Current Betting Lines – Legislative Races

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Bring your $2.00 up to the window. The introductions have been made and the horses are approaching the gates. Senate 4thGreenville-Brandywine Hundred-Pike Creek Valley -> Mike Katz Democrat 51% Greg Lavelle - Republican Senate 12th New Castle-Delaware City-below the canal Dori Connor Republican ->Nicole Poore - Democrat 54% (Dori, when I see your William Penn looking signs down in Cav's Country, I think about how upside down the world must seem to you right now.)

Delaware Political Weekly: October 20-26, 2012

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We get stuff forwarded to us all the time. From campaigns, from sources, from ’sources’, and from the parties. I call it ‘working the refs’. Part of the game, nothing wrong with it. Even if/when you don’t believe what you’re being fed, the information/propaganda is still worthwhile, b/c it at least gives you an understanding of which races the parties are prioritizing. There can now be no doubt that both the D’s and R’s are intently focusing on the 29th Rep. District, a Clayton/Dover district in Kent County. Incumbent Lincoln Willis is widely viewed in Republican circles as one of the (very few) rising stars in the Party. Were he to win this year, I would not be at all surprised to see him elected to a leadership position within the House Republican Caucus. Challenger Trey Paradee is, at worst, a live underdog in this race. You will recall that he almost defeated incumbent Pam Thornburg four years ago, the district has been redrawn in a manner that would appear to favor Paradee, and Paradee is a great campaigner. The Democratic Party has been touting this race, and the R’s have circled the wagons around Willis. When I featured my “Most Intriguing Races of 2012″, I wrote that this race was ‘under the radar’. It is under the radar no more.

Open Thread – Delaware “Survivor” contestant didn’t survive long enough to annoy the sh*t out of me with her vocal fry

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After a few weeks of zero face time, Delaware's "Katie" washed out of survivor, not with a bang - but a whimper. After enduring a little smack talk from Jeff Probst during the elimination challenge, "Katie, completely ineffective in this challenge.” she was bounced at the tribal council. If you substitute the word "show" for challenge in Probst' statement you get a little closer to the truth.

The Polling Report [10.25.12]

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Mark Halperin: "Chicago remains sufficiently funded and emboldened by its own polling to compete for the final two weeks in all nine of the battlegrounds: Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia in the South; New Hampshire in the North; Iowa, Ohio, and Wisconsin in the Midwest; and Nevada and Colorado in the West. As they have in the past, Obama campaign officials say they expect to win a high percentage of those states and conceivably could sweep all nine." "When pressed, the Obama officials with whom I met said that five of the nine stand out: Nevada, Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa, and New Hampshire. In that quintet, Democrats believe the combination of their current leads in polling, early voting (where applicable), and ground game makes their chances of winning even greater there than in the other four. And given the Electoral College math, unless Romney picks off one or more of those five states, Obama would win a minimum of 281 electoral votes and re-election." As Greg Sargent notes, the polling averages show Obama leading in each of those states as well. The polls today also show Obama leading where it counts:

Christine O’Donnell Defends Eric Bodenweiser, calls Indictment “Tacky.”

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WGMD has the audio of Christine O'Donnell's reaction to the Eric Bodenweiser indictmenet. Christine O'Donnell, mind you, is the presumptive GOP nominee to run against Sen. Chris Coons in 2014. Here is the transcript:
CHRISTINE O'DONNELL: That’s why these sort of, charges are so, are so, potent as political weapons because they put a seed of doubt in someone’s mind. If you do it as an October surprise there’s not enough time between when they throw the bomb on election day for the truth to really emerge and, um, it’s just, it’s tacky and it’s what happened to our political system.
This is the same woman whose campaign spread rumors about Mike Castle being gay. Seriously, Christine, shut the fuck up. You are the ultimate practitioner of what you call "tacky" politics. You and your tea party has been using lies, rumors, racism and innuedo since your arrival on the political scene. Further, this is not tacky. It is tragic. A Horror. And if these charges are true, Eric Bodenweiser is a monster that needs to be put away forever. Yes, forever. Until he dies in prison. Seriously, it is that freaking serious.

Twice Divorced Trump to make a big deal about an almost divorce?

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So weird-hair cut Birther King and small businessman Donald Trump, who has had numerous adulterous affairs throughout his life and has been thrice married and twice divorced, has a big announcement scheduled for this afternoon, and in his typical lampoonish style, Trump has described what he will announce as "bordering on gigantic," a story so big that it would "possibly" change the state of the election. And what is this annoucement? Well, according to the British tabloid, the Daily Mail, the announcement will concern the discovery by Trump of long lost divorce papers that Michelle Obama had drawn up back in 2000 after Barack lost a U.S. House race to Bobby Rush in 2000.

Monster Downballot Polling Report, with some Presidential numbers too [10.24.12]

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The latest Reuters/Ipsos tracking poll finds President Obama moving slightly ahead of Mitt Romney, as you will see below. However, Obama "maintains a larger advantage in the state-by-state battle that will determine the outcome of the election. Ipsos projects that Obama holds an edge in the most hotly contested states, including Florida, Virginia and Ohio, and is likely to win by a relatively comfortable margin of 322 electoral votes to 206 electoral votes." I wish more tracking polls released this kind of information so we can see where these leads for Romney in the other ones are coming from. We saw last week that Romney's entire lead comes from the South, where he leads Obama by 22%, while Obama lead in every other region with 52 or 53%. We have new state polls in New Hampshire, Florida, Virginia and Nevada, where it is a close race all around.

Republican Senate Candidate: Pregnancy From Rape Is God’s Will

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FYI:  Todd "legitimate rape" Akin is not an outlier.  Rep. Roger "some girls rape easy" Rivard is not an outlier.  Sharron "make lemonade out of rape" Angle is not an outlier.  Paul "I agree with Akin" Ryan is not an outlier. As time goes on, I'm rapidly reaching the conclusion that Republicans view the act of rape as god's will.  It's almost as if, and I hesitate to type this, but... it's almost as if they are casting god as the rapist.  It's like these guys view god as a Zeus-like figure.  It's like they are saying that despite the woman's wishes god has decided she should be pregnant so he sent a rapist to fulfill his will.