gets better? The House Committee just launched an investigation into whatever it is Eric Massa is alleged to have done. Meanwhile, Massa is laying low – he’s missed several votes (including one on the jobs bill) since his announcement.

PA-12: Former Murtha aide Mark Critz says that he’s raised over $100,000 so far for his special election bid to replace his boss. Meanwhile, Critz’s opponent for the Democratic nomination, ex-Treasurer Barbara Hafer, is pre-emptively doing all she can to discredit the nomination process, as well as pressing for the release of Critz’s testimony to the House Ethics Committee. (J) On the Republican side, businessman Tim Burns has launched a teeny-weeny radio ad buy.

Netroots Nation: Thinking about heading to the progressive confab that is Netroots Nation? Well, MT Gov. Brian Schweitzer has already reserved a seat. He’ll be the keynote speaker on the convention’s opening night.

Redistricting: The National Democratic Redistricting Trust, a new group designed to support Dems in the inevitable legal battles over redistricting, has asked the FEC whether member of Congress can raise soft money to support the trust’s efforts.

• 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.)

• AZ-Sen: Fox News, of course, has become legendary for its little Chyron errors that always seem to work out to the Republicans’ advantage (slapping a “D” next to Republican Congressmen involved in sex scandals, for instance). What then, to make of their latest one? J.D. Hayworth was recently identified on-screen as “former Arizona congresswoman.”

• CO-Sen: Democracy for America (Howard Dean’s group) is getting involved in the Colorado primary, lending its support to appointed Sen. Michael Bennet. Probably his full-throated support for the public option is helping raise his profile in the netroots. It’s hard to pin down where the ideological fault lines in this primary are, though; his opponent Andrew Romanoff has gotten the big labor endorsements (although both Bennet and Romanoff sound leery about EFCA), and they spent their first debate last week mostly agreeing with and offering kind words about each other.

• FL-Sen:  Sorry, Charlie… Rasmussen takes another look at the GOP Senate primary and finds Marco Rubio putting more distance between himself and Charlie Crist. Rubio is leading Crist 54-36, which is an even bigger gap that last months’ 49-37 edge.

• IN-Sen: Ooops, this could get awkward. Rep. Baron Hill, who was out of the country all last week, got back and decided that he’s at least somewhat interested in (or at least “open to the idea of”) the Senate seat left behind by Evan Bayh too. Rep. Brad Ellsworth already is being treated as heir apparent (to the extent that a replacement for his seat in the 8th is lined up, too), but the state party committee will get the final word on who fills Bayh’s slot.

• NC-Sen: As a bonus addition to their NC-Sen poll from last week, PPP took a look at both sides’ primaries too. On the Democratic side, undecideds rule the day; SoS Elaine Marshall does have the lead, beating former state Sen. Cal Cunningham 29-12 (with 5 for Kenneth Lewis and 2 for Marcus Williams). The only subgroup where Cunningham has the edge so far is voters under 30. On the Republican side, further signs of voters’ general indifference about Richard Burr: he’s polling at only 55% against two unknowns, Brad Jones at 10 and Eddie Burks at 3.  

• NV-Sen (pdf): The first poll of the Nevada Senate race following the news that the Tea Party has sprung into existence and will be running Some Dude is an internal from a GOP pollster, POS. He finds that the top Republicans still beat Harry Reid, but by a much narrower margin than the last few rounds of polling have seen: Sue Lowden leads Reid 42-37 (with 9 for Jon Ashjian), while Danny Tarkanian leads 40-39 (with 11 for Ashjian). Reid beats Sharron Angle 37-32 (with 16 for Ashjian) and Mark Amodei 40-25 (with 19 for Ashjian). Lowden has the edge in the GOP primary, at 35, to 28 for Tarkanian, 8 for Angle, 5 for someone named Chad Christensen, 1 for Amodei, and 0 for the oft-hyped rich guy John Chachas. (Amodei, a termed-out state Senator from Reno, seems to have gotten the message from all this, and dropped out of the race today.

