On this particular teacher's final day of freedom (SNIFF!), we see some surprisingly bad new data out of West Virginia (from Rasmussen...who else?) but also some surprisingly good data out of New Mexico. We also have two separate examples of incredibly boorish Republican behavior at the House level, and a couple of surprise decisions by interest groups that could have big November implications.
All that (and more!) as we kick the week off proper with the Monday edition of the Wrap...
THE U.S. SENATE
AK-Sen: Murkowski loses her lifeline--and why Dems should smile
Any faint hope that Lisa Murkowski had of the Libertarian Party offering her a ballot line (and, at the same time, a political lifeline) has now been extinguished. The Libertarian Party's head honchos decided there was too wide a gulf between their party and Murkowski's ideology to bridge even in the name of electoral expediency. That means Democrats are denied the opportunity to split the GOP opposition, but a poll out over the weekend from PPP hinted that Democrat Scott McAdams might be better off facing Miller solo. The PPP poll showed that even in GOP-friendly Alaska, Miller only leads McAdams by a 47-39 margin. Since McAdams is still relatively unknown, this is clearly a sign that the state's mostly conservative electorate is very ambivalent about the GOP nominee. Therefore, despite it being counterintuitive, Murkowski's entrance into the race would almost certainly siphon more votes from McAdams than it would from Miller.
AZ-Sen: Post-primary housecleaning for new Democratic nominee
This is either a sign of a campaign retooling for a competitive Fall campaign, or an early sign of serious discord. Democratic nominee Rodney Glassman is swapping campaign managers, as former Romanoff campaign head Bill Romjue takes the job from Patrick Mellody. Team Glassman says this is a common post-primary reshuffling of staff, but it must be noted that this is the fourth senior staffer to head elsewhere in the past few weeks.
CT-Sen: Another former WWE star found dead
GOP Senate nominee Linda McMahon's day job is stubbornly refusing to stay out of the news cycle, and for the most tragic reason possible. Less than three weeks after former WWE wrestler Lance Cade was found dead, another former WWE combatant was found dead. This time, it was one of the outfit's former female wrestlers. 48 year-old Gertrude Vachon, who performed under the stage name Luna Vachon, was found dead in Florida on Friday. She worked for McMahon's WWE during much of the 1990s. The company acknowledged over the weekend that Vachon had gone to rehab recently under the auspices of the firm's talent wellness program. Prescription drug abuse was a connecting thread in several of the fatalities involving WWE talent in recent years.
DE-Sen: Tea Party Express' next target--Mike Castle
The Tea Party Express, fresh from their contribution to the shocking apparent win of Joe Miller in Alaska, have a new "establishment Republican" target: Delaware's Mike Castle. The TPE is pledging to commit similar resources to push right-wing insurgent candidate Christine O'Donnell in Delaware. In this case, time is a bit shorter: Delaware voters head to the polls in only 15 days. PPP's always excellent Tom Jensen assesses the odds of such a challenge being successful. Like me, he is a bit dubious about the prospects.
NC-Sen: "Unaffiliated voters" give slight edge to Burr
Conservative polling outfit Civitas is taking a novel approach to the U.S. Senate race between GOP incumbent Richard Burr and Democratic challenger Elaine Marshall. Their poll only sampled so-called "unaffiliated voters". Among those voters, the incumbent holds a seven-point lead (39-32) over Marshall, with Libertarian Michael Beitler drawing 7% of the vote. Civitas notes that Barack Obama carried this group in 2008, implying that this subsample is at least somewhat parallel to the state at-large.
THE U.S. HOUSE
AL-05: GOP internal poll shows GOP candidate under 50, up 11 points
Perhaps it is a sign of how crappy the general environment is for Democrats, but I was actually pleasantly surprised by this polling release: Republican Mo Brooks released an internal poll (done by Public Opinion Strategies) showing him leading Democrat Steve Raby by a 48-37 margin. The Madison County Commissioner defeated turncoat Republican incumbent Parker Griffith in June's GOP primary. Raby raised decent cash thus far, and had the benefit of a slightly less competitive primary. While the seat goes heavily GOP in presidential elections, it has consistently elected Democratic candidates.
