Tales from the Trail

President Barack Obama has filled out his absentee ballot to cast his vote in the Senate and governor races in Illinois.

And… drumroll please… he voted for the Democrats.

“He just voted absentee in the West Wing,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs disclosed. “I know who he voted for, for governor and Senate in Illinois — the two Democratic candidates who I believe will win,” he said.

According to the RealClearPolitics average of polls, both of those candidates are trailing the Republican candidate. In the Illinois Senate race for Obama’s old seat, Democrat Alexi Giannoulias is trailing Republican Mark Kirk by about 2 percentage points. It is  one of the key races that is being watched to see whether Republicans can seize control of the Senate.

In the Illinois governor’s race, Democrat Governor Pat Quinn is trailing Republican Bill Brady by an RCP average of 3.5 points.

Illinois is one of the stops on Obama’s final campaign push this weekend before next Tuesday’s election.

Republican Christine O’Donnell has a question: where in the Constitution does it say separation of Church and State?

And she is genuinely amazed that the issue is addressed in the First Amendment.

The moment was captured during a debate at Widener Law School in Wilmington and quickly spread through the blogosphere.

The Senate race in Colorado is almost neck-and-neck, with Democrat Michael Bennet closing in on Republican Ken Buck and narrowing his lead to 3 points, according to a Reuters-Ipsos poll.

But the enthusiasm gap favors Republicans, with 72 percent saying they are certain to vote in the Nov. 2 midterm elections compared with 55 percent of Democrats.

The Senate contest pits Bennet, who was appointed to the seat vacated by Ken Salazar when he became President Barack Obama’s Interior Secretary, and Buck, who is backed by the conservative Tea Party movement.

Liberal stalwart Russ Feingold trails his Republican challenger by 7 percentage points in a new Reuters-Ipsos poll of Wisconsin’s Senate race released on Tuesday.

With less than a month to go before the Nov. 2 elections, Republican Ron Johnson leads Feingold, a Democrat, 51 percent to 44 percent among likely voters.

That’s good news for Republicans, who are counting on a Wisconsin victory to help win control of the Senate. Not so good for Democrats, who could see the three-term incumbent swept out of office due to worries about the economy.

Democrats are leading in top California races a month before the election, but by margins too tight to offer great comfort.

Senator Barbara Boxer leads Republican challenger Carly Fiorina in the Senate race 49-45 percent among likely voters, according to a Reuters-Ipsos poll conducted Oct. 2-4.

That 4-point difference is smaller than the 4.7 percentage point margin of error which shows how close the race is between the three-term senator and the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard. Ipsos pollsters say it is unlikely, with the higher margin of error and all, that the findings were reverse. Boxer has consistently had a lead over Fiorina in public opinion polls.

The Tea Party’s on a roll and it’s a wake-up and smell the coffee moment for anyone who had dismissed the movement as a passing fad.

Tea Party backed Christine O’Donnell shook the political cognoscenti by winning the Delaware Republican primary over  longtime congressman Michael Castle last night.

Another Tea Party favorite, Marco Rubio, is leading in the Senate race in Florida, according to a Reuters-Ipsos poll on Wednesday.

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, one of America’s most powerful politicians, holds a narrow edge among likely voters in his re-election bid in recession-lashed Nevada, a Reuters-Ipsos poll said Tuesday.

The struggling U.S. economy is paramount in voters’ minds as they look ahead to the Nov. 2 election in Nevada, with 74 percent citing the economy as their top concern, the poll of 600 Nevada voters done July 30-Aug. 1 found.

And Nevada’s high jobless rate of 14.2 percent and rising home foreclosures and bankruptcies appear to be taking their toll on Reid in his attempt for a fifth six-year term. Seventy-one percent of registered voters said the state is on the wrong track.

A top Democratic strategist has a tip for political gamblers: Don’t bet against Harry Reid.

Polls show the embattled Senate majority leader in jeopardy of being rejected by voters in his home state of Nevada for a fifth, six-year term. But Robert Menendez, the Senate Democratic campaign chief, said he expects Reid to pull through next year.

“I’m convinced that Harry Reid will win,” Menendez told reporters on Tuesday at the headquarters for the Senate Democratic campaign committee. “I would not bet against Harry Reid.”