• NY-Sen-B: The NY Daily News observes what I had sensed was happening: the likely challenge from Harold Ford Jr. has seemed to mostly benefit Kirsten Gillibrand, as it raised her profile, and finally kicked her into higher gear, as she’s sought out the spotlight a little more on issues like the public option and DADT. The newest Siena poll (pdf) finds Gillibrand in fine shape so long as George Pataki doesn’t surprise everyone by getting into the race. She trails Pataki 47-41, while beating Port Commissioner Bruce Blakeman 51-24 and wealthy publisher Mort Zuckerman 49-29. She also leads Ford and Jonathan Tasini in the Democratic primary, 42-16-4. If Ford somehow survives the primary, he trails Pataki 48-34, while also beating Blakeman (41-23) and Zuckerman (40-26).

• CA-Gov: A nameless GOP pollster, on behalf of a nameless corporate client, shared an internal poll of the GOP gubernatorial primary with Taegan Goddard. While the lack of transparency is sketchy, the numbers are quite credible: Meg Whitman leads Steve Poizner 55-16.

• MO-Gov: This may be a little premature, but Republican Lt. Governor Peter Kinder is already publicly saying that he’s running for Governor in 2012, presumably against incumbent Dem Jay Nixon. An early start can only help, though; in 2008, Nixon benefited from having his nomination locked down way in advance, while the Republicans fought it out in a nasty primary.

• NM-Gov: NMSU is out with the first poll of the wide-open Republican gubernatorial primary field (although apparently not the general election). Thanks to the benefits of name rec, attorney Pete Domenici Jr. leads the field at 29, ahead of Dona Ana County DA Susana Martinez at 12, former state party chair Allen Weh at 7, Doug Turner at 7, and state Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones at 3. The New Mexico Independent breathlessly reports that this was before the bombshell revelations came out that Domenici used (gasp!) marijuana and cocaine while in college in the (swoon!) 1980s… as if that’s going to change a single vote.

• NV-Gov (pdf): That GOP internal from Glen Bolger also has gubernatorial numbers. Most interestingly, it sees Jim Gibbons (the damaged GOP incumbent) gaining some ground on ex-AG Brian Sandoval; Gibbons trails only 38-32, with North Las Vegas mayor Michael Montandon coming in at 9 (Sandoval’s decline may come at the benefit of Montandon as his profile increases, splitting the non-Gibbons vote). Reid the Younger (Rory, that is) beats Gibbons in the general, 47-36, while tying Montandon 40-40 but losing badly to Sandoval, 50-34. (Also worth noting: the poll also asks some state-level policy questions, and found voters preferring raising taxes to cutting services, 47-38. Certainly more grist for the mill, especially after the passages of Measures 66 and 67 in Oregon.)

• NY-Gov: Andrew Cuomo is still taking his time on announcing anything regarding his expected gubernatorial run. While rumormongers seem to think at this point that the announcement is coming in mid to late April (after the fighting over the state budget is completed), the NYT points to a finite deadline: May 25, when the party convention begins (unless for some reason he wants to get on the ballot by collecting signatures and petitioning instead). The same Siena poll (pdf) that we talked about earlier also, as always, covers the gubernatorial race, and there aren’t any surprises there (except perhaps that David Paterson is slipping a bit against GOP candidate Rick Lazio, in the unlikely event he survives his primary). In the primary, Cuomo moves up to 64-22 lead over Paterson (they stopped asking about Suffolk Co. Exec Steve Levy, whose support seemed to come only out of Cuomo’s column and had pushed Cuomo down to 57 last month). Cuomo beats Lazio 63-26, while Lazio beats Paterson 46-39. (Lazio and Paterson were tied at 42 last month.)

• OR-Gov: Rasmussen issued its first poll of the Oregon governor’s race, and find Democrats leading in every permutation. As always, it wouldn’t be Rasmussen without something weird in there, and what’s weird here is that the closest race is between Democratic ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber and long-ago ex-state Sen. John Lim, where Kitzhaber leads only 40-38. (Lim has a 31/28 approval, which I suppose is low name rec by Rasmussen’s strange standards, but freakishly high when considering that the 74-year-old Lim’s last big moment on the stage was losing the 1998 Senate race to Ron Wyden by 61-34, and that he’s probably best known for misspelling his own name on his bumper stickers from his 1990 gubernatorial run, where he lost the primary). Kitzhaber leads Chris Dudley 42-36, Allen Alley 42-34, and Bill Sizemore 48-35, while Bill Bradbury leads Lim 38-35, Dudley 39-36, Alley 41-35, and Sizemore 48-23.

