"Laugh it up, Cain. You'll be at 9% by Halloween."
If nothing else was made clear in this week's polling, the Republican Party has clearly found a candidate to captivate their base. And the name of that candidate is Donald Trump Michele Bachmann Rick Perry Chris Christie Herman Cain!
As the GOP continues to resemble a middle schooler who seems to fall in love with "the one" on a weekly basis, there is another story developing that is less entertaining for Dems. After leading all GOP comers for months, despite flagging approval numbers, a trio of pollsters all now show Mitt Romney with a very modest lead over Barack Obama.
At the Senate level, the Elizabeth Warren surge was confirmed by another pollster, and could the Democratic Nelsons survive? While one looks safer than the other, both of them are in better shape than one might think.
All this (and more!) in the "Fall has finally fallen" edition of the Weekend Digest.
THE RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE
NATIONAL POLLS: Everything you need to know about the current state of the GOP field can be exemplified by this week's new poll from ABC/WaPo. Mitt Romney has moved absolutely nowhere: he was at 25% in early September, he is at 25% now. But the bottom has fallen out of the Rick Perry support. He dropped from a leading 29% down to a tie for second at 16%. The sole beneficiary? Herman Cain, who went from 4% to 16% and moved into a tie with Rick Perry. Every other candidate moved one percentage point, or did not move at all.
Other polls were even more pronounced in their Cain-mania. CBS News put Cain into a tie for the lead with Romney, though both men were still in the teens. The CBS poll of the Republicans was the first in a while to really paint a picture of a wide-open field, with Cain and Romney at 17%, Perry at 12%, and nearly a third of the electorate still undecided.
Quinnipiac had Cain in a clear second place, though several points behind Romney (22-17). Perry was still within striking distance at 14%, the only other Republican in double digits.
The only pollster that has not totally bought into Cain-mentum is Pew, which still has Romney (22%) and Perry (17%) pacing the field. Cain has moved into third place (13%), but is only a point ahead of the stubbornly persistent Ron Paul (12%).
Interestingly, some state polls (particularly the PPP polls) have seen a bit of a surge for Newt Gingrich this week. Perhaps that presages his role in the near future as the next GOP "flavor of the month." Thus far, however, that surge has not been present at the national level: Gingrich averaged a fairly modest 8.3%. While that was a step up from previous polling, it was a modest one, at best.
While the ascendancy of Cain, and the rapid descent of Perry, were the big presidential stories of the week, data-wise, there is another trend developing that bears watching. For the first time this week, multiple pollsters confirmed an incremental movement in the presidential general election trial heats that put Mitt Romney narrowly ahead of Barack Obama. Romney has seen small leads over Obama before, but this week's general election polling was different in that no poll gave Obama a lead over Romney. The best he could do, in this week's Pew poll, was forge a 48-48 tie with Romney. The other pollsters that tested nationally this week all gave Romney small leads. Quinnipiac put the Romney lead at four (46-42), while ABC/WaPo had the margin at two (48-46), the same margin the House of Ras had over last weekend.
If Perry resurrects his chances, Obama is in an incrementally better position. He led Perry in all three national polls listed above this week, with margins ranging from 1-3 points.
IN THE STATES: While the Herman-ator has shown some distinct movement in the national primary trial heats, it is in the states where the movement has been the most profound. Case in point: a trio of polls conducted by PPP this week in the states of North Carolina, Nebraska, and West Virginia. In all three of these rather disparate locales, Cain led the GOP field by margins ranging from 6-14 points. The other eye-popping data point in those PPP polls, the new consensus runner-up was...Newt Gingrich, who launched into the mid-teens in all three states. Romney and Perry, for their part, were within striking distance of Gingrich for second place.
In other statewide primary polling, the results were more mixed. Cain and Gingrich, as might be expected, were lapping the field in Georgia, their shared home state. The new poll by Insider Advantage, however, made clear the choice of Peach State Republicans. It was Cain, who led Gingrich by 24 points (41-17).
