Swing State Project

I heard it first from Bleeding Heartland user mirage, and now IowaPolitics.com confirms that State Senator Brad Zaun is thinking about challenging Representative Leonard Boswell in Iowa’s third Congressional district next year. Zaun was mayor of Urbandale, a heavily Republican suburb of Des Moines, before winning a hard-fought race in Iowa Senate district 32 in 2004. He was re-elected to a four-year term in 2008, so he wouldn’t risk losing his seat in the upper chamber by running against Boswell.

According to IowaPolitics.com, Zaun will decide in the next few weeks whether to run:

Zaun said Boswell’s speaking out against cap-and-trade legislation this past summer but then voting for it concerned him and sparked his interest in a run for Congress.

“I’m frustrated because I think Leonard as well as so many other elected officials in Washington, D.C. don’t listen to their constituents and don’t represent where their constituents are on issues,” Zaun said. “Most elected officials in Washington, D.C. are out of touch with people they represent.”

Zaun is vice president of R&R Realty and has not yet formed an exploratory committee for the U.S. House. He said his biggest consideration on whether to run is his family. He and his wife have five kids ages 22, 21, 18, 13 and 11. “I’ve had long, long conversations with my wife,” he said.

Conservative and corporate-funded groups ran advertisements against Boswell this summer after he voted for the American Clean Energy and Security Act.

IowaPolitics.com also quoted Mike Mahaffey, a former chairman of the Iowa GOP, as saying “he’ll decide by next week whether he will run” against Boswell. He’s been thinking about the race for several months. Mahaffey was the Republican candidate in IA-03 the first time Boswell won the district in 1996. However, the district was quite different then and did not include Polk County.

Some political analysts, like Isaac Wood and Larry Sabato, consider IA-03 potentially competitive but give a strong advantage to the incumbent. CQ Politics is among the odds-makers who consider IA-03 a “safe Democratic” seat. I tend to agree that Boswell is not vulnerable in 2010. Republicans ran hard against him in 2002, 2004 and 2006 but came up short.

If this race did become competitive, I think a challenger with a strong base in Polk County, like Zaun, would stand a better chance than someone from one of the smaller counties in the district. Polk County contains Des Moines and most of its suburbs. Mahaffey is from Montezuma in Poweshiek County (where Grinnell College is located). But if Zaun doesn’t run, Mahaffey has the connections to put together a stronger campaign than the two currently declared candidates, Dave Funk and Pat Bertroche.

PBI or Party Brand Index is a concept I developed (with some much appreciated help from pl515) as a replacement for PVI.  PVI (Partisan Voting Index), which is measured by averaging the percentage of the vote from the last two presidential elections in each house district, and comparing it to the nation as a whole, is a useful shorthand for understanding the liberal v. conservative dynamics of a district. But PVI in my opinion it falls short in a number of areas. First it doesn’t explain states like Arkansas or West Virginia. These states have districts who’s PVIs indicates a Democrat shouldn’t win, yet Democrats (outside of the presidency) win quite handily. Secondly why is this the case in Arkansas but not Oklahoma with similar PVI rated districts?

Lastly PVI can miss trends as it takes 4 years to readjust. The purpose of Party Brand Index is to give a better idea of how a candidate does not relative to how the presidential candidate did, but compared to how their generic PARTY should be expected to perform. I’ve tackled IN, NC, CO, VA, MO, OK, AR, WV, NH,and OH. Now I will look at the swing state of Florida.

I had to take a break from my analysis for personal reasons. Like always I would like to post the data, then I will offer some analysis. My basic pattern is to work my way “out” from the “Purple States” to the more Blue and Red ones. (Although once in a while I like to skip my normal pattern of working out from purple states.  I’m often curious on how my model would work in states like that are deeply blue at the local level, but deeply red at the presidential level.) As a reminder a negative number indicates a Republican bias to a district, while a positive number indicates a Democratic bias.

Let’s examine the swing state of Florida, the second large state I have examined (Ohio was the first).

