I decided to take a crack at predicting the district-by-district results in Puerto Rico's presidential primary. While I do take into account the mayoral endorsements that I could find, I based my prediction largely on demographics. One of the two polls of the commonwealth suggests that college-educated or higher-income Puerto Ricans are more likely to support Obama than non-college educated or lower income voters.

Disclaimer: I could be totally wrong. All the numbers below the fold.

Oregon: Obama 57-Clinton 43
Kentucky: Clinton 60-Obama 35

Details below the fold

There's a little over a week before the North Carolina primary, so I figured I'd take a shot at some district-by-district prognostication.

NC-01:
Stretching across the coastal plain from I-85 in the west to Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds in the east, the rural, heavily black 1st district covers much of North Carolina's tobacco country. It is by far the poorest in North Carolina, with a median household income of just over $28,000, and it is also the most heavily Democratic. The district is represented in Congress by G.K. Butterfield, a civil rights lawyer and former state supreme court judge who won the seat in a 2004 special election triggered by the retirement of Frank Ballance in 2004. Butterfield has endorsed Obama.

About 60% of the Democrats in this district are African-American, so Obama should carry this six-delegate district with the 58.3% he needs to take a fourth delegate. A 5-1 delegate split here would require a 3:1 victory, which is possible but unlikely. In the end, too many white voters will turn out in the first for Obama to break 75%. The district will split Obama 4, Clinton 2.

Blue Jersey is reporting that the New Jersey Democratic State Committee will choose former governors Brendan Byrne and Jim Florio as the state's two add-on superdelegates. Both Byrne and Florio have endorsed Hillary Clinton for President.  The New Jersey Democratic State Committee will choose the state's at-large and add-on delegates on Thursday, according to Green Papers (though I've heard they're actually voting Wednesday night).  Unless the circumstances change in the next couple days, Clinton will take both superdelegates even though she won the state by a relatively narrow 54-44 margin.

Clinton supporter/Senator Evan Bayh suggested earlier today that the Republican Attack Machine will misconstrue Obama's comments to smear him in the general election:

"I don’t believe he is an elitist," Bayh said "His comments were open to interpretation, that’s the problem and the Republicans will use that ruthlessly against him, that’s the problem.

"I'm concerned that statements like this, even if they are taken out of context, can be used very effectively by the other side to keep us from getting the change that we need."

It turns out Obama won't have to wait for the general elections for his words to be "taken out of context" and used "ruthlessly against him". That's because Hillary Clinton, in Indianapolis earlier today, called Obama's remarks "elitist and out of touch."

I explained earlier this evening in a comment that Senate Democrats cannot unilaterally revoke Lieberman's committee assignments, but since then a diary calling for Reid to do just that has shot to the top of the recommend list.  With that in mind, I am posting a revised and extended version of my earlier comment as a diary, so that people don't unfairly ask Harry Reid and the Senate Democratic caucus to do something they cannot actually do.

Update: Obama & Clinton just voted no in the Senate.
The motion to concur passes 80-14 in the Senate.

NO votes in the Senate
Democrats: Clinton, Obama, Boxer, Feingold, Whitehouse, Dodd, Kerry, Leahy, Kennedy, Wyden.
Independent/Socialist: Bernie Sanders
Republicans: Burr, Coburn, Enzi

The House cast one vote on the disaster relief (which passed overwhelmingly, only the RSC nuts and Kucinich voted against it) and one vote the war funding.  If I'm not mistaken, the Senate vote was on the entire package, which explains why only 14 senators voted no.

This is the third in a series of diaries on competitve New York State Senate races. Here are the first and the second.

Competitve Races
Sen-34: Inc. Jeffrey Klein (D,W) - Jospeh J Savino (R,C) SOLID D
Sen-49: Inc. David J Valesky (D,W) - Jeff Brown (R,I,C) TOSS-UP
Sen-35: Inc. Nicholas Spano (R,I,C) - Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D) TOSS-UP
Sen-42: Inc. John Bonacic (R,I,C) - Susan Zimet (D,W) TOSS-UP
Sen-40: Inc. Vincent Leibell (R,I,C) - Michael Kaplowitz (D,W) LEANS R
Sen-02: Inc. John J Flanagan (R,I,C) - Brooke Ellison (D,W) LEANS R
Sen-24: Andrew Lanza (R,I) - Matthew Titone (D,W) - Charles Pistor (C) LEANS R
Sen-41: Inc. Stephen Saland (R,I,C) - Brian Keeler (D,W) LEANS R
Sen-03: Inc. Caesar Trunzo (R,I,C) - Jimmy Dahroug (D) - David Ochoa (W) LEANS R
Sen-15: Inc. Serphin Maltese (R,I,C) - Albert Baldeo (D) LIKELY R
Sen-11: Inc. Frank Padavan (R,I,C) - Nora C Marino (D,W) LIKELY R
Sen-56: Inc. Joseph A Robach (R,C,I,W) - Willa Powell (D) SOLID R
Sen-52: Inc. Thomas W Libous (R,I,C) - Mark Trabucco (D,W) SOLID R

Much, much more below the fold.