Up in the Granite State, as he has throughout, Mitt Romney enjoyed a sizeable lead in his semi-home state of New Hampshire. Romney led with 37%, well ahead of Cain (12%), Paul (9%), and..wait for it...Jon Huntsman (8%). If you are wondering about the whereabouts of Rick Perry: he has fallen into a tie for fifth at 4% of the vote.
On the general election front in the states, there were few surprises.
In the first poll in a very long while in Nebraska, the GOP field leads the president, who could still possibly nab a single electoral vote. The leads are slightly less than they were in 2008, with the margins ranging from 7-13 points when Obama is paired against the existing GOP field (Chris Christie actually had a slightly wider edge). But, the western-based 3rd district is so overwhelmingly GOP that the chance remains that if the race drops into single digits statewide, the president could snag an EV in either the 1st or 2nd district.
Meanwhile, in the considerably more frequently polled state of North Carolina, Obama's performance has been incredibly consistent. His lead over Mitt Romney stood, as it has many times recently, at a single point, while the rest of the GOP field (save, again, for Christie) trailed by 3-7 points.
Another Obama '08 state in considerably more dire straits is the state of New Hampshire. The new WMUR/UNH poll there has Romney leading Obama by 8% there (50-42). Of course, if Romney cannot secure the nomination there, one has to assume that the remaining alternatives would not fare as well as the almost-but-not-quite home stater Romney.
One state which remains locked into the Democratic column, as one might expect, is Massachusetts, where the Boston Herald/UMass Lowell poll gave the President an enormous lead over the leading two Republicans. Even former home-state Gov. Mitt Romney only came within 24 points (57-33), while Rick Perry trailed by 37 (62-25). Those 11 electoral votes, it is safe to say, are going nowhere
THE RACE FOR THE U.S. SENATE:
AT THE POLLS: When perusing the 2012 landscape, there has been a long-held perception that a couple of Dem-held seats were sure losers. One was the open seat in North Dakota, and the other was in Nebraska, where the consensus was that even a conservative Democrat like Ben Nelson would get caught in the red-state undertow this time around. While that may very well still take place, it has to be noted that his polling numbers, according to a new PPP survey, were a bit better than they were last winter, the last time PPP took the temperature of this race. Once down double digits to GOP state Atty Gen. Jon Bruning, the margin is now down to 4 points (46-42). He also is within striking distance of 2000 opponent Don Stenberg (44-41). While an improved position, it is still an incumbent trailing a challenger, and it is still thirteen months before the election. So...there's that.
Meanwhile, down Florida way, the other Nelson is in a substantially more comfortable position. Veteran Democrat Bill Nelson held a double-digit edge over all potential GOP comers. The margins varied little by candidate (13-17 points), which tells us that, to some extent, his field of Republican challengers is still relatively unknown.
Meanwhile, in Massachusetts, a pair of pollsters offered some confirmation of PPP's biggest polling bombshell of recent vintage. Early in the week, the first bit of evidence came from Princeton Survey Research (working for the Boston Herald and UMass-Lowell). The pollster had incumbent Sen. Scott Brown (R) leading Democrat Elizabeth Warren by just three points (41-38). Those numbers out of the Bay State were further confirmed on Friday, when a Western New England College survey showed Brown with a five-point edge over Warren (47-42).
There was a time when a lot of folks felt that freshman Sen. Robert Menendez deserved to be on any list of the most vulnerable Dems seeking re-election. New data out of New Jersey this week put Menendez in considerably safer position. When paired with his GOP opposition (Michael Doherty and Joe Kyrillos), Menendez held leads of 19 and 21 points, respectively.
Speaking of Dem incumbents, West Virginia got a ton of attention this week for the coin-flip special election for Governor, but PPP also elected to look ahead to next year's Senate election here. The bottom line--Joe Manchin looks safe. Even if the Democrat is challenged by the absolute #1 GOP recruit in the state (Rep. Shelley Moore Capito), Manchin would hold a double-digit edge (49-38). If there is bad news for Democrats there, it is that PPP looked ahead to 2014...and found that Capito would narrowly edge (48-44) longtime Democratic Sen. Jay Rockefeller.
