Unlikely Voter

TEA Party-driven politics get the bulk of the attention this year, but Democrats have targets of their own and Michele Bachmann, challenged by DFL candidate Tarryl Clark, is one of those targets.

However so far she is doing fine if SurveyUSA’s latest is to be believed.

I’m sensing great interest in recent Washington polling. The Elway Poll I’m going to ignore for now, as I’ve picked it apart in the past, and Real Clear Politics had a note on it as well, so I’ll look more closely at the new Rasmussen Reports poll, which shows Democrat Patty Murray retaking the lead from Republican Dino Rossi.

If I’m going to break my rule and talk about Delaware right away, then I might as well do the same and cover the new Rasmussen poll on New Hampshire, which is the first post-primary poll of that Senate race between Republican nominee Kelly Ayotte and Democrat Paul Hodes.

For a while there it wasn’t sure we’d get this matchup after all, but here we are.

Candidates matter. Even in a wave year, some candidates on the losing side will have no trouble. Dianne Feinstein was an example of that in 1994, and Democrat Ron Wyden appears to be one in 2010, as he is comfortable over Republican Jim Huffman in the latest SurveyUSA poll even as that poll and the Riley poll both have Republican Chris Dudley highly competitive for Governor against Democrat John Kitzhaber.

I normally like to let these races rest a week before I start looking into the polling, but thanks to one pollster sitting on a pre-primary poll to drop the bomb after the primary, I thought I’d hit today the actual first post-primary poll of the race between Democrat Chris Coons and Republican Christine O’Donnell.

SurveyUSA polled the North Carolina Senate race for WRAL, and the result is striking. In fact, it’s entirely unlike any other poll I’ve seen of the race between Republican Richard Burr and Democrat Elaine Marshall.

This poll makes Burr’s last big polling jump look small and timid.

Real Clear Politics showed 21 polls yesterday, plus we’re already at 5 today, so I’m grateful that some of them can be done in batches as with this bunch on the Nevada Senate race from Ipsos for Reuters, Rasmussen Reports, and POR for Fox News.

If we color Republican advantages in red, leads for Democrats in blue, and ties in green, then this set is a rainbow of results. Not a full rainbow or a double rainbow though, sorry.

I’m beginning to think that it may be time to scale back my near-obsessive coverage of the Ohio Senate race. It’s been a rollercoaster, but Democrat Lee Fisher has not shown a lead over Republican Rob Portman since June.

The three new polls out, from Rasmussen Reports, SurveyUSA, and Fox News/POR don’t change that, either.

Colorado is one of those states where the Republican Party had done pretty poorly lately. It looked like this year was the year of mending though, but it’s hard to see that in the Governor’s race. Democrat John Hickenlooper leads Republican Dan Maes easily in the new Rasmussen, but that’s because of a third party protest run going on this year.

The last time Public Policy Polling hit the Kentucky Senate race, Republican Randal Paul had squandered a huge lead. Democrat Jack Conway had pulled within 7 in the Rasmussen poll back at the end of June, and he was even tied in the PPP poll of Registered Voters.

PPP (this time for Daily Kos) is polling Likely Voters now, and it’s not good news for Conway.

Quinnipiac has released this month’s poll for the Connecticut Senate race. Now we turn to those who say Rasmussen’s “House Effect” is repsonsible for Democrat Richard Blumenthal’s surprisingly weak leads against Republican Linda McMahon, because Quinnipiac has the race even closer than Rasmussen does.

With the House update done, it’s time to move on to the new Senate update. Last week the pace of Republican gains slowed, as the GOP gained less than a full seat in my projection since I started running it. But the chance of a Republican majority has climbed every time, so let’s see if that still holds.

Another week, another look at where the generic ballot polls are taking us! Last week’s House update had the Republicans gaining 60 seats in the House of Representatives, truly a historic gain wiping out the last two elections’ worth of gains for the Democrats.

But with all the new polls out since, let’s see where we are now.