• VT-Gov: That Research 2000 poll (on behalf of local TV affiliate WCAX) that came out late last week had some additional matchups that we didn’t report on, focusing on the ever-present threat of a left-wing spoiler campaign from Anthony Pollina (although last I’d heard, Pollina was sounding more interested in trying for the Democratic nod rather than running 3rd party). Republican Lt. Governor Brian Dubie wins each permutation, including against SoS Deb Markowitz (who led Dubie in a 2-way race), where he’s up 37-35 with 11 for Pollina. Dubie beats Doug Racine 38-32-12, Peter Shumlin 39-31-12, Matt Dunne 38-31-12, and Susan Barlett 44-26-13.

• WI-Gov: The first candidate to hit the TV airwaves in the Wisconsin gubernatorial race is ex-Rep. Mark Neumann, who’s being treated as the underdog in the GOP primary against Milwaukee Co. Exec Scott Walker. Neumann has deep pockets, but this may be an indication that he’s committed to fighting out the gubernatorial battle to the end instead of moving over to the Senate race, where Russ Feingold currently only has minor opposition.

• MI-14, MI-15: Two octogenarian liberal stalwarts, and the two longest-serving members of the House, both confirmed that they’ll be running for another term: John Dingell (looking for term number 28) and John Conyers (term 23).

• PA-06: Looks like that internal poll released by Rep. Jim Gerlach that had him leading by an ungodly amount had the desired effect. Pharmaceutical exec Steven Welch packed his bags and got out of the race, leaving Gerlach with only token opposition. With a fierce primary underway on the Dem side, it’s now quite the reversal of fortune in this district from where we were mid-last year, when the Dems were united behind Doug Pike and a GOP food fight was underway.

• PA-12: Chris Cillizza is reporting that Joyce Murtha, widow of Rep. Jack Murtha, is going to announce that she won’t run in the May 18 special election to replace her husband. This is big news, as the frontrunners, ex-LG Mark Singel and ex-Treasurer Barbara Hafer, said they’d defer to Murtha. (One more Dem is getting into the field today, Mark Critz, who was Murtha’s district director. Singel and Hafer are the universally-regarded heavyweights, though.) Cillizza also hints that Republicans  “downplay their chances” in this special election, despite the district’s R+1 lean (the real problem for them is their lack of a bench in this traditionally very Democratic area).

• VA-09: Republican state House majority leader Morgan Griffith seems to be moving ahead with a challenge to long-time Rep. Rick Boucher in the 9th, an Appalachian district that’s sliding away from the Democrats. While the district’s trend has to hearten Griffith, he has two problems: Boucher’s huge cash stash, and the fact that Griffith doesn’t live in the district, although very near the border – but while he’s known in the Roanoke market portion of the district, he’ll need to start from square one in coal country in the deep southwest.

• WA-03: Here’s a surprising departure from the Democratic field in the 3rd: state Rep. Deb Wallace, who jumped promptly into the field after Rep. Brian Baird’s retirement and attracted good notices for the few days she had the Dem field to herself. She isn’t endorsing anybody, but said that the district needed a “true moderate Democrat” (which would seem to point toward ex-state Rep. Denny Heck rather than the more liberal state Sen. Craig Pridemore). Heck’s personal wealth probably drove Wallace out of the race, especially since she’d be splitting the “true moderate” votes with Heck while Pridemore ran unimpeded on the liberal side (well, except for flaky activist Cheryl Crist).

• FL-St. House: In the face of a growing ethics investigation that could potentially start moving in a criminal direction, Republican former state House speaker Ray Sansom resigned from his House seat today. There’s one interesting name among the many persons who’d been subpoenaed to testify before the House Select Committee on Standards of Official Conduct: another former state House speaker (and now Senate candidate) Marco Rubio. (Rubio isn’t accused of wrongdoing, and now it sounds like the hearings have been rendered moot anyway.)