FLORIDA PART 1

FLORIDA PART 2

FLORIDA PART 3

ANALYSIS

Unlike most other states I have examined Florida has very little deviation, from the PBI and PVI. This may be the result of the Floridian GOP’s very effective gerrymandering of house districts after the 2000 census. In fact there are only two districts where the PBI and PVI deviate. One is in Democratic Rep. Kosmos (FL-24). Interestingly enough this district was designed to elect a Republican although it’s not represented by a Democratic. The other is in Democratic Rep. Alan Boyd (FL-02), I think the PBI is a little high. This will be examined in the next batch of Blue Dogs I examine.  

The only hope for “new ground” for Democrats may lie in a swing in the voting preference of Cuban-Americans as a younger less “single issue” group of voters come of age. Also the makeup of many of these Latino districts are changing as more Puerto Ricans and Dominicans move in.

One final note, as I alluded to earlier, after I come across a few “conservative” Democrats, I run a “correction” factor to account for them being Blue Dogs. The general idea is that the distance they are able to maintain from the national party may help them win over voters who are more reluctant to vote for Democrats. I want to examine another swing state before I “recompute” Ohio’s Blue Dogs.

As a recap, here are the first “batch” of Blue Dogs, and rural Democrats (West Virginia’s Democrats aren’t members of the Blue Dogs) that I examined correcting for partisanship and ideology.

FOUR BLUE DOGS

THREE BLUE DOGS

As a reminder ranking a members ideology is a somewhat subjective decision. Potentially what’s one person “liberal” position, is another person “conservative” ones, remember the wingers developed a model that ranked the Sen. Obama as more liberal than Bernie Sanders or Russ Feingold. But partisanship, how often a member votes with their party is an absolute number. A Democrat who represents a “republican district” would be expected to “break with their party” on votes that don’t reflect their districts values.

I couldn’t find a website that ranks all the districts based on their PVI (I only could find list of them by state not rank, help please anyone), therefor I substituted a PVI ranking with where each member ranked in the Democratic caucus. In the 110th Congress the average Democrat had an ideological ranking of 170 (by the way this is a result of several members being tied, this is the medium not the midpoint). The average of members towards the center was 191, former Daily Kos celeb Ciro Rodriguez fell at exactly 191. The average of members towards the liberal side was 121, which falls between Rep. Larson of Conn. and Rep. Eshoo of CA. As or partisanship in the 110th Congress the average Democrat voted with their party 92.3% of the time.

As a clarification in Adjustment #1, I used a deviation factor based on how far each member was from the center of the Democratic caucus. Adjustment #2 was based on how far each member was from outside the standard deviation of the caucus. In Adjustment #3 I removed the partisanship factor to see what effect it would have. As I explained a few diaries ago I will use ADJUSTMENT FACTOR 2 in all subsequent corrections.

Because there are “only” 50 states (as opposed to evaluating 435 house members), I will at a later date have all the states ranked by PVI so I can adjust the Senator’s rankings. I developed Senate factors for the four states the four blue dogs came from. In the interest of full disclosure, my source for ideological rankings is Voteview, and for partisanship it was the Washington Post. This is still a work in progress, I’m making adjustments, and continuing to crunch numbers for more states. I also will use the adjustment factor on a liberal member of congress to see what effect that will have.

Anthology:

PBI (Party Brand Index) Part 7 Ohio

PBI (Party Brand Index) Part 6 WV and NH

PBI (Party Brand Index) Part 5 Nevada and Iowa

PBI (part 4) MO, AR, OK

Party Brand Index (part 3) North Carolina

Party Brand Index (part 2) Colorado and Virginia (updated)

Introducing PBI, Party Brand Index (Updated)

This race has definitely been turning in every direction possible. In the beginning of 2009, Republican Chris Christie had a small lead. In the summer, Christie was leading easily and now, it looks like an extremely close race. I have seen a few suggestions that Corzine should win by two to three points. I actually have to agree with them. The main question I plan to address in this diary is what to watch for on election night. I am not planning to address campaign strategies; it will only be what you should watch in each county while the votes are reporting. A gubernatorial election is extremely different from a Presidential election. It does not matter if Corzine or Christie wins the swing counties, it matters who racks up the most votes. For example, if Corzine won all the swing counties, it could require only a shift of a few votes for Christie to win them. However, the swing counties determine how well Christe, Corzine and Independent Chris Daggett are doing in parts of New Jersey. During this diary, I will split New Jersey into four geographical areas. They are Southern New Jersey, Central New Jersey, Northern New Jersey and Urban New Jersey. The counties in Southern New Jersey are Burlington, Ocean Counties and all the counties south of them. The counties in Central NJ are Monmouth, Mercer, Hunterdon, Somerset and Middlesex. Urban New Jersey is Union, Essex and Hudson Counties. All the other counties are in Northern New Jersey.

