National

Vance Phillips wasn't around to hand off the watermelon of doom, so did the job fall to Christine O'Donnell. The Commander Guy thinks so...

I love Pandora. (The blogger and the internet radio). I just got this email from Pandora (the internet radio) asking for our support.

The cherry on the top of the sundae that was the 2008 election was Obama winning the 2nd Congressional District in Nebraska. Nebraska is one of two states (the other being Maine) that apportions its electoral votes by congressional district winner and state wide winner. The statewide winner gets 2 electoral votes, and then the winner of each of the three congressional districts in Nebraska get one electoral vote each. The 2nd Congressional District in Nebraska encompasses the Omaha area, one of the more Democratic areas of Nebraska, relatively speaking. After the "embarrassment" of having a Democrat win a Nebraska electoral vote for the first time since 1964, Nebraska Republicans first attempted to pass legislation eliminating proportional representation, but that failed. Then through redistricting, they made the 2nd CD more Republican. But a new poll has been released showing a tie in the 2nd CD between Romney and Obama. Wouldn't be something if Obama wins that Nebraska electoral vote again? Indeed, I consider it a canary in a coal mine: a sign of the coming Obama landslide.

I mean, he can't be serious in the following quote, right? Because if he is, then ... whoa. As you may have heard, on Friday, Ann Romney's airplane had to make an emergency landing on Friday in Colorado due to an electrical fire in the plane that did send smoke into the cabin. Gratefully, nobody was hurt. Mitt Romney then decided to comment on it.

We have a more truncated report this morning, which is good because the last few days have been full of polling goodness, but still, pollsters, and those polled, need a break. We have three new state polls out today, all good news for the President.

This week I was granted access to some of the polling data gathered by a new local communications firm, Out of the Box. One of the men behind the curtain is Richard Korn, former Democratic candidate for Auditor. Richard sat down with me to answer questions about the polling that Out of the Box did for local races, including Insurance Commissioner, SD11 (Deluca v. Townsend), Mayor of Wilmington and County Executive. Deluca v. Townsend and Wilmington Mayor are first up...

The good news: Obama continues to kick ass. "Obama to win" positions hit new highs in both major trading markets over the weekend. (71% Intrade & 70 IEM). The bad news: Republican billionaires are committed to a strategy of harassment and intimidation of Democratic voters while bankrolling huge GOTV efforts among conservatives. ...

We have a TON of polls today, like yesterday, because of a polling outfit called YouGuv. Who are they? Here is Daily Kos Election's description:

The firm is a British firm, that moved into the American market in 2007 when they bought out Polimetrix, a California-based firm that had done a lot of internet-based polling in 2006 in an arrangement with Stanford University. Their polling is based on internet samples, a method which some find problematic (some aggregators of polling, indeed, refuse to utilize their data). It is a methodology that I also confess to qualms about, because when you have a sample that is essentially volunteering to participate, and a smaller universe from which to draw from, the potential pitfalls are pretty self-evident. However, the true measure is performance. [...] YouGov ... has earned at least a cycle's worth of benefit of the doubt. Their 2010 track record was more than reasonable. Indeed, of the 18 pollsters that offered up a substantive number of polls, YouGov came in fourth place in terms of their accuracy (defined as the percentage of races where they came within three percent of the final margin).

Another new polling outfit that has performed a polling dump today is Purple Strategies. Some of their results are eye raising. They have Obama winning North Carolina but losing Florida, and yet within three of Romney in Arizona. I will bet you everything I own that there is no way that is possible. If Obama wins North Carolina, he is winning Florida too. And if he is making Arizona a swing state, then he is up ten in Florida and 5 in North Carolina. Then again, Purple Strategies has been more pro-Romney this cycle, and if Obama is making Arizona competitive, then maybe this race has just broken wide open...