• Filings: Campaign Diaries gives a rundown of what happened with the Ohio and Indiana filings, which closed last week. Dems are looking at five competitive retentions in Ohio (including OH-13, where wealthy auto dealer Tom Ganley completed his switch for the Senate race, and OH-18, where state Sen. Bob Gibbs deciced to pull the trigger. Potential problems lurk for the GOP in OH-15, where David Ryon filed as the Constitution Party candidate (meaning Steve Stivers might get screwed from the right a second time), and in OH-16, where NRCC fave Jim Renacci faces a competitive primary against more conservative (and presumably less electable) Matt Miller, who almost won the open seat GOP primary in 2008. The GOP’s big disappointment is probably OH-06, where their best bet seems to be former Belmont Co. Sheriff Richard Stobbs (who lost by a wide margin in 2008). There’s less drama in Indiana (except for the unresolved IN-Sen and IN-08 situations), although the open seat in dark-red IN-04 attracted a host of Republicans (most notably SoS Todd Rokita, but also two state Senators).

• NC-Sen: Former state Sen. Cal Cunningham is going with an interesting focus for his campaign: filibuster reform. He’s pledging to end the filibuster “in its current form.” Certainly an idea worth exploring at the policy level, but is it a winner at the campaign-soundbite level (when most people don’t even seem to know of the filibuster and cloture process, if polls are to be believed)? Fellow Dem candidate Elaine Marshall also broached the topic in her recent diary at Daily Kos.

• OH-Sen: Two different new Democrats entered the primary election hunt in Ohio, Traci “TJ” Johnson and Charleena Renee Bradley. Bradley appears to have come out literally nowhere, but Johnson is a former state Rep. candidate and, more notably, she worked for the AG’s office when current Lt. Governor Lee Fisher held that position. That’s led to some suspicions of shenangians on the part of the Fisher campaign (who might benefit from another female candidate cutting a bit into Jennifer Brunner’s primary vote share), but Fisher’s camp says that they weren’t involved in Johnson’s decision and that Fisher hasn’t spoken to Johnson in over a year.

• WA-Sen: SurveyUSA has some surprisingly low approval numbers for Patty Murray, as she faces a re-election that could get tough if someone top-tier shows up to challenge her. She’s at 43/50 (which is lower than colleague Maria Cantwell, at 46/45, probably the first time that’s ever happened). What’s strange here is that, although SurveyUSA actually included some young people in this poll, Murray fares worst among the 18-34 set and best among seniors, which is completely counterintuitive (although it kept showing up in their WA-Gov and WA-08 polls last year too). Serious question: has anyone ever studied whether young people who are cellphone-only are disproportionately Democratic and those who actually answer their landlines are more Republican?

• WI-Sen: Rasmussen looks at the Wisconsin Senate race again, and like last time, finds Russ Feingold trailing Tommy Thompson, on the off chance that Thompson decides to say no thanks to all that sweet, sweet hedge fund money. Feingold trails Thompson 48-43, while leading minor Republican opponents Dave Westlake (47-37) and Terrence Wall (47-39). Feingold’s approval is 50/48.

• AR-Gov: Here’s one Arkansas Democrat we don’t have to worry about. Incumbent Gov. Mike Beebe has sported inhuman approval levels and hasn’t even drawn a Republican opponent yet. And now comes news that he raised more than $1 million toward his re-election in the month of January alone.

• FL-Gov, FL-Sen: There’s more pile-on on the issue of Alex Sink’s yawn-inducing and seemingly message-free gubernatorial campaign… and some of that is spilling over into Kendrick Meek’s Senate campaign, which doesn’t seem to be getting anyone fired up either.

• MI-Gov: Another Democrat seems to be moving closer toward a run for Governor: Genesee County treasurer Dan Kildee is opening up an exploratory committee. (Kildee may be getting some urging from a celebrity friend: Michael Moore.) Meanwhile, on the Republican side, long-shot rich guy Rick Snyder is actually letting his fans on his website choose which ad to air next; both ads focus on Snyder’s “nerd” credentials. Unfortunately, it sounds like Ted Nugent, who field strips nerds and eats their entrails for breakfast, is turning down requests that he run for governor (on the GOP side, natch). The Motor City Madman still contends that he’d make a good governor, though, in that he’d “bring in my machete and hack away at the waste and the cronyism.”

