Unlikely Voter

We’re seeing a real discrepancy in the California Senate polling. SurveyUSA’s last two results were Republican Carly Fiorina ahead 5 and and now 2, while Rasmussen Reports has had Democrat Barbara Boxer up 5.

When the first major post-primary poll came out for the Washington Senate race, some questioned whether it was skewed toward Republican Dino Rossi over Democrat Patty Murray, or if it was simply an outlier.

But now we have confirmation that Rossi does appear to have a lead at this point, though perhaps not as large as SurveyUSA showed.

For a long while I thought the Ohio Senate seat the one Republican held seat most likely to turn over to the Democrats, but that time is long gone. The numbers have shifted in Ohio. Democrat Lee Fisher hasn’t led Republican Rob Portman in a poll since June. Add in that incumbent Governor Ted Strickland is fading in his re-election bid against Republican John Kasich, and the environment created just might be too negative for Fisher to come back.

Yesterday we got a pair of polls on the Pennsylvania Senate race, both showing Republican Pat Toomey maintaining what is now a steady lead over Democrat Joe Sestak.

Ipsos for Reuters and Rasmussen show different particulars, but neither overall result is good for Pennsylvania Democrats.

All the talk in your typical Senate analysis this year has assumed Republican Mike Castle will beat Democrat Chris Coons in the Delaware Senate race, but the fact is there’s still a GOP primary in progress.

It’s forgivable to forget about that primary when polling of the primary is scarce, and PPP and Rasmussen hold Coons under 40, but let’s extrapolate from the PPP poll to the primary.

It seems like most of the third party and independent spoilers this year are harming Democrats, but the Constitution Party’s Tom Tancredo is clearly hurting Republican Dan Maes in the Colorado Governor’s race, currently throwing the lead to Democrat John Hickenlooper.

But two new polls on that race, from Magellan Strategies via Real Clear Politics and Rasmussen Reports are so different that I think we need to see why that is.

I know the whole world has discussed this poll to death already, but I think it deserves mentioning. In fact I would have yesterday but Gallup got in the way.

But here it is: Rasmussen suddenly shows Republican John Raese competitive with Democrat Joe Manchin in the West Virginia Senate race.

I’ve had my ups and downs with Gallup (one might say the relationship is like the plot of the Gallup generic ballot itself!), but since they’ve been solidly running registered voter surveys again, the numbers have looked reasonable.

But now they’re shocking us from the other direction by showing the Republicans having their largest ever lead in the generic ballot survey, showing a larger edge than even today’s Rasmussen’s GOP +6 (notwithstanding the alleged House Effect of the latter).

Public Policy Polling jumped out ahead to poll the Alaska Senate race even as Republican Lisa Murkowski tries to drag out her primary defeat at the hands of Joe Miller. PPP also checked up on what might happen if Murkowski somehow were able to dislodge the Libertarian nominee and take that party’s line on the ballot in November.

As we approach election day I will be updating my Senate projection more frequently. So while I went two months before pushing out my last update, this time I’ve only gone slightly over two weeks.

There was a time when I thought about Nikki Haley’s campaign for governor every day. I’d scramble to find whatever polling I could get my hands on and read the news to try to explain any trends I might be seeing in the polls.

Now, though, the South Carolina Governor’s race joins that of Republican Brian Sandoval’s in Nevada as non-competitive barring a major event (or for Haley, another dirty trick).

Busy day today, but I couldn’t let go without comment this new poll by Missouri State University for KY3 of the Missouri Senate race.

Even if its findings weren’t entirely out of step with the rest of the polling world, the details of the poll carry a number of warnings that it’s not very accurate.

When Sharron Angle came out of the Republican primary in Nevada, oddly enough she was vulnerable. She got no unity bounce, instead taking a stream of attacks from Republicans nationwide. As a result, Harry Reid went on the air for the knockout.

He didn’t get it. Even the new Mason Dixon/LVRJ poll has stabilized.