This past month, we have seen a number of polls coming from House districts with a common theme--Republican incumbents are either grossly underperforming, or they are actually LOSING.
GOP insiders are quick to dismiss these polls, since almost all of them have been conducted for the Democratic campaign involved in the race. "Push Poll" they claim in unison. "Sponsored polls are always biased," they reassured themselves.
So today comes a poll from a district that is considered competitive, but not necessarily a toss-up. It is an independent poll, done by the respected Research 2000 firm out of Maryland, run by Del Ali (formerly of Mason-Dixon).
The race, and the result (because I am a believer in the "teaser" before the news) after the jump.....
OK, enough build-up.
Research 2000 did a poll over the weekend which shows Indiana 02 Representative Chris Chocola LOSING to Democratic challenger Joe Donnelly by a 46-41 margin.
This confirms a private poll done last week for the Donnelly campaign, which showed a 48-38 edge for the challenger. At the time, Kos front-paged it, and it was one of those "holy shit" campaign headlines.
This is not IN-08 or IN-09. This is a race that almost nobody has in their top 20 most competitive races. And Donnelly, quite clearly, is leading Chocola. Two successive polls seem to confirm it (not to mention that Chocola has not retaliated with a poll of his own showing him up front).
One has to wonder that if this is where Donnelly-Chocola is, where is Sodrel-Hill? How about Hostettler-Ellsworth?