Normally, you'd think Senators facing tough reelection battles would want the highest-profile help their party had to offer. You'd think that for Republicans that would be the incumbent president -- but of course, Bush has the worst disapproval rating since they started measuring that.

So in this, as in so many things, McCain will be standing in for Bush, going on the road for New Hampshire's John Sununu, Maine's Susan Collins, Oregon's Gordon Smith, and Minnesota's Norm Coleman. Because, as the Cook Report's Jennifer Duffy says:

"The interesting thing about McCain is that he may not help anybody, but he's not a drag on anybody," she said.

Yet. He's not a drag on anybody yet. Because he hasn't yet faced a settled Democratic nominee. Because the traditional media has given him a free ride, rarely pointing out that on the votes that matter, McCain's no maverick. When  the Republican party and George W. Bush need him, John McCain is reliably there for them.

How alike are McCain and Bush? MoveOn puts you to the (f'ing difficult) test -- a test a lot of reporters could stand to take before they write their next stories squeeing over all the awesome straight-talking maverickness. If they start writing the story of the John McCain who actually stands in front of them instead of the one in their heads, by November he'll be as much of a drag on Sununu, Collins, Coleman, and Smith as Bush is today.

Race tracker wiki: NH-Sen ME-Sen OR-Sen MN-Sen

Senate Races:

NH-Sen: Rasmussen's latest poll shows Jeanne Shaheen maintaining her eight-point lead over Republican incumbent John Sununu. This race has sat comfortably in the top tier of Democratic pickup opportunities since Shaheen declared her candidacy, and it looks as though that is where it will stay. The New Hampshire race still looks like the strongest Senate challenge to a Republican incumbent this cycle.

NC-Sen: On the heels of the latest Research 2000 poll showing Elizabeth Dole with weak numbers versus Democrats Kay Hagan and Jim Neal (leading Hagan by seven points and Neal by 10), SurveyUSA has polled the Democratic primary race.

With just days to go before the May 6 primary, Hagan now holds a substantial lead over Neal, 38% to 17%. 35% of voters are still undecided, and Neal will have to take a large majority of those undecideds if he is to be the nominee.

OR-Sen: SUSA has polled this race as well, and in contrast to the North Carolina poll, this one shows the race tightening between Democrats Steve Novick and Jeff Merkley.

On the heels of Merkley's recent ad campaign, SUSA shows the race deadlocked, with Novick holding a statistically insignificant two-point advantage over Merkley. Last month, Novick led Merkley by 11 points.

At this point, I wouldn't even hazard a guess as to who is favored.

House Races:

IN-05, IN-07: Primary day in Indiana will also see three competitive races downticket. One is the Republican challenge to nutter Dan Burton in Indiana's 5th, one is the three-headed Democratic challenge to incumbent Andre Carson in IN-07, and one is the Democratic primary for Governor between Jill Long Thompson and Jim Schellinger, which we'll look at in a separate post.

Burton has held his seat since 1982, but has recently come under fire for absenteeism (he apparently prefers taking golf trips to actually casting votes in Congress), and faces his strongest primary challenge in years from fellow Republican John McGoff. McGoff has established a cute little website called "Where's Dan Burton?" to underscore this fact. His attacks must be getting some traction, because Burton has spent $1.2 million to defend his House seat.

In the Seventh District, Andre Carson, who won a March special election to succeed his late grandmother Julia Carson, faces three Democratic opponents in his primary; state Reps. David Orentlicher and Carolene Mays, and former State Health Commissioner Woody Myers.

As the incumbent, Carson is certainly at an advantage, especially as he managed to fend off a surprisingly strong challenge from Republican Jon Elrod in winning his special election by 11 points. Still, with four serious candidates running, it's difficult to say what will happen, especially given the race's racial dynamics:

Carson hopes his brief experience in Washington sets him apart from his seven challengers.

He and two of those challengers — former state Health Commissioner Woody Myers and state Rep. Carolene Mays — are black, and some community leaders worry the crowded field will split the black vote. That could give state Rep. David Orentlicher, who is white, an advantage in the district, which is about two-thirds white.

IL-11: Republicans had been without a candidate in this district after the NRCC's favored recruit, New Lenox Mayor Tim Baldermann, dropped out of this open-seat race. They have apparently finally found a challenger to Democrat Debbie Halvorson, in the person of millionaire Marty Ozinga.