• MN-Gov: One more Republican fell by the wayside in the Minnesota gubernatorial race, in the wake of a weak straw poll showing: state Sen. David Hann, who’ll run for another Senate term instead. In an indication that state House minority leader Marty Seifert is feeling confident about winning the GOP nomination, he’s already moved on to picking a running mate: Anoka County Commissioner Rhonda Sivarajah.

• NE-Gov: Nebraska, like Kansas, has been another state where the Dems have had a bad time trying to find a gubernatorial candidate. The search finally seems to be focusing on agribusiness executive Mark Lakers, who insiders say is very interested. (Ben Nelson and Bob Kerrey both emerged from the private sector to defeat incumbent GOP governors, for whatever that’s worth.)

• RI-Gov: Republicans have another option in their gubernatorial primary in Rhode Island: accountant Victor Moffitt. Moffitt is a former state Rep. but may be better know for being a frequent letter-to-the-editor writer. He’ll face John Robitaille, communications director to current Republican Gov. Don Carcieri, in the primary.

• SC-Gov: Attorney Mullins McLeod is dropping out of the race to be the Democrats’ gubernatorial candidate, and throwing his support behind state Sen. Vincent Sheheen. There’s no word whether McLeod, as rumored, is planning to move over to the Senate race against Jim DeMint, currently devoid of a Democratic challenger.

• AZ-03: Phoenix mayor Phil Gordon is definitely gauging possibilities for a run for the House, as he’s been polling the district. Interestingly, based on the poll questions, Gordon is considering a run as an independent as well as a Democrat. Gordon, although there’s a “D” next to his name, is quite the centrist and even endorsed John McCain in 2008, which could make a Democratic primary against deep-pocketed Jon Hulburd difficult. The poll also asks whether stories about Gordon’s payments to his girlfriend (for fundraising for his campaigns) would be a campaign liability.

• FL-05: GOP Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite has scheduled a “major announcement” tonight at a local Republican function, prompting speculation from all corners that a retirement, or perhaps even resignation, decision has been made. (J)

• FL-25: You may remember Annette Taddeo, the Democratic businesswoman who acquitted herself well while running in FL-18 in 2008. Some insiders (starting with Steny Hoyer, apparently) are encouraging her to take a look at running in the open seat race in the 25th this year. Taddeo says that if Joe Garcia (the 2008 candidate in the 25th, who’s reported to be moving toward a run) gets in, she’ll support him, but wouldn’t rule out a run in his absence.

• ID-01: One more Republican got into the field in the 1st: Michael Chadwick, who doesn’t seem to have run for office before but used to be an aide to Orrin Hatch. There’s still no word from ex-Rep. Bill Sali, though, as to whether he’ll join the fun.

• KS-03: With top Dem prospect and Kansas City, Kansas mayor Joe Reardon having ruled out a run in the open seat race for the 3rd, Dems are starting to look to state Sen. Kelly Kultala (who represents part of KCK) as the next best option (no word if she’s interested, though). One other name that’s getting attention now, though, is retiring Rep. Dennis Moore’s wife, Stephene, who’s “mulling it over.”

• NJ-07: Republican freshman Rep. Leonard Lance may have a rougher time of it in the GOP primary than the general. Lance will be facing businessman David Larsen, who appears to be challenging Lance from the right (upset over Lance’s cap and trade vote) and may be bringing up to $300K of his own money with him. Appraiser Bruce Baker is also in the GOP primary, flying the teabagger flag, although he may not have the money to make an impression.

• PA-04: Former US Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan seems to be having trouble making the transition from the legal world to the somewhat thicker-skinned electoral politics world. Her response when local talk radio host Marty Griffin hosted Cyril Wecht (the Allegheny Co. Coroner who’s had a longstanding legal battle with Buchanan) was to call in to Griffin’s show and threaten on air to sue him for defamation.

