We start this afternoon with the sad news of the demise of Paul, the psychic octopus who captivated the world this summer with his uncanny ability to predict the results of Germany’s World Cup soccer matches.
Fear not, though. There are other ways to divine the future, and especially the results of next week’s midterm elections.
But first of all Washington Extra would like to categorically deny that Paul, just before taking his last gulp of water, predicted that Republicans would win control of the House and Democrats would cling onto power in the Senate. It’s just not true. And if he did, he was only reading our poll data.
Talking of which (nice segue, huh?), our latest Reuters/Ipsos poll from Pennsylvania makes interesting reading today. It shows Democrat Joe Sestak drawing level with Republican Pat Toomey, with both men now tied at 46 percent.
It is quite a turnaround for Sestak, who was trailing by 10 percentage points in our last poll in late August, but seems to have struck a chord with voters after accusing his rival of wanting to export jobs to China. Another clue, perhaps, that some of the midterm races might be a bit closer than they appeared a couple of months ago.