On the primary level, we did get new numbers (courtesy of PPP) out of Connecticut this week. On the GOP side, it is all about Linda McMahon, who crushed her more moderate foe (former Rep. Chris Shays) by a gaudy 60-27 margin. Fortunately, it looks like the GOP hasn't learned any lessons on Senate electability since 2010. On the Democratic side, meanwhile, Rep. Chris Murphy held a considerably more modest lead over Sec. of State Susan Bysiewicz. According to PPP, the margin was six points (39-33).
ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL:
- In Arizona, we have an extraordinarily strange situation developing. If you thought the endless (and somewhat ghoulish) speculation about a Senate candidacy for the convalescing Gabby Giffords was a bit hard to take, this is equally annoying, but in a very different way. The story goes something as follows: everyone up to and including the president has asked former Surgeon General Richard Carmona to seek the Democratic nomination for the Senate. Carmona, for his part, is busy taking the word "ambivalent" to an entirely new level, with a very public display of indecision that is equal parts "everyone wants me to run" and "but I don't know if I really want to." This can't be helpful for the Dems, and it raises some real "fire in the belly" questions if, as now seems increasingly unlikely, Carmona elects to poop instead of getting off the pot.
- The "rising star" nature of the Elizabeth Warren candidacy for the Senate seat continues to thin the field in Massachusetts. This time, it is Bob Massie, who elected on Friday to join Newton Mayor Setti Warren on the sidelines. There are still several Dems still in the mix, but polls show Warren with a very solid lead over the balance of the Democratic field in the battle to replace Republican Sen. Scott Brown. Brown, for his part, made a bit of an ass of himself this week, as has already been covered extensively elsewhere. Incidentally, his cloak of victimhood about his own nude modeling past might have been harder to stomach than the "Thank God" remark. Republican women rushing in to defend him was equally nauseating.
- Money isn't everything, of course, but the 3Q finance numbers out of Michigan hints that we might have a legitimate primary battle on our hands there on the GOP side. Right-wing fave Clark Durant announced early in the week that he had raised $750K in his bid to win the Republican nomination. The establishment pick, former Rep. Pete Hoekstra, saw Durant's haul and raised him, logging $1 million for the quarter. For her part, Democratic incumbent Debbie Stabenow has to be hoping that Durant and Hoekstra blow most of those wallets bludgeoning each other in what could prove to be an acrimonious primary battle.
THE RACE FOR THE U.S. HOUSE:
AT THE POLLS: It looks like we now have some context for a gaudy general election poll in SD-AL last week. The poll, you may recall, had freshman Republican Rep. Kristi Noem losing by 21 points in a potential rematch with former Democratic Rep. Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin. Local reporter David Montgomery deconstructs the poll, and finds a little bit more (or, perhaps more accurately, less) than meets the eye.
On the primary front, it looks like the next big House contest will be in Oregon, where a special election will fill the seat of former Democratic Rep. David Wu. In that battle to claim the seat in OR-01, a Grove Insight poll this week hinted that state Sen. Suzanne Bonamici is the betting favorite to be the Democratic nominee. However, caveat alert: the poll was on behalf of EMILY's List, who has endorsed Bonamici. The poll claimed a big lead Bonamici, with 34% versus just 10% for state legislator Brad Witt and 8% for state labor commissioner Brad Avakian.
Meanwhile, on the generic ballot front, Quinnipiac took a look at the Dem vs. GOP nums in their national poll this week. And they found...a perfect deadlock. Both parties were sitting at 39% in their tabulation, suggesting that there are a lot of "pox on both your houses" voters sitting out there. Meanwhile, the mini-surge for the Dems in the weekly Rasmussen check of the generic ballot seems to have abated, as the GOP-friendly pollster put the Republicans back into a modest lead. The margin, according to the House of Ras, stood at six points (44-38).
ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL:
- The Democrats were probably overdue for a bit of bad news out of Illinois, and they got it early in the week. It was not a total shock, but the news that longtime Rep. Jerry Costello was going to retire from his perch in IL-12 was a bit of a blow nonetheless. The district is a Democratic one, but not overwhelmingly so: Barack Obama carried the district 55-44, which actually makes it one of the more conservative districts in Illinois currently held by a Democrat.
