Friday’s political round-up

My new daily feature about campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may nevertheless be of interest to political observers:

* The fight among the high-profile Dems hoping to take on Rick “Man on Dog” Santorum has ended rather abruptly. Gov. Ed Rendell (D) has endorsed state Treasurer Robert Casey Jr., prompting former treasurer Barbara Hafer and former representative Joe Hoeffel to drop out of the race.

* Now that Ohio Rep. Rob Portman (R) is slated to be the next U.S. trade representative, angling is underway for his seat. Local GOP leaders are eyeing Pat DeWine (Sen. Mike DeWine’s son) and Phil Heimlich, both of whom are county commissioners. Among Dems, state Rep. Tyrone Yates is mulling it over, though he probably knows that Ohio’s 2nd congressional district is heavily Republican.

* Sen. Russ Feingold’s Senate campaign has registered www.russfeingold08.com, .org, and .net, sparking renewed questions about his possible presidential ambitions. It’s not exactly a subtle move — Feingold isn’t up for re-election to the Senate until 2010.

* Speaking of websites, my friend Darrell noticed that Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) was sworn in three months ago, but remains the only senator in the chamber without a website. Take a look.

* Fernando Ferrer, the Dem frontrunner in New York’s mayoral race, has hired my favorite media advisor, David Axelrod.

* John Edwards always seemed to have the best stump speech in ’04 and he’s well on his way with his re-tooled stump speech, which was well received in California yesterday. (If you haven’t seen the speech, it’s really quite good.)

* And speaking of Edwards, the former senator may very well be the first-ever national candidate to embrace podcasting. Kudos to his tech team.