A poll on this Friday night from the website GaPundit.com that shows a tight race on the Republican side in Georgia to see who will replace Saxby Chambliss in the US Senate next year.

US SENATE – GEORGIA – GOP PRIMARY (GaPundit)
Jack Kingston 18%
Phil Gingrey 16%
Karen Handel 16%
Paul Broun 14%
David Perdue 6%

This poll was done May 16th among 993 likely voters.

It is Friday morning and the race in Virginia continues to have wild swings back and forth. With this morning’s new poll from Wenzel Strategies, we have now seen Ken Cuccinelli go from a 10% lead according to The Washington Post to trailing by 5% according to Quinnipiac University and back to an 8% lead in this morning’s new poll.

GOVERNOR – VIRGINIA (Wenzel)
Ken Cuccinelli (R) 44%
Terry McAuliffe (D) 36%

This poll was done May 14-15 among 800 likely voters.

Seriously, he can’t hold his own umbrella?

Public Policy Polling is out with a new poll this afternoon that they were paid to do by the League of Conservation Voters that shows Ed Markey with a 7% lead over Gabriel Gomez in the US Senate race in Massachusetts.

US SENATE – MASSACHUSETTS (PPP/LCV)
Ed Markey (D) 48%
Gabriel Gomez (R) 41%

This poll was done May 13-15 among 880 likely voters.

If you want to believe all polling organizations put out accurate polls, this morning you have to believe that Terry McAuliffe managed to turn what was a double-digit deficit just one week ago according to The Washington Post to a five-percentage-point lead today according to Qunnipiac University.

GOVERNOR – VIRGINIA (Quinnipiac)
Terry McAuliffe (D) 43%
Ken Cuccinelli (R) 38%

PRESIDENT – VIRGINIA (Quinnipiac)
Hillary (D) 51%
Marco Rubio (R) 38%

Mark Warner (D) 51%
Marco Rubio (R) 33%

This poll was done May 8-13 among 1286 registered voters. I tend to believe this poll a little more. It really is a shame that Republicans were handed a gift with the Democrats settling for a candidate as bad as Terry McAuliffe, yet decided to choose someone who could actually lose to him.

Public Policy Polling has put out a national poll for the Presidential race in 2016 and it shows Chris Christie would be the strongest candidate Republicans could put forward and would actually lead Joe Biden by 9% in a head-to-head matchup.

PRESIDENT – NATIONAL (PPP)

Hillary (D) 47% Chris Christie (R) 44% Hillary (D) 51% Rand Paul (R) 41% Hillary (D) 51% Marco Rubio (R) 41%

Chris Christie (R) 49% Joe Biden (D) 40% Joe Biden (D) 46% Rand Paul (R) 44% Joe Biden (D) 46% Marco Rubio (R) 45%

PRESIDENT – NATIONAL – GOP PRIMARY (PPP)
Marco Rubio 16%
Jeb Bush 15%
Chris Christie 15%
Rand Paul 14%
Paul Ryan 9%
Ted Cruz 7%
Rick Santorum 5%
Bobby Jindal 3%
Susana Martinez 1%

PRESIDENT – NATIONAL – DEM PRIMARY (PPP)
Hillary 63%
Joe Biden 13%
Andrew Cuomo 4%
Mark Warner 3%
Elizabeth Warren 3%
Martin O’Malley 2%
Kirsten Gillibrand 1%
Deval Patrick 1%
Brian Schweitzer 1%

PRESIDENT – NATIONAL – DEM PRIMARY (w/o Hillary) (PPP)
Joe Biden 38%
Andrew Cuomo 13%
Elizabeth Warren 10%
Mark Warner 3%
Martin O’Malley 3%
Deval Patrick 3%
Kirsten Gillibrand 2%
Brian Schweitzer 1%

PRESIDENT – NATIONAL – DEM PRIMARY (w/o Hillary-Biden) (PPP)
Andrew Cuomo 25%
Elizabeth Warren 17%
Deval Patrick 6%
Martin O’Malley 5%
Kirsten Gillibrand 5%
Mark Warner 4%
Brian Schweitzer 1%

This poll was done May 6-9 among 1099 registered voters.

Jeff Greenfield gives some advice.

Just make sure you include the word “progress” in the title. For instance, The Hedgehog Report RINO PAC for Progress….