Ozinga has plenty of personal funds and has raised over $400,000 for the race so far, but he's deep in the hole against Halvorson, the Illinois Senate Majority leader, who has over $673,000 on hand and has already made the DCCC's Red To Blue List. IL-11 is a swing district with a PVI of R+1.1, so in a Democratic year, I like Halvorson's chances.

-CQ runs down the House races in the Midwest, and handicaps them here:

No Clear Favorite
KS-02 Boyda (D)
MN-03 Ramstad* (R)
OH-15 Pryce* (R)
OH-16 Regula* (R)

Leans Democratic
IL-08 Bean (D)
IL-14 Foster (D)
IN-07 Carson (D)
IN-09 Hill (D)
MN-01 Walz (D)
WI-08 Kagen (D)

Leans Republican
IL-10 Kirk (R)
MI-07 Walberg (R)
MI-09 Knollenberg (R)
MO-06 Graves (R)
MO-09 Hulshof* (R)
OH-01 Chabot (R)
OH-02 Schmidt (R)

Democrat Favored
IL-11 Weller* (R)
IN-02 Donnelly (D)
IN-08 Ellsworth (D)
KS-03 Moore (D)
OH-18 Space (D)

Republican Favored
IL-06 Roskam (R)
IL-18 LaHood*  (R)
MN-06 Bachmann (R)
OH-14 LaTourette (R)

* denotes retiring incumbent

It's certainly inspiring to note the predominance of Republican seats on this list, particularly in the most competitive categories. For me, though, the biggest pleasant surprise is the listing of Joe Donnelly, Brad Ellsworth and Zack Space in the "Democrat Favored" categories.

Donnelly, Ellsworth and Space all represent Republican-leaning districts. The Indiana representatives hail from a state which has been reliably Republican in presidential election years, and has not given its electoral votes to a Democrat since 1964. These are precisely the kind of districts that a more vibrant and relevant Republican Party would have at the top of its target list. Nevertheless, at least by CQ's analysis, our Democratic incumbents are relatively safe.

MS-01: So the NRCC has responded to the $700,000 bombshell the DCCC dropped in MS-01...by throwing just under eight thousand whole dollars into the race. Meanwhile, the DCCC topped their previous investments with an additional $40,000.

The NRCC previously spent quite a bit here, so maybe they feel like they've done enough...but they better be damn sure if they're going to risk losing an R+10 district. I mean, that can't be good for morale.

Race tracker wiki: NC-Sen NH-Sen OR-Sen IN-05 IN-07 IL-11

If you thought 2006 was a good year for us when we picked up six seats, 2008 looks a GREAT DEAL better.  It's been quite a long time since we've gone into an election cycle where the Repubs have, for the most part, written off FOUR Senate seats seven months before the election!

DSCC chairman Chuck Schumer stated that his committee will contest up to seventeen races in 2008.  With our major financial advantages right now, there is a good change we can win at least six, and maybe up to nine races, which would put us at the magic 60 mark.

Anyway, here are my rankings:

Hotline has a major round-up of Senate fundraising numbers; Senate Guru reformatted much of the information to be a little more readable, and has some thoughts.

I see lots of good news here. Democrats may be playing even less defense than expected. Only three Democratic incumbents -- Landrieu, Durbin, and Kerry -- have Republican challengers with more than $70k cash on hand, and Durbin and Kerry are safe nonetheless. That leaves a lot of room for Democrats to focus on open seats and taking out Republican incumbents.

And several of those Republican incumbents should be sweating the money situation. Al Franken outraised Norm Coleman ($2.2 million to $2.1 million), and Jeanne Shaheen outraised John Sununu ($1.2 million to $1 million); both Franken and Shaheen trail in the cash on hand department, but continued solid fundraising (and good polls in Minnesota and great ones in New Hampshire) is pretty damn sweet. Next door to New Hampshire, Maine's Tom Allen trails Susan Collins but has an impressive $2.6 million cash on hand.

In the battle for New Mexico and Colorado's open seats, the Udalls are kicking ass. New Mexico's Tom raised more than Republicans Wilson and Pearce combined, and holds a similar cash on hand advantage. Colorado's Mark outraised sweatshop-promoter Schaffer ($1.5 million to $1 million) and has nearly double the cash on hand.

Mark Warner continues to pull in ridiculous money ($2.5 million) on the way to joining Jim Webb in Virginia's senate delegation.