• PA-12: Lots more movement in the 12th. One more heavyweight, former Lt. Governor Mark Singel, isn’t deterred by fears that the 12th will be dismantled in a few years: he told the Johnstown paper today that he’ll be running. However, he (like Barbara Hafer) couched that by saying that he wouldn’t run if John Murtha’s widow, Joyce, decided she wanted the job. Cambria Co. Controller Ed Cernik Jr. is publicly stating his interest too, and Westmoreland Co. Commissioner Tom Ceraso is circulating petitions. Meanwhile, there seem to be more GOPers passing on the race than expressing any interest; the only new name to surface is businessman Mark Pasquerilla, who can self-fund; the few elected Republicans whose names were floated, state Reps. Jeff Pyle and Dave Reed, and state Sen. Kim Ward, aren’t running.

• CT-AG: Here’s an about-face from Susan Bysiewicz, who had previously said she would just plow ahead with her AG run despite uncertainty as to whether she legally qualified for the job. Apparently, there’s been enough behind-the-scenes doubt on that front that is was putting into jeopardy her chances at the state nominating convention, so now she’s suing in order to get a declaratory judgment on the question. There’s no indication on what, if anything, she’d run for if it turns out she isn’t qualified to be AG (remember she bailed out of the governor’s race despite being the frontrunner, and with a May 25 filing deadline, potentially she could get back in, although she may have badly hurt her prospects with this whole business).

• AZ-Sen: John McCain’s various Republican establishment friends keep showing up in droves to give him a boost in his primary fight against J.D. Hayworth. Today, it was the turn for former Tennessee senator and brief presidential primary rival Fred Thompson, who awoke from his slumbers long enough to give McCain the thumbs-up.

• KS-Sen: Wow, things are actually happening in Kansas. Not that it seems likely that Democrats are going to be in a position to make either the governor’s or senate races there competitive, but at least they’re filling the holes with credible candidates. In the wake of state Sen. Tom Holland getting into the gubernatorial race for the Dems, now Kansas City-based state Sen. David Haley is making noises about running for Senate. He’ll make a final decision within the month. Former newspaper publisher Charles Schollenberger is already a candidate, but Haley sounds like an upgrade.

• ND-Sen: Kristin Hedger, a 29-year-old businesswoman in North Dakota who lost the most recent Secretary of State race, is floating her name for the Democratic nod in the Senate race. She says she’ll defer to former AG Heidi Heitkamp if she gets in, but is interested in the race if not. State Sen. Tracy Potter is already in the race for the Dems. (And yes, it sounds like she’s aware about needing to be 30 to be a Senator; she’ll be 30 by swearing-in day.)

• NV-Sen (pdf): The legacy media keeps treating the GOP primary in Nevada like a two-way fight between Sue Lowden and Danny Tarkanian, but I’m going to keep maintaining that former Assemblywoman Sharron Angle is the real one to watch here (seeing as how Lowden gets tarred with the “RINO” label and is especially loathed by the Paulist set). A straw poll conducted during the Clark County Republican Party Central Committee meeting several weeks ago supports that idea, as Angle finished first, with 49 votes out of a total of 202. Tarkanian and Lowden were still, of course, right in the thick of things, at 48 and 46 respectively. In a bit of a surprise, Some Dude named Bill Parson was a solid 4th with 24 votes. (Parson seems to be working the hardcore teabagger angle. And check out the flattop – shades of Bob Conley all around.) Another potential wrinkle for the GOP: Sen. Jim DeMint, self-appointed kingmaker on the extreme right, while speaking at CPAC, wouldn’t rule out supporting third-party Tea Party candidates where the GOP fails to nominate “strong” candidates – and he explicitly mentioned one state: Nevada. Recall that the Tea Party just sprang into existence as an official 3rd party in Nevada, and already have a candidate lined up (Jon Ashjian).

• NY-Sen-B: I’m still chuckling over Mort Zuckerman’s trial balloons regarding the New York Senate race… but then, I was also chuckling about Harold Ford Jr. at first too. The super-wealthy publisher Zuckerman has gotten some encouragement from state party chair Ed Cox to look into running. Still, Cox is also encouraging other entrants (like Orange County Executive Edward Diana) as well, even while a number of county-level party chieftains have started lining up behind port commissioner Bruce Blakeman.