Here is the link to 2008 Presidential election results in New Jersey. If you look around, you can find results for Corzine’s 2005 and 2000 runs. http://www.uselectionatlas.org…

This link has a map of New Jersey and if you click on the counties, you will see the demographics, income and population of each county. http://quickfacts.census.gov/q…

Southern New Jersey

This area leans Democratic in most elections. I believe that Christie should beat Corzine here for a few reasons: Corzine tends to do better than average in urban areas but below average in suburban areas. Southern New Jersey’s population is mostly suburban and rural except for Camden County which has 517,000 people. Southern New Jersey has more white voters and more independents than the rest of the state and Christie should do well with these groups. If Daggett grows stronger, southern New Jersey should be one of his strongholds. He goes to Ocean County every summer but then again, so does almost everyone in New Jersey. The beaches in the summer there are FULL. The only solid stronghold Corzine has here is Camden County which he won 60% of the vote in 2005 and Obama won 67% of the vote there in 2008. Theoretically, if Corzine wanted to win, he would have to win in Camden County by more than 21 points. He should make up lost ground in Northern NJ and Camden County is 63% White, just above the 62% White population of NJ. Therefore, I believe that Corzine needs to beat Christie in Camden by more than 15 points if Corzine wants to win. To do that, Corzine needs to maximize minority turnout but also win over middle class white voters in the Camden suburbs. Other counties in Southern Jersey are mostly swing counties except for Ocean County which is going solidly for Christie due to all the Conservative retirees there. Cape May County should also go the same way. Salem County is a small rural county which Obama barely won but Christie should win due to its working class voters. If Corzine were successful with white working class voters in Camden County, he would win Gloucester County which demographically is Camden County without the heavily Democratic city Camden and its close in suburbs. Cumberland County with Vineland is 53% White with large numbers of Hispanics and African Americans. Due to the large minority population, Christie should fail to win this county where Obama won 60% of the vote. If Christie wins Cumberland County, expect Christie to be moving to Trenton and Corzine moving back to Hoboken. Burlington County which gave Obama 59% of the vote seems to be one of the three big bellwethers. Even though it voted 2 points more for Obama than the rest of the state, the population is 72% White. Most of the white voters are the working class voters Corzine needs to win over along the Pennsylvania border from Salem County to Trenton. The other bellwether county is Atlantic County. In one sense, it is completely different from most of New Jersey. It represents beach communities while New Jersey has some nice beaches New Jersey is basically a suburb, not a beach resort nor is it Las Vegas. Obama won 57% of the vote here, Corzine in 2000 won 50%, in 2005 Corzine won 53%. These percentages are also the percentages of the respective candidates’ statewide wins. Demographically, Atlantic County is like the rest of New Jersey. The population is 62% White, the same as New Jersey. Also, there is a correct balance between urban and suburban. Atlantic County has Atlantic City as the urban area, some suburban mainland communities and some rural areas in the Pine Barrens. This relates to New Jersey as a whole because there are urban areas in Essex and Hudson Counties with suburban counties further out and a few rural areas. Since Christie appears more popular on the shore, I could see him winning Atlantic County by one or even two points but still losing. This is why I believe that if Corzine wins Atlantic County, he wins the Governorship.

