Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 3/15-17. Likely voters. MoE 4%, 5% for primary samples. (8/31-9/2/2009 results)
Republican Senate primary
Rand Paul (R) 40 (25)
Trey Grayson (R) 28 (40)
Democratic Senate primary
Daniel Mongiardo (D) 47 (37)
Jack Conway (D) 31 (30)
On the Democratic side, Lt. Gov. Daniel Mongiardo has significantly expanded his lead over Kentucky's Attorney General.
For the GOP, Paul, son of Ron, has reversed the primary numbers in the last six months, running an outsider campaign that is pure teabagger with a dash of anti-war fervor. He is certainly giving the GOP establishment fits, especially the Mitch McConnell machine which is backing the secretary of state. Even Dick Cheney appears involved, panicking at the thought of an anti-war libertarian undermining neocons from within.
On the other hand, Paul appears to be the GOP's strongest general election option:
Rand Paul (R) 46 (42)
Daniel Mongiardo (D) 37 (37)
Rand Paul (R) 45 (41)
Jack Conway (D) 39 (37)
Trey Grayson (R) 43 (45)
Daniel Mongiardo (D) 38 (41)
Trey Grayson (R) 44 (46)
Jack Conway (D) 36 (40)
Certainly not as hopeful as last week's SurveyUSA poll of the race. Both Democrats suffer from high undecideds from Democratic respondents -- in the other of 20-26 percent. Less than 10 percent of Republicans are undecided. But there aren't enough Democrats to make up these gaps, so to be competitive, they will have to close their sizable deficits among independent voters.