Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 2/8-10. Likely voters. MoE 4% (No trend lines)
Favorable/Unfavorable ratings
Evan Bayh (D) 61/33
John Hostettler (R) 40/33
Dan Coats (R) 38/34
Coats has had a disastrous rollout for his campaign. The former Indiana senator has been going around talking about how great it is to live in Virginia, and bragging about his million-dollar retirement home in North Carolina. All that dissing of Indiana isn't going over so well in Hoosierland.
And while Evan Bayh could be vulnerable to a true outsider, given the incumbent senator's strong ties to lobbyists, and his wife trading on his position to enrich herself on various corporate boards, the fact that Coats is actually a lobbyist (with Hugo Chavez a client, no less) gives him no credibility on those legitimate issues. (Former Rep. John Hostettler, another creature strongly tied to Washington D.C., also lacks those outsider creds.)
All of this adds up to a solid reelection position for Bayh:
Bayh (D) 55
Coats (R) 35
Bayh (D) 53
Hostettler (R) 37
Bayh isn't just comfortably above the 50 percent "vulnerable" mark, but he actually does better against Coats -- the NRSC's prized recruit. But either way, it doesn't matter. When you run corrupt Washington insider against corrupt Washington insider, the opposition remains uninspired.
The way to win this year -- either Democrat or Republican -- is to run against the corrupt DC cesspool. The Republicans gave up a solid opportunity to do so in Indiana.