Unfortunately, in Oregon Merkley and Novick are underperforming financially, just as they've been showing other signs of weakness. And Texan Rick Noriega's totals (both money raised this quarter and cash on hand) weren't where they should be, though Burnt Orange Report points out that his fundraising picked up substantially in the latter part of the quarter, once it was clear he was the nominee.

But back on the up side, Andrew Rice pulled in an extremely nice-for-Oklahoma $431k. Oklahoma will remain a long, long shot, but Rice could outperform expectations -- that would be some serious map-expansion. Add in races like Alaska and Mississippi, where Democrats Mark Begich and Ronnie Musgrove may trail their opponents in fundraising but are polling well, and it continues to look like a great year for Democrats.

For context and rankings on these races and more, see brownsox' State of the Senate: April.

Race tracker wiki: MN-Sen NH-Sen OK-Sen OR-Sen NM-Sen CO-Sen VA-Sen

Cross posted at Calitics

So as we've established by now, Darrell Issa thinks very little of 9/11 rescue workers and would prefer that the federal government not concern itself with their welfare.  Cause according to him, 9/11 is not and presumably was not a national issue.  We've also established that he has no qualms about throwing federal money around on local pork as long as it benefits him directly.  So the next logical question for me is "oh hey, are there any familiar names that don't mind taking Darrell Issa's money?"  As you may or may not know, Darrell Issa is filthy rich.  So he's spread a lot of money around on Republicans and conservative causes.  So as it turns out, there are quite a lot of Republicans currently running around the Capitol funded in part by Darrell Issa (partial list):

The New Hampshire senate race remains static. In a good way.

Rasmussen. 3/16. 500 likely voters. MoE 4.5%. (2/13)

No one was going to pay much attention to this until after the New Hampshire primary, but in the two months since, we've seen Shaheen maintain a steady lead now in two of the more reputable polls following the race. Good news for us.

Race tracker wiki: NH-Sen

Crossposted with different title on Blue Hampshire

Jeanne Shaheen (D, Senate candidate):

"First and foremost, today we remember the fallen heroes of our armed services and their families.  We pray for the men and women serving our country and we honor the veterans who have sacrificed so much for all of us.

"Today, we are five years into a war we were told would last a matter of weeks, five years into a war that has taken almost 4,000 American lives and is costing us $12 billion a month, five years into a war that has diverted our military focus from pursuing terrorist threats around the world.  This morning, President Bush asserted once again that the war in Iraq has made America safer, while our intelligence agencies tell us that exactly the opposite is true – we are more vulnerable to terrorist threats now than we have been at any time since 2001.

(more)

So with eight months to go, I figure it’s time for an updated look at all the 2008 Senate races.  There are 35 seats up for election because of a scenario in Wyoming and Mississippi where both seats are up, due to the passing of Craig Thomas and the resignation of Trent Lott, respectively.  Now obviously, quite a few of the races are considered "safe" for the incumbent.  So I’ll rank these in terms of tiers.  The top tier will be the races where there is a serious challenger to the incumbent (or at least the incumbent’s party, in cases of retirement), where the party holding the seat has a real shot of switching.  The second tier are races that could become top tier races, but are not at this point.  Tier III are ones where a major event would need to happen for the seat to come into play.  And the safe seats?  Well, Mike Gravel has a better shot at winning the presidency than those incumbents have of losing their races.

Follow me below the fold for all the races.  Note: Some of this may seem repetitive, with information you already know.  That’s because I originally wrote this for the Bruin Democrats, many of whom don’t follow the national races like we do.  Consider this a primer for both newcomers and political junkies alike.

...I said Su-No-No-No!

(more)

The Presidential race is incredibly important this election and I'm glad the electorate is fired up. However, if we want to pass progressive legislation in 2009 and beyond, we need to start paying attention to the Senate. The Senate Democrats have been split on numerous issues like FISA immunity to voting for the horrid 2005 energy bill. Besides the problems within our own party, we also have the Republicans to deal with. You and I both know that they will never be on board with progressive legislation. IMO, with the exception of the Presidential race, electing more and better Democrats to the Senate is the only way we progressives will accomplish our goals. Follow me below the fold to take a look at a few Republicans we have to send packing......

(Crossposted with different title at Blue Hampshire)

Phony libertarian John E. Sununu (Vulnerable R-NH)spent some time with the Free State Project Liberty Forum last January trolling for votes from the Ron Paul crowd.