The NJ State Supreme court just ruled that the state must provide all of the rights and benefits of marriage to same sex couples. The decision gives the state legislature 180 days to either modify the marriage laws to allow gay marriage or to grant all of the rights and privileges of marriage to same-sex couples. In that sense it is similar to the Vermont decision. You may recall NJ already has a Domestic partnership act, but this is insufficient in granting rights to same-sex couples, as we saw from the Laurel Hester story. The decision was 4-3, but the dissenters in an opinion of outgoing chief justice Poritz took an even more pro-marriage equality stance. So really, the decision to grant same-sex couples all of the rights and prviliges of marriages was unanimous. The fight for full marriage equality now goes to the New Jersey State Legislature.

Last month, I wrote about a dozen contested races for the New York State Senate. Since then, candidates have filed the 1-month pre-election campaign finance compiling report, scheduled and participated in debates, and won endorsements. The playing field has changed somewhat. I overlooked the 2nd District, where Brooke Ellison is mounting a serious challenge to incumbent John Flanagan. In the 40th District, Mike Kaplowitz has gained support from the state party establishment in his race against Vincent Leibell.

Two recent polls underscore how vulnerable the Republican majority in the New York State Senate could be. In a September poll run by the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle, 67% of Monroe County voters said that state legislators have not "done anything noteworthy on [their] behalf." Earlier this week, Elliot Spitzer led John Faso 68-22 in a Siena University poll , carrying every region of the state by at least 40 points. The same poll found that 60% of upstate voters felt that the state was on the wrong track.

Republicans have controlled the New York State Senate thanks to decades of partisan gerrymandering. Two Democratic pick-ups in 2004 cut the GOP's advantage in the Senate to 35-27, and Democrats need only five seats to take control of the body. This year presents an unprecedented chance for Democrats to cut into the Republican majority in the senate. Senator Hillary Clinton and Gubernatorial nominee Elliot Spitzer will win big this November, and their coattails could help Democratic State Senate Candidates across New York.

What's at stake: The Republican majority in the State Senate relies on older (8 members over 70 years old), long-term (average 16.5 years of service) incumbents representing gerrymandered districts (the 29 seats where one party has 20% registration edge are all democratic). If the Democrats take control of the senate for just one cycle, a couple Republicans may defect and several will retire or run for something else. When the 2010 census is complete, the Democrats will be able to draw the maps both for the State Senate and the US Congress.

The Bridgeton News reports that the DCCC is "actively recruiting" a candidate to run against Frank Lobiondo in New Jersey's 2nd congressional district.  Their ideal candidate must be Jeff Van Drew, an extremely popular State Assemblyman from the 1st legislative district who would put NJ-02 in play immediately.

If you live in NJ-02, especially if you live in the 1st Legislative District as well (see bottom of diary for a list of municipalities in these districts), contact Assemblyman Jeff Van Drew, and tell him you think he should run for Congress against Frank LoBiondo.  Van Drew is our best bet to take this district, which voted by <1% for Bush over Kerry.

Corzine's upcoming announcement that he will appoint Bob Menendez (D, NJ-13) to fill his presently vacant Senate seat makes Menendez the clear favorite to win the Democratic primary and take on Tom Kean Jr. in the general election.  Kean is widely percieved to be a tough opponent, because of his supposedly moderate politics and his status as son of former governor and chairman of the 9/11 commission Tom Kean.  History dictates that this will be a close race.  The polls are reflecting so much: Rasmussen and Quinnipiac have Menendez up38-34 and 41-39 respectively, while Zogby gives Kean a 43-34 lead.

All of these numbers show that a significant portion (at least 20%) of voters have not made up their minds, and how they break out will to a large extent depend on how each candidate defines himself (and his opponent) in the early stages of the election.  We must work to define Congressman Menendez as a self-made man independent of the Hudson County political machine.  We must also debunk the myth that Tom Kean Jr. is a political moderate whose views are in line with the majority of New Jerseyans.