Central New Jersey

I will start with Mercer County where Trenton, New Jersey’s capital is located. With heavily African American Trenton and Princeton University, Christie has absolutely no chance winning in Mercer County. John McCain even failed to win a single municipality in Mercer County which explains why he won only 31% of the vote here. There are some working class voters here but not as many as the other Delaware River counties. Corzine’s percentage should drop below Obama’s because Corzine will not get Obama’s boost of African American and University turnout even though Obama’s recent visit may help a bit. To hold down Christie, Corzine needs to beat him here 3:2 and if Corzine can do that, this shows he was able to bring Democrats out to the polls. Monmouth County along the shore is 77% White with a mix of Conservatives and middle class voters should be an easy win for Christie and his Lieutenant Governor candidate Kim Guadango who lives there.  Daggett could over perform so if he gets more than 20% of the vote here, expect Christie to be in trouble. Hunterdon County is a high income Conservative area where Christie needs to slow down Daggett’s advances. Somerset County should be watched carefully. It has high income voters and Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996 lost the county. Somerset County definitely has been trending Democratic with Obama winning 52% of the vote and Somerset County barely trended toward Bush from 2000 to 2004, even with 9/11. Corzine’s success as a businessman may appeal to the high income voters but Christie’s close proximity in western Union County and the independent streak of the voters should give Somerset County to Christie. Daggett has a chance to over perform here among all the independents so if Christie can carry Somerset County by more than 15 points, he definitely has won. Christie can still win with a few less votes here. Middlesex County is 53% White. It does not have a significantly high African American or even Hispanic population, Middlesex County is 19% Asian. Middlesex County is not the most important county in New Jersey but Corzine should try to keep his margin at about 10 points.

Urban New Jersey

There is a fair argument for including Passaic and Bergen Counties but most of those counties are suburban. Hudson, Essex and Union County are all expected to go for Corzine and Daggett should win few votes in these areas because independents are less abundant here. Also, an important group here is Hispanics who are 41% of the population in Hudson County. Corzine has not cracked down harder on immigrants but he has not pushed to help them. Christie however does not address immigration directly on his website. Corzine does not either but he does address diversity, has worked to improve health care for minorities and he started a panel that discussed immigration reform. Since Christie and Daggett represent the more Conservative suburban voters, I do not see Christie and Daggett making inroads in Hudson County. Corzine lives in Hoboken which is a really nice Liberal town filled with transplants from Manhattan. Corzine has always over performed in Hudson County, winning 75% of the vote there in 2005 in his successful gubernatorial race against Republican Douglas Forrester. Corzine won 53% of the vote, like John Kerry but Kerry won 67% of the vote in Hudson County, much worse than Corzine. Another county to watch is Essex County which contains Newark and is heavily Democratic. Christie should make few inroads there due to its large minority population. Corzine would at least need to receive about 60% of the vote there if he wants to win. Union County is probably the most crucial county in Urban New Jersey. It is basically Essex County in the east and Somerset County in the west. Even though it is Christie’s home county, Corzine should still win it due to margins in Elizabeth. If Christie can pull it close in his home area, it shows he is winning overall. This is why Christie needs to hold Corzine below a 10 point win in Union County.

Northern New Jersey

Except for Passaic County and possibly Bergen County, Christie looks set to sweep this area. Warren and Sussex Counties are both heavily Republican and lightly populated so Christie should have no trouble winning them. Morris County also looks like a set Christie win because Morris County is traditionally Republican and McCain won 54% of the vote there. The issue for Christie in Morris County is that Daggett should be able to garner votes there. During the election, I expect Christie’s and McCain’s percentages to remain similar and if Christe beats Corzine by more than 20 points, Christie’s percentage in Morris County should be near McCain’s. If Christie wins Morris County by less than 20 points, it will show Daggett made inroads or Corzine over performed so Christie needs to win by more than 20 points. Passaic County is the only county in northern New Jersey that Corzine looks set to win. If Corzine does not win Passaic County, it will demonstrate he failed to increase turnout in the central cities and therefore he will lose. I believe if he is reelected, he will have won Passaic County by six points or more. In 2000, Corzine won Passaic County by eight points and won the Senate seat by three. Passaic County includes heavily Hispanic Paterson but also some Republican suburbs which are outnumbered by Democratic areas. The real county to watch is Bergen County. Obama won 54% of the vote, 3 points less than his 57% statewide win. Corzine lost the county by three points in 2000. The White population is above average for New Jersey. On paper, it appears that Corzine can lose Bergen County but still beat Christie. I would agree except the Lieutenant Gubernatorial candidate is Loretta Weinberg who is from Bergen County. Weinberg is 74 years old but neither Christie nor Daggett has made her age an issue. She represents that 37th Legislative district which is mostly in southeastern Bergen County, a Democratic area. Someone running for Lieutenant Governor should not have the biggest influence on the voters but Weinberg has been in Bergen County politics since Gerald Ford was president. She was elected in 1975 to countywide office and has remained in Bergen County politics since. Her problem is that party bosses are not crazy about her but that should not impact Bergen County as much as other counties. If Weinberg had a large effect on the campaign, Corzine could win Bergen County and still lose to Christie but if Weinberg’s effect was minimal, Corzine could lose Bergen County but still beat Christie.

