Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:<\/p>\n
* After all the turmoil, Rep. [tag]Katherine Harris[\/tag] (R) still managed to win<\/a> her Senate primary race in Florida yesterday, beating her largely unknown GOP rivals with 49% support. She’ll now face incumbent Sen. [tag]Bill Nelson[\/tag] (D), who leads Harris in the latest Rasmussen poll<\/a>, 57% to 34%. (The poll found that one in three Republicans in Florida plan to support Nelson.)<\/p>\n * Speaking of Florida, the two major parties chose their gubernatorial candidates<\/a> yesterday, with Rep. [tag]Jim Davis[\/tag] beating state Sen. [tag]Rod Smith[\/tag] to get the Dems’ nod, and state Attorney General [tag]Charles Crist[\/tag] beating state CFO [tag]Tom Gallagher[\/tag] for the GOP nomination. The latest Rasmussen poll<\/a> shows Crist leading Davis in a general election match-up, 45% to 41%.<\/p>\n * In Kansas, Gov. [tag]Kathleen Sebelius[\/tag] (D) still enjoys a double-digit lead over Republican challenger [tag]Jim Barnett[\/tag], but the margin is not quite where it was. According to the latest Rasmussen poll<\/a>, Sebelius is now ahead, 48% to 37%. The 11-point gap is six points smaller than it was in July.<\/p>\n * In Illinois’ gubernatorial race, incumbent Gov. [tag]Rod Blagojevich[\/tag]’s (D) recent ad blitz has driven up the negative numbers on his GOP rival, [tag]Judy Baar Topinka[\/tag], but the ads haven’t expanded his lead much. The latest Research 2000 poll<\/a> now shows Blagojevich leading Topinka, 47% to 39%.<\/p>\n