We have a new poll from New England College for the 2016 presidential rpimary in teh state of New Hampshire and it shows a bunched-up field on the Republcain side.

PRESIDENT – NEW HAMPSHIRE – GOP PRIMARY (NEC)
Marco Rubio 17%
Jeb Bush 16%
Rand Paul 15%
Chris Christie 12%
Paul Ryan 12%
Jon Huntsman 6%
Rick Santorum 4%
Bobby Jindal 2%

PRESIDENT – NEW HAMPSHIRE – DEM PRIMARY (NEC)
Joe Biden 10%
Elizabeth Warren 5%
ANdrew Cuomo 4%
Deval Patrick 3%
Martin O'Malley 0%

The article from New England College did not include dates, but it was done among 340 Republican primary voters and 314 Democratic primary voters.

Quinnipiac University has a new poll for the state of Virginia, but does not include any electoral numbers.

Harper Polling has put out a new poll for the US Senate race in Alaska claiming Sarah Palin would lead both a three-way race that included Lt. Governor Mead Treadwell and dominate a straight head-to-head matchup with Joe Miller in a Republican Primary.

US SENATE – ALASKA – GOP PRIMARY (Harper)
Sarah Palin 32%
Mead Treadwell 30%
Joe Miller 24%

US SENATE – ALASKA – GOP PRIMARY (Harper)
Sarah Palin 52%
Joe Miller 29%

Just what the Republican Party doesn’t need nationally – Sarah Palin back in the spotlight. This poll was done May 6-7 among 379 primary voters.

We start out this new week with the news that Gabriel Gomez has put out an internal poll from OnMessage, Inc claiming he is within 3% of Ed Markey in the US Senate race in Massachusetts.

US SENATE – MASSACHUSETTS (OnMessage)
Ed Markey (D) 46%
Gabriel Gomez (R) 43%

This poll was done May 5-7 among 800 likely voters.

The Capitals just refuse to make things easy and now once again, I am going to have to go through a night of stress watching a Game Seven….

Dartmouth College released a new poll for the state of New Hampshire on Friday and it shows Jeanne Shaheen with a healthy lead over two potential Republican challengers including former Republican US Senator from Massachusetts, Scott Brown.

US SENATE – NEW HAMPSHIRE (Dartmouth)
Jeanne Shaheen (D-inc) 48%
Jeb Bradley (R) 25%

Jeanne Shaheen (D-inc) 44%
Scott Brown (R) 30%

PRESIDENT – NEW HAMPSHIRE (Dartmouth)
Hillary (D) 37%
Chris Christie (R) 32%

Hillary (D) 44%
Marco Rubio (R) 33%

This poll is actually a little stale, being done April 22-25 among 433 registered voters.

I am going to go off script for one post. As you can see, I have not had a post up since Friday morning. My heart has not really been in it since Friday when the news came out we lost one of the great people in Howard County, Dennis Lane through some tragic circumstances. Dennis was someone whom I met strictly due to both of us writing blogs that were based in Howard County, but someone who I got to know personally in real life. I won’t pretend to say I knew him as closely as a lot of others, but we did meet more than a few times and we even traded emails on a semi-regular basis whenever he would post something about local politics.

His blog was a daily read for me every day and I honestly learned more about my own hometown from his blog that I would get from the local newspapers and media. I probably met him twenty times or so in person, mostly at either a happy hour when local blog writers would get together, or at a political event for a local candidate or issue. He was someone who always was the most friendly personalities in the room and always took a few minutes to hold a conversation with me, even if it was just to say hello. As we both were local bloggers, he had referenced this website on many occasions, especially when I was posting about local stories and issues. His last time was just this past election cycle when he gave this website a quick shout out. He at one time even called me the Grandaddy of the Howard County blogosphere when I celebrated my fifth year writing this site. I stopped posting on local issues a few years and fell out of the local blogging scene, but Dennis still occasionally would send me an email once in a while just to say hi.

It is truly amazing to have seen the outpouring of memories from many people in Howard County about Dennis Lane. I said on Friday on Facebook that when I heard the news, it was a rare time that I actually started to cry a little while reading something online. I will miss the daily morning ritual of reading his website, but I know that wherever he is, he is still making people laugh.