Here are the last words: If you look at the final map and see Corzine won a line of counties stretching from Bergen to Cumberland, Corzine has won. Also, ask yourself; is Christie pulling up large margins along the shore, is there large turnout in Urban New Jersey, which way is Union County swinging, who is leading in Bergen County and how large is Corzine’s margin in Camden?

Today, the NRCC added 32 candidates to its Young Guns program:

These candidates have all been added to the bottom rung of the NRCC’s list, which they call “On the Radar.” The Republican House campaign committee has also bumped up nine previously-added names to their middle tier, “Contenders”:

Of those initial thirteen picks, four didn’t make the jump: Van Tran (CA-47), Adam Kinzinger (IL-11), Charles Djou (HI-01), and Jon Barela (NM-01). (Kinzinger, for what it’s worth, has been officially endorsed by the NRCC, the only candidate other than Dennis Ross in FL-12 to be so honored.) Two other dudes who were added later (but before this round) also stay put: David Harmer (CA-10) and Greg Ball (NY-19). I have to believe this means the GOP is writing off any hope of a stunning Harmer upset in next week’s special election.

Interestingly, the NRCC seems to have no reservations about naming more than one candidates running in the same race to their program – they’ve done so in IL-10, MO-04, and NY-19. This is something I don’t recall the DCCC doing with Red to Blue over the past couple of cycles. However, all of these multiple-choice challengers are still only at the “On the Radar” level. I wouldn’t be surprised if the NRCC narrowed things down if certain candidates started to show more promise than others.

• One more poll released in this race today, and like yesterday’s Club for Growth poll, it’s another poll from a Republican pollster on behalf of a fringe-right group: Neighborhood Research (the Rick Shaftan-run New Jersey-based pollsters who were right-winger Steve Lonegan’s pollster in the New Jersey GOP gubernatorial primary) for the Minuteman PAC (the Minutemen have enough money to commission a poll? that may be the most newsworthy thing in the whole story…). They put up similar numbers as yesterday’s CfG poll, with Conservative Doug Hoffman leading at 34, Democrat Bill Owens at 29, and Republican Dede Scozzafava dwindling at 14. At any rate, now Pollster.com has enough data to put together some trendlines for the race (no surprise: Owens and Hoffman going up fast, Scozzafava nosediving). There’s also some interesting back-and-forth between Nate Silver and Pollster’s Mark Blumenthal on just how much salt to take these two polls with.

• In the endorsement parade, Hoffman continues to rack ’em in, from Representatives that no one in the 23rd has ever heard of — Georgia’s John Linder, worried that Scozzafava would give Nancy Pelosi bipartisan cover, and SSP’s favorite punching bag, Oklahoma’s Tom Cole, who, reprising his role as master strategist, understands that Scozzafava has no reasonable shot of winning anymore. The New York Post‘s very conservative editorial page also endorsed Hoffman, and Fred Thompson (who was one of the first name-brand Republicans to endorse Hoffman) awoke from his slumbers long enough to cut a TV spot on behalf of Hoffman. Even Michael Barone (editor of the Almanac of American Politics) got in the act today, playing the ACORN card against Scozzafava.