• OH-Sen: The DSCC is starting to play offense against ex-Rep. Rob Portman, hitting the former Bush budget director, ardent free trader, and all-around consummate insider with a playful new website: “Mr. Portman’s Neighborhood,” conveniently located at the corner of K Street and Wall Street. (Which, seeing as how we spent an inordinate amount of time here thinking about redistricting, only served to remind us of this 2006 article from The Onion.)

• UT-Sen: Even though Club for Growth hasn’t settled on which primary opponent to Bob Bennett they want to back, it seems like Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks has made up their minds. They’ll be backing Mike Lee, who despite his conservative legal establishment pedigree (son of former Solicitor General Rex Lee, and former clerk to Samuel Alito) has been reaching out to the tea party platoons.

• HI-Gov: Honolulu mayor Mufi Hannemann is operating in a kind of legal limbo for now, and his gubernatorial primary rival, Rep. Neil Abercrombie, is crying foul. Hannemann has opened a campaign account (which has $2 million in it) and, as such, is listed as running for governor with the state’s Campaign Spending Commission, and he’s actively campaigning around the state. However, despite the state’s resign-to-run law, he’s staying in his current position as mayor, as he doesn’t have to resign until he actually files to run with the state’s Office of Elections.

• NY-Gov: This is the weirdest endorsement I’ve ever read (although, where Ed Koch and David Paterson are concerned, I wouldn’t expect anything else); in fact it may be more of a diss than an endorsement. At any rate, I’ll just let Koch speak for himself: “I am for him, in effect, out of sympathy for his being in a Kakfa-esque situation.’ You can’t do this to people, use rumors to destroy them…But I’m not really for him.”

• PA-Gov: As he’s been hinting for a few weeks now, Scranton mayor Chris Doherty finally ended his long-shot Democratic gubernatorial bid, plagued by weak fundraising. He’s still looking to move on from his mayoral gig, though, and instead he’s going to run for the state Senate seat being vacated by long-time Dem Robert Mellow. (He’d also apparently considered the Lt. Governor slot, but that option seemed closed after the state party endorsed former Philadelphia controller Jonathan Saidel by a wide margin.) Meanwhile, Allegheny Co. Exec Dan Onorato seems to moving closer to something approaching frontrunner status with another big labor endorsement, this time from the United Steelworkers.

• DE-AL: Republicans had apparently been pinning hopes on wealthy businessman Anthony Wedo in order to help them retain Delaware’s at-large seat, vacated by Rep. Mike Castle and soon to be occupied by Democratic ex-LG John Carney. Wedo won’t be running, though, leaving another (and apparently less wealthy, which would explain the NRCC’s seeming indifference to him) businessman, Fred Cullis, as the only GOP face in the race.

• PA-12: Here’s a surprise: state Sen. John Wozniak, a longtime Johnstown ally of Rep. John Murtha and always at the top of the list when successors were discussed, has decided not to run in the special election to replace Murtha. I wonder if that gives some credence to this article from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (not Pittsburgh’s “real” paper, but rather the local mouthpiece for the right-wing Mellon/Scaife crowd), which made some provocative allegations: that both parties were basically prepared to write this depopulated district off, in preparation for its dismantling during the 2012 redistricting process. Rumors are that the GOP wouldn’t launch a top-tier effort and that Murtha’s widow, Joyce, would hold the seat for the three years until its elimination (and, according to the article, “Democratic leaders” say she’s emerged as the leading contender) – so for a key Murtha ally like Wozniak to stand down suggests there’s some truth to this. Notwithstanding this seeming master plan, though, former GOP state treasurer Barbara Hafer and Ryan Bucchanieri remain in the hunt for the Dems.

• CA-LG: I’m surprised that San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom would want to give up being executive of a major city in exchange for a do-nothing job with a fancy title, but maybe he sees that as a better stepping stone to becoming Governor someday (although he should ask John Garamendi how that ever worked out). Bolstered by polling giving him a big edge in the LG race, he’s filing a ballot statement to run and is in the process of reassembling a campaign team.

• Polltopia: Nate Silver weighs in on the great Firedoglake/SurveyUSA debate of ’10 (with what’s hopefully the last word on the matter), saying that he doesn’t see anything “untoward” going on here, although methodological choices seem to add up to some pro-GOP house effects.