IA-05: The worst answer to a debate challenge...ever.
Right-wing Congressman Steve King's reputation as something of a jerk has been long established, but this is pretty crappy, even by his lowered standards. King was confronted at a public meeting by his Democratic challenger, Matt Campbell. Campbell asked if the Republican incumbent, who has not debated a single opponent in his near-decade of tenure on the Hill, would participate in a debate this year. King gave a fairly curt denial, brusquely informing Campbell that "you have not earned it." Alas, the Iowa 5th is an uber-conservative slice of Western Iowa, which means that arrogance like King's is liable to be rewarded with re-election as long as he pleases.
NM-01/NM-02: Dem incumbents holds modest leads in key matchups
Despite other polls showing them in varying degrees of peril, the new polling out from the Albuquerque Journal suggests that the Democratic incumbents in the Land of Enchantment will survive...barely. Martin Heinrich, the Democratic freshman who represents Albuquerque and its environs, holds a six-point lead over Republican Jon Barela (47-41), an exact reversal of a summer poll from SurveyUSA. Perhaps even more surprising was the data from the more rural and conservative 2nd district, where the current incumbent (Democrat Harry Teague) holds a three-point advantage over the old incumbent (Republican Steven Pearce). Teague has a 45-42 lead in a race that many presumed would be a GOP pickup when Pearce decided to seek his old office.
PA-10: How NOT to handle protests, starring GOP challenger
Um...if you are planning to head into the DC fishbowl, you probably need to learn to be a little less thin-skinned. Confronted with some hecklers at a recent joint appearance with GOP Senate nominee Patrick Toomey, Marino lost his shit a little bit and decided to mouth off. He asked one adversary "what kind of welfare" he/she was on, and also repeatedly asked "what do you do for a job?" Marino is challenging Democratic sophomore Rep. Chris Carney in GOP-leaning territory in the central part of the state.
WI-07: When the DCCC stops being polite, and starts getting real
The DCCC has picked their first independent expenditure target, and it is in a critical open-seat race in the Midwest. The DCCC is giving Sean Duffy the honor of being their first IE target of the cycle. Duffy, the former Ashland County DA better known as a former cast member of MTV's long-running reality show "The Real World", gets cracked by the DCCC for his support for social security privatization.
THE GUBERNATORIAL RACES
MN-Gov: Minneapolis cops buck past trend, endorse Democrat
The Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis, which has endorsed Republicans more than Democrats in the past decade, has spurned GOP nominee Tom Emmer and thrown their support to Democratic nominee Mark Dayton. The union supported Republican Tim Pawlenty in both his gubernatorial bids in 2002 and 2006, and also endorsed Norm Coleman in 2008 over Al Franken. Their most recent Democratic endorsee was Amy Klobuchar in her successful 2006 bid for the Senate.
NM-Gov: GOP holds six point lead, according to Journal poll
Spurred in part by abysmal numbers for incumbent Democratic Governor Bill Richardson (33/63 approval spread), his Democratic Lt. Governor is struggling to gain traction in her bid against Dona Ana County DA Susana Martinez. Republican nominee Martinez holds a 45-39 lead over Democrat Diane Denish, according to the poll conducted for the Albuquerque Journal. The key to victory for Martinez is her surprisingly strong support among both Hispanics and Democrats (with about 20% of Democrats defecting to the GOP candidate).
THE RAS-A-PALOOZA
Ras is un-Ras like in one race (they actually show some serious tightening in the Colorado Senate race), but very Ras-like in another (Manchin by 6?!). On their other two races on the card today (Oklahoma Senate and Arizona Governor), they stay pretty much status quo compared to their previous data.
AZ-Gov: Gov. Jan Brewer (R) 57%, Terry Goddard (D) 38%
CO-Sen: Ken Buck (R) 47%, Sen. Michael Bennet (D) 44%
OK-Sen: Sen. Tom Coburn (R) 67%, Jim Rogers (D) 24%
WV-Sen: Joe Manchin (D) 48%, John Raese (R) 42%