• Newt Gingrich, however, is left holding the establishment GOP’s standard by himself and is doubling down on Scozzafava, decrying the “purge” and saying that supporting a spoiler is the best way to strengthen Pelosi’s hand. The Hill picks up on this growing divide today when looking at NY-23 in the context of the GOP’s 0-for-4 streak at holding contested House special elections (IL-14, MS-01, LA-06, NY-20 — with the first three all seeing nasty, contested primaries, and even NY-20 distinguished by an insider pick that didn’t ignite the base).

• Finally, kudos to our own silver spring, whose now-seminal diary “The Amazing History of NY-23” (if one can accuse an SSP diary of actually being “seminal”) showed how the core of the 23rd hasn’t been represented by a Democrat since 1850. That diary got a citation in the New York Times today.

• CA-Sen: Everyone has been treating Carly Fiorina as already running for Senate, but she’s never officially announced anything. It looks like Nov. 6 is her launch date, though; she has a “very important announcement” scheduled at a Pleasanton event.

• NV-Sen: With right-wing former Assemblywoman Sharron Angle’s entry into the GOP primary a few days ago, I hinted at the prospect of a bloody civil war erupting in Nevada — and here’s some more fuel for that fire. Movement conservatives in the Silver State are setting up a specifically anti-Sue Lowden PAC, dedicated to stopping the media-designated frontrunner. The Fair Nevada Elections PAC seems run by Paulists, who remain upset over Lowden’s actions in the 2008 caucus, when she was the state GOP party chair, which ended with voting being shut down when it looked like Ron Paul would wind up winning delegates. While there’s no explicit Paulist in the primary (unlike, say, Kentucky and Connecticut), Angle seems like the most kindred spirit for these types.

• CA-Gov: Meg Whitman’s sputtering campaign got a boost when she nailed down the endorsement of popular GOP moderate Richard Riordan, the former Los Angeles mayor — which might keep her from losing votes to ex-Rep. Tom Campbell on her left. Her other opponent, state Treasurer Steve Poizner, also announced his own endorsement, from American Conservative Union head David Keene. Not that any Californian would have any idea who Keene is, but this seems like a more fruitful endorsement vein to mine, as all three candidates are on the party’s moderate side — good for the general, but bad for making it out of the primary dominated by California’s rabid base.

• MA-Gov: There’s a new poll of the Massachusetts governor’s race showing embattled Dem incumbent Deval Patrick walloping his opponents — and it comes from Rasmussen, of all places. Despite only 36% of respondents thinking Patrick should run (49% say don’t run), Patrick leads GOPer Christy Mihos and independent Tim Cahill 34-23-23, and leads Charlie Baker and Cahill 34-24-23. This doesn’t jibe at all with their previous poll from August, which gave the GOP candidates leads over Patrick but didn’t account for Cahill’s presence, absorbing anti-Patrick votes — but it does pretty closely match Suffolk‘s September poll, so maybe Patrick is stabilizing a bit after some terrible numbers over the summer.

• NJ-Gov: After a week of unadulterated good news, the two most recent polls from New Jersey show Jon Corzine taking a slight turn for the worse. And the reason seems to be clear — Chris Daggett is starting to lose votes, perhaps as a share of soft Daggett voters who dislike Corzine more than they dislike Chris Christie are realizing that they’re contributing to a spoiler effect and shifting to Christie, helped along by RGA ads attacking Daggett. PPP (pdf) finds Christie leading Corzine and Daggett 42-38-13. Rasmussen gives toplines (based on their re-allocation of Daggett leaners) of 46-43-7 for Christie, while their “initial preference” this time, interestingly, gives an even better result for Christie, at 42-38-14. (Discussion underway in DCCylone and JFM110‘s diaries.

• OH-Gov (pdf): The Ohio Newspaper poll (conducted by University of Cincinnati) projects a close race in the Ohio gubernatorial race, as Democratic incumbent Ted Strickland leads GOP ex-Rep. John Kasich 49-46 among likely voters. Contrary to what one might expect, Kasich pulls closer among all registered voters, with a 48-47 Strickland lead.