The thing I really like about the Paul people?  They tape everything. And for once we have the real John E. Sununu speaking his mind in front of a friendly audience.  No obfuscating, cloudy, SenatorSpeak here.  John E. goes full force with ridiculing Obama's campaign slogan, followed by an open admission of his dream goals for change: a flat tax and the privatization of Social Security.

<center></center>

(more)

University of New Hampshire (PDF) 1/18-27 MoE 4.2% (September 2007)

Shaheen's lead has been steady in UNH polling; in November, SUSA had her up over Sununu 53-42, while in September, Rasmussen showed Shaheen leading by just five points, 48-43.

As Dean Barker points out in a Daily Kos diary, strong Democratic presidential primary turnout is fantastic news for Shaheen's prospects; on the flip side, in a comment at Blue Hampshire, one of Shaheen's strongest supporters urges against complacency. To echo her, it's great to have any lead (let alone a 17 point one) over an incumbent, but Sununu will not go down without a fight and we can't take this one for granted.

To learn more, go to Jeanne Shaheen's website, or follow the race at Blue Hampshire.

Race tracker wiki: NH-Sen

Some very encouraging news out of the Granite State tonight. Former NH Gov and challenger Jeanne Shaheen is trouncing incumbent Senator John E. Sununu 54-37 (MoE 4.2%) in the latest UNH poll.  And moreover, from a screenshot taken from the .pdf of the poll results, it looks like Sununu hasn't been able to build any traction for half a year now.

(Important to note: this poll was conducted by the U. of NH, not NH-based ARG, a frequent NH-Sen pollster, but one declared recently to be one of the most inaccurate of the prez season)

More detail below.

Today brings us news that former governor Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) is once again trouncing incumbent John Sununu (R-NH and Dubya sycophant extraordinairre) by a solid 17%, 54 to 37.  This seat is looking good.  (There was an outlier poll a few weeks back by ARG, the most craptastic of pollsters, which showed Sununu with a lead, but as expected, it was indeed an outlier...)

And in other wonderful news over the weekend, looks like Udall (D-NM) is well on his way to pummeling either/both the reprehensible Pearce (R-crazytown) or the self-proclaimed moderate (but clearly not) Heather Wilson by double digits, so much so that CQ Politics has changed the race to Dem Favored, meaning that Udall is now the frontrunner :)

Hey all - I'm taking a break from the presidential politics to inform you of a great candidate running for the U.S Senate in New Hampshire. That women is  Former Governor Jeanne Shaheen. This year she is running in a rematch against Senator John Sununu. Some of you might remember the election of 2002 when the "phone gate" phone jamming incident happened in New Hampshire. This year that's not going to happen and we're going to boot do-nothing Sununu from the Senate.

More after the fold

I'm running for the US Senate here in New Hampshire.  What follows is adapted from a statement I made at a press conference yesterday and the q&a section that followed.

If we needed confirmation that we have lost control of our energy future, we got it on Tuesday. President Bush was in Saudi Arabia trying to convince King Abdullah to help out our economy by increasing oil production. According the report I read, the response was "lukewarm." Clearly, we need to take back control of our future by ending our dependence on foreign oil. Yesterday, I presented a plan to do just that-- and it appears below. I would be interested in your comments.  

It has been more than two months since my last Senate rankings. With the presidential primaries on every one's mind, congressional races are looking less urgent, not to mention that there was just very little news coming out of down-the-ballot contests during the holiday period. But a lot has changed since the beginning of November -- starting with the number of Senate elections that will be decided in 2008. Trent Lott's shocking decision to prioritize lobbying over holding the position he was elected to a year before has added a 35th race to our rankings, and has expanded the map for Democrats with an unexpected opportunity.

Full rankings are posted here, on Campaign Diaries.

The New Hampshire Republican Party has quit "with regret" as a co-sponsor of tomorrow night's nationally televised GOP forum on FOX News.

That, from the Union Leader. The reason being Fox's exclusion of radical libertarian Ron Paul from the debate. As TPM notes,

Bear in mind that Fox News is excluding Paul from the debate, despite the absence of any objective criteria that would shut out Paul and still include some of the other people they're inviting. For example, Paul got 10% of the vote in Iowa, while invited candidate Rudy Giuliani took only 4% and is at about the same place as Paul in New Hampshire polls.