- A key state added their voice to the redistricting milieu this week, with the release of a draft map by the independent commission in Arizona. The net result: by and large, a status quo map. The map ensures 4 safe GOP districts, a pair of safe Dem districts (presumably for Pastor and Grijalva), and three "fair fight" districts. Two incumbents look destined for those semi-competitive districts: Republican Paul Gosar and Democrat Gabby Giffords. The third district, the suburban-based 9th district southeast of Phoenix, has all the looks of an open seat. It contained a lot of the home territory of freshman Rep. David Schweikert, but the word is that he'll head to safer ground in the 6th district, where he will likely face fellow GOP freshman Rep. Ben Quayle.
- Meanwhile, one state edged closer to redistricting, while another edged (if anything) further away). Maryland looks like they are starting to settle on a map that would gun for longtime Western Maryland Rep. Roscoe Bartlett. Meanwhile, Republican internecine warfare appears to have put the new maps in Utah on ice. The map, bandied about earlier, looked to put the lone Democrat in the state delegation (Rep. Jim Matheson) in dire straits.
THE RACE FOR THE STATE HOUSE:
AT THE POLLS: Before we get into the elections yet to come, a quick shout out seems appropriate. Once again, our polling partners at PPP were willing to wade into an always unpredictable special election cycle, and once again, they hit it right on the freaking screws. In their final poll out of West Virginia, they had Democrat Earl Ray Tomblin clinging to a single-point lead over Republican Bill Maloney (47-46). The final margin was...three points (50-47). Well done, once again.
In another 2011 gubernatorial race, the tension seems to be far, far less. In Kentucky, Democrat Steve Beshear is sprinting away from Republican David Williams, turning a solid lead into an absolute laugher. The margin now stands at 31 points, with Beshear at 57%, Williams at 26%, and perennial Indie candidate Gatewood Galbraith at 8%. Beshear's lead has grown seven points over the past month. The only question now is if Williams' irrelevance in the gubernatorial election allows for a rare Democratic sweep downballot.
Meanwhile, in North Carolina, perhaps the post-Irene bump experienced by Democratic Gov. Bev Perdue was not totally ephemeral. The monthly check on that race by PPP had Perdue still trailing Republican Pat McCrory, but that lead was once again a fairly modest one. The Republican led the Democratic incumbent by five (47-42). Somewhat interestingly, PPP took a look at how other Democrats might fare in the decidedly unlikely event that either (a) Perdue steps down or (b) she gets primaried. A bit of a surprise: two-time Senate loser Erskine Bowles fared the best, tying McCrory at 42.
ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL:
- Holy pissing away cash, Batman! You gotta love the pluck of the GOP front group "Restoring America." Those fools must have cash to burn, because they just dumped nearly three-quarters of a million bucks into trying to soften up Gov. Steve Beshear in Kentucky. Even the RGA isn't biting on that race anymore, of course, and polls (see above) showing it getting out of hand in a hurry. But...hey...their largesse might pull Williams within 20 points, or something.
- Meanwhile, it looks like the race in Mississippi will be closer than that, but there is no reason to suspect that this means political bettors should be placing their cash down on Democrat Johnny DuPree. The NY Times threw out a fascinating piece where they outlined the extremely polarized racial voting patterns in the Magnolia State. The end result? Democrats are confined to a relatively narrow band of support in the state. Worst case scenario? A Democrat should expect around 40% of the vote. Best case scenario? A Democrats' ceiling is at around 45% of the vote. That's because voting in Mississippi has reached the point that virtually all Democrats vote Democratic, while virtually no whites will vote Dem.
- Looking (way) ahead to 2013, it looks like the GOP establishment in Virginia has fired a shot across the bow of far-right Atty Gen. Ken Cuccinelli. They have already determined that a primary, and not a nominating convention, will determine their nominees in that election. The move has to be seen as a boon for Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling. While Bolling might still lose a primary to the infinitely more teabaggy Cuccinelli, he'd be dead man walking in an activist-driven convention.