• VA-Gov: Three different polls in Virginia, all of which showing Creigh Deeds trailing by double digits. (Ooops, almost typed “triple digits.”) The Washington Post is the most encouraging with a mere 55-44 lead for Bob McDonnell; Deeds has a 56-43 lead in northern Virginia, which may help retain some of the tight House of Delegates seat there. PPP (pdf) sees the race as 55-40 for McD (with similar-sized leads for the GOP’s LG and AG candidates); SurveyUSA has the widest spread, at 58-41 for McD. Deeds’ fundraising seems to be dying down, also, as the establishment realizes this one is over; McDonnell outraised Deeds $4 million to $3.1 million in the first 3 weeks of October (with most of Deeds’ money coming from the Tim Kaine-led DNC).

• FL-08: Alan Grayson saying something bombastic is getting to the point of not being newsworthy anymore (he called a Fed official a “K Street whore” on a radio show a month ago, although the pearls are just getting clutched today), but fellow camera-hogging Rep. Anthony Weiner gets some ups for saying what we’re all thinking: “Is this news to you that this guy’s one fry short of a Happy Meal?”

• IL-07: Rep. Danny Davis, after a drawn-out period of vacillation, finally got off the fence, and filed to run for President of the Cook County Board (although he plans to also file for his 7th District seat too; he has until Nov. 9 to withdraw one of his petitions). Assuming that he continues to follow through, this creates an open seat in the dark-blue, African-American-majority 7th and a hotly contested Dem primary.

• KY-St. Sen.: The special election is on, in Kentucky. GOP state Sen. Dan Kelly was appointed to a state circuit court judgeship yesterday, creating an open seat that Dems have a shot at picking up. The election is set for Dec. 8, the same day as a House special election to fill the seat of Dem Robin Webb (who was promoted to the state Senate in another recent special election).

• Mayors: The Charlotte mayoral race will go down to the wire; PPP finds that Anthony Foxx and John Lassiter each poll at 45. Foxx leads among African-Americans 80-9, while Lassiter leads among whites 63-29 (Charlotte is 33% black).

• Blue Dogs: Here’s an interesting fundraising tidbit: donations to the Blue Dog PAC fell to only $12,500 in September (from only three donations — from Ernst & Young, the Food Marketing Institute, and the NRA). They had averaged more than $176K per month in the first half of the year. Is this a blip, or a sign of things to come?

• FEC: If you can’t get enough about campaign finance disclosures and regulations, we’ve got the blog for you. The FEC has its own blog now… if you can consider something that has no bomb-throwing invective or pictures of hilarious cats to be a blog.

Well, both PPP and Rasmussen have released brand new NJ-Gov polls, with identical results, both bad for Corzine.

The takeaway is that it appears the Christie/Republican attacks on Daggett are working, and strangely somehow are turning the model into one where Daggett hurts Corzine more than Christie.

PPP released its poll this morning and shows Christie up 42-38, with Daggett at 14.  PPP explains that Daggett voters now are saying Corzine, rather than Christie, is their 2nd choice, by a 44-32 margin.  That’s a reversal of before.  Strangely this doesn’t come from Daggett lcsing ground and Christie gaining; rather, Daggett is actually holding steady in his own support.  So the crosstab results could just be statistical noise, with subsamples having very high margins of error.

But Rasmussen suggests there is more than just noise going on.  Rasmussen continued its dishonesty in its latest NJ-Gov poll, but this time with a twist:  the real topline looks better for Christie than the published one.  The real topline with “initial preferences” shows the same result as PPP, at 42-38, with Daggett at 14.  Their published topline is Christie up 46-43, with Daggett at 7–actually a narrower Christie lead than the real topline.  Rasmussen cooks its numbers as a rule this year, but their close-to-election numbers boomerang back to the norm of other pollsters…they pretty much have no choice to maintain their reputation.

Two polls, two identical results, two both showing a flip in which side is bleeding to Daggett.

PPP explicitly suggests that Christie’s attacks on Daggett are doing the trick.  I didn’t think tying Daggett to Corzine would be effective, especially when the attack narrative started so late, barely a month out.

I hope these polls are wrong and it really remains a dead heat.  I’m aware of the Suffolk poll from a few days ago showing Corzine up by a big margin, but that poll was flawed and has “outlier” written all over it.

I really hope Corzine can pull this out, because we’ve reached the point where his defeat would look worse than it should have, given the latest expectations that his comeback was near-complete.